Thinking Inside the Box

Somebody has to say it, so I will: It is time to raise taxes.

Sales taxes, property taxes, income taxes, I don’t care. We’ve got to do something drastic, because this political po’ mouthin’ has got to stop.

I know such a radical idea might not thrill the John Locke Foundation or the N.C. Citizens for a Sound Economy protesters who showed up to chant and drink tea in front of the legislature Monday afternoon, but hey, you call ’em like you see ’em.

And I see big trouble coming if we don’t send the government some big money in a big hurry. The heavens are already ablaze with warning signs.

Out in Knightdale, a once-humble country town where the colorfully named Jack Ass Road was a major thoroughfare until squeamish boosters had it changed, politicians are saying goofy things such as, “We’ve got to look outside the box.” Mayor Joe Bryan has been to one too many leadership seminars when he effortlessly spouts consultant gibberish like that.

What Mayor Joe saw when he looked outside his box was a new water tower going up near the highway. And on that water tower, Mayor Joe saw a swoosh:

“If Nike came up and said, ‘We’re going to put a swoosh up there and it’s going to be real nice, and we’re going to pay you half a million dollars to do that,’ I mean, that’s worth discussion.”

A “real nice” swoosh?

If this is a bluff for more money, it’s a good one. The thought that Knightdale would become, like the UNC-Chapel Hill athletics department, a wholly owned subsidiary of Nike is disturbing. I once would have laughed off a threat to put advertising on the town’s water tower because in the old days, the countryfied teenagers of Knightdale would have quickly turned the swoosh into a “Kevin + Krystal” pledge of eternal love writ large in John Deere green paint.

Unfortunately, Knightdale’s young folks seem to have gone the way of Cary’s slothful youth, who are content to sip lattes while town employees paint “Class of 2002” on that town’s water tower. Hiring out your teenage vandalism sort of takes the fun out of it.

Perhaps WUNC radio could take a lesson from Knightdale and threaten to run Nike commercials if their fund-raising drive doesn’t bring in enough money. In fact, if there is any tax money left after paying Knightdale not to sell its soul to the devil, perhaps we could throw a little cash WUNC’s way.

Anything would be better than on-air fund raisers endlessly chanting “nine-six-two-nine-eight-six-two” like it was a religious mantra instead of the station’s phone number. True

story: In one four-minute break Tuesday morning, I heard that number repeated 12 times. The message I got was, “Pay up, or we’ll drive you crazy.”

Not that there is a snowball’s chance in Hades that taxes will be raised this year. Rep. David Redwine, the Democrat who is co-chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, spoke for most legislators when he said, “I don’t think tax increases of any kind have much of a chance, since it’s an election year.”

How’s that for putting the welfare of the state above your own political fortunes? Not exactly a profile in courage, is it? I guess the 150 anti-tax tea drinkers got their self-serving message heard loud and clear.