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Dec. 30, 2008 - Rush Limbaugh Program
35:28
December 30, 2008, Tuesday, Hour #3
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Well, I don't know where you are, but it's 17 degrees and snowing in Minneapolis, St. Paul, which can mean only one thing.
Al Gore is still an idiot.
I'm telling you, this global warming thing is...
Did you hear about what they're going to do in Oregon, by the way?
In Oregon, the governor there, you think you're going to save money by buying one of these little pillboxes they call cars that gets 40 miles to the gallon.
You're going to buy your Prius.
You're going to buy your hybrid and spend 10, 15 grand more than you otherwise would.
Add insurance costs onto that, and you'll never get your money back, no matter how much gas money you save.
Regardless, in Oregon, they're going to now try to figure out a way with satellite technology to tax you for the miles you drive.
The left-wing governor of Oregon is looking into a GPS-based system that would keep track of your car, the in-state mileage driven by you.
He says, well, because people have taken our advice and they're buying cars with higher miles per gallon ratios, we're not getting enough gas tax revenue.
So you thought you were going to save money?
This is all about government greed.
That's all they care about.
They're going to figure out a way.
Isn't it funny?
They tell you to drive less.
You got to buy a little, you know, a Ford focus.
So you get 30 miles to the gallon, 40 miles to the gallon.
And yet, what for?
You're going to save money?
Nope.
The insurance costs are going to go up.
Going to buy a hybrid?
No, that's going to cost you actually more, the capital outlay.
Well, I might save on gas.
No, we're going to start taxing you for the miles you drive, not how many gallons you use.
Now, who's the greedy one again in this society?
Oh, yeah, that would be governments, by the way.
Welcome back, everybody.
Jason Lewis in for El Rushbo.
More economics on the way with Dr. Walter Williams tomorrow in the program.
Rush best of on Thursday.
Mark Stein, America Alone on Friday, so a stellar lineup for the rest of the week.
And then El Rushbo back on Monday to start 2009.
Hey, Arod Blagojevich, the beleaguered governor of Illinois, you got to give this guy credit for chutzpah.
He is now getting ready to hold a press conference to announce who he's going to appoint to fill the vacant Senate seat of President-elect Obama.
Supposedly, it's the former U.S. or a former attorney general, 71 from Illinois, I should say.
Apparently, he's 71 years old, and he's going to be the lucky guy, according to most media reports.
But you'd think the guy would be holding a press conference, you know, putting forth more evidence or contesting the charges.
No, life just goes on.
Rumor has it, he called Caroline Kennedy to see if she wanted the job.
Apparently, he asked Caroline Kennedy, and all she could say was, well, you know, you know, you know, I'm not, well, you know, Caroline Kennedy off to a rocky start with the first few interviews, reminiscent of her uncle's 1979 interview with Roger Mudd when he had kind of a problem answering why he wanted to be president.
You know, people forget Bobby and Jack Kennedy spoke that way as well.
I don't know about the you knows that Caroline is now famous for, but when it was ah or the ah, you're yeah.
Just a thought.
I don't know where I'm going with that, and it frankly really doesn't matter.
1-800-282-2882.
That's a 1-800-282-2882, the contact line for the Rush Limbaugh program.
I want to get to education because there's a couple of interesting scenarios now.
We've been talking about the economic stimulus package, and I've been making the case that it is fundamentally most of what government spends money on.
I mean, government really doesn't create wealth.
It consumes wealth before it creates anything.
In order to build a bridge, it's got to remove something other that would have been built.
Henry Hazlitt, I think, the lay person's best economist, Economics in One Lesson, great book.
He also wrote a refutation of the Keynesian stuff we've been talking about years and years ago, the failure of the new economics and all of that.
But he used to say, the reason government gets a free pass is when government does something, we see it.
They build a bridge, they do this, they that.
What we don't see is what would have been built had the government not spent the money on that, if it would have been left in private hands.
And I know right now we're in this sort of liquidity trap where people don't want to invest on anything, and so therefore the government's got to, but it's still a malinvestment.
It still doesn't create new wealth.
We've got to restart the engines of investment.
That ought to be the government's goal, not to simply take the place of private investment.
