Andrew Coulson has published a new paper on State Education Trends. Here is a quote and graph from the paper. I guess this is not surprising but it begs the question whether common core is the answer.
The performance of 17-year olds has been essentially stagnant across all subjects despite a near tripling of the inflation adjusted cost of putting a child through the K-12 system.
It is getting close to the end of the enrollment period and www.healthcare.gov is trying real hard to re-establish our relationship. I never felt the love and now they want a more serious relationship. I would like to remain friends but ever since the Administration said I could keep my grandfathered plan for two more years, I moved on. Maybe in two years healthcare.gov will grow up and be ready for a honest, less complicated relationship like … what I have when I buy auto insurance! I often wondered whether I was buying or marrying my health insurance plan.
Yesterday I found out that the Enquirer is reporting that the Ohio Republican Party failed to endorse John Becker and two other area Republican state representatives. I am a constitutional libertarian with Republican leanings who voted for John in the last election. Based on my voting record I am not a reliable Republican voter so what is the Republican Party saying to me about John and the Ohio Republican Party? I can see that the Ohio Republican Party sounds petty. On the other hand the Ohio legislature has plenty of people who can spend money and relatively few people who have a clue how to balance a the budget. Considering Ohio’s poor performance at controlling spending Ohio probably needs more people like John. He has the skills we need for our future well being. It may be inconvenient for both political parties but it is hard to imagine Ohio taking businesses and jobs from Indiana and Illinois without getting its financial books in order. So why should voters choose Republicans over Democrats to govern the next four years? For most voters the top two issues is the economy and jobs. Instead of a growing Ohio economy and jobs we seem to have settled for a Medicaid expansion. Not exactly an inspiring future for my kid. Maybe the current situation is dire enough that the winning party will get some bipartisan cooperation that gets businesses to expand while both parties promise to fight the good political fight another day. This may sound silly but this type of political bargain has worked in the past. The first step is getting along with people you disagree with. If Republicans want to be the winning party you have to ask if they cannot get along with people like John, what are the chances they will get along with Democrats who are still smarting from some pretty bad decisions over the last six years? Between the failed roll out of the Affordable Care Act, the questionable foreign policy decisions of Benghazi, Syria, and the Ukraine, and the never ending saga of the IRS targeting the Tea Party, you would have to say the Democratic Party has made a very persuasive argument that they are the stupid party. It is accomplishment they are not particularly proud of. After twelve months trying to defend the Affordable Care Act we should expect them to be a little testy. My favorite response by an Administration official has to be this comment about the Benghazi response to CBS News.
We’re portrayed by Republicans as either being lying or idiots," said one Obama administration official who was part of the Benghazi response. "It’s actually closer to us being idiots.
One thing we should have learned at the expense of the Democratic party was that “the my way or the highway approach” leads to bad decision making and impairs your re-election chances. So here is the big question. Has the Republican Party learned anything or are the Republicans doomed to make the same mistakes as the Democratic Party?
I am still pondering the President’s plan for the individual mandate. I realize that the executive branch has been given a lot of leeway in implementing the Affordable Care Act but his recent actions concerning the individual mandate are humorous at best. Just last year the Democratic party railed against the Tea Party as legislative arsonists for their efforts to defund Affordable Care Act. Here is a Nancy Pelosi quote from Mediate.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi appeared on State of the Union Sunday morning to discuss the looming budget showdown, and told host Candy Crowley that the House GOP, which just passed a continuing resolution that did not fund ObamaCare, were legislative arsonists intent not on cutting government but crippling it.
Although defunding the Affordable Care Act was not likely even to the Tea Party faithful there was a lot of political agreement by both parties to postpone the individual mandate. Postponing the individual mandate was the political middle ground since it polls badly and it is an election year. When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. The Administration had a great opportunity to give a little on the individual mandate in exchange for laying the ground work for bipartisan cooperation in fixing the Affordable Care Act. The greatest political opportunity to rescue the Affordable Care Act was staring the administration in the face and they fumbled it. Now we find that their plan is to postpone the individual mandate by executive order! They chose the solution with all of the problems and none of the benefits. I don’t get it! It is as if the Administration is deliberately setting fire to their signature legislation. Can we discern a difference between the Administration’s handling of the Affordable Care Act problems and the efforts of the Tea Party last Fall? Therefore if we believe Nancy Pelosi’s definition that acting like a legislative arsonist is one of the defining characteristics of the Tea Party then it follows that the President must have joined the Tea Party.
