'Round the Bend

At least the Republicans know how to win one war... the war on religious freedom. From the Washington Post (c/o Georgia10 at dKos):

With little public attention or even notice, the House of Representatives has passed a bill that undermines enforcement of the First Amendment's separation of church and state. The Public Expression of Religion Act - H.R. 2679 - provides that attorneys who successfully challenge government actions as violating the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment shall not be entitled to recover attorneys fees. The bill has only one purpose: to prevent suits challenging unconstitutional government actions advancing religion.
...
Such a bill could have only one motive: to protect unconstitutional government actions advancing religion. The religious right, which has been trying for years to use government to advance their religious views, wants to reduce the likelihood that their efforts will be declared unconstitutional. Since they cannot change the law of the Establishment Clause by statute, they have turned their attention to trying to prevent its enforcement by eliminating the possibility for recovery of attorneys' fees.

This is a truly insidious bill. Passage of the bill would mean that people who go to court over their 1st Amendment right not to be discriminated against on the basis of their religion would have to cover their attorney's fees themselves, even if they win the case. Except when they don't: this rule would only apply in cases on the establishment clause (i.e., you sue b/c religious fundamentalists are coercing you into doing something), not in ones on the free exercise clause (i.e., you want to perform some aspect of your religion in public or government space).

This bill is another big step in the fundamentalists' war to invalidate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, which codified protection from the very kind of religious discrimination that sent English settlers across the Atlantic to Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay in the first place. English Calvinists (Puritans) were required to pass Anglican (and, alternatively, Catholic) litmus tests in order to hold any government offices, among many other things. Puritans were treated as second-class citizens in the best of times, and enemies of the state in the worst, just for not being of the same religion as the guys running the government.

So they came here in the hopes of being able to practice whatever religion they damn well pleased without ever being asked to forsake it for someone's else by the government. That very same sentiment impelled Thomas Jefferson to insist upon an amendment to the new Constitution of the United States of America protecting the rights of those of a different religion than the president. Jefferson was so worried about matters of religious freedom because he was worried that, under the Constitution, the Congress and the President would be much more powerful than they were under the Articles of Confederation, and that they'd be tempted to impose their religion upon everyone else.

It appears that Mr. Jefferson was even more prescient than we gave him credit for.

You may be wondering why I wrote this post in a blog about the IN-02 race. But then again, you probably know exactly where I'm going with this.

Who voted for this bill eviscerating the Establishment Clause and bringing us a step closer to a fundamentalist theocracy?

Right again: Chris Chocola.

Number of coalition troops killed in Iraq: 2945
Number of US troops wounded in Iraq: 9286
Total number of dead in September 11 terrorist attacks: 3030
Estimated number of Iraqi deaths: 43,546-47,343 (as grimsaburger notes, this is the official tally; the reality is quite possibly several times this number)

Time since US conflict in Iraq began: 1288 days (apparently I was a day off)
length of American combat operations in Europe in World War II: 1244 days (another correction)
time since Osama bin Laden-coordinated 9/11 attacks: 1842 days
total time Osama bin Laden has spent in captivity: 0 days

total number of days the Republicans have run all 3 branches of government, including both houses of Congress: 2076 days

Still trust the GOP to keep you safe?

Chris Chocola has cast his vote for the President's pro-torture, anti-habeas corpus bill. Under this bill, enemy combatants can be subjected to any treatment the President deems is not torture (so tactics like waterboarding and induced hypothermia are hunky dory), and they can be taken from their homes, in America or otherwise, and locked away at the President's discretion for any length of time without being charged or even allowed any opportunity to prove their innocence.

So who qualifies as an "enemy combatant?" It ain't just terrorists caught firing Kalashnikovs at our troops, folks. Anyone the Dept. of Defense deems an enemy combatant qualifies. You can be a legal resident. You can be a US citizen.

And you won't get a trial.

I guess Chris Chocola hates us for our freedom?

Give Rep. Chocola's office a call and thank him for bringing martial law to the United States. Don't forget to ask if he did it because he values Bush's luv over the rule of Law or because he really does think torture is TEH AWESOME!!!

