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Tuesday, November 2. 2010

Vote!

Today is election day:
GO VOTE!

Today is the BIG DAY! Mid-term elections all across this great land! Right now I’m watching Dylan Ratigan on MSNBC. Sometimes I agree with what he says, Ratigan comes from the financial world and had reported on business on CNBC for quite a few years, and before that, he worked for the Bloomberg Network.

At the moment, without hesitation he called the government corrupt. Actually, it’s hard to disagree when we hear about how much money is being spent on these elections: 4 billion dollars! Enough money to take a chunk out of the national debt. Meg Whitman alone is closing in on 200 million for her bid to become the governor of California. Think of that: one (would be) politician.

Her opponent, Jerry Brown, has spent a fraction of that amount and yet he leads in the polls and is expected to win today. But, Brown has had a lot of backing from the usual suspects: the unions representing teachers, nurses, government employees, police and firefighters (among others) and they have spent a lot of money on “issue ads” that have specifically attacked Whitman’s views on the issues.

Let me go off on a tangent for a bit. Republicans like to bash unions, mainly because they have historically backed Democratic candidates, although there have been a few notable exceptions. When the bail out of the auto industry was being debated, Tennessee Republican Senator Bob Corker would only get on board with the bail out if the Auto Workers Union (UAW) was dealt with, even after the union had given up a large number of benefits and cut paychecks.

In fact, one of the great visuals of the Congressional Hearings on the auto industry bailout were the heads of the “Big Three” sitting down in harmony with the president of the UAW, the four defending each other and their efforts to keep afloat a sinking ship. It was mind-blowing.

But when Republicans attack the unions, who are they really attacking? The reality goes either unnoticed or ignored, by both politicians and media alike. The “unions” are the workers: the teachers, nurses, DMV workers, police officers and firefighters, among others. In other words, these are “the people.” But, no politician wants to say he or she is against firefighters and police officers, but they want to weaken their power over elections, so the Republicans attack the unions, as if the unions and the people they represent are not one and the same.

The advantage Republicans now have, since the whole Ronald Reagan-PATCO affair, is that only 12.4 % of the American work force is represented by unions. That’s a rather small base for the Democratic Party.

This year, Republicans in California have been attacking their Democratic opponents mainly by attacking the support they get from the Teachers Union, the National Education Association by way of the California Teachers Association.

The big deal over education is reform, but what does that mean? Don’t really know, besides, “We want to hold teachers accountable!” The union, you see, protects those teachers who are not qualified to teach! Well actually, the union protects all teachers and there are good reasons to grant tenure to educators.

It’s a fact that teachers do not want to downsize their work force thereby increasing class size. It’s a fact that the larger the class size and more students a teacher is forced to attend to, the less effective the education.

The upside for Republicans is that as public schools decline, their call for subsidizing private schools, through vouchers, grows. Religious fanatics, many of whom have private schools that do not have to teach science in science classes, invariably vote Republican.

So, Republicans oppose the unions, which means they oppose teachers and more money for schools; are for larger class sizes and a high teacher-to-student ratio, hoping it will lead to the ascendancy of private religious schools.
 Just (another) small tangent: the United States ranks 37th in education spending, tied with Estonia and Austria. Cuba ranks #1 in education spending. In math literacy, the U.S. ranks 18th, behind Japan of course. In reading literacy: 15th. Fifth in real dollars for teacher salaries; but third when you look at per student education spending.
 We don’t value education or teachers in this country

Enough of that short tangent. Is the system corrupt? Yeah. As George Carlin used to say during his routine during election years, this government was bought and paid for a long time ago. But I’m gonna vote anyway. I can’t wrap my head around the idea that my efforts — my vote — don’t matter. It’s about all we have left in this nation. But, as Carlin also said, garbage in, garbage out and money, most specifically the chase for that campaign money, keeps the politicians occupied with the interests who give them the money.

Campaign finance reform? Make ALL campaigns publicly financed; no more dependence on donations and lobbyists looking to pass around billions of campaign dollars to any and all politicians willing to do the pet tricks required to get those dollars. But that’s not going to happen. Too many lobbyists depend on the current system for their jobs and they aren’t going to let go without a fight. And let’s face it, they have far more money than “we” do.

Even the Supreme Court undid the McCain-Feingold campaign reform bill, which is why there are millions of undocumented dollars pouring into this election. I’m voting anyway. It’s the principle of it all. I gotta stand up for something and having the right to vote is that principle, today.

Click Here for the non-partisan Smart Voter Guide for California.

Posted by Tim Forkes in Life at 08:01 | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

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