They don't want the high-performing teachers getting paid more. They say it's because teaching is a group effort. My translation: Just because the crappy teacher saw that kid once and wasn't able to ruin him, he should get a share of the bonus meant for the good teacher who really helped that kid.
In reality, they simply don't want anything hooking pay to performance. That would ruin the cushy racket.
"Party like its 1773" to tea partiers. Get it? It was a great line (whoever wrote it), but it was twisted by a media that is obsessed with destroying her.
"and didn't she attempt to imply that by being able to see russia from a random island in alaska gave her foreign policy credentials"
The statement was a response to the moderator's challenge to her previous statement that Alaska's proximity to Russia gives her international experience. It does, since Alaska has quite a bit of direct dealings with Russia due to the proximity, mainly in fishing, gas and oil. The true statement that you can see Russia from Alaska was trying to reinforce this fact with a visual in the minds of the viewers.
My point remains, bashing these days doesn't require the truth. The statements of both Gore and Palin were true, the bashers need to twist it in order to make them look bad.
Then you have the middle ground, the standard gaffe. They deserve a good laugh for that every once in a while, but it's not indicative of some general ignorance or deception. It's like Bachmann saying Lexington and Concord are in Hew Hampshire or Obama's 57 states, his "Austrian" language, his misspelling of "advice" or signing the Westminster Abbey guest book this year as 2008.
A question you need to ask yourself right now: When I mentioned those Obama gaffes, did you immediately doubt they were true, did you immediately think it may be the same twisting as done to Gore? Did you give him the benefit of the doubt before further research?
Now the big question: Did you give Palin and Bachmann the same consideration? Likely not, given you didn't know about the context of the Russia argument. You just took it as given. .
Be careful, partisanship can cloud your mind. I've see the most vicious idiocy ever directed at Palin and Bachmann. They pore over their every word in real-time, hoping to be the first to publish a story of their supposed mistakes without bothering to do one second of research or even thinking.
For the record, I am neither a Bachmann nor a Palin supporter. They're too religious fundamentalist for me.
They are accountable to their admins, then their district admins, then state, then federal. The only way they are accountable to the parents are through school boards, which aren't necessarily filled by people who actually care about the kids. And then throw in the unions, a huge power in opposition to the parents.
I was talking about more direct accountability. If the parents don't like the teacher, get rid of him. One correlation to the decline of the schools has also been the increasing centralization of the administration of the schools. IMHO, it's a partial causation too.
As far as parents teaching, I have a neighbor who I doubt could teach a fat kid how to eat a Big Mac. She's supposed to be in this teaching circle? Not my kids.
One problem is that most regulations are written by politicians who are in bed with those they are regulating. Dodd-Frank was a great example, since both of those are in bed with the financial industry, and pull a huge amount of money from the industry to stay in office.
And then there's the revolving door: One of the FCC commissioners who helped approve the Comcast merger immediately resigned to be the head Comcast lobbyist. Chris Dodd also pulled money from the MAFIAA for years as a senator before quitting to become their head lobbyist.
Another problem is ideologues regulating out of a sense of fairness without looking at the economic realities. Everybody should own a home? BS. But their efforts to make that happen regardless of economic fitness to own a home helped cause the crash.
One: Many school systems have become quite top-heavy. The administration at district, state and federal sucks huge amounts of money from teachers and supplies. Trim it down.
Two: Get rid of the feel-good and PC instruction. We pay for extra administrators and instructor hours to do stuff that is not education.
Three: Get rid of the extra expense in firing bad teachers. It can cost over $100,000 to fire a bad teacher, after he's sat on full pay for the two years it took to fire him. Most districts just buy the teachers out with no admission of wrongdoing or poor performance, and the teacher is free to move to the next district -- wash, rinse, repeat.
They were going to hold me back in the second grade until they realized I was just bored out of my mind. They gave me some more challenging work to do and I was performing well.
Some kids just don't have the patience to do boring things. I aced almost every test in high school, but I rarely did homework so my GPA wasn't all that hot. Plus there's the rebellious "I understood it the first time, you idiot, so why are you making me do it again?"
"your argument is that because the worst disaster ever was at a government run facility that means privately run ones are safe?"
No, my argument is that government isn't necessarily superior. It's a knee-jerk reaction from the left -- private enterprise sucks. Same as the knee-jerk reaction from the right -- government sucks. Either can be done well, either can be done poorly.
"I then went on to point out that we could reduce that reliance and move it to more stable, friendly countries."
Or you could go nuclear like France and break that reliance.
