Income tax time again

[dazzleman]

What I find interesting is how much discretionary domestic spending has increased under this supposedly conservative administration.

And yet, it's still not enough.  Bush has massively increased federal education spending, and the liberals are still complaining it isn't enough.

With all these increases, are schools demonstrably better than they were in, say, 1999, the heyday of the Clinton presidency?  I think we know the answer on that.

The other interesting thing is that the same people who say Bush isn't spending enough pine for the days of Clinton, when domestic spending was quite a bit less.  It seems we were getting along pretty well back then with lower spending, but the answer is always said to be more spending.

I think that we should simply reduce our spending to the levels of 1999 and be done with it.  That would save hundreds of billions of dollars per year without, apparently, really hurting anybody.

[dazzleman]

If you want "natural market forces" to fill that gap, you're either going to have to pay a lot more, or (in typical GOP fashon) allow the private sector to ignore the rules and provide poor instruction and moderate cost for most and good instuction for high cost for a few.

Isn't this more or less what is happening now, under the localized public school systems?  Wealthy districts provide good instruction at high cost, and poor ones provide poor instruction, at a lesser, but still high, cost.

I find it hard to believe that the costs of additional standardized testing are anywhere close to the additional educational spending.

I have a friend whose husband is on the Board of Education for a district in suburban New York.  Their district was getting a federal grant to do a whole lot of unnecessary work reconfiguring the school buildings, when there was nothing really wrong with them the way they were.  This is probably a perfect example of how billions of federal education dollars are being wasted on things that don't improve education one iota.  This is the typical result whenever the federal government gets involved in anything.

[dazzleman]

I think that you have to consider what you are getting for all your tax money.
Schools- Free Education for your children K-12
Roads- You couldn't get to work to make your money without them
Police protection- The cops suck when they're handing you a speeding ticket but you'd better thank Jesus they're there.
Fire Protection- Just might come in handy
Military Protection- There's a lot of pork here but it's a worthy cause
Parks- Making life more pleasant
Social Security- Keeping you from having to support your elderly parents/grandparents.
Medical research- Hopefully, we can kick cancer before I'm old
College Aid-Most Americans wouldn't make it past high school without it.

I'm not here to argue that everything the government does is efficient or wise, but you have to consider all the good things you're getting before you bitch about taxes.  Federal Budget for 2006 is 2.6 trillion dollars, which comes to about $9,000 for each man, woman, and child. If you're not paying that much for each member of your family, you're getting a bargain.

Most of what you mention isn't funded at the federal level, memphis.  In fact, only social security, medical research and college aid receive a significant amount of funding from the federal government, out of what you listed.  The rest is funded primarily at the local and state level.