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Spending per public school pupil has roughly tripled in the last 45 years (inflation-adjusted). The U.S. now spends more per student than any other OECD nation except Switzerland.

The problem is school administration. The number of non-teaching administrative staff has more than doubled in 45 years, far outpacing growth in number of teachers or students. They control how funds for education are spent. Basically every time we increase spending on education, the administrators use it raise their own pay, hire more administrators, and buy useless but high-profile bling like iPads. Every time we cut spending on education, the administrators make sure it goes straight to the teachers. The teachers then get lots of media coverage complaining about how they're underpaid and under-supplied. Which leads to further increases in education spending which the administrators sop up again, passing only a token amount down to the teachers.

If you've got a proposal for how to selectively reduce spending on only administrative staff in public schools, I'd love to hear it. If not, the only alternative we have that we know works is competition. Which means charter schools, even with all their warts.

• Passport
• Government ID card
• Military ID card
• Student ID card
• Public housing ID card
• Any ID specified by HAVA and New York State law as acceptable
• Utility bill
• Bank statement
• Paycheck
• Government check (Social Security, tax refund, military paycheck or paycheck stub)
• Other government documents with your name and address including but not limited to: voter registration card, hunting, fishing, or trapping license or firearm permit.

So, if you work - your paycheck stub is OK. If you work for cash - your bank statement. If you don't work - government check. If you don't work and are in public housing - housing ID card. If you have a landline phone - your bill. If you don't have a landline phone - cell phone bill with matching address. And so on, and so on. Please, PLEASE show me ONE person who can have any semblance of normal function in society and yet somehow avoid having ANY form of ID.

If someone doesn't have ANY form of ID (how the HELL do they live? How do they drive / buy cigarettes / alcohol / drugs? How do they avoid being arrested if stopped by a cop? How do they receive welfare or own a home? Who the HELL in today's society doesn't have ANY ID?), and they're too damn lazy to even call up the state and ask for a voter ID card, do we really need to hold their hand all the way to the voting booth? Or can we acknowledge that sacrificing the rights of hundreds of thousands of legitimate voters (whose vote would be canceled by someone else's fraudulent one) for the sake of a tiny percentage of lazy/arrogant jackasses who can't function on the most basic level, is a terrible idea?

Or do we instead cling to the "screw the rights of millions, protect the rights of the few" doctrine and allow rampant vote fraud to take place?

Well, in hopes that you will come back and actually read this, I will tell you that my main objection to greenman3601's presentation is that it's largely propaganda. It only tries to show you one side. More specifically, they spent a lot of time talking about how the climate models were able to predict the change in temperature that comes from volcanic eruptions, and I will tell you, that's not very impressive; it is a fairly well understood area of climate science, and you can make a fairly good estimate with pencil and paper. No computer is needed. So if his models couldn't do that, it would be extremely pathetic.

For evidence the other way, here is a great debate between two scientists. One of them has actually built climate models, and he gives evidence that they are inaccurate.

As a parent who recently bought a home deliberately OUTSIDE the Charlotte-Mecklenburg system, let me assure you, these people don't have any idea what they're doing. This school district has been in the crapper for years and years. No small part of my wife's and my decision to move OUT of Charlotte was the schools. You can check CMS's test results or you can find lots of interesting facts, not to mention things like this or this. The list goes on and on.

There seems to be a fallacy that people believe where pumping out more college graduates somehow equals to more jobs being created and also helps create a better economy. This is just not true.

You have countries like Canada and Egypt where the government spends a lot of money on education but have a higher unemployment rate than the U.S.

The notion that pumping more money into a system ( especially when the government is involved) will fix any problem is just bad economics

Here is a paper that argues that what we need is to let the free market work, to get the government out of the education biz and NOT subsidize more college graduates.

The paper is called "The overselling of higher education"

http://www.johnlocke.org/acrobat/pope_articles/the _overselling_of_higher_education_report.pdf

I suggest all /.'s take a read.

No, multiculturalism isn't working just fine in a America. The only reason you think its working is possibly because you ether haven't been exposed to its failures or you are simply not aware of them. If multiculturalism was working you wouldn't have problems of White flight which is a direct cause urban blight in places like downtown Detroit and other cities. Blacks start to move in and Whites move out, taking their money and their business with them. Whites simple ,as a group don't, want to live next to Blacks and I've heard plenty of Blacks say they same thing.

Here in America the most discriminated people are White Americans. A White person can't even make a joke about racial problems with being branded a racist. You bring up concern about a "person of color" you risk losing your job, friends, and even your family. For instance radio talk show host William J. Bennett makes a crack about aborting Black babies to low the crime rate and he is burned at the stake by the media. While this evil sack of shit, Kamau Kambon, makes a speech on live tv about exterminating White people off the face of the planet and no one says a thing. One man because he is White gets hanged in the press, the other Black, gets cheers. Yes, people cheered and clapped when he said that.

Here is a link to Kamau Kambon http://www.johnlocke.org/lockerroom/lockerroom.htm l?id=5854 so you can listen to it yourself. There are video links around the web but they are getting harder to find.

No, multiculturalism isn't working just in fine in America. It just hasn't reached as bad here as it has in France. In France and most of Europe there is no more room for the races to separate, while here in America there is still plenty of room. Once that room runs out though.

By they way I just want to put out there for thought that right now the most discriminated race in America is he White race.

Consumer Reports tested only what the Ask Slashdot question wanted to know (ie: Dust removal).

A large byproduct of these ionizers is ozone. Which brings me to my next point: Does your wife find it easier to breathe outside just after a lightning storm?

If so, it isn't the dust removal that's helping, it's probably the ozone. You might want to ask your doctor, though, if there's a danger of overexposure to ozone from these things. I doubt there is, but it is something to consider. You also may want to consider just using an ozone generator instead, which could be more effective.

But let me repeat: You really need to talk to your doctor about this. Some scientists say ozone is dangerous, and some say ozone is not a problem. It's up to you and your doctor to decide if ozone is the best way to go.