The government should have left Tucker alone and forced the car manufactures of Detroit to compete. But government did what it always does, it corrupted innovation and growth with an attempt to control the manufacturing process. And 60 years later, look at Detroit. But the jobs the senator and his friends were protecting lasted so those people could retire and go fishing for a couple of years, and that’s all that mattered to those people during that time. They didn’t care what would happen to Detroit a half a century later. They only thought of themselves.
Well, the same thing goes on in every industry, most notably the health care industry.
We have arrived at a time and place where the human being can change what getting older means. We don’t have to take pharmaceutical medicine any longer, or at least we shouldn’t have to. Science has arrived to make such things seem barbaric. Growing new body parts and fixing all illnesses, genetic defects, and even cancer rests within genetic engineering, and will very, very soon be as common to our language as television is now, compared to a person that remembers life without television. The human body can repair itself. It built itself within a mother’s womb and can always regenerate all tissue at any time. Those secrets have begun to be unlocked.
Hospitals except for emergency surgery such as gun shots, car crashes and other traumas will become unnecessary. Doctor visits less needed. And prescription drugs including the thousands of drug stores all over the country are going to become useless.
Medicare is a corrupt system that costs all of us a treacherous amount of money.
This kind of thing has to stop. Obama Care will only exacerbate this kind of behavior. We need a lot less of this fraud and abuse, not more. And regenerative science will give us the option. It will allow us to extend the retirement age to perhaps 100 to 150 years old. It will solve our Social Security problems, and it will eliminate much of the expensive abuses that go on in the medical industry. But it will require human beings to think differently. And humans aren’t good at that. Look at these idiots in London today, just because the government wants to cut its costs, which is the responsible thing to do. People like this are parasites to innovation and are incredibly short-sighted and define why I can’t stand unions.
The great moral question of tomorrow will be a religious one, how long should we live? Do we have a right to manipulate the aging process? The answer is that of course we do, because we already do with prescription drugs, that we’ve all come to accept it as a reality. The next natural step in that scientific advancement is regenerative medicine. We have to look at it as the only moral solution to our current funding dilemma and it is the most humane way to deal with handicaps and debilitating illnesses.
The medical industry as we know it will change. New jobs will be created, but they will be different roles, and there will be a lot of resistance to those changes. Drug manufactures will spend billions of dollars to prevent people from trusting new forms of medicine, just as steel lobbyists in Atlas Shrugged tried to keep a new metal from hitting the market. They don’t want the cost of competition. They, just like those in the education profession, cling to the old way of doing things, because their pensions and job security are tied to it.
I know what it’s like to lose a job. I’ve had periods of wealth, and periods of complete collapses. I can remember vividly days where I rode my bicycle to work 12 miles each way all year-long to save money on gas. And I’ve worked every job and odd job one can dream up from sales to janitorial work and everything in between. I’ve been on the bottom and have been on top. I know what I’m asking when I tell people to be bold, not to worry, and not to cling too tightly to the job you currently hold, because to do so prevents innovation which is necessary to the growth of our nation, and ultimately beneficial to our everyday lives. What is the point of arguing about retirement and pensions if such things aren’t needed in a future where life expectancy will double or triple within the next two decades? And to those of you reading this that think what I’m saying is science fiction, check it out for yourself. There is only one reason for us to continue dying at age 65 to 85, and that is to protect the jobs of those in the health care industry. That’s the only reason, because science is bringing us new options that many people would forgo in favor of security. Think what an absurd notion it is to consider that someone would trade a life of limitless adventure and unknown excitement for one that is certain to end about 10 years after retirement. Yet those in government that seek to suppress these new scientific discoveries will do just that, because they are short-sighted puppets to lobbies sent by pharmaceutical companies to stifle the creativity of our nation, and are themselves cancers to our inventive spirit.
The question is do you have what it takes to say yes to life? Because in saying yes, you say you have the courage to reinvent yourself as many times as needed to always look with an eye toward the rising sun and leave the false security to those seeking sunsets.
And in saying yes, the world may crumble, but it will be rebuilt with something much better and stronger than would have otherwise been possible.
1. What was your involvement with the Lakota Levy?
a. I am currently the spokesman for No Lakota Levy.com which is a group of residents and businessmen living within the Lakota district opposed to further property tax increases. For many years we all worked separately from our various positions, but when it comes to the business of defeating a Lakota Levy we pull our resources together to finance the campaign portion of such an endeavor and run a unified campaign. I handle the media contacts and campaign strategy in conjunction with a core group of approximately 22 motivated members at the front of the effort, each handles specific obligations from data collection, legal needs, financing, and content design. My specific obligations were to collect all that information and project it through the website of nolakotalevy.com and other media outlets.
2. What is your main reason for not supporting the levy?
b. The only way to sustain the education budget at Lakota is to stop the inflating costs. Education is going to have to get leaner, not larger. School Choice is going to force competition, so Lakota must adapt if it hopes to continue to be a choice school for students moving to the district. Online classes are proving to be more efficient for some forms of education, such as foreign language and mathematics. Blind obedience to older forms of education are proving to be devastating to our national culture, so throwing more money at an average, or outdated system is not wise, and the teacher contracts that we are currently obliged to at Lakota are inflating the budget in an uncontrollable way, the average teacher makes over $62,000 per year and the step increase obligations are increasing that budget each year. Real estate movement has frozen as a result of the Housing Bubble crash of 2008 and taxes need to actually go down to attract business and residential growth to the area, not up. Passing a levy would only make this problem worse and far less attractive. Potential business development and residential expansion will move to Franklin, Trenton and Monroe if taxes continue to increase which is not the direction we want to go to in Liberty Twp and West Chester.
3. You say that to pass the levy it would just be putting a band-aid on a much larger problem. Is this problem the mismanagement of state funds in your opinion?
c. My opinion is that education has grown to expect too much funding. It has become used to a large bureaucratic system that funnels money without question under the umbrella of education and those dollars are not getting children the education they need. The band-aid is a term to that describes the levy increase is only to pay for an inflated budget driven by step increases from a teachers union that told the press they took a pay freeze, yet the budget needs continue to expand because of those step increases, so the statements to the press and community were very deceptive. Throwing more money at the situation will not improve the educational lives of the children in the community. In fact there is no evidence that more money will solve anything. What we need is competition introduced to all school districts, through programs like School Choice. This will force school systems like Lakota, and Mason, and all others to bring down their per-pupil costs which are currently hovering around 10K per student. That’s a ridiculous sum that as a society we cannot allow that cost per student to increase to 11K or 12K in the coming years. Those costs need to go in the other direction so we can sustain education far into the future. Not just till many of the district employees currently in the system reach retirement. Our concerns are for the health of the district. Not the current employees.