I'm gonna start up a quick daily reminder to the IN-02 community, and it is one word: IRAQ. Both campaigns, with their commercials about ethanol and immigration and corruption, are forgetting about 1 immutable fact.

This election is about the war in Iraq. So was 2004. And 2002. 2008 will be, too.

The president has said that the job of pulling out will be that of "future presidents." Chris Chocola stands with him, and wants to stay the course. And every day we stay the course, more people die. More American troops are killed and wounded.

For what?

I'm sure all the patriots who gave life and limb in this debacle are just shit-tickled to know that they died for the sake of an Islamist state with strong ties to Iran.

So I'm keeping a count. Every day. For more on the specifics of the casualty count, go to Iraq Casualty Count.

So here we start:

Total Coalition troops killed: 2941
Total deaths in September 11 terrorist attacks: 3030
total US troops injured: 9230
total Iraqi casualties: 43,491- 48,283

time since American invasion of Iraq began: 1285 days
length of American combat operations in World War II: 1244 days
time since Osama bin Laden-coordinated 9/11 attacks: 1840 days
total time Osama bin Laden has spent in captivity: 0 days

Doug at Masson's Blog notes that the Democrats in Indy are going to propose raising the minimum wage from $5.15/hour to $7.25/hour (which, I believe, is the same amount as the hike Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm signed into law recently). He then wonders:

Still, I’d be interested to know how many workers are making less than $7 per hour.

My answer: Does it matter?

Obviously, if there's a ton of people in this state working at or near minimum wage (and I'm willing to bet there are more than you'd expect-- I know I made that amount some years ago both at a massive retail store and in the restaurant industry) then it inclines one even more toward raising it, but what if only 5% of the people are working at that wage level? What if only .5%? Does $200 for 40 hours of work become acceptable at that number? On the other hand, it seems to me that the fewer people there are working near minimum wage, the less potential there is for the economic backlash that conservatives always fear with these hikes (a backlash that never materializes, I might add).

Furthermore, hiking the minimum wage affects not only the people working at or near the old minimum wage, but people working at or near the new one as well. Their wage no longer looks as sweet as it did before, and their employers will have to raise the wage if they want to continue attracting "better" workers (that is, of course, why you would offer slightly higher wages).

The minimum wage is good for a lot of people, no matter how you cut it, but even more than that, after 6 years of Republican mismanagement at the federal level, it has, sadly, fallen upon the individual states to return this country to an even moral keel.

Boy, the Count must be in trouble. Rumors abound that Laura Bush will be coming to South Bend to host a $100/plate dinner for her husband's embattled yes-man, possibly in a bid to counter his abyssmal polling among women voters.

Great idea, 'cuz this'll really help with the things that Chocola's campaign was really missing: money, and associations with George Bush.

Idiots.

From the Washington Post (c/o TAPPED):

Frances Acanfora, 65, had been paying $58
for a three-month supply of her five medications. But
this month the retired school lunchroom aide learned
that her next bill would be $1,294. She had entered
the doughnut hole.[...]

After talking to her doctor, Acanfora decided to
temporarily stop taking a drug as part of her
treatment for breast cancer. She hopes to obtain some
free samples of eye drops for her glaucoma. Three
other medicines -- for high cholesterol, diabetes and
osteoporosis -- cost $506.62, which Acanfora put on
her credit card.

"I pay a little bit at a time," she said. "What am I
going to do? I need it. . . . Sometimes, just to think
about it, I cry."

Chris Chocola's vaunted Prescription Drug bill in action.

The donut hole, by the way, is not a fluke side-effect of the legislation. It was purposefully designed as part of the plan. This is the medicare legislation that Chris Chocola is so proud of.

It makes sense, though, as Ezra Klein notes in the TAPPED article above. This bill wasn't designed to work in the long run. No bill the Republicans have passed in 6 years is.

It was designed solely to maximize the political effect at the time, and to sway the low-information voters. A nod to conservative free-market econmics here, windfall government handouts for the pharmaceutical lobby there, all mixed together not out of the desire to govern well, but solely to create the appearance of governing well.

