Survey: Utah’s Economy Strong Compared to Other States'

But relatively sound financial management ain't the same as good leadership, says renowned business and economic analyst 

In the aftermath of yesterday's Weber County Forum writeup, putting the focus on a recent Wider Opportunities for Women (WOW) study "which rates Utah dead-last in the nation when it comes to economic security for families," we'll direct our readers' attention to this morning's Standard-Examiner guest editorial "puff piece," touting "Utah’s economy [which] continues to project a more stable picture economically than most of the nation’s 50 states":

• Survey: Utah’s economy strong compared to other states'

This morning's Antone Clark piece is of course the latest edition in a seemingly never ending flow of local media "hype," which constantly and serially trumpets the shop-worn "strong Utah economy" meme, and by implication, of course, the "wisdom" of the state’s (elected) fiscal managers.

At risk of playing the part of the naysayer however, here are a couple of recent Deseret News items which will hopefully bring some of Utah's frenzied economic cheerleader/politicians "back down to earth." Relatively sound financial management ain't the same as good leadership, says Salt Lake Chamber chief economist and U. of U. David Eccles School of Business Associate Dean Natalie Gochnour:

• Utah becoming too reliant on accolades, economist warns
• Don't rely on Utah's 'best run state' accolades

Nope; Dean Gochnour is correct, wethinks. “Utah is not the best-managed state; it is among the best-managed states.” "While Utah has performed well economically over the years compared with other states, there is still work to do." "If we are not careful [the "best-managed" claim] gets confused with leadership, creates complacency and stands in the way of needed improvements." "Utah's [broken] education system is the perfect example," Gochnour says, quite rightly, we believe.

So what about it O Gentle Ones?  Is your blogmeister the only one who grows weary of our local media's incessant barrage of these infernal  "best managed state" puff pieces?

Are there others out there in Weber County Forum Land looking forward to that day somewhere in the dim future when Utah legislative "leaders" will be boasting about Utah's number 1 public education and health care systems?

The floor's open for your ever-savvy comments, O Gentle Readers.

Study: Utah Dead Last in the Nation in Economic Security for Families

The fact that Utah is actually tied with states like Tennessee, Mississippi, and Alabama, who all share D+ ratings will provide at least some consolation to we struggling Utahns, we suppose... at least in the sense that misery loves company, right?

We'll shine the spotlight this morning on an eye-opening heads-up story from UtahPolicy.com, reporting on a recent Wider Opportunities for Women (WOW) study "which rates Utah dead-last in the nation when it comes to economic security for families. The analysis took into account 85 areas including income, job quality, education, public supports and how much families save."

Here's the full story, from the 24/7 Wall St. website:

• States with the Most Government Benefits

And here's the Utah data and rating in a nutshell, for those who'd just like to cut to the chase:

1. Utah
> Economic security grade: D+
> Median household income: $55,869 (14th highest)
> Gov’t spending per capita, 2011: $5,922 (20th lowest)
> Tax collections per capita, FY 2011: $1,958 (13th lowest)

No state offers its residents fewer benefits than Utah. The state is among the nation’s worst at providing public support programs. A worker going on unemployment insurance in May 2012 was eligible for 60 weeks of benefits, much less than most other states. Worse, just 40% of unemployed workers were even on this program, among the lowest in the nation. Utah was also rated among the nation’s worst states at providing policies that encouraged residents to build their savings and assets. The state is among the worst at providing consumer protections against payday lending. Utah’s limits for TANF, SNAP and Medicaid eligibility were all considered to be stringent by WOW.

The fact that Utah is technically tied with states like Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama, who all share D+ ratings, will provide at least some consolation to cash-strapped Utahns, we suppose... at least in the sense that misery loves company, right?

So can we see by a show of hands, folks, how many of you are surprised by these results?

Standard-Examiner: Hostess Announces Liquidation, Will Layoff All Employees - Updated

Good bye, relatively well paid Ogden union jobs

Bad news for the Utah economy this morning, as the Standard announces that "Hostess Brands Inc. says it's going out of business after striking workers across the country crippled its ability to make its Twinkies, Ding Dongs, Wonder Bread and other snacks":

• Hostess announces liquidation, will layoff all employees

Hostess employs about 570 people in Salt Lake City and Ogden, which are "home to two of its 36 regional bakeries," according to this morning's Salt Lake Tribune story:

• Hostess moves to shut down amid strike, 600 jobs in Utah could be lost

Click to Enlarge Image

Good bye, relatively well paid Ogden union jobs. 

It's a sign of the times, we guess, in a crippled US economy and market where a union labor-produced product like Wonder Bread demands a buck per loaf premium over a nearly identical white bread product produced in a non-union shop.

