Burnt Orange Report

I don't know about Donna Howard. Her bitchy tone towards Andy at the UDems endorsement meeting pissed me off more than anything. She should have just kept her yap closed and played nicely. Also, I find it interesting that the folks I met blockwalking rather than knowing who they want to vote for, are set on NOT voting for Howard. Looks like she knows how to be disliked.

I know a lot of women get written off as "bitchy" for being intelligent and opinionated. It's not a popularity contest. Vote for the candidate you think will work hardest and do the most good--not the one you'd most like to hang out with.

Jess, you don't do your preferred candidate much good with this kind of sour grapes. The sense of entitlement from Andy Brown supporters is misplaced and not winning him many new converts beyond the original Kool-Aid drinkers.

Seems that Rep. Dukes manages to get along year after year as another austin state rep with a history that tends on the "strong and oppinionated side". Maybe there are personalities (I missed that meeting sadly) but in the various times I've met and talked with Donna Howard, I havn't sensed anything overtly hostile...

"If you think public schools have so many resources that we can afford to siphon billions of tax dollars out of them to fund a private-school voucher scheme, vote for Ben Bentzin."

Cool, will do.

I honestly don't have a preferred candidate. I'm just giving my two cents about this one.

I can understand how passionate democrats can get so indignant at Bentzin about his association to the Republican fundraising machine.
But it is a mistake to misinterpret this as diminishing his committment to improving education. He sees education from the point of view of employers both locally and internationally, particularly the technology industry. He understands that growing the economy depends on an educated workforce.
So he is not so much interested in defending the methods of the past as helping to discover ways of keeping Austin competitive. Does anyone not yet realize how far behind the US is failing behind the rest of the world in education?

Paul -

You wrote that "[Bentzin] understands that growing the economy depends on an educated workforce." If you read through the Howard and Rider interviews, you'd find that they understand the exact same thing:

from Rider's interview: "We simply cannot, as a state, continue to have the fifth best business climate if we don't have a good workforce, and you can't have a good workforce without educating our children."

from Howard's interview: "What we really need to do to attract businesses is to provide the kind of community services – a strong public education system, quality health care, etc. – that will benefit the employees of businesses."

Everyone knows you need an educated workforce, Paul. Anyone with a pigeon's understanding of politics knows that's the easiest talking point in these campaigns. The difference is in how you achieve that educated workforce.

If the Democrats supposedly represent the people - which they don't - how come Ben Bentzin is about to win this special election in HD 48 running away and very probably the fall election as well? Because most people in HD 48 want Republicans to represent them, not left-field Democrats.

I don't doubt that any serious candidate knows that we need an educated workforce.
I support Ben because he is more likely to deal with this issue from the point of view of the employers who tend to be less ideological about improvements and more practical - Do we need as many school districts, how can we reduce administration costs, what is the optimum ratio of public schools, charter schools, voucher schools, etc.
I like Ben because I believe he is willing to put more options on the table to choose from.

Robert, if Ben (how personal) is about to win in HD48, it has nothing to do with his wisdom or vision - it's called $300,000 of TV ads (in which he poses and says nothing) that were placed by Crossroads Media of Alexandria, Va., the same company that has bought media for at least one other pro-voucher Craddick-Leiniger candidate against a fellow Republican who actually supports (gasp!) public schools. No wonder Ben doesn't talk in his TV ads - that way he doesn't have to lie personally and directly.

A firm involving a former Midland County Judge (Craddick ally?) reportedly helps arrange the BB media buys for Crossroads, which have been paid for, in part, (see his report) by contributions from the likes of the Wal-Mart Waltons, Swift Boat Bob Perry, Rick Perry's Revolving door man Mike Toomey, and more of that ilk.

Tom DeLay would be proud of a guy like Ben who buys and sell so,so easily. Travis County voters shouldn't be.

Get real,

Sounds like sour grapes to me. George Soros could have spent 200M, instead of 25M, and John Kerry would have still lost. When you have a liberal losing message, economically and culturally (and militarily), advertising it more just loses you votes.
Bentzin is going to win this special election in HD 48 with 55% of the vote, 2% more than Bush, because the voters like him and his conservative message. Or rather, they don't like the standard liberal fungi-infested porridge that the Demos dish out.
Beyond that, the Demos are going to lose ALL 3 swing seats in Travis County in 2006: HD 47, 48 and 50. Mark Strama may be a nice guy and a good politician, but his liberal policies and votes put him in the minority in HD 50. Just like the other Demo candidates for HD 47 and HD 48.
Beyond that, I see the Demo effort imploding statewide as well, with the Repubs picking up House seats and maybe a Senate seat as well. I suggest changing your policy positions on about 20 issues. You might get more votes and more campaign contributions. Nobody wants to invest in the Titanic before it sails into iceberg land.
However, I do think the Demos in Texas will do SUPER in the one mile radius around the University of Texas.

"If you think public schools have so many resources that we can afford to siphon billions of tax dollars out of them to fund a private-school voucher scheme, vote for Ben Bentzin."

What a stupid comment by Donna Howard on so many levels. First, the purpose of education is to TEACH CHILDREN, not to coddle public school system. If there is a better way to teach children, why close it off? Why force kids to go to just ONE school, when another school (say a charter or nonprofit specialized school) may educate them better? Why is she opposed to even programs that are limited to giving kids from failed schools an opt-out choice?

Second, education studies prove the #1 factor in child attainment is parental involvement in schools, and the #1 way to increase parental involvement? Give them choices in how their kids are educated.

Third, the idea that public schools will be harmed by school choice is utter bunk. If the school are bad, they will lose students - and will deserve their fate. But most will be fine, if they serve students well. The entire country of New Zealand went the route of school choice and voucher, and the result?
The public school system is doing just fine and dandy, having got a jolt of competition to improve its operations and efficiency, so that overall school spending is flat while educational performance is dramatically better ... 85% of kids are still in public school in the system.

Sadly, Howard represents a failed way of thinking about education; putting the educrat lobby ahead of teaching children, with demands for more resources while performing less well year after year.

My kids have been at both public (Round Rock ISD) and private schools. The private school cost was 1/2 the cost of public, yet the academics was more rigorous and our kids learned more. It's pure bunk that $8,000/child per year isn't enough to educate children. AISD gets that much but *still* many of their schools are barely passing grade. I support public schools with my kids and my taxes, but I can see first-hand the waste, lack of drive for excellence, and bureaucratic overheads that cry out for reform.

Howard's adamant opposition to school reforms like school choice proves that she is absolutely the WRONG person to send to the lege now.

"So he is not so much interested in defending the methods of the past as helping to discover ways of keeping Austin competitive. Does anyone not yet realize how far behind the US is failing behind the rest of the world in education?"

We are so far behind, it is pathetic.
We spend $100,000 to educate a child from K-12,
and yet third world countries that spend a fraction we do have higher educational attainment.

The system is flawed enough, that homeschoolers have educational attainment well above public schools. What private industry would survive selling an expensive product that someone can do at home better? Go check the AISD website and their org chart of their hundred plus central administrators - do they REALLY help kids read and learn with that overhead?

The public school educrats are desperate to maintain their monopoly status precisely because they know that educational reform would tear down the bureaucratic empires.