A political party that does not believe government can function effectively is not going to create a government that functions effectively. A political party that wins elections by sowing division is not going to enact policies that benefit the masses. It makes sense. Why have we been surprised to find out that it's actually true?

From Robert
Greenwald, we find out that, last March, Rep.
Henry Waxman introduced this amendment:

"None of the funds appropriated or
otherwise made available by this Act shall be
obligated or expended by the Secretary of the Army or
his designee to award a contract to any contractor if
the Defense Contract Audit Agency has determined that
more than $100,000,000 of the contractor's costs for
contracts involving work in Iraq under one or more
Army contracts were unreasonable."

This is a bill to help stymie the flow of money from
the US military to war profiteers.

War profiteers, you know, the guys who lobby
our politicians to go to war and secure no-bid
contracts so that they can make a killing while our
soldiers get killed. It should go without saying that
these companies usually
do a shoddy job to boot:

Titan Corp. and CACI provided translators
and interrogators implicated in abuses at Abu Ghraib.
Blackwater sent men in understaffed, unarmored
vehicles in violation of a contract to a massacre in
Fallujah. Becthel failed to complete the construction
of a children’s hospital in Basra it was paid $50
million to build.

Later in the day, the Democratic Policy Committee,
chaired by Sen. Dorgan, convened a hearing featuring
Halliburton whistleblowers describing how
Halliburton’s own employees took items intended to go
to the troops. Witnesses provided new details of the
"Good Friday Massacre" in which Halliburton
supervisors sent unarmed American civilians to drive
through a combat zone, resulting in the death of six
truck drivers and two soldiers….

So guess who's on the long list of Republicans that
voted to kill Waxman's anti-war-profiteers amendment?
That's right.

Chris Chocola.

Guess who's received $2,500 from TITAN, one of the
biggest war profiteers? Right again.

Chris Chocola.

Jeff Colwell at the South Bend Tribune has a good take on the race (c/o Masson's Blog:

Chocola wasn't overconfident. And his early fundraising efforts didn't show lack of serious effort. He had $1.5 million on hand at the time of the last campaign expense reports, and that was after a big TV buy to slap back quickly at the MoveOn.org commercials attacking him.

Nor did White House political guru Karl Rove take Chocola's re-election for granted. President Bush came to the district -- the first district in the nation in which he campaigned for a House member this year -- to raise $650,000 for Chocola in February.

Blindsided?

Certainly not.

I think I agree with this. Chocola did get his campaign off the ground relatively quickly, and we were inundated in political ads from both the Chocola campaign and his various big industry allies long before anyone started planning for their Labor Day weekend. Many things can be blamed for the Count's anemic poll numbers, particularly his lackluster performance as a congressman and complicity in most, if not all, of the Republican majority's most egregious initiatives during the last 2 terms (that Colwell was eerily unwilling to put any of the blame on Chocola himself was more than a little annoying), but being ill-prepared is probably not one of them.

Now, if we can just get the Michiana press to stop pretending like Chocola shares no blame for his own unpopularity...

Tomorrow the South Bend Tribune will release the detailed results of their new poll on the IN-02 race. The results:

Chocola 42
Donnelly 50

So we have confirmation of last week's Constituent Strategies poll that, indeed, Donnelly has cracked the 50% mark. Polls can be deceiving, however: the Republicans are renowned for their ground game, and the Count is gonna put out some serious cash to try and save this one.

It's time to fight. Support Joe Donnelly.

Things are looking pretty good from here. From Constituent Dynamics:

Chocola 40
Donnelly 52

If this polling outfit is legit, then this is huge news. So far as I can tell, it's a bipartisan project composed of the Tarrance Group (a GOP outfit) and Constituent Dynamics (a Democratic one) that uses robocalls like SUSA (which ended up coming closest of all the polls in '04). Still, this poll gave huge numbers to all Dems in Indiana, so I wouldn't put absolute trust in this one just yet.

