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 Frazzled wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Why does the Drug Enforcement Agency need an intelligence branch?

Because we insist that cocaine is bad, and that if we can't have it no one else can.

Thats not an answer. Thats a crime. There's no need for an intelligence unit for that. There's no need for the DEA to be involved whatsoever.
Try again.

You're saying there is no need for the Drug Enforcement Agency to have any intelligence gathering abilities in its attempts to counter drugs? So no need of informants, or surveillance or information gathering and analysis?

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:


Sure it is.

Further if there are 17 agencies, then that means sharing of information is...limited in the real world. it violates every organizational management concept known.

Which ones would you cut? Under what justification?

All of these agencies have drastically different missions and methods.



To address your other post, the DEA's mission statement:

The mission of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is to enforce the controlled substances laws and regulations of the United States and bring to the criminal and civil justice system of the United States, or any other competent jurisdiction, those organizations and principal members of organizations, involved in the growing, manufacture, or distribution of controlled substances appearing in or destined for illicit traffic in the United States; and to recommend and support non-enforcement programs aimed at reducing the availability of illicit controlled substances on the domestic and international markets.

That has nothing to do with The Commies (tm). There is some convergence in the missions among agencies. For example, Narcoterrorism is a thing, and is an area where the DEA cooperates with other intelligence agencies. That said, fighting foreign wars is not the DEA's mission, nor does it make sense for the CIA to maintain personnel with expertise in DEA-specific missions.

Less cut, more amalgamate. GIve me the list and I will tell you. Based on conversations so far:
*Coast Guard: cut the intelligence. Cut the Coast Guard as separate from the Navy. HERESY!!!
*DEA: cut the intelligence unit. Eliminate the DEA. Any legal drug issues remit to the FDA. HERESY!!!
*ATF: Kill it entirely. Alcohol by Con Amendment is a state issue. Tobacco-seriously? Gone. Firearms? You suck at it. Give enforcement to the FBI. HERESY!!!

Personal nitpick: Post Service-gone. ENLIGHTENMENT!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Why does the Drug Enforcement Agency need an intelligence branch?

Because we insist that cocaine is bad, and that if we can't have it no one else can.

Thats not an answer. Thats a crime. There's no need for an intelligence unit for that. There's no need for the DEA to be involved whatsoever.
Try again.

You're saying there is no need for the Drug Enforcement Agency to have any intelligence gathering abilities in its attempts to counter drugs? So no need of informants, or surveillance or information gathering and analysis?

Even more then that-I'm saying the entire DEA should go. Its overduplication of existing entities plus its a prime mover in the militarization of the US police mentality (same with the ATF).

Everything everywhere needs to be examined.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

nah... the best thing you can say about Trump is that he's a doofus... and he praises anyone who kisses his ass.

It's not any deeper than that.

I think that is startlingly accurate.

 BigWaaagh wrote:

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 BigWaaagh wrote:

And that, of course, is exactly the message and theme behind Trump's slogan...

If that is true, then why is the word "again" in the slogan? See... the word "again" carries with it certain weight and meaning. Again means that something has ceased and restarted, or there's a desire to restart/return to that thing. If I say I'm going to the gym again, it's because at some point I've ceased gym activities, and now I've returned to them.

Which is why I asked those few questions I did above. I'll be honest, they were originally written by another member of this forum, as I said on the previous post, probably in the 2016 politics thread.... but when people continue to spout nonsense like "MAGA" I'm going to have to question them, if nothing else then to understand what these people are really wanting.

You did notice the sarcastic, laughing Orkmoticon attached to my comment, right?

Yes, I noticed your Orkmoticon.... I deleted much of the rest of the text to avoid creating a wall of quote blocks

One day ladies and gentlemen

 Frazzled wrote:


Less cut, more amalgamate. GIve me the list and I will tell you. Based on conversations so far:
*Coast Guard: cut the intelligence. Cut the Coast Guard as separate from the Navy. HERESY!!!
*DEA: cut the intelligence unit. Eliminate the DEA. Any legal drug issues remit to the FDA. HERESY!!!
*ATF: Kill it entirely. Alcohol by Con Amendment is a state issue. Tobacco-seriously? Gone. Firearms? You suck at it. Give enforcement to the FBI. HERESY!!!

