Brazos County Democrats: Daily News

BCD Daily News for: April 11, 2008

GREETINGS FELLOW DEMOCRATS!

Check your facts on both candidates!!

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/02/dem_flipflops.html

Things we could do with ONE days war costs:

Provide health coverage for a year for 424,000 children

Build 84 brand new schools

Buy school lunches for a year for 1.2 million children

Provide 6,482 units of affordable housing

Pay the annual salaries of 12,500 new classroom teachers

Put 35,000 students through a 4-year state college

Jim Hightower’s Lowdown

(Jim Hightower’s Lowdown quoting the American Friends Service Committee)

Border Fence

A continuous 18-foot high environmentally damaging border fence is essential, right? Why then will there be at least two major gaps in the Texas fence; one at the River Bend Resort golf course and the other at Sharyland Plantation, a 6000-acre development of million dollar homes (which is owned by Ray Hunt of Dallas—a $35 million donor to the Bush library.)

(Jim Hightower’s Lowdown quoting the Texas Observer.)

Spreading Religion

One of President Bush’s favorite paintings which he has hung in the Oval Office is a cowboy image by W.H.D. Koerner. Bush has described the rider as a circuit-riding minister rushing to spread religion. It turns out the picture depicts a horse-thief fleeing a lynch mob.

The Illustrated President - Read this page for more information on this issue and see image of painting

Homeschoolers Who Don´t Learn Science Shouldn´t Receive a Diploma

Steve Shives
April 09, 2008

There are many, many things I find dubious about the practice of parents homeschooling their children. I wonder how a mother or father who has not been educated as a teacher, who in many cases has not even been to college her/himself, can possibly provide their child with as good an education as students receive in our much-maligned public schools. And I can´t help but think that these homeschool students, of whom there are several million in the United States, are being robbed of a crucial formative experience by not attending school with other people their age and being forced to interact with a diverse group of peers.

Most disturbing is the virulent strain of religious fundamentalism that is found in the lessons being taught homeschooled children, especially in the United States. Not all American homeschooling is religious—that´s not what I´m saying. I´ve known people personally who were homeschooled from a secular curriculum, and there are many others like them throughout the country. I think I´m safe in saying, however, that the majority of homeschooling in the U.S. is religious—specifically, fundamentalist Christian—in nature. This is no big secret.

http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/57938

A Weekend to Start Fixing the World

As Finance Ministers Convene Here, Multiple Crises Test Their Ability to Cope

By Neil Irwin and Michael A. Fletcher
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, April 11, 2008; D01

Financial markets are tumbling. The world economy is starting to sputter. Food prices have shot up so far, so fast, that there are riots in the streets of many poor nations.

It's a hard time to be one of the masters of the global economy.

Those leaders -- finance ministers from all over the world -- are gathering in Washington this weekend to sort out their reactions to the most profound global economic crises in at least a decade. The situation could reveal the limitations that international economic institutions face in dealing with the risks inherent to global capitalism.

"There's got to be something coming out of the weekend, a way to visibly assume public responsibility for trying to limit the damage that financial markets can do to our society," said Colin Bradford, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. "The pressure is on politicians this weekend to come up with an answer. . . . What is the power structure going to do about this?"

The Group of Seven finance ministers of major industrialized countries meet today, and the governing boards of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank will meet tomorrow and Sunday. Their agendas: in the case of the G-7 and IMF, countering the breakdown in financial markets; in the case of the World Bank, food inflation that threatens to drive more of the world's poorest people into starvation.

But these problems don't have obvious solutions, and it may be hard to achieve consensus on even modest steps that might improve the situation.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/10/AR2008041003867_pf.html

Brazos County Democratic Party
P.O. Box 4568
Bryan Texas 77805
979-779-5600 Fax 979-779-5601

America was not built on fear. America was built on courage, on imagination and an unbeatable determination to do the job at hand.
Harry S. Truman, Democrat, President of the United States of America

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