Because if you allow that, they end up wasting the money.
Give you a perfect example.
Where is this?
In Arkansas, as part of the economic stimulus plan, President-elect Obama has pledged to wire schools with more internet access.
Oh, but we're not going to stop there.
In Arkansas, they've got a pilot project to wire buses, actually put wireless internet connections on buses, ostensibly so Johnny and Susie can use their hour-long ride to really crack down on their laptop.
Now, I'm not making this up.
It's not good enough that the kids have to have their own laptop in your school district.
You know, when I was going to high school, we had business classes and we had typewriters and rudimentary computer systems, but they were in one room.
And during that class period, you would go there or the library and you would use them.
And there were plenty of them.
But there was never this notion that in order to learn, every kid's got to have a new laptop.
But there are a number of schools in Minnesota, and I'm certain where you live, where the educational unions are saying the kids have to have laptops because, by God, they won't read, but they'll look online.
You know what this is for.
In many cases, the teachers want the laptops.
But that's a topic for another portion of the story.
So we're going to literally spend government money, state and federal, on wiring school buses so kids will, in fact, do their homework, learn with their laptop, which presumably will be given to them by the school or somebody, where they otherwise would be throwing spitballs.
The question that popped into my head when I read this story in the Wall Street Journal yesterday, I'm thinking, well, wait a minute, you've got a child or two that won't read their book on the bus, which, by the way, is going to be a darn sight easier than conducting business on a laptop over potholes, reading a book.
They won't read the book, but by God, they'll do homework with the laptop.
In fact, a number of people are already expressing skepticism of this.
There are a couple of reports of participants using the laptop at first, and after the newness wore off in about a week, they're back to throwing spitballs on the bus.
But this is going to be your stimulus package.
That is a pretty good manifestation or a pretty good poster child for what's wrong with education.
We do not have a funding crisis for education, my friends.
Not even close.
In fact, if you look at the money we have spent on K through 12 education in the United States of America over the last three and a half decades, you will see that per-pupil spending has trebled in real terms.
That's gone up three times for those of you in Rio Linda.
Per pupil spending has trebled in real term real terms over a 35-year period.
It's doubled in total dollars just since 1990 for K-12 government schools.
Title I spending for poor kids has been growing at a staggering rate since, quite frankly, the Bush administration, 52% since 2001, actually over that now, because this data is a year old.
And yet, test scores for American students still lag their international counterparts, which spend less per pupil, who have higher class size numbers.
Now, how is that possible?
Could it be that money is not the problem with education?
Could it be that education is actually conducted today for the benefit of those adults in the system and not necessarily for the interest of the kids?
You know, the National Education Association talks about, oh, well, we do everything for the kids.
That's why we strike.
Huh?
There are a number of states where teachers go out on strike.
We have this ridiculous law, ridiculous law in most states that you've got to be a certified teacher.
Now, that is precisely due to keep competition out from the NEA.
And this is, you know, getting back to the unions, why they are more concerned about benefits for their members than anything else.
Why on earth would you allow somebody like Henry Kissinger, or to be bipartisan about this, Madeline Albright?
We allow them to teach college.
They can go for a semester and teach college on geopolitics or foreign policy, but they would be unable to teach your high schooler in your town.
Well, why is that?
Well, you've got to be certified to teach K-12.
Don't want just anybody going in there.
We've all had bad teachers.
We know they don't get fired.
The certification rules, the certified teacher nonsense, is precisely to keep competition out from the union because some people who are retired, who are brilliant businessmen or women, may want to go in there and teach business at a lower rate.
We can't have that.
That wouldn't be good for the kids.
But what we have right now in K-12 schools is a top-to-bottom government monopoly.
You want to talk about monopolies?
You know, when you've got a free-flowing marketplace, it is nearly impossible to form a monopoly.
Now, it is the goal of every business to form a temporary monopoly.
You want to be the first coffee shop on the corner.
You want to be the first convenience store on your block.
And you get a temporary monopoly, and you get a big reward for a while for the investment.
But sooner or later in a marketplace, this is the beautiful thing about profits, people see growing profits and they enter the market, and that drives the profits back down to a normal profit, what economists call a normal profit, which is usually the going rate of interest.
