ADVERTISEMENT

How can we get back to reaching back across the aisle?

C

CarolinaSpider

Graduate Assistant
Gold Member
Nov 27, 2006
5,270
2,076
113
My family was having some discussion on Republican vs Democrat status across state and national lines. Reagan was so successful at bridging the two parities, but it seems like in recent years it has gotten worse. I am for diversity of thought but
when you have controlling parties in House, Senate and Presidential (Governor), the only result seems to be gridlock and the public suffers for it. I like check and balances, but what made Reagan successful at reaching across party lines, and now a severe case of them vs us. Maybe we need to get rid of all party affilitations, have term limits on all congressional and senate offices, and allow everyone the same amount of campaign funds.

This post was edited on 8/17 10:52 AM by CarolinaSpider
 
Reaching across the aisle or compromise can and will only happen with a strong leader (Potus) at the table. It is the Potus, the President, the Chairman or the #1 in rank at the table who has the ultimate responsibility to bring about compromise......that does not mean he has "to give the most" .....but the chief at any meeting must do what is necessary to keep the subject live in order for compromise to move forward. Leadership in about influence and selling ideas behind closed doors...not behind a teleprompter or in front of a large audience.

Obama is not a leader and never has been . He makes speeches and assumes that because his title is Potus that his influence will carry the day. He has an irritating, arrogant style when talking to his adversaries that turns off the very people he needs "to win" over. Reagan had it and so did Bill Clinton....the ultimate responsibility in a meeting is for the "head knocker" (in this case Potus) not to allow the meeting to breakdown or the discussions to end......otherwise it is easy for everyone to "walk" and leave the room in gridlock.

This post was edited on 8/17 12:51 PM by LKNSPIDER
 
it is difficult to compromise when our govt is basically broke and in debt to where it is fatal. some on the left wish to continue with the govt providing cradle to grave give aways and the right wants to limit that and get the financial order back. where do you compromise, taxes, who wants to send more money to washington? cutting programs, who wants their medicare, social security or welfare cut? we are at a tipping point where this will take care of itself and unfortunately, it is not going to be pretty but seems to be the only thing that will wake up those who choose to ignore our dire situation. business cannot continue as is and everyone needs to be educated as to what is coming and a leader needs to step forward and be willing to take the heat but tell the people the truth and not worry about votes but about our country. even T, after viewing the youtube on our budget and debt had his eyes opened, we need to have that shown on tv every night by every network and cable outlet until we all understand what we face. then maybe someone will have the onions to do what is needed. screw compromise, we are fighting for our lives, the integrity of our country, compromise to me would be business as usual and that will not work.
 
We don't have to look far to find an example - one bad and the other good.


Compare the leadership style of our former UR president to our current president. The former president had a fan(s) escorted out of the Robins Center because he didn't like the comment expressed on a sign referring to his heavy handed tactics. Our current president, Ed Ayers, is a natural leader and part of his leadership style is based on humility and a friendly approachable demeanor. Those two characteristics go a long way in building bridges.
 
We haven't had a budget passed in the Senate for more than 3 years. We need stronger leaders.
 
To me, the answer seems pretty simple. Revenue does not cover spend, thus two things need to happen.1. Increase revenue and 2. decrease spend. The way to increase revenue is not to increase taxes. Doing that means people spend less so the economy suffers, business suffers, jobs are lost and ultimately your tax base (people and companies that actually pay taxes) shrinks. The only way to increase tax revenue over the long haul is to increase the tax base. Put more people to work, help businesses grow and prosper, make sure everyone is paying their fair share of taxes. Tax revenues will go up and the deficit will start to shrink.

Just look at the state of Maryland to see how raising taxes and fees works. Maryland has lost many thousands of tax payers who got tired of the high tax rates and the excessive fees and have moved out of the state. The result is that Maryland's tax revenues are shrinking dramatically. See the link below to see the impact on Maryland.

