School Choice, Indiana style

Governor Mike Pence has been a leader introducing school choice, with the established education lobby vociferously opposed, duh!  Results?

33,000 kids are now enrolled in the programs. 60% of students in Indiana qualify for vouchers, the largest in the country. The $4800 cap has been removed. Court battles have been won by the governor.

The results of our current model of educating our youth show how we do it today are failing. We have been sliding down the scale compared to other advanced countries. Denmark has installed “project based learning” and it seems to be working. They learned that from us. We don’t use the methods.

Disruption and experiments are needed to reverse the trend in results.

See the WSJ, Allysia Finley, “Pence on School Choice”, July 20, 2016.

Clinton to rewrite the first amendment

Hillary said in a taped speech to the Netroots Nation conference, “Today, I’m announcing that in my first 30 days as President, I will propose a constitutional amendment to overturn “Citizens United” and give the American people-all of us-the chance to reclaim our democracy.”

That supreme court decision said it was legal for corporations to spend money on political speech.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC

Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, No. 08-205, 558 U.S. 310 (2010), is a U.S. constitutional law case dealing with the regulation of campaign spending by organizations. The United States Supreme Court held (5–4) that Freedom of Speech prohibited the government from restricting independent political expenditures by a nonprofit corporation. The principles articulated by the Supreme Court in the case have also been extended to for-profit corporations, labor unions and other associations.

She doesn’t like it because the FEC had ruled that Citizens United could not produce a video opposing her earlier run for the presidency. They sued and won. She doesn’t like it because she can’t control the information like she wants to.  Donald Trump has growled about the same thing, controlling the information.  So has Erdogan after the coup attempt. So do most people in charge of totalitarian states.

Do we spend too much money on political campaigns, without a doubt. Controlling the money ain’t the solution, changing how we elect folks may be the answer.

Politicians, in most cases, want control, power. You know the old saying about power and corruption, reduce the power, reduce the corruption. Information is powerful tool to do so.

 

Biogenic Carbon versus Fossil – Carbon

An editorial in the WSJ by Bruce Dale, July 11, 2016, details the effort of the EPA to regulate the emission of of biogenic carbon.  That is the carbon released when the natural process of growing plants, eating them and releasing the carbon stored in them back into the atmosphere, where plants reacquire the carbon.

The author states the attempt has no scientific basis, zero.

I offer the article as another example of bureaucratic creep, or overreach. Any body of regulators will move to cover more ground, there is no limit to what they want to cover, they cover more because they can, and want to.

Small governments is the only way to keep these folks from adding costs to everything thus reducing the ability of the economy to produce economic growth and thus providing more people with wealth so to manage their own lives.  The EPA produces nothing, not that we should do away with it. Otherwise we will have Birmingham, Alabama in the 1970’s with horrendous air pollution.

The key is to limit an organization to its’ mission, and only Congress can change it, and the economic costs must be calculated and published.

Those laws are mostly on the books, just not enforced. Like a lot of other issues like immigration.

 

Three Good Men Talk About Race

The title of an editorial by Peggy Noonan in the July 16-17 WSJ.   Worth the read.

Dallas Police Chief David Brown. “I am running on fumes…we are asking the police to do too much…take care of mentally ill folks..run down loose dogs…take care of over indulging drug users……..”

He goes on to say, “We’re hiring. Get off that protest line and put an application in. We’ll put you in your neighborhood and we’ll help you resolve some the the problems your’re protesting about.”

But griping, pointing fingers, blaming is much more fun. The other two men, both with African heritage, talked about their experiences and without a doubt there is prejudice in our country, along with all countries, from the beginning of time. The action is what we do about it.

Police Officers’ Lives Matter. Civilians Lives Matter. All Lives Matter.

Can we come together and talk about how to make it a bit better rather than pointing fingers? My mom always said, “When you point your finger, four are pointing back at you.”  It still applies.

Coal Investments, California Insurance Commissioner

The progressives talk a great deal about unwarranted access to the political process by corporations, lobbyists, the military, anyone they don’t agree with  philosophically. I get it; like politicians are objective legislators who do their own research, never asking for opinions from others, just doing their own thing.  Well, that hasn’t happened since Brutus and others knifed Ceasar in the Forum, politicians are supposed to be influenced by all their stakeholders.

California insurance commissioner Dave Jones is an environmental advocate, a fan of Tom Steyer (who has spent hundreds of millions of dollars supporting candidates who agree the sky is falling and the seas are rising). That is fine, that is politics. That is the definition of the political process.

But Mr. Jones has told insurance companies doing business in California must also agree with his philosophy by disinvesting in those companies, like coal, who are blacklisted by those who think like he does. He is also planning to run for Attorney General if Harris is elected to the Senate. If a Republican did what Jones is doing he would be drug through the mud and sentenced to a tongue lashing from, one of those dudes on TV.

Double standard, absolutely.

Puerto Rico, another democrat socialism failure

So, American taxpayer, Puerto Rico is going to “restructure” their debt, which built up under democrat leadership to an untenable level, bailout time! WJC juices up the CRA, threatening banks and mortage companies to loan to those who can’t afford a loan, unscrupulous people take advantage and 2008 happens.  Will the political leaders be held to account by Bernie, or 1/26th American Indian senator, or former secretary of state, don’t hold your breath.  Somehow they will find a conservative to blame.

