School Choice and the Lack Thereof

A lot has been said of Governor McDonnell's budget, namely the $40 million cut to education funding. Since the press is leaving it as it is with that statement, it sounds pretty horrible, but what is seen as a greedy Republican taking money away from public schools is actually a pretty simple solution to the embarrassment that is the public school system.

One issue that I have agreed with President Obama is the need for more charter schools. With healthcare reform, cap and trade, and jobs hogging the headlines, I doubt that this issue will be addressed any time soon. A charter school is simply a hybrid of a public and private school. A charter school receives public funds, but in exchange for lesser regulations on the school and teachers, the students and teachers are held to a higher academic standard. There is little public opposition to this, so what is the downside? A considerable amount of teachers would lose their jobs, because a teacher protected by the union is nearly impossible to fire, no matter how bad they are at their jobs.

As it stands right now, a student in a certain neighborhood can only go to a predetermined public school. Simply, public schools choose their students by geography, so unless parents want to fork out the money for a private school, tough noogies. State and local spending aside, the federal government spends an average of over $9,000 per student to have them in the public school system, which is why many legislators support a school choice act. The school choice act, in essence, attaches that money to the student so they can take it to the public school or their choice, or apply that in the form of a voucher to a private school education. Again, there is little public opposition to this, but the downfall is that many union-protected teachers would lose their jobs. The big upside is that teachers who are doing their job well would be rewarded. Belgium and Denmark both have a similar system and their students are light-years ahead of us. Federal funding alone has increased more than 100% in the past 30 years, while test scores and graduation rates have virtually remained the same. Milton Friedman nailed it on the head when he said "It's a disgrace for a country like the United States to have 30% of her population not graduate from high school." After all, school choice should be about teachers and lawyers, not students and teachers, right?

The President Without A Country

Got this email today, thought it was pretty good...

The president without a country The president without a country By Pat Boone "We're no longer a Christian nation." - President Barack Obama, June 2007 " America has been arrogant." - President Barack Obama "After 9/11, America didn't always live up to her ideals."- President Barack Obama "You might say that America is a Muslim nation."- President Barack Obama, Egypt 2009 Thinking about these and other statements made by the man who wears the title of president. I keep wondering what country he believes he's president of. In one of my very favorite stories, Edward Everett Hale's "The Man without a Country," a young Army lieutenant named Philip Nolan stands condemned for treason during the Revolutionary War, having come under the influence of Aaron Burr. When the judge asks him if he wishes to say anything before sentence is passed, young Nolan defiantly exclaims, "Damn the United States ! I wish I might never hear of the United States again!" The stunned silence in the courtroom is palpable, pulsing. After a long pause, the judge soberly says to the angry lieutenant: "You have just pronounced your own sentence. You will never hear of the United States again.. I sentence you to spend the rest of your life at sea, on one or another of this country's naval vessels - under strict orders that no one will ever speak to you again about the country you have just cursed." And so it was. Philip Nolan was taken away and spent the next 40 years at sea, never hearing anything but an occasional slip of the tongue about America. The last few pages of the story, recounting Nolan's dying hours in his small stateroom - now turned into a shrine to the country he fore swore - never fail to bring me to tears. And I find my own love for this dream, this miracle called America , refreshed and renewed. I know how blessed and unique we are. But reading and hearing the audacious, shocking statements of the man who was recently elected our president - a young black man living the impossible dream of millions of young Americans, past and present, black and white - I want to ask him, "Just what country do you think you're president of?" You surely can't be referring to the United States of America , can you? America is emphatically a Christian nation, and has been from its inception! Seventy percent of her citizens identify themselves as Christian. The Declaration of Independence and our Constitution were framed, written and ratified by Christians. It's because this was, and is, a nation built on and guided by Judeo-Christian biblical principles that you, sir, have had the inestimable privilege of being elected her president. You studied law at Harvard, didn't you, sir? You taught constitutional law in Chicago ? Did you not ever read the statement of John Jay, the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and an author of the landmark "Federalist Papers": "Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers - and it is the duty, as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian nation - to select and prefer Christians for their rulers"? In your studies, you surely must have read the decision of the Supreme Court in 1892: "Our lives and our institutions must necessarily be based upon and embody the teachings of the Redeemer of mankind. It is impossible that it should be otherwise; and in this sense and to this extent our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian." Did your professors have you skip over all the high-court decisions right up till the mid 1900's that echoed and reinforced these views and intentions? Did you pick up the history of American jurisprudence only in 1947, when for the first time a phrase coined by Thomas Jefferson about a "wall of separation between church and state" was used to deny some specific religious expression - contrary to Jefferson ' s intent with that statement? Or, wait a minute. Were your ideas about America 's Christianity formed during the 20 years you were a member of the Trinity United Church of Christ under your pastor, Jeremiah Wright? Is that where you got the idea that" America is no longer a Christian nation"? Is this where you, even as you came to call yourself a Christian, formed the belief that "America has been arrogant"? Even if that's the understandable explanation of your damning of your country and accusing the whole nation (not just a few military officials trying their best to keep more Americans from being murdered by jihadists) of "not always living up to her ideals," how did you come up with the ridiculous, alarming notion that we might be "considered a Muslim nation"? Is it because there are some 2 million or more Muslims living here, trying to be good Americans? Out of a current population of over 300 million, 70 percent of whom are Christians? Does that make us, by any rational definition, a "Muslim nation"? Why are we not, then, a "Chinese nation"? A "Korean nation"? Even a "Vietnamese nation"? There are even more of these distinct groups in America than Muslims. And if the distinction you're trying to make is a religious one, why is America not "a Jewish nation"? There's actually a case to be made for the latter, because our Constitution - and the success of our Revolution and founding - owe a deep debt to our Jewish brothers. Have you stopped to think what an actual Muslim America would be like? Have you ever really spent much time in Iran? Even in Egypt? You, having been instructed in Islam as a kid at a Muslim school in Indonesia and saying you still love the call to evening prayers, can surely picture our nation founded on the Quran, not the Judeo-Christian Bible, and living under Shariah law. Can't you? You do recall Muhammad's directives [Surah 9:5,73] to "break the cross" and "kill the infidel"? It seems increasingly and painfully obvious that you are more influenced by your upbringing and questionable education than most suspected. If you consider yourself the president of a people who are "no longer Christian," who have "failed to live up to our ideals," who "have been arrogant," and might even be "considered Muslim" - you are president of a country most Americans don't recognize. Could it be you are a president without a country? PLEASE SHARE THIS MESSAGE WITH OTHER AMERICANS IN YOUR ADDRESS BOOK, BECAUSE YOU'LL NEVER SEE IT ON TV NEWS OR YOUR LOCAL NEWSPAPER.

