HOW INEPT IS KERRY?

I just have to keep asking the question.

posted by David 8:18 AM

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LESSON LEARNED—NOT!

The Des Moines Register editorial page admits that the for-profit Edison school in Des Moines has made significant progress in educating its students:

In August 1999, the Davenport school board voted 4-3 to let Edison Schools Inc. manage Jefferson Elementary for five years. This March it voted 7-0 to renew the contract for another five. One reason for the unanimous enthusiasm had to be reading test scores. They have soared.

Among all fourth-graders, 57.1 percent scored at or above the proficient level in reading comprehension on the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills in 2003-04, compared to 38.3 percent last year.

The achievement gap is closing, too, between African-American and Caucasian students.

After the acknowledging its success, the editorialists write:

That's impressive progress, and there may be lessons for other schools struggling to raise test scores.

And what lesson are we to draw? That private enterprise works better than government? That the threat of losing a contract compelled Edison to succeed? That the profit motive should be introduced to more schools? Well,

one of most obvious being that success doesn't come cheap.

Folks, that is beyond parody.

posted by David 8:16 AM

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DIDN’T HEAR THE NEWS?

In their gratuitous editorial on the Ahmad Chalabi matter, the Des Moines Register editorialists appear to not have read the news lately:

[Chalabi] apparently was a major source of the false intelligence about the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

That editorial appeared about nine days after this story first showed up in the news media. You would think it might give the editorialists a bit of pause before repeating the charge about “false intelligence” of WMDs. On the other hand, we’re talking about the Register.

posted by David 8:14 AM

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WHO NEEDS TO READ WHAT?

A few housekeeping bits today on some things in the Des Moines Register that I missed during my March hiatus. First, this editorial:

A thistle to some members of the Iowa General Assembly for their embarrassingly childish reaction to a contrary Supreme Court ruling on gambling taxes. They threaten to sock the racetracks with a punitive (and unconstitutional?) property tax, and one senator suggested justices who ruled against the state be kicked off the bench. If they believe the court is wrong, they should ask the voters to amend the constitution. Meanwhile, get over it, equalize the gambling-tax rates and consult a textbook on how the American system of government works with three separate-but-equal branches.[Italics added]

Perhaps the Register editorialists need to consult a copy of the Federalist Papers. In Federalist No. 51, James Madison (that guy who wrote the Constitution) wrote:

…it is not possible to give to each department an equal power of self-defense. In republican government, the legislative authority necessarily predominates.

posted by David 8:56 AM

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OH YAY!

Also, the Register editorial board noted a recent award received by the city of Burlington:

Burlington has more economic-development success stories in its 50-block downtown business district on the banks of the Mississippi River than a city twice its size should expect. Monday, Burlington (pop. 26,839) won recognition very few cities of any size could expect: The city was one of five winners of the Great American Main Street Award.

Burlington was one of five American communities recognized by at the National Main Streets conference in Albuquerque, N.M. The program, sponsored by the National Trust for Historic Preservation and administered in Iowa by the Main Street Iowa program, recognizes community economic-development efforts that put a premium on restoring economic and cultural vitality along with historic downtown districts and buildings.

And, apparently the Main Street Iowa program has been a big success for Iowa:

Over the past 18 years it has added nearly 200 new businesses, 460 jobs and 383 building renovations representing $28.2 million in private investment and more then 34,000 hours of volunteer labor.

A government program that has, supposedly, created jobs! No wonder the Register went ga ga over the award.

However, it didn’t take but about 10 minutes of Googling to find this story that states Burlington has lost 1,800 jobs since 1996.

But hey, with the 460 jobs created by Main Street Iowa, we're only down 1,340 jobs.

posted by David 8:55 AM

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WELL, THAT DEAD HORSE…

…needed another beating.

In an attempt to convince us that socialized medicine rules and America’s health-care system sucks, the Des Moines Register ran another such editorial two weeks ago Monday. The inaccuracies begin in the first paragraph:

The United States spends twice as much as Australia, England and Canada.

Actually, the U.S. almost spends twice as much as England, and spends about 25% more than Australia and Canada. You can look it up.

The Register also claims:

United States has a system that irrationally ties health care to employment, making a job the source of coverage for millions of Americans.

That’s true, but whose fault is that? Well, it’s the fault of the tax code, which gives the tax break to the employer, not the worker. This was due to the wage controls imposed by the Roosevelt Administration during the Great Depression. In other words, a government-caused boondoggle.

They also throw out some hysterics:

Then there was the especially troubling study conducted by Rand Corp. This took the most comprehensive look yet at the quality of health care in this country. What did researchers find? Patients get about half the care recommended for conditions from heart disease to diabetes, regardless of where in the United States they live.

But that doesn’t mean that our health care is worse than other nations. The Rand study only looks at the U.S. The Register hopes that you’ll infer that patients in other countries get 80% or 90% of recommended care. But the study doesn’t show that. And I wonder, if other nations get more recommended care, why do Canadians cross the border to get treatment here in the U.S.?

The Register also cherry picks its statistics:

A study published in Health Affairs, a policy journal, looked at five countries and found the quality of care in the United States is no better, even though this country spends far more money. A fragmented system was given as one of the reasons for the higher costs, and the study found the United States had the worst five-year survival rates after kidney transplants of the nations examined.

Yes, we do have the worst five-year survival rate for kidney transplants and for avoiding Hepatitis B. But the study also shows that we are first in breast cancer survival, measles prevention, smoking prevention, and cervical cancer screening. We rank second in suicide prevention, asthma mortality, pertussis prevention, and cervical cancer survival rate. Funny how the Register leaves that out.

Last, let’s talk about this concept of “cost.” The Register’s implication is that a single-payer system would reduce the cost of health care in the U.S. However, the amount of money that is spent on health care is only one way of measuring cost. The time one waits for treatment is another type of cost. According to an August 24-31, 1998 article in BusinessWeek, the median wait for general surgery in Canada was 7.1 weeks For neurosurgery it was 16.5 weeks and for cardiovascular it was 18.2. The story recounts the death of a number of patients who could not find treatment in a timely fashion.

Yes, Canada, that system so admired by the Register editorialists.

posted by David 9:23 AM

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