Something must be done! Even if it's the wrong something.

Last Friday, on their pay site and in the dead-tree edition, The Chronicle ran an AP story focusing on a recent poll around public opinion on solving the obesity "crisis". ($$$)  Given that this is a story for which the Chron is inexplicably charging for access to I went out and found the same story (for free) at the Denver Post's online site.

Poll: Obesity's a crisis but we want our junk food. Lauren Neergaard & Jennifer Agiesta, AP via DenverPost.com

There's a lot in this poll that will not surprise you.  Most Americans like the idea of calorie counts on menus, we like increasing physical activity for children, and we like the idea of nutritional education for children. We don't want the government telling us what we can and can't eat, and we definitely don't want the government limiting our choices. Unfortunately, for those of a progressive persuasion, the things that we don't want are exactly what they think we need, provide what we 'need' is in line with what they 'want' that is.

What bothers me, and what is the point of this post, is the following comment by one of the poll respondents:

"That's a start," said Khadijah Al-Amin, 52, of Coatesville, Pa. "The fat content should be put up there in red letters, not just put up there. The same way they mark something that's poisonous, so when you see it, you absolutely know."


Read more: Poll: Obesity's a crisis but we want our junk food - The Denver Post http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_22309557/poll-obesitys-crisis-but-we-want-our-junk#ixzz2H1vYzRuE
Read The Denver Post's Terms of Use of its content: http://www.denverpost.com/termsofuse

The emphasis is mine.  And therein lies the rub.  Of all the things you ingest when you eat out the fat content is probably the least of your worries.  Those who fixate on it have fallen prey to something that's called the lipid theory.  What we've found out, after years of it being applied and the nation growing fatter, is that the science behind the lipid theory is not science at all.  In fact, it's almost totally junk science. It might help at this time to take a hard look at what the lipid theory has produced:

Margarine:  Which, we now know, is less healthy than the animal lard and butter that it was intended to replace. This is mainly due to trans fats, which are nasty little things that can actually go significant damage to your heart.

"Low Fat" supermarket items:  Which are loaded down with sugar, carbohydrates and other substitutes for fat, many of which have increased the rates of diabetes to never before seen levels.

"Safe" cooking oils:  We now know that the best cooking oils are natural ones period.

As a matter of fact, were I to list the dangerous things on a mythical, fast food, menu fat content would be well down the list behind carbohydrates, sugars and artificial flavorings and colors.  This is not to say that you should go out and eat a bucket of lard. But by focusing, and singling out, fat as similar to something that's "poisonous" is just wrong.

Then there's the argument that the government, who we're now looking toward to solve all of our problems has, in large part, gotten us into this mess in the first place. By subsidizing the corn and soy farmers they have inadvertently shifted our diets from leaves to seeds.  You can read a lot more about how they've done this in Michael Pollan's "In Defense of Food".  By cheapening corn the government has reduced our dietary spectrum, made our meat less healthy by switching feed-stock from grass to meal, and we haven't even gotten to the stupidity that is ethanol. As for soy, there is an increasing amount of research showing that over consumption of the bean is bad for men.  Can we really trust the same people who have done this to us to bail us out of the issue?

Finally, there's the entire issue of What is really obese, and it it really all that bad for you to be overweight?  There's no doubt that, at this time, certain diseases are called "obesity related" but the fact is many of them might not be.  First off, it has been known for years now that BMI is a terrible way to measure health.  According to BMI measurements Matt Schaub, Andre Johnson and Arian Foster are all obese.  As a matter of fact, pretty much everyone who is not an ecotomorph is probably going to be labeled "obese" by the measurement whether they are or not.

All of this brings us back to the poll which, as we're seeing, is the opinion of people who don't fully understand what is happening in health sciences these days.  And that's not meant as a knock on the public.  In my side job, as a features writer for Iron Man Magazine, it's my job to keep at least somewhat up to date on fitness and nutrition trends, and even I struggle with weight issues mainly due to my past acceptance of the lipid theory.  How in the world do we expect people to sort through all of the government provided misinformation to make dietary changes that might not even be necessary?