Detroit: The Liberal Utopia

Want to see what the United States might look like someday if the Leftists get their way? Go to Detroit.

Detroit, in it's day, was the wealthiest city in the country. It had the highest median household income, but now it ranks 66th out of 68 of the biggest cities in the US. It also has some of the highest crime and unemployment rates, and one of the lowest graduation rates. But how did one of the most prosperous cities in the country fall into the condition that it is in now?

It's no secret that Detroit is a haven for Liberal politicians. Every mayor since 1962 has been a Liberal Democrat. This made Detroit a model city for liberals' claims of "helping the poor." Jerome Cavanaugh was elected Mayor of Detroit in 1961, and under President Johnson's "model cities program," he expanded the role of government to unprecedented levels. The model cities program was considered the first step in urban city planning. Over $400 million in federal funds was granted to a 9 square mile radius in Detroit in order to make it an "exemplary" city for the rest of the US to follow. What it did was create a government-dependent city because in exchange for the government restricting the private sector in Detroit, the federal government provided the city with funding for education, healthcare, etc.

Lack of funding is certainly not the issue facing Detroit's education system. The federal government spends about $11,100 per student in Detroit, much higher than the national average of $9,600. Despite having more federal dollars coming their way, Detroit has a graduation rate of only 25%, and sadly, a student in Detroit has a bigger chance of ending up in prison than graduating high school. But why these poor results despite a fiscal advantage? Enter the teacher's union, which refuses to bend on their policies to enact new agendas that might help the students of Detroit, such as merit-based pay, increased student to teacher ratios, or the school choice program. Seems to me like the teacher's unions aren't really looking out for the students, but for themselves.

