Austin School Teacher wages

I totally agree with you that something needs to be done about the pay wage scale for Austin teachers. It’s sad to see that the old school district I lived in Cypress Fairbanks that is in North West Houston teachers get paid more then the entire city of Austin. I do believe that teachers here need to be paid like other cities in Texas. It is not like the city is hurting for money. Teachers are the growth of all states and nations giving students the knowledge they need to achieve their goals. You’d want happily paid teachers so that the kids today can achieve their goals and move on to getting higher degrees form college and so on. The days of just a high school degree is over and we need the teachers today get paid, so that they are happy and can help educate students to help reach and achieve their goals. I believe that AISD needs to take a good look at other cities and see what they can do to make Austin teachers happier.

http://abluesview.blogspot.com/2010/05/low-teachers-pay-no-end-in-sight.html

What Happen'd To Freedom of Speech and Expression

In the San Antonio Express editor Jonathan Guwitz goes into the fall out of the recent south park episode debacle. I agree with Jonathan on this issue why should Islamic faith be set apart from being made fun of? or certain historical sites destroyed. South Park has taken shot’s at every religion, political and entertainment figures and twisted it into their very own humor. With the recent episode of the prophet Muhammad in a teddy bear suit that later revealed Santa clause along with Muhammad being bleeped out whenever the name was said.

This was a decision made by the upper executives before the showed aired. They came under fire again two years ago with the same issue. They were going to show the prophet again in an episode of South Park, mocking fellow it’s fellow rival show family guy.

The two show’s creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker were receiving death threats from a Muslim extremist group tjhat was based in of all places New York city. Jonathan also explains that director Roland Emmrich in the movie 2012 destroyed every religious site except the Kabba in Mecca. To me I just don’t under stand your going to destroy the Jesus statue on Rio de Janero and the Vatican and all kinds of religious architecture but can’ destroy the Kabba cause of the respect for the Muslim faith.

I just don’t get it I thought this country was based on freedom of expression and religion. You don’t see catholic priests threaten to throw down in a street fight after they are mocked in the south park episodes. You don’t see Mormons burning down houses in getting made fun of, or celebrities boycotting episodes they are in. I thought this nation was brought up into Freedom of speech that you could say what ever is on your mind or express it. Why do these religions get the free pass from being the stage of comedy? I know their religions are highly spiritual.

Fellow comedy central employee John Stewart backed his two South Park brethren on the episode and criticized Comedy Central’s actions and believed they should of just rolled with it. Bill Maher also gave his support for the two writers as well on his show real time. He states, “it’s a cartoon” and goes on to state the facts of comedy and religion. I guess we as American’s learn to laugh and move on. I think a nation with no humor is one scary thought if you can’t laugh about it.

Border Security Comment

I agree with you Kalpana's blog entry that border security is going to get worse, and will only become more violent. This also proposes a big challenge on the Governor even if he is reelected will have to address this even more.. The state keeps throwing money at the border war with no end in site. Mexican government wants to stop this as well. Everyday though more and more border guards are getting killed by cartel soldiers. The Washington Post reports over 22,000 deaths of US guards have occurred. Cartel soldiers are turning to guerilla tactics launching against US troops. I don't think there is any ending in site as well. There needs to be some full military intervention in this and have a general actually deploy a plan rather then just sending national guard troops in. Washington posts also that over four journalists that were reporting along the Texas border have been kidnapped as well. I think we should not be bullied around by these cartels and keep losing innocent lives.

'Where's My Rebate"

An editorial in the Austin Statesman goes into the pushback and horrible handling of the Texas federal rebate cash for appliances program. Texas received 23 million dollars in federal money for the rebates or trade up program as it is called. People could receive any where from $35 dollars to $1200 dollars depending on what you were trading up to. The program was to start on Wednesday March 31^st, though it became delayed due to Easter, and various different religious holidays. The rebates for the appliances went online Wednesday April 7^th.

You could apply for the rebate on the Texas Powerful site for your rebate. Once the website went live the whole entire site was jammed up. No one could get on to even submit for people’s forms, this was caused by the system only having one single IP address. People had another option to call in to get their rebate. This was even worse, with hold times over 3 or 4 hours. This wasn't necessarily going to grant you a rebate, the reason why is because it was just to apply for it and not to receive an instant verification.

I agree with the editor that there should have been some kind of drawing or lottery to give people that really need these rebates. This would have gone a lot smoothly then the way it was handled, almost like how NCAA holds lottery’s for tickets to bowl games or the final four. I believe this process should have been planned out more wisely then it was. Then the state is paying a third party company Helgeson Enterprises Inc, based out of Minnesota. Texas is paying Helgeson $983,000 dollars for the rebate program. The editor goes into telling us that the company dealing with the rebates has a very bad track record as well.

