Blog @ MoreWhat.com

from MoreWhat.com staff:
Senator Reid, we now know why Rush Limbaugh has been
known to criticize you. Aren’t you getting a little ahead of
yourself? Have you sent a copy of this to the troops? That
would probably give them a warm feeling. Typically, we
try to refrain from name calling but…….

…….Senator Reid !!!!!!! Your acting like a moron!!!!!!!!

third world county permalink 

Below is a perfect example of another grant program in education
that defies understanding. The purpose of the grant awards is to
provide funds for principals and staff to use in improving school
communications aimed at increasing school participation. Not by
students but parents and other community members.

First, the parents should need no encouragement to participate.
Second, the only significant reason for others to get involved is
their tax dollars pay for it. Unless the real purpose of this grant
is fundraising for the school. Third, we ask why maintaining the
communication function is not already part of the principal and
staff job descriptions?

Read on. We view this as just another example of misguided
decision making in the academic world. Of course they’ll keep
doing it until the public makes them change.

School Principals Win Grants Designed to Strengthen Community Connections - 08/25/06 NAESP - Press Release » August 25, 2006by Raven PadgettAlexandria, VA—August 25, 2006—The National Association of Elementary School Principals (NAESP) and MetLife Foundation today announced the recipients of the 2006 Sharing the Dream program, an initiative that was created to help principals build closer relationships between schools and communities. Thirty principals nationwide have been awarded $3,000 grants to develop ways to actively involve parents and community members with their local schools. “Principals are critical in establishing and maintaining strong school and community connections,” said Vincent L. Ferrandino, NAESP’s executive director. “This year’s grant-winning principals were carefully selected for the unique, but practical programs they created to improve communication within their communities and increase support for their schools.” Using the grants and a resource toolkit, the principals and their staffs will develop and evaluate a variety of projects during the 2006-07 school year aimed at improving community leadership and creating a sense of ownership and involvement in schools. “The principal sets the tone in a school and is key to bringing teachers, staff and parents together to ensure an effective learning environment,” said Sibyl Jacobson, MetLife Foundation president and CEO. “We are proud to support Sharing the Dream, which assists principals in uniting the school community to improve student achievement.” The Sharing the Dream initiative originated after the 2003 MetLife Survey of the American Teacher: An Examination of School Leadership revealed a significant disconnect between the ways in which principals and other members of the school community view their schools and relationships with one another. Principals perceived a markedly more positive school atmosphere than did students, teachers and parents. The Sharing the Dream programs provide the selected schools with the resources to decrease this perception gap and also supports principals in their efforts to meet the high standards outlined in the 2001 NAESP publication: Leading Learning Communities: Standards for What Principals Need to Know and Be Able To Do. The standards detail the need for principals to set high expectations, ensure quality instruction, foster adult learning in the community, use multiple sources of data in their work, and actively engage communities. Recipients’ schools represent rural and urban, small and large, elementary, middle, and secondary schools in the United States. Awards were based on need, the creativity of the plan, and the commitment to program evaluation. At the conclusion of the school year, NAESP will highlight the successful programs in its publications and on its Web site. A list of the grant-winning principals and the programs they created is available in PDF format. ###Established in 1921, the National Association of Elementary School Principals (NAESP) serves 30,000 elementary and middle school principals in the United States, Canada and overseas. NAESP leads in the advocacy and support for elementary and middle-level principals and other education leaders in their commitment to all children.MetLife Foundation, established in 1976 by MetLife, supports programs that increase opportunities for young people to succeed, give students and teachers a voice in improving education, develop partnerships between schools and communities and strengthen relationships among parents, principals, teachers and students.

We find the last two paragraphs especially disturbing. What a
load of PR. If you’re so concerned about the children, please try
to explain school funding, teacher’s pay, the poor academic per-
formance and the need for these grants.

Like the previous post, this relates to a post by Senator Waxman
at The Hill’s Congress Blog.

Here’s an excerpt and link to The Hill’s Congress Blog and a
post by Senator Frist to which we took exception. The first
item to which we took exception is in bold below as well as a
copy of our comments post which may or may not be on The
Hill’s website.

visit Beltway Traffic Jam

As one conducts research, studies or otherwise attempts to stay
informed or improve one’s knowledge, it is not unusual to find an
item or two along the way which gives one pause. Occasionally,
the pause is due to a gratifying discovery laced with optimistic
outlooks for human kind. Then there is the other observation.
How inept one can feel upon notice of a significant historic note
which previously escaped notice. So here is the most recent one
we found. We were not aware that the Federal Water Pollution
Control Act was enacted in 1948. In our defense, we would like
to mention that with events such as the Love Canal and others
over the years, we had not expected to find what is now a better
than 50 year old law designed, at least by description, to prevent
damage to the natural water resources of the United States.