It was the automobile industry that made Detroit so prosperous after World War II, but the unions have managed to drive that into the ground as well. The Obama administration has blamed the collapse of the auto industry on "poor management, and lack of fuel-efficient cars." Poor management? That may be, but lack of fuel efficient cars? No. The top selling automobile in America is still the Ford F-150, and 6 of the top 10 cars sold in the United States are trucks or SUVs. Nonetheless, GM alone produces more "fuel-efficient" cars than Honda and Toyota combined, but Americans simply didn't want them. Despite fully knowing that there was a lot of red ink in the future of American automobile companies, the UAW still demanded 7 weeks paid vacation, the maintenance of job banks, and $74/hour in salary and benefits. Add it all up, and the average UAW workers makes $130,000/year in salary and benefits, which accounts for an average of an additional $1,200 markup on each American car sold just to cover the demands of the UAW.

What has all of this amounted to for Detroit? For starters, an unemployment rate of 29%. This causes people to move away, and poverty and crime rates to skyrocket. The murder rate in Detroit is 5 times the national average, and 7 out of 10 murders in Detroit go unsolved. The average home price in Detroit is $5700, which sounds great until you see the homes, most of which are suitable only for demolition.

So why am I telling you all of this? Listen to the campaign slogans and promises of the left, and they sound eerily similar to the promises that were made to the city of Detroit, which has made the city all but hopeless.

A Good, Solid Fail

I'm sure we all wish we could give ourselves our own grades. I know if I could have set my own grades, I'd have a J.D. from Harvard Law School by now. Should such a fantasy become reality, President Obama would give himself "a good, solid B+" for his first year, according to an interview with Oprah. Without being provoked to explain his reasoning behind his slightly above average grade, Obama quickly summed up what he believes to be his accomplishments. Not surprisingly, most of what he considers accomplishments are promises or plans, but he really seemed to puff his chest out when he listed them.

To start off the list, Obama emphasized that he "inherited the biggest set of challenges for an American President since Franklin Roosevelt." This is nothing new. Obama has been bashing Bush since the second he showed up on the campaign trail. It's pretty easy to pull the wool over the eyes of his rabid supporters, but those of us who have the slightest bit of economic literacy know better. Yes, Obama inherited a huge deficit, but he seems to think that the remedy for that is to grow the deficit exponentially. If people handled their finances the same way the Democratic Congress does, everyone would be in line at the soup kitchen.

Taking the comparison, let's see how his idol handled what truly was the worst economic downturn. FDR expanded the role of government to sky-high bounds, creating programs such and medicare and social security. Many, if not all of those programs are close to or are broke, and they're programs that are mandated by the federal government. You don't have a choice but to pay into social security and medicare your entire working life. These programs are far from paid off, as we're still paying for them, with no end in sight. What catapulted us out of the great depression was World War II, so unless Obama is planning on a World War III, there is no definite end in sight for the current downturn.

"We have stabilized the economy." Are you kidding me? Anybody who has any economic literacy knows that the economy is far from stabilized. We were promised upon passing of the stimulus package that unemployment would not rise above 8%. Guess what? It's over 10% now, and closer to 18% when you factor in people who have given up on trying to find a job. Obama says his administration has stabilized the economy while he's talking about a 2nd stimulus package. Of course nobody is going to question him, because according to his zombies, if he stabilized the economy, it's stabilized.

"We have prevented a 2nd great depression." We were never headed for a 2nd great depression. Sure, things are bad, but not nearly as bad as the great depression. The policies that the Obama administration is pushing could very well lead to a 2nd great depression, not the opposite. When there are more dollar bills floating around, the dollar loses its value, and with all the money that the federal government is printing, expect the dollar to plummet. It's no coincidence that you're seeing and hearing more and more commercials for gold companies. They know that the dollar is losing value, and gold is never worth 0.

"We are on our way out of Iraq." Because he says so. This is not an accomplishment; we're heading out of Iraq because he says so. The actual war in Iraq has been over for a long time, what troops are doing there now is providing security and holding the Iraqi government's hand until they can hold their own. I'm glad there's a plan to leave Iraq, what I'm not happy about is that there's a timeline. If I told you I was going to rob your house between 10am and 2pm Saturday, chances are you're going to have cops outside waiting for me. Now that the world knows that we're going to be out of Iraq at a certain time, they're just going to wait us out.

"We have the best possible plan for Afghanistan." That's up for much debate. In order to please both sides, Obama is sending a 30,000 troop surge into Afghanistan. Even though General McChrystal wanted 40,000, I'm glad the government is starting to focus more on the war in Afghanistan. With the war in Iraq hogging the headlines, people seem to forget that there is still a war going on in Afghanistan. In my opinion, the war in Afghanistan should have been our first priority the entire time. Do I believe Saddam Hussein was a bastard and should have been taken out? Yes. Should that have been our first priority? In my mind, no. What I have a problem with, similar to Iraq, is that there's a timeline. Obama seems to be trying to please the side that wanted more troops in Afghanistan by sending in a surge, but he's also trying to please the peace nutjobs by setting a timeline of 18 months. What football coach do you know says to his players, "Go out there and play your hearts out for 2 hours!," then when a player says, "what if the game lasts 3 hours?", the coach says, "screw it."?