Once, on Twitter, I got into a discussion with a Texas Progressive about calorie counts on menus. He, naturally, thought this was a grand idea.  Even when I started to address the accuracy of the counts, and the enormous expense on testing foods to ensure accuracy, he wasn't deterred.  He figured the food industry would absorb the cost without passing it onto the customer if only they were made to.  He didn't understand that accurately tracking calorie counts would involve new government bureaucracy that would cost a lot and, to be honest, he didn't care.  All he wanted was for "big corporations" to pay for the damage that they had (in his mind) inflicted on society. I was able to walk him through a maze of regulation and testing that ultimately would cost taxpayers Millions of dollars to implement (because, that's what it would take) and he didn't skip a beat.  "Make 'em Pay".

Sadly, it doesn't really matter if what we're making them pay for is the true problem, or that they provide the right information, or if, given societies apparent inability to correctly apply the data, it would do any good at all.

Something! Must be done!  And I have a feeling something will be done. That it's going to be another wrong something is not the problem of those who are hell-bent on making it seem like we're addressing it.

More money = education?

That appears to the the editorial stance of Chron.com....


Business group joins suit over school funding. Gary Scharrar, Chron.com

Some of the education-related parties in the litigation are not pleased that Hammond's group is trying to piggyback on their efforts to get more money for public education and more equity.

I'm guessing this is the 'official' editorial position taken by ChronBlog, that only the groups demanding more money, more equitably distributed are "education-based". That leaves open the question of what the Texas Association of Business is now, a group that's also focusing on education but also wanting a full cost analysis performed before additional funding is approved.


It's sad that it's come to this, but it's where we are in policy debate in Texas.


For the worse apparently, given how things are progressing.

What we used to do is now a "boycott"

...yet another strange dispatch from the ever-twisted world of education politics.

Fed up with menu, students stage lunchroom boycott, Chron.com

Macaroni and cheese again? Students at a junior high school near Texas' Gulf Coast staged a four-day boycott of cafeteria food last week to press for more menu choices and healthier alternatives.

About 30 students at Austwell-Tivoli Junior High School in Tivoli, Texas, shunned the cafeteria's offerings and brought their lunches from home for four days last week

The Chron blurb links to this story, from the Victoria Advocate, as their source material.

All of which leads me to this question: When I was in school I brought my lunch almost every single day. My Mom made it up for me and I happily ate it, instead of those cheesy egg rolls or mystery meat burgers or something that, was the opposite of what pizza should be. Was I boycotting?

No, I was just eating a better lunch than the school provided day after day. Of course, these days, my lunch probably wouldn't make the cut.

The lesson that should be taught to these children is that, if you don't like the free option, you're perfectly welcome to bring your own lunch as a substitute. Instead we're telling them that they're entitled to more than they're already given, despite the fact they clearly don't need it (after all, they had the money to bring their lunch right?)

Let's be honest, none of us, with the possible exception of some fringe elements, want to see little children go hungry, and I've no argument that free school meals are the last Maginot line for some children between basic nutrition and starvation. Those aren't the kids that I'm worried about here.

What I'm concerned about are children from families with means deciding that the free lunch their getting isn't suitable because it's not all that they feel entitled to.

The solution is to bring your own, if you can. Not to scream that other people need to pay more of their hard earned money because you're tired of mac n' cheese.

Wait! I thought Texas schools were OUT of money

The "$4 Billion in cuts" were obviously not everything we were led to believe (By Texas' lock-step political media that is)

Fort Bend ISD approves $18M plan to replace textbooks with iPads, KHOU

Fort Bend ISD is going high-tech. The school board approved an $18 million plan to replace textbooks with iPads.

As far as I know, there are no scientific studies proving that the use of iPads over textbooks lead to higher student test scores. So basically this is just the case of a school district deciding to spend some money on a piece of technology because someone, somewhere has decided it would be cool.

