A great pilot can sail even when his canvas is torn.
Seneca
Christie, Budget Cuts, Gail:
"None of Your Business": Thumbs UP!
Gov. Chris Christie (R-NJ) last night, in New Jersey on public TV, "Christie on the Line." This is why people like the guy. In a prerecorded videotaped question, a woman named "Gail" says (sniveling), "You don't send your kids to public schools, you send 'em to private schools. So I was wondering, Governor, why do you think it's fair to be cutting school funding to public schools?"
CHRISTIE: Hey, Gail? You know what? First off: It's none of your business. I don't ask you where you send your kids to school; don't bother me about where I send mine. Secondly: I pay $38,000 a year in property taxes for a public school predominantly in Mendham that my wife and I don't choose to utilize because we believe -- we've decided -- as parents that we believe a religious education should be part of our children's everyday education. So we send our children to parochial school. Third: I, as governor, am responsible for every child in this state, not just my own, and the decisions that I make are to try to improve the educational opportunities of every child in this state. So with all due respect, Gail, it's none of your business.I just want to provide some alternative commentary here, although I think clearly Chris Christie is exactly right in what he's saying. I heard some Democrat on a Hannity panel argue that he objected to Christie's tone to the constituent. The question, in fact, at its heart a personal attack: it's suggesting that cuts are intrinsically unfair, the reason Christie allows an injustice occur is because he isn't vested in public education, i.e., "let them eat cake". There's also an implicit judgment that the reason Chris Christie doesn't care about education is because he is "rich enough" not to have to worry about other kids whom don't have parents whom can pay for private education.
I think Christie needs to be more specific. For example, he goes from talking about cuts to saying "the decisions that I make are to try to improve the educational opportunities". He needs to be clearer on what exactly he's saying here. For example, he could be saying "current funding is intrinsically unsustainable; if we going to have sustainable funding, we aren't going to get there with unsustainable anti-business growth tax and regulatory policies. We aren't going to be able to do that by subsidizing bloated school administrations or teaching staffs, by postponing the inevitable, e.g., school closures, etc. There are also points where he could be sharper. "Cuts" by themselves are not "unfair". We already know many of our international competitors have lower teacher to student ratios but show higher achievement. If and when we agree higher achievement is our properly measured outcome, it's clear that teacher headcount is not an efficient reform. In addition, the "fairness" criterion, in my judgment, spans the whole expanse of the state budget, not a single parochial interest, like education; what's fair is the state budget cuts being spread as equally as possible. Finally, there's a question of a competitive education market. The very existence of private schools provides a check on public education, forcing it to shed costs and streamline programs to become more competitive. (Governor Christie could have also raised issues involving security challenges for his kids in the public education system or the fact that President Obama also enrolls his children in private schools.)
John McCain: For Shame!
I have written quite a few commentaries on McCain and Palin. My patience is getting thinner with both. But first, one of the things that really annoys me is the unaccomplished "prodigious progeny" (say, for instance, Ron Reagan), whom leverage their famous parents' fame. Bristol Palin, the oldest daughter of Sarah Palin, is writing a memoir at the ripe old age of 20, and she seems to be taking shots at Meghan McCain and her mother. Bristol Palin's claim to fame, of course, was the achievement of being pregnant and unmarried during the campaign with an irresponsible hockey player and giving motivational speeches on teen abstinence. Ms. McCain graduated from the same Ivy League school as Barack Obama, is a nationally syndicated columnist. There was some speculation on a Today Show interview whether McCain might make a second try in 2012, which he rejected. I haven't seen any relevant recent polls, but I don''t think the party wants to rerun the same failed candidacy that mostly failed on economic issues.
I did want to focus on a couple of other points: first, there was McCain's totally unsubstantiated and unduly provocative claim that unauthorized aliens are responsible for current wildfire blazes in Arizona. It's not just these allegations fundamentally are prejudicial against Latinos and reflect, in my judgment, intrinsically anti-Christian values. We libertarian-conservatives really constitute the backbone of the Tea Party movement; we do not recognize undue interference by the government telling us how to run our businesses (including whom we hire). It's utterly PATHETIC that the hypocritical media conservatives--the Sean Hannity's, the Rush Limbaugh's, the Mark Levin's, the Ann Coulter's, the Laura Ingraham's, etc.-- and their so-called Republican allies claim to support free market principles when they want to prescribe every possible state or federal restriction aimed primarily at a single ethnic group, Latinos. It's morally reprehensible. I'm getting sick and tired of demagogues trying to scapegoat immigrants for the job situation, safety net spending, etc. It's mean-spirited, unfair, and, at its core, anti-Christian. I'm getting tired of hearing all these states trying to usurp federal prerogatives and responsibilities of immigration policy. I have my own issues with the Democrats, but the idiot activists trying to co-opt the Tea Party with a fundamental anti-Tea Party agenda of government intrusion into the private sector are doing everything possible to try to push Latinos to reelect Barack Obama: How STUPID are these media conservatives? "If Ann Coulter Had Any Brains", she would be lashing out against the anti-immigrants doing their best to throw the election to Obama next year. It's not the immigrants--it's counterproductive, punitive Obama tax and regulatory measures that have slowed the recovery by creating unprecedented uncertainly in business 5-year plans.
Second, there is the recent charge by McCain that the GOP is becoming more isolationist. No, but we cannot overextend ourselves, we have to understand the expensive mistakes that were made, and we need to choose our battles better. NO MORE BLANK CHECKS, NO MORE INITIATIVES OF DUBIOUS STRATEGIC NATIONAL INTEREST.
Killebrew Fact
June 4, 1969: Rod Carew and Cesar Tovar both steal home in one plate appearance—a Killebrew plate appearance. Carew stole second, third, and home in that one at-bat.Political Humor
"The team of Obama and Boehner beat the team of Vice President Joe Biden and Ohio Gov. John Kasich. When they tallied up the score, they were 14 trillion over par." - Jay Leno
[Obama kept hitting the ball into sand traps: Iraq, Libya, ... He never could quite chip out and took the penalty. Then the President's shots off the tee constantly hit the rough. Boehner nicknamed it "the Economy". Then there was the greens fee--Obama took all the green in Boehner's wallet.]
"The prize money for the U.S. Open had to be borrowed from the Chinese Open." - David Letterman
[Rory McIlroy, a 22-year-old golfer from Northern Ireland, won the US Open. I'm not saying that the Obama Administration spin machine is working overtime, but they pointed all the Americans outscored the Northern Irishman in an international competition.]
Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups
Chicago, "I Don't Want To Live Without Your Love"