Personal nitpick: Post Service-gone. ENLIGHTENMENT!

The Coast Guard is a DHS law enforcement organization and the Navy is DoD. The Coast Guard *can* function under the DoD given Presidential or Congressional direction during a time of war. Your justification for merging them is that both have boats? If we're going to talk about recommended changes, we should at least be reasonably well-informed.

 Frazzled wrote:

Less cut, more amalgamate. GIve me the list and I will tell you. Based on conversations so far:
*Coast Guard: cut the intelligence. Cut the Coast Guard as separate from the Navy. HERESY!!!
*DEA: cut the intelligence unit. Eliminate the DEA. Any legal drug issues remit to the FDA. HERESY!!!
*ATF: Kill it entirely. Alcohol by Con Amendment is a state issue. Tobacco-seriously? Gone. Firearms? You suck at it. Give enforcement to the FBI. HERESY!!!

Personal nitpick: Post Service-gone. ENLIGHTENMENT!

A counter-argument/proposal: Leave the Coasties as is... all branches of military have their own specialized intel units with mission sets/equipment geared toward the mission of the branch.
Cut DEA entirely... I agree. But the duties carried out currently by this branch would be split between the FDA and FBI.
BATFE: I also agree... they helped in a lot of tom-foolery including Ruby Ridge, Waco and whatnot. They've lost millions worth of guns across the border in their "investigations" and generally been a very big black mark on federal law enforcement for years.

Postal Service, I would probably make a fully fledged federal agency, rather than the weird, private-governmental hybrid that we have now.


Some agencies I'd roll up, or delete:

DIA
NGA (National Geospatial-Intel Agency)
Office of Intelligence and Counter-intelligence
Office of Intelligence and Analysis
Bureau of Intelligence and Research
Office of Terrorism and Finance Agency (seriously... WTF!?)
National Reconaissance Office

There are far too many Intel agencies in the country, and quite a few look rather redundant.

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:


Less cut, more amalgamate. GIve me the list and I will tell you. Based on conversations so far:
*Coast Guard: cut the intelligence. Cut the Coast Guard as separate from the Navy. HERESY!!!
*DEA: cut the intelligence unit. Eliminate the DEA. Any legal drug issues remit to the FDA. HERESY!!!
*ATF: Kill it entirely. Alcohol by Con Amendment is a state issue. Tobacco-seriously? Gone. Firearms? You suck at it. Give enforcement to the FBI. HERESY!!!

Personal nitpick: Post Service-gone. ENLIGHTENMENT!

The Coast Guard is a DHS law enforcement organization and the Navy is DoD. The Coast Guard *can* function under the DoD given Presidential or Congressional direction during a time of war. Your justification for merging them is that both have boats? If we're going to talk about recommended changes, we should at least be reasonably well-informed.

They both have boats and choppers (and helicopters too ). Give the responsibility to the Navy. Cut the bureaucracy.

Also cut the insults. That attitude is why we are in the crapwagon we are in now.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

Some agencies I'd roll up, or delete:

DIA
NGA (National Geospatial-Intel Agency)
Office of Intelligence and Counter-intelligence
Office of Intelligence and Analysis
Bureau of Intelligence and Research
Office of Terrorism and Finance Agency (seriously... WTF!?)
National Reconaissance Office

There are far too many Intel agencies in the country, and quite a few look rather redundant.

Why? Do you know what they do? Do you know how information is transferred among the agencies?

Not trying to be a jerk - there's a whole lot of alt-ctrl-delete in this thread with little knowledge of how it all works.


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 Frazzled wrote:

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:


Less cut, more amalgamate. GIve me the list and I will tell you. Based on conversations so far:
*Coast Guard: cut the intelligence. Cut the Coast Guard as separate from the Navy. HERESY!!!
*DEA: cut the intelligence unit. Eliminate the DEA. Any legal drug issues remit to the FDA. HERESY!!!
*ATF: Kill it entirely. Alcohol by Con Amendment is a state issue. Tobacco-seriously? Gone. Firearms? You suck at it. Give enforcement to the FBI. HERESY!!!