4. With the levies not passing, what effect do you think this has on the West Chester community?
d. Unfortunately in the short run busing has been cut, electives cut, lay-offs of some of the newer teachers, who probably shouldn’t have been cut because they were new and full of energy. Sports have been cut, but all these cuts are really cents on the dollar. They are intended to impact the community negatively in order to secure future funding, and that is an unfortunate game to play. The healthy aspect of not passing the levies is that it has helped create the need for a bill such as S.B.5 which will give our school board the ability to control its costs. One of the primary complaints I’ve heard from the school board is that there is very little they can actually do, because the union contract is so restrictive. That kind of restriction costs an enormous amount of money in compliance. So because of the failures of these levies, we have been able to get advancements of programs like School Choice, and S.B.5 which will allow our school board to continue to manage Lakota as a highly sought after school district. The most devastating event that could have happened in recent history is when the teachers union threatened to strike in 2008, which immediately drove up the labor costs within the Lakota School district, and this has had a very negative effect on real estate that is cautious of such high taxes and the ability of the school system to remain solvent. I have been asked, as many in the No Lakota Group have, why I don’t run for school board to help solve these problems. Well, when S.B.5 becomes law I can think of about 50 people right off the top of my head that would then be ready to help run the school district properly, businessmen that are successful in the West Chester area. They won’t do it now because the unions are a radical group showing no flexibility or understanding of fiscal responsibility. I personally would not deal with such people, and many of the people I know won’t either. What we can do at this phase is deny more money to a broken system. That forces them to live within a budget. The district really should look at lowering their 160 million dollar budget to something below 120 million. We’re not asking them to do that. We’re asking them to work with what they have without increased costs. Just under 100 students were added to the Lakota School System after 2009 because the housing market froze. That lack of growth occurred well before Lakota failed a levy. It is a direct result of a poor housing market, and extremely high taxes. More tax increases is an insane and treacherous path that will force a decline in what we’ve all worked hard to build in West Chester and Liberty Twp. We need to drive our costs down instead of up and by voting no we are forcing that discussion to take place. We’re not taking away their money. They are choosing to respond to the small cuts instead of getting their payroll under control. The same amount of money is still flowing in their direction. And that figure will go down if they continue to make Lakota appear to be a bad district for sports, busing cuts and electives, driving residents away which will further lower the taxable income the district receives. The district must be responsible, work with the budget they currently have while keeping Lakota a desirable district attractive to parents while using S.B.5 to get their costs in line the moment it is passed.
5, Do you think the education or school system reflects on a community?
e. No, that is a popular myth. The school system is a reflection of the community not the other way around. The kids that go to Lakota are good or above average because the parents that send those kids to school care about their kids. Whenever parents take an active role in their kids those kids will perform higher. The school system will be good because the people in the community are good. Money has nothing to do with it. Things are good or great because of the people involved. Paying people well does not make something good. It only says you appreciate the work they do and you pay them more money so that they won’t leave and go someplace else. Lakota was a good district when there were cows next to the school buildings and there was not air-conditioning, because the residents that were attracted to live in the district are good people, and they still are. Because of that long-standing success Lakota has attracted people from other places within the city. But these are the first type of people who will leave and turn their backs on the district in the crises we currently face, because they falsely believe that money is the key to success. It is not. Success is a state of mind. And because Lakota has good people it will remain a good district.
6. Do you think with the school levies not passing people will be discouraged from moving into the West Chester community?
f. I think some of the parents that are looking for a great school system with a foot half in half out will be, and those types of people are the first to leave when something goes wrong anyway. They cost our community more with their short-term investment hoping to get excellent schools for their kids on the backs of the tax payer while not making a long-term commitment to the community. They usually move away when their kids grow up and downsize. I don’t have much sympathy for those types of residents. As a community we need to build a strong community with residents that are willing to invest in our district and maintain that investment, and not sell at the first sign of trouble. To do that we need to lower taxes. We need to lower our overall operating budget and still provide the services that other districts have cut to maintain their costs. We need to think outside the box and not allow ourselves to sink in obligation to union contracts that are outdated and forced upon the community through coercion. Coercion is exactly what the strike threat in 2008 was and that behavior has no place in our district. There are a lot of great teachers out there and we want them in our schools. We’ll offer them good pay, a nice community to teach in, and pleasant students with parents that care. Those are all benefits. But we cannot afford over 400 personnel that make over 65K per year. That’s way too expensive. The teachers union should have recognized this and renegotiated their contracts to bring their costs in line with the community at large that is considered statewide to be affluent, yet average just around 50K per year per working professional.
7. What are some positive aspects for the community with the levy not passing?
g. It is forcing the discussing of how we can cut costs and still maintain the high level of service that Lakota has built a reputation around. If successful, Lakota will be one of the first school districts of its kind to remain excellent while reducing their budget, which is a process that must happen. It’s not an option. Once we bring costs down for education then West Chester can explore the possibility of lowering tax rates and attracting growth back to the region from the imposing tax rates that we are currently experiencing. This should be the first desire of the school board, to provide a quality education and to do so within the allocated budget. Not passing the levy has stopped the blind obedience to union step increases by exposing them for what they truly are.
8. With the levy not passing, do you think Lakota schools are cutting appropriate aspects to fit with their budget?
H. Absolutely not. They should not have cut busing. That is less than 3% of the total budget. They should not have cut sports. Sports are less than busing as far as budget significance. They should not have laid-off any teachers. They should not have cancelled electives before they explored reducing their inflated labor costs. All teachers with tenure are not worth 65K per year. If we reduced overall payroll by 30% Lakota could have saved nearly 30 million dollars which more than solves the budget problems. But making such decisions requires true management understanding and making tough decisions, which are unpleasant, especially with a teachers union that is very contentious. After all, it was just 2008 that they flooded the school board meeting in October and threatened to strike. Once S.B.5 is passed, teachers will not be able to extort more money with such manipulative methods that are destructive to the community at large. If those employees seeking unreasonable sums of money wish to teach someplace else, they are free to leave. But they will not be able to strike and stop work hurting our children in the process. The problem starts when we have superintendents like Mike Taylor that feed the teachers union with comments saying “I don’t think teachers make enough money,” this coming from a former teacher himself that has obviously lost touch with the cost value of services in the private sector. The superintendent, reports to the school board. The school board reports to the community. All the teachers report to all above and what has been forgotten is who the manager of funds is. It is not the teachers unions that threaten a community with striking in order to drive up their labor costs. It is the community itself that has had to deny funds in order to stop the excessive bleeding of tax payer dollars that has been corrosive to further development of our area out of sheer greed. No, the cuts have not been made in the proper place. A real manager understands that the excessively expensive employees are better off to go someplace else while the hungry, appreciative employees that are in the business for all the right reasons come out of college every year and are there for us to hire. Labor is not in shortage so the advantage goes to the manager, the community. Our school board will need to begin thinking like managers of the community’s money instead of trying to hold back a wall of threats by a teacher’s union that wants more than any community should ever be expected to pay.