The amendments and other changes to the original may explain
the less than adequate condition of natural resources in this land.
A link is provided for your convenience if you would like to see
more from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. You might also
like to contact your elected representatives to remind them of the
importance of protecting the environment. Or you can visit our
forum and register plus submit your opinions so we can do the
citizen action for you later. We hope you won’t simply call us
tree huggers and split. The environment is not our only concern.
And people who are concerned do not deserve the pejoratives.
BTW, our forum URL is in the sidebar under Site Navigation.

Federal Water Pollution Control Act (Clean Water Act)
Federal Water Pollution Control Act (Clean Water Act) (33 U.S.C.
1251 - 1376; Chapter 758; P.L. 845, June 30, 1948; 62 Stat. 1155).

The original 1948 statute (Ch. 758; P.L. 845), the Water Pollution Control
Act, authorized the Surgeon General of the Public Health Service, in
cooperation with other Federal, state and local entities, to prepare
comprehensive programs for eliminating or reducing the pollution of
interstate waters and tributaries and improving the sanitary condition of
surface and underground waters. During the development of such plans,
due regard was to be given to improvements necessary to conserve waters
for public water supplies, propagation of fish and aquatic life, recreational
purposes, and agricultural and industrial uses. The original statute also
authorized the Federal Works Administrator to assist states, municipalities,
and interstate agencies in constructing treatment plants to prevent discharges
of inadequately treated sewage and other wastes into interstate waters or
tributaries.

Since 1948, the original statute has been amended extensively either to
authorize additional water quality programs, standards and procedures
to govern allowable discharges, funding for construction grants or general
program funding.

There is a story in Business Week attributing the health care
industry to “propping up the economy” and without those jobs
we would be hurting. We submit that because of those jobs
we are hurting.

With the arrival of health networks, for those fortunate enough
to have health insurance, their is limited competition which is one
reason healthcare costs are out of control. The other being what
is allowed by medicare and medicaid. Two notable examples are
benefits for those who have eaten themselves into obesity and a
practice of paying for drugs to address erectile dysfunction. It
may seem trivial but the costs are not. Administrative cost in the
healthcare industry are 31% of total costs. That’s obscene.

The reason we would be in an economic coma is not the Business
Week contention of the lack of promise from tech jobs. It has been
the exporting of American jobs to foreign countries. It is the import
of foreign labor for jobs claimed to be unwanted by Americans. Of
course an American would not want the lower paying jobs for their
entire working life. But what they fail to mention is neither do the
foreign workers. It is just the way to get your foot in the door. And
getting one’s foot in the door is simple if you leave the door wide open.

You can search health on this blog to find other supporting details
relating to our disagreement with Business Weeks assertions. Our
policies, greedy corporate citizens and unenforced laws are the real
root of most problems in this country.

Immigration forum stresses stricter enforcement

by Michael Flynn
published September 9, 2006 9:48 pm
FLAT ROCK – Highlighting the interest of many mountain residents in
immigration issues, more than 200 people gathered at Blue Ridge
Community College this evening for a two-hour forum on the topic
sponsored by U.S. Rep. Charles Taylor, R-Brevard, and featuring U.S.
Rep. Tom Tancredo, a Colorado Republican.

from MoreWhat.com staff:
Just a reminder post so folks might remember the immigration issue.

Can anyone provide a convincing argument that the Pope
was unaware the statements he made related to Islam would
produce the response reported? Further, can anyone provide
an equally convincing argument that the silence of Muslims
who claim to be passive is not approval of the Muslims who
express a religious right to kill?

To practicing members of Islam, Judaism and Christianity, it
would likely be helpful if you would remember that a belief
or faith is exactly that. If you believe, you have an opinion.
If that opinion is shared by many, it is still an opinion. This
means you have no proof. You have an opinion. The opinion
no matter how strongly adhered to does not make it fact. If
you kill or destroy on behalf of your faith or belief, you only
dishonor an otherwise noble endeavor.

