Federation of Connecticut Taxpayer Organizations

Again, I want to extend to all of our readers and contributors a sincere thank you for forwarding to me the very interesting news articles which I share with our readership through Tax Talk.� Susan Kniep

Inside Tax Talk 82

Scott Coleman of Rocky Hill a leader in formation of new business group
Theresa McGrath provides further insight into issues re Education
A message from Brian Freeman of the Federalist Society re U.S. Supreme Court Strikes Down Vermont Campaign Finance Scheme
Mexican Drug Cartels Rig Elections in US
Property owners challenge Property Tax System in Court � The Massey Case
Property Taxes Driving Seniors from their homes
US � a Nation of 300 million
Feds Probe in Bridgeport
42 Standards for FBI Investigations
Government Unions, Property Taxes
Security Risks in Electronic Voting
Superintendent receives large raise
Family life threatened with government invasion in UK � could US be next

Gang expert backs Tancredo charges - Retired cop says Mexican drug cartels rig elections to take over U.S. cities � READ The entire News article appears at the end of Tax Talk.��

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From:� Brian Freeman, BFREEMAN@RC.com

Chair, Federalist Society - Hartford Chapter

U.S. Supreme Court Strikes Down Vermont Campaign Finance Scheme

June 26, 2006

Greetings - This may be of interest following the debate that the Hartford Federalist Society chapter sponsored earlier this year on Connecticut's campaign finance law.�� The Hartford chapter is currently in summer power-down, but look for more great events this fall.� Also, please note our new email address: hartfordfederalists@cox.net.� Brian Freeman

Brian Freeman forwarded the following which is from the James Madison Center for Free Speech �

PRESS RELEASE, Monday, June 26, 2006, Contact: James Bopp, Jr.
Phone: 812-232-2434; Fax 812-235-3685, jboppjr@aol.com

U.S. Supreme Court Strikes Down Vermont Campaign Finance Scheme: The Supreme Court held today in Randall v. Sorrell that Vermont�s draconian campaign finance scheme, which includes extremely low contribution limits and mandatory expenditure limits, is unconstitutional. �Today�s decision effectively reinvigorates application of the First Amendment to campaign finance laws,� stated James Bopp, Jr., lead counsel for the Vermont State Republican Committee, who argued the case in the Supreme Court for the plaintiffs.� Continued at the following website:� http://www.jamesmadisoncenter.org/

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THE FOLLOWING IS A MUST READ �.. Click to read - Property Taxes: A Look inside the Massey Case

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Maurice Tandy: Property taxes are driving seniors from New Hampshire http://www.unionleader.com/article.aspx?headline=Maurice+Tandy%3A+Property+taxes+are+driving+seniors+from+New+Hampshire&articleId=16d6f56c-2838-490c-8b75-80dbc406d332

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A Nation of 300 Million , By Haya El Nasser, USA TODAY (July 5) -- The USA is closing in on a milestone that seemed unthinkable 25 years ago. Sometime in mid-October, we will become a nation of 300 million Americans.� We will then embark on a relatively quick journey to 400 million. Target date: around 2040.� Continued at the following website:�� http://articles.news.aol.com/news/_a/a-nation-of-300-million/20060705073609990001

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Lots of road ahead in feds' City Hall probe, By Mchael J. Daly, Managing Editor of the Connecticut Post, June 18, 2006 -� Keeping up with a continuing federal investigation into Bridgeport corruption over the next few months may require use of a seatbelt. There's more coming and it's going to go into Bridgeport City Hall.� http://www.connpost.com/sports/ci_3952051

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42 Standards for FBI Investigation -- Investigation Required http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/eousa/foia_reading_room/usam/title8/cvr00042.htm

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THIS IS A MUST READ FOR TAXPAYERS WHO ARE CONCERNED FOR GOVERNMENT LABOR COSTS�..� Click and read� An education in soaring property taxes , Albany Times Union - Albany,NY,USA, ... employee unions. The net effect of their work this session could well raise your property taxes in the long run, not lower them. ...