" Or can you provide evidence to prove otherwise?"
A trend. So-called environmentalists are even getting their panties in a bunch over the environmental impacts of solar installations, apparently they're worried about the ecological impact of the sun not hitting the ground as usual. They go apopletic when we consider building that very clean renewable energy source -- hydroelectric dams.
This isn't about saving the environment. It's about stopping progress.
It's mainly because of the GUI and such that PARC is thought of as some pure research organization. But even with the Alto Xerox tried to commercialize, in the form of the Xerox Star. They just failed.
A few times a month I hear of the esoteric stuff coming out of IBM -- stuff that won't hit the shelves for another decade, if at all.
Like I said, plenty of private research being done.
Democrats and their fawning media (DailyKos Markos and PBS's Gwen Ifill -- a presidential debate moderator -- started it) blasted Sarah Palin as ignorant over her "Party like it's 1773" comment to tea party activists. Doesn't that ignorant slut know it's 1776?
Then Republicans reminded them that she was referring to the Boston Tea Party, which did happen in 1773. So the Democrats are the ones without a clue.
Yet the story remains repeated, just as the one about "I can see Russia from my house" is. Somehow, being informed of their own ignorance doesn't even help. Eleanor Clift on The McLauglin Group during the election:
CLIFT: "And Palin said 'I can see Russia from my house.'"
BUCHANAN: "No she didn't. That's what Tina Fey said on Saturday Night Live."
CLIFT: "Well, that's what she meant to say."
Now it doesn't even matter what a Republican actually says, only what the Democrats say Republican meant to say.
While they are ordered NOT to do their duty and defend the position of the United States Government.
In general though, I would hope they are among the least competent people in government. These are the people who defend laws that are very often unconstitutional. They were the ones defending the the various civil rights abuses caused by the war on drugs.
Any private company doing this will get railroaded by the "environmentalists." And by that in quotes I mean those people who are against progress at all costs, BANANA, and not necessarily for the environment. You know, the people that caused Greenpeace co-founder Patrick Moore to leave the organization.
At least with the backing of FedGov they might have a chance to get something done instead of having their project put on hold in the courts until it dies.
Take your example of the solicitor general. They are supposed to argue the position of the United States Government in the Supreme Court.
The official position of the United States Government, by the passing by the House and Senate and signing by the President, is the Defense of Marriage Act. It is the law of the land regardless of its (IMHO) stupidity.
However, due to political considerations, the "institutional competence" of the United States Solicitor General will not be used to defend the position of the United States Government as it its mandate.
Likewise, for political reasons the Department of Justice refuses to use its professional competence to prosecute egregious examples of race-based voter intimidation.
However, this issue of malware is not likely to be political, so the government might actually do a pretty good job in this role. It is interstate in nature, and it is a role, like fire departments, that is not efficiently served by free market solutions.
In reality, the Democrats are just as bad, if not worse. They can be worse because of that successful marketing pitch that they're looking out for the little guy, when they're just trying to screw him in a different way.
The Republicans are "evil" and want to take away our rights, so we put a microscope on their actions. They can't get away with quite as much.
I said make sure he is not a danger in your own state.
If HE can't find a state HE is willing to go to, and that will accept him, then he must be detained so as not to be a danger to the local country until such time as HE finds a country HE is comfortable going to. See, no rights violated. It's his choice to stay.
He cannot be allowed to simply roam free, arrange crimes and plot the destruction of the free society he's in just because no other country that he wants to go to will take him.
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They don't want the high-performing teachers getting paid more. They say it's because teaching is a group effort. My translation: Just because the crappy teacher saw that kid once and wasn't able to ruin him, he should get a share of the bonus meant for the good teacher who really helped that kid.
In reality, they simply don't want anything hooking pay to performance. That would ruin the cushy racket.
"Party like its 1773" to tea partiers. Get it? It was a great line (whoever wrote it), but it was twisted by a media that is obsessed with destroying her.
"and didn't she attempt to imply that by being able to see russia from a random island in alaska gave her foreign policy credentials"
The statement was a response to the moderator's challenge to her previous statement that Alaska's proximity to Russia gives her international experience. It does, since Alaska has quite a bit of direct dealings with Russia due to the proximity, mainly in fishing, gas and oil. The true statement that you can see Russia from Alaska was trying to reinforce this fact with a visual in the minds of the viewers.
My point remains, bashing these days doesn't require the truth. The statements of both Gore and Palin were true, the bashers need to twist it in order to make them look bad.
