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Tom DeLay’s Defense Fund attacks Robert Greenwald with Greenwald’s appearance on The Colbert Report
Illinoize Articles on the Lottery Sale
Yellow Dog Democrat offers up a good criticism of the plan from a political point of view, and Cal has a good story on making Policy legal.
I think the funding is dead on this deal. The seven year license for the British lottery by YDD makes some sense, but I’m not sure it improves the state’s financial status that much.
He also mentions Georgia’s case of a semi-public institution to run it, but Georgia also created a new program with its lottery that specifically dedicated the funding to that program stopping the shell game. What might be salvaged out of this plan on the financial end is to look at either the British or Georgia case for potential savings (I have no idea on either subject honestly) and then dedicate the funding to
1) Revolving text book fund
and then perhaps moving towards all of the lottery money going into dedicated funds for different school purposes that aren’t existent now reducing at least the shell game aspects of lottery deals (and yes, Cal is correct, the lottery wasn’t started to fund education)
The problem is that the alternative to the Blagojevich plan doesn’t exist and until then, the programmatic end is important and right now, the focus is on the funding. Not a trivial matter by any means if one wants to continue funding schools, but it obscures important points about serious issues in education. That someone is talking about them is important in itself.
Zorn on the MySpace Rule
Eric makes some good points regarding student behavior and encouraging students to stay involved regarding Libertyville’s new rule to hold students accountable for what they post on line and more generally do outside of school.
When students misbehave, they forfeit the privilege.
The problem with this ought to be obvious:
Extracurricular activities are often the salvation of “bad” kids. Youths who feel lost, alienated, tempted and angry can find their way through participation in sports, music, drama, academic teams and so on.
They can find their special talents. They can find like-minded souls; perhaps a new and more salutary peer group. They can find dedicated, interested faculty members who can keep them aimed in the right direction. They can find opportunities for college scholarships.
The thing is it isn’t an either or decision in disciplinary cases. Even in an age of no tolerance, the Unit 5 policy I linked to suspends students from the team for 1/4 of the season–probably less than a month in high school sports.
I don’t disagree that students should be allowed to participate after an infraction, but part of keeping students involved is using carrots and sticks. A reasonable disciplinary scheme reinforces those efforts of teammates and coaches. 3
Sure, many schools have bad disciplinary schemes–NCHS’ involved a condescending ass smiling at you for a half an hour if you were a boy–but effective schools can build in discipline that is done with the idea of keeping students involved as a part of the process.
So, yes to discipline involing the extracurricular, no to automatic banning of extracurriculars.
Education Plan Carping
I’m not including the finance in this because those are very legitimate concerns, but some of the carping doesn’t seem to get the plan.
One of the key points is that a merit pay system would be developed with teachers and teacher unions to get around the problem of capricious local decisions. I tend to the think merit pay isn’t that big of a deal, but if you are going to do it, this concern has to be met and I think the Governor’s plan wisely avoids the specifics.
The most bogus line
Local superintendents and elected school board members object to portions of the plan that they charge will wrest decisions away from them and put them in the hands of state education officials.
“This is a slap in the face of local control,” said Walt Warfield, executive director of the Illinois Association of School Administrators. The governor is saying “that the state board, which has absolutely no track record of educational excellence, even competence, is in a better position to run a school than a locally elected body,” Warfield said. “The higher up in government you go, the accountability and credibility tapers off.”
East Saint Louis. Brooklyn. Etc. Etc. Taking over failing districts is reasonable in extreme cases and those two examples are perfect.
The idea that local school boards are efficient or effective is nonsense. It’s a body created to insulate decisions from political parties and in the end, hardly anyone pays attention to what happens on the Boards other than if their taxes are increased. It doesn’t make state government perfect, but it does give the State of Illinois the leverage to come in and provide technical expertise that might otherwise be rejected.
And some of the complaints are just dumb:
But State Rep. Roger Eddy, a Republican who is also superintendent of a Downstate school district, said replacing books every six years would take more than the $40 million the governor has proposed to update books. “I think you have to be careful when you mandate a schedule, that you also allocate enough dollars,” he said.
A six year cycle is reasonable. For social studies and science it is imperative as we learn more about our world. Math and other texts need to be updated for new improvements in curriculum.
But that’s just the small part of the problem with the statement–am I to understand this superintendent doesn’t do a curriculum review every six years including materials? WTF? There is no excuse for this sort of crap and with NCLB, one of the few good side benefits to come from it, is an emphasis on better understanding teaching techniques with actual quality scientific research. In six years, pedagogy changes a lot–and so the curriculum should be reviewed, updated and new materials bought. If it takes more money, good enough, let’s find it, but it has to happen. If his District isn’t currently doing that, then he shouldn’t be superintendent.
The biggest fault other than the financing I see in the plan is centralized procurement and building. Given the track record of CMS there is little reason to think centralization will work. A better system would be to provide technical assistance to Districts for issuing RFPs and then evaluating the proposals later.
The other argument from A+ Schools is that it doesn’t go far enough.
I agree. And the funding issue is a big part of that, but the actual plan is decent and would improve education in Illinois–more to the point, it wouldn’t eliminate future changes in law to put the State on a better funding strategy–it only addresses 4 years and then continues some funding.
I’d like the Governor to change his mind about taxes, but he isn’t going to do that, and Madigan isn’t going to leave his people out there with a tax increase with a Governor attacking the plan. The political reality if Rod is reelected is this is about as good as it going to get and it’s a good improvement in terms of programmatic changes and in the long term it doesn’t limit future changes in funding related to a tax swap.
