Volume 2 Issue 74
May 19, 2003
Service or Diversion?
John Kerry gets confused about national service, Howard Dean's second wind, and breaking the terrorists with a purple dinosaur
Where to start, where to start...ok, I'll start with the supposed front runner in the race for the Democratic Presidential nomination, John Kerry. Kerry over the weekend introduced a health care plan, the details of which are not as important as the fact that he, Dean, and Gephardt have all put forward practical solutions to insuring more people without going to a system of socialized medicine. Regardless of who eventually wins the nomination, this could really be an issue that the Democrats should jump on in 2004, being that the US is the only 1st world nation without universal insurance.
Kerry really dropped the ball though, on his much touted "national service" address. As explained in an article linked below, Kerry rolled out a plan that called for states to impose a mandatory community service requirement for high school graduation. This is a good start I suppose, and Kerry does promise to fund it, but where the plan goes off is with his new "Service for College" Initiative.
First of all, "service for college" already exists. It's called AmeriCorps. The writer of Kerry's paper on the program seems to agree, because at some point he begins to use the term AmeriCorps, without explaining whether the plan is an extension of AmeriCorps or a new program. The basic idea of the plan is that 2 years of service gets you 4 years at a public college. Sounds great...but how the hell does he envision paying for it? While the part about the HS requirement makes it clear the feds will pick up that tab, there is no such language in the portion on "service for college". If Kerry is depending on the states to kick in that money, the plan is dead on arrival.
But the Kerry service plan fails two even greater tests. First, it does not effectively up the military benefits for education, while promising outlandish service benefits. In 1993, AmeriCorps was almost killed by military and veterans groups who were pissed that people who served in the Armed Forces did not get full tuition, while people in AmeriCorps were going to. In the end, the AmeriCorps plan got watered down because of this. In Kerry's plan, this issue will come up again, and while Kerry makes some vague promises to enhance ROTC, he falls short of the only way a plan like his could work: national "community service" can not get any more benefits than military service. Therefore, unless Kerry is willing to offer everyone in the military a free education, the plan won't be politically feasible.
Now, I happen to think that offering everyone in the military a free education is a good idea, in fact, regular readers will remember that I personally am for 2 years of mandatory national service, military or domestic. The key to any national service plan is that it has to be universal, or pretty damn close. Kerry estimates 500,000 people will serve in his program in the next 10 years, or basically 10% of students. This means that even with the free college carrot, the plan is likely to fail. The opportunity cost to many kids of not going to college for 2 years, or taking 2 years off after graduating, is such that the free in-state tuition alone will not be worth it. Therefore, these students will not participate. So in the end, we'll have a plan that just features poorer students and a small group of altruistic Americans. This fails one of the key goals of a national service plan, which is to have an environment where people from all backgrounds can interact with each other as Americans, serving to take down some of the racial and socioeconomic barriers that exist today.
In the end, John Kerry should be lauded as the only Presidential Candidate so far to talk about service, but his plan falls far short of what is useful, and offers at best the hope for a watered down version that will neither help students pay for college (more need based aid would be a better buy) or establish service as a key value in the nation.
Well, that took longer than I thought, I was going to touch on the ACC/Big East spat, but I guess I'll do that later in the week, the story will be more developed by then anyway. I will note an interesting article in USA TODAY that showed that the old "tax and spend" label...now applies to Republican's more than Democrats-
http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20030519/5168660s.htm
On to the rest of the insanity!
Losing the Peace: Two different articles today make the same point: That the US has flubbed its chance to stabilize Iraq, and the result may be that we are less safe now than we were before we invaded -
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7784-2003May18.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/19/international/worldspecial /19POLI.html
Of course, considering the Pentagon has apparently misplaced over a TRILLION DOLLARS in cash and equipment -
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2003/05/18/MN251738.DTL
Roadblock to Peace: Looks like the President's latest Middle East peace plan has been blown off the road by a series of bombings this weekend. This is on the heel of a new Al-Queda offensive as well -
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/5892359.htm
It's the Economy Stupid: Comments from the Secretary of the Treasury today spoke, and what he said apparently scared the bejesus out of folks, as the dollar and stock markets proceeded to crash -
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/19/business/worldbusiness/19C ND-DOLL.html
And unless the Senate takes action this week, the United States will dissolve next week, once it defaults on it's debt, unless the debt ceiling is raised yet again. Of course we can afford tax cuts! From CQ:
" In no uncertain terms, the Treasury Department warned lawmakers today that
unless Congress sends President Bush a debt limit increase bill by May 28,
the federal government will default on its obligations. In a letter to
congressional leaders, Treasury Secretary John W. Snow said that unless
Congress acts by that date, the United States may be unable to make $78
billion in payments to Social Security recipients, defense contractors and taxpayers awaiting refunds."
