Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich saw more than a loss for his team in last weekend’s special congressional election in Louisiana, where a district went Democratic for the first time in 33 years: “Either congressional Republicans are going to chart a bold course of real change or they are going to suffer decisive losses this November,” he wrote for Human Events. Gingrich sees John McCain’s strength in opinion polls as “a sign of the gap between the McCain brand of independence and the GOP brand.” His prescription for House Republicans: Repeal the gas tax for the summer, cutting domestic discretionary spending accordingly. Redirect the oil being put into the national petroleum reserve onto the open market. Introduce a “more energy at lower cost with less environmental damage and greater national security bill” as a replacement for the Warner-Lieberman “tax and trade” bill. Establish an earmark moratorium for one year and pledge to uphold the presidential veto of bills with earmarks through the end of 2009. Overhaul the census and cut its budget radically. Implement a space-based, GPS-style air traffic control system. Declare English the official language of government. Protect the workers’ right to a secret ballot. Remind Americans that judges matter.
Excerpts from Randy’s column today:
If there’s one place that’s synonymous with family fun, it’s Baghdad. So it didn’t surprise me to hear that American developers are planning to build a Disney-style amusement park in downtown Baghdad. Right next to the Green Zone.
I’m not kidding. You can’t make this stuff up. It’s too crazy.
According to news reports, the Pentagon has given the green light to the attraction, which will include a cultural center, condos, shopping malls and restaurants around a lagoon, amusement rides and a giant skateboard park.
Thrill-seekers will love it. Talk about white-knuckle excitement — imagine being on the top of a giant Ferris wheel when the city’s electricity goes out! And the mortar rounds start coming in.
Those screams you hear? Just people having fun.
Baghdad residents, especially the children, need ‘normal’ experiences and outlets for fun. But are we really the ones to organize the good times?
My guess is that Iraqis don’t want a Cheesecake Factory. They just want us to leave.
U.S. troop deaths from postwar suicide might outnumber combat fatalities, according to Thomas Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health, the government’s top psychiatric research arm.
It’s a shocking reminder of the ongoing and hidden costs of the Iraq war.
Insel blamed the problem in part on a failure to provide adequate care for returning soldiers.
His remarks came on the heels of a Rand Corp. study last month indicating that of the more than 1.6 million military members who’ve served in Iraq or Afghanistan, about 300,000 suffer from depression or post-traumatic stress disorder — and only about half of those sought treatment. And for those receiving treatment, about half received substandard care.
It’s good that the Defense Department recently ramped up efforts to ensure that soldiers who seek mental health treatment aren’t stigmatized — 6 in 10 military enlistees in a recent survey said they believed that coming forward would hurt their careers.
Another key factor, according to Insel, is that many community mental health centers, especially in rural areas, aren’t prepared or equipped to handle the problem.
Get out your handkerchiefs. State Rep. Bill Otto, R-LeRoy, channeled his frustrations over Gov. Kathleen Sebelius’ coal-plant vetoes into a song, “Home on the Range: 2020 version,†sung by candlelight onÂ
“Students enrolled in a $6 billion federal reading program that is at the heart of the No Child Left Behind law are not reading any better than those who don’t participate,†the Washington Post reported. The study released last week by the Education Department’s research arm found that students in schools that use Reading First, which provides grants to improve elementary reading, scored about the same on comprehension tests as their peers in schools that did not receive such money. Investigators previously found that some federal officials who helped oversee the phonics-focused program had financial ties to publishers of Reading First materials, the Post reported.
Seven Wichita public schools use the Reading First program. Has it been effective here? Yes, said Sue Farag, executive director of the district’s elementary learning services. She said that trend data shows significant gains in reading in each grade level from kindergarten through third grade.
However, the new study questions whether improvements in reading scores are because of the Reading First curriculum or because teachers are spending more time on reading instruction.
Among other benefits, the restaurant smoking ban approved this week by the Wichita City Council could help discourage teenagers from taking up the habit.
That’s according to a Massachusetts study indicating that teens who lived in towns with strict restaurant smoking bans were 40 percent less likely to become regular smokers.
“When kids grow up in an environment where they don’t see smoking, they are going to think it’s not socially acceptable,†said Michael Siegel of the Boston University School of Public Health, the study’s lead author. “If they perceive a lot of other people are smoking, they think it’s the norm.â€
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich saw more than a loss for his team in last weekend’s special congressional election in Louisiana, where a district went Democratic for the first time in 33 years: “Either congressional Republicans are going to chart a bold course of real change or they are going to suffer decisive losses this November,” he wrote for Human Events. Gingrich sees John McCain’s strength in opinion polls as “a sign of the gap between the McCain brand of independence and the GOP brand.” His prescription for House Republicans: Repeal the gas tax for the summer, cutting domestic discretionary spending accordingly. Redirect the oil being put into the national petroleum reserve onto the open market. Introduce a “more energy at lower cost with less environmental damage and greater national security bill” as a replacement for the Warner-Lieberman “tax and trade” bill. Establish an earmark moratorium for one year and pledge to uphold the presidential veto of bills with earmarks through the end of 2009. Overhaul the census and cut its budget radically. Implement a space-based, GPS-style air traffic control system. Declare English the official language of government. Protect the workers’ right to a secret ballot. Remind Americans that judges matter.