"We have reset our image around the world." Yes we have, for the worse. A country that during the Reagan administration pushed "peace through strength" is now touring the world saying "America has shown arrogance." Combine that with Obama's public message that he wants to slow the development of new weapons and "de-weaponize space," and it seems as if America is bending over and spreading her cheeks for countries that want nothing more than to see America at the bottom of the ocean.

"We have reached an international consensus on the need for North Korea and Iran to disarm nuclear weapons." I wish I could write extensively on this, but it's so laughable that he considers this an accomplishment. It seems as if in his la-la land world, other countries wanted North Korea and Iran to have nuclear weapons and he convinced them that they shouldn't.

Lastly, "we are on the verge of the most significant piece of social legislation since social security." In case you're not following, he's talking about "healthcare reform." Aside from the fact that he's comparing it to the social security program that is in shambles, he's pushing a bill that over 60% of Americans don't want. My disdain for this bill is expressed in a previous blog, and if he thinks this is the best way for America to prosper, he's got another thing coming.

Gitmo: Cuba's Paradise

Mention "Guantanamo Bay" to most Americans and they paint a pretty ugly picture in their head, yet a recent video by conservative pundit Steven Crowder may change that. Crowder exploited a lot of the misconception that Guantanamo Bay is nothing but a torture chamber, and revealed that is one of the most well run prisons around.

For those of you who don't know, Guantanamo Bay is a U.S. military operated prison located off the shore of Cuba which houses terrorist detainees. For years the prison has been an icon for American intolerance and prisoner abuse, so the very first Executive Order by Obama was to close Guantanamo Bay within the year. This debate has been put on the back-burner with the stimulus bill, health care reform, etc. becoming more prevalent, but nonetheless, Gitmo is still a source of widespread debate.

One of the first things that Crowder pointed out is that the military employs paralegals to keep up discipline and make sure that prisoners are treated fairly. In fact, the Navy has an Interrogation Control Element, or "ICE," and it is their job to make sure that members of the armed forces abide to the strict standards of the handling of prisoners. People have joked that Gitmo is a place that "when you come in, you don't come out," but since the number of prisoners has declined from 779 to 221 in the past decade or so, that argument loses all of its merit.

Let's compare Gitmo to some other American prisons, shall we? In comparison with a California maximum security prison (the worst of the worst) and Gitmo's maximum security division, Gitmo detainees get, among other things, an extra 2 hours of rec time, and different choices in meals in case you are a vegetarian or have a "sensitive stomach." Compare Gitmo's mid threat level division to American prisons, and the differences are night and day. If a prisoner were to hurt himself attacking a member of the armed forces, a doctor will patch them right up, with much more attention than if I were to go to the emergency room. In fact, before some merited political outrage, Gitmo detainees were in line to receive the swine flu vaccination BEFORE AMERICAN CITIZENS. Their privileges include rec time virtually whenever they please, access to television, video games, and the internet, as well as numerous life skills courses. Unlike American prisons, inmate on inmate violence isn't really an issue.

Contrary to what is in Michael Moore's warped mind, Cuban citizens would rather be prisoners of Gitmo than live without a television, telephone, and internet, and live on a ration of 6 eggs, 1 pound of rice, and 2 pounds of fish per month. One of the biggest problems facing Gitmo is keeping Cuban citizens from sneaking in, THEY WOULD RATHER BE PRISONERS OF GUANTANAMO BAY THAN CITIZENS OF CUBA.

But of course, the biggest issue with Gitmo is their interrogation procedures. People love to throw out waterboarding, which granted, is no walk in the park, but it's a last ditch effort. More commonly used "enhanced interrogation techniques" include: deception, (which is an American interrogator acts as an official from a country with a reputation of harsh interrogation techniques), mistaken identity, rapid fire questioning, isolation, and incentive or removal of incentive. Things that troops CANNOT do include: making prisoners stand for prolonged periods of time, threaten, cover their head during transportation, interrogate for more than 20 hours, or deprive them of sleep. What is sad is that we have access to this list. The Obama administration has made this information public, so now detainees know what they can and can't get away with. Recently, a member of the military was booted off of the island after throwing a cup of water on an inmate in response for having a cocktail thrown at him. When I say cocktail, I don't mean a martini. A cocktail in prison is a vat of urine, feces, and just about anything else than an inmate can excrete from his body. For comparison's sake, an American thew a cocktail at a judge and got 30 years in federal prison.