As far as spend goes, we cannot continue to have the entitlements at the current levels. The Mason youtube that I attached several days ago explains that current tax revenues do not cover current entitlements, let alone the government's "discretionary spend." Nothing should be considered sacred anymore.

http://www.americanlegislator.org/2012/07/taxpayers-flee-maryland/
 
correct, even though the deficit went up under reagan because spending cuts that congress promised him, never materialized, by cutting tax rates, revenue to the treasury almost doubled. the key is not to add new programs or have new spending when your revenue increases, pay off the debt. what is very scary is the fact that we are going broke yet are adding national health care, almost seems like a death wish for our country.

This post was edited on 8/18 8:28 AM by WebSpinner
 
The "dismal" science of Economics contains the plain truth that a country can not keep escalating debt continually. What is coming is basic - inflation, higher government cost to carry the debt, and reduced creditworthiness for the country. This administration wants to spend, spend, spend with no end in sight. Giving away money to obtain votes is immoral. I agree with this quote:


"I am for doing good to the poor, but...I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. I observed...that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer."
? Benjamin Franklin
 
am neither a democrat or repbulican, vote the best candidate and in all fairness, this debt is the fault of both parties over the years. will admit this admin seems to have an agenda with its spending if you are familiar with the socialist outline on how to bring down a free economy like ours. am not accusing but it seems eerily on target with their game plan, hope that i am just seeing things and reaching.
 
We have been putting all the fault in the laps of various Presidents. And, yes they do submit their budgets with various "promises" to be kept. But the debt story has been frightening under Presidents from both parties. The debt doubled under Reagan, etc. I continue to be troubled by the acrimonious atmosphere within the halls of Congress. We are in perilious times and the solution will not come until level heads from both parties sit down together and take on a genuine bipartisan reform. I don't see that happening in a Presidential election year, but it needs to happen soon. We talk a lot about the level of spending for benefits programs, but that is not the whole story. The biggest slice in our budgetary pie goes to the military. Congress needs to find some way to work together to reduce spending when they pass their budget resolution and the various appropriations committees need to get on the "cut spending" bandwagon.
This post was edited on 8/18 9:20 PM by tarrantula
 
To get back to Carolina's original thought...it will take the leadership from both parties to make the "Reaching Across" occur. With 435 representatives and 100 senators, each wanting to keep some promise to his or her constituency, there are a lot of "pet projects" to be addressed. The House of Representatives is where it starts and we need the leadership of that body to reach across the aisle and bond with their rivals in common purpose. Instead, it seems the focus for these folks is on protecting the seats held by members of their own party. We have a drastic shortage of "the good of the country" and a hardheaded obstinance when it comes to "reaching across".


We already have in place a mechanism to prevent overspending. It is the Gramm, Rudman, Hollins Deficit Reduction Act of 1985. This act was passed in an effort to reform Congressional voting procedures so as to make the budget deficit a matter of conscious choice rather than simply the arithmetical result of an appropriations process in which no one ever looks at the cummulative results until it is too late to change them. Part of the Defense Budget and Social Security are exempted from this process. Everything else is under the act. Spinner may rail at the Social Security exemption, but Congress decided that this was a promise they needed to keep for Americans who may need to depend on it in their later years. Maybe, a good amendment to that area would be to eliminate SS payments to Americans whose personal wealth is above (pick your own figure here,( I'll throw out 5 million to start the debate). Part of the defense cuts this year included closing some military bases in three southern states(all solid Republican states). At present three Republican Senators(who are all men I admire...Graham, McCain and the guy from New Mexico whose name I cannot spell) are campaigning in those states to get a groundswell of opposition to these cuts. So, the monkey continues to chase his tail when it comes to budget reduction...everyone wants it, but they want it to come at no price for their constituency.
This post was edited on 8/19 9:38 AM by tarrantula
 
