Tag Archives: 2012 Election

News

Bobby Jindal cuts spending in Lousiana and imposes accountability

1 Comment
Bobby and Supriya Jindal
Bobby and Supriya Jindal: no teleprompter needed

UPDATE: Welcome visitors from the Anchoress! Thanks for the link! New visitors, please take a look around. My blog is 50% news and policy analysis, 50% defending Christianity in practical ways.

Found this recent blog post over at Governor Bobby Jindal’s blog. (H/T The Maritime Sentry).

Previously, I had blogged about his refusal to take bailout funds, his defense of Rush Limbaugh on CNN, and his plans for education reform in Louisiana.

In the new post, he talks about cutting spending and imposing more reporting and accountability on the government departments:

Our budget will decrease by 9.8 percent compared to last year’s budget, including a 12.7 percent decrease in state funds… We have asked agencies and departments across state government to provide meaningful performance data, so that we can target underperforming and out-of-date programs while protecting high performing programs from severe reductions.

He outlines specific measures to deal with the economic downturn:

School funding based on performance

First, are calling on the Board of Regents to implement a new funding formula that will reform higher education spending. While the current formula too often rewards enrollment alone and results in duplication, a new formula should reward performance, and, for example, encourage schools to target specific programs that will provide degrees in high demand professions – aligning funding with our state’s economic needs.

Eliminate unnecessary government departments

Next, we will create a Commission on Streamlining Government, whose mission will be to examine agencies and departments throughout state government to ensure that their roles and missions are still relevant today.

Improve efficiency of civil service

Third, we will work to reduce the size of state government by implementing civil service reforms that encourage state workers to do their jobs well – not just to reach tenure.

Facilitate future spending cuts

Dedicated funds will have to be just as transparent as discretionary funds, and will sunset every four years beginning in 2010. We will change the current laws so that discretionary funds can be cut up to 10 percent, whereas currently they can only be cut 5 percent, and to remove the two year limit on cutting these funds.

Improve transparency and accountability in education spending

Finally, we will reform the current MFP funding process for our state’s K-12 schools. As the MFP funds are given to school district as a block grant, there is not enough accountability for how the funds are spent. We will require that beginning in FY11 districts must fully account for how these dollars are spent, and the Department of Education will develop an easy to use website allowing taxpayers to see how their hard-earned dollars are being spent.

The post goes on to discuss other initiatives, such as increasing economic growth. And that is when you read this startling statement:

The retention and expansion of jobs has been a top priority of this administration, and we will continue working to expand our economy in the coming months and years. In December, we were the only state in the nation to add jobs, and in January, we were the only state in the nation whose unemployment rate when down and not up.

Sigh. Shouldn’t we have elected Bobby Jindal instead of Mr. Teleprompter-Reader?

To find out more about Bobby Jindal, check out these links:

Interview with Rush Limbaugh (PDF)
The American Spectator: Hope Floats on the Bayou
RedState.com: Bobby Jindal Saves Louisiana
Townhall.com: The Future of Conservatism (Isn’t Running for President)
The Weekly Standard: Another Winner from Winn Parish
The National Review: The Governor Is Right
The Wall Street Journal: Bayou Boy Wonder
Townhall.com: Want real hope and change? Try Louisiana

News

Mark Sanford and Bobby Jindal refuse bailout funds

7 Comments
Governor Mark Sanford
Governor Mark Sanford

I noticed some posts at the Maritime Sentry about Governor Mark Sanford. If Bobby Jindal can’t save us in 2012, then Mark Sanford is my second choice. Everybody knows that Jindal is turning down bailout funds. Here is Bobby Jindal on the Hugh Hewitt show explaining why he is refusing the bailout funds, on how he intends to deal with the economic downturn in his state budget. Dynamite!

But Maritime Sentry has the story on Mark Sanford’s refusal to take bailout funds. Here, they link to this Forbes article, entitled “Why Mark Sanford Matters: Small-government conservatives have found their champion.”

Here is an excerpt from the article:

Sanford’s opposition to President Obama’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, and in particular his insistence on using up to a fourth of his state’s stimulus funds to pay down debt or refusing it outright, has fast made him a folk hero to conservatives.

