Steven Latimer

BREAKING

There are rumors flying around that at today's 4 p.m. meeting of the VCU Student Senate, there may be articles of impeachment introduced.

Check back later tonight for more details and developments.

UPDATE (10:35 p.m.): At today's Senate meeting, no articles were introduced, however it is being said that articles may be introduced sometime later this week or next. Stay tuned ...

UPDATE (4 OCT 12:18 p.m.): It appears all this may have been wet. If anything else develops, I'll post it here. --SCL

In a news release issued today, the Republican Liberty Caucus came out swinging against the U.S. government's proposed bailout plan, in which our federal government actually purchases key businesses that have failed and cannot stand on their own.

The organization's chairman, Bill Westmiller, starts the release by besmirching the government takover of bad businesses, then discusses why his organization feels that this current financial stress was caused by too much government intervention and regulation, not less. Finally, Westmiller laments over the lack of accountability measures in these "Government Sponsored Enterprises." He concludes by thanking those who are standing up against the proposed bailout.

The entire text of the RLC news release can be found here.

Carolina over Atlanta
Cleveland over Cincinnati
Jacksonville over Houston
Denver over Kansas City
New Orleans over San Francisco
Arizona over New York Jets
Green Bay over Tampa Bay
Tennessee over Minnesota
San Diego over Oakland
Buffalo over St. Louis
Dallas over Washington
Philadelphia over Chicago
Pittsburgh over Baltimore (Monday night)

(Week 3 Record: 10-6; Cumulative Record: 27-20)

Last week while traipsing through Oliver Hall, I was taken aback when I found the office of Dr. Robert Reams seemingly vacant.

Oliver Hall houses VCU's Department of Mathematics, among others.

I could only assume that Dr. Reams' office had been relocated or that - being a journeyman mathematics professor - he decided to accept a teaching position elsewhere.

After searching through the VCU website, I found that Reams has indeed left VCU after at most five years as a professor. Greener pastures must be at SUNY Plattsburgh; on his official VCU webpage, Reams writes:

My new address from August 2008 will be: Room 239E, Hawkins Hall, Department of Mathematics, SUNY Plattsburgh, Plattsburgh, NY 12901

This makes SUNY Plattsburgh at least the sixth American university Dr. Reams has taught at. (See Reams' SUNY Plattsburgh faculty listing here.)

The scraggly and often humorless Irishman taught me a pair of 300-level mathematics classes during my sophomore year: Introduction to Mathematical Reasoning, and Linear Algebra. A pure mathematician, Reams' tutelage helped me develop a greater understanding and appreciation for topics such as set theory, the elements of proof, and linear algebra. Were it not for Dr. Reams, I would not have obtained the high degree of mathematical comprehension that I have today.

A farewell to Reams.

Kansas City over Atlanta
Buffalo over Oakland
Chicago over Tampa Bay
Carolina over Minnesota
New England over Miami
New York Giants over Cincinnati
Tennessee over Houston
Washington over Arizona
Denver over New Orleans
San Francisco over Detroit
Seattle over St. Louis
Cleveland over Baltimore
Indianapolis over Jacksonville
Philadelphia over Pittsburgh
Dallas over Green Bay
San Diego over New York Jets

(Week 2 Record: 10-5; Cumulative Record: 17-14)

Because I am a libertarian, I'd be completely amiss if I did not mention that today is "Constitution Day," a day initially ensconced in the mind of Sen. Robert Byrd in 2004 because Americans are supposedly ignorant of our founding document.

(Williams' article can also be read here, courtesy of the Jewish World Review.)

Virginia Commonwealth University appears to be in full compliance of Big Brother's mandate, and to boot, has a showy Constitution Day website to show for it, here.

Curiosity killed the cat, so I decided to attend the lecture today by the State Solicitor General for Virginia, Stephen McCullough. In a nutshell, McCullough argued to a small crowd that while the United States is generally more pro-freedom than other countries in the West, there are concerns on the horizon, especially if our Constitution becomes a delegitimized scrap of paper, like what happened to the Soviet Constitution.

Carolina over Chicago
Cincinnati over Tennessee
Green Bay over Detroit
Jacksonville over Buffalo
Kansas City over Oakland
Indianapolis over Minnesota
New York Giants over St. Louis
Washington over New Orleans
Seattle over San Francisco
Tampa over Atlanta
Arizona over Miami
San Diego over Denver
Baltimore over Houston
New England over New York Jets
Pittsburgh over Cleveland
Dallas over Philadelphia (Monday night)

(Week 1 Record: 7-9; Cumulative Record: 7-9)

The first speaker was Jonathan Williams of ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council. Williams cited the results of ALEC's new study, Rich States, Poor States which seeks to establish a correlation between taxation policy and wealth.

