Not-my-President Bush's new budget for 2006 is cutting 48 education programs totaling $4.3 billion - this includes Safe and Drug-free school grants, education technology grants, literacy programs, and other programs that mainly effect inner-city youth.
However, for balance he's decided to find room to train 70,000 teachers for AP math and science - recruiting 30,000 engineers and professionals to become teachers. The entire nation currently has only 32,000 AP teachers. We are going to triple the amount of AP classes. Which schools are going to get these new teachers? Probably not the ones where Even Start and literacy programs are being cut.
The idea that engineers would give up lucrative private sector jobs to come teach is absolutely ridiculous unless they were going to schools where they could focus on teaching instead of discipline; where classroom management skills weren't required. I know I wouldn't.
However, to truly balance the budget and cut down the deficit the President has prudently decided to add a 5 percent INCREASE in our defense budget. He can't find $4.8 billion to save education programs but he's found nearly $20 billion plus an additional $50 billion for a down payment on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.
Now get this trickery: Bush can claim that he has slashed the $2.2 billion dollars for 56 new F-22 fighters. However, he has simply restructured the contract so that instead of buying them all in the next two years he will buy 20 a year in 2008, 2009, 2010. So he is actually not getting rid of planes; he's buying 4 more! When is his presidency up again? Right, exactly when the new president comes into office and finds a bill collector from Lockheed Martin wanting payment for planes Bush ordered. Classic.
I guess the bright side is that when we finally have enough firepower to take on Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, North Korea, and anyone that needs to be "smoked out" many of us will be too dumb to be consciencous objectors. Unless, of course, you were fortunate enough to have new AP math and science teachers.
