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Vol. 18, No. 41, APRIL 10, 2006 |
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The Friday Program: Reforming Elections for the Preservation of Liberty (Bob Williams) | Friday Potpourri | Classification Talk: Roger Allington | Cinco de Mayo Heads-Up | Retreat Recap | Rotary First Harvest Work Party | Membership for Young Members | Another Classification Talk: Tim Leahy | District Conference Update | Web Fun |
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The Friday Program:
Williams has written many articles on the Foundation’s topics, to include the topic of Friday’s program, “Reforming Elections for the Preservation of Liberty.” One of the EFF’s main goals is to bring about election reform. “Your President-Elect (Zidar) mentioned your recent retreat where you discussed your club’s mission, vision, and goals. We need an exercise like that in this country. I’d like to propose a solution: that every elected official in our area gets a copy of Rotary’s Four-Way Test!” President Lingenbrink welcomed the audience and introduced two new members to get the meeting off and rolling. Jim Everist gave the invocation and led the pledge to the flag; Mark Meyer greeted visiting Rotarians and guests. President Steve said the new Kirkland Breakfast Rotary Club, sponsored in part by the BBRC, will send a delegation to the Saturday Rotary First Harvest Work Party at Pier 91 in Seattle. This would be the new club’s first official community service event. It was great to see Don Deasy, tanned and ready, after his winter hibernation on Maui. Glad to have you back, Don!
Roger Allington, a native Californian, has been a Washington resident since 2001, moving here from Alaska. Roger, whose classification is “Consultant-Transportation,” worked for CALTRANS, the California State Highway Department, for several years, before moving north to Alaska in 1969. There he became State Highway Engineer for the largest state in the U.S. His main interest is the “interaction of the driver and the highway and the science of road building." Roger married his wife Reva in 2001, creating a “blended family” which now resides in Bellevue. With that, Roger finished his requirements to retire his Red Badge and was promptly given his new Blue Badge to the applause of the membership.
Including partners of members, 69 people attended the retreat. retail therapy, golf and, for the first time, skiing were featured distractions, as the members wound their way through rain and snow to the quaint village of Leavenworth. Hospitality at the Enzian Inn was superb, with an included breakfast Saturday morning. Zidar thought that the 2006 Retreat would go down as the “Year of the Chicken Dance.” Bob Ottos Polka Pals provided the music, and Margie Burnett knew just about every dance imaginable. “Her classification of Exotic Taxation takes on new meaning,” Jim observed. “I now know what CPA means ... Certified Party Animal!” The Saturday business session featured breakout sessions where topics such as Fundraising (Kopczynski), Giving (Kuechle) and Project/Membership (Noble) were discussed by all of the attendees. Sign-ups for committees for the 2006-2007 Rotary year commenced, with members urged to sign up for at least two.
Upon completion of his report, President Lingenbrink awarded Jim Zidar the plaque for March 2006 Rotarian of the Month, for his leadership in planning and executing the annual Planning Retreat. Jim, in turn, praised the excellent talents of Sayoko Kuwahara in making sure all the details were covered for the event. It really was a fine meeting. You all are invited next year. Following the lead of Steve Luplow and Tom Smith, the Bellevue Breakfast Rotary Club Board of Directors has embraced a proposal to increase the diversity of the club by offering special membership to persons under the age of 35. The proposal includes a reduced fee structure of half dues for the young member’s first three years of membership. Steve Luplow called attention to a prospecting form on each table to be used to let the committee know of potential members who would qualify in this new Young Rotarian category. The program will be administered under Club Service II as a new Membership Development initiative. Current BBRC members are asked to contact the committee, headed by Luplow, with names of prospects. Another Classification Talk: Tim Leahy Tim Leahy, who quickly has become an icon with his auctioneering presence, gave his classification talk doing the “First Annual Jimmie Z Auction.” Armed with his classification of “Auctioneering,” Tim began auctioning off his Classification Talk done in auctioneer terms — that is, fast and with very few breaths. He sounded like those people who do the disclaimers for automobile commercials, only you could understand Tim! To the delight of his audience, Tim got through it all and earned his new Blue Badge. Congratulations, Tim! Below are links for forms and information pertaining to this year's District Conference (all PDF):
The Friday Program:
Williams has written many articles on the Foundation’s topics, to include the topic of Friday’s program, “Reforming Elections for the Preservation of Liberty.” One of the EFF’s main goals is to bring about election reform. “Your President-Elect (Zidar) mentioned your recent retreat where you discussed your club’s mission, vision, and goals. We need an exercise like that in this country. I’d like to propose a solution: that every elected official in our area gets a copy of Rotary’s Four-Way Test!” America’s founders traded in their bullets for ballots, Williams observed. “All U.S. citizens are eligible to vote, except for felons. A recent report put out by Department of Justice contained sad news. There are currently 120 election fraud investigations ongoing. There are criminal investigations underway in nearly two-thirds of the states. Voting fraud is a major problem. Both major parties are guilty of sponsoring vote fraud and undermining the rule of law. Most of our election officials believe that it should be legal for as many people to vote as possible. The Evergreen Freedom Foundation says the Constitution should prevail. People should meet the qualifications, be a resident, and be registered.”
