Comments on: Pawlenty Disputes the Messenger, Not the Facts

By: Andrew Olson

Andrew Olson — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 20:33:22 +0000

You’re welcome Rick, though next time I would appreciate it if you would ask for my money, instead of taking it by force.
It is my firm belief that individuals such as yourself did not need the sort of government sudsidy that you used in order to become educated and succesful. You sort of hint at that with the statement “probably” as you do know that it was you who performed well enough in school in order to be accepted to a medical school and it was you who could have either went to a bank and gotten a loan (even if it was high interest) or you could have applied for a privately funded scholarship. I certainly don’t blame you for utilizing the government programs to your advantage, but let’s look to a better, more efficient way to do things especially in a period of high unemployment showcasing the unsustainability of these government programs.

By: Rick

Rick — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 21:59:57 +0000

i would like to thank Andrew Olson for subsidizing my education. I came from a family of modest means who could not afford to send me to a private school. My public service after college included the Peace Corps and other volunteer programs. Those volunteer positions qualified me for low interest loans, and state/federal grants etc. to continue my education. Without those, I probably would not have been able to become the physician I am today. So, Mr. Olson, from myself and thousands others, thank you for your tax money.

By: Roseann Lloyd

Roseann Lloyd — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 17:03:12 +0000

RESPONSE TO PAWLENTY’S RADIO INTERVIEW FEB. 3, 2010
Once upon a time there was talk of making the University
of Minnesota one of the greatest public research universities
in the world. In fact there was talk of becoming one of “The Top
Ten.” (Not so long ago, this goal was given of one of
the reasons for cutting General College and other services.)

The University of Minnesota has been known for great accomplishments.
How did the University become known for its open heart surgery? How did
the University develop high-yield grains, “saving the world from hunger”?
Norman Borlaug received the Nobel Prize for this work.
Why is the University well known for psychology
and other fields? Why are students from China and India coming here
to study engineering, and technology–and bringing their solid tuition money?
It came from public support, appreciation, funding, and hard-dedicated work
by the staff, professors and researchers.

Once upon a time, “The U.” had respect.
Now there is sarcastic talk of professors who “only”
teach one class (See StarTrib website).

To these comments, I say, stop a minute and think: if you were going
to cut open someone’s chest, i.e. be a professor who does high-level
research, would you have time to teach 180 students? Would you want
to be the person on the operating table with a doctor who stayed up all night grading first-year papers on basic musculature?

A great university needs both great teachers and great researchers.

Stop with the sarcasm and support our University of Minnesota with respect.

Not only is “The U” being attacked with sarcasm the budget is being savaged.
All colleges have been directed to cut their budgets by 30%. That means bigger classes,
less-effective classes (online courses), fewer professors, less time for research.
It means people leaving the state.
It means that “The U” will definitively not be on the Top 10 List of Research
Universities in the world.

By: Andrew Olson

Andrew Olson — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 16:59:19 +0000

Where did I say that we should eliminate free k-12 education? Conservatives want to reform public education, not eliminate it (though yes, if we could start all over again conservatives might keep it out of the state constitution). As far as “dog eat dog”, our system is not a zero-sum game. No one becomes wealthy on an island by themselves in a capitalist system. We have voluntary contracts that benefit both parties and create wealth for the whole country.

By: Andrew Olson

Andrew Olson — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 15:42:57 +0000

1. Of course our republic (note that it is not a democracy) is based upon checks and balances making it hard for the majority at a certain time to hold down the minority. The author claims that we’ve had conservative public policies for a decade. I’m sure that in his perspective they were conservative, but in reality conservatives didn’t have the power or will to pass real conservative reform. In that sense we agree that the governor wasn’t being fiscally responsible as the cuts weren’t nearly soon enough or large enough. Where were you in the months before Pawlenty used his power to unallot? I’d call that a fair attempt to work together.
2. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what hurts the creation and retention of high paying jobs. Government health care and public transportation are supported by the high paying jobs (i’m sure these government jobs are high paying as well, but we’re talking overall economic growth here). Our educational system is not poor and it is not making people leave the state. You’re confusing health care with insurance as pre-existing conditions are treated and not rejected by the hospitals in the sate, they just might not be subsidized by my insurance premiums that I was responsible enough to sign up for before my conditon existed. You might like to move to a system where health care is a right and all the high paying jobs subsidize everybody else to a greater degree than they currently do, but that isn’t going to create or retain those high paying jobs.
3. We both agree that our education system could perform better. It isn’t poor now, but it certainly has a lot of room to improve. I threw out the idea of giving tuition tax credits to families who send their kids to higher performing private schools. This helps the lower and middle class families far more than the rich families who already have their kids in the private schools. It’s possible this approach will be more expensive than the current approach, but it would achieve our goal of having more highly educated kids. As a conservative I’d like to less education spending, but if we have to pay for k-12 we might as well spend it on the schools that work, whether that be a traditional public school, public charter or private school.