Personal nitpick: Post Service-gone. ENLIGHTENMENT!

The Coast Guard is a DHS law enforcement organization and the Navy is DoD. The Coast Guard *can* function under the DoD given Presidential or Congressional direction during a time of war. Your justification for merging them is that both have boats? If we're going to talk about recommended changes, we should at least be reasonably well-informed.

They both have boats and choppers (and helicopters too ). Give the responsibility to the Navy. Cut the bureaucracy.

Also cut the insults. That attitude is why we are in the crapwagon we are in now.

That wasn't intended to be insulting - the fact is that each of these agencies has different missions, capabilities, and funding sources. Advocating deleting an agency simply because you think the name sounds redundant, without knowledge of that agency's specific mission and capabilities, is silly.

 Frazzled wrote:


Thats not an answer.

Except it is the answer.

Like literally. That is why the DEA has a loop into the intelligence network (I mean, there's the opium trade too, but we tend to facilitate that one).

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

Less cut, more amalgamate. GIve me the list and I will tell you. Based on conversations so far:
*Coast Guard: cut the intelligence. Cut the Coast Guard as separate from the Navy. HERESY!!!
*DEA: cut the intelligence unit. Eliminate the DEA. Any legal drug issues remit to the FDA. HERESY!!!
*ATF: Kill it entirely. Alcohol by Con Amendment is a state issue. Tobacco-seriously? Gone. Firearms? You suck at it. Give enforcement to the FBI. HERESY!!!

Personal nitpick: Post Service-gone. ENLIGHTENMENT!

A counter-argument/proposal: Leave the Coasties as is... all branches of military have their own specialized intel units with mission sets/equipment geared toward the mission of the branch.
Cut DEA entirely... I agree. But the duties carried out currently by this branch would be split between the FDA and FBI.
BATFE: I also agree... they helped in a lot of tom-foolery including Ruby Ridge, Waco and whatnot. They've lost millions worth of guns across the border in their "investigations" and generally been a very big black mark on federal law enforcement for years.

Postal Service, I would probably make a fully fledged federal agency, rather than the weird, private-governmental hybrid that we have now.


Some agencies I'd roll up, or delete:

DIA
NGA (National Geospatial-Intel Agency)
Office of Intelligence and Counter-intelligence
Office of Intelligence and Analysis
Bureau of Intelligence and Research
Office of Terrorism and Finance Agency (seriously... WTF!?)
National Reconaissance Office

There are far too many Intel agencies in the country, and quite a few look rather redundant.

I can find no fault in these arguments.


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 LordofHats wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:


Thats not an answer.

Except it is the answer.

Like literally. That is why the DEA has a loop into the intelligence network (I mean, there's the opium trade too, but we tend to facilitate that one).

horse . That would mean every police department in the US must have an intelligence unit.
Give their criminal duties back to the FBI.

 Frazzled wrote:
horse . That would mean every police department in the US must have an intelligence unit.

They basically do...

I mean they're obviously not roped into the national intelligence network, but the FBI, DEA, ATF, and whatnot do send information down the line for the purpose of coordination and someone in the NYPD has to manage that (not to mention the NYPD probably has its own city oriented intelligence interests).

Give their criminal duties back to the FBI.

So you're plan is to not shrink the government at all, but induce massive organizational bloat onto a single element of it by cutting all the others until the FBI itself is as large as the United States Army?

You can't cut agencies as an end to itself. Agencies only exist as an extension of policy. If we don't like the DEA, the solution is to end the policies that necessitate it, not treat the DEA itself as superfluous and damage the others when we shift all of its burdens to them (especially since that wouldn't really save much money anyway cause you still have to pay for all the drug enforcement).

By combining entities they can cut corporate overhead while maintaining operational levels unchanged.