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From:� Scott Coleman, Myrockyhill@aol.com , June 29, 2006

New Rocky Hill Business Association to meet July 18�

From Scott Coleman: The following story appeared in July's Rocky Hill Life. http://www.myrockyhill.com/news/news.php?id=11502�� Hopefully, it's only the first of many. Special thanks to Doug Maine Editor of Rocky Hill Life for the coverage. The press will always be welcome at our meetings, as will their sales reps. �We're going to try to hold two meetings a month, one on the third Tuesday, and one on the fourth Thursday of each month. Both meetings will have the same agenda. Hopefully, all will be able to attend one meeting or the other, The main meeting will be held on Thursdays. Meeting speakers and presenters will be asked to attend the main meeting.�� Our second meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, July 18th. and Thursday, July 27th. Time 6:30 (open for a vote) . Please RSVP by email, or phone if necessary (529-1777). If 30 or less, we can hold the meeting in my office. If a greater number is expected, we'll have to rethink the location ... Town Hall, the Community Center, a restaurant, The Marriott, etc.� Our Town Manager, Barbara Gilbert, has graciously agreed to attend Thursday meetings, and to present a brief town update, followed by Q & A. Maybe I can get our state rep, Tony Guerrera, to make an appearance as well, along with our Mayor. I will be inviting all town boards and committees to send representatives as well. The Chamber, as well as the State Small Business Advisory Board , DECD (Dept. of Economic & Community Development) will be asked to send representatives.��

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Theresa McGrath,� FACE0203@comcast.net

Executive Director

FACE, Family Alliance for Children in Education,� .Forwarded Message:

Subject:� Weighted funding as a school reform proposal: Dollars follow child

The following� is interesting information...Interesting that Rod Paige now works for the Ford Foundation, which is a hugeeeeee supporter of public schools and very anti private schools...yet, just a few months ago, I received a letter from a school choice group out west who mentioned that the Ford Foundation was connecting with them to look for alternative methods of education.� Read article below....hmmm...I wonder what's up....� This concept in the article that is mentioned, had been mentioned at our state capitol by an economist, a previous opm employee and Atty Horton. Our education committee ignored their recommendations.

From the URL below you can see some interesting proposals re school finance reform. As you know, the Cabinet has included the idea of dollars following the child as one of its Framework Agenda Items. This has to do with the K-12 system but is worth your thought. JMG

URL: http://www.100percentsolution.org/fundthechild/page.cfm?id=357

See the original site below:

Bipartisan coalition backs new school funding model
Solution boosts spending for needy children and promotes education choice

By:� Jennifer Leischer, Communications Manager , 202-223-5452, jleischer@edexcellence.net�

WASHINGTON, DC--Key state and national education leaders, including three former Secretaries of Education, showed their support for a new school funding proposal released today by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, signaling a breakthrough in the decades-old war over the financing of public education in America.

"Closing the achievement gap is the civil rights issue of our time," said former Secretary of Education Rod Paige, a trustee of the Fordham Institute, and author of a Op-Ed in this morning’s New York Times about the plan. "Nearly everyone agrees that all young Americans should achieve at high levels regardless of class or special needs. But innumerable studies and plenty of direct experience show that a quality education costs more for some than it does for others. Under today's school-funding arrangements, however, the children who need the greatest education resources frequently end up with the least."

The proposal, Fund the Child: Tackling Inequity an d Antiquity in School Finance (visit www.100percentsolution.org ), is a "manifesto" that offers a comprehensive solution to the most pressing problems in American education, including funding disparities on many levels:

Between districts: 36 states have a funding gap between high poverty and low poverty districts that averages almost $900 per student, according to the Education Trust.
Within districts: The ten largest school districts in California alone have spending gaps between high- and low-minority schools that range from $64,000 to $500,000 per school (Education Trust).
Between school options: Students who opt out of their assigned district school (26 percent of students nationwide) often choose schools (e.g., charter schools) that receive markedly less--as much as 40 percent less--funding per child.

This new model, known as Weighted Student Funding (WSF), has three key elements that level the playing field for low-income students while widening their educational opportunities:

Funding follows the child to the public school that he/she attends.
Per-student funding is weighted to provide more resources based on a student's specific needs and circumstances.
Resources arrive at the school as real dollars (not teaching positions, etc.) that can be spent flexibly with emphasis on results, not programs, activities, or other inputs.

"In this age of accountability," Paige added, "school leaders need the authority to get the job done. Giving them more control over their budgets is a big part of the puzzle."

In tandem with the release of the proposal, Fordham launched a new web site today, www.100percentsolution.org, where readers can learn more about Weighted Student Funding, add their name to the growing list of supporters, and see how this system stacks up against the so-called "65 percent solution," which adds new regulations and further ties the hands of school leaders.

"The 65 percent solution is a gimmick that doesn't begin to solve the biggest problems in school funding, much less education writ large," remarked Fordham Institute president Chester E. Finn, Jr. "Weighted student funding isn't a complete answer to every challenge that public schools face but it will eliminate the biggest funding disparities, foster equity, empower school leaders, and catalyze school choice. Reasonable folks from left, right, and center are rallying around WSF as the first serious, practical proposition to revolutionize the financing of U.S. public education for the 21st Century."

Click here for the list of current signers. To read the full document, visit www.100percentsolution.org.

