State Editorial Rdp

Nov. 9

The Austin American-Statesman on privatization:

Here's a Monday morning reminder on a lesson we seem to need to periodically relearn: Privatization of traditionally governmental functions can be a good thing, or not.

Two recent examples from that latter category remind us that governments at all levels must move carefully and precisely when farming out functions to profiteers promising to save some tax dollars.

These are particularly good reminders because they involved two vital functions -- voting and eating.

IBM Corp. has an $863 million contract to consolidate data functions at 27 state agencies. Seemed like a decent idea at the time.

Actually, it still seems like a decent idea. It's the execution that's been troublesome. An August server crash caused a 13-day outage of the secretary of state's business records filing system. This was a great inconvenience, perhaps more, as well as a signal that the balky system could not be counted on for the state's elections.

"We couldn't allow the ability to conduct fair, credible elections to be jeopardized," spokesman Randall Dillard of the secretary of state's office said in explaining the decision to pull the elections system from the IBM contract.

Gov. Rick Perry and the Department of Information Resources OK'd the move, allowing the secretary of state's office to also set up two backup locations.

Turns out that wasn't the only agency with a qualm or two about IBM's efforts. A spring survey found that almost all 27 agencies expressed dissatisfaction with how IBM is handling its responsibility.

Dillard said the election system will remain independent until at least through 2011. Good move.

And, says Secretary of State Hope Andrade, it will remain out of IBM's hands until issues regarding "inadequate performance and service" are addressed. That's an even better move.

"Until then, we simply cannot put the Texas election system at risk," she said in a letter to the Department of Information Resources.

Privatization also has been a problem for the state's beleaguered food stamp program, where applications have been backlogged because of slow processing. This one dates to 2005, when experienced state employees who had handled the task began leaving because the function was to be privatized. As the backlog grew more untenable, the state moved to add workers.

"I have been with the agency 21 years, and I have never seen it this bad. We can't work like this anymore," Linda Perez, a supervisor in San Benito, wrote to Health and Human Services Executive Commissioner Tom Suehs, who had sought employee input. "Morale is low, but we come to work every day with the hope that things will get better."

Like much in life, privatization is neither all good nor all bad. It can be done well, and it can be done poorly. But it always must be done carefully. On the IBM datacenter contract, there is evidence that the state may have underestimated what it would take for a private vendor to take over the services. And, as on any privatization contract, there always is the danger of underbids to get the contract.

It's a lesson worth learning again. And we're glad the secretary of state's office moved to prevent us from learning it the really hard way by way of lost election data.

There's a related lesson -- also worth relearning -- in the food-stamp mess.

Texas is blessed with many fine state employees, often willing to go above and beyond the call of duty, who do their jobs and deliver services even when the politicians and higher-ups screw things up.

URL: http://www.statesman.com

---

Nov. 6

The Dallas Morning News on the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall:

"From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the continent," Winston Churchill declaimed, not long after the final shots of the Second World War were fired in Europe. The Cold War was on. Fifteen years later, East German authorities erected a physical manifestation of the Iron Curtain, a hideous concrete wall dividing the former German capital.

The Berlin Wall, the foremost symbol of communist tyranny, stood for more than a quarter century, until Nov. 11, 1989, when the anti-communist earthquake spreading throughout Eastern Europe rent Soviet communism's veil.

Who can forget the delirious scenes of celebrating Germans, divided so cruelly for so long, hacking the hated barrier to bits? On that night 20 years ago this week, we saw the end of a world that tens of millions, East and West, feared might always endure. Three years later, the Soviet empire, like the Berlin Wall that had been its monument, collapsed.

Everything seemed possible in those days of rebirth and revolution. But contrary to optimistic expectations at the time, history did not end. In fact, it resumed in the Balkans, which again fell prey to religious and ethnic wars. Russia, ravaged by seven decades of Soviet misrule, did not become a free-market liberal nation but descended into drink, depression and the despotism of mobsters and oligarchs.

The last 20 years have been happier for other former Eastern Bloc nations, who rejoined Europe as free, peaceful countries. Once-divided Germany has been a source of strength, economic dynamism and stability that has benefited all of Europe -- and, in turn, the United States and the world.

Twenty years ago this week, Angela Merkel was an East German chemist. Last week, she stood in Washington before a joint session of Congress as the chancellor of a united Germany and told U.S. lawmakers, "I know, we Germans know, how much we owe to you, our American friends. And we shall never -- I personally shall never -- ever forget this." Nor should we forget the courage of American leaders, Republicans and Democrats both, who never lost sight of the true nature of the evil empire. Not all of us were so clear-minded and steadfast on the side of right.

In his classic 1984, George Orwell imagined a totalitarian future that would be like "a boot stamping on a human face -- forever." It might have been, and indeed was for millions of souls for far too long. But 1989 was the answer to 1984, and the miraculous joy of Berliners standing triumphant atop the Wall was startling evidence that history is made, not fated, and that the last word does not belong to evil.

URL: http://www.dallasnews.com

---

Nov. 6

Fort Worth Star-Telegram on the shootings at Fort Hood:

A tragedy as stunning as Thursday's mass killings at Fort Hood evokes extreme emotions.

Perspective is difficult -- but absolutely necessary to understanding what happened and its implications.

The rush of information after 13 people were shot to death at the U.S. Army base was at once extensive, incomplete and occasionally wrong.

Military officials believe Maj. Nidal Hasan, a 39-year-old Army psychiatrist, fired a handgun in a center where about 300 soldiers were waiting to get vaccinations and eye tests as they prepared to deploy overseas.