And for those fanciers of Hostess's more delectable and exotic products, (Twinkies and Ding Dongs, for instance), don't make the mistake of thinking you can rush down to your local grocery and fill your pantry with a product which will last on your food storage shelves forever.  The myth that a Hostess Twinkie (or a pack of Ding-Dongs, for that matter) will remain edible for "anywhere between fifty and one hundred years" has been thoroughly debunked:

• Snopes - Forever Twinkies

But look at the bright side, Twinkie fanciers.  We've scoured the net and have come up with a home kitchen recipe for those who don't wish to go totally "cold turkey" on Twinkies.  Drumroll... here it is:

• Don't suffer from Hostess Brands' financial woes -- make your own Twinkies

Does Weber County Forum cover the Ogden Lumpencitizens' backs on every important issue? Nevermind answering; we already know the answer to that.

Update 11/16/12 5:15 p.m.:  This was inevitable, we suppose, with the increasing popularity of the White House citizen petition site:

• Petition wants Obama to save Twinkies

Update 11/16/12 6:13 p.m.: Fox 13 News is now running a video story on this, which includes an interview with rarely-seen Ogden Mayor Mike Caldwell, who's possibly barely recognizable to most Ogdenites sans his usual bicycling apparel:


Who knows?  Maybe with a little luck, and some help from Ogden City's vaunted Economic Development Department, Mayor Mike might be able to hook up a few displaced Ogden Hostess employees with nice minimum wage jobs at Ogden's very newest bakery outfit.

So what say our gentle readers about all this?

Update 11/17/12 9:00 a.m.:  And so begins the inevitable post-mortem exam:

Of course the right-wing media is quick to blame the unions, but in the end the union members would have lost more if they had capitulated to the vulture capitalists demands. By this move, they can hope to salvage the retirement plan, while if they’d given in they would have lost it all. $2 billion is a lot of money to just “give away” in negotiations. Of course the unions were expected to surrender despite the fact that the management company was asking the bankruptcy court to give their outgoing CEO up to $5.5 million. All of this was in addition to the 80% raises the executives were being treated to.

• Hostess Bankrupt – Vulture Capitalists Picked Corpse Clean (VIDEO)

Salt Lake Tribune: Two Tales of One City: Ogden is Rising and Reeling

Revitalized core and its new jobs stand in stark contrast to neighborhoods still bearing brunt of recession’s unemployment high of 12.5 percent

Interesting Paul Beebe story in yesterday's Salt Lake Tribune, dovetailing somewhat with Dan Schroeder's seminal 7/29/12 writeup, and putting the focus on Ogden City's still-troubling unemployment statistics. Despite the ample Boss Godfrey quotes, this "ain't no puff piece," folks.  Here's the lede:

The first year of the Great Recession was pretty easy on Ogden. For most of 2008, unemployment wavered around 5 percent of the labor force, pretty good for Utah’s seventh-largest city, which had seen far higher rates of joblessness earlier in the decade.

That changed in December, when the jobless rate exploded. In just 30 days, it jumped to 11 percent from 5.3 percent in November.

Thus began an extraordinarily difficult time for Ogden. Over the next two years, the jobless rate averaged above 10 percent. For a year it was 11 percent or higher. And in July and August 2009, after the recession officially ended, the unemployment reached 12.5 percent — highest of any city in Utah with a population of 25,000 or more.

Read the full Trib story here:

• Two tales of one city: Ogden is rising and reeling

So what about it, O Gentle Ones? Has the Ogden City jobs economy made any significant net progress during the past four years? Are we even treading water? If you were the philosopher-king/emperor of Ogden City, with unlimited dictatorial power, what changes would you make to improve Ogden City's still-dismal unemployment picture?

Standard-Examiner: Election-Year Politics Keep Sequestration Threat Alive

Yes, gentle readers, there's plenty of congressional blame to go around

Top-notch story in this morning's Standard-Examiner, bringing to the local public forefront a federal budgetary "'knife' that threatens to lop 10 percent off 2500 defense programs starting Jan. 2," according to the Standard's syndicated military columnist, Tom Philpot:

• Election-year politics keep sequestration threat alive

Taking into account our local economy's dependence on the Hill Air Force Base cash cow, this is definitely a story with local implications, folks.

For those readers who may need a memory refresher, Washington Post columnist Robert J. Samuelson presents the background on this dilemma "for the 99.99 percent of Americans who aren’t budget wonks":

Last summer, Congress passed the Budget Control Act (BCA), raising the federal debt ceiling and pledging to cut budget deficits by at least $2.1 trillion from 2012 to 2021. Of that, cuts of $900 billion were included in the BCA — with half from defense. Congress then created a “supercommittee” of 12 of its members to achieve the remaining $1.2 trillion of deficit reduction through more spending cuts or tax increases.
Sequestration aimed to promote agreement by creating an alternative that seemed worse: automatic cuts in defense and non-defense spending. The theory was that the fear of sequester would so upset Republicans (against deep defense cuts) and Democrats (against domestic cuts) that they would negotiate a more acceptable package. By the same logic, Congress would then approve the supercommittee’s plan.
Wrong. The supercommittee didn’t agree, and Congress didn’t vote. With hindsight, this is unsurprising, because the sequester is not neutral. Though defense spending represents 19 percent of the budget in 2012, it would absorb half the cuts. Moreover, many entitlements (Social Security, Medicaid) were excluded from cuts. As supporters of domestic spending, Democrats had less reason to fear sequester. Similarly, the sequestration imposed no automatic tax increases; this appealed to Republicans. And because sequestration itself wouldn’t start until 2013, failing to agree in late 2011 had little political fallout.
So: The sequestration now scheduled for next January means about another $500 billion in military cuts over the decade. These are in addition to the $487 billion in defense reductions already in the BCA and billions of earlier cuts ordered by former defense secretary Robert Gates, who ended some major programs including the F-22 stealth fighter. Nor do these cuts count the automatic reductions occurring from withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan. Even without sequester, defense spending is estimated to fall to 13 percent of the budget in 2017.

