Teacher Layoffs

Today, I read some troubling news. The Seattle city school district is announcing a whole bunch of layoffs.

Teachers. They are laying off Teachers now.

Now, I'm no expert. Really. But, I once read this somewhere, and it resonated with me: "If you don't spend the money on schools now, you are destined to spend the money on prisons later."

I believe that education is the long term way out of this economic crisis. If the United States is to take a top spot in the global economic competition, it will not be accomplished on the backs of the folks making minimum wage asking if I 'want fries with that burger'. It will be accomplished through innovation from educated people.

Of course, politicians don't want to think long term. They have elections to win in the short term, and those elections will be won by balancing the budget today. And if they cut projects like a tunnel that replaces the Alaskan-way viaduct, the supporters of that project will accuse them of not wanting to create jobs. They will run commercials to that effect when re-election time approaches, and people will be dumb enough to believe what they see on TV, and another politician bites the dust.

Of course, the reality is that the jobs they are creating are mostly bullshit middle-management jobs. Nobody ever talks about that. Oh, plus a few people will get 22 bucks an hour to stand on the highway with marker signs that tell people 'detour' or 'slow'. Those are vital positions. They will save the economy.

I guess I'm not really bitter about the tunnel. It will create jobs, and those jobs will put more money into the economy, and this is all a good thing. I'm just bitter that they can't find a way to save the job of probably the most important role in our society: the teacher.

I guess I just think that in this world we live in, a good teacher gets to:

1) Get paid a pittance
2) Have to worry about getting laid off each year due to elected officials that can't budget properly.
3) Probably get a 2nd job over the summer just to make ends meet.
4) Work as many hours as they have to in order that a kid can get a quality education, all the while dealing with inattentive parents that only talk to them when they have a complaint.

How very sad. How many more good teachers could we, as a country, attract if they were all paid well, had job security, and had attentive parents that actively partnered with the teachers in their child's education?

And how many of the kids would those good teachers affect? How many of those kids would go on to become pioneers, inventors, and leaders of the future?

I guess we will never know.

How to save the financial system in 5 easy steps

The title of this post is a completely whacked out load of bullshit. You cannot fix the economy in 5 steps and even if you could, it sure as hell isn't going to be easy.

But if you listen to some of the media coverage, it seems they expect the public to buy such nonsense.

All I hear in the news coverage lately is some schmuck getting up and telling me who's fault they think it is. "If the regulators had done their jobs", "if not for George Bush", "If not for the wall street fat cats", "If not for Ben Bernaki"....shut the hell up.

I'll tell you who's fault it is: Everybody.

Yup, that includes you. Nobody saw this meltdown coming, but everybody should have. The people buying houses that they couldn't afford: Guess what...anything too good to be true: is.

The banks leveraging in amazing amounts based on mortgages that were questionable? I don't blame the execs really...they were just being dumbasses and following all the other banks. As were the investors in all of those banks that didn't call their management on it. More regulatory overview might have brought it out to the light of day more, but EVERYBODY KNEW IT WAS HAPPENING. EVERYONE.

Lenders, consumers, government officials, Wall Street 'fat cats'....everybody knew there was a housing bubble. Everybody knew banks were overextending their assets in large leverage positions. When everybody knows, there is no conspiracy. No smoking gun. Nobody to blame.

The bubble burst, and now everybody is doing whatever they can to get us back to where we need to be. Obama has a tough road ahead of him. His plan is risky...large Government spending and huge bailout packages. I hear a lot of opposition to his plan, but nobody willing to stick their neck out with an alternate plan.

Obama has been in office for about 45-50 days. This 'crisis' is more than 10 years in the making. It wasn't the fault of the current or former Administration. It wasn't the fault of CNBC, Fox news, CNN, or any other media outlet. It was everybodies fault. Everybody should have done more. Pointing fingers however, doesn't solve anything.

I hope and pray that Obama can turn the ship around, but I doubt he will do it in the next few months. I think it will be years before we see any kind of major growth. Unfortunately that will be the problem for Obama in his reelection, and he will probably lose when it is all said and done.

I just hope the Replublicans don't put up Sarah Palin as a nominee.