9. Is there anything else you would like to add?
I. It is unfortunate that the perception that passing a school levy is actually good for kids. This was created by union marketing and has no basis in reality, absolutely zero. What is good for our children and our communities is competition and options. The current level of school funding at 10K per student is too much and relies on broken models of tax collection from unconstitutional property tax acquisition. It is my conclusion after watching the behavior of education costs for over a decade closely and fighting 6 school levies that the union influence has been detrimental to community management of school district costs. The trend in the future will be less funding from the state so more finance dependency will have to come from the local communities all over Ohio. That means that the teachers unions will have to either become much more accommodating and realistic or must be eliminated completely in favor of a system dictated strictly off competition. For myself, I simply don’t want a single dollar of my tax money going to union activity; because I do not, or have ever support them. I think they are bad and devastating to the American economy and I think it’s the wrong kind of thing for any children to be exposed to. I’d personally like to see children striving to be much more self-reliant and competitive, which I don’t see happening in public education. But that aside, it is the costs that everyone in the community must consider, personal issues aside. And it is labor costs that are the most extraordinary part of the budget that must be handled. This should not be a difficult concept for tax payers to understand. This is exactly why sports teams have salary caps, so a team cannot spend above a maximum set budget. School systems need to have a funding cap that the community establishes and the school board must figure out how to live within that cap. For Lakota that number is somewhere between 150 million and 160 million, which is a lot of money to spend on educating 18,500 students. If that means Lakota has to drive the costs down to 7K per pupil or even 6K per pupil, then that’s what the district must do, and still meet the excellent rating of the community. If they refuse to provide this service, then School Choice will be implemented and parents can send their kids to Mason, or Little Miami, or Fairfield in order to get the services they want as parents. This is the reality that is arriving, and it is expected that Lakota will embrace this challenge and emerge as a leader, because failure is not an option. And neither is higher taxes. If they can’t think out of the box to drive down their costs, then they need to step aside so people who do think this way can take control and get the budget under control.
Now, to support some of what I put down here I point you dear reader into the direction of two articles. These two articles describe the problem of public school from two angles, but centering on a common theme. Public school has a monopoly over education, where it shouldn’t, and that monopoly exists to protect the financial structure of its employees and nothing else. If we ever hope to truly educate our children properly we will eliminate this monopoly in favor of real, competitive education that has genuine value and a benefit for the communities that support it.
New Report Shows Vouchers Benefit Public and Private School Students
INDIANAPOLIS — A new report by the Foundation for Educational Choice finds that out of the 10 “gold standard” studies examining school voucher programs throughout the nation, nine showed that vouchers contributed to the academic improvements for students who use them.
The report also reviewed all 19 empirical studies on how vouchers affect academic performance in the public school system, finding that 18 of these studies show vouchers improved public schools.
“A Win-Win Solution: The Empirical Evidence on School Vouchers” reviews the studies spanning 20 years, including some recent ones. The empirical research consistently finds school voucher programs have improved the academic achievement of both the students who transferred to private schools and those who remained in public schools.
The research, by Greg Forster, a senior fellow with The Foundation, examines randomized experimental studies and other high-quality empirical studies evaluating school voucher programs conducted by researchers at Harvard University, Stanford University, Cornell University, Princeton University and the Federal Reserve Bank among other respected research institutions.
Forster, a senior fellow with The Foundation, says that test scores and graduation rates would have improved more dramatically if the voucher programs were offered to all students and not restricted based on income and other demographic factors, or capped to a certain number of participants.
“We are seeing some benefits thanks to vouchers, but we would see much more improvement with much more choice,” Forster said. “The more competition, the more pressure there would be to improve public education. With a lot more choice you will likely get improvements on a much broader scale.”
There are 26 school choice programs in 16 states and Washington, D.C. The first limited voucher program launched in Milwaukee in 1990. More than 190,000 students nationwide use public funds to attend the private school of their choice.
“Choice works,” said Robert Enlow, President and CEO of The Foundation. “We have known that for a while now. This review of all the research underscores it. What we need now is more choice for more kids to achieve more success.”
About the Foundation for Educational Choice
The Foundation for Educational Choice is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and nonpartisan organization, solely dedicated to advancing Milton and Rose Friedman’s vision of school choice for all children. First established as the Milton and Rose D. Friedman Foundation in 1996, the foundation continues to promote school choice as the most effective and equitable way to improve the quality of K-12 education in America. The foundation is dedicated to research, education, and outreach on the vital issues and implications related to choice and competition in K-12 education
NH Supreme Court: homeschooled girl must go to public school against mom’s wishes
BY JOHN-HENRY WESTEN
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CONCORD, NH, March 17, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The New Hampshire Supreme Court upheld a lower court order Wednesday that sided with the father of a homeschooled student and forced her into a government-run school against her Christian mother’s wishes.
The court made clear that it was not addressing larger religious liberty and homeschooling concerns and was basing its ruling only on the narrow and specific facts of the case.
“While [the case] involves home schooling, it is not about the merits of home verses public schooling,” stated the justices in their opinion.
“We affirm the decision on the narrow basis that it represents a sustainable exercise of the trial court’s discretion to determine the educational placement that is in daughter’s best interests.”
The court heard oral argument in the case on Jan. 6.
Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) attorney John Anthony Simmons, who represented the mother, who is divorced from the father, argued that the burden of proof was on the father to prove harm in order to change the schooling arrangement. Because no harm was demonstrated and the girl was acknowledged to be academically superior and socially interactive, even by the court, Simmons argued that the homeschooling arrangement should not have been changed.
However, in the original order issued in July 2009, Judge Lucinda V. Sadler reasoned that the girl’s “vigorous defense of her religious beliefs to [her] counselor suggests strongly that she has not had the opportunity to seriously consider any other point of view.”
“Parents have a fundamental right to make educational choices for their children,” responded Simmons. “Courts can settle disputes, but they cannot legitimately order a child into a government-run school on the basis that her religious views need to be mixed with other views. That’s precisely what the lower court admitted it was doing.”
“The lower court held the Christian faith of this mother and daughter against them,” Simmons said. “Unfortunately, the Supreme Court bypassed this issue and wrote this off as a ‘parent versus parent’ issue without recognizing the very real underlying threat to religious liberty.”
Nevertheless, ADF Senior Counsel Joseph Infranco said that the law firm appreciates the Supreme Court’s choice to limit “its decision to the facts of this case,” which should ensure that the decision “cannot be used as a battering-ram against religious liberty or homeschooling.”