Just like clockwork, there's plenty of finger pointing from both sides of the congessional political aisle, of course, as this issue looms as a party-partisan major federal election issue this year, and our federal congress-critters continue to dodge their legislative/budgetary responsibilities, even a mere 73 days shy of the November election:

• Sequester blues: Congress faces buyer's remorse on defense cuts

Fascinating quote from Rep. Justin Amash (R) of Michigan, ("a libertarian lawmaker who frequently bucks his party for not being stringent enough on spending"):

I think it’s completely hypocritical for the people who voted to raise the debt ceiling, who voted for sequestration, now to be calling it ‘devastating.'

Yes, gentle readers, there's plenty of congressional blame to go around.

We'll be keeping a close eye on this story as it develops.

The floor's open for your ever-savvy comments, O Gentle Ones.

Don't let the cat get your tongues...

Why Congress Cannot Pass a Balanced Budget

Not so complicated when it's laid out in simple math

By: OneWhoKnows2

This fellow lays things out pretty well. It’s understandable, but nerve wracking. The video is only 5 minutes, but quite illuminating.

Here's the eye-opening video:



Not so complicated when it's laid out in simple math. The pain that he's talking about? Remember, government’s biggest source of income - people like You & Me. Start getting ready for it as best you can.

The floor's open for your comments, folks.

KSL News: The Case For A 'Local First' Mentality

Can we see by a show of hands how many of our WCF readers have joined in this burgeoning "shop local" movement, and already make it a point to patronize our locally owned, home-grown businesses first?

Thanks to a tip from another sharp and alert Weber County Forum reader, we'll put the focus this morning on a highly enlightening  KSL News story which will give boosters of our Utah state and local economies something to seriously contemplate the next time the local media breathlessly report that yet another national cookie-cutter-style restaurant chain or cavernous  retail box store outfit sets up shop in their own Utah city or town. 

Here's the eye-opening lede:

SALT LAKE CITY — Spending money at local businesses can have a bigger impact on the local economy than spending those same dollars at national chains, a new study states.
Research conducted by Civic Economics detailing the amount of revenue returned to the local community by locally-owned, independent businesses showed that 52 percent of all revenues went back into their communities compared to about 14 percent for national chain stores.
The report also indicated that local eateries returned nearly 79 percent of revenues compared to just over 30 percent for national restaurants.
Overall, locally-owned, independent businesses return 382 percent more dollars to the Salt Lake City economy than chain retailers, explained Nan Seymour, executive director of Local First Utah.
“Four times the amount of dollars stay in our community when you spend at a local business," she said.

Here's the full article, for our readers' perusal:

• The case for a 'local first' mentality

“The more that we support our local businesses, the better they do.” “The more they can provide local jobs and local products … and the more revenue we all receive from that,” says U of U academic and urban planner Bob Farrington.

“Local is becoming a huge movement,” adds Betsy Burton, co-owner of Salt Lake City's King’s English Bookshop.

So what about it, folks?  Can we see by a show of hands how many of our WCF readers have joined this burgeoning "shop local" movement, and already make it a point to patronize our locally-owned, home-grown businesses first?

The floor's open, O Gentle Ones.

Outdoor Industry Association Throws Down the Gaunlet - Updated

Herbert told: Change environmental course or trade show will leave

We’re going to lose this convention because of a political stunt.

Jim Dabakis, Chairman of the Utah Democratic Party
Standard-Examiner: An ultimatum
August 2, 2012

[They're] killing the goose that lays the golden egg.

Peter Metcalf, CEO/President of Black Diamond Equipment
SLTrib: Outdoor rec industry lashes out at Utah’s public lands policy
August 2, 2012

Both the Standard-Examiner and the Salt Lake Tribune report this morning that Utah government's right wing extremist political policy is on a collision course with Utah's economic interests, as the Outdoor Industry Association, the fifteen-year host of Salt Lake City's Outdoor Retailer Show, "one of the world’s largest outdoor gear trade shows, is threatening to pull their biannual expo from Salt Lake City if Utah’s governor doesn’t change course on environmental issues":

• An ultimatum - Herbert told: Change environmental course or trade show will leave
• Outdoor rec industry lashes out at Utah’s public lands policy

"It is disappointing that Utah — a place that draws outdoor businesses and enthusiasts alike — has not had a collaborative policy relationship with the outdoor industry."  Instead, at least recently, "the industry is often surprised and frustrated" by Utah's public lands policy, Frank Hugelmeyer, president and CEO of the OIA says.