“The accuracy of elections is under fire. People do not have confidence in their elections. When that happens, liberty suffers.” Questions from the audience: What about the charges that Electronic Voting Machines are open to fraud? What about Gerrymandering voting district boundaries to favor a party or candidate and the ability to vote in term limits on elected officials?
Thanks to Bill Brooks for his introduction. To s upport Rotary’s Literacy program, the BBRC has donated a book in Bob Williams’ name to the Ready-to-Read program of the King County Library System.
A little house with three bedrooms and one car on the street, In the kitchen on the wall we only had one phone, We only had a living room where we would congregate, We had no need for family rooms or extra rooms to dine, We only had one TV set, and channels maybe two, For snacks we had potato chips that tasted like a chip, Store-bought snacks were rare because my mother liked to cook, Weekends were for family trips or staying home to play, When we did our weekend trips depending on the weather, Sometimes we would separate to do things on our own,
Then there were the picnics at the peak of summer season, Get a baseball game together with all the friends you know, Remember when the doctor used to be the family friend, The way that he took care of you or what he had to do, Remember going to the store and shopping casually, Nothing that you had to swipe or punch in some amount,
There was a time when mailed letters came right to your door, The mailman knew each house by name and knew where it was sent; There was a time when just one glance was all that it would take, They didn't look like turtles trying to squeeze out every mile;
The record player had a post to keep them all in line, Oh sure, we had our problems then, just like we do today, And why would boys put baseball cards between bicycle spokes, |
A shot across the bow: fair warning for a picture-taking session for the directory in a few weeks. All members who have not had their picture taken will be notified of the date.
Bob Williams, former Washington gubernatorial candidate and member of the legislature for five terms, is president and senior research fellow at the Evergreen Freedom Foundation (EFF), headquartered in Olympia. Founded in 1991, EFF is a private, non-profit, public policy research organization with a mission to advance individual liberty, free enterprise, and limited and accountable government.
Friday Potpourri
President-Elect Jim Zidar gave a one-sided, biased and very prejudicial report on the previous week’s Annual Planning Retreat, saying, “You missed a good one!” Well, yes, it seemed that the 50 members attending the retreat would agree. “The Reveille for April 4 contains a pretty good wrap-up of our work,” said Jim.
The Club Leadership Plan is part of the agenda for the next year, a plan put forth by Rotary International in hopes of streamlining Rotary clubs. Tom Smith led a presentation on Mission, Vision, and Values, and a committee will function to hash out the details of that discussion. Highlight of the morning was Phil Salvatori’s “resignation,” which served as the April Fool joke of the day!
Bob Williams, former Washington gubernatorial candidate and member of the legislature for five terms, is president and senior research fellow at the Evergreen Freedom Foundation (EFF), headquartered in Olympia. Founded in 1991, EFF is a private, non-profit, public policy research organization with a mission to advance individual liberty, free enterprise, and limited and accountable government.
The Motor Voter Act, passed during the Clinton Administration, required drivers license officials to ask, when renewing a license, whether the person wanted to register to vote. There was no other requirement, no inquiry as to the citizenship of the person getting the driver’s license. This requirement of gathering no information about the person was deleted in 2004. But, during that time, Williams contends that “in King County, fraud has flourished. Many reforms are needed now. The greatest potential for fraud is voting by mail. The potential for tampering with ballots is great. What happens to the ballot when it’s mailed in? Where does it go? Who handles it? The Evergreen Foundation says all ballots must have a paper trail.”
So, how do we clean this up? Williams calls for the “urgent need to update registrations. We must require proof of citizenship. Once we clean up the voting rolls, we need volunteers to observe elections. We need to observe controls over ballots during the whole election cycle.”
Williams closed by saying there is a great need to return to citizen legislatures. “The more it becomes a full-time job, the less a legislator pays attention to constituents and the more removed the lawmaker becomes from the people.”
MEMORY LANE
Then there were the movies with your favorite movie star,
The milkman used to go from door to door, 
One time the music that you played whenever you would jive,