so when the republicans are running the house, they should reach across but when the dems ran it, no way. look what pelosi did with obamacare, did not even take it to another vote, just rammed it down our throats even though the majority of americans did not and still do not, want it. when the dems ran things, there was no compromise at all yet now, we need to compromise. think things are too polarized to get together, things will have to fall apart on their own and that will force it. at least defense is something that the constitution calls for, the social spending is not but the defense budget. along with all the other departments need to be slashed, some eliminated all together. defense shows how tough this is going to be, we have been cutting, closing bases, cutting personnel, yet it is still too much. again, what we need to avoid is our legislators saying they are cutting when all they are doing is cutting the growth of the budget, say all departments are slated for 10% increase in their budget next fiscal year, congress says we are cutting all depts by 50%, that means they are only cutting the growth from 10% to 5% when cutting should be that their budget is being cut back from where they are today by 20% not the growth. they know how to hide the pea in washington and make it sound good but nothing of value actually happens. this is why i rail against compromising on taxes until ACTUAL cuts in spending are in place, not cuts in growth, not projected cuts over the next 10 years but the military type of cuts, cuts in depts, cuts in personnel, reductions in all the green checks which go out or are direct deposited. those would be ACTUAL cuts and we will never see them, at least, until we just cannot print anymore money.
 
The leadership (or lack of) comes from the White House. He calls the plays for his surrogates in Congress. The two parties are not going to reach across the table with Obama unless Potus changes his leadership style. He is inexperienced and has never worked in a culture where everyone had to pull together to win. He has spent his career working for "not for profit" and bureaucrats that are paid from tax revenues. If Obama is re-elected the country and economy will muddle around for four more years with the private sector struggling to generate real growth.
 
Hmm! I thought that the topic was the need for bipartisan efforts to deal with the debt crisis. I didn't talk about the HOR because it was primarily made up of one party or the other, but because so many spending bills originate there and it has members who represent districts as well as their state AND THIS COUNTRY. If the attitude of our representatives is like those I just read, then we are headed to bankruptcy. It's too late to continue to talk about who's to blame. The conversation needs to become "How do we fix this together?" or we are doomed to failure.
 
agree but look at the dems, they say they would rather go off the financial cliff than not raise taxes on the rich which has been shown not to help reduce the deficit at all but just a class warfare tactic. if that is their way, there is no way. taxes automatically go up on everyone when the tax-cuts expire anyway. once that is done, that should fix the whole mess, revenues will be up and we will only be spending, maybe $1 trillion more than we take in today. SPENDING is the issue and if the dems would get off the tax issue and get on the spending issue, we could start but feel we are so far gone and that any spending cuts all of these bozos, both parties, come up with, will be imaginary, and not real, they always are. most in washington want the govt to continue to grow, they are either idiots or just do not care, they want business as usual. do not think there is any aisle crossing in our immediate future nor any solution to our dilemma, sorry to say.
 
"How do we fix this together?"


Get rid of Barack Obama.....before we bankrupt the country. The voters spoke 4 years ago and elected BO. then the voters spoke two years ago and Obama did not hear them. So the voters can try again to get it right.

This post was edited on 8/19 4:21 PM by LKNSPIDER
 
Soinner with your passion when are you running for office?
 
i would be another Virgil Goode, not be beholding to any party, vote my principles but could never see myself out raising money and feel like i owed anyone a vote, not my bag. would love to see an overhaul to our house and senate, make them subject to the laws they pass, cut back on their staffs, foreign junkets, make the job unattractive, term limits, get rid of seniority (my rep should have as much power as any other rep) deep six the automatic pay increases, the job has too many perks. maybe should be a part time job like the state legislature, except how many laws are floated at each VA legislative session each year, thousands, that is stupid! govt, all levels, has become too big, too involved and too self-important. now is a great time to reel in all of this and get them out of our lives more, not more involved in our lives, but guess who would have to vote to do all of my pet peeve deals, yes, legislators and they would never vote to reduce their power, their perks, their super jobs. alas, a pipe dream on my part.
 
