Republican Night of the Long Knives continues...

[rb336]

where is the power to nationalize ore even run a student loan program delegated in the Constitution?

it falls under the "general welfare" clause [[which both history and the longest string of judicial precedence of any issue clearly is legally interpretted rather broadly. Washington and Jefferson both argued that it ok'd a federal education system). with interstate student bodies, one could argue it under the interstate commerce clause as well

[oladub]

gp, I wrote that supply/demand was a 'significant factor' for why tuition is outstripping inflation. I did not suggest it was the only reason. You provided another good reason, at least for public universities but your explanation falls short of explaining why private college costs are going up too. Sorry, no banana. Take some time out to read up on supply demand. More demand reduces supply causing costs to rise. Or areyou suggesting that for some reason supply/demand dynamics do not hold with regard to student loans?

DC Public Schools: $1.29 Billion, $28,170 per Pupil
"According to The Washington Post, the D.C. school system ranks first in the nation for percentage of budget spent on administration and last in spending on instruction." It has a great student to teacher ratio and a highly paid staff but it doesn't work.

Federal funding for District of Columbia public schools, including charter schools, is $103 million according to the Department of Education’s website. Pro-rating this to exclude charter schools [[a rough estimate that should understate federal funding received by district schools), we are left with $72.7 million. Under the Washington, DC school voucher program, however, DC public schools are granted an additional $13 million dollars annually [[a “sweetener� added to the bill to ease its passage through the legislature), bringing the total up to: $85.7 million.
The grand total of DC public school funding for 2007-08 is thus $1.216 billion. Divide that by the OSSE’s official enrollment figure of 49,422students, and you arrive at an estimated total per pupil spending figure of $24,606.'
"DC public schools receive funding from several sources: the District’s local operating budget, special supplementary operating funds from the DC City Council, capital funding for building improvements and construction, and the federal government. "

Your turn. You are suggesting that all this money is raised from city residents. I proved there was federal funding and showed you the $100,000,000 figure you asked for. Now please show where the rest of the money came from if it came from DC residents as you claim. Property taxes, sales taxes, cigarette tax, or what? How do DC residents manage to fund their schools better than the residents of Grosse Pointe on a per student basis? That's what you are saying. I backed up my stuff. It's your turn. Numbers please.

rb336: "it falls under the "general welfare" clause [[which both history and the longest string of judicial precedence of any issue clearly is legally interpretted rather broadly. Washington and Jefferson both argued that it ok'd a federal education system). with interstate student bodies, one could argue it under the interstate commerce clause as well "

rb, General welfare is mentioned twice but I can't find the part under either heading delegating the federal government to play a huge role in education or operate a student loan monopoly. The word 'delegate' is important because the 10th Amendment says that powers not delegated are reserved for the states. If the general welfare clause meant that whatever Congress dreamed up and claimed was for the general welfare automatically met that definition, there would have been no need to put specific delegated powers into the Constiution such as "to provide and maintain a navy" because Congress could have figured that out. Why not just get rid of the rest of the Constitutional powers and just have a commerce clause and a general welfare clause to justify nearly everything? How about a different interpretation of general welfare that would be consistent with the 10th Amendment? Notice the adjective 'general'. That word is a clue. Everything the congress does is supposed to be for the 'general welfare' rather than 'special interests'. "Welfare" is not a synonym for government doles except for liberals..

[ghettopalmetto]

Really, oladub? The Cato Institute?

You're implying that DCPS receives the vast majority of its funding from the federal government. At the same time, the numbers you cite demonstrate that the level of federal funding is actually less than 10% of the total. This is the money that the DC school district--like any other school district in the U.S. gets--for federally mandated special education requirements.

Where do you suppose the other 90+% of DCPS's funding comes from? I mean, Lord knows the residents of DC don't pay taxes or have their own local government--they just sit around waiting for the federal government to hand them checks, right?

[oladub]

Really, oladub? The Cato Institute?