Then Ed Braddy spoke. He is the executive director of the American Dream Coalition. Braddy spoke on how flawed "smart growth" and "new urbanism" really are. While appearing innocent, these models frequently end up controlling people against their wishes, rather than controlling urban space, argued Braddy.

George Mason University Economics Department chairman Don Boudreaux then rounded out the speakers with his talk on "Political Myths." I introduced myself to the nutty professor prior to the coalition meeting commenced and mentioned to Dr. Boudreaux that I am a VCU student majoring in mathematics who aspires to become an actuary. Boudreaux looked approvingly, even likening me to Milton Friedman - who once wanted to become an actuary himself. (Boudreaux surmised that this means I will win a Nobel Prize, just like Friedman did. Hmmm ...)

Then it was time for a "news conference" on an initiative that the National Taxpayers' Union is doing on taxes. NTU's national kickoff was to begin in Richmond, but according to Gottstein, the media read the press release (below) wrong and thought the conference was scheduled for Monday. After the representative from NTU spoke, State Senator Ken Cuccinelli was scheduled to speak, however because Cuccinelli was running late, the conference had to end without him.

Gottstein summed up what he thinks Cuccinelli would have said: "Tirade, tirade, tirade! Taxes bad!"

I scanned the press release I received yesterday, which is below:

Some of the more enthusiastic readers of this blog will know that I have been giving a bit of coverage to the election in Arizona's fifth congressional district, and particularly to Susan Bitter Smith. (See here and here.)

Normally I don't pay attention to Arizona politics, but I have been making an exception because I am friends with Bitter Smith's niece, Angela.

Susan Bitter Smith's campaign for Congress came to a screeching halt last Tuesday when she lost the Republican primary to David Schweikert, reports KSAZ-TV (FOX 10) here.

Despite being endorsed by Sheriff Joe Arpaio, Bitter Smith couldn't pull it off. Schweikert faces incumbent Representative Harry Mitchell (D) who stands for re-election to Congress for the first time.

Yesterday when I saw that the masthead of Thursday's Richmond Times-Dispatch proclaimed that plans are underway to create another unelected transportation (taxing) authority - this time for the Richmond region - I almost had to do a double take. So reports RTD staff writer Will Jones here.

Created in earnest under the guise of raising revenues to fund transportation projects, these regional transportation authorities almost always without fail turn into unelected, regional taxation authorities, which is not what we need. These RTAs, as they are known, severely undermine sovereignty of the people.

I'm not suggesting all taxes and fees are automatically bad. Rather, any taxes and fees need to be approved by the voters via referenda, rather than by unelected regional authorities. If created, the Central Virginia Regional Transportation Authority will do the latter.

Jones of the Times-Dispatch writes:

Authorities were set up for Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads, but a Virginia Supreme Court ruling essentially knocked them down as unconstitutional. The central Virginia proposal is structured to avoid a similar entanglement, said Henrico County Manager Virgil R. Hazelett, who prepared the draft.

Now, I understand the need to avoid challenges in court, but you have to realize that RTAs are very unpopular. Just ask former Virginia State Senators Marty Williams and Jeannemarie Devolites Davis, who fell victim to intense public outrage when the Virginia General Assembly passed HB 3202 during the 2007 session.

Whether or not a proposed Richmond RTA can justify itself in court, there is little demand among the people for another layer of government that is difficult to afford. Our leaders would be wise to understand this. Unfortunately, I fear they won't.

Throughout the NFL regular season, I will be picking winners of football games across the league. Here are my picks for Week 1 (all games are on Sunday unless otherwise noted):

Washington over New York Giants (Thursday night)
Seattle over Buffalo
Pittsburgh over Houston
New Orleans over Tampa Bay
Atlanta over Detroit
St. Louis over Philadelphia
Jacksonville over Tennessee
New York Jets over Miami
Cincinnati over Baltimore
New England over Kansas City
San Francisco over Arizona
San Diego over Carolina
Dallas over Cleveland
Indianapolis over Chicago
Minnesota over Green Bay (Monday night)
Denver over Oakland (Monday night)

Check back next week and see how I did!

Super Bowl XLIII will be held in Tampa Bay on February 1, 2009. The 2008 NFL season begins tomorrow night when the New York Giants and the Washington Redskins play in the NFL kickoff game. This will coincide with John McCain (R-AZ) accepting his party's nomination for President of the United States.

I'm predicting that the San Diego Chargers will beat the Seattle Seahawks in Super Bowl XLIII.

I'm probably wrong, but I wanted to put this on the record in case this does happen. That way I can say "told you so!"