Fauci says there needs to be a stimulus bill to reopen the schools. Even though many schools never closed and there’s been no problem.
This is typical Democrat stuff that drove me nuts even when I was a Democrat. They believe in the magical quality of money. If there’s any problem at all, throw money at it. Money will make the boo-boo go away! There’s absolutely no indication that teacher unions will agree to come back to the classroom if more plastic crap is purchased. None. But let’s spend first and figure out the consequences later.
Clarissa's Blog 
I was dismayed to read an article by the WSJ editorial board that the US Federal debit is now 100% of GDP.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-pandemic-spending-hangover-11613173947?mod=opinion_lead_pos1
“The last time federal debt exceeded 100% of GDP was in 1946. Debt held by the public never exceeded 40% of GDP even during the Reagan defense buildup, and it reached 47.9% in 1993 before declining until the 2008 recession. It has kept growing since, and exploded in the last two years, as the nearby chart shows.”
I have to stay off the internet if I want to know anything good these days. Time to go watch the birds eat walnuts and peanut butter. Anything is better than the harbingers of doom from the far reaches of the internet.
LikeLike
What infuriates me is that public schools have remained closed with the excuse that it’s “not safe” while Catholic schools have long since opened with no problems. That reveals that their argument is just an excuse for the public school teachers to sit at home while collecting a paycheck on the taxpayers’ dime. Science shows that there is minimal risk to teachers of getting exposed to covid from students and students are at an extremely low risk of getting it. Meanwhile, the rest of us are all having to go out and do our jobs. Why are teachers being paid to sit at home?
LikeLiked by 1 person
It drives me absolute nuts. This is hypocrisy that has nothing to do with science. All private schools where I live have been open with no interruption since August. Everybody is perfectly fine. No outbreaks, no sick teachers. It’s all fine. But the public school down the road barely managed to open two days a week this month. It’s ridiculous.
LikeLike
As far as I can tell…
Either US teachers unions have been coopted by those wanting to eliminate most brick and mortar schools in favor of social media….
Most US teachers unions are made up of blithering idiots who are far too stupid to be allowed around children who need an education….
Any other hypothesis that fits the data is welcom but right now I’m stuck at those two….
LikeLike
“Either US teachers unions have been coopted by those wanting to eliminate most brick and mortar schools in favor of social media….
Most US teachers unions are made up of blithering idiots who are far too stupid to be allowed around children who need an education….
Any other hypothesis that fits the data is welcom but right now I’m stuck at those two….”
The most efficient way to raid a government budget is via something that is national, centralised, and digital, since being national means that contracts can be filled in every state, while being centralised means that only one or a handful of people own the entity, and while being digital means that all business records are easily manipulated.
Since there are only a relatively small number of teachers unions, all you have to do in order to be awarded a multi billion dollar possibly multi year contract is promise a payment of money and job afterwards to union officials.
At the same time, political donations and promises of jobs (or immediate awarding of jobs to those close to the politician) go to the politicians who sign off on the spending bill.
Since the fist year of funding is easiest to ensure, contracts are signed, goods are purchased etc followed by a report being done on the company that naturally shows it to be very profitable.
The company is then offered publicly or to institutional investors (eg pension funds including those to do with teachers) which yields a massive profit to the people who put the deal together as well as those at the institutional investor.
The retirement savings of teachers are now invested in the company, which means that after the first round of funding is approved and spent, the company board, teachers unions, and teachers themselves will demand another 4 years or 6 years or whatever more spending bills also be approved so that more contracts go to that company to ensure its value and thereby guarantee the value of their own retirement portfolios.
According to this model, wasteful spending is more profitable for the company, which incentivises waste and stupid spending.
FYI I have seen similar scams play out in real life.
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s also much easier to centrally collect income tax data on people employed by large corporations rather than small local businesses. It is especially difficult in the case of people who work for cash or tips.
Progressive taxation means that one person earning 200k pays more tax than four people earning 50k.
Guess which kind of businesses are favored by central governments.
LikeLike
@ PaulS: In the beginning, I had a lot of trouble understanding why politicians and other political types allowed good businesses to be destroyed that they could have saved, or for so much waste to happen, or for so much opportunity to create good things to be missed.
Later, it became obvious that to the kinds of maniacs who run governments everywhere who want large central governments, it is good when the economy and everything that comes with it is destroyed, because in that moment when there is nothing left, the government is the last thing anyone can go to.
I don’t know if you’ve read Marx’s manifesto, but if you ever do, he sums up all of communism in a single sentence – “abolish all private property”. What we are seeing now is what he was talking about.
LikeLike