You're implying that DCPS receives the vast majority of its funding from the federal government. At the same time, the numbers you cite demonstrate that the level of federal funding is actually less than 10% of the total. This is the money that the DC school district--like any other school district in the U.S. gets--for federally mandated special education requirements.

Where do you suppose the other 90+% of DCPS's funding comes from? I mean, Lord knows the residents of DC don't pay taxes or have their own local government--they just sit around waiting for the federal government to hand them checks, right?

Yes, I am implying that a high percentage of DC school funding comes from federal coffers.

-oladub post 49: "The federal government pays over $100,000,000 a year directly to DC schools."
-gp post 50: "CITE SOURCE"
-oladub post 52: "Federal funding for District of Columbia public schools, including charter schools, is $103 million according to the Department of Education’s website." "Your turn. You are suggesting that all this money is raised from city residents. I proved there was federal funding and showed you the $100,000,000 figure you asked for. Now please show where the rest of the money came from if it came from DC residents as you claim. Property taxes, sales taxes, cigarette tax, or what? How do DC residents manage to fund their schools better than the residents of Grosse Pointe on a per student basis? That's what you are saying. I backed up my stuff. It's your turn. Numbers please."
-gp: ....crickets...

Perhaps this will help. Washington D.C. derives 26.4% of it's $10.4B budget revenue from federal sources. 14.8 % of DC revenue is from 'enterprise funds' which is to say things that pay for themselves. Only 50.4% of DC revenue is locally raised. If the enterprise funds were not included, 31.1% of DC revenue is from the federal government.

FY 2009 [[from table 3-5) of Washington DC's budget
Actual Revenue [[in thousands)
F1 Federal Grants 1,936,195
F2 Federal Payment/Contribution 146,748
F3b Medicaid FMAP Increase 130,949
F3c Foster care\Adoption Assistance - Title IVE 2,587
F4 Private Grants 9,737
F5 Subtotal, Federal & Private Resources 2,226,215

F10 Expenditures [[by Appropriation Title)
F14 Public Education System 268,366

That is to say, according toWashington DC's Budget, that $268,366,000 if federal money went into DC schools. On top of that, any money that came from the City council or mayors office came out of a general budget that was made up of 26.4% federal revenue. I don't know where this fits in but there was also a $75M federal contribution for 'school improvement.

[ghettopalmetto]

How is less than 10% "a high percentage"? Your own numbers aren't consistent with what you're claiming. And are your figures for DCPS expenditures counting the "state" educational overhead, or just the "local" operating funds? How do DCPS expenditures per pupil compare to the suburban school districts in the metropolitan area?

Do you mean to say that Michigan doesn't get any federal money? I'm sure if we counted all the money Michigan gets for roads, education, Medicare, the Corps of Engineers, etc, the percentage would be pretty comparable. But you're just ready to jump to conclusions based on fragments of evidence, aren't you? You're being intellectually dishonest. Maybe you should conduct your analysis before you reach conclusions, instead of trying to fit your analysis to your pre-ordained crap.

Hell--at least Michigan is able to tax more than 60% of its land.

[rb336]

Considering that DC is the Federal District I find the arguments regarding its federal funding -- for anything -- funny. Let's say they, like any other city, got their income from property taxes. What do you suppose the total property tax on those federal properties would be? HUGE. of course, they are not subject to the tax, even though virtually everything about DC is, by definition, there to support those structures. The amount DC as a whole gets from the govt is probably a pitance compared to what they would pay if it were a private company paying taxes to the city

[maxx]

Quote: "if only he could get away from that KKK & anti Jew rap he has"

Huh? Please source where Ron Paul indicated either.

You're asking for citations??? lol I need a new irony meter.

[maxx]

oladub:
I'd guess that California's student scores have more to do with the number of poor Mexicans that have come to California than with the amount of money spent on the schools. I notice that the people who say that throwing money at schools doesn't improve them are quite willing to throw a lot of money at the schools educating their own children.
I'd also guess that the Dakotas do not have as many Mexican-American families as California.

