Only 7 days to go guys - let's make them count.
Posted on 10/29/2002 4:09:56 AM PST by BigWaveBetty
[snip]
The concept of merit is central to Gov. Bush's approach to education. Elected in 1998 as an education reformer, Jeb Bush shook up the system. Under his leadership, Florida started using a state standardized test to give schools grades (A-F), with extra funds going to improving schools and those with good grades. Kids in perennially bad schools are offered vouchers to attend private ones. A new Bush proposal expand a program that pays teachers extra for seeking national certification and serving as mentors to other teachers. On the higher education front, Bush unilaterally abolished affirmative action for minorities in university admissions with One Florida.
McBride favors an immediate $2,500 across-the-board pay hike for teachers. He believes this will help recruit the new teachers the state will need if voters pass two constitutional amendments on the ballot--one would provide kindergarten for all 4-year-olds whose parents request it, and the other would reduce class size. Additional planks in McBride's lengthy education platform are eliminating the grading of schools and improving early childhood intervention. (He supports the class-size amendment; Bush opposes it.) McBride, though, has had difficulty explaining how he would pay for all he wants to accomplish, admitting in his second debate with Bush that the class-size amendment might cost $15 billion, about one quarter of the state budget. (In a related note, the Florida Education Association has been his biggest organization donor, giving more than $1.5 million for primary ads alone, and Cathy Kelly of the FEA is on loan as his campaign manager.)
Bush has not been shy about trumpeting his initiatives' success. The more controversial, the harder he tries to convince Floridians of his good intentions. This has been particularly true of One Florida, launched in 1999. The governor's office has issued statistics showing that eliminating affirmative action hasn't been as devastating for minorities as some supposed it might be: Enrollment percentages for minorities at most schools have fluctuated only slightly, thanks in part to expanded outreach and a provision that allows the top 20 percent of graduating seniors from each high school to enroll in a state university. A number of university presidents--a group that has traditionally fought for affirmative action--have praised the governor's initiative.
"I know in my heart that we're on the right track," Bush said recently in Orlando, calling racial preferences a "soft bigotry of low expectations," a phrase uttered often by other members of the Bush political family.
Among minorities Bush stands to fare quite well. He is expected to win a majority of the Hispanic vote, and to hold approximately the 12 percent of blacks he garnered in 1998. In his losing bid to defeat Democrat Lawton Chiles in 1994, Bush got a paltry 4 percent of the black vote; this year he's the honorary campaign chair for the United Negro College Fund. [snip] (The Bush family is a long time contributor to UNCF) WeeklyStandard
WASHINGTON — President Bush is signing legislation to revamp the nation's voting system and protect against the kinds of errors that threw his own election into dispute two years ago.
The White House scheduled a morning bill-signing ceremony for Tuesday, starting Bush's two-day respite from campaigning for GOP House, Senate and gubernatorial candidates in next Tuesday's elections.
Under the Martin Luther King Jr. Equal Protection of Voting Rights Act of 2002, states will receive $3.9 billion in federal money over the next three years to replace outdated punch-card and lever voting machines or improve voter education and poll-worker training.
The new law's protections against voting error will not affect next week's balloting but are scheduled to be mostly implemented in time for the 2004 congressional and presidential vote, which will most likely include Bush's re-election bid. [YEA!]
It was Bush's bitter 2000 Florida recount battle with Democrat Al Gore — with its confusing "butterfly ballots," half-perforated punch ballots and allegations of voter intimidation — that gave rise to the legislation. Bush's election was ultimately decided by the Supreme Court. [NO! It wasn't decided by the SC. The SC said to FSSC you can't change the rules in mid stream. THAT ended the idiocy. The election had already been decided!!]
The House approved election changes late last year and the Senate followed suit in April, but Republican demands for strong anti-fraud provisions stalled reconciliation of the two versions for months. Lawmakers did not send a final bill to Bush until last Wednesday. [It's shocking, dims don't want tough anti-fraud provisions?!]
"This has been a long marathon, but the finish line is finally in sight and the winner is the American public," said Senate Rules Committee Chairman Chris Dodd, D-Conn. "This landmark legislation will ensure that everyone not only has the right to vote on Election Day, but that their voice is heard."
Beginning Jan. 1, first-time voters who registered by mail will be required to provide identification when they show up at the polls. [How about a measure that requires everybody to provide identification, everytime they vote. That's the way we do it in my little county. That was probably over the top for the dims.]
By the 2004 vote, states will be required to provide provisional ballots to voters whose names do not appear on voter rolls. Those provisional ballots would counted once valid registration is verified.
For 2006 balloting, states will be required to maintain computerized, statewide voter registration lists linked to their driver's license databases. States will also be required to have voting machines that allow voters to confirm the way they marked their ballot — and, if necessary, change their votes — before they are finally cast.
Such voting software was tested in one jurisdiction in the 2001 Virginia gubernatorial election. The Century Foundation, which reviewed the results, found that the "lost vote" rate went from between 600-700 votes in the 2000 election to just one vote in 2001, said Tova Andrea Wang, a staffer to the National Commission on Federal Election Reform who later oversaw the foundation's study.
"The bill goes a long way toward addressing a lot of the problems, but the extent to which the bill works relies on what the states do because they are given a lot of discretion," said Wang.
"A new polling machine is fine and great as long as people know how to use it, and there's no specificity in the legislation on poll-worker training and voter education." [That's left up to the states. Geez, we should be spending federal dollars on teaching people how to vote?!]
Wang and other election experts also worry that discriminatory enforcement of the voter-ID requirements could especially disenfranchise minorities, the poor, immigrants and students. She called the provision "something that may have to be revisited." [Who's a dim lib?]
Thanks for the great recipes. My kids will love you!
I'm here! Woo, what a week. I'm just now catching up with my chores. As I told some of you on Freep mail. Now that they caught the snipers, I finally got to go into town and resupply on all kinds of stuff we were lacking, or just plain needed.
While I was in California last week, they opened up our new Super Wal-Mart out here. WOO HOO! Look out, here I come.
Ok everyone, fill me in. What's been happening. I didn't even get a chance to listen to Rush last week, we had so many errans to run to get ready for mom's Memorial services.
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