Graves, Bill

English

Research Papers in Economics

THE MICROWAVE  SOCIETY AND  CROCK-POT
GOVERNMENT
Governor Bill Graves
State of Kansas
I am pleased to welcome this very diverse group to Kansas. We thank you
for  coming,  and  are  glad  to  be  able  to  acknowledge  the  role  that  Barry
Flinchbaugh's played over many years in agriculture and rural Kansas economic
development.
Kansas  has the enviable position of not only being geographically  the
center of the  United  States,  but right  now,  in  a public  policy sense, the
agricultural center of the United States. We probably have more clout than
many of you think we deserve. But we're going to take it and keep it for as
long as we can. But any time you discuss the creation of the farm bill back
in Washington, you have names like Bob Dole, Pat Roberts, Dan Glickman
and Barry Flinchbaugh come up. We have all of  the big names working for
us, and I hope that speaks well of  this country, and I hope in the end, reflects
positively on how the farm bill  is reworked.
This gives me the chance to say to all of you how important we believe the
work you do, in the land grant universities of  this country, is to the back- bone
of this nation,  and agricultural  policy.  The graduates you  produce  lead this
country. Thus, we are pleased that you decided this year to come to Kansas to
have this conference.
Barry asked  me to speak about citizen involvement  and public policy
development.  I made a note when he said that I got over 60 percent of the
vote;  I'm glad that he didn't ask me to talk  about political  involvement,
because six out of 10 voted right in the last gubernatorial  election, so they
obviously have their politics straightened out. But I'm going to start with
citizen involvement.
It made me think ofthe oration that I wrote for the Optimist's Club rhetorical
contest  as a sophomore  in high school  in  1968. Without boring you with the
entire  speech, it began  something like this: The American  education system
reflects the values of  our nation. One of the most important values taught in our
schools is that of citizenship.  Since the beginning of my own education,  I've
been made aware of the importance of good citizenship; that is the survival of
democracy  in America.  I have  learned  that  a democracy  depends  upon  its
people, and its people must take an active role in this nation's affairs in order to
ensure that our heritage of democracy might be passed on. This participation by
the people is called good citizenship. I got second place for that speech.
15I was thinking back about that, and the fact that there are some people who
no longerthink that the education system reflects the values ofournation. I hope
that it does, and I hope we continue to invest in the American education system,
because  I believe  that it is a critical  link to developing  citizenship  skills and
values in young people, who are so very important today.
As  Governor,  I have  discovered  the  best place  to  learn  about citizen
involvement and  to get advice and  input,  is  someplace many  of you  are
familiar with,  and that's at the State Fair, which I attended  about 10 days
ago.  A gentleman  walked  up to me and  said, "Governor,  you are doing a
great job, so far."  Then I went by the Kansas Veterinary Medical Associa-
tion Birthing Center. I don't know how many of you have birthing centers
at  your  state  fairs,  but this  is  a  big  deal  in  Kansas.  We  actually  have
bleachers, and people come in and sit around for hours and wait for a cow,
or hog,  or something, to give birth at the birthing center. I walked in with
the executive director of the Fair Association to take a tour of  the new center,
and there was a young veterinary  student from KSU, a young woman who
was taking care of twin calves that had been born the day before. We stood
there  and asked  a lot of stupid questions,  and I would  have assumed  she
knew we were probably politicians, but instead she turned to us and asked,
"Are  you all  a group of veterinarians?"  The director of the fair was quite
embarrassed that this young woman didn't recognize  me, and he said "No,
this is Governor Graves." This young woman looked at me and it was clear.
she didn't know who I was, and she didn't care who I was.
I mention that to you because, as I thought about that, in a funny sort of
back-handed way, that was the ultimate compliment to somebody in public
service. What if some of us could go through our terms in office and perform
the  duties that we  are  required  to perform  without  becoming household
names?  It seems to  me, that,  in  this country,  one of the reasons  there is
cynicism  and distrust among the electorate,  is because  most of what they
know about us comes from hearing all the bad things about public officials.
We all know more about Bob Packwood than any of us want to know, and,
this  is  not just  in  Republican  politics.  We  all  know  more  about  Dan
Rostenkowski's problems than we want to know, and we all have our own
favorite  list of those people who have gotten themselves  in trouble.  So I
guess my goal is to go back to the fair next year and hope somebody doesn't
recognize  me; probably says that I've been  doing all right.
I've been governing  Kansas for nine months,  and I think that I have a
fairly interesting and unique perspective  on being a new Governor. Most of
what we do and where we work seems to be internal. It's kind of the inside
"baseball  stuff."  You put together a cabinet and staff. You go to work on
some of  the issues of  the day. You make critical appointments, and again it's
16basically  internal.  You  work  with  the  legislature;  that's  kind  of inside
"baseball  stuff."