 LordofHats wrote:


You can't cut agencies as an end to itself. Agencies only exist as an extension of policy. If we don't like the DEA, the solution is to end the policies that necessitate it, not treat the DEA itself as superfluous and damage the others when we shift all of its burdens to them (especially since that wouldn't really save much money anyway cause you still have to pay for all the drug enforcement).

Precisely the point - if we don't care about a capability, then by all means eliminate the agency. If the capability is necessary, then we need to fully understand that agency's mission and capabilities before deciding it would be best to nix it.

The FBI/ATF issue is particularly weird - the FBI handles a bunch of firearms-related issues anyway (NICS checks, for example), while the ATF "handles" a lot of the paperwork (4473s, Form 4s, etc.). Until 2001 they weren't part of the same parent agency so it wouldn't have made sense to roll them together. Nowadays, it makes a lot more sense.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 BigWaaagh wrote:

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 BigWaaagh wrote:

And that, of course, is exactly the message and theme behind Trump's slogan...

If that is true, then why is the word "again" in the slogan? See... the word "again" carries with it certain weight and meaning. Again means that something has ceased and restarted, or there's a desire to restart/return to that thing. If I say I'm going to the gym again, it's because at some point I've ceased gym activities, and now I've returned to them.

Which is why I asked those few questions I did above. I'll be honest, they were originally written by another member of this forum, as I said on the previous post, probably in the 2016 politics thread.... but when people continue to spout nonsense like "MAGA" I'm going to have to question them, if nothing else then to understand what these people are really wanting.

You did notice the sarcastic, laughing Orkmoticon attached to my comment, right?

Yes, I noticed your Orkmoticon.... I deleted much of the rest of the text to avoid creating a wall of quote blocks

Just not getting the sarcasm then? Even PJ pointed it out to you in a reply post, but, K...if you like arguing with yourself. Maybe I should have italicized "of course" to really get the tone across...*note to self.

 Frazzled wrote:
By combining entities they can cut corporate overhead while maintaining operational levels unchanged.

Citation needed. By that metric, why do you have separate air, navy and army forces? And then the Marines? Roll them all into one as they are all in the business of shooting things.

By combining multiple agencies into a single one you need to integrate the operations and command structure. Are we also going to move them into the same building? What if the headquarters of the agency that the smaller agency is being integrated into is far away from the headquarters on the integratee?

 Frazzled wrote:
By combining entities they can cut corporate overhead while maintaining operational levels unchanged.

Except public policy isn't a corporate enterprise;


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 A Town Called Malus wrote:
Citation needed. By that metric, why do you have separate air, navy and army forces? And then the Marines? Roll them all into one as they are all in the business of shooting things.

It's almost like you don't improve operational capacity by confusing organizational goals.


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 NuggzTheNinja wrote:

The FBI/ATF issue is particularly weird - the FBI handles a bunch of firearms-related issues anyway (NICS checks, for example), while the ATF "handles" a lot of the paperwork (4473s, Form 4s, etc.). Until 2001 they weren't part of the same parent agency so it wouldn't have made sense to roll them together. Nowadays, it makes a lot more sense.

Personally I think the ATF is in a different boat than the DEA. The DEA will always need a law enforcement capability because the entire point of the DEA is to enforce certain drug policies and not all of those policies are related to the War on Drugs. ATF I think has become dead wieght as an organization. I'm all for good gun control laws, and even stricter ones than we currently have, but our current gun control scheme is a fething mess. Five minutes into an explanation of gun trusts and my thoughts were "the feth is going on." The whole "black guns are bad guns" thing is sad and funny because it's such an accurate reflection of how we're doing it (really stupidly, on a superficial level). Alcohol and Tobacco don't need their own agency. They should be under some commerce regulator, the DEA, or the FDA. We aren't unindated with moonshine runners anymore. Basically all the ATF does is enforce our really badly organized and even worse realized gun control laws, and they can't even do that right. They're really asking for an inquisition, a purge, and a rebuilding as just "Firearms" (let the FBI trade over its own gun regulation obligations while we're at it, cause the FBI should be dealing with crimes not the ho-dum business of making sure the guy buying a Beretta hasn't bought another gun in the last 15 days or whatever the stupid measure is).

