The Message to the Democrats from Wisconsin

This will sound familiar to my long time readers as the pollsters surveyed the independent voters in Wisconsin and other states and found they think like me.

Independent voters want Simpson-Bowles implemented.  End fiscal stimulus gradually and balance the budget with 2/3's spending cuts and 1/3 revenue increases.  Reform entitlements in a responsible manner without ending them as we know it.  Implement the Affordable Health Care Act and Tort Reform.  If the Democrats ran like this and simply told their liberal base that it's this way or the highway, that the GOP will not reform entitlements in a responsible manner; the democrats will win.

Also, public sector unions need to start thinking like the private sector unions.  Something like 30% of the latter voted for Governor Walker because they understand that the public sector pensions need reform so that there is still money for social services and routine things in the state and local budgets. Property taxes are high enough and cannot be raised at a rate faster than inflation and even that is too fast for retirees.

There was a distressing story on Type 2 diabetes in kids.  I don't know the solution but Diabetes is a crippling expense for the health care system and short of death panels for fat people, the only viable solution is education starting very early on in a comprehensive manner.  I remember being taught health in grade school and it seems like that should be a focus for all ages.

Finally, the NewsHour did a 3 day set on teachers and tests.  They did focus on the High Performing schools that show up on tests are Charter schools that admit high performing kids and went on to say that you still need a way to see how teachers perform when they teach lower performing kids.  There needs to be a focus on improving kids ability to think rather then memorize (which is what the current tests do) and how this changes over the course of a year in measuring the effectiveness of any specific teacher.  When they talked to the teachers, my takeaway was kids are still being passed when they should fail and what happens at home is still the most important thing. I was shocked at the statistic that 30% of High School students drop out before graduating.  Clearly, neither No Child Left Behind or the Race to the Top are addressing that awful reality.

These posts may become infrequent as I thinking about taking a job that will keep me busy much of the time starting very soon.