That said, as I said before the release, Madigan is going to have to seriously consider whether this leaves too much of a funding mess to clean up out of interest in Lisa’s potential run in four years. Even if she were to campaign on a tax swap, it could make a couple difficult years while it’s put into place.
The Case for an Independent Counsel Law
Is showcased in several recent incidents. First, the concerns over Congressional privilege brought up by Hastert are serious, though bullshit in the case of Jefferson given there was a search warrant and the FBI took it further with a screening team.
In Rep. Jefferson’s case, however, “separation of powers” just won’t cut it if the affidavit for the search warrant shows probable cause to believe that evidence would be found in his office. The same would apply to the President, the Vice President, their staffs, and the judiciary: If there is probable cause linking the place to be searched with an alleged crime, the search has the imprimatur of the law, is presumptively valid under the Fourth Amendment, and that is all that will be required to defeat a separation of powers claim. His private papers concerning his thoughts and votes are not off limits to a search warrant if the allegation in the affidavit is that the vote was paid for. That is bribery of a Member of Congress, and no Congressman is immune from that. Ask former Rep. Duke Cunningham.
When deliberations of a Member of Congress are relevant to charges, how is Congress different from the Executive? One way to mitigate these issues would be to set up a truly independent counsel law again and have independent counsels outside the normal power structure of the executive branch lessening the impact upon the separate branches.
It might also eliminate the stories such as high level DOJ officials from commenting on investigations into politicians. Currently there is an incentive to make a statement because of political ties–as we see in the double denial by DOJ of Hastert being ‘in the mix’ of the investigation over Abramoff.
The story at ABC is here, here, here, and here.
If one remembers Scott Lasser’s statement in 1998 that declared George Ryan was not under investigation, it gives you good reason to respect how Fitzgerald is so damn quiet about his investigations.
As a note, compared to the incestuous Note, Brian Ross is one of the few great investigative reporters left in television. His work on the Marianis Islands and the forced abortion there has been fantastic and he has been the guy hitting stories well ahead of the Abramoff scandal breaking showing the true evil that much of Abramoff’s work brought.
Pelosi asks Jefferson to Step Down from Ways and Means
While I understand the Congressional Black Caucuses concerns about minority Members of Congress being targeted, the $90,000 in the fridge tends to suggest this was warranted.
Maybe He’s Not Just Tom DeLay’s Pool Boy
Hastert linked to Abramoff scandal.
John Laesch, the new Mike Flanagan? Discuss.
The Topinka Plan
Okay, it’s snarky and such, but let me put it this way, these are three of the most important issues to me:
1) Children’s Health Care
2) Early Childhood Care and Education
3) Education Funding.
I’m not a particular fan of the Governor and I think the financing on this deal is stupid (and many others). However, he has plans in all three areas. I don’t think the education one goes far enough, but it’s a start. His ECC plan is a good idea. And I think All Kids is good though I’m still concerned about the funding.
Right now, Judy is still trying to unite her party and that’s reasonable, but for the general election there is nothing right now on her actual positions in these areas other than vaguely being against All Kids and calling the Governor’s plan a sham.
I think the financing is certainly problematic, but the programmatic end of his plan is a good start. I’m all for a good pile on of the Governor at times, but at some point it has to be pointed out that he’s had some really strong ideas–even with poor funding schemes. Judy wants to be fiscally responsible and it’s good she didn’t sign the no tax increase pledge, but that doesn’t tell anyone how she’ll fix the state’s financial problems and maintain important programs or offer reasonable alternatives in the mean time.
Duckworth Polling
Sweet covered the essentials today in her column.
It’s a Bennett, Petts & Blumenthal poll:
The following is a summary of findings from a telephone survey conducted among 400 likely voters in the Sixth Congressional District of Illinois. Interviews were conducted May 9-11, 2006. The sampling error for this survey is
plus or minus 4.9 percentage points.
Hard numbers:
Roskam: 35%
Duckworth 34%
Leaners
Roskam 40%
Duckworth 40%
Other parts of the memo:
Despite the Republican nature of the district (49% Republican, 36% Democrat), the political environment presents an opportunity for Duckworth. Specifically:
? Just 27% think things in this country are going in the right direction while 58% think things are on the wrong track.
? Only 34% think President Bush is doing an excellent or good job as President while 65% disapprove of Bush?s job performance. More four in ten (42%) rate his performance as poor.
? More have an unfavorable opinion of President Bush (48%) than have a favorable impression of him (43%).
65% disapproval of George Bush in the 6th CD. Heh. 48% don’t even like Bush. Statewide, Survey USA has Bush at 67% Disapproval and 73% disapproval in Suburban Cook. with the collar counties the only place he’s even close to breaking even with 47% disapproval (DuPage is collar under Survey USA and many polls).
Considering Roskam is also an incumbent representing a part of the area this is a hard result.
Roskam wants to localize the race, hence discussing a potential lease deal on the tollways, but the problem is this is a national race with a national candidate who is in many ways the face of the war. Add to that, Roskam is generally more conservative than Bush and it’s pretty difficult to figure out how the race becomes localized. Adding to his problems, that pesky DeLay fundraiser around the time of DeLay’s indictment, Roskam has to run away from people who have supported him fairly strongly to win.
The numbers one really needs to see are the intensity numbers for this year though. All national evidence points toward a Republican base that isn’t terribly motivated and a Democratic base that is fired up. The mitigating factors could be a motivated DuPage County getting out the vote for Birkett, but in the recent Survey USA poll between Topinka and Blagojevich don’t show her above 50% in the collars–given his unpopularity in that area, that’s a real problem for Republicans all around.