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What's wrong, is that you don't see anything wrong with people who are *not* bona fide US Citizens having a vote in a US election.

According to the article you linked to, this is a ballot measure that will be voted on by the public.

Isn't that the whole point behind "States rights"? Letting people that live there decide on law that will only affect their local community? Who are we to judge what the people of Portland want for their own lives?

I recall a similar argument happening on another topic. What was it again? Oh right.

What do you mean "spin it"? I live in Virginia. I don't want my state being NY/NJ's dumping ground (or any other state's, for that matter). My state government listened to us voters and attempted to limit out of state waste. They were overruled by the Federal Government saying we had to accept out of state waste. MY state can be forced to take another state's waste?

Every college/university I know of can charge out-of-state students a lot more than in state - why is that legal? Why can't VA charge in-state dumpers $10/ton and out-of-state dumpers $1,000/ton?

because your going to have to ditch the educator unions too. Its a jobs program, both for those who went to school to teach and those who know the right people. The ratio of employees (teachers, admins, etc) to students has never been higher and education just keeps becoming less and less.

Reference the Vermont State of the Union speech given recently http://www.stateline.org/live/details/speech?contentId=449875 and understand the problem facing education in this country. This "new DARPA for schools" will simply increase the number of non educators in the system further burdening it. We all know we can't get rid of the people we have and as such we just have to get more from any new program. Until we get over it and start ditching people who are not needed in the education budget we will never improve it. Yes it is sad we don't need all of them, but like the milkmen of days gone by, society adjusts to changing needs.

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Since 1997, school staffing levels have increased by 23 percent, while our student population has decreased by 11.5 percent. The number of teacher's aides has gone up 43 percent. The number of support staff has gone up 48 percent. For every four fewer students a new teacher, teacher's aide or staff person was hired. There are 11 students for every teacher - the lowest ratio in the country - and a staggering five students for every adult in our schools. With personnel costs accounting for 80 percent of total school spending, it's no wonder that our K-12 system is among the most expensive in the nation at $14,000 per student per year.
In most organizations, if your customer base is shrinking, you make adjustments to stay within budget and, at a minimum, you stop hiring. Although some will be quick to scold that "education is not a business," neither is Medicaid or public safety or environmental conservation. But in each of these areas, if we ignore the basics of prudent financial management, we imperil the services that we provide. Until labor costs in our schools are brought under control, taxpayers can expect their bills to grow every year and the onus of the property tax will continue to threaten a healthy economy.
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As I recall Michigan made a reasonable profit by chasing down the folks who were dodging the cigarette excise tax. They took a big blow to their image, but they did bring in several million dollars even after subtracting the administrative/legal costs. Several other states are starting to do this as well since it is profitable. http://www.stateline.org/live/ViewPage.action?siteNodeId=136&languageId=1&contentId=29157

For the most part they chose a handful of online vendors and forced them to turn over their customer records, then sent out bills and threatening letters. They only put the lawyers on those who owed large amounts over a several thousand dollar, such as the street vendors some of whom owned over $10k.

Claiming federal taxes aren't legal just marks you as ignorant. Go look up the laws and bills where Congress legally granted the authority.

If I wanted to be a good samaritan, it would not be with a governor who had, by 2007, an average salary of 124 398$. It would be with a poor family, a child, anyone who can't afford it. Not a governor...

you are insane. and also very incorrect.

let's start with something really easy: job creation by presidential party. the numbers don't lend themselves to a nice pithy "party A good; party B bad" conclusion, but certainly the average shows that, on average, we as a country do better on jobs with Democrats in the head office than Republicans.
okay, maybe you don't like "job creation" as the employment metric (there are decent reasons not to). unemployment is more straight-forward to measure and the data comes in regularly and frequently; what's it tell us? try this analysis. i'll save you some reading, since i imagine that's a problem for you; the conclusion, on page 2, includes the punchline: "Over the past 34 years, Democratic Presidents have overseen periods when the unemployed became employed, and Republican administrations were characterized by an increase in unemployment."
alright, alright, it's not fair to focus only on "employment". there are other ways of generating wealth (although where that gets focused is an interesting question), and the employment numbers don't tell us as much about turnover as we'd like. how about some other metrics? well, this analysis is old enough that we don't get to poke at Bush II much, but the numbers are pretty conclusive over modern US history. "...since 1900, Democratic presidents have produced a 12.3 percent annual total return on the S&P 500, but Republicans only an 8 percent return." c'mon, tell me there's a liberal bias in S&P. you'd have to also lump in the Dow (nearly the same numbers). focusing on congress is also pretty damning; the spread is less dramatic, but still statistically relevant.
perhaps the most important macro metric of all - real GDP - follows the same trend as the stock market, at least since 1930.
how 'bout regionally? well, at least up until the current collapse, New England has been growing substantially faster than the rest of the country (left two columns in this chart; right two aren't really relevant). note the increasing spread between New England and the national average, either by percent or absolute dollars, as it coincides with the blue shift in the region over the same time period.
the Republicans got a lot of traction in the last election cycle out of the "redistribution of wealth" phrase, which they're still pimping. but the reality is that modern Republicans are far more guilty of it. take a look at GDP vs. median wageduring the Bush II years. the nominal increase in the economy after the Bush II crash was all focused on the top slice of the economy - doing very little to stimulate overall economic growth and stability.