And yes folks, this is a very big deal for the Utah's economic well being, inasmuch as this gigantic trade show "draws more than 25,000 people and injects more than $40 million into the Utah economy annually," according to the S-E story.

It'll be fascinating to see how this story plays out on the cusp of the 2012 General election, as Governor Herbert sweats out Mr. Hugelmeyer's 30-day ultimatum, no?

Update 8/3/12 9:15 a.m.:  Informative followup story from the SLTrib's Judy Fahys, fleshing out the Outdoor Industry Association's issues... and introducing "sagebrush rebellion pushback" from Utah legislative "throwback" West Valley City's Rep. Fred Cox:

• Outdoor industry wants political clout it says it deserves

Salt Lake Tribune: Utah Ranks Second Among The Next Economic ‘Boom States’

Sit back and enjoy the upcoming Utah economic gravy train, folks

Chirpy puff piece from the Salt Lake Tribune, reporting that a U.S. Chamber of Commerce report compared states throughout nation, and says the Beehive State’s economy ready to take off.

Here's the lede:

Washington • Utah’s economy is growing and a new report comparing states throughout the nation says it is ready to explode.
Citing the state’s burgeoning tech sector and its spike in exports, combined with a lenient regulatory structure and low cost of living, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce ranked Utah second in a list of "the next boom states."

Check out the full Matt Canham story:

• Utah ranks second among the next economic ‘boom states’

Funny... not a word about Utah's abysmally low wages. Realistically speaking, you'd think that's the one Utah economic factor which these "Chamber of Commerce Types" would be raving about the most, no?

Predictably, Governor Herbert, who stands for re-election in November,  is milking this story for all it's worth:

"It is an attitude. We are saying to the marketplace that we value the entrepreneur and the businessperson," Herbert, a Republican, told the crowd that included business leaders. "We’re going to make sure we have government that gets off your backs and out of your wallets."

And the U.S. Chamber's numero uno state, poised to set its local economy on fire?

North Dakota? C'mon. Gimmee a break.

Read the Trib story. We are not making this up.

Sit back and enjoy the upcoming Utah economic gravy train, folks.

Financially Ailing Wolf Creek Resort Headed for the Auction Block

Although some chirpy optimists are claiming the recession is over, we say "tell that to the current Wolf Creek Resort owners, folks" 

While our friends at Ogden Valley Forum were the first local news source to break the story yesterday, both the Standard-Examiner and Deseret News are bringing up the rear and reporting this morning that Ogden Valley's Wolf Creek Utah Resort becomes the latest Utah casualty of the 2008-12 Great Recession:

• Wolf Creek resort up for auction
• Year-round destination resort in Eden up for sale

Although some chirpy optimists are claiming the recession is over, we say: Tell that to the current Wolf Creek resort owners, who've been struggling without success to effectuate a voluntary "creditor workout" since their original 2010 Chapter 11 Bankruptcy filing.

While Wolf Creek insiders say this property is worth "somewhere between $27 million and $34 million,” it'll be interesting to find out whether it'll fetch anything close to that at auction, as the U.S. remains gripped by a continuing recessionary economy.

We'll be keeping a close eye on this folks, as this forced sale ought to provide a telling barometer of the current bedrock economic health of Utah's tourist industry... and that of the local and U.S. economies as well.

Comments, anyone?

Standard-Examiner: Ogden Hopes Plan Change Will Aid Small Businesses

Is your blogmeister the only one who's troubled that even under a new mayoral administration, Ogden City Government continues to lurch at top speed upon the course of unrestrained borrowing and spending?

To kick off the morning discussion we'll refer to a story which appeared in yesterday's Standard-Examiner, reporting that, in addition to getting into the student scholarship business, Ogden City Big Government Planners are also setting the stage to get into the loan business. Here's the lede:

OGDEN -- The city is proposing a change to its five-year plan that includes an amendment to help new small-business owners.

The city's five-year consolidated plan includes a proposal to create a Community Development Block Grant-funded "loan loss" program aimed at promoting business development by leveraging grants to secure loans from larger loan pools that could then be given to small businesses.

City officials say the loan program is needed to provide otherwise viable small businesses with loan options when traditional loan and investment opportunities aren't available.

Read the full story here:

• Ogden hopes plan change will aid small businesses

The gist of it? Even in these tight economic times, when beleaguered Ogden taxpayers are pinching their pennies to manage their own personal expenses, the BIG SPENDING SCHEMERS at Ogden City Hall are now forming up a whole new raft of shell entities and unleashing a brand new wave of "leveraged" public borrowing:

The new program would use block grant loans to secure loans that would be issued by Ogden Reinvestment Corporation. An initial amount of $305,000 would come from the sale of six CDBG-funded small-business loans.

The funds would be used to provide a 10 percent security backing for loans issued by ORC to small businesses. The loan pool available to ORC contains $3 million and comes from the Ogden Industrial Development Corporation.

The goal of the program is to take the $305,000 initial investment and leverage that money to secure $3 million in loans that would then be available to the business community.