Still, it's good news: Donnelly over 50%= chalk one up to the Dems, as long as he doesn't screw up big.

Go with the good guys, IN-02: Support Joe Donnelly.

Quick boasting moment: I tipped off Greg Sargent at TPM on this one, and they posted on it. Sweet!

Yet another new ad from the Count has hit the airwaves, this one nailing Donnelly for supporting a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants. Chocola cynically calls it "amnesty," which is of course supposed to incite your anger that Donnelly would have the temerity not to wanna mercilessly punish people who, ya know, came here in search of a better life.

Only problem: what does "path to citizenship" mean? From the Economic Policy Institute:

In the context of the current debate, the idea applies to people who came here illegally but have lived within the law since then, held jobs, paid taxes, and met other standards, such as learning English. Under the more welcoming approach to immigration reform, these people, after paying a fine, would have the opportunity to become naturalized citizens, with the same rights and responsibilities as native-born Americans.

Oops, guess it's not "amnesty" after all! Well, actually that's aside from the problem that "path to citizenship" legislation has broad support from both parties, including from the president and Senator Richard Lugar.

Hey Chocola, since you're such a hard-nosed law-and-order guy, would you please inform us as to how your ancestors came to this fine country? I mean, I think we can assume that "Chocola" isn't Native American...

Of course, I'm not implying anything untoward about your own "path to citizenship" or anything. I'm just sayin'.

Possibly the most reprehensible part of Chocola's commercial is its statements that illegal immigrants "raise healthcare costs." This is one of the most virulent, hateful canards to come out of the modern Republican party.

Here's how the myth goes:

let's say you're from another country (in the myth, it's always Mexico) and you're thinking to yourself, "Self, man I'm lazy. I sure do hate all this working and not being to sit on my couch and eat tacos and get drunk all day like American black people. Hey, I got an idea!"

Then your mistress (since you're all Catholic, and therefore sinners) tells you, "Where are you going?"

"America, baby. I'm gonna sneak over there, crossing the desert for days and risking my life, so that I can sit on my culo and collect welfare. And the best part, since I drink so much I'm gonna get real sick soon, but in America the liberals have made sure healthcare is free for anyone who doesn't wanna pay! BWAHAHAHHAHAHA!!!"

"But can't you just get your visa and go there legally?"

"Nah, man, haven't you heard any of this? I'm lazy! If I'm not willing to stay here and work, I definitely don't wanna fill any stupid paperwork!"

It shouldn't have to be said that there's no credible evidence to back up the argument that illegals buoy the cost of social services.

Thank you very much for raising the level of the discourse, Mr. Chocola. What this election season really needed was a healthy dose of xenophobia.

From TPM Election Central:

The National GOP leadership is dumping huge amounts of pork into a handful of Indiana districts in an effort to help save the seats of embattled GOP Reps Chris Chocola, John Hostettler, and Mike Sodrel. Combined, the three Congressmen’s districts have been greased with a staggering $24.57 million out of the $36.16 million in earmarks Indiana received in several recent House bills -- two-thirds of all the state's pork. The idea is to give Count Chocola and company something -- anything -- to run on.

Let's hear some more about that vaunted Chris Chocola fiscal restraint!

Oh, but I must be being too critical, right? I mean, surely the Count has a good, fiscally responsible explanation for why his party is suddenly throwing money around like a smack addict with Bill Gates' social security number, right?

Chocola, Hostettler and Sodrel did not return phone calls for this story.

Hmm, that's funny, especially considering that, in an election year, candidates normally scramble for opportunities to dance for the cameras.

From The South Bend Tribune:

"We're purchasing tremendous amounts of oil from one of the most unstable regions in the world from dictators who do not have the United States' best interests at heart," [Joe Donnelly] said. "The sooner and faster we become energy independent, the safer our country will be."
Donnelly believes current legislation requiring that the nation develop the capacity to produce 7 billion gallons of ethanol fuel by 2012 is too modest.