Virgil is running for president and is on the ballot in a number of states. Can only speculate on his motives for running but have linked his website as it is rare to have a Spider on the presidential ballot. Don't know from which party he will siphon the most votes and/or whether or not his vote count will be high enough to make a difference. He could hurt Romney in Virginia because of the voters who know and like Virgil and what he stands for. My opinion for what it's worth is that such candidancies have little effect with the possible exceptions of Perot and Nader who did siphon enough votes away from the major parties to make a difference.

http://www.goodeforpresident2012.com/
 
Want to change the House and the Senate? Term Limits is the only answer.....I would vote for candidates from either or both parties that would support term limits......Senate...two terms. House 4 terms.
 
think the only way you get term limits is to vote for the candidate who states he or she will run only for two terms or four terms, the candidate only saying that he or she is for term limits, will have no voice at the table to try and implement them.
 
Term limits are probably not going to happen. Reasoning presented is that voters have the option to vote someone out of office every election cycle. As a result we end up with professional politicians who become more interested in being reelected than taking principled positions.
 
Going back to the original question and LKN's assertions, an article is out this morning that seems to suggest POTUS cannot even spearhead a campaign among like-minded partisans, let alone reach across the aisle.

The country needs a change in leadership badly.

Campaign in Turmoil
 
had to laugh at some of that, obama not happy with the partisan nature, yet he forced obamacare on us, against the will of the people and then saying romney is not fit to run the country, heck, most anyone could do as well as he has done. this is carter all over again........carter got in because of the watergate backlash, obama on the bush/war backlash, neither guy being fit as a leader of the entire country. i want someone who is proud of this country not apologizing for it and ashamed of it. not sure anyone is going to solve our financial crisis but i do want someone who is positive, does not hate business, profits, free enterprise. the democrat party i grew up in has morphed into a hate business, hate profits, let the govt take over everything attitude. they need to look at their leadership and make some moves, think they are way out of touch with the majority of americans right now. my dad would roll over in his grave with this bunch in charge. the occupy group is a great example, they come out and the press treats them like some majority, heck bet they are not even one tenth of 1%, these are the same folks who protest at any world financial meeting in the streets, acting like the people are behind them, we are not. these are the same people, called rent a protestor, they just like to be in the streets protesting, does not matter what it is. they are the exact replica of the two suvivors in the andes in ALIVE, they want to be taken care of by others. this is the exact thing that is created by the attitude, currently, of the democrat party. it is sad, how did this party get to this point?
 
If you consider that Obama basically ran unopposed for Illinois Senate and ran for President in 2008 when the GOP had serious headwinds, I believe the Obama campaign has waded into the deep water against a serious opponent for the 1st time in his career.

It will be interesting to see how it plays out. I expect a lot of Hail Mary passes in the upcoming months.
 
make no mistake, obama comes from chicago where they know how to win at any cost so i expect he will be very difficult to beat. with the way the economy is, he should be behind by a landslide, yet is not so who knows what will happen. you have a ton of people, like my sis, who voted a sympathy vote for him and will again.
 
Our best economic times in the past 40 years resulted from the joint leadership of Clinton and Gringrich. Both men were willing to compromise and got the groups in their respective Parties in the House and Senate to balance the budget and drive forward tough but good economic changes. Most importantly the results of their actions enabled the Debt Clock in NYC to be turned off. It is easy (and often correct) to bash Obama as the faux leader of the elected federal Democrats but we should equally bash the leader of the federally elected Republicans. Where is their version of Gringrich?
 
Good post, 97. I believe that Obama will lose this election for the same reason that he won the last one...an economy in free fall. However, I am not optimistic that the change will be the answer. I look around and see a world in recession. Many of our European friends are facing similar problems. I'm no economic expert, but I don't think that the reasons for the debt crisis are going to be as simple as replacing the president and abolishing Obamacare. How do we compete with Asia and South America for manufacturing plants? How can we make goods here that can compete with goods from those areas in the world market? If we can't go back to being a maker of marketable goods, how do we provide jobs for our citizens? I had hoped for a thoughtful discussion of where and how we can cut spending, but all I read is "Oust Obama and abolish Obamacare." Well, we were in bad shape before we had Obama or Obamacare, I had hoped for some discussions that had a bit more depth than political rhetoric.