If Texas school districts have $18 Million to blow on "cool" then possibly it's time to re-examine their cries of poor? Or maybe it's just time to tune out Texas lockstep political media and the InterLeft when they band together and tell obvious whoppers. In fact, school funding INCREASED over the last biennium. Just at a slower rate than it would have under the old formula. That's a reduction in growth, NOT a cut. Obviously some ISDs could have used a cut if they're wasting money on items such as this.

HISD Must-reads

If you're a resident of HISD's jurisdiction, have a kid in their school, are just worried about where your hard-taken taxpayer dollars are going, or are among the many who claim it's all "for the children" (and the teacher's unions of course), then you should take the time to read these three excellent pieces released today by Texas Watchdog....


Rash of improper influence over high-dollar contracts at Houston ISD -- while teachers are cut and schools are closed, Mike Cronin & Jennifer Peebles, Texas Watchdog



Former Houston ISD procurement chief reveals problems in the agency, talks about his dismissal, Mike Cronin, Texas WatchDog


Houston school district launches two audits, but questions abound on whether either will solve HISD's problems, Mike Cronin, Texas Watchdog


There are some issues one would hope prove to be non-partisan. Somehow I doubt that will be the issue in this case. There are sure to be a lot of politically sacred-cows gored here, be interesting to see who feigns the most outrage over this. The spin should also be good for some clean fun. I encourage you to go read all three pieces and then share them with everyone you know who has a child attending HISD, or who pays taxes to them.

In the coming economy....

some might say it's wise to teach kids how to cheat.

HISD's school board seems to think this is OK.

Hey, we've got ChronBlog, The Apple Dumpling Gang, the Metro Board and Progs everywhere supporting Grenias' alleged kiddie-porn habit so why should being accused of cheating be all that big a deal?


Next up: Murder is A-OK. Oh....wait....

How much is "enough"?

One of the loudest critical questions used by Progressives against Republican plans to cut taxes is "How much is enough?" As in, when will we get to the point that we've cut "enough" taxes? What is the "minimum" level of funding that Government needs? In some sense, the progressive argument is flawed. It assumes that Government funding is static (it's not) and refuses to view some government programs as unessential (they are). Still, it keeps progressives from having to answer the same question about their programs, such as "How much is 'enough'?"

The reason they don't want to answer this question is the same reason Republicans don't (or can't), because it's never going to be 'enough'.


For an example of this take a look at this month's education round-table in Texas Monthly magazine. I'm referring to one small blurb that I'll reproduce here. You should really go read the entire back-n-forth to see just how far apart both sides really are on this issue. The quote I'm referring to cam from Center for Public Policy Priorities Executive Director Scott McCown:

I want to have a strong educational system that produces folks who can be entrepreneurs and small-business men and get out there and make money. If we make he wise investment now, we come out ahead. So I'd expand the sales tax base with some way to deal with regressivity. I would expand our business tax and fix the structural deficit. And in the long run we need a personal income tax in this State.

If you're not familiar with the CPPP (and if you read the State's political media there's a good chance you're not) the CPPP is a progressive organization that advocates progressive solutions to what they believe are the State's problems. Typically, in the MSM, you'll see them identified as "a think tank who advocates for the poor." That's not entirely true. The advocate for Government solutions, at taxpayer expense, that ostensibly benefit the poor (despite the fact that there's little evidence linking many of their proposals to an actual decrease in the poverty rate.)

The problem that progressives are experiencing right now is that the money well is dry. Even Texas, who traditionally has resisted big tax and spend legislative solutions to problems that may, or may not exist, is feeling the sting. The progressive answer that tax increases are the solution to Texas' many problems is not being supported by the laboratory of real life.

The big problem with both sides of this argument is that they ignore the real issue here...the fact that neither cuts or tax increases are the solution to the problem. Neither is the "balanced approach" that many are touting as some bi-partisan scheme to make things rosy. Most of the balanced approaches don't cut nearly deep enough, and they raise taxes entirely too high to cover basic needs, instead keeping several political favors to preferred constituent groups and financial backers.

