![[The Skinny]](../images/skinny.gif)
PHONE HEALTH: When the state Children's Clinic of Rehabilitation Services in Tucson opened its doors in 1991, they ended up with the wrong phone number in those blue government pages. OK, bad things happen to good people; they got the phone number of the director of the health department. Bet they went through a few receptionists that year. Worse, it wasn't corrected for the next year. And, sorry to say, it's still not right. Three years running and the office can't get the right phone number posted. Sources can only say that "somebody in Phoenix keeps sending the wrong number in." With new phone books coming our way this summer, we can always hope the Rip Van Winkles in Phoenix get it done this year. Ring, ring. This is your annual wake up call.
ROUNDTABLED FIFE: We caught Gov. J. Fife Whiteguy III having his chain tugged on Arizona Illustrated's Reporter's Roundtable last Friday. He talked about everything from school finance--nothing's been done on the issue because they're waiting for the assessment on schools--to chain gangs--"It's a visual picture to say that's where crime can lead," he said.
Fifester, let us remind you that you created a new position for C. Diane Bishop to fill as adviser on education issues. If she moves as slowly on the assessment as she did during her pitiful years as state school superintendent, we figure by the time state bucks reach students they'll only be usable as scrap paper for adding up all the books that could have been bought last year.
Tucson Citizen editor Mark Kimble tried to let Fife at least admit chain gangs are dehumanizing. Not taking the out, the Guv replied, "I never thought work was demeaning." How, we feel compelled to ask, would he know?
A nice summer break on the chain might be just the ticket to teaching Fife "I'm-Still-In-Litigation-Over-My-Finances" Symington what real work is all about. And come to think of it, with C. Diane's behavioral problems, we just realized she might learn something out there picking up trash right next to him.
BUT FIFE STILL MANAGES TO FIND THE MORAL HIGH GROUND: In a speech earlier this month to the conservative Policy Exchange Foundation, our bold Gov. J. Fife Whiteguy III shared his thoughts on liberalism, as reported in the Arizona Capitol Times:
"Nothing has done more to coarsen American life than the relentless growth of government," his lordship intoned. "As government grows in audacity, it declines in moral authority. With liberalism, I have always believed, the optimistic rhetoric had a hollow ring to it. It was a false front, and underneath was a deep distrust of free men and women.
"At its center was always a vision of what government could do for people, or the people in turn could do for their government, but never what people could do for themselves and for one another."
Ah, yes--what people could do for each other. Fife knows something about that. Like, for example, when the board of directors of Southwest Savings gave him--a fellow board member at the time--that $52 million loan after he'd put up a whopping $432 to build Phoenix's Camelback Esplanade. A few weeks later, Fife made sure two Southwest executives got hefty bonuses.
Now that's a good, moral, conservative approach that depends on trust and honesty among free men--who, of course, left the liberal big government holding the bag when their financial house of cards collapsed.
WOODS STILL DOESN'T DO WINDOWS: The nice folks at Alliance Marana--whose role continues to resemble that of the French Resistance during the Nazi occupation--have had real problems getting anybody to care about what goes on behind closed doors in their corrupt little town.
Alliance Marana wrote Attorney General Grant Woods to ask for an investigation of the massive conflicts of interest that transpire there regularly, specifically citing the use of the attorney for New World Homes to fight the referendum on their rezoning, and the number of closed meetings city staff had with the developer and their attorneys even before the referendum was filed.
So how did that ace protector of the public respond? He said that since it was an election law matter it's not his jurisdiction and referred them to the Marana town attorney, the guy appointed by the very folks the complaint was against!
Translated, that means Woods' view of any potential election corruption by local officials can only be investigated by the local officials themselves.
HISTORY LESSON: KGUN-TV must be hiring only Harvard graduates these days--the overwhelming majority of whom, according to a recent New York Times poll, can't place the Civil War in the proper century or locate Africa on a world map. We're guessing that newsreader Laurie Raymond was working from one of their scripts when she informed an eager Tucson audience that May 8 marked the celebration of "Victory Over England Day," which she later corrected to "Victory Over Europe Day."
Count backward to 1945, newly minted Crimson fans, and repeat after us: Victory in Europe. Victory in Europe."
Not to be outdone, the folks at the morning daily had their own WWII problems. On May 9, the Star ran an article about how the Brits were celebrating the end of WWII in Europe and printed a picture of Elizabeth, the Queen Mother. Only problem was, they captioned her photo "Elizabeth I."
Sorry, Star gazers. Elizabeth I, as any Bette Davis fan knows, was queen at the end of the 16th century--back there with Shakespeare and the Armada and all that stuff. The current Queen Mother is a lady named Elizabeth who was married to Elizabeth II's father, King George VI. Da-da-da-DUM.
DEVELOPERS PAY THEIR OWN WAY--YEAH, SURE: The latest example of taxpayer-subsidized growth is occurring right now on Shannon Road near the site of the old Shamrock Dairy, now called El Dorado Holdings. While the cows are gone, the bullshit remains.
Pima County is looking for a site for a new sewer-pumping station in the area, mainly to accommodate all the new homes El Dorado will be building. The pumping station needs about two or three acres and Pima County staff--always good little stooges for any developer--are pushing hard to acquire the land ASAP.
They're fast-tracking this operation before somebody notices the neighbors are aroused by having a proposed mini-sewer plant near them and ask the simple question, "Hey, why not make the developer put it on his 96 acres instead of having us taxpayers pay for more land?"
This deal is going on in Supervisor Big Ed Moore's district, so we'll see if his recent supposed reconversion to neighborhood protector is just more bullshit, or if he's willing to blow more tax money taking care of some fat cats in Phoenix who own the land. Your move, Big Ed.