The “ADF will be vigilant to make sure that it’s not,” he concluded.
“We are disappointed that this young girl is being forced to attend a public school over her mother’s, and reportedly her own, wishes,” said Michael Donnelly, the attorney for the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA). HSLDA had submitted an amicus brief to the Supreme Court in the case.
“However, the NH Supreme Court confined its ruling to this case and these facts avoiding any collateral impact on the rights of other parents in New Hampshire who homeschool their children,” he continued. “While the lower court’s decision could have been read to create a presumption in favor of public education over homeschooling, the court emphatically rejected this notion.”
The superintendents are leaving the sinking ships because their true motives are revealed. They’ve always been about the money. They say it’s about the kids, but their actions speak otherwise. In Kevin Bright’s situation he still has the Stacy Schuler case that is coming his way and will be extremely embarrassing and he knows that once S.B.5 passes, the school board will be forced to make real cuts to the district, not cosmetic ones. There won’t be anymore levy increases, so he’s leaving to friendlier districts. What he doesn’t understand is that this movement that is occurring in Southern Ohio is growing north. He can hide from it, but he won’t escape.
It would be wise for these school officials to come clean now, and stop hiding behind children, and real estate values and reveal their true intentions before things become even more embarrassing. And for those teachers and administrators that are gaming the system thinking of leaving these districts for some friendly place like Kevin Bright is doing, good luck, because soon we’ll be there too. Enjoy it while you can.
Here Doc Thompson talks about Governor Kasich’s Ohio Budget and the further application of School Choice, which I support tremendously, because it creates competition in the education system. I am more convinced now than ever that the collectivism taught in schools by default has been devastating to our national economy, our political structure, and our personal identities and can be declared an epic failure. I have been open-minded about public education for the benefit of society. But now that I’ve seen the protests at the state level, and the way students have been conjured up to serve the needs of teachers unions in spite of whatever their parents might think, I am now prepared to openly speak against all the devices that are failing in American society so they can be identified and changed.
I came to similar points of view as Ayn Rand not by reading her. I came to her work late in life. But I traveled a path similar to her and arrived at similar conclusions. She, as I do, likes Nietzsche and understands without corruption what that philosopher was trying to say. She was an atheist where I’m not, but I understand her reluctance. I see spirituality in higher dimensional planes where she looked for reason in the observable world. But on matters of collectivism versus individualism I am with Ayn completely without pause.
Now that may seem extreme by let me tell you a brief story illuminating this fact. I have joined my share of groups, but I usually end up leaving them because of this whole collectivism issue. I hate it. Years ago I was a member, which I still distinctly support, but I was much more heavily active back then, called the Joseph Campbell Foundation. I spent my 20’s reading Campbell’s vast work and through him and his lectures, which I think I heard them all, I explored James Joyce’s work through the Skeleton Key and Ulysses, and much of Nietzsche’s work. But Campbell’s work put me on the path. Now Campbell was an intellectual individualist, much different from other intellectuals, so this is the reason he’s been successful on a level most only dream of regarding the field of comparative mythology and religion with sub categories in psychology, philosophy and art. Campbell was a maverick in many ways which is another way of saying he was an individualist. But, many of the people attracted to literature, and I run into this all the time, are liberal. So many of his fans were left-winged, so the moment he died, even to his warnings, they tried to turn Joseph Campbell into some collective savior, almost a religion.
So my words here, and the resistance to further taxes in schools, and reform such as what we are exploring in School Choice as heard by Doc’s interview are for the good of that great tree that is America. I see the insects that are eating the inside of our beloved tree need to be removed so the tree doesn’t die or split at the first big storm. And I have no emotion about the lives of those insects. They should not have attempted to set up a colony in our tree.
Meanwhile, President Obama is going on vacation to Rio in South America while nothing less than the fate of the world hangs in balance.
• Japan is in need of United States help from its catastrophic devastation at the hands of a tsunami. • Congress, the Senate and the White House cannot agree on the proposed budget cuts and are only buying small increments to keep the government operating. • Socialist labor unions are threatening order all over the United States. • States and cities are going bankrupt all over the nation. • The NFL is even shutting down over “collective bargaining!” • The Middle East is undergoing destabilization. • Fuel prices are rapidly increasing. • Food prices are rapidly increasing. • And the immigration violence on the border is terrible while the pacifists feed the discontent with rhetoric like this:
Weiner and company forget that even John Boehner is standing behind the cutting of the Joint Strike Fighter which has the engine built-in Boehner’s district at the GE facility. Everyone is making sacrifices, but those stories aren’t being reported, only the emotional ones that are equivalent to pouring blood in the water to attract the mindless sharks. All that kind of discussion is lost to the foolish sharks like Weiner and his friends that only look at the meal in front of them and circle the island of logic, hungry for more food to feed their mindless lives of living just one more day on the spoils of others.
Darryl Parks is right. We are all on a lonely island, the last sane vestibules of continuation that must fight an ocean of predator’s intent on immediate, selfish destruction in order to restore our nation to a life of thriving unification that can only occur when the predators no longer threaten our existence. We are truly engaged in a battle of the mindless sharks and the beings of reason for the advancement of civilization.
And Barak Obama is in Rio looking at string bikinis. Hey, I was happy to elect Alan Keys as the first African-American president, but nobody wanted to listen to him.
Because the sharks want their food to swim right into their mouths, they don’t want us on an island planning our escape, or the taming of their wild, bloodthirsty ways.
With Obama, the socialist minded, tribal leaders of the African-American community got what they wanted, a man who would turn his back on his nation, play golf, and go on vacation to South America while the world burns, and the sharks are free to eat.
The protests on Fountain Square the day Governor Kasich released his budget were amazingly short-sighted considering many of the participants were educators. “We need to tax the rich, and save the middle-class,” were the chants. Really? I mean, really???????? These people really believe that there are other options that are less painful than the budget cuts Kasich placed on the table. They really believe that the wage levels are somehow separate from collapsing community budgets.
Few of these public workers understand that Medicaid is almost a third of the state budget and only 4% of the people occupy 70% of the cost. That’s a major problem and one of the largest contributors of the budget deficit Ohio is experiencing. It’s certainly not that the rich aren’t paying enough taxes, or that industry is getting tax breaks. The people who say such things are incredibly selfish and not very wise on world affairs. They only look at their little piece of the world and could care less if everyone else suffer, which is what’s happening in Lakota and every other school district.
The protestors were already prepared to protest Kasich no matter what he said in his budget. He could have said he was giving everyone a thousand dollars in the state of Ohio, and they would have still complained about what an evil guy he is.