Cuts are, at best, a temporary solution to a long-term problem. Belt-tightening only goes so far. The best solution is to cut temporarily while doing a top-to-bottom scrub of what's not working, what's duplicated and what fat can really be cut.

Unfortunately, when that second, most serious, option is given serious treatment the defenders of the dysfunctional status-quo throw a fit. Never mind that throwing money at a broken model is a bad idea, there are sacred cows that cannot be slaughtered.

Fixing Texas education system is going to take more than just tax cuts or increases, it's going to take serious people making serious decisions about what we're doing right and wrong. Unfortunately, if the current tenor of the debate is any indication, our current leaders are failing education reform 101.*














*This is not to say that the State's think-tanks are not doing any better. The CPPP does nothing more than provide psuedo-intellectual cover for the State's foundering progressive/Democratic, statist-solution minority, while the TPPF is frequently asleep at the wheel on large issues, and doesn't do enough to engage that a State political media that has little interest in seeking out there side of almost any issue.

When you don't understand the policy....

...it's difficult to create a credible argument.

From today's ChronBlog:

(Classes may get more students, Jennifer R. Lloyd, ChronBlog):

State representatives will take up an education bill on Tuesday that includes, among other changes, a proposal to swap the strict 22-to-one limit for a 22-student average and prohibit districts from enrolling more than 25 students per class in the early grades.

From the comments:

This_Machine_Kills_Fascists: As a 9th grade teacher, I can tell you that anything over 30 is going to severely impact the quality of education provided in a given classroom. I have a few classes in the high 20's and it makes it that much more difficult to ensure that each student's needs are met.

Emphasis mine on the above.

Looking at the bill in question it's fairly obvious that no one is threatening class sizes in the 30's. EXCEPT the teacher's union, who has a financial incentive in favor of low class sizes and more teachers on the payrolls. When you get to the high school level the argument against large class sizes becomes doubly hard to swallow. In colleges, many Freshman classes are conducted in auditoriums with student counts well into the 100's. I would argue that a larger class size for Junior and Senior level classes would help reduce the culture shock when Johnny and Jill are sent off to UT-Austin.*

From another perspective: How many kids did you have in your class growing up? I know mine was closer to 30 than it was 22. Outside of a propensity to mis-spell words and over use hyphens and adverbs I turned out OK. I'm sure you did too.














*Of course, if more professors at UT taught students instead of always conducting research........ *wink*

Carburetors and buggy whips....

Such is the future of municipal libraries?


There's an argument for that, moth-ball our space consuming book repositories and re-deploy with smaller, more economical "data-centers". Hell, I'm willing to bet you could get Apple, HP, Dell and other companies to chip in on some of the infrastructure cost, in return for deals to buy their machines.

Hey, I like books as much (or more) than the next guy. I've always been a voracious reader. That said, I'm about to make the jump to Kindle and leave paper books behind. Think about it: a network of data centers spread across Houston could be established fairly quickly in the many unused store-fronts (Hey, you could even place one in a couple of the many derelict areas along the MetroRail line.) in Houston, they could be staffed by just a few people (an on-site help-desk person and a centralized IT staff) at a fraction of the cost current libraries are burdened with. An ideal arrangement would be to negotiate exclusivity deals with either Kindle or Nook so that children can download books onto devices they purchased at discounted prices. I'm sure a charity group or two could do a device delivery for Christmas as well. Talk about bridging the digital divide, and at a reduction of costs to taxpayers.


Of course, if you don't like this idea there are others. Many others that don't involve continuing to fund a non-sustainable business model just because it's been around for a long time right? Texans have always been about creative solutions to big problems. Let's go Houston, let's get some creativity flowing here.

The more things change.....

...The more they stay the same.

Whether you call them "Mrs. White", "The ed board formerly known as Mrs. White", "Mr. Gibbons" (nice to see him back in the pages of ChronBlog" today) or "The Apple Dumpling Gang" one constant has been there though thick and thin, bad editorials and worse ones.