"I think we're going to hit that number by 2008," Donnelly said, adding that he'd like to see the goals hiked to 10 billion gallons by 2010, and to 30 billion gallons by 2020.
"This alone would be a huge boost for our energy independence," Donnelly said.

So Donnelly is all for ethanol, contrary to what the Count keeps shoving down our throats. Joe thinks it's good for the economy and a great way to wean us off of foreign oil.

Joe doesn't sound too happy, however, with Chris Chocola's BFF Big Oil, and the super-sweet 2005 energy legislation that gave it $5 billion in tax writeoffs (which Chocola fully supported). Joe, wacko Democrat that he is, doesn't think that oil companies deserve a free ride from the government just because they bring in $10 billion every quarter (snort).

This, however, is hysterical:

U.S. Rep. Chris Chocola says he has a four-point plan for reducing energy costs that starts with finding a way to lessen its reliance on foreign oil and includes increased domestic exploration, more conservation and making sure that price gouging isn't tolerated.

Yeah, 'cuz he really showed ExxonMobil who's boss last fall when we got blasted at the pump and they broke the record for most profits ever by any company! You remember, when the Republicans asked the oil CEOs to testify before Congress, didn't even put them under oath, and asked them "pwetty pwease wif shooga on top" to stop gouging Americans.

Puhleeze. The Count may think he's royalty around here, but he bows like a peon before the Almighty Chevron.

But then again, he doesn't appear to have a clue what the hell he's talking about:

"I think that facts and science should ultimately rule the day, and I think the facts are that nuclear energy has proven itself to be a safe, efficient renewable source of energy."

Uhh, besides the fact that the people living near Chernobyl and 3-mile Island might disagree with his categorization of nuclear energy as "safe," since when was enriched uranium "renewable?"

My favorite part of the interview, though: Chris Chocola talking the energy crisis as if he hasn't been freakin' congressman for 4 years. When were you planning on putting that 4-point plan into action, Mr. Count? Hmm?

How 'bout that! From The Times of London:

But the mood among many diehard Republicans has soured. There are local factors not helping Mr Chocola — the new Republican governor, Mitch Daniels, a former White House budget chief, has infuriated Indiana voters by altering their time zones — but two issues above all else are dragging the candidate down: an unpopular president and his war in Iraq.

“It’s Iraq. It’s the war,” Ben Daulton said, during a lunch of meat loaf and pasta at a meeting of the Kiwanis Club in Rochester, a charity dominated by elderly Republicans. “I voted for Chocola and Bush. Now I don’t know. The Iraq policy is not succeeding. Without Iraq, Chocola would win hands down. If he loses, he can point to the war and the war alone.”

At the lunch, and elsewhere in Rochester, everybody had the same view: Mr Chocola faced possible defeat because of Iraq. And Mr Bush’s efforts to convince voters that Iraq was the central focus of the War on Terror appeared to be failing.

I highlighted this part of the article because the rest is an introduction to the American midterms, the district, and the race to Britons. While kinda neat to read, it's not exactly insightful for us.

This part, however, very much is. I've been wondering a bit why we've found ourselves in a bit of a "nobody acknowledging the elephant in the room" scenario, where neither candidate seems to be talking much about Iraq. I can understand Chocola, but Donnelly? I know he wants a change in course; he needs to just put it out there and break the back of the Chocola campaign.

And it's not like there's no Iraq news for him to talk about. There's news that W redirected our Marines from bin Laden to Iraq 2 months after 9/11. Or the news that Iraq is on the verge of claiming more American lives than 9/11. Or the memorandum from one of the generals there that claims that we've lost the damn war in Anbar province. Like, permanently lost, it's gone, the terrorists are running the show and we lack the ability to drive them out.

And we have, among others, the Count to thank for sending us there, and the Count among others to thank for ensuring that we have no plan for Iraq other than... to stay.

That's why we built permanent bases, people. That's why the objectives keep changing. We will stay the course because Bush equates leaving with losing. There is only one objective: to stay.

Tired of staying the course yet? Support Joe Donnelly.

[cross-posted on Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch...]