For hard copies, media requests for interviews, or further information, please contact Jennifer Leischer, Communications Manager, at 202-223-5452.

Nationally and in our home state of Ohio, the Thomas B. Fordham Institute strives to close America's vexing achievement gaps by raising standards, strengthening accountability, and expanding high-quality education options for parents and families. For more information about the Institute's work, visit http://www.edexcellence.net.

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New Fears of Security Risks in Electronic Voting Systems

The New York Times, Monica Davey, May 12, 2006

CHICAGO, May 11 � With primary election dates fast approaching in many states, officials in Pennsylvania and California issued urgent directives in recent days about a potential security risk in their Diebold Election Systems touch-screen voting machines, while other states with similar equipment hurried to assess the seriousness of the problem. Continued at the following website �.� http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/12/us/12vote.html?ex=1305086400&en=5b3554a76aad524a&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

Concerned for Electronic Voting?� Here is what you can do �. http://www.votetrustusa.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1353&Itemid=26

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Court decision riles anti-eminent domain rally
Atlanticville - Long Branch,NJ,USA
... from the city and towns across the state gathered on the Long Branch oceanfront Friday evening to call attention to their fight against eminent domain abuse. ...
See all stories on this topic

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Head Of Schools Receives Raise

June 29, 2006, By FULVIO CATIVO, Courant Staff Writer

WEST HARTFORD -- Superintendent David P. Sklarz will receive a 4.5 percent salary increase for the 2006-2007 school year.� Board of education officials, in a brief meeting Wednesday afternoon, also extended Sklarz's three-year contract one year to June 30, 2009.� The 4.5 percent raise will bring Sklarz's salary to about $184,647 a year, nearly $8,000 more than the $176,696 he got during the 2005-2006 school year. The board also voted to give the superintendent a $3,500 bonus. Last year, the board gave Sklarz a $4,000 performance bonus.� Continued�

http://www.courant.com/news/local/fv/hc-whdboard0629.artjun29,0,1914557.story

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WILL THE US BE NEXT�..

Family life faces State invasion, By Sarah Womack, Social Affairs Correspondent, the UK (Filed: 26/06/2006) Government surveillance of all children, including information on whether they eat five portions of fruit and vegetables a day, will be condemned tomorrow as a Big Brother system.� http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=5VOXYCGRACD1DQFIQMFSFFOAVCBQ0IV0?xml=/news/2006/06/26/ndata26.xml

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Gang expert backs Tancredo charges
Retired cop says Mexican drug cartels rig elections to take over U.S. cities

June 27, 2006, WorldNetDaily.com, by Joseph Farah

WASHINGTON � Rep. Tom Tancredo's charge that (click the following to read) Mexican drug cartels are buying up legitimate businesses in U.S. cities to launder money and using some of the proceeds to win local mayoral and city council seats for politicians who can shape the policies and personnel decisions of their police forces, has been backed up by a veteran gang investigator.

Richard Valdemar, a retired sergeant with the L.A. County sheriff's department and a longtime member of a federal task force investigating gang activity, went beyond the charges made by Tancredo, the chairman of the House Immigration Reform Caucus who has led the fight to secure America's southern border.

In fact, he cited first-hand experience in investigating attempts to take over seven cities in Los Angeles County � Southgate, Lynwood, Bell, Bell Gardens, Cudahy, Hawaiian Gardens and Huntington Park.

He also told WND in an exclusive interview that he has since become aware of similar efforts by Mexican drug cartels throughout the Southwest � in New Mexico, Arizona and Texas.

The stunning disclosures substantiate claims made by Tancredo in his new book, "In Mortal Danger: The Battle for America's Border and Security," in which he exposes what he has learned from meetings with law enforcement authorities regarding a concerted effort by the Mexican mafia and drug cartels to extend its corruptive influence in urban areas dominated by illegal alien populations.

Tancredo says some of these small cities have become hostile and dangerous places for legitimate law enforcement officials. Valdemar agrees, saying the sophisticated technique being employed in the U.S. was "invented in Mexico."

Valdemar, the grandson of legal Mexican immigrants and now a consultant to law enforcement agencies across the country on gang activity, explains how the operations work.

"In the typical scenario, a wealthy Mexican immigrant opens a business in a small town," he says. "It could be a very nice Mexican restaurant. He's well-dressed, speaks English, seemingly a real gentleman. He gets involved in the community. His business welcomes police officers with discounts. He makes friends with city officials and other businessmen. No one has any idea where his money comes from � the Mexican drug cartels."

Valdemar says the agent of the cartels often sets up other businesses � including the sale of cheap used tires and used autos. These businesses are used almost exclusively as fronts for laundering money.