Now, if the plan Congress is debating goes into effect a reasonable path forward may actually take place, the state can renegotiate their debt and bondholders may not take a haircut.  Lots of maybes.  The same thing happened in Washington, DC, in the 1990’s after decades of democrat leadership. Deju a vu all over again.

Why can’t those who love Hillary and Bernie see the writing on the wall, the more government we have the worse things will get. Santana said, paraphrasing, those who refuse to study history are doomed to relive it.

Teachers, Tenure, Kids Suffer

“California’s Supreme Court has the opportunity to make a civil-rights breakthrough by agreeing to hear a landmark case that challenges teacher tenure laws on equal protection grounds.”  The opening sentence in a WSJ article today, editorial page.  The article goes on to say that six students have sued California because lousy teachers are moved to low income schools since getting rid of them takes forever, is almost impossible and very costly.

The first trial judge agreed, it was appealed-supported by the idiot governor Brown and the unions of course-and the appeals court vacated the ruling.  Now it goes to the supreme court.

The web if full of more detail, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/vergara-v-california/, Huffington even agrees!

When will the money and power of the teachers unions stop protecting lousy teachers, our education results have been sliding for years, from in the high single digits to low 10’s when compared with our global competitors.  Wake up America!  Our youth are being screwed.

When does anyone deserve a lifetime job?  The rest of us sure aren’t. Academic freedom my butt, this is pure power and money.

Living in Alabama we are starting to see a change, not much yet, but the local union, the AEA, spent $40 million in the last cycle and all the candidates lost and the NEA had to come in and take over the union.

What are the results?  That is the question.

The next US president must carry a big stick

The above title is from the American Enterprise Institute, a non partisan, conservative think tank, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Enterprise_Institute.

The battle over the American military presence overseas, and in the seas has been raging since 1787. The Federalists and “Republicans” of the time had long and bitter battles in Congress and in the country over whether or how we should be involved. As the various sides gained power their policy would be put in place, sometimes successfully, Barbary Pirates, WW 1 and 2; sometimes not so successfully, Vietnam.

With the probability of national wars receding, hopefully, we face however a much heightened threat of “Asymmetric” warfare. What should we do? Put troops in Iraq? Pull our soldiers out of Korea and Europe? Mothball our aircraft carriers, or build more?

One thing for sure, not being prepared to fight has encouraged idiots with power and money to kill others expecting us and our “allies” to do nothing.  The examples of this are too numerous to mention, but just a few, Rwanda-Kuwait-Poland-Manchuria-Korea.

Turning our back on the responsibility to be strong is foolish; Bernie, HRC and my fellow libertarians. The responsibility to have a respectful and strong diplomatic arm is as important as the military, so to keep us out of conflict, Donald.

With our win-lose attitude in Congress and the executive branch I have little hope that passions will lose to reasoned thought. Sad. So many lessons of history both sides are ignoring.

The article below from AEI is reasoned, please take some time to read.

Peace

http://www.aei.org/publication/the-next-us-president-must-carry-a-big-stick/?utm_source=paramount&utm_medium=email&utm_content=AEITODAY&utm_campaign=060316

Socialism Is For The Uninformed

Thomas Sowell (born in 1930, dropped out of high school, joined the marine corps, then obtained numerous degrees, wrote a bunch of books on economics, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Sowell) penned an article with the above title.

Wanting something has nothing to do with getting it done unless  you focus on data that demonstrates what actually accomplishes the goal. Health care, or the ACA, was going to get everyone on insurance AND reduce the cost to all. NEITHER HAPPENED. Public housing was going to help those in poor housing. NEVER HAPPENED…..

This article highlights the lack of seriousness of “The Bern” proclamations, he doesn’t talk about if anything he is proposing has ever worked, IT HASN’T. HRC is close behind with proposals that have never worked. The Donald is in the same camp.

I know everyone is pissed off, I am also. But heaven requires us to do something that may actually accomplish a goal, that means our political “leaders” must have conversations rather than fire fights to try various things that actually produce the result.  The amazing thing is, both sides of this war agree mostly on what needs to happen.

Grow up people.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/436022/bernie-sanders-fans-dont-bother-think?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Saturday%20Best%20of%206/4&utm_term=VDHM

 

Fannie, Freddie and an Outbreak of Amnesia

Douglas Holtz-Eakin penned the above title in a WSJ article on 25 May, 2016. The gist; During the 2008 financial imbroglio these two “government sponsored entities” were put into conservatorship with the taxpayers contributing $188 Billion to bail them out. These two agencies buy mortgages and package them to sell as bonds.

The hope was they would be reconstituted and run better next time. Someone was smoking something in the cloak room to hope for that, they are giant honey holes for Congress to “reform society” and put their friends in place. Being government they get lower interest rates than banks and if they mess up WE get the bill.

Fanny and Freddie are the very embodiment of crony capitalism that the Bern, HRC and the Donald rant about.  They are a defacto state owned enterprise in the United States, kind of like China, or our friend Putins’ place.

Why is it that it has become a right to own a house? If we agree home ownership is a good thing is there a better way to put forward that policy without exposing the taxpayers to this kind of risk, maybe a more free market oriented solution? Maybe cities looking at how much cost they load on builders that increases the cost of housing by 20-30-40%. Maybe renting is a better idea than buying at certain times in your life.  Maybe being more vertical is a good idea, seems to work in New York.

Driving a social policy through by threatening banks with regulation and fine hell has been proven to be stupid.