Hypocrisy

This is a guest posting from a retired school teacher in the Palmerton Area School District. 

It isn’t much fun being a teacher these days.  One doesn’t have to turn too far on the TV dial to hear some network talking head accusing teachers, and all other public sector workers, of being solely responsible for the economic mess our country is in today.  Never has the concept of “overpaid and underworked” been so overused.  As a retired teacher whose husband, several family members, and many friends are still teaching, I can’t help but take these attacks personally.  

When I was asked to write this blog, my goal was to present a reasoned, researched response to the nonsense Republican governors and legislators have been spouting in the name of fixing education. It has become obvious, though, that they could not care less about fixing the problems of education in this country.  All they care about is busting unions, and I am very angry about that.

Their shameful hypocrisy can no longer be ignored.  During the debate about extending the Bush tax cuts, the president wanted to allow the cuts to expire for anyone who was making more than $250,000 a year. The arguments against the president’s proposal were loud and long. How can anyone think that people who earn $250K a year are rich? These poor people have mortgages to pay! They have children who want to go to college!  $250,000 a year is nothing in this day and age! Yet these same folks decried the avarice of teachers who are making $51,000 a year plus benefits. How greedy can teachers get?

And let’s not forget the sacredness of contracts, but only as they apply to the big shots on Wall Street.  After the taxpayer-funded bailout of the banking industry, it was suggested that perhaps these CEOs and other high-ranking officials of the banking industry might forego their bonuses so that the government “loans” banks received could be paid back more quickly.  But once again, the defenders of the status quo came to their rescue. These are contracts, after all!  Legal documents!  How can we expect to attract talented individuals to Wall Street if we don’t honor these contracts, written and signed in good faith?  

Somehow, these same standards don’t apply to public sector workers. Teachers must make concessions. They can’t expect the taxpayer to continue financing salaries, benefits, and pensions they don’t even deserve.  It is time for them to make some sacrifices for the common good.

Yes, I’m angry. I hope to present the more reasoned response I had intended when first asked to comment on the problems educators face today. But in the meantime, thanks for letting me vent.

WWJD

In November 2006 Bush administration officials said that children born unto undocumented immigrants with low incomes would no longer be automatically entitled to health insurance through Medicaid.  Papers had to be filled out by the parents to prove the child’s citizenship.  Doctors doubted that many parents would do that.

Atheist that I am, I nevertheless often attend church with my wife.  The minister is politically liberal, and I usually like her selection of hymns.  This morning’s lesson was from Matthew, Chapter 25.  That is the passage where Christ separates the sheep and the goats.  I’ll quote a relevant portion.

41  Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:

42  For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat:  I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink:

43  I was a stranger, and you took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not.

44  Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee?

45  Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.

46  And these shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal.

If only.

Natalie and Mike

Mike Huckabee is a self-righteous Bible thumper.  Natalie Portman, on the other hand, is absolutely the bee’s knees. If she has a baby without benefit of husband, that baby will not require governmental assistance.

Nevertheless, I believe I understand what Huckabee, in his inept way, is trying to say.  If you could pick one indicator for childhood poverty, it would not be educational level, race or ethnicity, religion, or geographical area.  It would be that the child has a single mother.

Of course, one way to reduce single motherhood is to abstain from sex.  That’s probably what Huckabee would preach.  Another more realistic way would be to make abortion safe, available, and affordable.  In any case, I don’t think we should demonize single mothers.  Nor do I think we should glorify the idea.

$4 gas

We are running out of oil.  We have been since Drake drilled his first Pennsylvania well.  Oil is a finite commodity.  Unlike wood, or wind, or sunlight, the earth contains a certain number of barrels.  While I don’t know what that figure is, I do know it is fixed.

The intelligent response is to use oil wisely.  We haven’t been.  We drill off the coast and on Alaska’s North Shore because we have depleted the oil in the easy places like Oklahoma and Texas.  

We could have been raising the required fleet MPG average, including pickup trucks in the fleet average, developing alternatives to gasoline power engines, increasing subsidies for high speed rail, raising the gas tax to discourage use and fund research.  We didn’t.

Europeans are better at this.  Gas at the pump is much higher than in the U.S.  Almost everybody drives very small cars or scooters or uses bikes.  Public transportation is available and fairly reliable, and intercity rail is high speed.  

We had a gas crisis in the Seventies, but we learned very little from it.

Extinction

I once saw a mountain lion.  On Friday afternoons, to avoid the traffic on U.S. 101, I often drove home from San Jose to Fairfax by way of Mountain Road.  About 20 miles longer, Mountain Road had beautiful views of the Pacific and Mount Tamilpais, and redwoods--and no traffic.  One day I saw this large animal streak across the road.  I immediately pulled over and got out of the car, and then it hit me--that was a mountain lion.  I quickly got back in the car.

I had been aware of mountain lions.  When I hiked in the Marin Municipal Water District property, signs at the trailheads contained instructions on what to do if you came across a mountain lion.  Look big, yell, don’t run, and if attacked, fight back.

When I hike in Pennsylvania, I will never see an eastern mountain lion.  The federal Fish and Wildlife Service has declared them officially extinct.  We knew that already, but somehow the official declaration makes it so final.  The last one died in the 1930s.  I will never see one.  My daughter won’t see one.  My grandson won’t see one.  No one will ever see one.  

I sometimes think that people don’t appreciate the finality of extinction.  The eastern mountain lion, a species that lived during my father’s lifetime, is now gone forever.  

Delicious

Sometimes the irony is almost too great to bear.  Mark Bittman, a columnist for the online New York Times, notes that a number of Tea Party congress members are getting  federal agricultural subsidies. Here are three members and their subsidies:

Vicky Hartzler, Rep. of Missouri, $775,000

Stephen Fincher, Rep. of Tennessee, $2.5 million

and (OMG)

Michelle Bachman, Rep. of Minnesota, $250,000.

You can provide your own comments here.

Why are they like that?

Our Republican legislators seem to go out of their way to support policies that any reasonable person can see are wrong for the state and nation.  There were two more mind-boggling examples of this Republican obtuseness today.

The kennel law

Pennsylvania long had a reputation for permitting puppy mills. They were all over the state; one was operating in my own Towamensing Township and another in neighboring Franklin Township.  Many of these kennels mistreated dogs, keeping them in inhumane conditions.  In 2008 the state legislature and the Rendell administration managed to enact legislation insuring that kennels provide certain size cages, exercise for the dogs, and reasonable temperatures.  

The reforms had an impact. Over 1/3 of the commercial kennels in the state shut down.  

Now Rep. Gordon Denlinger, a Republican from Lancaster, wants to reopen the kennel law.  He and five other Republican co-sponsors note that the state has lost millions in sales tax.  Well, yeah, and saved a thousands of dogs from a miserable life.  Here’s a suggestion to make up the revenue--a severance tax on natural gas.  Torturing dogs is not worth the money.

The trade agreement

Republicans in Congress are opposing an Obama trade package.  If they don’t get their way, they will note renew a program called Trade Adjustment Assistance that dates back to 1962 and helps workers who lose jobs because of free trade.  

At this point I would say “unbelievable” but unfortunately, it isn’t.  It’s far too typical of Republican legislators.  Who elected these people?

Info on the kennel law can be found in the Morning Call, Mar. 1, p. 17.  For info on the trade agreement check the New York Times, Mar. 1, p. B-1.