It seems to me another lazy attempt by the state to just throw everything out there rather then carefully prepare for it. This can be seen in my earlier blogs about the states lack of preparation to the border wars. I thought in my mind we are getting a rebate from the state not a third party company. Then again doesn’t surprise me in this day and age. Everything gets insourced or outsourced no one seems to be able to do anything on there own any more. I believe the cash for appliances is a great idea but here in Texas has been done very poorly.

Facebook Creates New Jobs In Austin

In the North Texas Conservative the Blogger Shawn Griffith goes into explaining, how great it is that Austin won the honor of the social networking site Facebook bid for them to open an office in Austin. We see in the Austin statesman that the giant will create over 200 jobs. The statesmen also reported that "Gov. Rick Perry announced the Facebook proposal this morning, and said the state would provide $1.4 million in incentives, conditioned on the approval of local incentives." This I believe is another big win for the state in Job growth rate and will make companies look even more at Texas.

The blog then state’s how Texas has not needed any of the government’s involvement with anything in our state due to our state of strong economics and job growth. I agree with Griffith in this manner that Texas does have a great growth rate and economic principles. Facebook saw this as a strong point and also with the big Technological business that are already in Austin.

Austin is number one in Job growth due to the high technological industry and along with a few other cities here in Texas. I do agree that corporations are seeing Texas as an expanding ground for their companies.

I disagree with the author on that on his approach on President Obama “President Obama continues to push irresponsible policies to spend money the federal government does not have in order to satisfy his own political agenda.” I don’t believe the president has his own agenda in my own opinion he is fixing the mess that the previous administration had put us into.

I think It is a good think that Texas can survive on it’s own with out having to plug any money into our state. He quotes his saying that “Our state is not dependent on the Obama administration, and President Obama doesn’t like that.” I think the government sees that as a breath of fresh air. That it’s one less state that does not have to be funded and can focus on the states that really do need the money and the help. To create jobs and have business open up shop.

Border War

In Jan Russell’s blog from the San Antonio Express, Russell criticizes Governor Rick Perry for his lackluster efforts on winning the Texas border war on the drug cartels. She argues that Perry is throwing Texas state money away into this war that has had poor results and no near end in sight. There have been a lot of skeptical critics of Perry’s actions since he has been Governor for over 10 years now but has been very careless to finish this conflict Russell believes that the Drug cartels are running easily through the state and also using prisons as a staging ground. The first operation “Operation linebacker” was the first to be set up and was put together by border town sheriffs that were funded by the state of a total of 25 million dollars that would supply the sheriffs with firearms and money to fight these cartels at the border. This operation has been unsuccessful with losing almost over several thousand officers to this fight. Operation Rio Grande was next when the Texas government with local authorities deputy’s and federal agents. This operation another flawed waste of money with no results then came, Operation Border Star and funded it at $110 million. The last and now current is Operation Wrangler, a build up of 133 police departments and 604 Texas Army National Guard troops, along with federal agencies. Perry then approved another 5 million to set up cameras along the wall along the border to spot illegal immigrants and possible drug traffickers. Once cameras were in place the idea was to stream these on the web, so that a regular civilian could view and report any illegal activity. This has been very unsuccessful and has just led to just arrests with people trying to come into the country and no major arrests. I agree with Russell on her stance that Perry is at a lost. He needs to push for more government intervention. Governor Perry needs to bring in some top military leaders and plan a strategy rather then sink money into one failed operation after another. Perry has already wasted over 175 million dollars of state money into this so-called quiet “Border War”. I believe that if he pushes for more government involvement he will get more funds and more military disposal. There needs to be to a clear decision on a win or lose exit strategy, before things get even more out of hand and more American lives are taken.

UT Tuition Rising Again

The rising costs of college tuition in the University of Texas College System were raised to 3.95 percent, after the Board of Regents had voted for tuition increases. With another increase doomed for next 3 years of another 3.95 percent the raising of school prices are taking its affect on students, making it harder to attend and pay for school. San Antonio Express states reports that the rise in rates is to help expansion of space more staff and a solid infrastructure. The lowest blow of the increase is to low-income students, since 20% of it will increase their finical aid. The rising cost of tuition will cost more students to have to borrow even more money to pay for school. UTSA Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa acknowledged, “Students are being asked to shoulder more of the cost burden but said the boosts were necessary to maintain quality and competitiveness”. In 2002 Texas was paying 62% of the amount to schools for educating undergrad students. Now students are paying 51 percent of the cost for school out of pocket makes things worse especially if you are not making much working a side job. Or even more you will have more students working a fulltime job and taking finical aid for school. With this being such a hike in student tuition we may see people in more debt and even more borrowing, which could land to a huge downfall to students getting their education. Even in an economy where everyone is in debt. The rise in tuition will lead to more debt frustration and putting even more students in debt and may have them turn else were to other Colleges for their education.