I look at the things Kasich wants to do and it all sounds good to me. The protestors clearly just don’t want change because they benefit tremendously by keeping everything broken. They are ultimately a very selfish lot that lack the intellectual capacity to educate anyone in my opinion. To know that there were teachers from Lakota at this rally disgusts me. They represent the community very poorly.
Here is what they are protesting from Kasich’s budget plan.
• More oversight over Medicaid, although spending on the federal program will continue to grow by $1 billion annually. Medicaid comprises 30 percent of Ohio’s $60 billion budget in fiscal year 2013, including all federal matching dollars.
• Better coordination of mental health services.
• To offer the state’s health-care coverage to local governments to save money and ask union workers to pay more toward premiums.
• To sell liquor distribution rights to raise money for job-development programs,
• To honor pay increases contained in the third year of a union contract that ends next February. The extra pay offsets lost personal days and unpaid furloughs by state workers – concessions to balance Gov. Ted Strickland’s last budget.
• To double vouchers for school choice, eliminating a waiting list for parents who want to transfer their children from public to privately operated charter schools.
• Bonuses for teachers – $50 for each student who shows marked improvement.
• A closer look at adding slot machines to Ohio’s horse tracks or legalizing casinos operated by Native American tribes.
• Study the concept of semi-private “charter” universities to give now-public colleges more flexibility. That would eliminate the requirement that they hire multiple prime contractors and pay prevailing wage on construction projects, to keep tuition down. It also caps annual tuition growth at 3.5 percent.
Recently I needed a part from a large manufacturer in Dallas, Texas, and the person on the other end of the phone said they could see the part through the window from where they were sitting. But they couldn’t send it to me. Why? Because the department on the other side of the window was controlled by the union and the guy in charge of moving that part was out on sick leave, and he was the only one able under the contract to move the part. So because of union rules the person I was speaking to could not simply open a door and pick up the part to ship back to me. It cost thousands of dollars in delivery penalties and seriously set back our manufacturing process. I was so mad at that process that I put my fist through my phone in frustration.
The same mentality is at play with these public sector unions. They are out of touch and protecting the serious imposition they have imposed on us all. And they could care less of some kids suffer because of their inflated opinions of themselves.
The proof is in what they say and do. Not in their very controlled bullet points designed to manipulate a busy voting population.
Doc Thompson covers how the “rich Hollywood types and politicians hide their money from tax collectors, gaming the system. These are the same people who proclaim that we should pay increased taxes in order to fund public sector jobs. Doc has an argument with a guy that claims he’s willing to send in a $20,000 check to pay his “fair share.” Also, Doc covers a UC administrator that received over $900,000 in severance upon being released from his contract. Have a listen:
My guess however is that these current administrators won’t explore that option unfortunately, because they cannot think any other way, which is part of the problem.
Before a single layoff is ever explored, wage reductions should be implemented. Realistic wage amounts need to be established, not the outrageous levels they currently are. Teachers of high school students and junior high students are not all worth 70K or more no matter how much schooling they have. Some may be, but not a majority. Few people are worth that much in labor and a college degree does not guarantee those wage levels, which is the assumption under the established step increases, and the fact that I even have to write it down so that administrators have to be told says they are out of touch completely with the community marketplace.
The other is from Arnie Engle from Fairfield who has been fighting this fight for a long time.
To one and all FYI The board will be voting to cut High School busing this Thursday Are you willing to risk our children’s lives to save $300,000?? The next Board meeting is 3-17-11 6PM in the Community Room at the HS
The blackmail tactics are about to begin
Our community was divided over the 3 school levies the board jammed down the throats of the community in 2004. This board is knowingly driving our district into fiscal crisis and a repeat of the 2004 community divide. Why are they doing this? Because they refuse to place the community and our children before the staff with appropriate cost cutting measures. Please attend and let your voice be heard
Please pass this on to everyone you know !
You must sign in to speak at the beginning of the meeting and you get 5 minutes. There is also an additional chance to speak before the board votes on the cuts. 2 minutes.
On the agenda are 3 million in cuts to be voted on. The list can be viewed on the school web site. In the list is the elimination of high school busing to save $300,000.
Fact! The schools own finance report, shows we spent 6.6 million on pupil transportation in 2010. We are cutting 1/3 of our busing. Shouldn’t we expect a savings of 1/3 of $6,000,000???? You can view this report on the school web site.
School busing is the safest way to transport school children. Putting our kids on the road to and from school is a disaster waiting to happen.
And for what??? $300,000???
Are you willing to risk our children’s lives to save $300,000??
I’m not!
The following is what I said about cutting busing back in 2004. The same applies today.
From the 2004 CARE flier WHY CUT SPORTS AND BUSING?
The recent cuts made by the Fairfield School Board do more than balance the budget. They actually punish our children and the community,
in an effort to force an unjust $9,000,000 school levy on the taxpayers of our fine city. This tax levy will definitely benefit the staff, but NOT our children.
Regarding Sports, local papers have reported that the Xenia School District “saved $183,000 by cutting extra-curriculars. However, more than 100 students left the school district and went to other schools to participate in sports. The decreased student enrollment ended up costing the school $340,000 in school funding from the state.” Our school board and administration are aware of this, but they cut our extra-curriculars anyway.
Regarding busing, our school officials say we will save $400,000 by cutting busing. According to Treasurer Scott Gooding, we have a $5,500,000 transportation budget. We are cutting more than one-third of our transportation by cutting busing for grades 9-12 and extra curricular activities. You would expect to see savings of one-third of $5,500,000 or at least $1,800,000. Also note that the state gives us $2,000,000 for transportation as reported in the ODE, SF3 report. If we loose one-third of this funding that amounts to $667,000, nullifying the $400,000 savings projected by our officials. Therefore, it just doesn’t make good economic sense to cut busing and sports, unless it’s really an effort to punish our kids, parents, and community in order to pass the next school levy on August 3rd.
I have heard it time and time again that the district needs to move forward and forget about the past \history. The problem is that history is about to repeat itself! We can all expect that $600 pay to play and the elimination of all busing will soon follow.
This board is, knowingly, running our district right into financial crisis. The solution to their madness was spelled out in my last letter to the editor. The boards blackmail tactics will never end as long as this board continues to places the staff ahead of the community and our children
BOARDS 1-13-11 RETREAT Letter to the Editor February 2011 BOARD INACTION WILL LEAD TO DISTRICT FAILURE
In regard to the Fairfield school districts budget retreat it was disappointing to hear the board was still considering a new tax levy. It would be a big mistake for the board to assume the community would support any type of levy. I would hope the board would anticipate this and enact the appropriate cuts to balance the budget. Failure to do so will send our district down the same road as Little Miami. The board needs to put the box of band aids away and get down to enacting a budget void of new levies. Time is running out.
