pro-voucher nutso on CB

[MikeWaters]

I was thinking this guys is nuts.

http://www.cougarboard.com/noframes/...tml?id=3101463

Referendum 1-What Pubic Ed doesn't want U 2 Know..

Author: icecougar
Date: Oct 18, 2007 - 04:46pm
Category: Political Discussion
Viewed 59 times

...I've seen lots of misinformation tossed about on CB recently regarding vouchers and private vs. public education. There's one thing at the heart of the issue that you need to keep in mind but Public Education hopes you don't realize:

When does Govt do anything better than private enterprise/industry?

Public Education and the funding behind it is huge business and that's what it all boils down to. School administrations are bloated, inefficient and downright wasteful.

Case in point, in my hometown we were having a teacher's strike because the teachers hadn't had a raise in 7 yrs (not even keeping up with inflation). The School District Superintendent said there simply wasn't any money to do that. Class sizes had increased, kids were paying $175 per sport to play on school teams, and had to pay a fee to park in student parking lots.

Yet, somehow in spite of this terrible financial crunch, the Superintendent was able to push through approval for funding on an additional Asst Superintendent plus a receptionist for the new Asst Supe at a salary cost of $150K annual. Then he comes up with a proposal to restructure his position as School District Superintendent into a Contract position so that the district wouldn't have to pay his health benefits and other perks and it would save money overall on his compensation (he'd get a higher salary but the total would be less w/o his benefits). What everyone caught on to was that he was going to retire in 3 yrs and his retirement pay was going to be based on his 3 highest income years (his proposal would've significantly increased his pension income for many years and cost way more than in the long run).
If you were running a business in that fashion and a competitor was building a better mousetrap, cheaper and faster would you close up shop, maintain the status quo until you ran it into the ground or try and get competitive? That's the main issue behind this.
The liberals fight the idea of vouchers by using scare tactics, "They're going to shut down public schools!!!!!" and for the less informed it works.

Remember when Newt Gingerich was running things in Congress with his Contract with America? One of the things he was trying to do was eliminate a lot needless waste on the Federal level and send block grants directly to States to fund things like education, etc. Since every state has a Dept of whatever there wasn't really a need for a Dept of whatever on the Federal level too. They could skip the middle man, send more money directly to the states but spend less overall out of the federal budget, bypassing the federal bureaucracy.

What did Clinton and the liberal media machine do to combat this novel approach? Scare tactics. For example when Newt was trying to eliminate the Federal school Lunch program and just send money to the states to use for their own School Lunch programs the liberals all screamed that he was trying to starve your kids and take away thier lunch programs for low income children. More money overall would have gone to the States for this program and yet the Federal Govt would have saved money but everyone bought into the scare tactics and that began his downfall.
Well the liberals that control the public education machine are trying to use the same scare tactics regarding private education and federal education dollars. What most of you don't seem to realize is that something like this already exists in most areas involving Home School families.

I don't live in Utah and would be curious to see how this turns out for you. Inevitably in my home state we'll have the same discussion sooner than later on vouchers. Don't fall for the hysterics but do as one CB poster said yesterday and read the referendum and be informed.

Then this post confirmed it.

http://www.cougarboard.com/noframes/...tml?id=3101616

My son is doing his high school thru Liahona Prep,
Author: icecougar
Date: Oct 18, 2007 - 05:16pm
Category: Political Discussion
Viewed 6 times

Academy in Orem even though we live in Alaska. They offer their curriculum through distance education and the Home School program we belong to here pays for it.
I'm extremely impressed by the folks who started and run that school.

[jay santos]

I'm totally against school vouchers in Utah, but it's not a philosophical thing for me it's a practical thing. Yeah, maybe if we started from scratch a private school system might work better than public, don't know. But we have a public school system right now. And in Utah, public schools are pretty decent. Good enough to get you on the right track and into a good college. Good enough that you're not going to be faced with drugs and murder on a regular basis. If you have standards you can keep them while you go to public school. So I see private schools, charter schools, and home school as a threat to me as a parent. If they take enough good kids from public schools, public schools could go to hell and it would cost me more to put my kids in private school. And one dime they take away from my public school to go to somebody else takes away from my kids' school's budget. So I'll fight for that dime no matter how unfair it is or how sound the theory is for vouchers. I told my home schooling brother this and his jaw nearly hit the floor. He felt it was completely unconstitutional and anyone with an ounce of principle should vote for vouchers.

[MikeWaters]

I'm just laughing that it comes out this guy is not only a homeschooler, but one who pays to get his materials from zion.

[BlueHair]

Screw vouchers. I say charge full tuition to public school students. Whatever the actual cost is, charge it. Of course, I'm a Libertarian nut.
This might slow down the procreation in Utah County. It also might stop some of the whining about Mexicans taking all of our resources.

Americans have turned into beggars. We want everything for free. We want our health insurance to pay for everything (instead of just major events). We think the government should pay for college. We think everyone is entitled to own a home regardless of credit (see subprime mess). I don't believe education, home ownership, or health insurance should be rights. Buy it or go without.