It's very, very difficult, if next to impossible, for a market monopoly to occur.
There are a few exceptions, but very rare.
However, when government carves out monopolies, everybody talks about the railroad robber barons.
They wouldn't have been anywhere without government carving things out.
And the classic monopoly is not Microsoft.
It's not big oil.
It is K-12 education, where no matter where I want to send my child to school, no matter what I want to consume, I've still got to buy their product.
Can you imagine if you went to Burger King, but you by law were forced to buy McDonald's too?
Well, you can go to Burger King.
You've got choice, but you're still going to have to pay McDonald's.
That's exactly what the NEA has wrought.
That's exactly what, quite frankly, government schools have wrought.
Well, you can send your kids to a private school.
You can homeschool.
But, oh, by the way, you still have to fund the public schools.
It's a public good.
No, it's not.
It's a public benefit, perhaps, but there are vested interests that kids will be educated.
Automobile insurance is a public benefit, but we don't buy everybody's insurance.
Education benefits those who get the education.
There are vested interests, or is a vested interest, in becoming educated yourself and having your parents educate.
Does anybody believe that if you had all of your tax money returned, your property taxes and the bulk of your state income taxes go to education, and now the federal government's getting into the game, does anybody believe that education would disappear because the government didn't fund it?
The government's got to fund a public good, and if they don't fund it, it goes away.
No, you would take that tax dollar, and there would be a flourishing free market for primary and secondary education.
And I dare say it would do better.
Now, I know what you're thinking.
Jason, I'm a teacher.
Quit beating up on teachers.
Lots of good teachers out there.
But that's immaterial.
The vast majority of teachers who belong to the union are liberals.
And they will protect their status.
They will protect the monopoly.
They will fight vouchers.
And I prefer tuition tax credits to vouchers.
I think they're better.
They will fight any choice in education.
In fact, you know what they're pushing now?
They're pushing for universal preschool.
So K through 12 wasn't good enough for the monopoly.
Now they want E through 12, a backpack on every four-year-old.
Oh, by the way, in order to do that, we'll need more certified teachers who will, because it's a closed shop, have to join the union, increase union dues, and increase contributions to Democrats who will protect the monopoly.
You ever wonder why Joe Biden and Barack Obama are attending or have their kids and grandkids go to the private school, the Sidwell Friends School?
I believe the Clintons went there or Chelsea went there as well.
If they believe in public education, try out the Washington, D.C. schools, where the per-pupil expenditures are sky high, and even the chancellor of that beleaguered school district now understands that the union is obstructing progress there.
This is a great issue if conservatives just latch onto it.
I'm Jason Lewis.
Let's get your thoughts on this when we return right after this on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
Hi, I'm Jason Lewis.
Minnesota's Mr. Wright.
In for America's Mr. Wright.
Great to be back behind the golden EIB Mike.
Once again, hope you're enjoying the program.
1-800-282-2882.
Off to the phones we go this hour.
Matt in Clayton, North Carolina.
My old stomping grounds down there.
How are you, sir?
Doing great.
How you doing, Jason?
Could not complain at all, except for the snow, the blizzard I'm looking at out the window.
Yep, you guys can have it a beautiful day in North Carolina.
Don't start with me, Matt.
Well, I can't help it, Jason.
We all make choices.
Well, I need a snow bailout.
Well, come on down.
Heading to the beach tomorrow for New Year's, so come on down.
You.
The weather's pretty.
Hey, real quick, you were beating on, I believe it was Oregon about a new highway tax based on the number of miles you drive.
Right.
North Carolina's doing the same thing.
Yeah, this is the big movement amongst the energy dilettantes out there.
But I thought if we would reduce our gas mileage, that was going to be good enough for them.
Well, no.
I'm sorry, increase our gas mileage, I should say.
That's right.
But we're losing on every corner with tax dollars.
So where are they going to come up with more dollars so they can spend more?
They're going to start looking annually at your state inspection and record your mileage, which they already do.
They're now going to base and bill you, tax you on the miles you drive per year.
You see, here is what this entails.
It entails two things.
Pure government greed on the one hand, and two, the war on the automobile, which put together are unsustainable.
If, in fact, they start raising taxes, it becomes more costly to drive in North Carolina.