Although there was an additional 4.6 million in cuts presented at the retreat there are still millions in possible cost cutting and revenue generating ideas presented by both me and the districts own hand picked finance committee. My suggestions and the finance committee’s suggestions should be reviewed, considered and enacted or rejected with reasoning shared with the public for any rejection, before there is any discussion of a new levy. The community is entitled to know, in detail, why the board refused to enact all cost saving ideas presented by anyone.
In my opinion there needs to be a fundamental change in the way the district does business. This would include but is not limited to the following suggestions.
Getting serious about contract negotiations.
Not relying on local property taxes to fund schools
The board must be honest with the public and follow through with their board actions.
The board should vote with an understanding of how their vote will effect the budget and leave their emotions at home . The board needs to start placing our children and the community first.
The board needs to review the business partner relationship it holds with it’s vendors and assure the public it is receiving the best possible price for the tax dollars spent.
The board needs to have a conservative outsider to review the way the district operates
The status quo of taxing and spending is not working in Fairfield or any government agency. If this philosophy can not be reigned in it will undoubtedly lead to the financial ruin of our district.
Let me leave you with a quote from the districts own finance committee “The current system is unsustainable without the fundamental changes we are suggesting — inaction will lead to district failure.” I have been warning the district of this for years. Time is running out.
Arnie Engel Past member Fairfield Board of Education CARE founder 829-7840 Please pass this on to everyone you know ! and please attend the next Board meeting on 3-17-11. Bring your neighbors, friends and family.
The crowds around Wisconsin on Saturday March 12, 2011 had a diseased quality about them that cannot be summed up without a philosophic journey of epic understanding. In short however, I can only offer that those poor souls marching to a socialist drum beat are lost to what it means to be an American. Without question, many of the marchers are veterans, police, firefighters and other traditional patriots, but to me they seem weak, and ill-informed, lost in a portrayal the media has given them without actually earning it. The America they want and desire is one for the soft, fragile specimens of human being that finds their life spans sickly, and always in need of assistance.
So I’ve kept my motorcycle riding more of a private thing. I’ve always embraced a sense of freedom and a love of individuality and vehicles on two wheels were the closest thing to a horse that I could get living in a modern, suburban environment.
The cowboy wanted to extend his mobility over vast distances, whether he was herding cattle or just searching for food. And where herding cattle may not be needed, and food is available at the closest McDonalds, the need to extend your reach is still needed for the hungry adventurer.
Airplanes are deceptively fragile, with only a very thin skin between the pilot and the outside air. In order to operate them, a well-defined understanding of the dangers involved is needed.
It is no coincidence that motorcycles and airplanes are both associated with freedom. At first, because they tie up their operators with being fully involved in the process of flying or driving them, it is this very fact that lends to the feelings of liberation.
Make a long run on a motorcycle, and you will feel you earned every mile, and it is inescapable to feel complacent afterwards. Where the motorcycle is unique over any other mode of transportation, the cost to operate it per mile is very inexpensive. And that makes it one of the best machines around if you’re willing to trade a bit of safety and comfort for the reach a motorcycle gives you.
On our trip to Key West from Cincinnati we traveled over 3000 miles in just under 7 days and spent $167 in fuel.
And that’s the appeal for me. Every time you get on a bike, there is an opportunity for adventure that you just don’t get in an automobile. It gives you unprecedented reach for traveling because you can do it much more economically than any other mode of transportation. And it allows you to cater your bike and riding apparel to your individual tastes.
In a car, you might just get in and start driving, and the ritual is rather short and uninvolved. On a bike, you have to dress for the ride which will probably include a jacket of some kind, gloves, boots, and durable pants. You have to keep your eye on the world around you not only the traffic and the dangers associated with that, but the weather too.
A storm can surge up in an instant. A heavy downpour on a highway at 70 MPH can cause you enormous amounts of pain if your skin is exposed. And you’ll notice when the breaks in the clouds are coming and see how the rain rolls in and drifts away as you move through it, where in a car, you may drive 20 to 50 miles and barely register what’s going on in the world around you, because inside the car, life goes on much like it would in your home.
It is true that I have a particular fondness for the pirates that roamed the Caribbean during the golden age of piracy from 1660’s to the 1720’s. Not to imply that I honor the life of the thief. But I do credit those particular pirates as being the foundations of America, because in my view the nations of Europe were the true thieves.
Controversial, of course it is. But you have to remember what the world was at the time and why the pirates came to be. At the time that Spain claimed central and South America, they eradicated all the cultures existing at the time and stole the wealth of those cultures. Just because a nation is behind the robbery, does not make them any less a thief. And consider that at the time the English navy, would kidnap young men and employ them against their will to serve the might of their empire, and that England and France, always at war with one another, could not stand to allow the Spanish to reap all the benefits of its conquest of the Aztecs and their great capital city of Tenochtitlan.
“Tenochtitlan was a marvelous metropolis with complicated lakes that surrounded the place. The Spanish upon seeing it claimed it was so beautiful that it looked like a dream. Cortez conquered the city shortly, and had Montezuma stoned to death in front of his own people. The Aztecs had an army, but their only real focus had been to raid neighboring tribes for victims in human sacrifice to their insatiable gods, especially Quetzalcoatl. They were no match for the battle hardened Spanish and their firepower.
Cortez destroyed the city block by block and built a new city on the ruins of Tenochtitlan, a city that would become one of the largest cities in the world, Mexico City. Not only did this city go on to become one of the most dangerous places in the world, but any attempt to uncover the past of Tenochtitlan are long since destroyed. The great monument that resides in Mexico City now is the golden-winged Angel of Independence. A very strange statue for a people who were completely conquered by Spain and had their culture eradicated.
Anyway, Cortez sacked the city, destroyed the culture which was rich with gold, and proceeded to bring all that gold to Spain much to the concern of England and France. England, recruiting naval officers in the manner they had, and the rigors of their sea fairing discipline made it easy for rebellion at sea to cast off their nation and become a pirate.
Privateers were acts of piracy backed by countries, to prevent the Spanish from keeping too much gold of their newly conquered land. It didn’t take long for those privateers to cast away their nations and the burdens of their ownership in favor of freedom. So the exploits of L’Ollonais, Captain Morgan and Black Beard may have been violent and against the law, but the law makers had broken many laws as well. Those pirates wanted freedom from the heresy of nations. These very pirates were the first democracies in the world. Pirates had elections, and insurance, and were certainly the first organizations in the world to show a successful democracy and the ability of a small few to stand up to the tyranny of nations. Without question, the very popular book Buccaneers of American by Alexander O. Exquemelin which was published just shy of the 1700’s sat on the book shelves of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams who at their time collected thousands of books. It is no accident that the exploits of the pirates in that book paved the way for the bold words of the founding fathers, because the pirates had managed to wreak havoc against the mighty English. Using the same basic principles as the pirate code, The Declaration of Independence was written with a bit more education behind the quill that wrote it, but with equal sincerity. In fact, in the final battle against the English during the War of 1812, Jean Lafitte helped Andrew Jackson defeat the English in New Orleans by using the pirates that ran with Lafitte to break the English will. Pirates have played an important role in the foundations of America, and I love them for it! Their descendents find themselves riding motorcycles instead of sailing ships.