Through it all the irrational desire to roll out the catapult and throw increasingly large amounts of money at the problem has stayed the same. Today's editorial (and accompanying political cartoon) were no different. When it comes to education, The Apple Dumpling Gang just can't help calling for increases in funding to programs that continually produce diminishing returns. Given that the State's education system is experiencing more and more bloat, perhaps a forced diet is just what is needed in order to get the focus back on educating children, and less on how to feed the administration/union machine.

To my knowledge there have been no discussions of pooling resources to reduce construction costs, of not building schools that are more tributes to existing leadership than education centers and no talks about requiring schools to cut (or require hard audits on) programs that are notoriously wasteful. Instead of worrying about teaching children, the Apple Dumpling Gang are threatening to use ChronBlog's editorial and reporting resources (which ARE intertwined, since both Kilday-Hart and Fikac act as both columnists AND reporters) to attack law-makers who choose to not perpetuate the State's failing education model and not raise taxes on anyone ChronBlog and their fellow Statist travelers don't agree.

If the definition of insanity is to keep performing the same actions while expecting differing results than it can reasonably be said that those calling for additional funding into a failed education model are made by those who should be under the supervision of the State's Mental Health services. Of course, we're cutting those services as well, which means that those of us who understand this can't continue are forced to see dreck foisted on the public as "journalism". This leads us to surmise that the only two things more broken than the State's education system are the political system that's allowing this failure to exist and the State journalism machine that's seemingly incapable of allowing Texans to have an honest debate on how to fix it.

A local news investigation in the making....

On the heels of the day care tragedy involving Jessica Tata comes the news that Houston City Council Member Sue Lovell is crafting an ordinance designed to force day cares to register with the city and submit to annual inspections.

While we here at HCA don't have any truck with the City overseeing day cares. (as a matter of fact, when it comes to the people who watch over the people who will be paying our retirement in the Ponzi-scheme of Social Security we're all for them being well taken care of) we have severe concerns about the City's ability to actually pull off these annual inspections.

How long will it be until Wayne Dolcefino or the Channel 11 Defenders team runs a sweeps week piece about the City falling down on it's responsibilities when it comes to performing annual inspections? How many stories will there be of "well off" day care centers not facing the same type of scrutiny that "poor" day care centers face?

In other words, this is a mess waiting to happen. That the Houston Way of government is designed to create messes seems to be beyond anyone's grasp. The only way to deal with something is through an ordinance, which then becomes part of a system that's too unwieldy to ever properly navigate.

Ficksing Skools (A year later)

Last year, on the award-winning *snicker* now-defunct, Lose an Eye, It's a Sport, I wrote a short series on what I thought was wrong (in part) with the public education system and some steps that would go a long way towards fixing it. If you haven't read this series, or are a masochist and would like to read it again, you can find all of the posts here. (start at the bottom and work your way up)

My main argument was that Texas, and America really, were pushing many children toward college that really didn't need to go there. From time to time I've linked to articles on my diigo feed that offered up evidence supporting that contention.

Today, in ChronBlog, I found two unrelated articles that move the ball further down the field.


(A warning signal for Latinos and Texas, R.G. Ratcliffe, ChronBlog, 05/17/2010)

If the American Dream is upward economic mobility and arrival in the middle class, the grim statistics show only a small percentage of Texas' Hispanics are on the road to success.

As the state's Latino population continues to expand over the next two decades, if current trends stay the same, Texas is in danger of developing what one academic describes as a “permanent underclass.” Widespread poverty could pull down the standard of living for all Texans.

Later on in the story, the following fact is mentioned:

Hispanics make up a third of the manual laborers in Texas. But U.S. Census statistics show that even in construction trades Hispanics account for less than a fifth of skilled labor, such as an electrician.

Which leads me to this second story, also in ChronBlog:

(College for all? Experts say not necessarily., Alan Scher Zagir, AP via ChronBlog, 05/17/2010)

The notion that a four-year degree is essential for real success is being challenged by a growing number of economists, policy analysts and academics.