You drive less, then where are they going to get the money for the roads?
And why even have roads?
Well, they're going to get it from somewhere, and this is a new vehicle, but they're not going to relieve any of the existing taxes.
Yeah, neither is the governor of Oregon.
He's going to, I think, raise the gas tax two cents for vehicles that don't have a GPS system.
And there are a whole host of privacy concerns when you start putting satellite systems as opposed to reading odometers.
And by the way, if you're driving out of state, how do they account for that in North Carolina then?
They don't care.
People have no...
I'm a small business owner.
I'm a small businessman, and I make my living sometimes on the roads.
Right.
So there's just another new tax for me.
People have no idea how oppressive North Carolina is.
I think it's the most liberal state in the South.
You know, your top income tax rate is about 8.25%.
I believe you're right.
It is one of the higher tax states around.
And no wonder people are moving to Tennessee down there, moving to South Carolina.
Governor Easley and the Democratic legislature out of control down there.
Well, we got his clone coming in right behind him with Bev Perdue.
Oh, Lord.
I worked real hard for a great guy, Pat McCrory, and didn't quite make it.
Matt, thanks for calling, buddy.
I appreciate your time.
You know, here's what their energy policy is.
Here's what the left Al Gore energy policy is.
Don't use any of it.
We're the Beatles when we need them.
Remember the great song, Tax Man?
You know, if you walk, I'll tax your back or tax your feet.
If you turn your back, I'll tax your back.
This is so out of control.
And yet we hear people who say, well, we're undertaxed.
We can't afford these tax cuts.
Who's undertaxed?
Certainly not anybody that produces anything.
Granted, the bottom 40% of income earners in the country don't have any federal income tax liability, but the top 5% of earners pay 60% of the taxes.
This gets me to one of my fundamental principles, one of Lewis's laws, if you will, and that's this.
Any tax that's levied must be levied on everybody.
Because what we've done with the income tax, we have exempted so many people that now they don't care if the income tax rate goes up because they're not paying it.
We're breeding social division, class warfare.
And so we're basically throwing the tax on quote-unquote the rich.
And by the way, if you're in the top 10% of income earners in the country, you're at around $100,000, $110,000 a year.
It's hardly rich, but you're paying 70% of the income tax burden.
But the rest of the people don't care because they're not paying income taxes.
Bottom 40%, according to the CBO, have no federal income tax liability.
Why should anybody be exempt from any tax that is levied?
When everybody has to pay a tax, it serves as a built-in mechanism to make certain the tax doesn't grow too fast.
But when only a few people are paying it, you're setting yourself up for, quite frankly, mob rule.
Anyway, got to move.
Thanks for the call.
Chris in Elton, Maryland.
Hi.
Chris, we only got 30 seconds, so be brief if you would.
With you, teacher certification is overrated.
I am lucky enough to be teaching in a private school with nothing but a high school diploma.
I love my job.
I am very good at it.
I would challenge anyone to do my job as well as I do.
You think it's for the protection of the NEA, then?
Absolutely.
You do not want to get me started on unions.
Well, why don't we reform it?
Why can't we have choice in education?
Why don't we?
It's a good question.
Why doesn't some politician take the mantle on this issue and run with it?
Reagan ran on tuition tax credits in 1980 and won a landslide.
And we are back on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
Great to be here once again.
Speaking of schools, there is a holy war, if you will, going on in Washington, D.C., where I believe the chancellor of the Washington, D.C. schools, Michelle Ree, who I think is a Democrat, if memory serves me correctly, is really going after the teachers' union there.
She wants to disavow tenure, the holy grail of the teachers' unions, as the Wall Street Journal puts it, and essentially say, look, you want more money.
You always say you don't have enough money.
Teachers are underpaid.
The average compensation in Minnesota is $50,000 a year, by the way.
But they say they're underpaid.
And I think some good teachers probably are underpaid, but that's what happens when you have a union-run shop.
You've got to underpay the stars in order to overpay people who should be fired or demoted.
It's called protecting mediocrity.
That's why the system is so antiquated.
But regardless, she's going after them saying, look, you do away with tenure so we can fire bad teachers, and we will give you more money.
