< PREVIOUS ] [ 1988 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >
It's easy to get confused these days. There's the
uncomfortable adjustment to Daylight Saving Time (what were
we on before, Daylight Wasting Time?), and there appears to
be no easy answer to How do you purchase a legislator's
attention?
The situation is this: Companies and trade groups naturally have an interest in certain matters that come before the Colorado General Assembly. These organizations also generously donate to our legislators everything from sticks of beef jerky to trips to the Super Bowl.
Of course, our legislators say that these presents have absolutely no effect on their judgment. Being as it's Mud Season in the mountains, and there's nothing else to do, I suppose I might be willing to believe that.
But if that's the case, then why do these companies and trade groups continue doling out the goodies? If they're not getting anything for the money they spend -- which is what the legislature insists -- then why do the companies bother? If they're just feeling charitable with an irresistible urge to give stuff away, why not give to the Salvation Army or the Red Cross? Or are American enterprises falling behind Japan's because out companies are run by idiots who expend precious corporate resources and get nothing in return?
Granted, some of these emoluments that legislators receive make sense. The ski industry is important to Colorado, and legislative decisions often affect the ski industry. It is better for all of us if the people who make those decisions are people who can tell a bull wheel from a stem christy.
So every year, Colorado Ski Country USA provides a free ski weekend for the Colorado General Assembly. This might indeed be educational, although one must wonder whether the legislators experience the same ski weekends their constituents endure -- shelling out for $35 lift tickets, staying in ramshackle motel rooms that go for $100 a night, standing an hour in line for a $9 lunch that consists of a dried-out hamburger and cup of tepid coffee.
Never mind. The leaders of the ski industry must find this tour worth the expense, since they do it every year. Because this works for the ski industry, other groups might want to use the same approach to a legislature that sometimes seems insensitive to their needs. Some possible junkets:
Farm Labor Migration: Lots of healthy exercise here as our curious legislators get to set onions, thin sugar beets and pick peaches under a hot sun for 12 hours a day. As a bonus, they must bring their families to share this educational experience. Nightly quarters vary from old boxcars to the back seats of 1958 Buicks. Any participants who can't produce a Green Card on request will get a free, all-expenses-paid, one-way trip to Mexico.
Unemployed Father Excursion: Each Republican male
legislator finds himself on East Colfax, out of a job and
out of money, with a family about to be evicted from a
fleabag apartment. He discovers that if he stays around,
his family cannot receive public benefits -- but if he
vanishes, his children can get food and medical care. Upon
re-emergence in political circles after this short tour, a
legislator might actually realize that the laws he passes
make a mockery out of the pro-family
planks in his
party platform.
Joe Average Junket: The average weekly wage in America
is $299, which comes to $15,548 a year. During this
proposed one-year junket, a legislator would have to live
on that average income, instead of the $17,000 he gets for
his 120 days of part-time service in the General Assembly
and the $35 or $70 a day in expense money, plus whatever he
brings in from his other enterprises, such as being a
public affairs
consultant for a trade group.
During his tour as an average citizen, the legislator would have to buy his own lunches and pay for his own trips. The only gifts he'd get would be Christmas presents from close friends and relatives.
After this tour of a side of life that our legislators don't seem to be aware of, he could return to the statehouse, and maybe, just maybe, he'd quit complaining about what a financial burden it is to serve in the Colorado General Assembly.
< PREVIOUS ] [ 1988 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >