Stupid American
This generation is something alright…let’s see if the baby boomers can turn EVERY American into a war mongering, illiterate, drug addict (anyone want an ambien?) by the time they’re all collecting those social security checks that were supposedly “never going to be there by the time we retired.” Maybe if the boomers spent a little less time pissing and moaning about what their neighbor was doing, and a little more time making sure they left a better world for the rest of us, we wouldn’t be FORGETTING HOW TO READ. Maybe it’s because I’m a liberal, but reading is probably the most enjoyable thing I do on a non-sex day. It really pisses me off that we’ve basically doubled our national debt in 7 years by fighting a stupid war while cutting taxes for the rich, and in the meantime getting dumber every day.
I know one thing…we’re going to need more than just basketball players reading to kids on television commercials to get this trend moving back in the right direction. We’re going to have to push the boomers aside once and for all, study up on what the rest of the world is doing to educate, employ and provide health care for its people, and admit finally that we have a problem. That’s the first step towards recovery…right? Anyways, for the parents reading this, take the time to make sure your spawn don’t end up being illiterate mopes watching TV every night of their adult lives. Set a good example. And badger Congress for more money in education. The boomer and replica young Republicans will insist that when you spend money on schools, books and paychecks, it’s a waste. They’d rather we spend that money on some missiles or overpriced Halliburton chili-mac. Ignore them. They’ve had their chance to govern, and from Reagan until today, movement conservatism has been most likely to result in stories like this one:
(WaPo) Americans are reading less and their reading proficiency is declining at troubling rates, according to a report that the National Endowment for the Arts will issue today. The trend is particularly strong among older teens and young adults, and if it is not reversed, the NEA report suggests, it will have a profound negative effect on the nation’s economic and civic future. “This is really alarming data,” said NEA Chairman Dana Gioia. “Luckily, we still have an opportunity to address it, but if we wait 10, 20 years, I think it may be too late.”
Al,
Are you telling us that all the money we spent with Dept. of Education has been wasted, all of those empty courses and all the wonderful self-esteem stuff was useless?
We should have insisted upon classes in the good old 3 R’s instead of allowing liberals to ruin our educational system. Don’t blame conservative principles, you know better than that. Badger congress for more money, wow, what a novel idea!
All those charter schools parents are dying to send their kids to probably won’t help anyway because the NEA still runs them. Let us not however, allow anything like school choice via vouchers. In that case, all the parents would pull their kids out of the useless public school system that hasn’t figured out that one size does not fit all, that hard nose reading, writing, and math are of real value.
NEA Chairman Dana Gioia thinks this is alarming but figures it isn’t too late to fix the problem. Of course it isn’t too late, we have a whole new first grade class every year that can still be salvaged if we get the corrupt teachers unions out of the picture.
We also have the option of sending our kids to private schools like our elite politicians do, except for the fact that we are stuck paying for the public school system and we don’t make the big bucks they do.
Also, if you are going to study up on what the rest of the world is doing to educate and employ their citizens, be sure to pay attention to those nations that don’t have a corrupt teachers union and the kids are given real class work. As for the employment part, just look at those nations that are turning towards a free market system, not like our EU friends who have created the socialist workers paradise with its 15-20% unemployment rates. While you are studying up on health care, be sure to ask the English how well they like their Hillary Care and speak to the Cnadians who come here for treatment.
You claim you are a liberal, and you certainly sound like one.
Television is helping to dumb everybody down. You just sit back and stare at the screen. Pretty soon the little munchkins are in alpha mode and absorbing everything. And I mean EVERYTHING. You don’t even need to use the particular eye muscles used in reading. But what’s worse is the subliminal messages. Consume, spend, be popular, leave the heady stuff to the experts, and the real men are watching sports all day long.
The least we can do is take a “hands off” approach to private schools and home schooling (which are a means of escape if the school is just awful) Of course, (and this is obvious to some not to others) this entails no more fancy schemes where textbooks in these areas have to be “official”, they’re free of most government regulations, and no more fancy schemes which allow public money into these areas. (there’s always a catch)
well said, Joe.
Al
LOL! You’re a piece of work!
All the money spent on these schools, unionized labor and administrators due to Democrat policies, and you have the gonads to blame the other side? Is that a joke? Let’s see….
1. Drop-out rates continue to sky rocket….I’m not certain, but I’d guess this, too, is the fault of evil conservatives FORCING kids to drop out at record rates.
2. Out-of-wedlock pregnancies among teenagers are higher today than at any time in history….Darn! Those traditional evil conservative values again!
3. Single-parent households in both the white and African American communities are now the norm. In fact, more than 70% of children born to African-American women are born to a father-less household. The percentage is nearly 25% in the white community and rising steadily. Isn’t it odd that these “issues” only surfaced when the enlightened 60s generation came along? Clearly this MUST be an evil conservative conspiracy.
Now let’s see……in D.C. for example, the taxpayer spends MORE THAN $10K per year per pupil. The same is true of most big cities regarding dollars spent per student. The dollar figure has risen steadily since the “enlightened” days of the peace, love, flower-power generation of the 60s when “self-esteem,” free condoms, etc, etc became the norm in schools due to DEMOCRAT policies.
Please Al, enlighten us as to how, exactly, this is all the fault of conservatives.
If that wasn’t so ridiculous it would be hysterical!
VOTE GOP! Vote FOR America!
Very informative. It’s not about the education of the kids…no, we’ve got to kill the union first. And until the union is dead, the conservative movement will nickle and dime the system, then blame liberals and the union for all the problems.
Why is it that following the New Deal, in the 1950s, 1960s and into the 1980s, the United States had public schools that succeeded in educating the children?
The rhetoric is fine for radio shows, but if we’re not more concerned about our own prejudices than we are actually about actually providing American children an education, then why rely on it here and now? Has the radio simply convinced you beyond the shaddow of a doubt that the children aren’t learning because of liberals and teacher’s unions?
Joe – if all you can offer in response to “Americans are reading less” is a couple transcripts from the Rush Limbaugh show, then:
1) Are you REALLY “above the fray”, not being a Democrat or a Republican…or are you just another a Republican who has become embarrassed in recent years?
2) Are you the type of guy who puts ideology above people (in this case the children)?
I suspect both answers are ‘yes’, which means you’re about as qualified to be President as this three hole punch I’ve got on my desk.
But keep plugging away. You’ll sound authentic to the idiots at least.
SgtMac,
You’ve got your programmed responses also. Very good. Too bad they haven’t been updated since the 90s, because the GOP controlling every lever of government for most of this decade has only managed to make things worse. The trick for Republicans is to only complain about education, never actually improve anything, but instead focus entirely on finding ways to blame whatever’s wrong on the liberals, nig*ers, border jumpers, condoms, unions, aCaDeMiA, single parents, television…
All the Republican Party has are clever ways to bitch about things. It’s the only thing you guys do well at this point. Hell, if governing was about nothing more than kicking back, pointing fingers and hooking up friends with jobs, things would be getting better, not worse, and Republicans would still be in charge of everything.
The sad truth is, you guys started believing the bulls*it Limbaugh and others were spouting on the radio, and here it is 10 to 15 years later, you’re saying the same thing you said back then. You’re still falling for the con.
Are you Republicans actually that gullable? Do you actually think that once the teachers unions are gone, that Republicans will actually enact policies that will ensure the generation coming up is smarter? REALLY? What evidenice is there that your party cares at all about education?
Besides cutting pell grants, rigging the government school loan program to favor banks (inflating costs), cutting funding for headstart, school lunches, Boys and Girls clubs in neighborhoods across the country…
That is what happened when Republicans controlled the WH and Congress. Yet it’s the teacher’s unions…indeed.
And unlike your bulls*it, those cuts I listed are actually real…I can actually prove those things. But continue with the “what’s wrong with education” Limbaugh mantra from 1995, by all means…
Al,
I agree wtih you that our (public) schools stink, but, if you want more bang for your buck, privitization is the way to go. There isn’t one thing that the gov’t does better than the private sector…so why do we trust our kids education to it?
The money spent on Iraq has nothing to do with our education system. Throwing more money at a school doesn’t make the curriculum any more demanding or take away the distracting political correctness. Education is a problem that doesn’t need money thrown at it to be fixed. What is needed is a dose of tough love. Raise the standards, require more of students instead of giving more excuses for them not to succeed.
Are the kids of a hundred years ago any different than today’s kids? Culturally, yes, but there is no difference in ability or capability. One hundred years ago, kids learned (proper) English, as well as Latin and French. Today, we can’t even teach kids proper English grammar. Why? Because we don’t expect anything from our kids.
Aubrey –
The marines provide security at a lower cost and with fewer murders than Blackwater.
Army cooks can provide meals in the field of higher quality and much lower costs than Halliburton.
The government built the Eisenhower tunnel in Colorado (still safe to drive through), but the private contractors trusted with jobs on the Big Dig couldn’t be trusted to use the proper cement, so ceiling tiles fell and killed someone.
Social Security checks go out on time every pay cycle.
It is a MYTH that private interests and the invisible hand of the market always combine to equal a more quality, cost efficient good or service than would the government.
Evidence to the contrary is readily available. Insisting that:
When the evidence is not there to support such a statement, it should not be repeated.
FYI
THE TROUBLED ECONOMICS OF AYN RAND
by Mark Skousen
The founder of modern economics, Adam Smith, takes a different approach by trying to incorporate both concepts in his “system of natural liberty.” Smith and Rand are in agreement about the universal benefits of a free capitalistic society. But Smith rejects Rand’s vision of selfish independence. He teaches that there are two driving forces behind man’s actions–in his Theory of Moral Sentiments, he identifies the first as “sympathy” or “benevolence” toward others in society, while in his Wealth of Nations, he focuses on the second, “self interest,” the right to pursue one’s own business. Smith believes that as the market economy develops and individuals move away from their community, “self interest” becomes a more dominant force than “sympathy.” But both are essential to achieve “universal opulence.” (Smith 1965:11)
Adam Smith is famous for making a statement that sounds Randian in tone: “It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest.” (Smith 1965:14) But this statement is often taken out of context. Smith’s self-interest never reaches the Randian selfishness that ignores the interest of others. On the contrary, in Smith’s mind, an individual’s goals cannot be fully achieved in business unless he appeals to the self-interest of others. Smith says so in the very next sentence: “We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages.” (Ibid.) Moreover, he writes earlier on the same page, “He will be more likely to prevail if he can interest their self-love in his favour….Give me that which I want, and you shall have this which you want, is the mean of every such offer.” (Ibid.) Smith’s theme echoes his Christian heritage, particularly the golden rule, “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” (See Matthew 7:12)
Perhaps a true capitalist spirit can best be summed up in the Christian commandment, “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” (Matthew 22:39) Adam Smith and Ludwig von Mises would undoubtedly agree with this creed, but apparently Howard Roark and John Galt — and their creator — would agree with only half. And that’s a great tragedy for the greatest novelist of the 20th century.
“‘We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages.’ (Ibid.)”
I don’t agree, John. That quote doesn’t say to focus your concern on your neighbor’s plight. It says to appeal to his sense of selfishness. Give them waht they want in order to get what you want.
The quotes in this article do not support the author’s argument.
Al,
I like they way you compared Marines to the private security firms and not the Nat’l Guard or Reservists who ably manned the Abu Gharaib prison. Also, the Eisenhower tunnel and not the management of resevoirs here in Ga. And then you mention SS. Really? That’s a success for in your book?
We’ve covered the ground on education on this blog before.
Public education is as good or better than private education with the exception of Catholic schools.
But, AL’s right. It’s best to ignore facts and blame the system, Democrats, and teachers for false perceptions.
MD
Social Security is a shining achievement! Fully funded up until the 1980s, and following a tax hike in (81 or 82), one which hit middle and low income taxpayers only (incidentally, about a year after the high income and corporate tax rates were cut, leading to budget defecits)…
This money was surplus funds into social security. Those surplus funds were then used to pay for budget defecits (hence the IOU speech Bush would frequently give).
It made it so that politicians could overspend receipts without having to take the heat for it.
Regardless, the program has worked. It has served its purpose and then some. For the same reasons that the very idea of it was attacked during the Gilded Age, it is attacked today.
Whether it works or not, those who hate the very idea of shared burden amongst a society will always attack it. They’ll tell lies about it. They’ll create propaganda to teach us how it’s one step away from all the little boys and girls at the elementary school being taken from their momies and dadies and forced to work 18 hours a day in the communist diamond mines…
SOCIALISM…scary! It’ll rape your wife and take a dump in your favorite chair before you even know what’s going on.
Yet we celebrate the idea of having a military, stocked by people who sacrifice on behalf of everyone. THAT type of shared sacrifice is romantic…
Al
Nice reply. It’s a shame you filled it with rhetoric and crap. You failed to even mention that the ways of the democrats have been an abject failure desppite the evidence to the contrary.
Please explain WHY the public education system is failing.
Let me help you……go re-read what either Joe or Aubrey posted. Every word is true and accurate.
How is it that parochial schools, who spend FAR less per pupil, boast better graduation rates, better grades, and more successful and responsible citizens? Please check any Parochial School in any district and compare it to the public school in the same district and you’ll find this is true in virtually every case. How do they do this? I’ll tell you how;
1. A disciplined approach to learning and a clear understanding of how kids learn.
2. No molly-coddling and a curriculum that challenges kids to ANALYZE ideas on their own.
3. Oh, did I mention NO TEACHER’S UNIONS?
4. Let’s see….what else? Oh yes, no free birth control or condoms and clearly defined limits on students.
5. Academics before athletics and other non-academic “activities.”
6. How about a teacher actually degreed in Math teaching Math? Now there’s a novel approach. Maybe you can explain why public school teacher’s with an education or Liberal Arts degree teach Math, Biology, Physics, Chemistry, etc. in the public schools when private schools REQUIRE a degree in the subject being taught. Oh Wait! The Unions won’t stand for that!
Let me see if I understand you on this point Al, you seem to think that a good old fashioned “Liberal Arts” degree is good enough to be used to teach advanced Geometry, Trigonometry, Calculus, etc? Perhaps you should check out your local school district and actually see for yourself how many of these people are teaching subjects for which they are completely unqualified except for that “education degree.” Oh, I didn’t mention they get PAID the same as a qualified Math or Science teacher…..union rules again.
You know something Al, most of the time you post serious, intellectually honest stuff. However, every once in a while you expose your left wing for all the world to see and blather a load of rubbish about “radio talk show hosts.”
I don’t need a talk show host to tell me a person with a Math degree is better qualified than a person with an education degree to teach Math. I also don’t need you telling me this is a “conservative conspiracy” of some kind.
I recommend you do a bit of research on the subject and you’ll find, as I have, that making kids and parents responsible for their own success is a CONSERVATIVE ideal that you on the left poo-poo ad nauseum.
Instead of the typical blame assessment tripe, I recommend a close look in the nearest mirror. Maybe at that point you’ll see just who’s responsible for this mess and it’s certainly not anyone on the conservative side of the debate.
Joe
I seem to remember you saying you’re from Long Island. Recommend you take a look a this issue in both Nassau and Suffolk Counties. Check the Shirley school district in Suffolk and pick one out in Nassau (maybe Valley Stream?). You’ll find that there are a number completely unqualified people teaching Math and Science at the High School level. I’m not suggesting ALL math and Science teachers are unqualified, but you’ll be shocked by the number who are.
Vote GOP! Vote FOR America!
Al,
I admit that I haven’t done any in-depth research in to SS, but, can you name one reputable economist who doesn’t have dim predictions on SS?
Al,
I think your heart is in the right place in regard to education. We both agree, I think, that the end results leave quite a bit to be desired. The problem I have with simply tossing more money at this black hole is that it may feel better but there is no substantive change, just a more expensive version of the same, non-productive thing.
Sgt.
Coincidentally, I actually grew up in Valley Stream, and the education I received there was very good, but the times have changed. I haven’t been there is many years, but I lived for many years in New Mexico, and my daughter was home schooled for the first , few years of grade school, so I know a bit about that.
Al admits to being a liberal so I don’t think he understands the situation. As Aubrey states, pouring more money into the system is not the answer.
So Al, just to respond to you, I have never listened to Limbaugh or any of these other talk radio folks. Sgt. mentioned some ideas above but you seem to discount them. I have been watching our educational
system decline for many years and when I speak out about the teachers unions, it is because I have seen the changes they brought into the schools.
Morality & God- out the door
Right & wrong – that’s judging others
How a child feels – more important than learning to apply himself
Basic 3 R’s – irrelevant to the new everything is equal ideology
Now, we’ve gone even further!
Putting condoms on cucumbers to explain how they work, giving 11-12 year old girls birth control pills, teaching and encouraging the breakdown of the family by introducing Bobby’s two mommies or daddies, denigrating people’s faith, trashing the Boy Scouts and our military.
The latest folly being pursued is in Colorado where the decision to have a class valedictorian is being eliminated because it might hurt the feelings of those who didn’t achieve such high grades!
Study upon study has shown that parents if given the choice, will opt to take their kids out of the public system that has failed them. There is no way you can say that there wasn’t enough money provided. Besides the terrible waste of money from the DoE, places like NY instituted lotto games years ago to funnel even more money into the schools.
You claim that I am a fraud when I attack both parties, but that isn’t true. I believe that both parties are stuck in old liberal/conservative ideology that is based upon partisanship and power for the elites and the hell with the needs of the country. I think it is time for a new leadership that focuses on accomplishing real goals that are meeting the needs of our nation, and there are opportunities if we get out of the DEM/GOP/MSM propaganda trap that they have set for us.
I have no love for the GOP anymore than I do the Dems. They have both stolen our inheritance and jeopardized the future we are handing off to our kids and grandkids. The same old same old is finished. As President, I would challenge our congress, and in this case the teachers, to put aside the belligerent attitudes and arguments of the past and work towards a solution.
The ideas that I have on my website, not only for education, but for health care, immigration, taxes, foreign policy, etc. are designed to be starting points upon which to fashion policies that will work.
The first one is to get our budget balanced, really balanced, not some version of the numbers game that economists like to play. We will not be able to forge answers to most of the challenges ahead of us without doing that first.
Our needs are many, but they will not be met with more of the same old partisan politics of the two major parties. The biggest sorrow we will face will be another elite President who will continue the same divisiveness of the past.
I am against that first!
Joe,
Thank you for being against so much. Especially given your inability to address specific issues I’ve raised about your knowledge of the Constitution on other threads.
It is best to say everything is broken and place blame where ever blame can be placed.
Even if that means damning your country to Hell.
Well done, Joe
The Dems are wrong.
The GOP is wrong.
Teachers aren’t doing their jobs.
Economics are liars.
Leaders are worthless.
Money isn’t important for education.
Congress is worthless.
Government has failed.
Cops aren’t doing their jobs.
Judges are always wrong.
Any body you don’t hate?
First of all, with the technological improvements of our economy, and the fact that those improvements are generally brought to the market en masse by computers doing calculations, a math major would survey the job market and become a teacher only to accomodate an altruistic need to “give something back to the community”.
Ayn Rand is right on the money in a philosophical sense when she informs us that people act primarily out of self interest. She is wrong by taking it further and claiming that it is even more noble to act selfishly than to act selflessly. To act selflessly is to act irrationally, to the detriment of self and society.
Obviously the economic truth is that teachers with specified degrees aren’t going to take a $36K teaching job, when they can go work at a bank or a software company for $40K+…especially when the latter career track can equal promotions and a $20K bump in a few years, whereas a teacher has to earn a masters before they get a significant raise.
This hatred of teachers unions has justified the bleeding of their resources dry, and driven out young professionals who would have been more qualified and able to teach than the people we have today.
The people we have today are performing a public service, regardless of how Republicans love to paint them as crooks and swindlers – teachers in this country work damn hard for less than they deserve, and the results are obvious.
Ravi Batra is one that comes to mind right away. In fact, there are economists out there who weren’t buying any of the supply-side economics coming out of the Reagan administration, but I suspect that as media consolidation continues, the opportunity for a variety of opinion being heard decreases dramatically.
“Conventional wisdom” is always a formidable factor in the realm of economics. Every so often a great thinker will emerge with a contrarian view and be proven right. Ravi Batra is one of those people. This happens in politics as well. Groupthink is the condition.
An accepted norm for a big chunk of our lives has been that Social Security is a program about to self-destruct, but as I researched it more this past year, it was really mind-blowing how dishonest such a statement really is. My parents had this mantra about it all throughout my growing up, as if it were a foregone conclusion. Why wasn’t it known by mainstream Americans that while we were being told of Social Security’s insolvency, nobody was adding in the fact that the surplus balances (created by Greenspan and Reagan to head off a potential crisis in the future, this was the tax hike in 81 or 82) were being spent to cover the federal budget defecit every year.
That is a collective act of…something…and it’s bipartisan, this theft of our social security funds. Greenspan, Tip O’Neal, Gingrich, Bush Sr, Clinton, Reagan…it’s spanned across administrations.
This is another instance where the conventional wisdom fails. It is not a “black hole” just because we’ve been told that’s what it is for the last 10-15 years. The truth of the matter is, schools are given much less funding per capita in 2007 than they were in 1980.
The first part of the deal was to convince us that public schools are a problem, and then when the funds get sucked out of the system year after year, to the point where teachers are having to buy their own supplies at Staples, schools are having to send kids door to door to hawk crap (not for a class trip) to afford books…
It’s a national disgrace. Especially since this all happened while the government spent its way into $7+ trillion in debt. Where did it all go? You mean to tell me (not you Aubrey, but whoever’s standing around the soapbox) that a tax break for the rich that we couldn’t afford was a better invesment of these funds than in our schools?
Once again, providing more money doesn’t constitute a change in lesson plans. Joe is right when he says that schools have tossed, “Morality & God- out the door
Right & wrong – that’s judging others
How a child feels – more important than learning to apply himself
Basic 3 R’s – irrelevant to the new everything is equal ideology.”
The problem isn’t how much construction paper the kids have, it’s the content and quality of what they’re being taught.
As for Dr. Ravi Batra, I couldn’t find anything of his that says SS isn’t on life support. Maybe his books go into more detail but I am not going to run out and buy it.
I have to disagree yet again. You said, “To act selflessly is to act irrationally, to the detriment of self and society.” This is not the case. Actions that result in positives for yourself are the only rational acts. If I’m the butcher and make sure that my life is stable and secure, the village also benefits because of the service I provide. If I give my profits away to the village idiot and go out of business…the village suffers from the loss of my service. Such behavior is predictable, normal, and is the basis of free markets. This concept is also an argument to privitize schools. Just like the butcher, the schools and teachers will have to take ownership of their product because it is for their own good…which results in the greater good.
You’re changing the subject. Schools are keeping thermostats below 60 in some areas because of a lack of funding. You want to talk about God and morality?
So getting the books and the heat turned on is not the most important thing?
It is this tactic in particular that causes us to solve nothing in this country. By you responding to an argument that schools are failing with a lack of books and supplies with the injection of religion, the whole debate collapses. It is a diversion tactic.
I never ever ever had religion taught to me in the public schools I went to growing up, but I did go to Sunday School once a week. I think I ended up with a good education.
By me just going there though, it gives in to the diversion, and legitimizes it, as we might now get into a thread where Catholic schools are put up alongside public schools.
Aubrey, it’s not as if this hasn’t been planed out for a long time already. This is Grover Norquist’s vision in action…you starve the public institutions of money and competent leadership, then take advantage of the situation however it is most convenient. In this case, it’s the underfunded public school system versus private Catholic schools.
How nice – - – a fair fight…with one school system unable to pay to keep the heat on in the winter, and the other one funded by chips off the gold mountain back at the Vatican.
Then pump the idea constantly that money has nothing to do with anything and the teachers are all overpaid.
I just read his books. To be honest, I’ve never read anything in the form of an article or otherwise written by him. The last one I got was .01 on Amazon…about 3.50 after shipping. Besides the library, that’s where most of my books come from.
Have you read Ayn Rand’s “The Virtue of Selfishness”? You should pick that one up. I probably have it on audiobook, maybe I can burn you a copy. You’re speaking her language right there.
I can’t argue with it really. Where Rand and I become polar opposites, is when she gets into this whole concept of capitalism being perfect in its purest form, minus any and all government regulations. Movement conservatism has put her theories into action, and the results haven’t been good.
One big agreement between her and I is that the market is corrupted when the government picks and chooses winners and losers (think the awarding of contracts)…this is happening also when it comes to mergers and acquisitions. How political donations so easily turn into favoratism…
Crony capitalism is what this is, and it means that the best and most qualified players do not get what they deserve. It is called ’statism’…Cheney and Haliburton are textbook examples. Add in the lack of accountability, and it can’t be described as anything other than thievery.
Rigging the system to make oneself rich off of the people’s sweat is an anathema to capitalistic purists, but movement conservatism has always avoided having to deal with that one particular hanging chad. Between FEMA and the war profiteering, the chickens are coming home to roost on that score.
A political party cannot hang its hat on the virtues of capitalism for the sake of laziness or disintrist forever. It’s like a candidate proclaiming to be a super duper holy warrior, only to get caught doing blow and partying to death metal once they’re elected.
MD,
With regards to your posts 19 & 20 above:
Once again your anger towards me is showing as you either misrepresent or outright fabricate stuff I never said. Also, be sure to mention your superior knowledge of Constitutional court cases every time you attack me. I promise to admit you know more than I do about that, ok? I hope you’ll sleep better at night now.
You accuse me of saying everything is broken, which I never said of course. You are correct however that blame should be applied to those who deserve it. The elites who serve in government do so as hired help. If they do not do the right thing, I will certainly speak out about their individual and collective failure. Not only that, but I will also offer my solutions or proposals which you are free to disagree with and refute on every occassion. Why shouldn’t I speak out? For that matter, why aren’t you? Isn’t that what this site is for in part?
Whose country is this anyway? Is it their personal little kingdom, or an inheritance that belongs to us all?
1. I never said anywhere that I hate anybody.
2.I did not damn my country to hell.
3. Dems & GOP are wrong – I have stated many times that the Dems & GOP have pursued power rather than solve the challenges of the nation. I’m sure you can correct that with a thread on how our country is in great shape due to the policies of both parties over the last 60 years and show how I am wrong, not them.
4.Teachers aren’t doing their job – I believe it to be true that the teachers unions, not every teacher, are not serving the needs of our kids. I’ve been watching them for 40 years as the education of our H.S. & college graduates has continually declined . If you haven’t noticed that, you haven’t paid attention.
5. “Economists are liars”, not exactly what I said. I did say that they play games, i.e., they produce numbers depending on many different factors. Our own federal budget has many different categories; things like off budget, supplemental, deferred, etc. That is what I was referring to as you well know.
6.”leaders are worthless” another thing I never said. I have said that partisanship has replaced leadership in the two parties, but if you don’t think so, you could argue that our leaders are great statesmen and start that thread as well.
7.I never said money wasn’t important to education. I did say that the DoE has wasted billions of dollars because there has not been any improvement since its inception. I also live in NYS where the state lotto was created to generate even more money for the schools, and the kids in NYC are still suffering.
8& 9. Congress is worthless, govt. has failed. reread numbers 3 & 6 above.
10.Cops aren’t doing their job. Sorry MD, but I never said that either, you just made it up.
11.”Judges are always wrong”, well I never said that either.
Joe – How do you know that teachers aren’t doing their jobs? What resources are you utilizing to come to that conclusion?
You’ve seen the system decline, but why are you laying that all on the teachers? If management is incompetent, do we blame the workers when a company collapses?