 LordofHats wrote:

 feeder wrote:
I expect the CIA is still suffering from the institutional dysfunction created by decades of paranoid rule under Hoover.

Hey man. Someone has to spy on Congress to make sure there's no plans to cut the secret budget. I mean honestly. Damn elected officials thinking they can do what what they please.

Paranoidly spying on Americans for unAmerican activity, the real American past time

In all seriousness, AG Eric Holder refused to answer Sen. Kirk in a 2013 Congressional hearing when asked if the DoJ spies on Congress. Holder dodged the question and claimed he couldn't give a response in an open hearing and there's no reason why Holder couldn't say that no, the DoJ doesn't spy on Congress, in an open hearing. Sen. Bernie Sanders asked the NSA in 2014 if the NSA spied on Congress and the NSA replied by stating that members of Congress have the same protection from NSA spying as the public and we know that the NSA routinely collects phone call data from the public without warrants so by extension the NSA also freely wiretaps Congress. The CIA doesn't need to spy on Congress, multiple other agencies already do it.

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/asked-if-justice-department-is-spying-on-congress-holder-refuses-to-answer/
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2014/01/nsa-pretty-much-admits-spying-congress.html

Some people get into Twittah wars with the press, and some people do this:




I think I will miss this aspect of Obama the most. He was able to poke a lot of fun at himself, and didn't explode every time someone was mean to him.

His birth certificate reveal was awesome as well:

Prestor Jon wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

 feeder wrote:
I expect the CIA is still suffering from the institutional dysfunction created by decades of paranoid rule under Hoover.

Hey man. Someone has to spy on Congress to make sure there's no plans to cut the secret budget. I mean honestly. Damn elected officials thinking they can do what what they please.

Paranoidly spying on Americans for unAmerican activity, the real American past time

In all seriousness, AG Eric Holder refused to answer Sen. Kirk in a 2013 Congressional hearing when asked if the DoJ spies on Congress. Holder dodged the question and claimed he couldn't give a response in an open hearing and there's no reason why Holder couldn't say that no, the DoJ doesn't spy on Congress, in an open hearing. Sen. Bernie Sanders asked the NSA in 2014 if the NSA spied on Congress and the NSA replied by stating that members of Congress have the same protection from NSA spying as the public and we know that the NSA routinely collects phone call data from the public without warrants so by extension the NSA also freely wiretaps Congress. The CIA doesn't need to spy on Congress, multiple other agencies already do it.

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/asked-if-justice-department-is-spying-on-congress-holder-refuses-to-answer/
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2014/01/nsa-pretty-much-admits-spying-congress.html

Oh no disagreement there.

I only mention the CIA because they literally get caught spying on Congress at least once every decade. Last time was 2013 I think.

Really it's kind of funny. We fund a mountain of clandestine agencies and operations, and the idea that we can regulate them at all is just laughable. By its very nature "clandestine" is hidden. So yes. Let's give billions of dollars to huge agencies, and just trust that when we tell them to keep it all secret they'll actually be honest with anyone about what they're using the money for. By the way to anyone reading that gak is exactly how the US ended up in Vietnam (US intelligence agencies bungled their meddlings with a foreign country), exactly how we ended up in Iraq the first time (US intelligence agencies bungled their meddlings with a foreign country), how we ended up in Afghanistan (US intelligence agencies bungled their meddlings with a foreign country), and how we ended up in Iraq a second god damn time (US intelligence agencies bungled their meddlings with a foreign country).

You really think we'd learn the damn lesson at some point.

 LordofHats wrote:



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 NuggzTheNinja wrote:

The FBI/ATF issue is particularly weird - the FBI handles a bunch of firearms-related issues anyway (NICS checks, for example), while the ATF "handles" a lot of the paperwork (4473s, Form 4s, etc.). Until 2001 they weren't part of the same parent agency so it wouldn't have made sense to roll them together. Nowadays, it makes a lot more sense.