By: Facebook User

Facebook User — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 15:38:47 +0000

Free education to our young is a guaranteed right.
I dread to even learn what conservatives like you think is a “real conservative policy.” I think, from previous posts, that it is every person for him/herself. Dog eat dog. Nobody compromises on anything. It doesn’t sound like any kind of peaceful or amicable solution for anyone. Bully your way into getting your way.
I think this guy has missed the point of democracy and guaranteed rights all along.

By: Cindy Swessel-Hofer

Cindy Swessel-Hofer — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 14:52:42 +0000

Andrew, You have missed a few relevant points in your analysis.
1- US democracy is based on compromise. No one, no party, no interest group gets everything they want. The governor and the Republican party have certainly had an opportunity to influence the dialogue much more over the past 10 years than those that were not in power. With that said, we are here, with a deficit that rivals anything that our state has seen before even with all of the governor’s talk about fiscal responsiblity. This doesn’t look like fiscal responsibility to me and because the governor decided to NOT work with the legislature on the budget and decided that he alone was up to the task of “balancing” the budget, he can also take responsibility for the effects of his actions.
2 – Yes we do like high paying jobs here. I doubt that you or I can provide the analysis to determine exactly what is going to bring the high paying jobs here in the future. Maybe it IS health care or transportation. The point is no one knows but we do know what will make people leave the state. Things like a poor educational system, like not being able to drive a car without hitting pot holes and incurring thousands of dollars in damages, and like not being able to have any health care or getting rejected because you have a pre-existing condition. While some may think, good riddance to “those” people, that will further diminish an already diminishing tax base. We need jobs and we need our citizens. We need them to ensure that we do not lose representation in the federal legislature as we participate in the 2010 census.
3- I see that we are sliding in our rankings from an education perspective and there is no plateau, just further sliding as far as the eye can see. Your distinction that we are only moving from 12th to 15th is disturbing. Did you think we would drop from 12th to 25th in a short time? It will be a slow slide to mediocrity. What is the cutoff for being mediocre? Is it 25th or 34th? Do we have to move to 40th before everyone agrees there is a problem? Once we get there, how long will it take for us to move up again in the rankings? That will also be slow and painful.
4- People that send their children to private school are choosing to pay for their children’s education twice if that is the way you would like to view it. To me, every Minnesota citizen has a responsibility to ensure that the our children (all our children, not just yours) are prepared for the future. Thus, those that have no children and those whose children are grown pay along with those that chose to put their children in a private school. Anyone can choose to put their children in private school. That is an individual’s choice but it doesn’t mean that the taxpayers have to subsidize that alternative choice of schooling.
5 – Finally, we need our neighbors and we need the people we don’t agree with as well as those that we do agree with. We need people in outstate MN as much as we need those that are in the cities. We need people in the suburbs and on the iron range. We need our farmers and we need our small business owners. We NEED everyone to make Minnesota a better place. Let us try to find those things that we can agree upon and work towards those things. Let’s support our legislature representatives, no matter what party, on those items that we can compromise on. Most of us want a strong Minnesota and while we may not agree on how to get there, if we start from that common base, I think there are things that we can work together on.

By: Andrew Olson

Andrew Olson — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 22:08:26 +0000

If you think that conservatives had the last decade to pick and choose among their favorite policies, you are mistaken. The governor has stopped new taxes but he surely hasn’t made the cuts that conservatives would like to see.

We sure do like high-paying jobs here in Minnesota and taxing these high paying jobs in order to pay for more government health care, education and public transportation isn’t going to create more of these high-paying jobs.

I’m confused as to you think things have changed dramatically in regards to education spending based upon your reports? We went from 12th to 15th and the kids are still 8th best in terms of the 8th grade and 4th grade standards. It is a big stretch to say that decreased spending lead to the decrease in performance as many factors are at play. Many states spent more and their scores were worse and so on…

We could start by putting in a real conservative policy and giving tuition tax credits who put their kids in private school so they are not paying for their child’s education twice.