Get over yourselves. There are plenty of people in this world
who practice a religion without killing people. Stop giving a
bad reputation to religious faith. Spiritual or religious faith
should be characterized as uplifting and positive. If it is what
drives one to kill it is nothing more than an excuse for extreme
misguided behavior. If you believe that a religion gives you a
right to kill, there is nothing wrong with the religion. There is
something wrong with you!

Below is a copy & paste from a contact form we submitted
to the National School Boards Association. We were conducting
some research on education in the United States. When this .org
appeared in search results, we mistakenly thought it might be a
good place to look for the information. Aren’t we silly?

The cost of education keeps going up. We let everyone inside &
outside the country attend if they so desire. The taxpayer is
simply getting crushed and all they can do is build more schools,
while the academic performance is at best a flat line. We will
continue to fail when competing against other developing nations
and likely never correct the problems. The students come and go
but the bill for education remains with those left to pay it.

(contact form comment section submitted to NSBA.org)
The only item in your news releases for 2006 related to students
or their education was a complaint to ABC about a program that
was critical of public education.

I visited your website while trying to research the state of education
in the United States. It seems odd that there appears to be no focus
on the topic here.

I omitted an area of interest on this form, since the ones I read
indicates the focus of your organization. It strikes me that the
focus is sadly similar to a lobby organization. Is it any wonder
why the general public reacts the way they do toward education
in this country? PR and school spending initiatives lacking a
discussion of accomplishment or performance evaluations are
the bulk of what is presented to the pubilc.

Should we be concerned about academic performance
or condom usage?

Another failure of an institution most of us associate with the good
in this country. At least the good before we forgot what we’re here
for. Is it possible that major established systems in our country are
flatly faliing apart or have there always been incidents like this and
with this frequency? We’re trying to decide if our memories are
failing or if it is the infrastructure and organizations we depend on.

Random Thoughts As They Occur:

Our news observation, strictly subjective in terms of what news
we consider important, provides the following results:

Technorati’s most popular items scored 16/30 or 53.3%
CNN, MSNBC, BBC and Google all had 4/10 or 40%
The surprise was Yahoo with 7/25 or 28%

The point we’re trying to make here is all people should be able
to devote at least enough time during a day to read some of the
news related to important issues. Everyone is busy and has many
demands on their time. But if you have time to read anything,
why can’t some of it deal with important issues? Probably for the
same reason voter turnout in this country is pathetic. And also
why power and influence has such an easy time controlling the
actions of government. And probably why we submit that the
percentage of news rated in “most popular” as we gauge it, is
close to the percentage of voter turnout. People in general have
shown their concern in sound bites of outrage when tragedy or
outrageous events occur but do little or nothing to influence the
outcomes as they watch “reality TV” which is an oxymoron.

The reality in TV is the programming dealing with the events
that affect the way we live. As a society or individuals we need
to resist the temptation to escape from the challenge of being
engaged in what largely determines our future.

Although we have not taken time to research this item thoroughly,
you may wish to follow up on the information we do have here
regarding Susan Dudley as a likely problem if confirmed to be the
new head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.

Both Public Citizen and OMB Watch have some troubling data
available. If this person is the sinister, extremist champion of all
that’s wrong with corporate America, then we might do well to
encourage those responsible to rethink this nomination. Yes, ok,
there are those among you who think any appeal like this is either
half-baked or the initiative of some kook left fringe. Well that is
why we wrote at the top we have not finished checking this out
but it seemed irresponsible to wait until we are sure since we are
obviously behind the curve on this one.

Dudley Materials Reappear on Mercatus Website

Earlier this month, OMB Watch reported that articles authored by the
nominee to replace John Graham as the head of the Office of Information
and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), Susan Dudley, were no longer available
on the website of the Mercatus Center, the industry-backed think tank
where Dudley was previously employed. Now, all the missing articles
have mysteriously returned to the website and several previously
unavailable articles by Dudley have also been posted there.

If true the above would certainly be interesting. First question
is why would they put the material back on the site, unless they
were concerned it was already indexed on search engines.

We first saw this mentioned at Public Citizen while just surfing
around aimlessly looking for post material. Almost passed it up
but then we felt obligated to share the find. Which by the way,
everyone else on the planet probably knows about except us.
How foolish we feel. Can’t be a big story, right? We certainly
would have heard if it was a big story, right? Oh, the Public
Citizen stuff, right.

