2011-09-11

Epic FAIL by BCPS school board task force

County Councilman David Marks is appalled:
An Inexcusable Vote by the School Board Task Force

For the past several months, a task force has been considering whether the Baltimore County school board selection process should be reformed. The central argument is whether some—or all—members should be elected by the voters of Baltimore County.

Community leaders and parents have testified in favor of school board elections. State legislators from both political parties support this change, and last month, a majority of the County Council endorsed a partially elected Board.

Yet despite bipartisan support from leaders across Baltimore County, the task force last week dismissed the idea, like someone swats an annoying housefly.

One of the members motioned to preclude any consideration of School Board elections from any future review. The vote was allowed to proceed—without no notification, and with several members absent.

The task force has only two Republican members, both of whom support school board elections. They were absent. One of the two Republicans, Senator J.B. Jennings, was on State Senate business at a committee visit at the University of Maryland.

The other absent member was the County Council’s representative, Chairman John Olszewski.

Again, the issue of school board elections is the key element of the debate. The vote should have been publicized in advance to all members of the task force.


2011-09-08

The determinants of economic growth

Jerry Pournelle's message to President Obama:
My general principle is that economic growth happens when energy is cheap and there is a maximum of economic freedom, and of those two, economic freedom is probably the more important.

2011-09-06

"Black English as linguistic progress"

Language nerd John McWhorter rocks. Superb interviewerer Josh Knobe asks good short questions and gets out of the way:



The next segment is good too, "The grammar of slang, yo":

2011-09-01

7 questions government agencies should ask themselves before creating any new regulation

Veronique de Rugy has a good list over at NRO's The Corner.
  1. Is there a large, systemic problem that is unlikely to resolve itself in the near future?
  2. Is [this] government [agency] in the best position to solve this problem?
  3. Does the regulation actually address the identified systemic problem?
  4. What other solutions are available?
  5. Would the proposed solution give rise to other significant problems?
  6. Would the preferred solution solve the problem at a reasonable cost?
  7. Will the agencies be able to recognize when the problem is actually solved and eliminate the regulation when it becomes obsolete?