Yesiree, folks, although the ever-energetic Big Government schemer Boss Godfrey is now gone, it appears that the spirit of aggressive Big Government intervention in all endeavors (those which do NOT fit within the framework of the "proper role" of municipal government) remains alive and well, probably due, at least in part, to the continuing influence of Godfrey's Business Development Department "A" Team, who are obviously still ramming Godfrey's old programs forward.

It would also be interesting to know where newly elected Mayor Mike Caldwell stands on all this. So far however he's saying nada, zero, and zip. While his laid-back style does definitely differ considerably from Godfrey's annoyingly flamboyant approach, it is beginning to become clear wethinks, reading between the lines, that with respect to the aggressive accumulation of public debt, and the subsidizing of the private business sector, Caldwell's doing nothing to apply the brakes.

So what about it, O gentle Ones? Is your blogmeister the only one who's troubled that even under a new mayoral administration, Ogden City Government continues to lurch at top speed upon the course of unrestrained Godfreyite borrowing and spending?

Is it possible that the below-linked tune soon will become Ogden taxpayers' new theme song?

• Meet the New Boss Same as the Old Boss (Won't get Fooled Again)

So what about it folks?

Ogden Marriot Hotel On the Auction Block?

We're not going to let ourselves get overly worked up; but we will be keeping a close eye on this situation

Wanna buy a classy downtown Ogden hotel for cheap? We received this interesting email query late last evening, from another sharp-eyed WCF reader. It was broadly interesting enough that we'll share it with our general WCF readership:

Marriot Hotel is on the Auction Block
Did you see the notice in the paper this morning (Monday)? It was different than most notices and I've never seen one that was that big. There was no mention of a debt amount, and a lot of legalese. The thought that the fieldhouse is not dead and about to resurface came to mind. I thought that maybe you could look it over and make some sense of it since you understand legalese.

Yes. This is very interesting, indeed. We searched the S-E digital edition, and did find the notice, although it was a mite too small and faint to make out. We did also find it on the utahlegals.com website however, where it was available in a more readable form:

• NOTICE OF SHERIFF"S SALE

The property in question? "[A]ll that parcel of land situated in Ogden, Weber County, Utah described as follows to-wit: PROPERTY DESCRIPTION: REAL PROPERTY Legal description of real property known as the Ogden Marriot, 247 24th Street, Ogden, Utah."

The legal situation? What's happening here folks that a Florida-situated entity, namely BACM 2006-5 24TH STREET LODGING, LLC seems to have perfected a civil judgment against the legal owners of this property, attached the hotel property under a writ of execution and scheduled a sheriff's sale, such sale to occur (barring an interim settlement of the matter), on the Second Judicial District Courts Building front steps on the "23 rd February, 2012, at 2:00 pm o 'clock."

We're not going to let ourselves get overly worked up over this at this point, inasmuch as situations like this usually get resolved short of an actual Sheriff's auction. Nor will we speculate whether this situation may be the result of an overbuilt and stressed out local hotel market. We will be keeping a close eye on this nevertheless, in which connection we offer additional thanks to yet another sharp-eyed and alert WCF reader for providing the timely heads up.

So who wants to throw in their own 2¢?

Another Perspective on the Possiblity of a Hill Air Force Base Closure

Would it be a good idea for our sole Utah Democratic Party House Representative Jim Matheson to waltz over to the Senate Office Building, slap Mike Lee upside the head, and then politely ask him to "cool his jets"?

In the midst of another slow Northern Utah news day, we'll direct our readers' attention to a couple of back burner news items which appeared in the Standard-Examiner and the Salt Lake Tribune, a couple of days back. Although these stories didn't seem to be intentionally juxtaposed by the S-E and Trib editors, we can't help but believe that they may be interrelated, nevertheless.

Here's the lede from the S-E story, which appeared on the print edition front page on Sunday morning, and provides the gist:

HILL AIR FORCE BASE — Even without knowing the specifics of the upcoming military budget cuts and the recommendation of new rounds of Base Realignment and Closures, there is a lot of concern that the changes could affect Hill Air Force Base.
“It’s too early to know any of the details that they are thinking, but everyone should be worried,” said Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah.
On Thursday, Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta announced plans to cut military spending as the military recovers from a decade of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Part of that plan is to close military bases in 2013 and 2015 [emphasis added].

Read the full S-E story here:

• Proposed defense cuts bring worries to HAFB

With a Democratic Party President occupying the oval office and base cuts on the drawing board, the fact that Republican folks like Rob Bishop and Jim Hansen might be a mite nervous makes perfect sense, of course.

And here's the lede from the 1/28/12 SLTrib story:

President Barack Obama used his weekly address Saturday to rip Congress for blocking his nominees, focusing his ire on Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah.

Earlier in the week, Lee vowed to oppose all of the president’s picks for open judicial and federal positions to protest the way Obama skirted the Senate to fill key jobs at the National Labor Relations Board and the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

"One senator gumming up the whole works for the entire country is certainly not what our founding fathers envisioned," Obama said, not specifically identifying Lee but leaving no doubt which senator he meant to single out.