you make some pretty weird claims about migration. can you show any evidence for a mass migration from blue to red states? i can't find it. instead, the conventional cause for census shifts are taken to be birth rates differing by states (for a good time, compare to teen birth rates when Republican hacks keep talking about the moral center of Real America) and immigration rates differing by states in roughly the same areas. the net domestic migration numbers, which i think are what you want to look at, don't seem to indicate what you want them to, although i could only find back to 1990. since then, there's been a departure from the northeast, midwest, and pacific coast for the western mo

They are also the only state that is currently asking for a large loan package from the federal government.

No, they aren't. California has far and away the largest economy and budget of any state, and its shortfall is the largest in absolute terms, but not proportionately to the total state budget or economy, and its not the only one looking to the feds for major assistance because most states can't run an operating deficit but the feds can.

The salary for the position of governor of alaska was $81,648 in 2001. It may be higher now. In any case, that amount is quite a bit more than "your average couple", although I'll freely admit that that is far from being rich. However, political connections can buy justice just as well, if not better, than money.

I'm almost certain that the governor isn't taking a pay cut,[...]

Actually, I recently read somewhere that he has never accepted his $200K-ish salary. Here's the first link I Googled: http://www.stateline.org/live/details/story?contentId=207914

We call it something different, but there is a lot of money spent on "cloud seeding" in the USA every year. There is some debate over whether or not it is effective, but apparently the Chinese aren't the only "bludgeoning buffoons" around here.

Texas rules... It's amazing though, no state tax, only a slightly higher sales tax and higher property tax. The property tax doesn't matter much because the houses are valued less. Yet their government seems to be doing great, with a lot of money going to schools and public services.

Texas lawmakers also are working under the gun of a court order to fix the state's $30 billion education financing system, which was ruled unconstitutional last September.
 
The Legislature and Republican Gov. Rick Perry failed to come up with an education plan during a special legislative session called by the governor last summer. So, last September, District Court Judge John Dietz threatened to shut down all schools if the Legislature does not act to replace the current school financing scheme by October 2005.
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Texas has struggled for years to correct inadequacies in its school financing system, which, like many states, depends heavily on local property taxes to fund education, a practice that is considered unfair to poorer communities.
 
Any solution to Texas' school financing problem will involve a significant tax hike, which was the sticking point last summer and will prove a significant hurdle in the Republican-controlled Legislature.
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Judge Dietz ruled that Texas's so-called "Robin Hood" school financing system, which attempts to equalize education funding by requiring wealthier districts to underwrite poorer districts, failed to generate enough money to meet state standards and was unconstitutional.
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In the past 10 years, the state government's share of education funding has dropped from 68 percent to 38 percent, forcing local school districts to raise property taxes to compensate. Texas ranks 37th nationwide in per-capita education spending, but the state ranks dead last in the percentage of state funds spent on education.
 
To keep up with inflation, nearly half of Texas' school districts have raised local property taxes to the maximum amount allowed under state law - $1.50 per $100 of property value. Although Texas's Constitution forbids a statewide property tax, Judge Dietz ruled that so many localities were at their maximum taxing power to support education that it was in effect a statewide property tax. The case is on appeal to the Texas Supreme Court, whose nine members all all Republican, but many say the chances are good the ruling will be upheld.
 
Source: http://www.stateline.org/live/ViewPage.action?site NodeId=136&languageId=1&contentId=15961

The amount of obligation that the public is under for the various Government Employee Retirement programs is going to come to light and it won't be a pleasant story. Already it was Virginia or West Virginia where there was a shortfall because of mismangement and the public was held accountable for it by the courts.

People complain about CEOs and their golden parachutes have never looked towards the public workers and realized just how golden those retirements really are. People think Social Security and Medicare funding are the big problem only do so because this is the big "dirty" secret that hasn't been publically harped on.

Here is a good story about just how big the numbers are, and you will be liable for it.

http://www.stateline.org/live/ViewPage.action?site NodeId=136&languageId=1&contentId=55769

Others have gotten in trouble for less deliberate eavesdropping. (Well, maybe not less deliberate, but not so much effort was required.)

Perhaps the authorities wouldn't have this problem, but I suspect they would.

Did you actually find anyone who was listed for public urination?

I don't make a habit of trawling through lists like this. However, the failures in the system have been widely, repeatedly publicised by organisations I trust not to simply make stuff up. Here's one news story with a direct quote from the ACLU mentioning public urination, and that's just from thirty seconds of Googling.