RE: your story on the Ontario school
I'm sure the harassment stopped as soon as the teacher was fired. How many teachers get fired because one student picks on another? And a one-room school is a strange place in that in order that the young ones learn the basics of reading, writing, and 'rithmetic, some older students have to sacrifice their own study time during school. It was better than nothing back when there was little need for even high school graduates. That sacrifice doesn't happen a lot in today's schools because of the greater academic demands placed on all students today. I imagine there was some conflicts among the various students' needs in that Ontario school.

[maxx]

Oladub:
When you start criticizing people for the recent bank bailout, you have to refresh your memory of the S & L crisis of the 1980s.
http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=...xeI6dgqPcYTxwQ
[IMG]file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/Inez/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/moz-screenshot-2.png[/IMG]
"As of year 1986 441 thrifts with assets of $113 B in assets were book insolvent and another 553 thrifts. with $453 B in assets had tangible capital of no more than 2% of total assets. These 974 thrifts held 47% of industry assets...
'Only 3 months after the cleanup started," he [Seidman] said, "...the problem was far worse than anyone... had envisioned , and it was getting worse everyday. Real estate was in real depression in parts of the country...We would also need billions to pay off depositors and to carry weak assets of the institutions until they were sold...

So allowing banks to just go under has consequences for the entire economy.

[oladub]

rb, I think your theory is plausible but didn't come across anything proving your point. It is possible this hypothetical federal property tax is masked as 'grants' to DC as you suggest. Where I live, the State pays almost nothing in property taxes to local communities for property it owns. Perhaps the federal government is more generous.


gp, review: DC only raises 50.2% of its budget locally. We start with line F14 'Public Education System $268,366,000' is directly from the federal government. Besides that, the city council provides money. I don't know the amount but when money flows from the city's general revenue to the schools it is, [[remember?) only 50.2% locally raised. I have read in different places that the annual school budget is anywhere from $1.29 to $1.8B. There was also that $75,000,000 of federal money to improve schools although I couldn't determine if that was included in the $268M or is in addition to it. The school aid was listed in a different chapter. Anyway, the federal funding of DC schools is significant, over 10% and less than 50%.


Earlier in the thread you stated, "DC Public Schools are financed by the residents of the District of Columbia, not the federal government." Do you still want to go with that.?


Which gets me back to my larger point. Why should it cost so much for Washington DC to do such a lousy job of educating it's children? How is this an advertisement for the role of the federal government in education? High paid teachers, lots of administrators but high drop out rates and lousy test scores.

[Stosh]

rb, I think your theory is plausible but didn't come across anything proving your point. It is possible this hypothetical federal property tax is masked as 'grants' to DC as you suggest. Where I live, the State pays almost nothing in property taxes to local communities for property it owns. Perhaps the federal government is more generous.


gp, review: DC only raises 50.2% of its budget locally. We start with line F14 'Public Education System $268,366,000' is directly from the federal government. Besides that, the city council provides money. I don't know the amount but when money flows from the city's general revenue to the schools it is, [[remember?) only 50.2% locally raised. I have read in different places that the annual school budget is anywhere from $1.29 to $1.8B. There was also that $75,000,000 of federal money to improve schools although I couldn't determine if that was included in the $268M or is in addition to it. The school aid was listed in a different chapter. Anyway, the federal funding of DC schools is significant, over 10% and less than 50%.


Earlier in the thread you stated, "DC Public Schools are financed by the residents of the District of Columbia, not the federal government." Do you still want to go with that.?


Which gets me back to my larger point. Why should it cost so much for Washington DC to do such a lousy job of educating it's children? How is this an advertisement for the role of the federal government in education? High paid teachers, lots of administrators but high drop out rates and lousy test scores.

Lots of words, little sense. Talk to the horse.

[ghettopalmetto]

rb Where I live, the State pays almost nothing in property taxes to local communities for property it owns. Perhaps the federal government is more generous.

In the District of Columbia, the federal government DOES pay nothing for the properties it owns. As do the various nonprofits. Embassies. And churches--DC is home to the second-largest concentration of Catholic institutions in the world. And Congress has repeatedly struck down proposals to allow a commuter tax that every other large city has, despite two-thirds of jobs in the city being held by nonresidents.