Sept. 12, 2006

Susan Dudley Unfit to Head Regulatory Agency,

Public Interest Groups Say

Public Citizen and OMB Watch Report Details Dudley’s
Radical Ideology, Close Ties to Industry

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The nomination of Susan Dudley as
administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs
(OIRA) represents another attack by the Bush administration on
the government’s ability to hold industry accountable and keep
Americans safe, according to a report released today by Public
Citizen and OMB Watch.

Below is an interesting appraisal of Mercatus Center from a
report on Katrina and various failures that explains in almost
politically correct form that Mercatus is “often skeptical of
government programs”. Aren’t we all?

Mercatus makes a connection between FEMA dollars received
and the rate of public corruption. That might be a stretch.

Report links disaster aid, official corruption

Sobel spoke Wednesday at a panel discussion organized by the Mercatus
Center, a Washington, D.C.-area think tank organization that is often
skeptical of government programs……..

…..But by the authors’ analysis, every additional $1 in annual per-person
FEMA relief “increases corruption nearly 2.5 percent in the average state.”

If you’re interested, have fun with it. We may come back with
more.

Update: Before we published the above, we added what you are
reading now. The decision was to hold this post until a little
more searching was completed. About the only item we found
was a report in the Washington Post of interviews with people
from the government or academia, one who claimed to be a
friend of Susan Dudley, and our best guess was these accounts
would be too subjective or offered in a style that would not pose
other problems for the interviewee. Bottom line is we see very
little from anyone but those lodging complaints. And as just a
side note, we are not crazy about air bags in vehicles or the fact
that they are manditory. Since that agress with Susan Dudley,
we’re not sure we should not like her as OIRA chief. But her
reasons for opposition of air bags may be completely different
from our personal preference. So…..

If anyone has information or opinions about Susan Dudley and
her nomination, go nuts. Let us hear ya!

Waiting on the debate

Companies push for an answer on wind vs. water
Mon, Sep. 04, 2006
By RYAN LaFONTAINE HANCOCK COUNTY - The federal government will give Terry
Jacob money to rebuild his Jourdan River home in a way that could
lessen the chances of it being destroyed during another hurricane.

But first, county officials must essentially choose a side in the wind
vs. water showdown between insurance companies and hundreds of
disgruntled homeowners in the Katrina-whacked South.
from MoreWhat.com staff:
We still shake our heads about this one. At first, we said yes, it makes
sense that one protects against wind and flood separately. But the more
we look at it, there may be something rotten in the Gulf Coast. From a
strictly common sense approach, if you have a hurricane and it brings
with it much wind and water (rain), it would seem reasonable that there
are both the possibilty of flood and wind damage. We understand that
specifically with New Orleans, there was a storm surge and that Lake
Ponchartrain sucked water in below sea level with the levess damaged
and then sent the water back out, but is it not all connected? A normal
combination of both wind and water initiating the consequences. Or is
it that insurance companies practice the art of denying claims whether
there is any basis for it or not?

Random Thoughts As They Occur:

Mr. Hannity, you had a caller today stating job creation during President Clinton’s administration and you disagreed and asked him for evidence. He replied he had none and you ended the conversation.

Shortly after, you had a caller criticizing CBS 60 Minutes and you agreed with him but did not ask for evidence as you did with the caller you disagreed with. You then added your description of 60 Minutes through over the years and at least implied they treated Repubilcan administrations different than Democrat and provided no evidence to support your claim.

We do not agree or disagree with your claim. We would simply ask you to hold yourself to the same standard of evidence you required of the caller you disagreed with.

With no supporting evidence, we think keeping Martina McBride’s music in your show’s opening is GREAT.

Random Thoughts As They Occur:
Also on today’s program Rush Limbaugh addressed the flack from
Bush 41’s administration and Colin Powell’s camp on the war and
related items as people who may be more concerned about their
legacy or an attempt to redirect attention from other topics.

Along with your obvious success on radio, Rush, comes something
of a responsibility to keep your audience informed that this may
be just an opinion, as you offered no supporting evidence. This is
offered as a suggestion since it seems many of your fans, based on
listening to them speak, may take your information as fact without
the evidence we mentioned. Opinions are fine. We have some.
Your listeners having them is fine too. But if they believe what
you say is fact and it is not, that would be a disservice to your loyal
fans.