That's what the chancellor of the D.C. schools, the Washington, D.C. schools, have some of the worst test scores in the nation.
Yet they spend almost $16,000 per pupil, one of the highest in the nation, so much for money in education.
But the point is, the union says, nah, forget about it.
We're not going to do that.
We're not going to do it.
We're not interested in that.
And so there's this very, very interesting battle going on.
And quite frankly, the same thing's going on in New Jersey.
In fact, there was a stat here I read the other day.
New Jersey has fired precisely 47 teachers in the last 10 years.
That's out of more than 100,000.
It's almost impossible to get fired.
Stephen Jobs, a lot of liberals' favorite businessman, said the first thing he would change if he could run a school system would be the ability to fire teachers.
He said once, can you imagine running a business where you can't hire and fire?
So we're going to take this monopoly and now we're going to say instead of reforming it, and as I've told you many times, I believe in universal tuition tax credits, whether the tax credit would apply to a business that wants to pay the tuition or you, universal tuition tax credit, if I just wanted to be philanthropic and I saw a neighbor in need and I told him, well, I'll tell you what, I'll send your Johnny or Susie to this private school or I'll pay for the homeschooling and that'll cost $8,000 a year.
I'll pay for that.
I could get the tax credit.
Whoever pays the tuition for a private school or homeschooling.
And why should you have to pay twice?
You don't have choice in education.
But instead of granting choice, which is the real route to salvation, the education unions, which control the Democrat Party, are now set to expand the monopoly into universal preschool.
Four-year-olds.
If you like Head Start, you ain't seen nothing yet.
I mean, they look at Head Start.
Well, isn't that good?
No, Head Start is not good.
The dirty little secret of Head Start, the 40-year-old federal bureaucrat program, is that kids, while some initially post gains, by the time they get to fourth, fifth, and sixth grade, it's gone.
They're indistinguishable from non-Head Start kids.
You look at where they've tried preschool, government preschool.
There's been essentially no effect, but here's what it does.
It increases the membership of the education establishment.
It gets more people on the government payroll who will then vote for Democrats who propose to give them more tax money.
The method to the madness.
This is really an area I think, quite frankly, conservatives and the Republicans have been a little bit behind the times on.
Instead of going after this monopoly, they have sought to curry favor, to get the imprimatur of the local unions.
We've got a governor here that talks about, well, I can't change education without the help of my friends in the union.
You have no friends in the union.
The NEA members never support Republicans and they never will.
So forget about it.
And if you really want to get conspiratorial, I mean, just take a look at what some people have said about preschool and what it will do to the mushy minds.
What was it?
The former prime minister of Sweden, Ingar Carlsson, said letting children out of getting them out of the home was, quote, essential to eliminate social heritage, close quote.
I have no idea what it means, kid.
Disraeli said tyranny begins in the nursery.
I think I know what that means.
I think a lot of people are going to be very, very suspect of not only having their taxes fund preschool, but then being told you've got to send your three or four-year-old there.
I'm just telling you, get ready, folks.
Back to the calls we go.
Astoria Queens.
It's Frank.
You're on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
Hi.
Yes, it's E. Frank.
I it's an honor and privilege to be on the EIB Rush Limbaugh show, Mr. Lewis.
I want to thank you for putting me on.
You know, I come to an understanding that basically if you want to invest in your child's education, you should actually think about saving your own money and investing in private education.
At one point when I was very small, I was a tiny small advocate of tuition tax credit here in Astoria for a local Catholic parochial school.
And that didn't work out too well because the people in Washington, there's not sufficient lobbyists that can support good solid educational theories and good solid educational funding for public school education.
I believe that the best thing to do is to basically invest only on private education and save a very long time for your child because at this rate, there's not going to be any lobbyists in London.
But that's the point.
That's the point, E. Frank.
The point is people can't afford to save.
If I'm paying in North Carolina, 8.25 income tax or Minnesota 8% income tax or New York or California even higher, if I'm paying property taxes of $8,000, $9,000, $10,000 a year and the bulk of state money and the bulk of your property tax goes to education, if I'm paying that and I'm paying $15,000 or $16,000, how can I afford to save for a private school which is going to cost me $10,000?