Now among motorcycle riders, these modern pirates, there are two categories of which I am of the second. The first is the rider that brings out his motorcycle on the first warm day of the year and rides his bike when the sun shines. The second is the one that rides all year, rain, shine, hot or cold. I know many, many men that talk tough, but in reality are soft at heart. They may have large muscle mass, but that is usually to disguise the weakness behind their eyes.
Many of that first type is the union worker that buys a Harley because they have the expendable income, and of that group are thousands of police, firefighter and factory workers, the so-called middle class. They bring out their motorcycles when the sun shines and the weather is warm. And in the windows of their cars and trucks they place a sticker proclaiming, “Harley Davidson,” so as to let people know that they have a motorcycle at home in the garage.
This tendency says a lot about their character.
For a while, I was vice-president of the Suzuki Club of North America and I was on a long ride with them all across Ohio. My wife and I put 500 miles on our bike that day, but I had a dispute with the president because we hit rain and he wanted to stop under an overpass. He figured that because he was president of the organization that I should follow his lead, especially in front of the other members.
I quit the club that day and road in the rain alone with my wife clutched to my back. We all met at a dealership later that day for a membership drive, but that was the last day I ever spoke to those guys. The philosophic differences between us were too great.
You see, this is the fundamental trouble with our nation. America was founded on freedom and independence, bravery, valor, rugged individualism, endurance and a tendency toward isolationism. This new breed of American raised in the labor movement, which has its roots in European socialism attracts the weak, soft minds of those that are afraid to compete.
Now to them, in the Socialist States of America they are American, and they’ll fly their flags proudly. I know them well. Because they lack character and individual strength they are easily mislead since they don’t know their own history, they have allowed others to rewrite it for their convenience.
A part of me feels sorry for those union protestors. 90,000 or even 100,000 fools can fill a stadium at a sport event, or even a rock concert. They don’t represent anything but a collective hive of insect minded creatures that can carry signs and attempt to hide their lack of character behind a mass. All they can do is make noise, scream and chant, or inflict vandalism on their opponents, because they don’t have the character to meet the majority equally in a war of ideas. I feel sorry for them because they lack the courage and character to truly be an American.
Our nation was founded by pirates, adventures, and intellectuals that dared to question the European socialism trends that Marx captured in his little pamphlet, The Communist Manifesto. I know some real Americans. They are a patient group that is easily overlooked by the media because they are self-reliant. And compared to the socialist, soft-minded, left-winged, characterless, malcontents inspired to chant as a mob to achieve rights that they have no claim to are in for a sad and pathetic awakening, the real Americans will be there when everything collapses because they are always what held the nation together.
That’s why they are a broken people doomed to fail over and over in their lives. To hear them speak is like listening to the ghost of a depressed soul that doesn’t know that life has left it. All you can feel is pity for the poor creature.
Thugs, losers and mindless fools are bred because they traded character for socialism.
Bob Hagan, a Democrat from Youngstown recently participated in a disgraceful exchange on Facebook with Kevin Crowther during a debate over S.B.5. Hagan did what most Democrats and union supporters do when they are intellectually challenged by facts, they called their intellectual superiors names. Hagan called Kevin“Buckwheat” on Facebook for all to see.
Here is that exchange.
Kevin is a black man, a conservative that was making some great points that Hagan couldn’t answer. So like a child on the playground at wits end, Hagan retreated into a racial slur.
If you have lived under a rock for the last century, “Buckwheat” was the little black boy on “Little Rascals.” After Hagan’s comments, many people went to the press and a few websites carried the story. I learned about it during a recent Tea Party meeting. If you read this article, you can see that Hagan is sorry he “got caught” I mean sorry he slipped with the racial slur.
Why is he sorry? Well, apparently he wants to run for Mayor of Youngstown, and that will never happen if he can’t capture the black vote. So now that he has realized that arguing with people on Facebook is a pretty stupid idea considering that people can take screen shots, like the one you see on this page. Sorry Bob, but you revealed your true thoughts and it won’t be forgotten with double talk. Why does Hagan seem to have problems with black people? The event with Kevin took place on February 19th. It’s not a conservative conspiracy to take his seat, because a year prior to this “buckwheat” incident Hagan was in the way of another man trying to view belly dancers on a stage and Bob wouldn’t get out-of-the-way. The two men had some words, and Bob was knocked out cold, the man who punched Hagan in the face caused a gash in his chin needing 11 stitches. The man who struck Hagan was a black man. However, according to Hagan, all these things that keep happening to him are the fault of some conservatives from Southern Ohio.
Now, you’d think that this would be a big national story. But it’s not. For the most part, the papers and TV stations have given Hagan a pass. After all, he’s one of them, he’s a progressive, so his answers that he didn’t mean “buckwheat” in a racial way, is accepted.
On May 4, 1886, in Haymarket Square in Chicago, the public rallied peacefully in support of 40,000 workers in Chicago who had gone on strike, to win the right to organize. The police attacked, and eight died.
On July 6, 1892, in Homestead, Pennsylvania, 3800 workers went on strike, to win the right to organize. Three hundred hired and armed goons attacked them. Five people died.
On April 20, 1914, in Ludlow, Colorado, 1200 coal miners went on strike, to win the right to organize. The Colorado National Guard attacked their shantytown, and burned it to the ground. Nineteen people died. Two women and 11 children were asphyxiated, and they burned to death.
Here and around the world, many people have fought and died, so that you and I would have the right to organize. And so that 250,000 public workers in Wisconsin would have that right, too.
This is not exactly a new idea. Six months after the Ludlow Massacre, President Wilson signed the Clayton Act, prohibiting the prosecution of union members under Antitrust Law. That was almost a century ago.
Two decades later, during the Franklin Roosevelt’s first term as President, he signed the National Labor Relations Act into law. It protects the right to organize. That was over 75 years ago.
The right to organize also is a fundamental principle of international law. Over 150 countries have ratified the “Right to Organize” Convention, an international treaty. It was adopted in 1949, over 60 years ago. So why are we even talking about this, 11 years into the 21st Century?