In his address, the president cited a comment Lee’s spokesman, Brian Phillips, gave to Fox News, saying the plan was to "delay and slow the process in order to get the president’s attention."

And here's the link to that (possibly interrelated) story:

• Obama takes aim at Sen. Mike Lee in nominee fight

Although Obama doesn't name him by name, it's pretty clear that Utah Senator Mike Lee is clearly on Obama's "obstructionist" radar screen, and that he's most certainly "captured" President Obama's individed "attention." (Hopefully at this point our readers are getting the drift when we suggest that these to stories may be interconnected.)

For those who might be interested in reading a robust study on the probably devastating Utah economic effect of a Hill Air Force Base closure, here's a good scholarly study produced by a research team from University of Utah David Eccles School of Business in 2004, when the possiblity of a 2005 HAFB closure was last on the U.S. Executive Department table. It's sobering, to say the least:

• Economic, Demographic and Fiscal Impacts of Closing Hill Air Force Base: A Statewide and Regional Analysis

And remember, folks, these numbers are calculated in un-inflated 2001 dollars.

As for devastating projected local impacts, the study furnishes a VERY long list, so we'll just pick out one of them, for starters:

Short-Term Impacts
In 2009, the impact of closing Hill AFB will be a loss of 47,400 jobs, an annual decline of $2.35 billion in earnings and $2.29 billion in personal income. Hill’s closure shrinks the state’s economy by $3.58 billion (a decline of 2.6% from the projected baseline). The annual loss of state tax revenue will be $192.4 million.

Hopefully everyone, Utah lefties, centrists and righties alike, will take the time to read the above-linked analysis.

The proposed 2005 HAFB closure was removed from the table during the presidential term of GOP President G.W. Bush of course, to the great glee of out mainly GOP Utah federal legislative delegation.

Can we see by a show of hands how many of our gentle readers believe Senator Lee is playing with fire? Is there anyone who believes that our Democratic Party President Obama will cut our Utah federal legislative delegation the same degree of leeway in re: HAFB as did GOP President Bush in 2005? Would it be a good idea for our sole Utah Democratic Party House Representative Jim Matheson to waltz over to the Senate Office Building, slap Mike Lee upside the head, and then politely ask him to "cool his jets"? (Maybe Matheson could even ask that a more than slightly "nervous" House Representative Rob Bishop might accompany him.)

What say you on this topic, O Gentle Ones?

Selected Morning Items for Ogden Political Wonks - Updated

A "bird's eye view" of Ogden City economic development programs; the downtown Ogden IRS building nears completion; bonus submission from Gentle Reader Bob Becker

Just to get the conversation going this morning, we'd like to direct our readers' attention to a couple of interesting items on this morning's Standard-Examiner business page:

As a followup to last Wednesday's column, focusing on the role of Weber State University as an "economic engine throughout Northern Utah," Ogden homeboy, hotshot business entrepreneur and Grow Utah venture capitalist/business startup mentor Alan Hall delivers his second of what the Standard-Examiner expects to be a series [by] individual professional community columnists sharing their experiences and advice with readers. This sounds like a danged good idea to us, so we'll jump aboard the bandwagon this morning and provide a link to this morning's Alan Hall column, which sets out upon the ambitious task of providing "a high level overview of Ogden key's economic development programs" :

• Ogden City has five key economic development programs

Considering the complex and labyrinthine nature of meddling in the local Ogden City economy by the Boss Godfrey administration, we believe Mr. Hall has done a serviceable job of boiling it all down. With the exception of neglecting to make any reference to Ogden City's high density housing projects, we believe Mr. Hall's done a good job this morning all-in-all.

Having said that we also have to admit, however, that we winced a little bit when we came upon Mr. Hall's closing paragraph:

As we look to the future, it is obvious that Ogden will continue to play a major role in economic development. We commend past mayors and city councils for their commitments in this important area and anticipate even more focus on this topic from new government leadership in the months to come [Emphasis added].

So what about it, O Gentle Ones? Does Mr. Hall deserve high marks for this morning's "bird's eye view" column, or is Mr. Hall starting to sound like a government intervention cheerleader?

We'll also make note of this morning S-E story, which reports that "construction on a $21 million Internal Revenue Service facility downtown is nearing completion":

• IRS building nears completion

If the prospect of hundreds of Internal Revenue Service re-locating in downtown Ogden doesn't spell good news for Ogden Ogden restaurateurs and retail businessmen, we frankly don't know what could.

So what about it, folks? Can anyone see any downside to this?

That's it for now O Gentle Ones.

Who'll be the first to contribute their own 2¢?

Update 12/28/11 10:18 a.m.: Added bonus... Here's something that just came in from Gentle Reader Curmudgeon, via a comment beneath a lower article:

SE reporting this morning on the Sears corporation planning to close 100 to 120 under-performing Sears and KMart stores nationwide, and possibly more:

• Area workers at Sears, Kmart stores face unknown futures

National press speculating on whether Sears has begun a death-spiral and will be the nation's next major chain store failure.