The point where we come in contact with the general public is always on
those policy matters that are of greatest concern to them. That's what keeps
you up late at night more than anything else in this business. In fact, a friend
was counseling me and advised that, "Governor, you need to understand that
you just can't be all things to all people," which may sound like good advice.
Although  in spinning that around,  I would say to you  in your respective
states,  and  depending  on  who your respective  leaders are at  a particular
moment in time,  or on a particular issue, that your leader can't be all things
to all people. How  many of you want to volunteer to be  in the group that
doesn't get served because I'm having a bad day? Who wants to get left out
in the cold in terms of the responsiveness of voting the way you want us to
vote  or on  addressing the  issue  you want  us to address'?  Who  wants to
volunteer to be part of that group?  The answer to that is, nobody wants to
be part of that group. That's the problem with public service today. We are
expected to be all things to all people, regardless of what the difficulty of
the issues are that we face. And we have some  issues that are no different
from the issues that are taking place  in your state.
We are having a great debate right now about closing a mental health or
mental retardation hospital in our state, because we believe that, if we spend
more dollars in community services, we can do a better job of taking care
of people.  We think that the old bricks  and mortar approach  has out-lived
its usefulness. We are trying to find a balance between closing down a state
institution and rechanneling  our effort and our energy  into communities.
That seems to make sense. But there are always those conflicting interests
of the patient, the family and the people that work in those institutions, who
don't want to see that happen.  The communities that are going to lose the
economic  impact of those institutions don't want to see that happen,  and,
yes, collectively, the state probably knows it's in our best interest to move
in that direction. Someone  is going to go away not feeling very good about
that problem.
We're having a big debate about gambling  in Kansas. We seem to think
everybody's leaving  Kansas  and going to other  states to gamble.  I don't
know if that's true or not, but I've been  saying to folks, "Why  don't we
resolve this issue once and for all, and have a statewide constitutional vote
to see whether or not we should have gaming in the state?" It seems to make
sense. But not to some people, because they feel the gaming interests have
a tremendous amount of money, and will come in and influence all of these
folks, who don't know any better, to go out and support having expanded
gambling in Kansas. So, some don't even think we should have a statewide
17vote on the issue. They think we should just do our jobs as public officials and
just say "No" to influence on gaming in Kansas. I happen to be one who thinks
citizen involvement  in that regard is very important.
How about speed limits? That's going to impact everyone in this room. Just
how fast is too fast?  How fast do people need to go to be satisfied in terms of
speed limits in this country?  I have a horrible problem. Everywhere I go I am
driven by members of  the Kansas Highway Patrol. These guys drive the speed
limitallthetime! I thinkI'm in the one caron the roadthateveryone else is going
past. There is a genuine public policy debate in this issue, and it has to do with
public safety. We try to find the balance between making sure we don't have
accidents,  take  lives  and have the type of property damage  associated  with
automobiles, by keeping speeds at a reasonable level. At the same time, it is not
government' s desire, and not my desire, to restrain people from moving quickly
and efficiently around our state to conduct business or for whatever purpose. But
again, it's one of those issues where I can line two people up in this room and
have them on opposite sides of the issue.
We're debating how to keep all the bad guys in jail. Every state is probably
struggling with prison construction. Every time I talk about this issue, I think of
the Kevin Costner movie, "Field of Dreams," where they said, "If you build it,
they will come." We have, in our public debate, and in our legislature, made a
decision that we want to put bad people away, and as a result we need to spend
dollars to build more prison space. But, at the same time, we have a lot ofpeople
saying  that we should  be more focused  on community  corrections;  that we
should be investing our dollars  in  programs that will keep  individuals from
repeating  crimes and from coming back to our corrections  facilities. I don't
know that  we can  do both,  because the Kansas  taxpayer,  and I would  bet
taxpayers  in most of your states, are very, very, unwilling at this moment to
absorb any more financial  obligation on behalf of the state.
The list goes on and on, and I could discuss a number of others. But let me
tell you where I see this whole thing going. I'd like to describe the dilemma that
we're faced with in public service, as the microwave society trying to live with
a crock-pot government.  Stop and think for a minute. Everyone of us gets up in
the morning and we fire up the oatmeal in the microwave. On the way to work
we run by the same-day dry cleaner, and just before lunch we run in and pick
up the photos we left yesterday. And then we drive through McDonald's, and,
when the voice comes on the speaker, we order lunch and someone hands it to
us in a plastic bag. Everything we do, and with every day of  our lives, we become
