Fair Share Challenge: What Taxes Do For Me

This post is in response to a blogger challenge from my friend Isy. She was fed up with millionaires who don't want to pay their fair share of taxes, as well as tea baggers who say silly things like "Get your filthy government hands off my Medicare!" She decided to write a post about her life, putting in boldfaced type anything that is funded or subsidized by taxes (federal, state, or local). I hope lots of bloggers take up the challenge and it makes its way all over the internet.

Now, some of you may know I have been critical of local government corruption in Baltimore, particularly when it comes to the degradation of The Senator Theatre, which got very limited funding when Tom Kiefaber was running it, but just got a lot more funding now that Baltimore City has taken it over and chosen some politically connected cronies to run it. It's important to be aware of it and speak out when tax dollars are being misused and public officials are acting inappropriately, but we all also have a lot of things to be thankful for that are funded by taxes -- things we almost couldn't live without.

Yesterday, I drove by city streets to Whole Foods, where I bought yummy stuff to eat. Many of the farmers who grew it probably received subsidies. Perhaps Whole Foods received subsidies as well, to build their store there. I know they have received such government help in other communities. Everything that was for sale at the store had conveniently arrived there on trucks that traveled over highways and city streets. Thank heavens for that, because I wouldn't want to shop at a store with empty shelves!

After I went to Whole Foods, I drove over more city streets to get to the farmer's market. Lots of delicious stuff there for sure! It was a lot of driving that day, but luckily, my car doesn't use much gasoline.

Tonight, my friend is coming to visit me, and she's arriving at Penn Station by Amtrak. Maybe while she's here, we'll visit the art museum, which we enjoyed last time she was here. Or maybe we'll go to the Inner Harbor and see the aquarium or the U.S.S. Constellation.

Later this year, I'm going to Massachusetts. I'll be using the interstate highway system to get there. It would be a pretty circuitous and maybe impossible route if it weren't for all those bridges built in the 1930s by the WPA. All of that infrastructure is getting quite old now, yet we all still rely on it every day. I often see Department of Transportation workers out on the highways and bridges fixing them. The resulting traffic jams are a bit of a pain, but it would be even worse if they never got repaired! Getting the funding to repair our nation's infrastructure is a continual political challenge, largely because of arguments in Congress like the one last week, where some people thought it was more important to subsidize Bill Gates and Dick Cheney and other wealthy people than to fund basic programs that benefit us all.

My sister just got a job working for the school system. Her kids are being educated in the same school system. Her husband works at a non-profit. My other sister works for a public university. Her ex-husband works at a library. My parents used to work at a different public university, but now they're retired. They're getting social security and Medicare. I hope those things are still available when I'm their age.

I've started selling things online, which I love so far. It means I can work from home, but sometimes I have to go to the post office to put things in the mail. I used to work for various corporations, but then I got injured. I'm glad I was able to get state disability and worker's comp, but it's a good thing I didn't have to rely on them entirely, and had savings, because they wouldn't have been enough. I'm thankful too that there's still some government regulation of the banking industry or my savings and my retirement fund would probably be long gone.

It's a struggle to start a new career, and I'm no longer receiving any disability, but fortunately, I haven't had to go on food stamps or anything like that. It's nice to know they'd be there if I needed them. I wonder if I would qualify for any government grants for small business, but I haven't looked into it.

I don't know what the corporations I used to work for would have done without public schools and public universities. Even with those systems providing them with skilled and trained workers, they were still having a hard time finding enough people with the right skills.

I have cousins who are in various branches of the military. I hope those who are still serving stay safe.

I've had a couple of friends who had to go to hospitals recently. I'm glad they got good care.

I also want to note my gratitude for electricity. Without it, I'd be writing this with a pen by candlelight, and you'd have trouble reading it.

UPDATE: The Fair Share Challenge now has its own blog!