Personally I think the ATF is in a different boat than the DEA. The DEA will always need a law enforcement capability because the entire point of the DEA is to enforce certain drug policies and not all of those policies are related to the War on Drugs. ATF I think has become dead wieght as an organization. I'm all for good gun control laws, and even stricter ones than we currently have, but our current gun control scheme is a fething mess. Five minutes into an explanation of gun trusts and my thoughts were "the feth is going on." The whole "black guns are bad guns" thing is sad and funny because it's such an accurate reflection of how we're doing it (really stupidly, on a superficial level). Alcohol and Tobacco don't need their own agency. They should be under some commerce regulator, the DEA, or the FDA. We aren't unindated with moonshine runners anymore. Basically all the ATF does is enforce our really badly organized and even worse realized gun control laws, and they can't even do that right. They're really asking for an inquisition, a purge, and a rebuilding as just "Firearms" (let the FBI trade over its own gun regulation obligations while we're at it, cause the FBI should be dealing with crimes not the ho-dum business of making sure the guy buying a Beretta hasn't bought another gun in the last 15 days or whatever the stupid measure is).

The FBI runs the NICS checks, the national criminal database that every licensed firearms dealer in the US has to use to run a background check on somebody before selling him/her a gun. Selling a firearm to a prohibited person is a federal crime, a felony, so it's completely independent of waiting period laws which only exist on the state level. If the FBI is controlling the database and prosecuting violators then it makes more sense to assign the enforcement duties from the ATF to the FBI and eliminate the ATF. Every state already has agencies that regulate alcohol and tobacco production and sales and enforce applicable state laws so federal alcohol and tobacco laws and enforcement is redundant.

I would be perfectly ok with losing the ATF, but that said, it does a lot more than just stuff related to individuals, it has a big role in industry regulation and technology compliance for firearms and explosives that the FBI just isnt set up for, and many firearms laws are actually set up to function in ways that dont necessarily flow through to the FBI well.

Prestor Jon wrote:
The FBI runs the NICS checks, the national criminal database that every licensed firearms dealer in the US has to use to run a background check on somebody before selling him/her a gun.

To be fair to me, I think that once someone is out of prison further restrictions on their rights are unconstitutional

If the FBI is controlling the database and prosecuting violators then it makes more sense to assign the enforcement duties from the ATF to the FBI and eliminate the ATF.

I don't really mind that either. We just really need to overhaul gun control laws around here, because they're confusing as feth and a lot of them just seem pointless. It's almost like some of these laws only exist because some law maker was trying to check their "I'm for gun control" box on their "things to do to get elected" sheet.

Every state already has agencies that regulate alcohol and tobacco production and sales and enforce applicable state laws so federal alcohol and tobacco laws and enforcement is redundant.

We'd still need some federal enforcement because Texas and Oklahoma don't have jurisdiction over each other, but certainly the actual task of regulating alcohol and tobacco today is not so monumental as to need a chimera-like monstrosity of regulatory cluster fething that is the ATF.


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 Vaktathi wrote:
I would be perfectly ok with losing the ATF, but that said, it does a lot more than just stuff related to individuals, it has a big role in industry regulation and technology compliance for firearms and explosives that the FBI just isnt set up for, and many firearms laws are actually set up to function in ways that dont necessarily flow through to the FBI well.

This too.

 Vaktathi wrote:
I would be perfectly ok with losing the ATF, but that said, it does a lot more than just stuff related to individuals, it has a big role in industry regulation and technology compliance for firearms and explosives that the FBI just isnt set up for, and many firearms laws are actually set up to function in ways that dont necessarily flow through to the FBI well.

Make it a subsidiary dept in the FBI rather than its own agency in the DoJ. Redefine it's role to remove redundancy of state laws and improve it's connection to the FBI. Enforcing compliance with federal laws is an FBI mission and the awkward split of responsibilities between the 2 agencies isn't helpful.


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 sebster wrote:
The confirmation hearings have been fairly interesting so far, as examples of how to give 'yes' sounding answers while absolutely not saying yes.

