@Carnage1995
They talk about fixing the deficit, by raising taxes. Wouldn't it help cutting down the INSANELY high defense/military budget? Wouldn't it help to not spend billions on chasing non-violent drug users and putting them in jail and tying up courts? Wouldn't it help if we didn't have a army base in every country? Wouldn't it help if we didn't join wars unless someone attacked us or is posing a threat to us?
I agree with all of these ideas about cutting defense spending, the war on drugs, and actual wars. We spend too much on those things. However I think you are lacking some information about the deficit. Its easy for small-government pundits to scare people with numbers and dollar amounts that the federal government spends. The problem is, in a nation with 311,000,000+ people, the scale of the government required is necessarily bigger than most people can comprehend. Thats just reality. Here is more reality: Since Obama took office, the federal goverment's revenue (as a % of GDP) has gone down several percentage points from the 17-20% that's been pretty stable for the past 60 years, to 15%. Additionally, the "off-budget" spending has gone down as well (all this info from taxpolicycenter.org). The "spending problem" and "runaway govt spending" that you hear about is a myth. Yes government spending goes up every year, but that is largely due to the population increasing and inflation. The way to measure govt spending accurately is as a % of GDP.
I agree that military and drug enforcement/encarceration spending should go down. Not spending trillions on the Iraq war and the drug war would be great for our country because some of that money could have gone to schools and infrastructure. To address your belief that education is not a federal government responsibility, I suggest a few ideas.
1) As Thomas Jefferson noted, a democracy such as ours (goverment of the people...etc)
relies on a well-informed citizenry. This national security reason alone establishes a cause for the federal govt to maintain standards for education. I know how much you love the founding fathers, so
here is some information about how the founding fathers felt about public education (*spoiler alert* They are in favor).
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be." --Thomas Jefferson to Charles Yancey, 1816
"Above all things I hope the education of the common people will be attended to, convinced that on their good sense we may rely with the most security for the preservation of a due degree of liberty." --Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1787
"[I have] a conviction that science is important to the preservation of our republican government, and that it is also essential to its protection against foreign power." --Thomas Jefferson
2) The economy is dependent on a well-educated and skilled workforce that can adapt (through education and training) to the rapidly changing technologies and job requirements. This creates a national interest for the federal government to assert itself in education due to the commerce clause of... (wait for it!)... the constitution!!!
You simply cannot maintain national standards for educating your citizenry by "closing your eyes and hoping that everyone does the right thing"(which coincidentally is my argument against many libertarian ideas.)
And my last point about education: you continually site 'better students' as a reason for private schools. What you have there is NOT cause and effect, it is self-selection bias. Think about who attends private schools vs who attends public schools. More affluent parents, who can afford to send their kids to private schools, have also been able to provide beneficial environments and opportunities for their children that lead them to be better prepared than children from poorer families. This does NOT mean that children who were fortunate enough to be born of rich parents and thus attend private school are somehow inherently smarter and more gifted than children born of poorer parents.
And here is a reality check in response to your complaints about people on welfare (since I'm assuming you are under 18 and living at home with your parents): From what I can find, the average family on welfare gets paid $500-600/month. My rent is $1200/month, and its nothing fancy. But that alone is double what welfare pays.... So these people are poor as S**t! Imagine trying to pay rent in some crappy slum, pay your utilities (gas, electric, tv, internet, water, trash, phone), buy food, transportation, clothes.....etc, much less school books, tuition, and health care. The point is, these people are NOT living the high life, and they are NOT getting rich off of your (your parents'
tax money. At best, they are surviving, which is far better than any of the alternatives (crime and/or dying).