What is constant in people, including Congressmen, that have supported Gitmo's closing prior to visiting the prison, is that they have made a complete 180 on their feelings about the "torture chamber." More surprisingly, but not really, is that Obama has never visited Guantanamo Bay. Maybe if he does take some time off from his "America sucks" tour, golf outings, and his taxpayer funded dates, he'll change his mind.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtrzcBMbVXs

White House vs. Fox News

Another instance of liberal hypocrisy is making headlines this week, the White House declared war on Fox News.

It's no secret that President Obama doesn't care for Fox News, he mentioned the news sources numerous times on the campaign trail, yet never did appear on Hannity, despite many invites, but some of his employees made it well known that they consider Fox an enemy, saying that they weren't a credible news source, and that they were an arm of the Republican party.

So what makes the White House so angry about Fox News? It seems apparent to me that most people who criticize Fox don't watch it very often, and if they do, they watch Hannity or The O'Reilly Factor, two programs that are, by their own admission, opinion shows. If you tune in in the morning or afternoon, you'll see shows like Fox & Friends, America's Newsroom, Special Report with Bret Baier, Fox Report with Shepard Smith, etc., programs that tell you the news and nothing else. That said, CNN and MSNBC have similar schedules. They have "just news" shows, primarily in the morning and afternoon, and they both have opinion programs such as Hardball with Chris Matthews, Countdown with Keith Olbermann, Anderson Cooper 360, etc., so it's not like Democrats are being shut out.

Given how certain news stations have certain biases, why is this now becoming such an issue? You never heard anyone from the Bush administration whine about CNN or MSNBC. This is typical liberal hypocrisy, CNN and the like can have a bias, but damn it if Fox has a bias that they don't agree with. Alot of liberals are calling for Fox to be shut down, have you ever heard a conservative call for MSNBC to be shut down? I loathe news stations and other media outlets with a liberal bias, does that mean I want them shut down? No. The first amendment was not written to protect polite speech, so let them say what they want.

But what does the White House think they're going to accomplish? Do they expect Fox to move out of their New York studio? Do they expect their loyal watchers to suddenly change the channel? The people will decide which stations are credible news sources, and which aren't. To me, this looks very bad on the White House's part. It makes them look childish, and like a schoolyard bully. Even a columnist from the liberal friendly Washington Post said that this is a very stupid thing for the White House to do. So what's their reasoning behind their bickering? That question is beyond me, especially when there's trouble in the war in Afghanistan, and we're creeping up on 10% unemployment. Seems to me like the White House has their priorities a little screwed up.

Differences Between Liberals and Conservatives

If a conservative doesn’t like guns, he doesn't buy one.
If a liberal doesn't like guns, he wants all guns outlawed.

If a conservative is a vegetarian, he doesn't eat meat.
If a liberal is a vegetarian, he wants all meat products banned for everyone.

If a conservative sees a foreign threat, he thinks about how to defeat his enemy.
A liberal wonders how to surrender gracefully and still look good.

If a conservative is homosexual, he quietly leads his life.
If a liberal is homosexual, he demands legislated respect.

If a person of color is conservative, they see themselves as independently successful.
Their liberal counterparts see themselves as victims in need of government protection.

If a conservative is down-and-out, he thinks about how to better his situation.
A liberal wonders who is going to take care of him.

If a conservative doesn’t like a talk show host, he switches channels.
Liberals demand that those they don’t like be shut down.

If a conservative is a non-believer, he doesn’t go to church.
A liberal non-believer wants any mention of God and religion silenced. (Unless it’s a foreign religion, of course!)

If a conservative decides he needs healthcare, he goes about shopping for it, or may choose a job that provides it.
A liberal demands that the rest of us pay for his.

If a conservative slips and falls in a store, he gets up, laughs and is embarrassed.
If a liberal slips and falls, he grabs his neck, moans like he's in labor and then sues.

If a conservative reads this, he'll show it to his friends and have a good laugh.
A liberal will delete it because he's offended.