2015 archive
A Bush of His Own 0
Also, pigs, wings.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Politeness is its own punishment.
The state has refused to prosecute because the incident was deemed accidental.
And though the victim’s family has launched an appeal to see him tried for manslaughter, DeHayes insists he has already been punished enough.
QOTD 0
John Astin as Gomez Adams:
We are faced with a very serious problem. There is only one thing we can do.
Worry.
Still the Chill 0
Detail
Chris-Crossed 0
Alfred Doblin doesn’t think Chris Christie is serious about his attempts to “reform” (Christie’s term, not mine–ed.) New Jersey’s pension laws.
But the facade is cracking, and that explains the pension war. The governor may say he intends to win this battle, but his actions say otherwise. He doesn’t need to win it, only to declare it to grab the attention of conservatives.
The overarching problem in pension-world is not retirees who expect to receive the pensions that they were promised. It’s companies and governments who promised the pensions, then failed to provide for them.
Employees kept their promises to come to work and do their jobs. Employers broke their promises and now would penalize employees for daring to expect a solvent retirement, while the companies and governments face no penalties for their pension lies.
The Testing Flailure 0
In my local rag, education professor Claire Berube argues that, as long as politicians continue to flail at public schools with standardized tests, education will continue to deteriorate. Here’s a bit; read the rest.
The beneficiaries of the testing flailure are the outfits selling the tests and no one else.
Situational Ethics 0
Shaun Day explains “ethics” (or at least legislation) on one situation do not lead to “ethics” (or at least legislation) on the other situation(s). A snippet:
This year’s bipartisan ethics reform bill focused strictly on one component of ethics in government — restricting gifts to elected officials — while ignoring two others that are critically important: redistricting and campaign finance.
Light Bloggery 0
Events.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
A permit for youthful politeness:
Harris County Precinct 5 Captain Romeo Chapa tells us they believe the child’s parents have a concealed handgun permit and that the child may have found the gun and accidentally shot himself.
The child didn’t make it.
Just Another Perk 0
Jeez Louise.
“Consensual sexual relationships do not have monetary value and therefore are not reportable as gifts or ‘reportable expenditures made for lobbying,’” the formal advisory opinion says.
If consensual sexual relations “do not have monetary value,” why is prostitution illegal?
Chartering a Course for Disaster 0
The Roanoke Times calls out the Virginia Republican Party for (guess what?) hypocrisy, this time on schools. A snippet:
Or put another way, it would allow Richmond to tell local governments how to run their school systems.
That runs contrary to how conservatives such as Obenshain generally think schools should be operated. Ordinarily, they believe schools should be run locally, with few mandates from Richmond and even fewer, if any, from Washington.
So why the philosophical about-face here? Because it appears to be the only way to accomplish another conservative goal: The creation of more charter schools.
In Republican land, putting public money in private hands outweighs using it for the public good six days a week and twice on Sundays.