Baltimore City Finds $40 Million They "Lost"

Associated Press reported yesterday that Baltimore City government has found $40 MILLION dollars it "lost." Given the way this city seems to work, was it "lost" in some city official's private account gathering interest? One can only speculate on how people lose $40 MILLION.

This money will reportedly be used to renovate schools, THEATERS, and libraries. Well, hey! Why not help The Senator with some of that money before it's too late and the theatre closes to be gambled away to an uncertain future? They only need $2 million, ideally. Even $1 million would keep the theatre open.

Please note that the folks that "lost" $40 MILLION are the same people that keep smearing Tom Kiefaber in the press for being a "bad businessman." I'm pretty sure Tom has never misplaced even, say, $1 million. I'd also like to note that the Baltimore Sun, which has been complicit in the smear job that has attempted to make Tom the "bad guy" for having debts, is currently in Chapter 11 itself.

Oh, the irony!

Video Diary: Edwards Speaks to NEA Annual Meeting

Yesterday, I went to Philadelphia to see John Edwards speak at the NEA annual meeting, then later at the ACORN presidential candidates forum. Today's diary focuses on the NEA event. Tomorrow I will post one on ACORN.

Edwards gave a rousing speech on education that was well received by the NEA audience. Video and some key points:

Part 1 of the video:

Edwards started by making an announcement that, although Congress has recently raised the minimum wage, he would go further as president and raise it to $9.50 an hour by 2012.

It's time to get rid of pension offsets for educators. Teachers deserve to get Social Security too. This policy announcement was greeted with applause so loud and sustained, that I couldn't hear the next paragraph of what he said. Here is a short video of that portion of the speech from the Edwards campaign, which is easier to hear:

He made a series of points about education:

The president must listen to teachers, and should bring back the teacher in residence program.

Early childhood education needs to be expanded.

No Child Left Behind needs to be dealt with and fixed. While talking about No Child Left Behind, he held up a T-shirt that said "a child is more than a test score." This generated a lot of applause from the audience.

Edwards said that standardized tests don't work and asked what the intent of No Child Left Behind really was. He pointed out that when the president has a program called No Child Left Behind, but doesn't fund it, the real intent is probably to undermine the public schools and make room for voucher programs.

Part 2 of the video:

Edwards talked about empowering teachers, creating second chance schools for dropouts, and his College for Everyone program, which would pay for tuition and books for the first year of college for kids who are willing to work 10 hours a week while they're there.

He emphasized his support for the public schools, which all of his children have attended, and said that we should not drain resources away from them with voucher programs.

Part 3 of the video:

In the final part of his speech, he spoke of organized labor as the greatest antipoverty movement in American history. His support for the Employee Free Choice Act, which would allow any worker to join a union by signing a card, earned him a standing ovation.

After his speech, he was asked two questions sent in by NEA members.

The first question asked how he would close the achievement gap by breaking down racial and economic barriers.

Question on breaking down economic and racial barriers.

His answer included expanding early childhood education, incentives for teachers to teach in poor communities, and getting parents more involved, but then he went beyond that to address some of his plans for eliminating poverty.

The last question he was asked was about No Child Left Behind. His answer was hilarious. I'm not going to describe it. You have to watch the video.

Question on No Child Left Behind.

After his speech to the NEA, Edwards gave a short press conference. It was held in a corner of a noisy public area of the conference center, so even though I was standing quite close to him, it was very difficult to hear what he said. I did manage to record a short video of his announcement about his plan to raise the minimum wage.

From what I could hear of the rest of the press conference, he mentioned the following points:

He said he doesn't think anyone else has proposed College for Everyone.

On No Child Left Behind, he said major changes are needed. The tests are intrusive, and they don't take into account struggling schools. There should be SWAT teams to help struggling schools. We need tests that are more responsive to the needs of states and individual schools. They need flexibility to use their own testing methods. In many cases this would yield more accurate information on student progress.

Asked how he pays for his College for Everyone program, he said it would be paid for by changing the way we do student loans. We can save upwards of $3 billion by making loans available directly from the government to students.