I'm waiting for the tsunami of examples demonstrating that socialism can provide services and products more efficiently than capitalism and the market...

The USA's Medicare program, health coverage for elderly and (I believe) poor, is significantly more efficient that the private sector. There are lots of numbers out there, but most of them show that the amount of money spent on administrative overhead by HMOs and other private health insurance corporations is 5 to 10 times higher than that spent on administrative overhead in Medicare.

Here is one of many such references: http://medicare.commission.gov/medicare/robinstest .html

If you think about it, it makes sense that Medicare is a lot more efficient. HMOs and the like have complicated payment structures, require several authorizations for treatments, have various methods for billing individuals versus employers, have marketing costs, maintain lists of 'in-plan' doctors and facilities, etc. Medicare on the other hand has a list of who is registered and another list of how much they will pay for each category of care. Since there is only one pricing structure and one entity to send and receive bills, the whole operation is simplified and thereby cheaper to run than having many companies all looking out for their own profits.

Likewise, having a single large buyer allows for better negotiation with pharmaceutical companies. Why are drugs cheap in Canada? Its because the entire country buys them as a whole and refuses to pay the outlandish prices the pharmaceutical industry tries to push.

Want more examples?

Try education for instance. As a graduate of an elite private college I can attest that such institutions provide excellent (maybe even 'the best' possible, if there is such a thing) education. But efficiently? Charging $40,000+/year to give 2500 students an education is a hell of a lot less efficient than charging $15,000(or less)/year to give 30,000+ students an education that can be every bit as good (or at least pretty close) as one at a private institution. Whether or not the margin of difference in quality (and style) is worth $100,000 is up to the student (and their parents), but in terms of efficiency the public universities are the clear winners.

How about elementary/secondary education? Public schools routinely educate students on less than $10,000/year/student and educate millions of children. Private schools typically cost at least twice as much and educate only a tiny fraction of the number. Maybe their quality is a little higher, maybe not. My public high-school in rural PA was pretty crappy due to a lack of local tax base and PA not pooling education funds state-wide. The teachers did the best with what they had though and the district gave everyone a basic education at a very cheap rate. Quite efficient.

If we wish our civilization to survive we must break with the habit of deference to great men.
-- Karl Popper

Great doubt: great awakening.
Little doubt: little awakening.
No doubt: no awakening.
-- Zen koan

Never in US history has a president tried to limit the rights of people. But in came GW Bush. He tried to limit the rights of gay people to get married. First president ever to try to limit someone's rights.

I call BS.

First, I'd like you to prove that no other president has limited the rights of people. If you need some source material, consider the ban on polygamous marriages. The law was created as a federal law to prevent the Mormons from practising polygamy. Before that they had no limits to this paractice.

Second, I'd like you to prove that the president tried to take away a right that Gay people had. In both cases where Gay marraiges have occured it has been because some local leaders have gone against state law, or judges interpreted law to allow unions, but not marriage. Gay Marriage laws in 50 states

So - How can one take away a right that was never a right?

-Adam

NG/ANG

Ahead of schedule

CNN agrees

It's in obscure trade journals

Straight from the horse's mouth

The stop-loss orders do not imply a lack of recruitment. Rather, it's a way to retain forces-in-being and their experience, and a way to increase numbers without increasing recruitment. Plugging the drain in the bathtub doesn't mean that the faucet has turned off.

how long do you think it will be before the governments get pissed about video playing capabilities... I mean, they got pissed when people were watching porn on the car DVD players (article)...but that was in the back seat... this thing rides up front. I hope these don't come to the states (legally) because there are going to be SO many accidents!!

At least we spend money on things that matter.

In short, your post simply confirms the original premise: the laptops are useless toys that do nothing education-wise. Sure, they might slightly improve students' understanding of computers. However, learning how to use Word and Powerpoint is something that can be done in just a few hours, and doesn't require students to have laptops.

Flame bait and ignorant.

Teachers like this one , and studies and newspapers back up my claim.

Do you work better on a good day or a bad day? Most work better when happy. I know this sounds amazing, but learning AND having fun is possible. Don't be a troll and don't try to deny the results. Attendance is up, kids are having fun, teachers are happy, test scores are good, etc. What more do you want?

Spoken like a true Libertarian (or a demagoguing Republican). There are budget cuts happening all over California. They're coming in public schools, rural healthcare, state parks, higher education, and more. Those are services that most Americans, and especially Californians, think are important. In fact, in order to cover the necessary gap, Gov. Davis has proposed more cuts than new taxes.

Incidentally, I decided to reply instead of modding you down, even though zapping your "insightful" bonus was very tempting.

Now, lets have bush raise the school budget to 150 billion from the little tiny 20 billion that it is, (currently we spend 400 billion and rising per year on the military)

In the USA, primary responsibility for education spending is with the state and local governments. According to this, education spending ranges from $3,700 to $8,100 per student. Military spending is only $1,400 per US citizen.