Last year, LEN WEEKS' father-in-law wrote a column stating "we" need more parking garages.
WEEKS' father-in-law is a Ph.D. economist who receives subsidized rents from the City of St. Augustine, some $564.81 for 430 square feet (sweetheart deal with City Manager WILLIAM BRUCE HARRISS' minions in 2009, with C.P.I. adjustments; lease expires 2018).
Is this by virtue of his son-in-law being the ex-Mayor and ex-HARB Chair (fined only $3600 for illegally destroying DON PEDRO FORNELLS HOUSE, 211-years old Spanish colonial home)?
WEEKS and ex-Mayor JOE BOLES pay 1/5 market rate for 81 St. George Street (Florida Cracker Cafe).
The WEEKS family are experts at City-subidized below-market rate subsidies to rich guys.
On Sunday, November 8, 2015, LEN WEEKS' father-in-law has yet another a column, again not identifying himself, proclaiming his "35 year" academic record, attacking "Socialism" and Senator Bernie Sanders. GEITHMAN and WEEKS are as lugubrious a pair of goobers as ever made a chair squeak. Once again, the witnesses (or witlesses) are excused. Go on, git!
We wear LEN WEEKS' economist father-in-law's scorn as a badge of honor.
Here is the dumb 'ole RECORD column by a glorified welfare recipient, City-subsidized DAVID TRESCOTT GEITHMAN:
Guest column: Ideology vs. common sense
By David T. Geithman
St. Augustine
A friend and fellow downtown merchant, not otherwise (sic) known for making aberrant statements, told me in passing last week he was sending Bernie Sanders money and registering to vote for him. Recently The New Yorker featured a cover story on Sanders, in which one of Bernie’s oldest friends in Vermont observed “for Sanders, everything is about economics.”
This resonated with me since, as a professional (sic) economist for 35 years, I use basic economic principles as organizing tools to make sense of the world; arguments must be logical and show support though evidence or facts.
But Sanders’ facts, like progressive arguments generally, constitute more of a rage (sic) at income mal-distribution combined with political misdirection to conceal seven years of economic under-performance (sic) under President Barack Obama — which has worsened income distribution. At 75 months, the current expansion is the fourth longest since World War II, but, astonishingly, median real household income is lower than before the 2008-09 recession, and fewer people have good, fulltime jobs now than when Obama took office.
You cannot simultaneously rage over the plight of the poor and the economic slippage of America’s middle class, while opposing policies that would grow the economy, create jobs and raise poor and middle class incomes.
Progressives have moved so far left that their ideology trumps everything else. You tell me how the black youth unemployment rate of 51 percent (as correctly given by Sanders) is going to be reduced by a progressivism that:
■ Panders (sic) endlessly to the global warming industry (sic).
■ Hammers the rich by demanding higher taxes for the sin of being rich.
■ Strengthens elite labor unions by supporting biased NLRB findings and the retention of the Davis-Bacon Act, both of which harm (sic) minorities, especially African-Americans.
■ Caters to teacher unions that cheat (sic) students in black neighborhoods of an education by protecting incompetent teachers and fighting voucher programs that give ghetto children access to better schools.
■ Denigrates (sic) and intimidates (sic) business owners so they can’t or won’t invest, thereby stifling jobs creation.
■ And, finally, pushes for a rise in the minimum wage that would make entry-level jobs even less available to the poor and undereducated than they are now.
Thomas Sowell, an internationally respected (sic)) economist whose column appears in this newspaper, tells about the luckiest break he ever got in his long employment history. It was when he first entered the labor force as a black teenager shortly after the end of World War II. Inflation had been fairly high, but the federal minimum wage had not risen for years. In effect, this meant the effective federal minimum wage was very low, having been eroded by inflation. As a Harlem ghetto youth he would’ve never gotten his first job had employers been required to pay a higher real wage for his services.
His lucky break came because he and other black youths slipped under the radar of a helpful federal government. The black youth unemployment rate at the time actually was below the white youth employment rate. For more evidence about the effects of raising the minimum wage on the poor, see Jason L. Riley’s, another African-American economist, “Please Stop Helping Us! How Liberals Make It Harder for Blacks to Succeed.”
It is striking beyond belief how progressive arguments keep reappearing, even gaining widespread support, despite their clear failure to address the real issues: How to raise this country’s economic growth rate, create more and better jobs and, thereby, reduce income inequality.
Still more government intervention in the economy, opposition to free (sic) markets, expanded regulations, higher compliance costs and higher taxes don’t make sense — but they are the policies of progressivism and the far left.
Geithman earned a doctorate In economics at the University of Florida, and subsequently taught, researched and published in the areas of economic theory and policy for 35 years. He owns an antiques and fine art shop in downtown St. Augustine.
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