Capitol Comments

Alzheimer's and the Aging Population

Do you know the impact of cognitive impairment in your state?

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is working with the states to collect that data to identify the health problems in each state to support health policy development, according to Lynda Anderson, chief of Healthcare and Aging Studies at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Anderson detailed the CDC’s work in the workshop, State Policy Challenges as More Seniors Live Longer, Friday during The Council of State Governments 75th Anniversary Spring Meeting.

The states lack information on cognitive impairment, she said. The CDC project, she said, has developed data to show what is happening in 100 cities across the country.

Beschloss: Great Leaders Make the Tough Decisions

Shortly before he left office, George Washington sent John Jay to London to enter into a treaty to ensure the British would not invade the United States again.

“As a result, when Washington left office, a huge number of Americans had turned their back on him,” presidential historian Michael Beschloss told the crowd gathered for the keynote luncheon Saturday during The Council of State Governments’ 75th Anniversary Spring Conference.

Similarly, advisers told Abraham Lincoln he should forego issuing the Emancipation Proclamation if he hoped to be re-elected in 1864.

“He was tempted,” Beschloss said.

And Harry Truman had to decide in the spring of 1940 whether to recognize the new Jewish state of Israel. He did, over the objections of many, including his wife Bess, an anti-Semite, according to Beschloss.

State Legislators Can Drive Innovative Transportation Finance

State legislators need to be aware of what’s coming at them when it comes to financing transportation projects. That’s the simple truth from Kathy Ruffalo, who is on the National Surface Transportation Infrastructure Financing Commission.

Here’s what legislators face: The federal piece of the transportation finance pie—the Highway Trust Fund—is not raising enough money to put back into the system, she said, “We are in trouble.” People are driving less, she said. “Last month we had the largest decrease because of the fuel prices in this country,” Ruffalo said. 

“That’s only going to exacerbate the problem,” she said, adding that as people buy less gas, less tax goes into the system to maintain and build America’s roads.

Sabato Gazes into Political Crystal Ball for Conference

Larry J. Sabato gazed into his crystal ball Saturday at The Council of State Governments Spring Conference in Lexington, Ky., and not only tackled election reform and the primary system—but also managed to offer his predictions for the 2008 presidential election as well.

Sabato’s new book, “A More Perfect Constitution,” offers his solution to the current frontloaded primary system. He advocates writing a lottery-style primary system—where regions take turns going first—into the Constitution.

The way things are right now, he said, just isn’t working. “It’s too much—too much politics,” Sabato said. 

Plenary II: Larry Sabato Discusses State Election Reform

Plenary II—State Election Overview and Reform
Saturday, May 31
10-11:30 a.m.
Embassy Suites, Coldstream Ballroom, 1st Floor

Front-loading—It’s the rush to the voting booths as the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary take their place at the head of the line. It’s the expectation that one presidential candidate will be left standing by the time last-to-vote states such as Kentucky, Montana and South Dakota get their turn at the polls.

But critics argue that the front-loading frenzy primary system just doesn’t work. They argue that every vote should count and some experts say the current primary system just isn’t conducive to that.

Lessons Learned from Presidential Leadership

Keynote Luncheon
Saturday, May 31
Noon to 1:30 p.m.
Griffin Gate Marriott, Grand Ballroom, 1st Floor

State government officials can learn a lot from presidential leadership.

That’s the message presidential historian Michael Beschloss intends to impart today during a luncheon keynote address.

“What I’m particularly interested in is leaders who take risks to do the right thing,” he said.

Beschloss, a prolific author of historical nonfiction, knows something about such leaders. He’s written books on several presidents, including Lincoln, Eisenhower, Franklin Roosevelt and Kennedy. He’s studied presidents who jeopardized their popularity or careers to do the right thing, such as ending slavery, winning a world war or bringing civil rights to America. His new book is “Presidential Courage: Brave Leaders and How They Changed America.”

Gingrich Tackles Real Change

He spoke about Reagan and history and the way things were. “Think about a world where the dominant medium is radio ... there are no iPods …” former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Newt Gingrich said. And with a dose of history he launched into his talk about change.

He took Friday’s audience and brought them through historical changes that illustrate what change is all about—including big-scale change in government.

He used examples such as New York City’s plummeting crime rates in the 1990s to illustrate change in government all the way to examples of how the founding fathers shaped the country.

CLE Workshop Offers Look into Cybersafety in the States

Rep. Johnny Bell was in a Kentucky middle school talking to children about the dangers of the Internet and cybersafety. He asked a simple question.

When he asked about MySpace and who had a MySpace page, he said, “Every hand in the building went up.”

Kentucky Attorney General Jack Conway, who accompanied Bell, advised the children that they were breaking the law, because they were under age 14, Bell said jokingly.

Broadband Drives the Future

Mark McElroy of Connected Nation showed a picture of a mule pulling cable into a rural eastern Kentucky community. Before the mule was a community that wanted broadband. Behind it was a public-private effort to get that service to them.

“This is digital inclusion in Kentucky,” McElroy said during the technology workshop Friday morning.

Connected Nation began as a public-private partnership in Kentucky and has expanded into several other states as the need to expand broadband technology across the country grows.

States Face Tough Times in Corrections

Kentucky has the highest growth rate in state prison population according to the new Pew Center on the States report, “One in 100: Behind Bars in America 2008,” released in January. And that means corrections issues are on the minds of Kentucky’s state officials—and many other state officials across the country.

In fact, according to the Pew report, Kentucky isn’t alone.

Last year, states spent more than $49 billion on corrections, up from $11 billion 20 years earlier.