The point I'm saying, sir, is give them a tuition tax credit.
So if I'm going to that private school, and this is not a voucher, I've got reservations on vouchers just like a lot of people, because a voucher is an actual, quite frankly, a government gift.
A voucher for somebody who doesn't pay taxes is like the Obama tax policy.
We're going to raise taxes on people who pay taxes and give tax rebates to people who don't.
And that's the reason vouchers aren't that popular.
People say, wait a minute, they're going to people that, quite frankly, don't have a liability, and then that voucher is coming to this private school.
And like Title I funding, you're going to have to comply with all of the regulatory apparatus that comes with a government check.
A tuition tax credit, however, is different.
You do not have the government strings, nor do I think you would.
It goes to people who have a tax liability, and they could then say, look, I can pay my property taxes of $8,000 or sales and income taxes of $8,000 and use the public schools.
Or with a tax credit, I could get that money back and use a private school.
And that would be choice.
That's all I'm suggesting.
Good old competitive choice.
Breshan and Ellsworth, where is this?
Ellsworth, Maine.
Excuse me, I couldn't see that.
Go ahead, my friend.
Hi, good afternoon.
I just had a couple of comments.
I'm not an expert on education, but I've studied it a bit in my college studies.
And I know from several studies that have been done, one that comes to mind is the Paris Preschool Project that done in the right way, there are a lot of advantages to having children attend preschool.
And by done in the right way, I mean, first of all, I don't think it should be compulsory.
And I don't think it should involve any kind of standardized testing.
But one study, for instance, found that the return on the investment is $6 for every $1 spent in terms of those children having less medical problems later on that must be subsidized by society and having less problems with the law.
Yeah, what was that study?
And who did the study?
Well, one study that comes to mind is the Perry Preschool Project.
And they followed the children for 20 years after they sent them into the program.
Did they go to private preschool, private preschool, or Head Start?
It wasn't Head Start.
This was prior to Head Start.
Yeah.
So this was private preschool.
So what you're saying is, what you're saying is you disagree.
You think preschool has benefits.
It's a fair point.
But that is in the construct of a private, flourishing market for preschool.
What I'm saying is I think it's up to the parent to determine whether they have benefits.
I think the evidence is skewed, and I'll give you some of my data in a second.
But regardless of whether you want your child in preschool or not, why ruin a flourishing market by having the government nationalize it now?
Well, I guess, you know, one argument would be that a lot of people simply can't afford it.
And also, unfortunately, a lot of parents are irresponsible and wouldn't always do the best things for their children.
I bet those parents are smokers, too.
Well, I don't.
I bet they are.
I think we need the social services department to come down on those parents.
Don't you think so?
No, I think that people being educated really benefits all of society and that there's a tangible benefit to providing free people.
Bresh, tell me, what grade do you teach?
I don't teach grades.
I'm a graduate student at the moment, but I've and you're focusing on what in your graduate studies, my friend?
On psychology.
And you're going to teach?
I don't know if I'll teach.
I may be a guidance counselor.
Yeah, okay.
So you've got a little bit of a vested interest in some of this.
The point is, if you say that my tax dollars going to educate somebody in Maine is a public good, which therefore must be funded by the federal government for all that goes.
Certainly I can say bailing out Detroit, creating a subsidy for a business is a public good because I may, in fact, have somebody who works at that business come into my shop and buy.
You have an unlimited view of what a public good is.
There is a difference between a public good and a public benefit.
And I happen to be a libertarian on this.
The public benefit is when a business opens next door to your community and everybody's incomes go up.
A public benefit is when tourism in Maine goes up.
A public benefit is having people on the road with automobile insurance.
None of those are subsidized or should be subsidized, and yet they have a benefit to the public.
A public good is something that is mutually exclusive.
That is, you can't opt out of it.
Now, if I pay for somebody's education in Maine, I may or may not get any benefit from that.
That's a little different than national defense.
I see what you're saying, but I guess just from a kind of compassionate type of stance, you know, children don't make decisions for themselves.
And for a child not to have opportunities that they should because their parents were poor or simply irresponsible, it would be a shame.
And I think, you know, when it comes to the publication of the public.
Well, that was the point I'm saying, my friend, is that has been the raison d'étra of public education.