Then you have the middle ground, the standard gaffe. They deserve a good laugh for that every once in a while, but it's not indicative of some general ignorance or deception. It's like Bachmann saying Lexington and Concord are in Hew Hampshire or Obama's 57 states, his "Austrian" language, his misspelling of "advice" or signing the Westminster Abbey guest book this year as 2008.
A question you need to ask yourself right now: When I mentioned those Obama gaffes, did you immediately doubt they were true, did you immediately think it may be the same twisting as done to Gore? Did you give him the benefit of the doubt before further research?
Now the big question: Did you give Palin and Bachmann the same consideration? Likely not, given you didn't know about the context of the Russia argument. You just took it as given. .
Be careful, partisanship can cloud your mind. I've see the most vicious idiocy ever directed at Palin and Bachmann. They pore over their every word in real-time, hoping to be the first to publish a story of their supposed mistakes without bothering to do one second of research or even thinking.
For the record, I am neither a Bachmann nor a Palin supporter. They're too religious fundamentalist for me.
Bill gives $56 billion. That's it, done.
Bill keeps the $56 billion principle and it keeps making money.
If it makes only 2% a year, that's a billion a year he can continually give away until he dies.
And then he can give away the rest.Total giving figuring he lives 30 more years: 86 billion.
They are accountable to their admins, then their district admins, then state, then federal. The only way they are accountable to the parents are through school boards, which aren't necessarily filled by people who actually care about the kids. And then throw in the unions, a huge power in opposition to the parents.
I was talking about more direct accountability. If the parents don't like the teacher, get rid of him. One correlation to the decline of the schools has also been the increasing centralization of the administration of the schools. IMHO, it's a partial causation too.
As far as parents teaching, I have a neighbor who I doubt could teach a fat kid how to eat a Big Mac. She's supposed to be in this teaching circle? Not my kids.
One problem is that most regulations are written by politicians who are in bed with those they are regulating. Dodd-Frank was a great example, since both of those are in bed with the financial industry, and pull a huge amount of money from the industry to stay in office.
And then there's the revolving door: One of the FCC commissioners who helped approve the Comcast merger immediately resigned to be the head Comcast lobbyist. Chris Dodd also pulled money from the MAFIAA for years as a senator before quitting to become their head lobbyist.
Another problem is ideologues regulating out of a sense of fairness without looking at the economic realities. Everybody should own a home? BS. But their efforts to make that happen regardless of economic fitness to own a home helped cause the crash.
One: Many school systems have become quite top-heavy. The administration at district, state and federal sucks huge amounts of money from teachers and supplies. Trim it down.
Two: Get rid of the feel-good and PC instruction. We pay for extra administrators and instructor hours to do stuff that is not education.
Three: Get rid of the extra expense in firing bad teachers. It can cost over $100,000 to fire a bad teacher, after he's sat on full pay for the two years it took to fire him. Most districts just buy the teachers out with no admission of wrongdoing or poor performance, and the teacher is free to move to the next district -- wash, rinse, repeat.
Let's keep going with this great idea. At a few thousand adults, you can pay a few adults in the community to teach the kids full-time.
What a great idea!
Are the smartest kids in two of my kids' classes.
But overall, black students fare much more poorly in our school than any other demographic.
The difference: Parents who impress upon their children that a good education is the ticket out.
They were going to hold me back in the second grade until they realized I was just bored out of my mind. They gave me some more challenging work to do and I was performing well.
Some kids just don't have the patience to do boring things. I aced almost every test in high school, but I rarely did homework so my GPA wasn't all that hot. Plus there's the rebellious "I understood it the first time, you idiot, so why are you making me do it again?"
Chris Rock went over this very well.
Get out of jail, you're a hero in the neighborhood.
Come back to town with a Master's degree, they don't give a damn, "Smart boy with a degree. But, can you whoop my ass?"
The teacher unions represent the teachers, admittedly to the detriment of the children if necessary.
The administration represents the bureaucracy and is often in collusion with the unions anyway (see Atlanta cheating scandal).
The PTA is just a fundraising/social group, forget it.
What collective group with one influential voice represents the children?
IBM has been working on that, with carbon IIRC.
Private research is alive and well.
"your argument is that because the worst disaster ever was at a government run facility that means privately run ones are safe?"
No, my argument is that government isn't necessarily superior. It's a knee-jerk reaction from the left -- private enterprise sucks. Same as the knee-jerk reaction from the right -- government sucks. Either can be done well, either can be done poorly.
"I then went on to point out that we could reduce that reliance and move it to more stable, friendly countries."
Or you could go nuclear like France and break that reliance.