Because the teabaggers want to “take back America.” They want to take it back, all right – take it all the way back to the 19th century. When there was no right to organize. When people worked for a dollar a day. When grown men competed against children for jobs. When women were barred from most jobs entirely. When you worked until you died. Not to mention slavery.
I want to see an America that is healthy and wealthy.
They want an America that provides cheap labor to our corporate overlords. An America where the middle class is chained by debt.
We didn’t ask for this fight. But we have no choice except to fight back. For the survival of the middle class in America. For us, for our children, and for our grandchildren. And so that the victims in Haymarket, in Homestead and in Ludlow did not die in vain.
As Cardinal Spellman said 45 years ago, “it is a war thrust upon us, and we cannot yield to tyranny.” I’m ready to fight for what’s right. What about you?
The labor movement was started by another Republican, Teddy Roosevelt, who fought during the first decade of the 20th century to break down anti-trusts and corporate power in machine politics. And you know what, I agree with what Teddy was trying to do. But………after his presidency, Roosevelt went on a grand safari hunt in Africa for an entire year, and every country he visited touted him as a king. Somewhere out there in the Serengeti Teddy became a bleeding heart progressive. Maybe it was his age, maybe it was a form of madness, who knows, but if Teddy had a fault it was that he craved power, and suddenly he didn’t have any power after the presidency. Before returning home, he toured all the nations of Europe dining with kings, queens, princes and Emperors. Everyone wanted to eat from his hand, and it went to his head.
The final blow came when Teddy came back to the United States and saw that his good friend President Taft had allowed machine politics to retake the Republican Party so Teddy decided to run for a third term of president. But the Republicans wouldn’t let him run on their tickets because Teddy had become, too progressive and had lost touch with his conservative principles. So they pushed him out of the party hoping he’d just retire.
All it did was make Teddy angry, because deep down inside, Roosevelt wanted power back so he formed his opinions around the new emerging “progressive” party being formed by “rich” Republicans seeking a utopia type era in America. So while the Republicans divided over progressivism and split the vote during the 1912 election, Woodrow Wilson won under a softer form of progressivism on the Democratic ticket.
Alan Grayson attempted to give a history of the labor movement as if to validate the union movement. The fact is, if Roosevelt had not fought hard for the worker rights against the corporate greed, they’d still be going on to this day. It took a president to provide that kind of leadership. The union movement only rode on Teddy’s coat tails and a friendly Woodrow Wilson administration that was so lost it was easy for the unions to take credit. When F.D.R came to the presidency, which was Teddy’s younger cousin, Franklin also suffered the Roosevelt tendency to elitism that came from their New York high society roots. Franklin came to power in government as a state senator when Teddy was most progressive and it seemed to have a serious influence on Franklin.
Franklin had another problem aside from being a progressive leaning young man……..he couldn’t keep his pants on, and had multiple affairs while married to Eleanor.
And I don’t want anything to do with a group of politicians that speak out of both sides of their mouths. Bob Hagan got caught using a racist slur. Alan Grayson is trying to incite violence among the union rank and file. I would suggest any financial damage caused by union radicals should be sent to Mr. Grayson for his incendiary comments and blind rhetoric, spewing half-baked historical facts to the masses that look to him for the truth, which he fails to offer. Instead he panders to the mob providing viability to his progressive philosophy, which has set America on a path of the pathetic as Republicans spend half their time defending themselves for far less impositions than what these Democrats have committed, recently.
And unions are not a right given by government. They should absolutely be illegal. They have no place in public funding, and what Grayson fails to point out in his child like grasp of history is that his beloved F.D.R also said that no public union should ever enter the mind of any politician. But he won’t tell the mushy minded followers of his rhetoric that. He is able to mislead his flocks of sheep because it’s worked in the past, and the plan is for it to work in the future.
The answer is, no, they didn’t. Because such realities are ugly truths that school administrations and other tax payer funded organizations seek at every opportunity not to consider.
But in schools, the way they disguise their perils is through sports. Sports are a wonderful unifying factor that virtually everyone can sympathize with and it keeps people entertained and from prying too deeply into the secrets that are pushed under the carpet.
This is why when it was discovered that Jim Tressel, head coach of the OSU Football Program had covered up improprieties at Ohio State University that many on the inside were well aware of, or had plausible deniability, but on the outside Ohio State is marketed as a beacon of academic and athletic excellence. So to appease the growing anger at having been caught attempting to cover up improper behavior from players on the football team, the school imposed a two game suspension and fined Tressel $250,000 of his $3.5 million annual salary.
For details of those improprieties listen to this exchange between Bill Cunningham and Lance McAlister of 700 WLW.
Ohio State hopes that the NCAA will be appeased and not implement further punishment to the football program. After all, Ohio State is one of the largest universities in the country. Its football team is nationally recognized and in the end, this is wonderful advertisement for the school that sells a tremendous amount of merchandise to former alumni and potential students. It’s big business.
To understand that business a bit I refer to the great film, The Program staring James Caan which came out in 1993. Caan reminds me a lot of Jim Tressel in that film so if you want to understand the situation of college football, and how it is used to sell the university system to millions of fans, have a look at this clip.
Improprieties are routinely overlooked because it’s a competitive world especially in sports, and the difference between winning and losing for a university is millions of dollars. But why? Because if the public perception can be built around a “program” and the public feels their money is going to produce a winner, people have shown time and time again that they are willing to look the other way to have victory.
Much of the film The Program, James Caan’s character is putting out fires from his players that are constantly getting in trouble. But as Caan said in a review board considering suspension of the star quarterback, “70,000 people don’t come out on a Saturday to see other students do math! They come out to see a star!”
Ohio State and it’s fans will seek quickly to put this whole issue behind them, and on opening day it will be forgotten, except for Tressel’s absence and the suspension of the other suspended players, because everyone wants to look the other way, because the fans, students, administration, even the sports world want to discuss a winner.
And the whole teaching profession has hidden carefully behind the marketing machine of sports. Even small schools have sports programs that communities will seek to attend on an autumn Friday evening. The dirty little secret is that when people look back on their education days, they usually remember the things they did, the games they played and the events they did with their friends as opposed to what they learned on a Thursday in February during history class. Most of the teachers in student’s lives come and go as a montage of faces. Occasionally a teacher here and there jumps out as exceptional, but for the most part the education process is viewed as something to be endured, not embraced and because of that little fact, the education finance system has placed band-aid after band-aid on the situation. Administrators attempt to whisk improper sex cases and other improprieties between students and teachers under the carpet behind public relations consultants and friendly newspapers in the trade-off for sports information. After all, sports pages occupy whole sections of newspapers and reporters need content to fill those pages. And for some households, the sports page offers entertainment that their own child may actually be a part of, and that’s exciting.
The Overmanwarrior 