It's unfortunate that the 5 year "anniversary" of 9/11 falls on a midterm. It's even more unfortunate that it falls on a midterm in which the Republicans stand to lose, and lose big.

Watch out for all the hype and pseudo-solemn occasions drummed up to scare the shit out of you and make you feel all warm and fuzzy about the glory days of King W. It's going to be ugly, it's going to be crass and it's going to be utterly and completely craven. And there's going to be A LOT of it.

[Crossposted at Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch...]

You may have heard by now about the upcoming ABC movie The Path to 9/11 that they plan to air without commercials on Sept. 10 and 11. There may be some things about the movie you haven't heard about, however, like the fact that it's conservative propaganda, about as factual as Team America: World Police:

They got the small stuff wrong such as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed instructing Ahmed Rassam to carry out the millenium attacks. Then they got the big stuff wrong, this fantasy about how we had a CIA officer and the Northern Alliance leader Ahmed Massoud looking at Bin Laden and they breathlessly call the White House to say we need to take him out and the White House said no. I mean it’s sheer fantasy. So, if they want to critique the Clinton administration and the Bush administration, based on fact, I think that’s fine. But what ABC has done here is something straight out of Disney and fantasyland. It’s factually wrong. And that’s shameful.

That was from a Bush Administration anti-terror official. Here's more from Digby on that keystone episode of the movie:

As most of you have probably read by now, the movie features an entirely fabricated scene --- and it's a doozy. Here's Rush Limbaugh gleefully describing it:

"So the CIA, the Northern Alliance, surrounding a house where bin Laden is in Afghanistan, they’re on the verge of capturing, but they need final approval from the Clinton administration in order to proceed.

So they phoned Washington. They phoned the White House. Clinton and his senior staff refused to give authorization for the capture of bin Laden because they’re afraid of political fallout if the mission should go wrong, and if civilians were harmed…Now, the CIA agent in this is portrayed as being astonished. “Are you kidding?” He asked Berger over and over, “Is this really what you guys want?”

Berger then doesn’t answer after giving his first admonition, “You guys go in on your own. If you go in we’re not sanctioning this, we’re not approving this,” and Berger just hangs up on the agent after not answering any of his questions."

Richard Clarke vociferously denies that this ever happened and it is most definitely not part of the 9/11 commission report. This is apparently a key scene, perhaps the most important scene in the movie, in that it indicts the Clinton administration for being too soft and weak to take out bin Laden when they had the chance. Rush certainly does seem to love it. Unfortunately, it just ain't true.

Greenwald, who is very quickly becoming my favorite online voice, has a great post exposing the notion of Clinton's inattention to Al Qaeda as demonstrably revisionist. I strongly suggest you read it for yourself.

As the last couple of days have gone on, the story just kept getting weirder and weirder. We found out that ABC sent copies of the movie to Rush Limbaugh and various rightwing bloggers, like Hugh Hewitt, to vet the movie (Rush just luuuuved it, if that tells you anything), yet didn't send it to any progressive voices or bloggers, or any Democrats for that matter. Then we found out that they didn't even vet the movie with any of the Democrats on the 9/11 commission, which the movie claims to be based upon, nor did they show it to President Clinton, Sandy Berger, or Madeline Albright, 3 people ferociously vilified in it. When Clinton's office requested a copy, they refused him.

And when confronted about the gross inaccuracies in the movie, ABC responds that it is "a dramatization, not a documentary, drawn from a variety of sources, including the 9/11 commission report, other published materials and from personal interviews."

In other words, it's not so much the truth about 9/11 as "Law and Order: 9/11." Don't tell that to the kids who are being shown the movie as teaching material, however.

Don't like that ABC is polluting the midterms with pro-Bush propaganda? Then do something about it.

Even just calling your ABC affiliate and raising Hell would do a lot of good.

Our race, highlighted in Washington Post (hat tip SOB):

September 1, 2006 | Rep. Chris Chocola (R) finds himself in very serious trouble against 2004 nominee Joe Donnelly. The root of the incumbent's problems appears to be the unpopularity of the president and governor, but Chocola seems to have also taken his re-election for granted, even after a July 25 South Bend Tribune WSBT-TV survey of 400 likely voters showed Democratic nominee Joe Donnelly leading incumbent Republican Rep. Chris Chocola, 46 percent to 41 percent.

