Tag Archives: morality

School Choice

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The Arizona State Court of Appeals (a level junior only to the State’s Supreme Court), Division One, ruled on a suit against that state’s creation of an education savings account (officially, Empowerment Scholarship Account) for grades K-12.  The Arizona ESA is designed to provide state funds to help parents send their children to schools of the parents’ choice (and away from failing schools), which might have included church schools.  The state had been sued on that last basis—the potential for state funds to be used in a religious environment.

The Appeals Court, politely, waved the BS flag at the suit:

The ESA does not result in an appropriation of public money to encourage the preference of one religion over another, or religion per se over no religion.  Any aid to religious schools would be a result of the genuine and independent private choices of the parents.  The parents are given numerous ways in which they can educate their children suited to the needs of each child with no preference given to religious or nonreligious schools or programs.  Parents are required only to educate their children in the areas of reading, grammar, mathematics, social studies, and science.

The ESA is neutral in all respects toward religion and directs aid to a broad class of individuals defined without reference to religion.  The ESA is a system of private choice that does not have the effect of advancing religion.  Where ESA funds are spent depends solely upon how parents choose to educate their children.  Eligible school children may choose to remain in public school, attend a religious school, or a nonreligious private school.  They may also use the funds for educational therapies, tutoring services, online learning programs and other curricula, or even at a postsecondary institution.  We therefore concur with the trial court that the ESA does not violate the Religion Clause.

Attorney General Eric Holder might want to keep this in mind as he sues Louisiana over that State’s use of state funds to subsidize parent choice.  The Louisiana case isn’t about separate of church and state, but it is, as was the Arizona case, very much about parents’ choice of schools for their children.

“Parents are required only to educate their children in the areas of reading, grammar, mathematics, social studies, and science.”  They can’t do that much when their children are trapped in failed schools.  Holder needs to get out of the way; the only serious outcome of his winning his suit is to keep Louisiana’s children trapped in that state’s failed public schools and so trapped in poverty.

Failed education is the first, and most important, link in the cycle of poverty.  By functionally denying children an education, Holder will be making it extremely likely that his victims grow up into either of two adult cycles of poverty: poverty and crime, or poverty and government dependence.

 

h/t AEIdeas

What if They Had a Government Shutdown?

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…and nobody cared?

A lot of financial sector data, for instance flow from the Federal government’s Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Department of Commerce.  However, these data also flow from private sector entities—organizations like the Institute of Supply Management (a host of forward- and backward-looking management surveys across a wide range of economic sectors), ADP (weekly jobs reports), the University of Michigan (confidence surveys), the Conference Board (roughly complementary confidence surveys), and so on.

Intuit makes, among other things, accounting and tax software—and it collects (with permission) employment data from 200,000+ businesses.  Its monthly employment reports, based on based on these real-time aggregated data, are current.  The best the government can do here (even when it isn’t shutdown) is eight months to a year behind real-time.

Etc.

And there’s Google and Bing.

Separately, but related, comes this…admission…from the just “shutdown” government:

The EPA said its plan for dealing with a shutdown would classify 1,069 employees, out of 16,205, as essential.

The Feds are saying that some 93% of its EPA employees are nonessential.  It’s reasonable to extend from that that the vast majority of these nonessentials are, in fact, surplus.  The EPA is a relatively extreme example, but it illustrates the degree of fat in the Federal government that could be cut—that is being cut by the present shutdown, at least for the duration.

Next there’s the actual impact of this government shutdown.  80% of all Federal employees are still at work (the EPA, et al., notwithstanding).  Parks are closed, which inconveniences several travelers (other than WWII veterans who forced their way into their War Memorial with the help of some Republican Congressmen and the acquiescence of the Memorial’s guards, who had more sense than their Park Service employers), and other frankly similarly minor items, but the government remains fully functional.

Finally, there’s this Federal hardship: First Lady Michelle Obama’s office announced via Twitter: “Due to Congress’s failure to pass legislation to fund the government, updates to this account will be limited.”

Negotiations

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President Barack Obama spent 15-20 minutes in a Tuesday Rose Garden speech proudly proclaiming his refusal to negotiate with Republicans over the budget or the nation’s debt limit.  He spent another hour Wednesday afternoon telling Republican leadership directly that he would not negotiate with them.  After all, he has said through his representatives and Congressional colleagues that Republicans are terrorists and have bombs strapped to their chests, and that they want to burn the US economy; with what/whom is there to negotiate?

However, Obama, directly or through subordinates, will treat with actual terrorists:

Hassan Rouhani (phone call)

Ayatollah Khamenei (letter)

Muammar Qadhafi (meeting)

Bashar al Assad (via Senator/Sec State Kerry)

Mahmoud Abbas (meeting)

Hugo Chavez (meeting)

Najib Mikati (via Senator/Sec State Clinton)

 

h/t AEIdeas, which has imagery.

This Is

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…what President Barack Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D, UT) and other Democrats want to shut down our government in order to protect:

California: 58,000 will lose their plans under Obamacare. …exodus from the…state’s Obamacare exchange: Aetna, UnitedHealth, Anthem Blue Cross (which left the Obamacare exchange for small businesses,t too)

54% of Californians expect to lose their coverage….

Missouri: Patients of the state’s largest hospital system—13 hospitals—will not be covered by the largest insurer on Obamacare exchanges, Anthem BlueCross BlueShield.  Anthem’s 79,000 Missouri patients may seek subsidies on Obamacare’s exchanges, but they won’t be able to see any doctors in the BJC HealthCare system.

Connecticut: Aetna…won’t offer insurance on the Obamacare exchange: “We believe the modification to the rates filed by Aetna will not allow us to collect enough premiums to cover the cost of the plans and meet the service expectations of our customers.”

Maryland: Aetna and (recently purchased)…canceled plans to offer insurance in the [Obamacare] exchange when state officials wouldn’t allow them to charge premiums high enough to cover costs.

South Carolina: Medical Mutual of Ohio left SC entirely in July due to Obamacare’s “vast and quite complex” new regulations.

New York: Aetna pulled out of New York’s exchange…to keep their plans “financially viable.”

New Jersey: Aetna won’t be a part of the [Obamacare] exchange.

Iowa: Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield…decided not to offer plans in the Obamacare exchange.

Wisconsin: United Healthcare and Humana [will not offer] insurance on Obamacare exchanges.

Georgia: Medical Mutual of Ohio, Aetna, and Coventry left due to Obamacare regulations.

More than a million-and-a-quarter insurees and potential insurees are affected by this Democratic Party action.

Mendacious

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Offered, repeatedly, House-passed bills to fund the government for the next several months, the Senate Democrats rejected every one.  They did so with no counteroffer; they simply refused to negotiate.

And Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid says, “They’ve lost their minds.”

That’s all Democrats have.  They refuse to address the issues at hand; all they’re willing to do is make scurrilous ad hominem attacks.

Their shutdown of the government is the temper tantrum of a tired, bitter old man.

Or, it’s the measure of the integrity in the Senate.