Their consensus is that more Americans should consider other options such as technical training or two-year schools, which have been embraced in Europe for decades.

And then, the following comment by a ChronBlog reader on the same story:

CheeryEyed wrote:
They should teach ROI in high school. Welders are in much greater demand than History teachers, and therefore make much higher wages.

For years now the American education system has been populated by public union employees whose main goal has been to feed the pipeline to create....more public union employees. This has led to an explosion of liberal arts degrees with no real, practical market purpose other than primary or secondary education. I'm not suggesting that we don't need teachers, obviously we do. But across the nation the real need is for educators in mathematics and science, not Social Studies, English etc. (unless you count ESL, which there's an argument to be made should not be taught in the first place.)

Tradition stated that the way out of poverty was to learn a skill or a trade and work your way to the middle class. After WWII an entire class of skilled laborers leveraged their skill and a hard work-ethic to realize the American dream. Somewhere along the way we've forgotten that, and allowed ourselves to be taught that the way out of the poverty class is to attempt to leverage large amounts of federally backed debt into an office career that's somehow viewed as "superior" to trades and skills that require manual labor.

In short, we've grown lazy.

By devaluing the blue-collar roots in favor of cocktail parties and ergonomic office chairs* we've cheapened what's always been America's most valuable resource: An army of workers with the desire to be put to work.













*What this doesn't mean is that we don't need accountants, engineers lawyers, and other professional positions in business. But there are too many people in colleges across America trying to ice skate up-hill in order to get a business degree they have no ability to complete. Hell, I'M an accountant who sits in an ergonomic chair all day. I went to school and have a degree that says I've been educated to perform my task. I happen to have an affinity for, and an enjoyment of, the work I do every day. That said, if the wiring in my house hits the fritz I'm sure hoping there's a licensed electrician around to repair it.

Dropping out on dropouts.

I was going to author a long blog post re-hashing my past arguments on education (in four parts, from the old blog) as it relates to dropout rates all the while deftly riffing on L'il Red and her lack of ability to put together a decent column when it hit me....

I can't do better than Slampo and Evan so I'll heartily encourage you to follow the links to their blogs and read what they have to say on the issue. (As opposed to heavily blockquoting them and then claiming I blogged on it at a later date knowing full well you won't follow the link.)

Tight times at HISD

Steve Mark of the West University Examiner offers this overview of the HISD financial picture.

(HISD could face $25m shortfall, more cuts, Grier says, Steve Mark, West University Examiner, 03/30/2010)

The current HISD budget is $1.6 billion. Between lessened revenue from the state, rising health insurance costs, an expected increase in water rates from the city of Houston, among other factors, Grier thinks the district could see a $25 million shortfall.

The result of this revenue shortage is, in the short-term, going to be about labor arbitrage and cost-cutting. Both of these policies are sure to spark off another round of arguing with Houston Federation of Teachers chief Gayle Fallon. Hopefully one that involves more name-calling and public outbursts by Houston's most entertaining member of the Courtesan class royal attendents.*



*Let me change that word to remove anything remotely sexual from the post in deference to my more sensitive readers. The idea of a courtesan class, in political terms, is equivilent to the scores of Royal attendents that were ultimately responsible for the demise of most monarchies throughout history. Once the listing of royal sycophants reached a breaking point, so did the ruling legitimacy of the pontif. The Courtesans who survived were those that were smart enough to pledge fealty to the next monarchy, and thus went on with the sole goal of preserving their unearned piece of the public largesse. Today's equivilent is the rapidly growing public sector.

Funny, I don't feel healthier?

So last night saw the passage of either the greatest, or worst, legislation in US history and reaction among the peanut gallery is......meh.

Not out there on the fringes mind you, the socialist progressive Left and the theocratic conservative Right are deep into the process of shoulder dislocation due to self-congratulatory back-patting or angry-at-something-but-we're-not-quite-sure-what fist shaking. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times"* without, unfortunately, much meaningful change being contained in the actual bill.

