Since public schools in the United States are primarily funded through taxation , it should be inarguable that it is fair to declare them as institutions of the Government. On top of taxpayer-funded sources, Government sets guidelines to be followed for receipt of those funds. Fail to satisfy Government standards, fail to receive funds and hence, Government schools.
Congress routinely engages in the practice that schoolchildren (and school teachers) do as Summer approaches; haul ass on the last day. The only difference is this; Congress must conclude its business before recess. Not so for teachers.
Imagine if teachers and administrators had a set agenda to complete before Summer began in earnest. Then imagine that those educators pushed through however many failing students as needed in order to disembark on that treasured months-long vacation. Would there not be howls of outrage? I have money that bets “yes”. So why is Congress not held to the same standard?
The answer is simple. They are Lords over serfs, and we allow it despite the power of the electorate, which we wield. We actually enable our masters. What a sad state of affairs.
Congress passed the Omnibus Spending Budget which has languished since September, but did so less than a day (for the House) and less than two days (for the Senate) after the full text of the bill was released. As Nicola Moore from FrontPage Magazine notes:
1. No one read the bill.
“The text of the omnibus was 3,417 pages–three times the length of the Bible and nearly the same length as the second edition of Webster’s Dictionary. The House passed the bill less than 22 hours after the text was first made available, while the Senate had 46 hours and 8 minutes for its analysis. For Members of Congress to have read this bill, they would have had to read the bill at a rate of 2½ pages per minute for Representatives and 1¼ pages per minute for Senators, without stopping to sleep or eat. No one could have read this bill before voting on it.”
“The text of the omnibus was 3,417 pages–three times the length of the Bible and nearly the same length as the second edition of Webster’s Dictionary. The House passed the bill less than 22 hours after the text was first made available, while the Senate had 46 hours and 8 minutes for its analysis. For Members of Congress to have read this bill, they would have had to read the bill at a rate of 2½ pages per minute for Representatives and 1¼ pages per minute for Senators, without stopping to sleep or eat. No one could have read this bill before voting on it.”
Moore also points out that part of the bill, which was rife with pork that the Administration warned against, contained some particularly irritating items, one of which was the Charles Rangel (D-Bronx) “Monument To Me“, at a cost of $1.95 million.
How Congress spends OUR money should be of concern to all of us, but just as they cannot be bothered to read the fine print, what with play time looming just within reach, we the people are more culpable in wasting our own money by allowing this sort of juvenile behavior. Think of it as having children on the payroll; we want to trust them but we must be ever vigilant that they remain on the straight and narrow. Should they stray from that path, we have no one to blame but ourselves.
-Woody
