HorsesAss.Org

Robert Reich sounds the alarm nationally about the fact we are bailing out Wall Street even as our education system faces drastic cuts.

Frankly I’m a little disappointed Gov. Chris Gregoire didn’t seem to really mention education while at the National Governor’s Association meeting. Or maybe she did and it just wasn’t widely reported.

Granted, infrastructure and health care funding are important, too, but why not stress to the president-elect the serious threat to “human capital,” as Reich refers to well-educated workers? If we wind up yanking a couple of billion out of K-12 and higher ed, as certainly seems possible, that’s a deferred disaster of monumental proportions.

Former Republican state chair Chris Vance, writing at Crosscut:

Dino Rossi lost because voters realized Republicans don’t have a freaking clue about economics.

Pretty much.

If you’re wondering how I earned the “honor” of going up against Bill O’Reilly last night, well, it turns out I have Dan Savage to thank.

Ken Schram from KOMO gave my name to a producer from Bill O’Reilly’s show who was looking for someone to come on tonight and defend the sign put up by atheists near the nativity scene in the state capitol. The producer added that O’Reilly wanted to “broaden the discussion out to include observations about Washington being a very liberal state.” Uh-huh. I declined and when the producer asked if I could suggest someone who might want to come on, I gave him your name Goldy.

So I guess I should just think of Billo as Dan’s sloppy seconds.  (Bet that’s an image that sticks in your head.)  But, hey Dan… when do I get my shot at doing Bill Maher?

In the end, O’Reilly really wasn’t all that.  Sure, he did that cutting me off and talking over me thing he does, but that’s not really all that different from a typical dinner table conversation in my family, and, well, I’ve spent enough time on both sides of the mic to have been there and done that.  Watching the video, I thought I did okay given the context… got in a couple good lines… didn’t embarrass myself or anybody else.  And now that I know what to expect, I’m confident I’d be more relaxed and forceful given another shot at going up against Billo.

Speaking of which, the process of taping the segment is probably not what most people imagine.  Both Anne and I appeared from studios at Fisher Plaza, but were taped in separate rooms.  Throughout the interview I sat alone in a small studio with a fake skyline behind me and a robotic camera in front; there was no TV monitor on which to view the proceedings.  Except for having to stare at the camera, it was pretty much like doing radio, except with a tinny piece in my ear instead of a set of good headphones.  In the end, having Bill O’Reilly’s voice in my head wasn’t all that scary—there are way more frightening demons in there—but it would have been easier if I could have heard him more clearly.

As to the story itself, well, it’s total bullshit, and it’s hard to believe that was Billo’s top story of the day.  In fact, after taping what I thought was a pretty uncontroversial segment, I almost feared they might edit it, bury it or cut it entirely.  But then, I’m not a real journalist like Billo, so what do I know?

My DSL stopped working sometime last night.  The modem says it is connecting fine, but I can’t connect to anything.  Anyway, expect some light posting while I sort this out.

UPDATE:
Qwest called me back within a couple hours and fixed the problem.  So I guess I’m satisfied with the customer service.

A floating pirate ship shooting pepperoni would look pretty killer if you ask me. Call Sea-Tac.

Join us at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally for an evening of politics under the influence. We start at 8:00 pm at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Some of us will show up even earlier to enjoy the fine cuisine.

Tonight we’ll tune in to The O’Reilly Factor for his annual War on Christmas™ comedy special. Perhaps we’ll construct some “hard left” holiday tree munitions decorations at the same time. And we’ll catch the tail end of the War in Georgia.

Not in Seattle? Check out the Drinking Liberally web site for dates and times of a chapter near you.

I guess I did kinda sorta okay before getting bogged down in his bullshit, but mostly O’Reilly just wanted to call Gov. Gregoire names, and that’s what he did.  We’ll see how it comes out in the edit.  (And yes, unlike almost every other show, O’Reilly pre-tapes, and edits out the truly unflattering—or boring—stuff.)

The thing is, it’s hard to imagine folks getting riled up once again about the so-called War on Christmas, when they’re more worried about how their going to pay for any Christmas celebration at all.  This sort of divisive rhetoric is a luxury I’m not sure many Americans can afford during these tough economic times.

Oddly enough, I’ll be doing the O’Reilly Factor tonight, defending Washington state from charges of being a far-left extreme commie-fascist-atheist sanctuary.  In other words, Billo doesn’t much like the Atheists sign that was put up in our state Capitol, but he somehow sees it as part of a pattern of secular decadence that includes Death With Dignity, naked bicycle riding, and the Fremont statue of Lenin.

Whatever.

In fact, none of these have anything to do with each other (I-1000 was libertarian, the statue of Lenin is kitsch, and naked bicycle riding seems, well, just plain uncomfortable), but you know, if religious groups insist on putting holiday displays in public facilities, they can’t much complain when competing groups do likewise, and since freedom of religion also means freedom from religion, Atheists have just as much a right to promote their solstice greetings as anybody else.

That’s America.  Love it or leave it.

With K-12 education accounting for about a third of state general fund expenditures, and a $5 billion-plus revenue shortfall projected over the next biennium budget, there’s little doubt that there will be at least some cuts in state funding of basic education… possibly as much as a billion dollars or more.

That could amount to over $1,000 per student, maybe two to three hundred thousand dollars a year out of your typical elementary school budget, a devastating cut that would result in larger class sizes and the elimination of “extras” like the arts, physical education, teaching assistants, tutors, counselors and other programs.  But it doesn’t have to happen that way.