very, very impatient. I think what we're seeing, at this moment  in history, is
people who are impatient with the government that really hasn't changed much
over  many,  many  years;  thus,  the  microwave  society  and  the  crock-pot
government. But I would submit to you, and I would imagine most of  you would
18agree, we're probably fortunate that we have the system of government that we
do, the slow deliberative process that we go through.
I want to suggest three things to you and you'll think I'm preaching  to the
choir. First of  all, in this microwave society, it is as critical now as it always has
been, that we continue to focus on education, and to make sure that people know
as much as they can about this system of  government so they can understand and
appreciate  it. Joyce Carrey, an English author, once wrote that it's the tragedy
of the world that no one knows what they don't know, and the less the person
knows, the more certain they are that they know everything. For those of you
who didn't get that, it's the tragedy of the world that no one knows what they
don't know, and the less the person knows the more certain they are they know
everything. I would submit to you that we have a lot of people like that, whether
it's their fault or not. It might be simply the circumstances of growing up in a
situation where they didn't have educational  opportunity.  We have a  lot of
people  who  are  uneducated  about  the  political  system  and  the  system  of
democracy that exists in this country. As a result, we find a lot of  people making
a lot of outrageous, uneducated, ridiculous  statements, and yet, most of those
people firmly believe  in a lot of those things that they are saying.
I think for us to get everybody singing out of the same book and on the same
page, we need to continue to encourage, no matter how long you've been doing
it,  and beating this drum, education. It is so critical to this country and the future
of our nation. Lack of education will undermine the democracy that has served
this nation so well for so many years. I think that we need to say to people that
they  need to appreciate the system of democracy that we have. In Kansas, and
every other state,  except  for the  unicameral  government  in Nebraska, every
single citizen gets represented inthe House of  Representatives on apublic policy
debate. Then they have the opportunity to be represented  in our State Senate on
a  public  policy  debate.  Then  a  governor  gets the  opportunity  to represent
collectively all the people in our state before signing, or vetoing, or making any
decision on legislation. Three times, people have someone, who is charged with
looking  out  for  their  best  interest,  involved  in the  process.  It's  slow  and
cumbersome, and does sometimes create confusion, yes; but I think it contains
the kinds of checks  and balances that are so critical to good public policy.
In  the  15  years  that  I've  been  involved  in  state  government  in Kansas,
anythingthat usually has been rushed through at the lastminute, or has been done
in a hurry, has ended up being wrong. And we probably regretted doing it. Not
always the case, but in most instances.
We have tremendous diversity in Kansas. If  you travel from the northeast to
the southwest, you would think you were  in two different worlds,  in terms of
geography,  in terms of the population, and in terms of the difference between
19the agricultural community and small manufacturing. Right now you're in
Johnson county, which  is probably the fastest growing, and soon to be the
largest county in our state. We have a county in western Kansas  where we
could take all the people who reside in the county and put them on a bus, or
buses,  and bring them  into this  hotel,  and they could  all check  in  for the
night. Now when you talk about diversity, this is not a large county by many
of your standards. We have about 400,000 people residing here. I think there
are  around  1,200  residing  in  Wallace county.  We have to make  or create
public policies that service both the 400,000 who are here in this county, and
also that small number in western Kansas, and again that makes it difficult
to be all things to all people.
So,  I would  first  of all  reiterate  that  education  in  terms  of citizen
involvement  is  so  very very  critical,  because  without  sound  education,
they're likely to be involved in a counter-productive sort of  way. Secondly,
I think, by being educated, it will create a citizenry with a greater apprecia-
tion for the wonders of the process that we have in this state and this country.
And I think that, finally, that appreciation will reinforce the realization and
the  understanding  that  government  can't  be  all  things  to  all  people.
Hopefully, folks will be more inclined to be patient with us and understand
that  we  are  all  working  for  the  best  common  interest,  but  sometimes,
individually,  you'll feel  like you've  been left out in the cold.
Again,  I thank Barry for inviting me to come over and get a chance  to
extend  my thanks to you all  for traveling to Kansas.  We're  glad that our
weather  is cooperating  to a certain  extent.  We're  all proud  this morning
because for the first time in the history of our state, both our football teams
are ranked  in  national polls.  For a number of years, the word  "rank"  had
nothing to do with quality relative to the football programs  in Kansas. But
we all woke up today on a high note. It's great to have you all in our state,
and I hope you have a productive conference.  Enjoy yourself while you're
here, and travel  safely on your trip home.
20

THE MICROWAVE SOCIETY AND CROCK-POT GOVERNMENT

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