A female police officer is credited with wounding Hasan, who was taken to an area hospital under custody.

Many details about his background emerged quickly: He was born in Arlington, Va., to Palestinians who moved to the U.S. from Israel. He grew up in Virginia's Roanoke Valley and graduated from Virginia Tech University. He received a medical degree from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md., and worked six years at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. A lifelong Muslim, he attended a mosque in Silver Spring, Md. He moved to Fort Hood in July.

But much is not publicly known yet, including his motive, partly because officials had not interviewed him. He was in a coma on Friday and on a ventilator, according to news reports. Investigators will have to determine whether his behavior had provided warning signs that he might engage in such mindless violence. And the public will want to know what would cause a military officer to fire on unarmed fellow soldiers.

A key point to remember is that even though authorities believe Hasan was the gunman, even if he is formally charged in the killings, he's entitled to the presumption of innocence unless and until the government proves he's guilty.

Some news outlets seem obsessed with Hasan's religion. Some online commentators have seized the opportunity to spew hateful denunciations based on ignorant stereotypes.

But Hasan's personal faith might have had nothing to do with his actions. The New York Times quoted his cousin as saying that Hasan dreaded his imminent deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan and that he was shaken by the horrors conveyed to him by patients who had been traumatized by war.

It could be months before important details are sorted out and become public. It took until October for the Army to release a report about Sgt. John M. Russell, who's accused of killing five people at the Camp Liberty combat stress clinic in Baghdad in May. The 325-page report detailed how Russell's fellow soldiers were worried about his behavior but procedures for dealing with him weren't clear enough.

Military personnel and their families face enormous stresses. These are exacerbated by the long wars the nation has been involved in. The Army is trying to improve its suicide-prevention efforts. But officials must determine what more can be done to improve safety on military bases.

The public can help most by avoiding baseless speculation and instead offering support and thanks for those who serve and their families.

Despite the old ad campaign slogan, there is no such thing as an "Army of One." We're all indebted, and the Army's loss is a loss for all our nation.

URL: http://www.star-telegram.com

---

Nov. 8

Houston Chronicle on canine witnesses:

With very little science to back them up, so-called scent lineups have been used extensively to convict defendants in Texas courts.

Dogs sample the odor of a suspect and several other persons and sniff crime-scene evidence. Then they indicate to their handlers through signals whether there's a match. In many law enforcement jurisdictions, officers can use the evidence to justify a search, an arrest, even a criminal charge.

One of the leading practitioners and popularizers of the technique is Fort Bend County Deputy Keith Pikett, who has constructed a lucrative career testifying to the accuracy of his pack of bloodhounds, colorfully tagged with monikers like Columbo, James Bond and Clue. In testimony for prosecutors, Pikett has claimed that his dogs are almost never wrong in their determinations in thousands of cases.

That assertion is under fire in federal court in Houston, as three men wrongfully accused on the basis of Pikett's scent lineups are suing for damages after spending months in jail.

Cedric Johnson and Curvis Bickham were charged with capital murder after Pikett's hounds linked them to a charred gas can found at the scene of a triple killing. Johnson spent 16 months in jail and Bickham eight before all charges were dropped. Another litigant in the federal suit, Ronald Curtis, was incarcerated after the dogs implicated him in a string of cell phone store burglaries. He spent eight months in the slammer before the real thief was arrested.

As a report issued by the Innocence Project of Texas documents, the practice of using of dogs for scent lineups is unreliable and amounts to "junk science." Police agencies in the Netherlands that pioneered the technique have concluded it has limited value and should only be used in conjunction with solid forensics, such as DNA.

Texas lawmen are not alone in using erroneous scent lineups to implicate suspects. In Florida, three men have had convictions overturned based on discredited testimony by dog handlers.

If the Texas Forensic Science Commission ever finishes up its delayed investigation of arson findings in the case of executed convict Cameron Todd Willingham, members should start sniffing up the trail of scent lineups.

URL: http://www.chron.com

---

Nov. 9

San Antonio Express-News on the military budget:

Credit President Barack Obama and Defense Secretary Robert Gates for restoring a little fiscal sanity to the military budget. The president signed the 2010 defense authorization bill last month.

At $680 billion, the measure still authorizes plenty of federal spending on programs with questionable value to any military challenges on the horizon. Congress authorized $560 million for research on a controversial alternate engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and for 10 additional C-17 transport planes. In both cases, the Pentagon and military planners say the projects aren't needed.

However, Obama and Gates were able to pare down some of the more egregious examples of politicians trying to use the military budget to score home-state and home-district federal spending. A veto threat from the White House capped the number of F-22 Raptors at levels recommended by the Air Force. The White House was also able to kill programs to build an airborne laser for missile defense and an extravagant new presidential helicopter.

These are programs deemed unnecessary by military leaders or are irrelevant to counterinsurgency operations the American military is currently engaged in and will likely continue to face in coming years.

Another sound change in the new defense measure is that it authorizes $550 billion for the Pentagon's base budget as well as $130 billion for U.S. operations in Iraq and Afghanistan for the current fiscal year. That's an attempt to actually budget those wars, something the Bush administration -- which consistently relied on supplemental funding outside the normal Pentagon budget -- never did.

The budget process isn't over. Now that Congress has authorized military spending for 2010, it still has to appropriate funds. That gives politicos on Capitol Hill and special interests another crack at larding the defense budget with earmarks for unneeded projects and weapons systems. The Obama administration and watchdog groups will need to remain vigilant.

URL: http://www.mysanantonio.com/opinion