Republican leaders: Out of Touch

First up, Texas.


And the first thing you have to know is that Barbara (Mrs. H.W.) Bush "pointed out that students in Texas currently rank 47th in the nation in literacy, 49th in verbal SAT scores and 46th in math scores."


Texas children rank near the bottom of the entire country in test scores and Babs is pointing it out, drawing attention to it.


Good for her. 


Look at this short list of statistics on the state:


Nobody wants to see under-performing, overcrowded schools being deprived of more resources anywhere. But when it happens in Texas, it’s a national crisis. The birth rate there is the highest in the country, and if it continues that way, Texas will be educating about a tenth of the future population. It ranks third in teen pregnancies — always the children most likely to be in need of extra help. And it is No. 1 in repeat teen pregnancies. 


But what do the Republican leaders in Texas want to do?


Here's your answer:  


"...the Texas State Legislature is looking to cut about $4.8 billion over the next two years from the schools."


Brilliant, no?


Could they be more out of touch?


And how did Texas get in such a fiscal, financial mess in the first place?  It's good you asked:


...Perry, the state’s governor, and his supporters made things much worse by reducing school property taxes by a third in 2006 under the theory that a higher cigarette tax and a new business franchise tax would make up the difference. 


Which they didn’t.

So the children in Texas are already hurting nationally in terms of performance and grades and the legislature wants to slash the education budget.

More brilliance, to be sure.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying you fix schools or test scores by throwing money at the problem at all.  What I am saying is that, if your kids aren't doing well in school, chances might be good that being able to hire more good teachers and get the teacher-to-child ratio down might be a good idea and that takes more money, for sure.  When your kids scores are low, that's not the time to slash the education budget.

My second and last example today showing how Republican leaders make it clear they're out of touch comes this time from Washington:

Republicans aiming to unhinge the Dodd-Frank financial reform legislation have turned to a new line of attack and have told the Treasury, Federal Reserve and other regulators to do more due diligence, according to a letter obtained on Thursday.

The letter raises questions about whether U.S. regulators are adequately following federal rule-making procedures such as reviewing public comments and conducting rigorous economic analyses of the rules' impact on the industry.

So let's get this straight--our economy nearly collapsed entirely within the last 2 years, nearly taking down all world markets with it and it was brought on by a horribly lax and unregulated banking industry, as has been proven in many different ways with many different companies, I think that's clear.

But these rocket scientists in Congress--bought, paid for and owned by the banking industry--want to make sure we at least slow down banking regulation, if not do away with it entirely.

Brilliant.

Links:  http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/17/opinion/17gailcollins.html?src=me&ref=general
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/us_financial_regulation