And then there's little stuff like providing police protection for "national" events like the teabagger parties, presidential motorcades, and the Vice-President's daily commute to work. That stuff doesn't get reimbursed.

gp, review: DC only raises 50.2% of its budget locally.

DC's budget for FY 2008 estimated $5.33 billion in locally-raised revenue. http://cfo.dc.gov/cfo/frames.asp?doc...ummary_web.pdf [[Page 4-2)

The same budget for FY 2008 estimated expenditures of $5.77 billion [[Page 5-7).

Also, the DC CFO's budget to Congress quotes a FY 08 figure of $16,730 per enrolled student in both of its public school systems [[Page 5-3).

Besides that, the city council provides money. I don't know the amount but when money flows from the city's general revenue to the schools it is, [[remember?) only 50.2% locally raised.

Um, yeah. That's how DC operates. The District collects tax revenues and uses it to fund the schools.

Earlier in the thread you stated, "DC Public Schools are financed by the residents of the District of Columbia, not the federal government." Do you still want to go with that.?

Yes.

[oladub]

maxx, I didn't want to bring up California's illegal alien problem. You are probably right. That is one of the side effects of declaring sanctuary cities and providing freebies to the illegal alien community. Subsidies always attract more of whatever is subsidized. Those are choices made by Californians . If such decisions atrophied California schools they should support higher taxes or overturn the referendum that froze property taxes.
edited to add - I forgot to mention that South Dakota has a large impoverished Amerindian population so poverty in California would be offset with reservation poverty in South Dakota for comparison purposes.

Regarding that school: The Superintndent rehired the school's former teacher who had lost her job because she got married which was the policy then. She not only cracked down on the troublemakers, she organized them into the best softball team in the area. She knew how to handle boys. My father's experience was not starting school until age 8 because of the -30 temperatures, bears, and a four mile walk. He didn't know a word of English and the teacher didn't tolerate Norwegian. His one room schooling ended by age 13 by which time he doing algebra. With a good teacher, kids could advance at their own rate in one room schools. I don't know if Canada had a national DOE at the time but kids learn anyway. I do know that when annual tests were given, Ontario required the children to take the tests in another school in the presence of a different teacher. This was in the thirties and early forties.

regarding banks: Almost all the S&L's that failed were in Texas and California because those states had lax banking laws. There is no longer a penalty for taking bank risks because the feds reward failure. Just today I read that Fannie and Freddie stocks were being removed from NY Stock Exchange listing. On Christmas Eve, President Obama signed an executive order requiring taxpayers to pay for all Fannie/Freddie defaults through 2012. That wasn't right. The troubled banks were allowed to sell their worst loan packages to Fannie at face value to shore them up and taxpayers have to pay the difference of value of the trash Fannie was stuck with. If that isn't economic fascism, I don't know what is.

[oladub]

gp, The difference in the $16k and $24K per student numbers has to do with indirect expenses such as paying retired teachers' pensions. At $16K, where else could taxparers get so little value for so much money?

[ghettopalmetto]

gp, The difference in the $16k and $24K per student numbers has to do with indirect expenses such as paying retired teachers' pensions. At $16K, where else could taxparers get so little value for so much money?

No, I agree. Something needs to be done to improve education in that city [[and everywhere, really). I don't claim to have any kind of knowledge in educational reform, so I really don't know what that is.

But if we're going to throw numbers, let's at least be consistent and accurate. When making a direct comparison you can't include "legacy" costs for one place, and then exclude them for another.

And you can't blame the federal government [[Well, you can blame Congress for forcing DC to fund two separate public school systems.) when there are thousands of other school districts that are subject to the same policies.

[Sstashmoo]

Quote: "You're asking for citations??? lol I need a new irony meter."