If one of the stores closed is the Ogden mall store, that mall will be in big trouble, having lost two of its three anchor store [Mervyn's at one end, Sears at the other.] If that happens, Mayor Caldwell may begin his term with a major hole being blown in Ogden property and sales tax revenues right off the bat. Be best for Ogden if (a) it's mall store is not on the target list for closing, and (b) Sears manages to right its ship and return to profitability.

Not good news, especially on a day when the Trib reports on the miserable snowpack in Utah, that one resort has not even opened for the season, and the there's more snow on the ground at the ski area closest to Las Vegas than there is at any Utah resort:

Think snow!

The GOP’s Payroll Tax Debacle -Updated

So what about it Gentle WCF Readers? Did the Obama administration seriously outmaneuver the Congressional GOP Tea Party faction on this issue, or what?

The Democrats set a trap and the Republicans walked right into it. By rejecting an ostensibly bipartisan “compromise,” the Republican House was portrayed as obstructionist and, even worse, heartless — willing to raise taxes on the middle class while resolutely opposing any tax increases on the rich.

Washington Post Op-ed
The GOP’s payroll tax debacle
December 22, 2011

The GOP’s performance nicely reprises that scene in “Animal House” where the marching band turns into a blind alley and row after row of plumed morons plows into a brick wall, crumbling to the ground in an unceremonious heap.
With one difference: House Republicans are unplumed.

Washington Post Op-ed
The GOP’s payroll tax debacle
December 22, 2011

Spot-on Washington Post op-ed for our WCF readers' perusal this morning from WaPo neoCON columnist Charles Krauthammer, concerning the U.S. House of Representatives' ham-handed handling of an eleventh hour "final compromise," which ushers in a WAY too short two-month payroll tax holiday for 160 million middle-class Americans, an outcome which even the most die-hard Congressional Republican obstructionists privately conceded to be inevitable.

Here's the lede:

Now that Congress has reached agreement on what must be one of the worst pieces of legislation in years — the temporary payroll tax holiday extension — let’s survey the damage:

Check out the full editorial here:

• The GOP’s payroll tax debacle

And the upshot?

Note the toll it is already taking on Republicans. For three decades Republicans owned the tax issue. Today, Obama leads by five points, a 12-point swing since just early October. The payroll tax ploy has even affected his overall approval rating, now up five points (in six weeks) to 49 percent.

While your blogmeister seldom agrees with anything that Krautheimer spouts, I have to agree with him on this. This GOP tactical blunder will haunt the Grand Old Party through the 2012 presidential elections, methinks.

So what about it Gentle WCF Readers? Did the Obama administration seriously outmaneuver the Congressional GOP Tea Party faction on this issue, or what?

Will this issue have lingering political traction continuing into November, 2012?

Wake up, people!

Update 12/23/11 8:48 p.m.: Oh my! Looks like the White House is already making political hay with this. Here's a letter which your blogmeister received in his email inbox a coupla hours ago:

• 12/23/11 Obama Letter

Gotta admit we're curious about how the White House latched onto our email address.

Standard-Examiner Guest Commentary: A Revival of Mercantilist Thought Among Conservatives

Some apparent parallels between post-feudal mercantilist thought and the views of some modern right-wing conservatives

Right-wing conservatives' ideology is even worse than mercantilism because it gives the impression to Americans that their policy actions, aimed at corporations and wealthy, will ultimately benefit low and middle income Americans. It is high time to bury the idea that making rich richer and wealthy wealthier through government policy will generate more opportunity for non-rich. What the political establishment has to do is to open up more avenues of opportunity aimed directly at non-rich, so that they can acquire more human capital and become successful entrepreneurs. I hope that conservative politicians' alliance with business and wealthy is a temporary phenomenon, because otherwise it will take the country's progress back to the mercantilist era and dismantle the middle class -- the fountain of entrepreneurship. It will have a deleterious effect on democracy, free competitive markets and growth.

Standard-Examiner Guest Commentary
A revival of mercantilist thought among conservatives
November 6, 2011

Fantastic Standard-Examiner Op-ed piece this morning, folks.

Although we sometimes disagree with Prof. Mathur's analyses, he definitely nails it this time, wethinks:

• A revival of mercantilist thought among conservatives

The merger of state and corporate interests in America is one of the greatest threats to individual liberty existent in the current national and local political environment, as we see it.

Of course we don't necessarily have to reach clear back to the "mercantilist era" for historical precedent, when 20th Century European "fascism" also serves as a more recent manifestation of the "corporatist" politico-economic phenomena which Mathur describes.

We hope you'll all read and comprehend the message that the good professor delivers this morning, without letting your eyes glaze over, even though it does deal with the sometimes-turgid topic of political economics.

So who'd like to throw in their own 2¢?

Deutsche Mark Back in Print?

Will the more economically-stable European powers... like Germany... bail from the socialistic European Union, and flee from the debased EURO?

I could be wrong about this, I guess; but somehow I do not think that this story is good news for the Euro-backed European economy, or for the European Union (or for the world economy in general):

• Deutsche Mark back in print?