" Or can you provide evidence to prove otherwise?"
A trend. So-called environmentalists are even getting their panties in a bunch over the environmental impacts of solar installations, apparently they're worried about the ecological impact of the sun not hitting the ground as usual. They go apopletic when we consider building that very clean renewable energy source -- hydroelectric dams.
This isn't about saving the environment. It's about stopping progress.
Ever heard of the laser printer?
It's mainly because of the GUI and such that PARC is thought of as some pure research organization. But even with the Alto Xerox tried to commercialize, in the form of the Xerox Star. They just failed.
A few times a month I hear of the esoteric stuff coming out of IBM -- stuff that won't hit the shelves for another decade, if at all.
Like I said, plenty of private research being done.
Tell me, what for-profit company was in charge of the deadliest commercial nuclear power plant, ever?
Oh yeah, it wasn't a company, it was a government.
"Don't forget that the UK is part of the EU and we already buy a lot of energy from other countries"
Yes, France, which means nuclear.
"I don't know why people are so down on this. "
The tech does look interesting. That's why I wouldn't like to see it get derailed in court by environmentalists.
In politics these days, what use are facts?
Democrats and their fawning media (DailyKos Markos and PBS's Gwen Ifill -- a presidential debate moderator -- started it) blasted Sarah Palin as ignorant over her "Party like it's 1773" comment to tea party activists. Doesn't that ignorant slut know it's 1776?
Then Republicans reminded them that she was referring to the Boston Tea Party, which did happen in 1773. So the Democrats are the ones without a clue.
Yet the story remains repeated, just as the one about "I can see Russia from my house" is. Somehow, being informed of their own ignorance doesn't even help. Eleanor Clift on The McLauglin Group during the election:
CLIFT: "And Palin said 'I can see Russia from my house.'"
BUCHANAN: "No she didn't. That's what Tina Fey said on Saturday Night Live."
CLIFT: "Well, that's what she meant to say."
Now it doesn't even matter what a Republican actually says, only what the Democrats say Republican meant to say.
While they are ordered NOT to do their duty and defend the position of the United States Government.
In general though, I would hope they are among the least competent people in government. These are the people who defend laws that are very often unconstitutional. They were the ones defending the the various civil rights abuses caused by the war on drugs.
Any private company doing this will get railroaded by the "environmentalists." And by that in quotes I mean those people who are against progress at all costs, BANANA, and not necessarily for the environment. You know, the people that caused Greenpeace co-founder Patrick Moore to leave the organization.
At least with the backing of FedGov they might have a chance to get something done instead of having their project put on hold in the courts until it dies.
For the last couple decades while all these vastly faster and more efficient processors just magically sprung from Obama's immaculate ass?
There's plenty of research being done.
Where a big-wig senator thinks it'll interfere with his view of the sea or his enjoyment of sailing his yacht.
Oh yeah, he's dead -- full spead ahead!
A politician can render a competent worker incompetent by telling him not to apply that competency.
No matter how capable you are, you can't do your job if you're told not to.
That the cost of streaming a movie 1/20th of the cost of DVD mailing.
At $8 per month, Netflix may not even be making a profit off of someone with a single DVD plan who always has a one-day turnaround.
Take your example of the solicitor general. They are supposed to argue the position of the United States Government in the Supreme Court.
The official position of the United States Government, by the passing by the House and Senate and signing by the President, is the Defense of Marriage Act. It is the law of the land regardless of its (IMHO) stupidity.
However, due to political considerations, the "institutional competence" of the United States Solicitor General will not be used to defend the position of the United States Government as it its mandate.
Likewise, for political reasons the Department of Justice refuses to use its professional competence to prosecute egregious examples of race-based voter intimidation.
However, this issue of malware is not likely to be political, so the government might actually do a pretty good job in this role. It is interstate in nature, and it is a role, like fire departments, that is not efficiently served by free market solutions.
That the Republicans must be doing it.
In reality, the Democrats are just as bad, if not worse. They can be worse because of that successful marketing pitch that they're looking out for the little guy, when they're just trying to screw him in a different way.
The Republicans are "evil" and want to take away our rights, so we put a microscope on their actions. They can't get away with quite as much.
I said make sure he is not a danger in your own state.
If HE can't find a state HE is willing to go to, and that will accept him, then he must be detained so as not to be a danger to the local country until such time as HE finds a country HE is comfortable going to. See, no rights violated. It's his choice to stay.
He cannot be allowed to simply roam free, arrange crimes and plot the destruction of the free society he's in just because no other country that he wants to go to will take him.