So Wyden is right on track to turn himself into the next Sen. Ted Stevens, doing his all to keep his state sucking on the Federal teat?

Senator Smith is completely right on this issue and you Oregonians would be saying exactly that if we were talking about any other state. The idea that Oregon counties and localities are due some sort of Federal largess because they have large tracts of Federal lands has always been suspect. Oregon timer counties are really no different from any other rural area in the country. In fact, they are probably in a better position to tax themselves than many.

Compare the typical Oregon timber county like say Josephine County (Grants Pass) to the typical rural Texas county. In Josephine County Federal timber lands are untaxed BUT (and this is big BUT) the county is not generally responsible for road maintenance and provision of services on Federal timber land. The Federal government builds and maintains its own forest service and BLM roads. Contrast that to where I currently live in central Texas. In rural areas, Agricultural uses are generally exempt from county property taxes, yet the county is still responsible for maintaining the massive network of local county and farm to market roads and for providing all sorts of services to rural residents.

I grew up in Oregon and I know that complaining about taxes is a time-honored sport. But it is ridiculous to think that Oregonians are overtaxed, or can't pay for their own dang libraries and police. My wife and I own a house in an unincorporated area outside Waco that is appraised by the county at almost exactly the same value as my parent's house in Salem. Both my house and my parents house in Salem are appraised at around $200 grand. Yet in this bastion of freedom and Republicanism called Texas, I pay over $1,000 more in property taxes than my parents do within the city of Salem. Not only that, the local school district here just pased a major bond levy on the first try to build several new schools in the area. And the county community college just passed a huge bond levy for something like $200 million in improvements and new construction. The vote was over 66% in favor. So our property taxes are going up even higher. The local library system is also proposing a new bond measure to completely rebuild the central library and remodel some branch libraries. And it will probably pass. Not only do we already pay a LOT more property taxes than the typical Oregonian, we seem to have no problem increasing them even more to pay for the services that we expect and want.

Add to that we have a LOCAL sales tax of 2.25%. That is on top of the 6% state sales tax which is separate and the conterpart to Oregon's income tax.

My point is that millions of people live in rural areas around the country where lots of land is basically untaxed due to agricultural exemptions yet still manage to fund their own local governments without sucking on the Federal teat. Here in suburban Waco the local school districts are building beautiful new schools, they not only have all-day public Kindergarten, but also all-day public pre-K. When my wife and I were looking at relocating back to Oregon last fall we couldn't find a single area between Portland and Salem where the local schools had all-day public pre-K.

Texas has plenty of its own problems. I grant you that. But the whining coming from Oregon on these Federal subsidies is really pathetic and unseemly. And I suspect you all would be screaming and cackling about it if this were some scheme by Sen. Stevens to bring a couple more billion to Alaska.

I can't imagine why that's necessary or needed. Children under the age of five have no business in a full time public school setting, in my opinion. Its not developmentally appropriate and its hugely expensive--two very big downfalls of such an animal. IMO, Waco would be better off investing the money in middle school, high school and higher education.

So in your world, mother's shouldn't work but stay home with their preschool age kids? Or should they just be rich enough to put their kids in whatever posh private montressori type preschool is in the neighborhood?

The fact is that pretty much every single industrialized and civilized country on the planet has public or very highly subsidized early childhood education. The fact that Texas is doing a better job with it than Oregon should give you cause for pause.

Doesn't Texas have a sales tax, though? I can't imagine all that money used for building the spanky new schools is coming just from property taxes.

Yes Texas has a sales tax. But like Oregon, pretty much the lion's share of school funding is from local property taxes. It's probably cheaper to build schools in Texas because land is cheap and construction costs are lower. But that's beside the point. My larger point was that people in this part of Texas already pay far higher property taxes for local services than do the typical residents in places like Grants Pass and Medford where much of this anguish is coming from. And they are walking to the ballot box to tax themselves even more for new schools, community colleges, and libraries. In fact, it isn't even that controversial. That's just a fact of life for people in most other parts of the country. This so-called fiscal crisis in much of rural Western Oregon is mostly self-created.

Maybe so, but it's rarely directed at 2, 3 and 4 year olds. And the complaint was over ALL-DAY preschool, which I agree is rather ludicrous. They're just not up for that much at that age, according to my wife the preschool educator--and you better believe I trust her experience and scholarly knowledge on the subject.

No, the complaint was over all-day pre-K which is directed at 4 year olds. In a public school setting, "all-day" means from 8 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., the same schedule that regular kindergarten and first grade follow.

That is a far cry from the 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. schedule that a whole lot of private preschools and daycare centers follow.

OK, I looked it up.