I am just saying that a plane that takes off with a full tank, takes a sharp turn, turns off the transponders, and drops below radar coverage sounds pretty familiar. All that is missing is someone like Todd Beamer saying Let’s Roll!
I am a fan of P.J. O’Rourke. He has written a lot of good lines. Recently he spiced up everyone’s life when he teamed up with the Cato Institute to file an amicus brief with the Supreme Court related to the upcoming case Susan B. Anthony List v. Driehaus. This is obviously some of his handiwork.
Driehaus voted for Obamacare, which the Susan B. Anthony List said was the equivalent of voting for taxpayer- funded abortion. Amici are unsure how true the allegation is given that the healthcare law seems to change daily, but it certainly isn’t as truthy as calling a mandate a tax.
Poking fun at the Chief Justice in an amicus brief has to be a first. I am familiar with Mr. Driehaus. He is a local politician lost his seat in 2010 to long time Congressman, Steve Chabot. He won the seat in 2008 with the help of President Obama and I guess the thrill was gone for the voters in 2010. I was surprised to learn that it was illegal to lie about politicians in Ohio and even more surprised that Mr. Driehaus sued the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List. It makes him look less like a former Congressman and more like a sore loser. This Ohio law forbidding lying is embarrassing. Although I would prefer that people stick to the truth about politicians and issues, I can tell you that it sure has not stopped anyone from lying in Ohio. Everyone has their favorite facts and studies. So we have a law most people ignore that is probably unconstitutional. Maybe the Supreme Court will put the law out of its misery before someone finds a way to abuse it. If they let the law stand the Supreme Court may have a mess that will make the Affordable Care Act look like child’s play to deal with. Sorry Chief Justice Roberts you set the precedent of how to deal with highly political laws. Here is what Ilya Shapiro wrote about the case over at Cato.
Believe it or not, it’s illegal in Ohio to lie about politicians, for politicians to lie about other politicians, or for politicians to lie about themselves. That is, it violates an election law””this isn’t anything related to slander or libel, which has higher standards of proof for public figures””to make “false statements” in campaign-related contexts.
During the 2010 House Elections, a pro-life advocacy group called the Susan B. Anthony List (SBA List), published ads in Ohio claiming that then-Rep. Steven Driehaus, who was running for re-election, had voted to fund abortions with federal money (because he had voted for Obamacare). Rather than contesting the truth of these claims in the court of public opinion, Driehaus filed a complaint with the Ohio Election Commission (OEC) under a state law that makes it a crime to “disseminate a false statement concerning a candidate, either knowing the same to be false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false.”
While the complaint was ultimately dropped, the SBA List took Driehaus and the OEC to federal court, seeking to have this law declared unconstitutional and thus enable advocacy groups to have more freedom going forward. The case has now reached the Supreme Court.
Maybe we finally found something that we can say that global warming caused.
Mark this as another Affordable Care Act fix I do not understand. Politics makes for strange bedfellows. As the “perfect” insurance customer the Affordable Care Act needs people like me to participate in the exchanges to make them sustainable. As a 60 year old gym rat I pay about three times more to the exchange than a millennial. Don’t get me wrong if we are not going to repeal the foolish thing then this is the next best solution. On the other hand I am the most likely prospect to go the uninsured route. Once again here are my reasons.
Here is what the Yahoo article, Obama Said to Allow Two-Year Renewal for Old Health Plans, said.
Americans who kept health plans that don’t comply with Obamacare requirements will be able to renew those policies for two more years, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The Obama administration, which has been deliberating the issue since November, is expected to announce today the extension of the health plans, said the person, who asked not to be identified because the decision wasn’t yet public.
With the pending Defense Department budget cuts you have to wonder whether some Pentagon types are expressing some serious bro love for Putin after the #Ukraine escapade.