And I don't know that I would hold up our K through 12 schools against our international counterparts, but it was based on just what you said.
And I don't think it's working in the poorest of communities like Washington, D.C. Do you?
Well, I think there's a very good reason why that it's not working, and that is because schools are funded through property taxes, and that's really a form of economic discrimination where, you know, because much better to fund them through income taxes.
Enough said, my friend.
I'm starting to feel a little queasy.
I gotta go.
You're on the Rush Limbaugh program.
President-elect Obama's choice for the education secretary, Arne Duncan of Chicago, getting rave reviews, and yet little more than half of Chicago students graduate on time.
I wonder if that's what Brescian calls compassion.
Washington, D.C., it's even worse.
LA, you can go right down.
What's so ironic about the idea of universal and free education is its justification was for the poor who couldn't afford it.
And yet that's where it fails at the greatest amount or the greatest, at the greatest level.
You got a situation here where, please, we have basically surrounded everybody into this government monopoly.
They could be making $200,000 in the suburbs, but they can only get their education in the public schools without paying twice.
We don't do that with college.
We have essentially a voucher system, whether it's a HOPE, a scholarship, or a GI bill.
We don't do that with food stamps.
That's a voucher system.
We don't nationalize the grocery stores yet.
We give people a voucher.
They can go, and that's how we means test it.
But we don't do that with education.
We've got to have a government run, top to bottom, K-12 monopoly.
And by the way, the verdict on preschool is not in, far from it.
In fact, in 2003, this from the Department of Health and Human Services, quote, Head Start is not fully achieving its stated purpose of promoting school readiness.
These low-income children continue to perform significantly below their more advantaged peers in reading and mathematics once they enter school.
That was from the paper strengthening Head Start, what the evidence shows.
June 2003, Department of Health and Human Services.
You got another one from HHS.
Going back a few more years, in the long run, the cognitive skills do not go up with Head Start.
You've got Oklahoma, what are the states here?
Oklahoma and another one.
What was it?
It was.
I know Oklahoma, and I think Georgia was the other one that have implemented universal preschool.
And yet in 2006, an analysis by Education Week found that Oklahoma and Georgia were among the 10 states that had made the least progress on the NEAP, the NAEP, the National Assessment of Education Progress.
So I would be very, very careful of getting your data from those who have a vested interest here.
1-800-282-2882 to the calls we go once again.
And Randy in Carolina, South Carolina, that is.
You are on a cell phone and on the Rush Limbaugh program.
Well, Mega Did I was, and I've been listening to this show since 1988.
I particularly like it when you substitute for Rush.
I appreciate it.
Thank you, sir.
I got out of the Navy in 1978, the first time I got out of the Navy.
I'm a retired Navy captain.
Well, thanks for your service, my friend.
Well, thank you.
I got out in 1978 and was getting ready to open a body shop up in Savannah, Georgia.
And temporarily, I started teaching.
But in 1976, I voted for Jimmy Carter.
And I really was a die-hard Democrat.
My parents were and everything.
And I taught school for about three months.
And I'm going to tell you, I switched to Republicans so quick, you couldn't shake a stick any quicker.
And I voted for Ronald Reagan in 1980.
And I just couldn't believe what had happened to the public school system.
And it couldn't fire any teachers.
All the good teachers had practically given up.
They were so frustrated.
It was so depressing for them.
Do you know another line of business?
Do you know another line of business in the market economy that pays people other than organized labor on lanes and steps, length of service, and how many graduate credits you get?
That's how teachers are paid, regardless of merit.
That's insane.
I don't know why we're stuck in protecting mediocrity here if our interest is in the children.
Looks like I'm running long again.
I got to get in one more break.
We'll come back and wrap it up.
I'm Jason Lewis.
Don't go away.
Well, that just about wraps it up for me, Jason Lewis.
Once again, let me thank Rush and everybody involved here at EIB, Kit and Mike in New York.
We had Jess and Steve and Brendan here in the Twin Cities.
Always a pleasure to be on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
Always a pleasure to talk with you.
So stay tuned tomorrow for Walt Williams, Friday, Mark Stein.
El Rushbo returns.
Monday, January 5th.
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