Although I'm not qualified to speak with much knowledge in these areas, some of you are experienced manufacturers and merchants. Spinner has talked with much zeal about the need to cut government spending. I put some info on here that I got off the web regarding where our money goes, but I was disappointed with the depth of the discussion that followed. I agree with my friend Spinner that this is certainly a big piece of the problem, but the discussion did not develop beyond his comments about reducing benefits, pensions, etc. The biggest slice in our spending pie goes to our military, but noone has offered any depth on that area other than a general agreement that we need to reduce payments to foreign governments and perhaps cut back on bases overseas. Maybe, we are all too far removed from this material to have more than superficial sugestions. I resign the discussion with this thought...the problem is bigger than Republican vs. Democratic administrators. The angry retorts that I have seen thrown around in this discussion are IMO typical of what we are getting from our elected representatives from both parties. Unless and until cooler heads prevail and both sides sit down together with the serious purpose of finding solutions instead of asigning blame, things will not get better.
 
T, i have been very consistent that we need to cut back, drastically on ALL govt. spending, All, including defense. one thing we have to do is quit bashing business and placing layer upon layer of regulations and programs that they have to fund to be in business. we have to quit saying profits are evil and setting up an atmosphere that is poison. it will be very difficult to match the low labor costs that china and many other third world nations have but we could do it if we are willing to pay much more for the products we make here or if we have labor here willing to work for a lot less but at least have jobs. my beef with obama is that he is a socialist, dislikes our country and wants the govt to take care of everyone. that is a recipe for other countries not the usa and i hated that in his first couple of years he visited other countries and apologized for our country, that sucked. feel if mrs clinton had been elected, we would have done so much better and am sure she is still wondering what happened and why am i not president, that was stunning. this is not the regular cyclical recession which we have all lived through a number of times in our lives. europe is feeling the pinch for all of their socialist programs which they now realize they cannot afford since they get their money from the people and the people have no money to cover all of that rot. obama loves the european model and wants to emulate it and we have been going down that road for decades and it is now catching up with us as well. think obamacare will be the final straw, you saw what is in the hands off programs, which we cannot afford yet we are now adding another trillion dollar hands off program to it. this is not a healthcare problem, we have the absolute best healthcare in the world, this is an insurance problem and we needed to reform that not have the entire deal taken over by the govt. agree that a change at the top will not save us, think we are too far gone for that but maybe, just a change in attitude and pride in our country will give us a lift and maybe get some people to work together and start on the long, very painful, road to working this out.
 
Mr T. I too will resign this thread but want to close with these thoughts. It is entirely fair to bash Obama. Sports, business and politics are all the same. When the numbers are good the boss gets the credit and when they are bad, they usually get the axe. I worked 37 years with management groups, executives and board rooms and have experienced both sides of good and bad leadership. The buck stops on the President's desk…..and yes we were in bad shape before Obama but there are many different kinds of "bad shapes" and we are now much worse and deeper in debt. We also forget that 9/11 knocked the props out from under this country's confidence seven years before the sub-prime market collapsed in 2008.


Now for a few thoughts about our economic woes, if you want manufacturing jobs to increase in the US and the economy to grow again….our government needs to level the playing field with other countries. That bad Donald Trump is absolutely right…..it is not only about taxes, but unfair tariffs, rules, regulations that put US manufacturers at a major disadvantage in every category. It is simply stupid that the US allows China, Korea, Thailand, Central and South American countries to manufacture for US companies on their terms. And then we can't understand why the balance of trade is so lop-sided. Consumers want the best quality product for the lowest price. (We wish it had a made in the USA label). But the real truth is
that consumers in America will buy it no matter where it was made. You cannot have it both ways.


