Yes, let's force people, even those who don't want to be in school, to go to school using their own money, but also wasting some of it on the people who collect and process it. Great idea! What could go wrong?

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A federal judge ruled today that graphic pictures of detainee abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison must be released over government claims that they could damage America's image.

Someone should tell them that bad press can be prevented by not abusing prisoners in the first place. Censorship is only needed to preserve the good reputation of those who have tortured and/or murdered already.

The research disagrees with you. In a school that is mixed higher- and lower- income (that's a prime determiner for success in education), the predicted lower-performers do better while the predicted higher performers either stay where expected or move up slightly. When those populations are segregated, the low-income kids suffer, but the high-income kids don't.

I wish I could find a link to the study.

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So many cowards.

You know who you are.

Of course all this is just test scores which are basically irrelevant once in the real world.

More importantly, and why i would advocate mixed income schools, are the life lessons and people skills people gain from mixing with people that are different than them. I agree with you that suburbia is bad for America but i think more importantly than mixing kids together is getting rid of the lower class attitude that education isn't important.

And that's a huge part of it. Most of my students' homes did not have a SINGLE book. To me, that's incomprehensible - I've been reading since before I can remember. There have always been books in the house.

The attitude towards education is understandable, though, when taken in the context of the cycle of poverty. We, as a society, will have to make a conscious effort to break that cycle. Part of that requires expending effort and money to instill in kids the value of education, and some of that will require peer pressure. The poor are not going to get that if they're cooped up in the same schools as all the other poor kids, with no other role models.

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So many cowards.

You know who you are.

Well, such things USED to exist before government started intruding into the free market. PRIVATE unemployment insurance existed long before government started encroaching on people's freedom in this matter.

Any such program would NOT increase overall income (as it will require people paying an additional portion of their income when they actually are working), and with unemployment at 5%, it is silly to suggest that a major part of the problem of people having insufficient income is unemployment.

If you're talking about GOVERNMENT "assurances" then you are either talking about unemployment issurance which ALREADY EXISTS, or you are talking about welfare. Both of which are horrible and antithetical to a free society.

Socialist states were all about "safety nets" and "guarantees", they failed.

There is no fundamental right to an income. A right is something which exists even in a vacuum. If something requires an affirmative burden on someone else, then it is NOT by definition a "right".

If you have a "right" to an income, that means someone else is an absolute obligation to work for you and not for themselves. Last time I checked, that was called slavery.

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"It's a good feeling to shoot a bad guy. Something you democrats would never understand. Americans are homesteaders, we want a safe home, keep the money we make, and shoot bad guys!"

----Denny Crane

Not true. Look at the Scandanavian states.

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So many cowards.

You know who you are.

If you are referring to market friendliness, then private unemployment insurance was never available as such a product, or public sector forms of unemployment insurance would not have been necessary.

There would be no need for welfare, as we know it, if unemployment insurance was available to anyone who is not gainfully employed. From one perspective, UI based income is more market friendly than the more socialistic forms of welfare, as we currently know it. UI based forms of income compensation is also tied to the known market based metric of employment and could simplify that factor for economic purposes.

It depends on what you mean by failure. Our war on poverty has not achieved the success it could have, even with a New Deal type of economic stimulus package. Our drug war is a complete failure, yet the government is burdening someone else to pay for those incomes and bureaucracy that has as a function the destruction of forms of wealth through the coercive use of force of the state. I can understand how you got your impression of forms of slavery that have nothing to do with respecting individual liberty or states' rights.

It was never "neccesary", at least not in a FREE society. Prior to the public sector IMPOSITION upon free people, it was available, and everyone was free to chose it or not.

Only those seeking to impose their preferences or values onto other people could define it as "neccesary".

Once of the economic challenges we face is a low savings rate....do you believe it "neccesary" to force people to save money?

What nonesense. You don't even have a fucking clue what "insurance" is. What you are calling insurance, is, in fact welfare.

If someone NEVER has a job, would they be "insured" under your proposal? Because if so, then your proposal is just welfare that is CALLED "insurance" either through abject ignorance or blatant dishonesty.

Actually, exercising police powers to RESTRICT what people may do (and taxing and spending to enforce those laws) is fundamentally different from a system which grants those who do NOT produce and contribute a claim on the fruit of another's labor for NO purpose other than the direct benefit of the recipient.

What if 90% of the population, having been told they have a right to be provided by society with "income insurance" decided simply to not work?

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"It's a good feeling to shoot a bad guy. Something you democrats would never understand. Americans are homesteaders, we want a safe home, keep the money we make, and shoot bad guys!"

----Denny Crane

It was never necessary, or simply not available as another financial product on an open market? I am not sure why you don't consider an income, in a mixed market economy "necessary".

I disagree with your premise that we are savings challenged in our mixed market economy, if as you would like us to believe, a free market would have the necessary mechanisms for adequate savings rates as a form efficient utilization of resources. Which is it, our current level of command economics or an inefficient market?

In any event, the private sector is not responsible for macro inefficiencies outside of their respective markets; that is why they are known as externalities and one of the reasons we have a public sector.

You will not convince me with your irrational form of argumentation. You are always welcome to use logic and reason. "At-will" unemployment insurance could be based more on market principles than current forms of welfare, as we know it. In that sense, it would be less like welfare, and more like insurance. The specific case you mention would be more like welfare, but the person would be able to enter the labor market for market based wages anytime an employment opportunity becomes available. In the mean time, they could be educating themselves or pursuing some other vocational training on their own, but with greater individual liberty and the freedom that comes with a market friendly form of income. And, when sufficiently skilled, they could opt for a position that pays market based wages.

The same argument could be used to claim that paying people to not provide labor input to the economy, benefits the rest of the populace by inhibiting "Robin Hood-ism" and any incentive for private individuals to privateer their way to prosperity. Anyone receiving an income from a hypothetical unemployment insurance scheme would still be able to be market friendly and pay local taxes, which helps local governments.

Since market forces would not disappear, the same market based forces would apply if Mr. Scott "beamed up" 90 percent of the population. Labor rates would probably go up due to a scarcity of labor market participants. Normal market forces will still apply since this type of scheme does not encompass the command economics of a totalitarian police state that feels it can afford to steal forms of private property, destroy it, and claim it is a necessary taxpayer expense.

We already spend more money on public education than any other country in the world and we have the least intelligent kids of all industrial nations.

Money clearly is not the problem with education in this country.

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"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we."

President George W. Bush, 8-5-2004

Carolina Politics Online

THIS IS REAL HOPE AND CHANGE!

Isn't this the same package where they wanted to give illegals a rebate check? Seems to me that it is.

I agree, a recession will come sooner or later and that we should let it run it's course.

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Anyone who thinks freedom comes cheap, please put the blindfold on and stand against the wall.

Many times I believe Americans will have to take back the country and start a new government.

Why are is there any discussion of tax rebates when we are running massive deficits?

Are any of the candidates willing to provide assurances that they will not later claim we need to reduce social spending because they can't balance the budget, afterwards?

Why are no candidates claiming they will balance the budget by running massive surpluses?

because handing out free money is better way to get votes.

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"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we."

President George W. Bush, 8-5-2004

Carolina Politics Online

THIS IS REAL HOPE AND CHANGE!

The problem, if you actually think one exists, is a large population of non english speakers and a portion of the population who don't value education drag down the average. Its not that their aren't smart Americans, its that the average is skewed.

Why does anyone complain about politics and politicians, if they are willing contributors to ineffectual politics?