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County Commission Guilty. Now What?

Now that the KNS trial over Knox County Commission’s violation of Tennessee’s Sunshine Law has been decided, what should we expect next? And no, I’m not referring to whether or not Scott Moore will (be asked to) step down or not, or how the seats will eventually be filled.

I’m more interested in knowing if they media scrutiny of County government is now going to turn back onto the Mayor’s office and the events over there. One thing that became clear to the public, if it wasn’t clear already, is that there are definite factions opposing one another.

If the KNS doesn’t pursue the story vigorously, it could be viewed as support of the argument made by some Commissioners that the New Sentinel is biased towards Mayor Ragsdale. Should we then expect more hard hitting coverage from another angle? From another news outlet? Will it be initiated by the Commissioners damaged by the trial as a sort of counterpunch?

This has potential to get even more interesting.

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School Choice Has No Impact. And Your Point Is..?

Steven D. Levitt writes about some of his cohorts whose studies indicate that sending kids to “better” schools doesn’t guarantee better results.

Part of the answer is likely that the definition of “better” is based on outputs, like how high the test scores are at the school or what fraction of its students attend good colleges. That sort of metric ignores the fact that “better” schools tend to attract “better” kids. These are kids with strong families and good academic backgrounds. So even if the school is not at all good at adding value, it will still have the best outputs, because it had the best inputs. If the school does not have high value added, there is no reason to expect that a child who transfers there will do better than she did at her previous school. Parents don’t have good information on the inputs to a school, only the outputs, so it is difficult for them to accurately assess value added.

If this is an argument against school choice, it is a weak one. Parents should be able to choose what school their kid attends not because of the expected outcome, but because he is their kid!

In thinking about the broader implications of this research, it is important to bear in mind that the school choice program that Julie and Brian analyze is just one kind of school choice (albeit the most common one), operating within a single public school system. It differs from voucher programs or school choice across school districts, and increased competition may be more effective in those settings.

It is a very slippery slope to decide policy based completely on the predicted outcome without regard for the rights of the individual to choose. Here’s why…

In Levitt’s conclusions in his book, Freakonomics, he contends that the drop in crime rate of the 1990s was a result of Roe vs Wade. Essentially, many would be criminals from difficult socio-economic backgrounds were never born, and therefore never grew up to be criminals two decades later.

Assuming this is true, would it be a valid policy to require all mothers in stressed economic conditions to have ablortions? Would we set a policy to kill all babies born into difficult socio-economic conditions in order to reduce the crime rate later on? Of course not.

No matter the expected outcome, it is wrong to violate the rights of the individual to choose, so long as the choice does no harm to anyone else.

Sorry, but where we send our kids to school is none of anyone else’s business. Period.

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Verdict in Sunshine Law–Violations Occurred

From the KNS

Jurors this afternoon said commissioners did violate the Tennessee Open Meetings Act in the way they chose 12 replacements for term-limited officeholders.

Now what? How do we fix it? What is the fall out? Does anyone want to vote for me? 😀

***UPDATE***
From WBIR

Chancellor Fansler announced he will release a written decision based on the findings of the jury. His opinion will offer a remedy.

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You Mighta Heard By Now, We’re Doin’ a Little Survey

There were some pretty interesting results from my last poll–at least I thought they were interesting. I asked readers to choose (one) between free markets, free religion, free speech, and free beer.

With 50% of the vote, speech won pretty handily. I’d assume that the 29% who voted for beer were being funny. It’s easy when the punchline is provided, no? 14% chose free markets, and 7% chose free religion.

Why is this interesting? Mostly because free speech won so easily–much more easily than I would have predicted. I think I know why.

Scott HallIf you give me free speech, I can use it to get the rest of them. Okay, to get free beer it helps to be as handsome as ten movie stars, but you get the point.

There’s a reason why freedom of speech is the first right guaranteed in the Constitution. If we ever lose it, all is lost.

*** Bonus points to the people who know why wrestling great Scott Hall is pictured in this post.

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Loving The New Smoking Ban

[sarcasm]
Today is such a great day. This new smoking ban is absolutely amazing and has enriched my life in ways I never thought possible.

Water tastes sweeter, the air smells cleaner, and my wallet is fat the sun is shining bright, but not so bright that it is causing unnatural warming–that’s coming from somewhere else.

It’s not that I’ve changed my dining, shopping, or work habits that makes today so great. It’s the fact that thousands of businesses across our great state have been forced to bend to my personal wishes.

Finally, popular opinion has won out over individual property rights, and people no longer have the power to decide what types of otherwise legal activities they will allow on their own property. What a great day for individual liberty!!!

And how lucky are we that we no longer have the right responsibility to choose what business we want to patronize based on their smoking policy. The State made this decision for us. One less thing to worry about. What a relief!
[/sarcasm]

I have to ask again, how will this affect the number of DUI arrests?