I also believe the US problems are far deeper than taxes, tariffs and labor rates. Our generation has done a poor job of teaching the next generation about hard work, value of freedom, liberty and equal opportunity for all (not equal outcomes). I've said this before….10 million Hispanics crossed our borders and most found work and prospered far beyond their roots. And yet our own and next generation can't cope with problems that have resulted from less than a booming economy. Parents spoil kids beyond belief, young kids can't lose a ball game…everyone wins, all the kids get to play the same number of minutes or innings…, we don't give grades until the ninth. There is such a serious deterioration in our culture of ethics, values and religion, the US may be past the point of no return.


This election may really be about more than just numbers and the economy.
This post was edited on 8/20 11:11 PM by LKNSPIDER
 
Originally posted by LKNSPIDER:Our generation has done a poor job of teaching the next generation about hard work, value of freedom, liberty and equal opportunity for all (not equal outcomes). I've said this before….10 million Hispanics crossed our borders and most found work and prospered far beyond their roots. And yet our own and next generation can't cope with problems that have resulted from less than a booming economy. Parents spoil kids beyond belief, young kids can't lose a ball game…everyone wins, all the kids get to play the same number of minutes or innings…, we don't give grades until the ninth. There is such a serious deterioration in our culture of ethics, values and religion, the US may be past the point of no return.
Click to expand...
Interesting point. Why do you think this happened? Is it the fact that we allowed our kids to be taught by a television set? The emergence of an over-reaching ACLU? Other?

This post was edited on 8/21 8:49 AM by MolivaManiac
 
No MM when I hear a teenager tell his hard working father to "F" himself and his father does nothing, then it is a sad picture of where our society has gone. I was spanked and had to cut my own switch and if it broke too easily, go cut another one. We are so libel scared, that discipline even with our own kids is shot. My kids are not perfect but they respect their elders and show it. There are a lot of evils as to why we are in this mess, but the greed and excessiveness of my generation, "baby boomers" has started much of this, and it may take losing a lot of freedoms to get us back to where we need to be. All I can say is a lot of tough love is needed to get us back on the right course. Did not intend this post to be so in-depth, but looks like it definitely spurred discussion.
 
think it started when all disipline was thrown out of the school system, dress codes, everything. then just in observation, parents wanting to be friends with their kids, cool, rather than being parents. as a grandparent, i can spoil all i want but as a parent, must be that first and foremost. the aclu has had a part in that they can sue any entity and charge the highest rate they can find thus it dampens or frightens the entity from fighting a deal rather than just caving to them. think movies, tv, have played a huge part and now the social media is finishing it up. it really is up to the parents in the end as to how their children are raised and what is taught to them as being basic and important.
 
No matter what anyone states, the audiovisual availability in multiple packages has certainly had a huge impact on what influences a young mind. Had a friends 18 year old start at App State who was very bright, but got hooked on a video game with his college roommate so severely, that they skipped classes, and basically flunked out. Now at community college trying to figure out what he is going to do with himself.

Freedom of speech and expression, has certainly gone to the extreme range. It is hard to watch a movie with your kid these days with every other word, one you taught them to never say. Too many choices and too many chances for poor decisions.
 
Spinner and Carolina, thanks for some thought provoking stuff for this parent of a 2YO.
 
MM to lay some humor for you and a 2YO, my son who is married and almost 26 and a coach, when he was about 5 met our new Asst Pastor at a family retreat. When the minister asked him his name, he announced "Sir Penis". The minister asked him to repeat his name and he stated it again. I turned to my wife and told her I was taking away that damn lego knight and castle set away. Moral of this story, don't ever ask a kid something twice, if you heard it the first time. Be ready my friend, the fun is only starting.
 
That's a pretty funny story, Carolina.

I tend quite liberal, generally, and I don't really feel much like stepping into much of the "Obama is this, Romney is that" discussion that is already going here. One critical point, however, that I feel that is not being touched upon is the fact that education, or the increasing lack of it in the US, is probably the largest reason why we are where we are now.