Really, you need the crown of stupidity. Someone indicated that RonPaul was a KKK member and had an "Anti-Jew Rap". I think it's healthy for us all to know where these lies come from. You've been asking for citations regarding a Biblical matter, i.e. my countering the nonsense "Catholicism is Christianity" concept. I've already explained to you, I wish to drop it so as not to offend those of that faith. And yet you keep grinding away at it. I can prove what I said, it may or may not silence you, but it would offend all in the process. Now it's up to you, should I continue? Drop it, Okay?

[Stosh]

Quote: "You're asking for citations??? lol I need a new irony meter."

Really, you need the crown of stupidity. Someone indicated that RonPaul was a KKK member and had an "Anti-Jew Rap". I think it's healthy for us all to know where these lies come from. You've been asking for citations regarding a Biblical matter, i.e. my countering the nonsense "Catholicism is Christianity" concept. I've already explained to you, I wish to drop it so as not to offend those of that faith. And yet you keep grinding away at it. I can prove what I said, it may or may not silence you, but it would offend all in the process. Now it's up to you, should I continue? Drop it, Okay?

He may need it, but you won't give it up. Share!

[ghettopalmetto]

. You've been asking for citations regarding a Biblical matter, i.e. my countering the nonsense "Catholicism is Christianity" concept. I've already explained to you, I wish to drop it so as not to offend those of that faith.

Oh, NOW you're concerned about offending Catholics....

[maxx]

Originally Posted by Sstashmoo
. You've been asking for citations regarding a Biblical matter, i.e. my countering the nonsense "Catholicism is Christianity" concept. I've already explained to you, I wish to drop it so as not to offend those of that faith.

Too late for that.

[maxx]

oladub: Did I say something about civil rights laws? No, but collective racism is a bi-product of Democrat policies and it is measurable. Using Detroit as an example; Detroit has Democrat voters and Democrat representatives. The result of their choices have been disasterous. Measured by unemployment rates, civic pride, housing stock, high school drop out rates, fathers who abandone their children, infant mortality rates, crime, longevity, Detroit's blacks are suffering.

maxx: If you read the article about how AZ looks today, you'll see that cutting taxes leads to less money being spent on roads, bridges, the Capitol building, etc.
In fact this sounds positively libertarian:

"...The anti-government attitude in Arizona is now reflexive, especially because of its entanglement with he issue of immigration. As one local resident, who didn't want to be identified because she has a government job, told me: 'People who have swimming pools don't need state parks. If you buy your books at Borders you don't need libraries. If your kids are in private schools you don't need K-12. The people here, or at least those who vote, don't see the need for government....'"

I won't argue with you that Detroit has had some remarkably bad leaders. I am still in shock that the City Council was ready to let Cobo Hall go under rather than accept regional aid. But don't lay bad governance just at the feet of the Dems.

[jiminnm]

Actually, the Fed Govt does make payments to states and DC in lieu of property taxes [[$382 million in 2009). The program comes out of the Interior Dept, so I expect that it relates only to lands administered by that dept. [[includes the BLM).
http://www.nbc.gov/pilt/pilt/states.cfm

[Jimaz]

"...The anti-government attitude in Arizona is now reflexive, especially because of its entanglement with the issue of immigration. As one local resident, who didn't want to be identified because she has a government job, told me: 'People who have swimming pools don't need state parks. If you buy your books at Borders you don't need libraries. If your kids are in private schools you don't need K-12. The people here, or at least those who vote, don't see the need for government....'"

What I found interesting about that sentiment was that it seems contrived to drive folks [[at least the individuals that hold it) away from the concept of "in unity there is strength." It's as if they're being conditioned to collaborate with a "divide and conquer" system that is plotting their own weakening but they don't recognize that manipulation.

But maybe they do: "As one local resident, who didn't want to be identified because she has a government job, told me..." There is some kind of awareness of impending deception there. This seems to be an individual who is on the cusp of being switched one way or the other and she has become aware of it -- and she knows she's not the one with the hand on that switch.

[maxx]

RE; Rand Paul and his certification

What a libertarian concept: if you don't like the regs put out by a professional accrediting board, just create your own.
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmem...mology_out.php