[jay santos]

Originally Posted by BlueHair

Screw vouchers. I say charge full tuition to public school students. Whatever the actual cost is, charge it. Of course, I'm a Libertarian nut.
This might slow down the procreation in Utah County. It also might stop some of the whining about Mexicans taking all of our resources.

Americans have turned into beggars. We want everything for free. We want our health insurance to pay for everything (instead of just major events). We think the government should pay for college. We think everyone is entitled to own a home regardless of credit (see subprime mess). I don't believe education, home ownership, or health insurance should be rights. Buy it or go without.

Subprime mess was private companies allowing everyone to get a home not gov't giving away free loans.

This libertarian stuff sounds good in theory but not in practice. We have been blessed as a nation enough that we can provide basic health care and education rights for the poor. You can make a case economically that it only helps us in the long run, anyway.

[BlueHair]

Originally Posted by jay santos

Subprime mess was private companies allowing everyone to get a home not gov't giving away free loans.

This libertarian stuff sounds good in theory but not in practice. We have been blessed as a nation enough that we can provide basic health care and education rights for the poor. You can make a case economically that it only helps us in the long run, anyway.

The subprime mess was private companies taking bad risks, but only because Greenspan flooded the market with dollars. Subprime paper was pooled with A paper debt and rated AAA by rating angencies causing greedy firms to buy it to make extra profit. But it did start with bad Fed policy.

As far a Libertarian stuff being good in theory, I agree. We'll never know if it would be good in practice, because everyone wants a free ride. Noone wants to give up their handouts (including me). It doesn't make sense to reward people that have a bunch of kids they can't pay for by giving them free education, medicaid, and food stamps. Having more kids than you can afford is reckless behavior. The more government hands out, the less responsible citizens become.

Having said all of this, if I had my choice of burning billions of dollars in a war, our giving it out to citizens in the form of handouts, I'll choose the handouts every time. It's been estimated that 276 million people could have been given health insurance with the money that the war has cost so far.

If we're going to be socialist, let's go all the way with it. I could turn into a lazy ass in no time.

[jay santos]

Originally Posted by BlueHair

The subprime mess was private companies taking bad risks, but only because Greenspan flooded the market with dollars. Subprime paper was pooled with A paper debt and rated AAA by rating angencies causing greedy firms to buy it to make extra profit. But it did start with bad Fed policy.

As far a Libertarian stuff being good in theory, I agree. We'll never know if it would be good in practice, because everyone wants a free ride. Noone wants to give up their handouts (including me). It doesn't make sense to reward people that have a bunch of kids they can't pay for by giving them free education, medicaid, and food stamps. Having more kids than you can afford is reckless behavior. The more government hands out, the less responsible citizens become.

Having said all of this, if I had my choice of burning billions of dollars in a war, our giving it out to citizens in the form of handouts, I'll choose the handouts every time. It's been estimated that 276 million people could have been given health insurance with the money that the war has cost so far.

If we're going to be socialist, let's go all the way with it. I could turn into a lazy ass in no time.

Blaming Greenspan for just about anything is bad form. The guy might be responsible for more economic prosperity than any American over the last 100 years. Every choice you make in his position has different consequences, and he pretty much nailed every important decision. It's not his fault lenders went crazy giving out bad loans.

[BlueHair]

Originally Posted by jay santos

Blaming Greenspan for just about anything is bad form. The guy might be responsible for more economic prosperity than any American over the last 100 years. Every choice you make in his position has different consequences, and he pretty much nailed every important decision. It's not his fault lenders went crazy giving out bad loans.

I'm not saying its entirely Greenspan's fault. I'm saying the creation of excess money created the opportunity for fraud. The lenders were greedy, but who doesn't make an easy buck when the opportunity arises? They were making loans and investors were buying them. It hard to blame them for making loans that investors were willing to buy. It reminds me of the dot com bubble. Everyone and their dog bought stock and everyone made money(for a while). Now I think the Fed should allow the banks and equity firms to pay for their mistakes. It's simply not right to allow them to make tons of money taking bad risk and then step in and bail them out with rate cuts. Let the market correct itself. The stock and real estate markets are vastly overpriced.

[MikeWaters]

Originally Posted by BlueHair

Screw vouchers. I say charge full tuition to public school students. Whatever the actual cost is, charge it. Of course, I'm a Libertarian nut.
This might slow down the procreation in Utah County. It also might stop some of the whining about Mexicans taking all of our resources.

Americans have turned into beggars. We want everything for free. We want our health insurance to pay for everything (instead of just major events). We think the government should pay for college. We think everyone is entitled to own a home regardless of credit (see subprime mess). I don't believe education, home ownership, or health insurance should be rights. Buy it or go without.

do you think BYU tuition should be subsidized by tithing? I assume not.

[BlueHair]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

do you think BYU tuition should be subsidized by tithing? I assume not.

I don't mind corporations spending their money however they please. I am however against the tithing tax write off. I think fast offerings are charity, but tithing is similar to a membership dues in a club.