Many of you speak of the coddled youth that are out there right now. I, in large part, agree, and it especially frustrates me with families that meet the historic "family" definition -- 2 parents at home, happily married, a couple kids, a cat, a dog, etc. Something happened along the way (I don't profess to know what), where parents have been more concerned about being cool and friendly with their kids, as someone mentioned earlier. That said, there are a LOT of youth who are not coddled, and their families do not fit anywhere close to the definition I mentioned previously. There are a LOT of kids out there who are living in poverty, who are going to school and happy about it because the only place where they may get something close to a balanced meal is school (not a Reagan ketchup packet, mind you -- OK, I didn't want to step there, and I apologize, but that quote, even if mistakenly attributed, always makes me chuckle).

I honestly think that the biggest problem facing our country right now is the failure to invest in our youth. Yet, education is costing so much more than ever before. Starting at the higher education level, tuition rates have expanded well beyond what normal inflation rates have dictated over the past few years (recall our own tuition hikes at UR, put in place to become "more prestigious." I certainly don't think UR is the only one that is facing those issues -- universities, with the ranking systems to which they are subjected, are constantly needing to keep up with the Joneses). Related to this increased hike, now, if you, as an individual, fail, and go bankrupt, the only thing you cannot get out of paying is your student loans, which are so much higher than ever before -- what's that all about?

Moving on to primary and secondary education, which is more critical than higher education, we (the US) are falling behind other countries drastically due to many things -- early childhood education; nutrition and health (the idea of a food desert is frankly very scary); No Child Left Behind (a bipartisan disaster -- this was something where the two parties DID try to do something together, and in my opinion, failed completely); more cut teacher jobs than ever before; etc. The outlook for the education system in place in the US right now is very bleak.

What are other countries doing that is causing us to fall behind and allowing recent US grads to be a young work force that is drastically under-prepared compared with other countries, which is another unspoken reason for "losing jobs" to places like India and China right now, in my opinion? They are investing heavily in every child. They want them to succeed. There is no "my parents are rich and so should I be!" attitude, for the most part. They want those who prepare children (teachers) to be qualified, and to succeed. Teachers are respected, not hammered for being a burden on the pension system.

In Finland, being a teacher is considered as prestigious as being a doctor or a lawyer -- the selection process to become a teacher is as rigorous as that of a doctor or a lawyer -- all teachers are required to have masters degrees. They are paid well, and rightfully so, I think. After all, they are somehow responsible for trying to get our coddled youth back on track somewhere along the way, right? We can't count on the family system that used to exist to be in place, because we would be lying to ourselves. Therefore, it falls on educators. In Finland, educators are not getting screamed at like they are on the boardwalk in NJ by Chris Christie (a Republican, but this, again, is not necessarily a partisan issue. Being originally from NJ I am seeing a lot of his antics, and I really don't like them). In Finland, because of this training, they are left alone to best educate their children as they see fit. They are the experts, and should be left alone -- they have received enough training to be officially responsible to educate the children in their classrooms. They don't have to worry about teaching to a test or whatever, but they can instead find the most appropriate way to educate the children in their classroom, period. Teachers are not being thrown into a den of lions, left to their own survival devices. Finland has a lot of nice things going for it, don't get me wrong -- there is something nice about being able to teach a fairly homogenous society. But, the point remains clear -- they want to invest in their children. So does China. So does India. Why don't we? Why aren't we doing this?

Finally, education will help our folks get through this mishmash of political pettiness. Politics at the national level have become such a machine that we are all simply along for the ride. What Obama does is hardly different from what Bush did, which was hardly different from what Clinton did.

I like the original question a lot -- the "those Donkeys/those Elephants" responses notwithstanding. I personally think further concentration on and investment in our education system will help us get back to making things work better -- I think it's likely the only way.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
ADVERTISEMENT

Latest posts

ADVERTISEMENT
Top Bottom
Back