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  • Posted by $ CBJ 7 years, 9 months ago
    “The President's budget request for FY 2017 includes $69.4 billion in discretionary funding.” That's President Obama's budget request made a year ago, and FY 2017 started last October. We don't know yet what President Trump's budget request will be for the next fiscal year. There will be pressure from Republican fiscal hawks to radically reduce the Department's budget or perhaps abolish the Department of Education altogether. DeVos will have some input into the department's priorities, but the final decision will be made by Trump and Congress.
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    • Posted by $ Abaco 7 years, 9 months ago
      I really, really want to see the Dept of Education go away. I think DeVos needs to dismantle it, tear down the building(s) and build a park in it's place, complete with little museums for science, math, art... Don't just end it - dismantle it...
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    • Posted by 7 years, 9 months ago
      Yes, I do realize that, but should have pointed it out. Thanks for doing that and for the analysis. I used that figure as the latest available just to indicate the relative size of the Department versus the school system. Now you have provided additional good context.
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    • Posted by CircuitGuy 7 years, 9 months ago
      "We don't know yet what President Trump's budget request will be for the next fiscal year."
      Indeed. But we're watching. We know President Obama's critics and I find a $400 billion structural deficit dangerous. I wonder how much it has to drop before President Obama's critics are satisfied. I would be satisfied if it went down 20%, so that we're on track for a balanced budget, even if a recession occurs, within eight years.
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  • Posted by chad 7 years, 9 months ago
    Vouchers are a an attempt by the individual to secure their own money while the government pretends it is doing you a favor giving you their money and requiring that you find a private school that meets all the educational criteria of their school system. Jefferson said there should be as much separation between state and schools as state and religion otherwise it would control the education, teach children that tyranny is freedom and raise up a generation of slaves demanding a tyrannical state without having to fire a shot.
    I don't have any children in school and don't want to pay for someone else's children to be educated. How I withdraw? Can I get a voucher. The only way to stop the alphabet soup of tyranny is to dissolve all of the bureaus completely. As long as there are any parasites in the system they will fight to maintain their lives to the very end.
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    • Posted by zonoz 7 years, 9 months ago
      Why should you be able to withdraw? Who paid for your education? Not your parents. Those buildings were built long before you were born. And who do you think will be paying into Social Security so your monthly check will keep coming? The kids that you paid to educate, just like somebody else paid to educate you and then you paid into SS and they were paid. Call it an investment in the future. Our forefathers knew the need for it. If we left it to the parents of today's children how could we ever be sure they would even bother to educate their own children given the way many are acting out today. It has always been the practice of the older generations to teach the upcoming ones so they could provide for their elders as they aged. Just because you don't have children doesn't mean that someone else's children won't be taking care of you sometime in your future does it?
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      • Posted by $ CBJ 7 years, 9 months ago
        So governments should continue running the schools, and taxpayers should continue being forced to pay for them? How is this position consistent with the Objectivist philosophy of individual rights?
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        • Posted by zonoz 7 years, 6 months ago
          Yes, yes. It's not.

          There are basically two ways to get an education. Public or private.

          Now for a little storytelling, possibly not entirely factual. Back in the old days many, many, many children got little or no education because, a) Ma and Pa never got no larnin' b) Children were needed at home to work the farm or to go to work somewhere else to help support the family-leaving no time for school c) There were no schools for children to attend.

          So in order to put a stop to the endless cycle of poverty it was made law that all children should attend school until age 16. And to accomplish that there needed to be schools available. At time I don't think private schools were much of a factor and so, as had been done, towns set up their own schools. Soon it became obvious that some type of standards and enforcement were needed to educate our kids so some type of governing organization needed to exist and who but the government had the power and scope to do that? So the individual towns, counties, and states organized and began collecting taxes for the establishment of schools, purchase of books, and the hiring of teachers. Nothing new, just on a larger and more organized scale. And somewhere along the way, as is always the case the Feds got involved, good or bad. But all in all, the intent was good. Everyone paid their share in what is now called paying it forward.