Walking out of Graduation: Over 80 students walked out of Rick Santorum's commencement address at St. Joseph's University in Philadelphia yesterday, as over 500 wore rainbow colored tassels in opposition to the Pennsylvania Senator's comments about gays -
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/5892391.htm
On the other side of the political spectrum, about a dozen graduates walked out of NC State's graduation, when speaker Phil Donahue went on an anti-Bush tirade -
http://www.wral.com/news/2211223/detail.html
Grey Lady Scandal: NYT editor Howell Raines supposedly says he models himself off of famed Alabama football coach Paul "Bear" Bryant. Jack Shafer says...oh really?
http://slate.msn.com/id/2083025/
Into the sunset: Bush Spokesman Ari Fleischer will leave his White House post in mid-summer, off to make some money in the consulting field. The AP writer here doesn't seem to mind -
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9731-2003May19.html
Trouble for Tony? Another member of the Labour Party resigned from Parliament today, accusing Blair of selling out and "losing his soul" -
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-685005,00.html
At the same time Blair has had to deny he's planning a European "superstate" that would take away sovereignty from Britain -
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1-685436,00.html
And that he's cut a deal with his Chancellor of the Exchequer to step aside as Prime Minister if the Chancellor will adopt the Euro -
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-684912,00.html
Look Who's Running for President: Howard Dean has a sudden plethora of articles and support today, perhaps indicating that the war will not be the end of his candidacy. One local paper in Washington State notes Dean's "Bristling, cut-the-bullshit advocacy of core Democratic principles draws an intense response from his audiences. ". -
http://www.thestranger.com/2003-05-15/feature.html
In that vein, Dean this weekend said that if Bush was re-elected, the US would have a depression -
http://www.adn.com/24hour/politics/story/891720p-6212160c.html
Howard Fineman says that surprisingly, Dean is still the man to beat -
http://www.msnbc.com/news/910604.asp
Look Who's Running for President 2: John Kerry chickened out and introduced a crappy national service plan, as noted above -
http://www.boston.com/dailynews/139/region/Kerry_unveils_com munity_servic:.shtml
And he didn't make too good an impression on one reporter in Iowa, who referred to him as arrogant and aloof -
http://www.dmregister.com/opinion/stories/c5917686/21286391. html
Also from the Democrats: Party Chairman Terry McAullife accused President Bush of fostering a "new McCarthyism" -
http://www.adn.com/24hour/politics/story/890839p-6206196c.html
From the Right: The GOP can't seem to stay unified though, which may hurt them come election time in 2004 -
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/139/nation/Attacks_on_fisc al_moderates_fuel_battles_within_GOP+.shtml
The Two-Party System Explained: http://www.ucomics.com/rallcom/2003/05/10/
Bad John Edwards Photo of the Day:
Um...may I go to the bathroom please?
History Decaying? Pretty much all photographs are slowly dissolving, causing problems for everyone from individuals with family snapshots to archivists and news services. What can be done? Well, the answer involves Bill Gates and a deep cave -
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A57798-2003May15.html
Boozing it up on Sunday: In an attempt to raise revenue, many states are now allowing liquor sales on Sunday, breaking down the last of the blue laws in many places -
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/19/national/19LIQU.html
Ahh, corruption: New Jersey politicans get the attention of the British -
http://www.economist.com/World/na/displayStory.cfm?story_id= 1774688
It all sounds the same: If the FCC goes ahead and deregulates media more, you can kiss what's left of quality TV goodbye as well, just as happened in radio -
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A2714-2003May17.html
You kidding? I'd cave in too: So what tactics are US forces using to break Iraqi prisoners? Try listening to Barney the dinosaur...repeatedly...for hours. This may border on cruel...
http://www.msnbc.com/news/914527.asp
Au Revior: The long-running musical Les Miserables closed on Broadway yesterday -
http://www.cnn.com/2003/SHOWBIZ/05/19/les.miserables.ap/inde x.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A8424-2003May18.html
A lovely topper for your Monday Afternoon: A new book by Britain's Astronomer Royal says, well, don't look now but things ain't looking so good -
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/18/books/review/18OVERBYT.htm l?pagewanted=all&position
Just say your money is stuck in traffic: The Powerball drawing could not proceed as scheduled on Saturday night...because one of the security officials was stuck in traffic -
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/local/states/new_jer sey/5893465.htm
Quote of the Day:"We can have a democratic society or we can have the concentration of great wealth in the hands of the few. We cannot have both." - Justice Louis Brandeis
Have a great day!