A story like this seems to hint that the Germans are tired of propping up the rest of Europe with their relatively thriving economy.

So get this! Here's another revealing story, which zeros right in on the most important point of all:

• Germany will leave the euro, says leading commentator

As the entire world economy continues to collapse of its own debt-ridden excess, will the more economically-stable European powers... like Germany... bail from the socialistic European Union, and retreat to conservative financial measures designed to protect their own local German (and other) currencies, economies and national sovereignty? Seriously, why wouldn't they do that?

Don't let the cat get yer tongues, O Gentle Ones.

Economic Cycle Research Institute: U.S. Economy Tipping into Recession

If you think this is a bad economy, you haven’t seen anything yet

Submitted by: Danny

Turn to Weber County Forum for news you can use.

Early last week, ECRI notified clients that the U.S. economy is indeed tipping into a new recession. And there’s nothing that policy makers can do to head it off:

• U.S. Economy Tipping into Recession
• ECRI Video - A U.S. Recession
• ECRI Report Summary Details
• ECRI Business Cycle

Selected cautionary notes:

Why should ECRI’s recession call be heeded? Perhaps because, as The Economist has noted, we’ve correctly called three recessions without any false alarms in-between. In contrast, most of those who’ve accurately predicted a recession or two have also been guilty of crying wolf – in 2010, 2005, 2003, 1998, 1995, or 1987.

Here’s what ECRI’s recession call really says: if you think this is a bad economy, you haven’t seen anything yet. And that has profound implications for both Main Street and Wall Street.

Read up, folks!

New York Times: Letting Bankers Walk

Shouldn't we hold bankers accountable for their actions, just like everybody else?

Eye opening Paul Krugman Op-ed piece in the New York Times, speculating about the reasons that federal officials have been giving "kid-gloves treatment" to banks that have engaged in abusive mortgage practices. Here's the lede:

Ever since the current economic crisis began, it has seemed that five words sum up the central principle of United States financial policy: go easy on the bankers.

This principle was on display during the final months of the Bush administration, when a huge lifeline for the banks was made available with few strings attached. It was equally on display in the early months of the Obama administration, when President Obama reneged on his campaign pledge to “change our bankruptcy laws to make it easier for families to stay in their homes.” And the principle is still operating right now, as federal officials press state attorneys general to accept a very modest settlement from banks that engaged in abusive mortgage practices.

Why the kid-gloves treatment?

For Krugman's savvy analysis, read on:

• Letting Bankers Walk

We don't often agree with the Keynesian Krugman; but we do believe he's spot-on in this practical, nuts/bolts instance.

So what about it O Gentle Ones? Isn't Krugman correct? Shouldn't we hold bankers accountable for their actions, just like everybody else? If not, why not?

Do Recent News Stories Indicate That the U.S. Economy is Again Ready to Dive Off Another Cliff? - UPDATED

Note to our Ogden City Council: Let extreme caution be the operative watchword here

We haven't posted much about the condition of the U.S. economy lately; so while we remain mired in the current Emerald City red meat news drought, we'll shift our readers' attention this morning to several not-so-uplifting economic news stories appearing within the last couple of days in the Utah print media:

• Consumer confidence falls unexpectedly in May
• Utahns hope in economy wavers
• US stocks fall on worries about job market
• Home-price index hits low as double-dip fears loom

The last of these articles mentions the prospect of a dreaded "Double Dip" ("W Shaped") recession.

So what about it, gentle readers? Is the U.S. economy in recovery, as some of the Pollyanna news media cheerleaders have been suggesting over the past few months? Or do these more recent and above-cited economic news stories serve as a bell weather indication that the U.S. economy is again seriously contracting?

One of our favorite news commentators, USAWatchdog.com's Greg Hunter, falls into the latter camp. Here's what he had to say on this subject this morning (and we tend to agree with him):

I have been telling you the economy is not in any kind of real recovery for more than a year. Sources I have been quoting have been proven right, and all the economic cheerleaders dead wrong. Reuters reported yesterday, “Data showing a double-dip in home prices, pessimistic consumers and a slowdown in regional manufacturing raised concerns on Tuesday that the economy’s soft patch could become protracted.” (Click here to read the complete Reuters report.) “Could become protracted?” It is protracted, and now the data is suggesting the economy is getting ready for another cliff dive.

You can read Mr. Hunter's full article here:

• Dreaded Double-Dip Is Here

So what's the point in mentioning this, you ask, other than to put you all "off your feed?"

Well... our Emerald City elected officials seem to be on the cusp of diving into another series of possibly reckless economic development projects which will require public bonding and otherwise burden the Emerald City public treasury, during economic times which are "uncertain" at best.

Note to our Ogden City Council: Let extreme caution be the operative watchword here.

And what about it WCF readers? In which direction do you believe the economy's moving?

Update 6/2/11 9:00 a.m.: In a demonstration of private sector prudence which will hopefully prove to be a model for the public decision-makers on our Emerald City/ Council/RDA Board, Winco Foods has delayed construction of its new Layton Fort Lane Village store "because the economy has not started swinging up":

• Construction of Layton WinCo delayed