Tag Archive for: Politics

Ann Coulter is still flapping her big mouth. Like I said before, she needs to shut the hell up. She’s not attacking Edwards or 9/11 widows this time, instead she’s saying that all women should lose the right to vote.

“If we took away women’s right to vote, we’d never have to worry about another Democrat president. It’s kind of a pipe dream, it’s a personal fantasy of mine, but I don’t think it’s going to happen. And it is a good way of making the point that women are voting so stupidly, at least single women.” Source

How can anyone take this woman seriously? It’s really sad.

From the NEA:

Is Senator Talent working for public education? ‘F’ on report card says no

It is report card time for lawmakers of all stripes and U.S. Senator Jim Talent has some explaining to do. He got an F on the National Education Association’s 109th Legislative Report Card for the 2005-06 session of the U.S. Congress, released in Washington, D.C.

Talent’s score was 29 out of 100. The F grade is based on votes on key NEA supported legislation and criteria measuring a lawmaker’s commitment to public education via co-sponsorship of bills, behind the scenes work, accessibility and advocacy.

Talent, whose recent state campaign ads highlight his work, falls short of the mark when it comes to sharing the responsibility of helping make public education work for every child.

Among the votes counted in 2005, Senator Talent voted against the restoration of $4.8 billion for 48 education programs slated for elimination, including those addressing Career and Technical Education, Safe and Drug-Free Schools, and education technology grants. He also voted against increasing Head Start funding and for massive cuts to entitlement programs in the budget reconciliation measure in late December of that year.

In 2006, Senator Talent voted against an amendment that restored funding for college prep programs, raising the maximum Pell Grant to $4,500, and providing up to $23,000 in student loan forgiveness to new teachers in high need schools.

On other lawmaking tasks of interest to Missouri public school workers, Senator Talent voted repeatedly against raising the minimum wage. He also refused to join the majority of his Congressional colleagues in co-sponsoring a bill to restore Social Security benefits that Missouri’s teachers and education support staff and their spouses have earned.

Senator Talent’s report card is available for NEA member’s inspection at http://www.nea.org/lac/senate.html.

Make sure you don’t vote for Talent this November and instead vote for Claire McCaskill.

This story is a bit old. I first heard it while student teaching in Troy as told to my Contemporary Issues class by my cooperating teacher. It is an excellent story about trying to run the education system as a business. Why post it now? Well, #wordpress was in one of it’s several hour long political discussions and many things came up. This time I didn’t participate, probably because politics bores me right now. I did offer this story though. It’s a good read.

“If I ran my business the way you people operate your schools, I wouldn’t be in business very long!”

I stood before an auditorium filled with outraged teachers who were becoming angrier by the minute. My speech had entirely consumed their precious 90 minutes of inservice. Their initial icy glares had turned to restless agitation. You could cut the hostility with a knife. Read more