Then he begins targeting political power in the town. When election time rolls around, Valdemar says, he sponsors � directly or indirectly � a number of candidates for the city council with the express purpose of winning a majority of seats for his handpicked operatives. Some of the candidates are simply in place to level baseless accusations against incumbents, while others keep above the fray, positioning themselves for victory.

As soon as they take power, the new majority fires the city attorney and names a replacement. Often the second city official to go is the city manager. Both of these moves are designed to cover up the illicit activities that will follow.

City contracts for trash collection and other services are given to friendly businesses � also in league with the cartel. Regulations on auto-repair businesses and alcohol sales are lifted � again, making it easier for cartel-tied businesses to operate more freely. Gambling ordinances are changed to permit casinos and bingo parlors. Loan sharking, prostitution and increased drug business follow � all of which increase revenues for the cartels and power for their agents in the city.

Valdemar says very few prosecutions are successful because of the wealth and political ties of those involved. The situation in the Southwest is grave, he says, and the problem is spreading nationwide.

"We lost California," the Arizona resident says. "That's why I don't live there any more."

Tancredo, who blew the whistle on the growing power of the Mexican drug cartels and Mexican mafia in his book, "In Mortal Danger," explains who is behind the plot.

"The Tijuana-based Felix drug cartel and the Juarez-based Fuentes cartel began buying legitimate business in small towns in Los Angeles County in the early 1990s," he writes. "They purchased restaurants, used-car lots, auto-body shops and other small businesses. One of their purposes was to use these businesses for money-laundering operations. Once established in their community, these cartel-financed business owners ran for city council and other local offices. Over time, they were able to buy votes and influence in an effort to take over the management of the town. They wanted to create a comfort zone from which they could operate without interference from local law enforcement."

Tancredo, now a powerful force within Congress for opposing amnesty plans for illegal aliens and for promoting tougher border security measures, points in his book to the L.A. County city of Bell Gardens � where corrupt elected officials under the influence of drug lords actually tried to shut down the police department.

"City officials who would not cooperate with the Mexican-born city manager were forced out of office," he writes. "Eventually, the L.A. County attorney's office moved in, and the city manager was prosecuted on charges of corruption. Unfortunately, Bell Gardens was only the tip of the iceberg. Other Los Angeles suburbs � including Huntington Park, Lynwood and Southgate � became targets for the cartels."

Tancredo, too, cites similar efforts under way to undermine law and order by Mexican criminal gangs in Texas, Arizona and elsewhere.

"The corruption spreading from south of the border is not confined to Southern California," he writes. "In Cameron County, Texas, the former sheriff and several other officials were recently convicted of receiving drug-smuggling bribes. In Douglas, Arizona � where the international border runs down the middle of the town and divides it from its sister city of Agua Prieta, Mexico � the mayor's brother was discovered to have a tunnel from one of his rental properties going into Mexico."

Tancredo reports he has had confidential briefings with top officials in big-city law enforcement who say there are entire cities under the virtual control of Mexican criminal street gangs and their associated businesses, in some cases, making it dangerous for county, state and national law enforcement officers to venture in and rendering any interdepartmental cooperation impossible.

This under-reported aspect of the immigration and border problem is just one of the reasons Tancredo believes the U.S., as a nation, is "in mortal danger" as the debate over solutions rages on in Washington.

Throughout "In Mortal Danger," Tancredo, the undisputed heavyweight champion of the border security issue in the nation's capital, tells the whole story of the threats facing the nation, the solutions within its grasp and his own personal quest to awaken the political establishment to the seething discontentment gripping America as a result of illegal immigration.

Tancredo warns that the country is on a course to the dustbin of history. Like the great and mighty empires of the past, he writes, superpowers that once stretched from horizon to horizon, America is heading down the road to ruin.

English historian Edward Gibbon, in penning his classic "The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" (ironically published in the year America's Founding Fathers declared independence from Great Britain), theorized that Rome fell because it rotted from within. It succumbed to barbarian invasions because of a loss of civic virtue, its citizens became lazy and soft, hiring barbarian mercenaries to defend the empire because they were unwilling to defend it themselves.

Tancredo says America is following in the tragic footsteps of Rome.

Living up to his reputation for candor, Tancredo explains how the economic success and historical military prowess of the United States has transformed a nation founded on Judeo-Christian principles of right and wrong into an overindulgent, self-deprecating, immoral cesspool of depravity.

His recipe for turning things around?

Without strong, moral leadership, without a renewed sense of purpose, without a rededication to family and community, without shunning the race hustlers and pop-culture sham artists, without protecting borders, language and culture, the nation that once was "the land of the free and home of the brave" and the "one last best hope of mankind" will repeat the catastrophic mistakes of the past, he writes.

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