In Texas, school funding is 49% local, 40% state, and 10% federal.

http://www.investintexasschools.org/schoolfunding/current.php

In Oregon, school funding is 53% state, 36% local, and 11% federal.

http://bluebook.state.or.us/education/educationintro.htm

The crisis is self-created in that most of these local governments have budgets that far exceed their local revenues. And instead of deciding to raise local revenues, they have chosen instead to slash public services. It would be interesting to look at the total taxable renevue base of a town like Medford and compare it to a comparably sized town in another state. I seriously doubt that Medford has a lower tax base just because of nearby forest service lands. Most unimproved land anywhere in the country is taxed at very low rates, if at all. In Texas agricultural land is exempt from property taxes. I fail to see how that is any different from forest service land being exempt.

In any event, this is really nothing new. Rural Oregon has known this was coming for a very long time and only because western senators have had a lot of seniority have they managed to put it off for so long.

I would really like someone to identify private preschools that go from 7 am to 6pm, or anything like it. Not daycares, which are wholly different--preschools.

TJ, I think you're mistaken on this one. A lot of preschools operate as joint daycares, including CityKids in the Portland Building. They do preschool curriculum for part of the day, and daycare actitivites the rest. It's not uncommon for a kid to be there from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. They're not wholly different animals, and a lot of educators have lobbied for public funding of preschool education because there are still kids who show up in kindergarten without having attended any preschool at all.

As for the larger point, Kent is right that this is a provincial concern that only seems important because it directly affects Oregon. It's no different than other "pork" that helps the local community. I support continuation of the funding with a slow phase-out, but let's not be self-righteous about it. If this money was going to another state, particularly a red one that happened to have Senators in high places, we would oppose it.

Well, it is and it isn't. It's more about what happens in the public debate:

Progressive person A notes that the so-called liberal media is actually a tool of the rich and favors the candidates of the rich relentlessly. Person A notes that the Democratic workhorse senator actually gets the job done, while GOP showhorse senator does not.

Then, from deep right field comes a lob from Waco (how perfect) comparing taxes in Texas and Oregon THAT DOESN'T MENTION THAT (A) TEXAS HAS NO INCOME TAX AND (B) THAT TEXAS IS ABOUT READY TO SINK FROM THE WEIGHT OF DOD SPENDING, and that the state receives far more in spending by the federal government than it pays in taxes, whereas Oregon, like nearly every blue state, is a DONOR state that pays for the red states to sit around and complain about welfare (Oregon and Wisconsin are always at the bottom of Pentagon spending--and therefore, all federal spending--because they were led for years by people who were courageous enough to stand up and oppose Vietnam and the military has never forgiven them.)

So we see the same pattern in small scale and in large: the facts are inconvenient for the GOP controlled media they dispense with facts, just like Kent from Waco dispenses with crucial facts important to understanding the comparison he's trying to make.

I admit that I was sorta embarrassed when this issue came up last year -- these payments started in 1993; 14 years really ought to be long enough for a county to either cobble together a new economic foundation or decide to shut down and move. What does it say about Oregon that so many of our schools are clinging to revenue from an industry that's been shut down since today's high school seniors were in play-school?

And the fact that other states are more dependent doesn't reassure me one bit. I want Oregon to be the proudest, strongest, most capable, most independent of all the states -- and then I want to widen our margin on the runner-up. "Not as bad as Texas" is not adequate as a goal for Oregon!

But when I want us to be independent, I mean I want us not to need help, and to have help to offer. I don't mean I want us to be too damn stupid to know when we need help or to ask for it, or to accept it graciously. And I'm really glad Wyden was able to forge a plan to both get us the help we need and to push us to get ready to live without that help.

Now if only it doesn't get vetoed.

Back to the point of subsidizing Oregon (and other state) rural counties... realize that many wonder about the challenges by environmental urbanites that helped put 25 Oregon rural counties into a "significant economic disadvantaged" condition. So, isn’t it a bit ironic that Oregon rural counties that once were able to pay their own way are now being subsidized by the rest of us good taxpaying urbanites. Thanks comrade Wyden...

JAC's point reminds me of the heartbreakingly adorable and heartbreakingly tragic young girl who came to testify when President Clinton was out here in 1993 ...

Her community was within commuting distance of what the timber industry estimated was five years' worth of cuttable trees. It was a wonderful community, where everybody supported the winning high school football team. Please, Mr. President, this child begged, please, please don't make us stop cutting timber, or we'll have to shut down the school and my 5-year-old brother will never get a chance to play football there.

Even if none of those pesky environmentalists had intervened, there was never a hope for that boy to play football in that town.

(Now I think of it -- it's possible that with the replacement payments, those people could still be there, still rooting for that team. I'm sorry I don't remember the name of the high school.)

But without "challenges by environmental urbanites," the people of that town would have had to find new jobs and probably new homes almost a decade ago. I grant you, it would have been easier, as there would have been other temporary towns available near other temporary stands of timber where they could use their best skills ... but then, they would not have had targeted federal subsidies to their libraries and community colleges to help them find those new jobs.

Resource extraction is part of the American way of life, as are ghost towns.