The state could raise additional revenues by eliminating billions of dollars in special purpose tax exemptions, and by extending the sales tax to some personal and business services (something the state will eventually have to do if it refuses to adopt an income tax).  But if, as many observers assume, the Legislature and Governor lack the balls to do what’s necessary to give voters the services they want, they should just let local school districts raise the taxes themselves.

Currently, the maximum local levy for about two-thirds of the state’s school districts is limited to 24% of state and federal funding, with the remaining schools grandfathered in at a lid as high as 33.9% (Seattle is capped at 32.9%).  There are a lot of sound reasons for maintaining this policy, and I’m not opposed to the school levy lid in theory.  But in these desperate economic times we need to let local communities choose to adequately fund K-12 education if the state proves unable (or unwilling) to fulfill its obligation.

A temporary lid lift of say, an additional 10%, would give local school districts the flexibility they need to weather this economic downturn without cutting basic education services.  And of course, local voters would always have the final say.  Districts in areas of the state that oppose higher taxes might choose not to seek a higher levy, or might have any increase rejected at the polls, but there’s little doubt that the vast majority of districts here in the Puget Sound region would stand a good chance of passing a temporary levy hike if a compelling argument can be made to voters.

Governor Gregoire ran on a no new taxes pledge, and I don’t doubt she plans to try to keep it, but that shouldn’t keep her or the Legislature from granting local taxing districts the authority they need to ask local voters to tax themselves to make up for any cuts in state funding. It is simply unfair and unreasonable for anti-tax sentiment in the rest of the state to dictate local tax policies, or to impose a lowest common denominator approach toward something as crucial as K-12 education.

As we saw once again in last month’s election, Seattle voters have proven themselves extremely generous when it comes to funding the services and infrastructure projects we want.  Given the opportunity to ease the impact of proposed state K-12 funding cuts, I’m confident Seattle voters will prove generous once again.

That is, assuming, the Legislature and the Governor gives us that chance.

The important thing at this time of national and international crisis is for Obama to “Sister Souljah” the unions and the dirty bloggers.

That will definitely reduce house foreclosures by an estimated 15.72% per quarter, according to my calculations.

It’s interesting how vital it is to some traditional journalists that dirty bloggers get their comeuppance. On the one hand we’re an inconsequential collection of fact-impaired rabble, and on the other hand we must be dealt with! And we’re all the same!

Personally I think Obama should “Sister Souljah” NBC News and E! That’d learn them magic picture box people.

I am loving the latest conspiracy theory out of wingnuttia.

Sad:

In the two months since federal regulators seized and sold Washington Mutual’s banking operations to JPMorgan Chase & Co., WaMu employees have been resigned to the likelihood that thousands of them would be out of work.

On Monday, they found out just how many: 3,400 employees, out of 4,300 the company had in Seattle at the time of the takeover.

And mad:

Bowing to aggressive lobbying — along with assurances from banks that the troubled mortgages were OK — regulators delayed action for nearly one year. By the time new rules were released late in 2006, the toughest of the proposed provisions were gone and the meltdown was under way.

“These mortgages have been considered more safe and sound for portfolio lenders than many fixed rate mortgages,” David Schneider, home loan president of Washington Mutual, told federal regulators in early 2006. Two years later, WaMu became the largest bank failure in U.S. history.

In more ordinary times the failure of WaMu would be the business story of the year. Instead it’s basically a tragic footnote, although it’s not a footnote to the 3,400 “lucky duckies,” to borrow a phrase from Atrios.

“It’s official:”

… for the last year, the United States economy has been in recession.

No shit, Sherlock.

Of course the “nonpartisan” National Bureau of Economic Research waited until after the election to make the pronouncement.  You know, God forbid accurate information influence an election one way or the other.

Dollars to donuts it doesn’t take a year to announce the end of the recession.

In case you haven’t noticed, I haven’t been writing much recently, partially because I’m a little burnt out on politics, and partially because I’ve decided to take some time to clean house.  That is, literally, clean my house.

I’m not a very tidy person, and my obsessive attention to blogging and politics has taken its toll over the past year.  When my home office grew too disgusting even for me, I picked up and moved into the dining room.  When the dining room table (and floor and chairs) became too stuffed with papers, hand scribbled notes, unopened mail and other detritus, my daughter and I started eating in the kitchen.

And then there are the dust bunnies… dust bunnies the size of real bunnies, which I could swear, in recent weeks, have started to animate, and perhaps, plot against me.  Between the dog and the cat, the fur they shed and the dirt they track in, not to mention the come-by-honestly perpetual mess machine that is my daughter, keeping my floors clean is a Sisyphean task under normal circumstances, and after an election year of neglect, the underside of the bed and the couch and other pieces of furniture had started to resemble a strange, alien landscape, where but for the absence of surface water, new lifeforms might arise, and eventually conquer our world.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t expect my drafty old 1912 craftsman ever to be truly clean—at least, not to ex-wife standards—but I’d like to be able to invite guests over again without being embarassed, or risking an emergency call to Child Protective Services.  I don’t mind the mess so much, but I’m not proud of the dirt, and I can’t really get to the dirt without first cleaning up the mess.  So it’s gonna take some time.

That said, in addition to getting my house in order, I’m also taking some time to get my house in order, in the metaphorical sense, both financially and otherwise.  One way or the other, expect some big changes here at HA.  Hopefully, good changes.

But in the meanwhile, don’t be surprised by occasional spurts of light posting.