I am a little concerned by his opposition to the Iraq war, because I feel that it was a successful action against terrorism with strategic gains that far outweighed the costs. I approve of his small government stand, though. The National Taxpayer’s Union also approves:

The 362,000-member National Taxpayers Union (NTU) has applauded South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford (R) and Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) for their decisions this week to refuse part of the federal stimulus package earmarked for their respective states. Sanford will accept $700 million only if the President allows him to use it to pay down debts rather than create new spending obligations. Perry has refused outright $555 million for expansion of state unemployment benefits.

Maritime Sentry also links to this 5-minute video, in which Sanford explains why he is turning down the bailout money. He doesn’t want Obama to be able to impose taxes on his state later, if he takes the bailout money today.

The Democrats doesn’t like federalism much. The DNC is even running ads in South Carolina against Sanford for refusing to take the money, and the attached strings. I found a statement about these DNC ads over at his blog. Jindal is also taking heat from unions and other economically-illiterate left-wing groups in his state.

UPDATE 1: Here is the transcript of Bobby Jindal’s interview on the Hugh Hewitt show. (H/T Binky @ Free Canuckistan!)

UPDATE 2: Here is the first part of an interview with Mark Sanford conducted by the Acton Institute, which specializes in free market capitalism and its relationship to religious liberty. (H/T Binky @ Free Canuckistan!)

News

Bobby Jindal pushes education reform in Lousiana

5 Comments
Governor Jindal speaks about budget reform
Governor Jindal speaks about budget reform

Last year, my favorite Governor, Bobby Jindal, passed several laws to address discipline problems in the schools. One bill’s goal was to re-establish discipline in classrooms by empowering teachers. Another bill sought to protect teachers from frivolous lawsuits. A third toughens penalties for students who are absent or tardy. That was a great start, especially since it was miles away from the typical teacher union plan to spend more money without any guarantee of better student achievement.

But he goes even further here, in a post dated 2/17/2009. First, he expands the laws governing discipline in the classroom even further.

We will give teachers more authority to remove students from the classroom for unruly behavior, require that parents be notified when their child is removed, and administrators will have to give their teachers feedback and management skills to help them work with misbehaving students.

Additional plans to increase discipline include requiring that suspended students make up missed work, permitting courts to help our schools hold parents accountable for attending mandatory intervention programs with their kids, and to allow schools to work with the courts to enforce truancy penalties. These steps will ensure that not only teachers and administrators will be taking a more active role in discipline – parents will be held accountable as well.

He also proposes to strengthen charter schools.

…we will require that our public elementary and secondary education boards use a high-quality third party review process for approving charter school applications. By ensuring that all applications are measured by the same high-quality standards, we can make certain that only the best applications are approved.

The regulation of charter schools is OK because as I understand it, charter schools are public schools. And lastly, he proposes something that the teacher unions and children will hate, but that parents and taxpayers will love: teacher and student evaluation criteria.

…we will work to implement a comprehensive value-added assessment model, which will aid our schools in better determining teacher effectiveness and student improvement. Our state has completed nationally recognized research, which was recently praised by the National Council on Teacher Quality, dealing with the use of value-added data well-positions in teacher preparation programs to improve our current system. This model takes student achievement into account, which better informs our parents, teachers, and kids on the progress our students are making.

The article also mentions a dropout prevention program that is coming out soon. The press release goes on to discuss budget reforms and coastal infrastructure. He proposes web sites to make budget expenditures transparent to the taxpayers, as well as subjecting all spending to accountability standards.

Bobby Jindal, along with Mark Sanford in South Carolina, are my two favorite governors. Being a person of color myself, it is a real joy for me to see an Indian-American man universally regarded as the savior of the Republican party. In the Republican primaries of 2008, I favored Fred Thompson, because he had good ideas. But Jindal is a policy genius. And at 38 years old, he has youth, charisma and passion. What we need in the Republican party are compelling ideas, and people who are willing to debate with our opponents in order to convince them.

To find out more about Bobby Jindal, check out these links:

Interview with Michael Medved (audio, 25 minutes)
Interview with Rush Limbaugh (PDF)
The American Spectator: Hope Floats on the Bayou
RedState.com: Bobby Jindal Saves Louisiana
Townhall.com: The Future of Conservatism (Isn’t Running for President)
The Weekly Standard: Jindal All the Way
The National Review: The Governor Is Right
The Wall Street Journal: Bayou Boy Wonder
Townhall.com: Want real hope and change? Try Louisiana