          But today we have people that don't want to pay their share. Their education was paud for by those that came before them but they don't want to do that for those that come after them. I don't know why. Cheap ass tightwads? Perhaps. To me it seems pretty fair. I'm paying to educate the people that are going to take care of me when I can no longer take care of myself, the ones that will pay into Social Security (as I did) so I can recieve the benefits I paid for when I was working, the ones that will run this country. I most certainly don't want a bunch of uneducated idiots working minimum wage jobs (which is largely what we have today) paying little or nothing into SS, or running the country. No, I want well educated men and women making big bucks, paying lots of taxes and SS and running this country as it should be run. So I'm okay with the way our school system is financed for the most part, although I'm not a big fan of what is being taught today and how.

          Charter schools and vouchers are simply a way for someone to take the portion of money that would be spent on their children and send it to a charter school instead of a publuc school. I personally think it will improve the overall education system as it gives public schools some competition and a reason to improve and I just don't see how that can hurt our kids edycatiins. In fact, in my own area I have already seen improvements in our public schools due to decreasing the overcrowding of classrooms, and increasing the quality of education in publuc schools.
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  • Posted by Dobrien 7 years, 9 months ago
    Competitive markets for attracting students will bring the quality of education up and the costs down . As the Government looter asked Dagny "what shall we do Miss Taggert" . She replied
    "Get out of our way".
    I always thought the liberal elite should educate their kids in the public hell hole of schools in this country . No , those who represent to want all equal and all inclusive . They Seek the most exclusive
    Private schools.
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  • Posted by Ed75 7 years, 9 months ago
    The home schooling movement is much bigger that most folks realize, and it is growing, thank goodness. A major element of support for the "government youth camps" is of course taxation. Ms DeVos has a formidable job ahead of her given that for at least the last 50 years, everyone involved has been subjected to the government brain washing of "public education.
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  • Posted by mccannon01 7 years, 9 months ago
    After viewing the Democrat's Holy Inquisitor, Franken, the escapee from the far left wing of the SNL asylum, pontificate over the current DoED debate regarding the importance of the semantic nuances of the relationship between proficiency and growth in today's education environment, I truly concluded the taxpayer is getting screwed here. DeVos squirming in her chair (or should I say shackled to the rack as victim) was justified as it was difficult to remain composed while this fool drooled on and on. I also concluded DeVos only needed two requirements for the job: 1) a battle axe to hack that bureaucratic pyramid into little pieces and 2) a toilet to flush them down. Now that she is in charge, let's see what she does.
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  • Posted by bubah1mau 7 years, 9 months ago
    I hope some of those "steaks" get served out here in Montana--even if they are served over the dead bodies of Gov. Bullock and Sen. Jon Tester.
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  • Posted by $ WilliamShipley 7 years, 9 months ago
    One of the things that the anti-voucher people fail to realize is that the existence of a large number of school children with vouchers will represent a major new market for new schools to form. It isn't just a case of using them at the existing schools.

    One can imagine turning the educational system upside down and having groups of teachers follow the model of doctors and lawyers and start a school where they hire the support staff. A side benefit of this would be teachers who were aware of free market principles and the need to be competitive -- it would be their 'practice', after all. This would undoubtedly have an effect on the lessons they taught.
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    • Posted by 7 years, 9 months ago
      Great comment. All of us who attended public schools were taught by people who made their living as government bureaucrats. Just a truism. Of course, their views varied greatly, many were married to businessmen, etc., but still...a definite bias, there...
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      • Posted by $ WilliamShipley 7 years, 9 months ago
        I think this may be one of the most important battles of all. Having everyone taught daily for 13-17 plus years by a government employee goes a long way towards explaining the popularity of socialism.
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  • Posted by CircuitGuy 7 years, 9 months ago
    This appears to conflate the issues of a) should gov't provide taxpayer-subsidized education for children and b) should it accomplish that by gov't owning and running schools. The article implies DeVos is against all taxpayer-subsidized education. Is that true?
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    • Posted by 7 years, 9 months ago
      I didn't mean to conflate the two. In fact, at one point I did address that point. And it is by the way an essential point to make. DeVos, as I quoted here, spoke against public education per se in one brief remark. I can't answer your question for sure without checking further. I know she will not be SAYING that she opposes all public (tax supported) education...
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      • Posted by CircuitGuy 7 years, 9 months ago
        I read it again. I agree with all forms of choice in school, even if it means people choose to spend voucher dollars on religious schools. That's not gov't establishing a religion. It's parents choosing to buy something religious.
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