I like the first sentence, too.

Shorter Chris Chocola: Only sinners who get divorced and can't keep a job are poor.

Apparently, the fact that poverty is up up up while divorces and unemployment are down down down is irrelevant.

Of course, if anyone knows about not being poor, it's the Count:

Mancini estimated Chocola's worth at from $12,166,079 to $35,690,000, a range that Chocola said is accurate.

"He's worth more than that," Mancini said, noting that the report does not include Chocola's family home in Bristol, a new home on Lake Maxinkuckee in Culver or any vehicles, jewelry, art or antiques he may own.

Noting that the report indicates Chocola bought and sold about $17 million in investments last year, Mancini said he would guess that Chocola's worth is at the higher end of the range, but couldn't be sure.

You see, the Count is more moral than you. That's why he's rich and you're not. God has blessed him with countless millions in assets, not to mention the ability to legislate tax breaks and "business-friendly" incentives that further increase his personal assets.

But as for you, God's, well, just not that into you.

From The South Bend Tribune:

More than four years after it took effect, schools throughout the country are beginning to feel the true bite of the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

In Indiana alone, more than half of the state's schools did not meet adequate yearly progress, or AYP, the teeth of the law's accountability.
...
Of the 73 Title I schools in the five counties [Elkhart, LaPorte, Starke, Marshall and St. Joseph], 41 did not meet AYP in 2005, and 21 are considered to be in improvement status, meaning they have not made AYP for two or more consecutive years.

Not a single school in the Elkhart and Concord school corporations made AYP this year. Only Parkside Elementary in the Goshen Community Schools achieved it.

In South Bend, only two nonmagnet schools out of 30 made AYP: Hay and Monroe primary centers. [emphasis mine]

AYP, here, is the annual yearly progress on passing rates of the ISTEP exam mandated by No Child Left Behind. Think that's just a number given for the sake of disclosure?

Think again.

NCLB has drastic consequences for schools that don't achieve their AYP. First, they get restructured. Ask any teacher what they think of restructuring an entire school to better prepare students to pass a standardized test, and chances are pretty good you'll get some choice words about said tests. Standardized tests have lots of problems, from the limited versatility of what skills they can test (i.e., only answers that can be graded quickly and/or by machine) to the relative ease with which students can cheat. The biggest issue, however, lies in the remarkable correlation between a student's test scores and their parents' economic status, i.e., the richer (and whiter) the student, the better they perform on standardized tests.

Of course, the better-known consequence comes into effect after that: students can choose to go somewhere else, and their home school has to pay for their transportation. Tack onto this the fact that the vast majority of schools will be failing by 2014 (most are failing now) and tack onto that the fact that schools receive funding according to the number of students they teach, and you see how dire of a consequence failing becomes for a school. Once they start hemorrhaging kids, they start losing money on top of paying for their former students' transportation. The consequences become cyclical.

How 'bout this graph from the Trib article:

A more prominent fear among many educators is that No Child Left Behind will eventually require nearly all Title I schools to restructure.

The law, many believe, is written so that by 2014, most of those schools will fail.

"There are some very prominent educators that are now saying that it's not a question of whether No Child Left Behind is going to be changed," Raymond said. "The question now is, what do we do after No Child Left Behind? Can we pick up the pieces?"

So, to recap: NCLB has been a colossal failure so far, and promises to be one in the future. NCLB was a Republican innovation (specifically a GWB innovation, with whom Chris Chocola votes 94% of the time). Should we be trusting these bozos with our educational system?

At least Chocola's been working to stem the bleeding these last 4 years, right? Well... From Ontheissues.org:

Voted NO on $84 million in grants for Black and Hispanic colleges. (Mar 2006)
Rated 17% by the NEA, indicating anti-public education votes. (Dec 2003)

Had enough? Support Joe Donnelly.