Partisanship to me is a situation where one faction is completely ambivalent to the desires of all others. We like to play King Solomon and cut the baby in half because it makes us feel like we’re rising above in some way, but taking into consideration the fact that Senate Republicans have filibustered every meaningful piece of legislation this session, requiring a cloture vote of 60 to even allow for a measure to come before the full senate for an up or down vote…
C’mon – bipartisanship has become the dumbest word in our vocabulary…it’s a word that translates into “sucker”. When Democrats manage to pass a bill in a “bipartisan manner”, it means they bent over and took a big GOP elephant nose up the rear.
Go ahead and prove that the Department of Education has wasted billions. Just saying it doesn’t make it so. Movement conservatives have been repeating the same message long enough for such accusations to seem legitimate even when they’re not.
You’re longing to be considered an independant, but it’s not working Joe. More thought and skepticism need to be put into your positions. If you’re of neither party, then sit down and research for yourself what’s what, and leave all talking points behind.
I’d read up on Ben Franklin and learn how he did it if I were you.
“C’mon – bipartisanship has become the dumbest word in our vocabulary…it’s a word that translates into “sucker”.”
Don’t say I never agreed with you, because that is spot on.
Al,
The easy part is I agree with you on the bipartisan thing, and the screwing works in the other direction as well. Perhaps, if partisanship wasn’t the big problem it is, the bipartisan label wouldn’t sound so weak.
The filibustering by the GOP is instant replay of the Dems when they were in the minority. Partisanship is at the heart of my message, and I disavow allegiance to either party. That doesn’t mean I am not favorable to view that could be best described as conservative. I do prefer that approach but I give no free passes to the GOP. They are equally at fault with the Democrats for pursuing power and party loyalty rather than addressing the needs of the nation. I’m not surprised at their current antics in congress. It was entirely predictable, I think, inevitable.
The main issue of our declining educational system speaks for itself. Imagine the roads in your town are in good condition but need some attention. You vote in a bond to pay for improving and repairing them, but as time goes on, despite the money voted for, the conditions get worse, more pot holes, more ruts, more accidents due to the poor conditions. Wouldn’t you declare the project a failure and the expenditures wasted?
The declining test scores such as the SAT’s and PSAT’s, the continuing poor graduation rates, the acknowledged need for remedial classes at our universities for incoming freshmen, and our moving down the scale in comparison to students from other nations are obvious signs. The thread was started by the comments of this Dana Gioia from the NEA, that there is a problem. That there are troubles in our schools is more certain that Al Gore’s global warming.
The reason that I believe the teachers unions bear the most blame is that they have set themselves up as the authority for how education will be done in America.
They initiated the many different programs that changed the basic three R’s into experiments
promoted feel good about yourself over achievement
encouraged the abandoning of the idea of right and wrong for the concept of everything is equal so you don’t judge anyone or anything and threw reverence for God out the window
in general have advocated for disregarding the mainstream values of our heritage, attacking traditional marriage, advocating homosexuality, supporting and encouraging promiscuity, etc.
insisting on tenure shemes to protect jobs, rejecting teacher performance standards
fighting against and rejecting all attempts to provide vouchers for the poor, in reality resisting the private school and home school variations
writing, promoting, and praising of textbooks that distort history because they don’t meet their standards of fairness and political correctness
constantly asking for more money without giving us a better product
I don’t think you are disagreeing with me about the state of our educational system, but you seem to not want to hold the teacher’s unions accountable. Yes, the politicians have made this a football, but then again, I’ve been saying consistently that their partisan ways are not taking care of business.
Joe, I don’t want this to come off insulting, but level with me here. How did you come to believe that this statement is true? Did you query the congressional record?
The trip you’re on is one I’m sympathetic to myself. If Hillary wins the nomination, I’ll vote for a 3rd party candidate. If Chuck Schumer was one of my senators, I’d vote for the Republican if he wasn’t a supply-side, tax cut maniac. The reason I’m a Democrat though, is because I still honestly believe that when it comes to taking care of Americans (kids, veterans, those at the low end of the pay scale, people who can’t afford college, etc.), there are politicians in the Democratic Party who are in public service for that reason specifically.
Obviously that can’t be said for all politicians of any party, but when it comes to what I want to see government doing with my tax dollars, the Democrats put the money to work in people’s lives, while Republicans for my entire life (born in 1978) have first and foremost been about distributing it to those who need it the least.
I’m very disappointed in the party’s unwillingness to stand for the Constitution in the face of tyranny, but I’m not yet cynical to the point where I believe that having Democrats in charge wouldn’t make a difference. In 10 years I could be in the same boat as you are…Kurt Vonnegut put it perfectly in his last book title, “A Man Without a Country”…I’m already halfway there, but I still have hope that things can get turned around.
So I’m not taking your political beliefs for granted. That said, I have to question how seriously you follow politics. I’ll address the rest of your comment later on tonight, but I think this is the most important point I could possibly make to you.
