SUMMER CROSS CURRENTS: PAST & PRESENT Even in the quietude of a downeast Maine "summah", there are cross currents. The currents across Pemaquid Pond that the Wills' cottage overlooks prompted the youngest of four grandkids to doubt if he could dive off the dock and swim into the wind.

"Papa George, will I come to the top of the water, once I get in?"
“Yes, but you must kick your feet and paddle.” But it was not my reassurances, nor those of his Mom and Dad that gave him the confidence to do it. It was the actual experience.

CROSS CURRENTS AHEAD: "THE FISCAL WINDS STRENGTHEN TO GALE FORCE"

These words of warning are from a recent column by Barry Rascovar, Maryland State House columnist, who usually applies wisdom to Maryland economic and business news. Rascovar puts it on the line when, in his mid-July column, there is the call for reality in the rhetoric from Gov. Martin O'Malley. Revenues for the fiscal year that ended June 30 fell $400 million short of lowered expectations and might hit $500 million.

I agree with Barry's point that it is time for the Governor to update his superlative warning of almost two years ago, "We now face one of the toughest fiscal challenges in our State's 373-year history". The record $1.7 billion deficit grappled with in 2007 pales next to the current huge shortfall of over $2 billion.

We can now expect O’Malley to call for round two of stimulus funding, a pleasant, but ineffective pacifier to the barons of the Legislature. But now is the time to look at real options, and there are good examples cited by Rascovar with additional points that I support:

1. Permanently reduce State employee pension benefits for $100 million in annual savings.

2. Freeze State education aid to local schools at last year's level, shifting from excess administrative bureaucracies to teachers less dominated by automatic promotion pushed by their unions for $165 million in annual savings.

3. Gradually eliminate 10% of the State workforce, except for public safety employees, for $140 million in annual savings.

4. Face reality in health care costs: keep and increase doctors in practice here in Maryland, without the threat of lawsuits by an increasingly selfish plaintiffs' bar. Then, there is less excuse for increasing insurance premiums. It’s time for Maryland's political leaders to call in the markers on recognizing that it is doctors and hospitals that constitute health care reform. As we watch progress on national health care reform, there will hopefully be a bottom line where the President meets and produces with moderate, result-driven Congressional leaders, not just lobbyists.

For rational, balanced and businesslike health care management, it "ain't going to be easy.

CALIFORNIA ACTS - WILL MARYLAND?

Maryland has small numbers compared to California, but as we enter the last week of July 2009 the west coast headline reads: "California Legislature Approves Budget That Closes $26 Billion Gap."

Gov. Schwarzenegger has gone from acting to action in a grinding round of work with Legislative leaders to produce an agreement with more than $15 billion in cuts to services. He spares local governments from serving as unwilling cash machines for the state's general fund and discards a plan to drill for oil off the Santa Barbara coast.

What will Maryland do? The only way for leadership to be exercised is for the politicians to act, not talk. We have recently seen the rhetoric from Comptroller Franchot, not in the tradition of his predecessors Louie Goldstein or William Donald Schaefer. Beyond pronouncing himself as in favor of State budget discipline, there are no specifics from a big spender.

As Winston Churchill said about Russia in 1939, Maryland government in 2009 seems to be "a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma". That must change, and in the words of William Donald Schaefer, “We must do it NOW”.

Let’s see if the politicians, like the Wills grandkids on a Maine lake, can jump in and keep their heads above water.

FINAL NOTE: THE PASSING OF WALTER CRONKITE

My indelible 1963 impression of television's greatest journalist was on a two week naval reserve duty with the Office of Naval Intelligence. Our early afternoon work was interrupted by a Dallas, Texas bulletin from ONI's Washington headquarters: "President Kennedy has been shot". Turning on a television set in the Baltimore office, we saw the reassuring countenance of CBS announcer Walter Cronkite remove his glasses and pause as tears welled up in his eyes: " Flash; we have just learned from a wire service report that President Kennedy has just died ... Vice President Johnson is expected to take the oath as our new President, before leaving Dallas."

Cronkite has been described as "proxy for a nation". By a combination of experience, timing and luck, this midwestern reporter began his first assignment during the Nazi bombing blitz in London, working for Edward R. Murrow. There is good fortune of learning from an exceptional first boss. I have understood that feeling under the guidance, training and friendship of Milton Eisenhower, President of Johns Hopkins. In fact, the first time I met Walter Cronkite was at a speech gave at a Hopkins convocation. His earthy personality came through instantly. As several of us, including "Dr. Milton", talked with him before he went to the platform, he smiled and said: "I know what you guys are thinking. He's shorter than he looks on the evening news".

The first really believable television news anchor, Walter Cronkite's death was like the passing of the last veteran of the world-changing war. Yet, he had the perception to understand different forms of change. As things got tough in Vietnam and President Lyndon Johnson continued caution in moving towards a negotiated settlement, Cronkite took on the assignment of on-site investigation of the conflict. At the conclusion of that battlefield tour, these words: "We can no longer believe in a silver lining in Vietnam ... and that's the way it is."

Viewing that evening news commentary from an "Oval Office television, LBJ' s blunt, but honest reaction: "If we've lost Cronkite, then we've lost middle America."  11:32 AM •  0 Comments •