Oh sure, there are some insurance mandates and medicare payment reductions, not too many people are going to be happy with those. Beyond that, however, the biggest immediate change that Americans are going to feel is a 10% tax for (get this) indoor tanning. That's right, the Democrats fired their shot and their shot is aimed....directly at tanning beds. Oh sure there's something in that bill hidden somewhere after John Conyers stopped reading it, which would be page 2, that might mention health-care co-ops and exchanges and all of that, most of which is scheduled to take place in 2014. For those keeping score there very well could be a different party in both Congress AND the White House by then. You don't think Republicans are going to sit back and let this public relations bonanza go by do you? Of course not.


What we're left with then is the promise of increased health-insurance regulation without actually enacting any reform. That's right, health-insurance regulation, which is what this entire mess was about from the git-go. The only people who believe this is about "reforming healthCARE don't understand the bigger picture....


The only way to reform healthCARE is to take a deep look out how our healthcare system operates. Changing from playing catch-up to getting ahead of the game with preventative medicine is unaddressed in this bill. Requiring medical doctors to have a working knowledge (although not a mastery) of nutrition would help, as would uncoupling the USDA from the big food. Little things like tax credits for gym memberships and ending farm subsidies which promote the growth of ethanol for fuel, returning our agricultural community's focus to foodstuffs, are beginnings. Demanding healthcare companies cover children on their parents insurance policy until the age of 26 is not. Neither are reducing Medicare payments by 10%, or setting up co-op exchanges etc. etc.**

For all of the promise and high-minded rhetoric dish out by Democrats and the gloom and doom, end of freedom rallies held by Republicans the final regulation bill feels a little bit like.....meh.

The good thing is this mess is easily fixable, as pointed out by the Brother's Judd:

While a reform requiring private health insurance -- and treating abortion as anathema -- would be a Pyrrhic victory for Democrats anyway, the best part of the proposed bill is how easy it is for a Republican majority to fix. All you need to do is add an HSA/catastrophic option and expand coverage to 100% of Americans.

We have until November to find out if Americans are going to be willing to give them that chance.


Until then we anxiously await the day that America decides to take a long, hard look at reforming HealthCARE. We're not holding our breath here at HCA.




*Why Charles Dickens of course
**All of these would be examples of increased regulation of the insurance industry, but NOT healthcare reform.

School Food and Taxes....

Watching Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution* today (Before I was interrupted by a news update telling me that the medical insurance industry is now facing increased government involvement) I couldn't help but think back to the Cy-Fair school district property tax exemption roll-back that was in the news last year. These two ideas came up because I couldn't help but thinking that a much larger group of people would support rolling back the exemption were it tied to better food quality and preparation in our schools.

Say whatever you want about the American healthcare system, but it'd sure be a lot less stress on the system if we stopped using tax money to pay for processed shit that we then feed to our children. Paying a little bit more in taxes so that kids don't have to eat food that's provided by the lowest bidder.




*Speaking of the show. Watching this show I'm very depressed about the future of America observing the attitude of parents who could give a shit about the lack of quality their children are shoving down their gullets.

HISD continues their clean-up

I've got a feeling there is more to come.

(Ericka Mellon, ChronBlog, 02/28/10)

Houston ISD Superintendent Terry Grier confirms that chief business officer, Dick Lindsay, resigned Friday. Grier, who accepted the resignation, would not comment on details.

Grier's work of cleaning out the long-time, embedded administrators is going to be the first step of turning around HISD.

Blast those schools!

They're not doing my job as a parent well enough!


When I was in public school (some moons ago) not only did we have our choice of what was on the 'menu' but we also had alternative choices from a salad bar, a la carte menu etc. My Momma and Daddy taught me well enough to know that eating a salad from the salad bar occasionally was probably a good thing to do.

Of course....it took my Momma and Daddy a LOT of work to teach that to a teenager who thought the best thing in the world was having the option to order pizza and egg rolls off the menu every other day.


On this matter we do agree: School lunches, as drawn up, suck.