The number of votes that have not been allowed to take place thus far in this session of Congress has been, historically, the highest in the nation’s history. The Republicans are on pace to shatter every other record of parlimentary obstruction from the first Congress up until today.
Democrats were accused by right-wingers of being obstructionists while they were in the minority, but if you look at the number of times they required that a cloture vote be passed in order to end debate (which they could just as easily have done as often as senate Republicans are doing it today), it is the type of comparison that cannot, under any circumstances, lead to the conclusion that they are equally culpable in this.
So Joe, I’m interested in knowing how exactly you came to the conclusion that all things in the realm of congressional obstruction are equal.
Al,
You are covering a lot of ground here, and you’re not even done with me! So I should start by saying that of course you shouldn’t take my political beliefs for granted. Perhaps I should tell you what they are.
The first thing I would say is that I am opposed to both parties because I believe they have become hardened in their liberal/conservative positions due to their quest for power above all things. Hence, serious needs are not being addressed by the folks we hired to do a job. The partisanship must end and the only way to break up this mess in Washington is to elect an independent President. Nothing else will get the politician’s attention.
Secondly, as a “boomer’ (born in 1946) from the generation of the 60’s, I happen to think like many others, that the government should be serving the needs of the people. Our modern society is totally unlike the pre-industrial revolution days. Some people watch too much TV and believe that every person in those “good old days” survived all by themselves due to their rugged individualism. That is absurd of course. Man is a communal creature and we band together to accomplish various tasks we could not do alone.
Fast forward to the 21st Century, when our vets return home from war, they deserve care, we cannot allow people who are elderly and have not been able to save enough money to be cast out into the streets. Social security is not perfect, but it is useable and workable. We also can’t have people dropping dead in the streets, so we need to solve the health care issue. My question to us all, politicians as well as voters is, how to make the government work to take care of the big items we cannot do alone. My personal belief is we can do more together than separately, but we have to use some common sense.
The partisanship has divided us up into for/against liberal/conservative positions that have plenty of room for compromise, not just for the sake of getting along, but because I think most of us Americans want to see smart policies that serve our needs and feel we can do that.
For the record, I think that we can devise so-called “liberal” policies that take care of our people while at the same time administering them in a “conservative” manner that spends the money in a wise way. The issues are many and the space for one comment limited, but I think the old adage of give the man a fish and he eats today vs. teach him how to fish and he feeds himself is a good one. So I do not hate the rich, and policies that favor job creation vs. govt. handouts are preferable. Indeed, I work for a company that was started by a man in his garage in 1965, and when I came to work here in 1987, it was about a $50 million a year business where I and 300 others have good jobs.
All of this leads to the question you have of why I see EQUAL obstructionism by both sides. I must state that I am not the only person who has observed this. It is probably the most agreed upon position of more people that, as some put it, “govt. is broken”! I agree but I identify the cause as power seeking partisanship. Every action in congress is immediately opposed by the other side.
The best example of that was provided by the Democrats when the President gave his State of the Union address a few years back and chided congress for failure to act on Social Security. EVERY DEMOCRAT stood up and applauded themselves for DOING NOTHING! It took John McCain and the gang of 14 to allow the President to get his court nominees to the floor for a vote.
The current obstructionism by the GOP is pure politics, but you cannot say that Reid and Pelosi are not provoking it. So much emotional anger is tied up in the war, and you must admit that the Dem. leadership has been putting into legislation items designed to provoke a veto. Honestly, the Republicans should have had many of their big spending ways vetoed by President Bush as well.
All of this proves my basic point, that the two parties are imprisoned by the ideological straight-jackets they have made for themselves, that we cannot get back to realistic ways to address the challenges facing the country until the power structure is shakened.
If your question is solely one of obstructionist voting and how many are on either side, then I admit that I have not kept count. To me, that is not important. Again, the most important issue facing the country is that the partisanship is caused by power seeking of the elites, and the result is a lack of leadership because everything they do (elites of both parties) is designed to secure advantage in the next election and create more power for the parties. I could almost bet that you and I could sit down and figure out where there are needs in the nation and come up with reasonable ideas on how to make policy that works. The Dems & GOP cannot, they are incapable of so doing!
So the issue isn’t which party is worse, it is how do “we the people” reclaim our authority by getting the hired help to pay attention to what we want, and how do we keep the freedoms we were given as our inheritance. That is the most important of all issues, because without those freedoms, everything else becomes subject to the will of a few men over the inalienable rights of us all.
You should check out a few pages on my website, particularly these two, ‘Partisanship vs. Leadership’ and ‘It’s Just Politics’. I’m looking forward to your further comments and I am not insulted by anyone who wants a rational discussion of who believes what and why. That’s the purpose of this website and the basis of our self governing nation!