Too many of you are nuts. Anonymously, viciously nuts. Stark raving nuts. Read the comments about the column I wrote last week on the failure of the bus bond. You'll see.
Half-baked, pseudo-conservatives decided I was a pinko for having the temerity to wonder whether voters missed the bus in turning down the bond and its bank-breaking tab -- about 75 cents a year for an average house. The bond totaled less than $1 million, but would have netted $4 million or more in federal funds for a bus system needing all the help it can get. Maybe, I said, we should be smarter.
Instead of intelligent discussion, we got, instead, "After this I can see why Jenkins is the token 'conservative' on Michael Carey's liberal lovefest on KAKM." This -- anonymously, of course -- from some boob with an avatar depicting the "Don't Tread on Me" Gadsden flag. He, she or it probably cannot grasp the irony.
In fairly short order, I was labeled a "failed journalist" and one dork even fretted I had fallen on my head. The writer claimed my wife and I get more in Permanent Fund dividends than we pay in property taxes (we don't) and that I live in a hovel in South Anchorage. I live in a hovel elsewhere, thank you.
Some commenters came close to the real argument, but most missed -- What is conservatism? Is there only one brand? How does it work? Who decides? Would a conservative approve a bus bond?
It would seem to me that conservatives believe the Constitution means what it says -- that individual rights come first; that government, indeed, has a place in protecting our freedoms, but that its role in our private lives should be limited.
Does being conservative mean rejecting all taxes and spending; can we have government without taxes and spending? Hardly. What is important is that taxes and spending be controlled, constitutional, necessary and targeted to protect our freedoms -- and aimed at the needs, not the wants, of our society.
Conservatism views government as a necessary evil -- not the answer, not the solution -- and understands it is, at its best, a willing servant. At its worst, it is an arrogant oppressor, enforcing its whim at gunpoint. Conservatism recognizes there is ample reason to be wary of government and believes the private sector is best-equipped to lay the groundwork for success for those willing to work for it.
Is voting "no" on all bonds and spending a conservative ideal? Hardly. Falling into mental lockstep insults freethinking, true conservatism. Each bond, each expenditure should be weighed on its merits. A difference between conservatives and liberals, after all, is that conservatives think and understand that ideological rigidity is wearisome and unworkable. Nothing says, "We've got nothing else," like an inflexible dogma whose overriding tenet is strict adherence.
So, a thinking conservative easily can justify spending a paltry sum on a bus bond for a large return to benefit a necessary - very necessary to some -- service. Is it wrong to accept federal funds? Strictly speaking, of course, but if you believe the proffered grant money will be returned to the Treasury after your "no" vote, you are mistaken. We should reject such money -- when everybody agrees to reject such money.
Oddly, voters spent millions. They bought an ambulance most will not want to use. They paid for road repairs of no benefit to most of us. They replaced fire engines most of us will never see. We all pay for schools and countless services most do not use. Then, we rejected a nickel-and-dime bond that would have improved bus service, which most of us do not use, either. Go figure.
An anti-bus bias was summed up by one commenter: "I'm tired of being cut off by buses, getting behind one at rush hour and not being able to get around it as it makes stop after stop, and seeing the bus with only six people on it . . . I don't use the buses and don't plan to." There also, in my view, is a bias against bus riders that smacks of racial and economic discrimination. Why would any conservative, who by any definition wants people to succeed, rejoice in that?
All that will change. When gasoline prices inch above $4 a gallon, buses will look good to the same folks who zapped the bond.
Let them eat bus passes.
Paul Jenkins is editor of the Anchorage Daily Planet.
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