June 2013

I guess that would depend on where else it forces cuts.  Russ Ullrich,  president of Galesburg Education Association, said “the reason aides are particularly important this year is because of the newly implemented Common Core Standards and Response To Intervention programs.  The curriculums have become more rigorous and expectations for both students and teachers have been raised”.  As I have a grandson, who will be entering third grade this year, I guess I will see more of what these “rigorous expectations for students” will entail.   If school administrators feel the aides are crucial they should find the pay for them.  “Back in the day” how did one teacher ever teach a classroom full of kids?  I guess those teachers really earned their pensions, which Governor Quinn now wants to see reduced.  In nearly every sector, more work for the same pay is being asked of all employees.  And if the school district is trying to stay within a budget why do they feel that the high school needs astro-turf for the football field?  Why can’t they play on grass like they always used to.  GHS never had tennis courts and a swim pool when I graduated.  How crucial is astro-turf?

Yes.  The 21st century technology that connects us instantly across the globe calls for the utmost in spy-guarding.  “Enemies of the state” that endanger our security and help our foes should run scared, like former NSA employee and traitor Edward Snowden.     Senator Mitch McConnell said, “The spying programs are authorized by law, overseen by Congress and the courts, and subject to ongoing and rigorous oversight”.   OMG, this is surreal!   When have I ever agreed with McConnell or Senator Lindsay Graham, who said, “If you’re not getting a call from a terrorist organization you’ve got nothing to worry about”.   Uncovering terrorist plots against our country is crucial to our existence!  If you don’t love America, go live somewhere else!   The CIA has been scanning chatter in the Middle East and elsewhere for at least a decade.  The data collected in this country by NSA or FBI helps detect suspicious behavior that begins overseas, and saves lives. …………Syndicated columnist, Eugene Robinson, wrote in his column:  NSA leaks show  debate needed…….that we will see if history deems Edward Snowden a hero or villain, but that first we should “have the debate he sparked over surveillance and privacy”.   Robinson wrote,  “The NSA, it now seems clear is assembling an unimaginably vast trove of communications data, and the bigger it gets, the more useful it is in enabling analysts to make predictions”.  And ended his article with, “Let’s talk about the big picture and decide, as citizens, whether we are comfortable with the direction our intelligence agencies are heading. And let’s remember that it was Snowden, not our elected officials, who opened this vital conversation”.  Yeah, it was Snowden, who leaked top-secret information to The Globe and another publication; our elected officials knew better than to do that.  Snowden wanted his 15 minutes of fame, but he’ll get longer than that.  If he helps evil-doers create mayhem in this country, we may never associate those acts with Snowden, but he will be at least partially responsible for them.  President Obama warned, “it will be harder to detect threats against the U.S. now that the two top-secret tools to target terrorists have been so thoroughly publicized”.  Obama also said, “Nobody is listening to your telephone calls!”  But my understanding is that although no-one is “listening”, certain words and phrases in email and texts may get a second look; words like: bomb, assassinate, hit-man, etc.  So now this post may get extra scrutiny.  So be it!  And since when do “we, as citizens” get to decide what “our intelligence agencies” are doing.  After the “Bay of Pigs” fiasco, then President John F. Kennedy threatened to disband the CIA, and remember what happened to him?  We can debate all we want, and feel however we want, but as I was looking through a magazine yesterday with pages of bloody scenes from the Boston Marathon (with citizens who’d had limbs blown off),  I stand firm in the conviction that although I wouldn’t agree with all the CIA actions  (now or throughout history),  that they are a necessary tool for keeping our citizenry as safe as we can expect to be.  They have foiled some attempts by evil-doers, and obviously can’t stop all attacks, but what catastrophes they can avert, I’m all for it!  God save America!   And God bless President Obama, who seems to be catching more crap for this than President W. Bush did, for instituting it, and Congress, who passed the Patriot Act in 2002.   That was after 9/11; remember that?  Snowden betrayed the trust of his employer, leaked classified information, and has put us all at greater risk.  There are persons with evil minds in this world who thrive on planning and carrying out evil acts.  And with greater mobility and technology these days, evil acts are getting easier to perpetrate!

The Illinois House and Senate each backed its own leader’s bill; the Senate voted down Madigan’s proposal, and House Speaker Madigan then adjourned the House without calling Cullerton’s plan for a vote.  In a recent Illinois Times article by reporter Patrick Yeagle, he stated: “Practically everyone knows that Illinois’ public pension systems are only about 45% funded, but not everyone knows that 45% is actually an improvement over the 40% funding of the past.  The historical record of Illinois’ 1970 Constitutional Convention shows the state’s unfunded pension liability wasn’t considered a crisis when delegates included a clause to protect pension rights”, stating “public pensions are contractual rights that cannot be “diminished or impaired”.   The Illinois General Assembly has failed to make the required pension contributions for the past five or six decades.  “It’s absolutely a manufactured crisis”, says Ann Lousin, who participated in the convention.  Illinois lawmakers now want to welch on those hard-earned retiree “rights”.  Professor Lousin says that “unfunded liability is an unrealistic measure of a pension fund’s health because it assumes that every employee could retire at the same time”, which of course wouldn’t happen.  “An unfunded pension liability measures how much money the state needs to collect in order to pay all current and future pensions”.  “Other states fund their pension systems at around 70 to 100%, making Illinois look bad by comparison in the eyes of credit rating agencies”, says Yeagle.  “For fiscal year 2014, Illinois must pay $6.8 billion total into the five public pension systems because of a state law enacted in the mid 1990’s.  If followed, the law purports to fund the state pension system at 90% by 2045”.  “Currently, Illinois’ five pension systems can pay out benefits to existing retirees.  The TRS (teacher’s retirement system) is the largest public pension system in Illinois, and despite carrying an unfunded liability since 1953 –TRS has always paid its retirees on time, and the executive director, Richard Ingram, stated “the truth is TRS will have enough money on hand to pay pensions well into the future”.  The convention debate of 1970 was fueled by the fear caused “when many businesses began reneging on pension promises made to workers in the private sector”.  Home rule powers were “newly included in the 1970 constitution allowing local governments to levy taxes, issue bonds, pass regulations and more”.  “As a result of the General Assembly’s inconsistent pension contributions and public perception that unfunded pension liability is a crisis, lawmakers are now searching for ways to cut future contribution costs”.   As a recent state retiree myself, with 25 years of service, I expect the state to keep to the contracts agreed upon.  I worked all those years anticipating that I would have a decent retirement benefit with my health insurance premiums paid, not having to pay out half of my monthly pension to pay for my monthly insurance premium!  Right is right!  Can we expect no one to keep their word?