Stupid way to run the world’s largest economy
Another last-minute deal. Another short term funding plan. Dumb.
Teacher Appreciation
Our unwillingness to adequately fund teachers and school for children across the US is one of our most shortsighted policies.
If we really appreciated teachers we’d remove the barriers to effective education.
GOP Defunds Law Enforcement?
Since the FBI served a warrant to retrieve classified documents from Trump’s house, several GOP members have come out forcefully and vocally calling to remove funding for the FBI.
Trump supporters held an armed rally outside an FBI office in Phoenix. And one Trump supporter in Cincinnati tried to storm the FBI office.
I guess they’re done backing law enforcement?
If you had predicted that GOP Trump loyalists would be calling to defund law enforcement in 2022, ride that prognostication wave and go buy a lottery ticket.
Schools
A county in North Carolina has approved a plan to put AR-15s in all schools for security reasons. Who can imagine anything going wrong with this plan?
Having two kids in public schools, I see every year how desperately underfunded our schools are. I’ve been PTA President; I’ve seen the receipts of what teachers have to self fund for their classrooms.
And that’s on top of teacher salaries that are mostly not near what they should be.
The dearth of public school funding is one of the most short sighted policies in America. Few things will pay off better for our country than investing in education.
So it’s sickening when funding then goes instead to guns or hardening schools. Which statistically has been shown to do more harm than good.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2776515
“The rate of deaths was 2.83 times greater in schools with an armed guard present”
The winner in this, of course, is the gun industry, as people just keep buying more guns. And now schools are, too.
I’m shaking my damn head.
Sensing a pattern
sensing a pattern here. Yes, I can imagine it’s tough to be a police officer. Yet it seems that the more they are criticized for failures and lack of response, the more funding they wind up getting.
Even here in San Francisco (which is not as progressive as many people think) - we’ve had years now of reports where police just decline to investigate crimes. Or worse, reports in the newspaper of police turning their backs on a crime in progress (such as store break-ins) and doing nothing, even when citizens are yelling at them to act. And no, it doesn’t have to do with prosecutorial approach. Besides, that’s not their job to worry about with a crime in progress.
Yet even here, the mayor is increasing police funding. It’s like, the worse they do, the more funding they seem to get. Because crime stokes a primal fear in people and many are unwilling to see that more police, more tactical gear, more weapons, are not the answer.
Uvalde is a prime example. That city spends a huge portion of its budget on police. Didn’t help the kids.
And this isn’t even getting into the recurring issues of police brutality, racial discrimination, etc.
At some point we’ll have to face that more police and funding for ever more outrageous weapons are not the answers.