Get a load of this nonsense from Betsy DeVos;

Tim Kaine: Do you think k-12 schools that receive federal funding should meet the same accountability standards, outcome standards?
DeVos: All schools that receive public funding should be accountable, yes.
Kaine: Should meet the same accountability standards?
DeVos: Yes, although you have different accountability standards between traditional public schools and charter schools.
Kaine: But I'm really interested in this, should everybody be on a level playing field? So public, charter, or private K-12 schools, if they receive taxpayer funding, they should meet the same accountability standards?
DeVos: Yes, they should be very transparent with the information. And parents should have that information first and foremost.
Kaine: And, if confirmed, will you insist upon that equal accountability in any K-12 school or educational program that receives federal funding whether public charter or private?
DeVos: I support accountability.
Kaine: Equal accountability for all schools that receive federal funding?
DeVos: I support accountability.
Kaine: Okay, is that a yes or a no?
DeVos: That's a "I support accountability"
Kaine: Do you want to answer my question?
DeVos: I support accountability.

The laughs from DeVos' political blather side, the pattern here is pretty clear - she wants to give funding to private entities, which is fine in some contexts, but then she doesn't seem too fussed about ensuring that the organisations that money goes to are providing decent returns, which is disastrous, especially given the issues with private colleges in the US that just started to be pulled back in Obama's second term. It is amazing that DeVos is so indifferent on the issue, unless, like with the tax handout called an infrastructure program, we start to see the pattern emerging - this whole thing has Berlusconi Mk II written all over it. If that sounds a little dramatic, remember the president elect ran this exact same scam himself.

Most of what the Dept of Ed does is handing out federal funding, making sure the right amounts go to the right schools with the right strings attached. It's a big factor in a lot of the problems we have in public education. The qualifications that schools have to meet to get their federal funding is primarily getting good test scores on federally mandated end of grade tests. That's why 3rd graders at my kids elementary school get stress counseling and teachers get stuck having to teach to the test, because if the kids don't get good marks on their EOG standardized tests then the school loses money. If you don't like economic policy that just amounts to the rich getting richer then I don't know why you're a fan of this education policy. Schools that do well on the test get money schools that don't do well get less money/no money so the nice suburban schools in areas with good household incomes get plenty of federal funding and the inner city schools plagued with problems lose their money because their test scores are low. Of course parents are still bound by law to send their kids to those failing public schools that lose federal funding and they'll run afoul of truant officers and child services if they don't send their kids there and voucher programs to help those parents be able to afford to send their kids to better schools are an evil Republican plot to destroy teacher unions so they can't have that either.

Instead of having the Federal govt collect Federal taxes from state residents just to then send that money back to the schools those residents use via a convoluted Federal program the Federal govt should collect less tax revenue, not give money to schools and leave the states and local govts to run the schools and collect taxes to fund them. The Dept of Ed has no idea what my local schools are like, there are no Dept of Ed employees who take the time to research the schools and find out exactly what the successes and failures of each are and how they're doing. The Dept of Ed only knows my local schools as a table of test results that is used to determine federal funding payments. My county school board, school superintendent, principals, state representatives and state dept of Education actually know what's going on with my local schools, collects data on the schools and student performance and most importantly they are much more susceptible to the desires of the public they serve than Federal bureaucrats and cabinet appointees that don't give a feth about my kids because they don't even know they exist.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 LordofHats wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:
The FBI runs the NICS checks, the national criminal database that every licensed firearms dealer in the US has to use to run a background check on somebody before selling him/her a gun.

To be fair to me, I think that once someone is out of prison further restrictions on their rights are unconstitutional

If the FBI is controlling the database and prosecuting violators then it makes more sense to assign the enforcement duties from the ATF to the FBI and eliminate the ATF.

I don't really mind that either. We just really need to overhaul gun control laws around here, because they're confusing as feth and a lot of them just seem pointless. It's almost like some of these laws only exist because some law maker was trying to check their "I'm for gun control" box on their "things to do to get elected" sheet.

Every state already has agencies that regulate alcohol and tobacco production and sales and enforce applicable state laws so federal alcohol and tobacco laws and enforcement is redundant.

We'd still need some federal enforcement because Texas and Oklahoma don't have jurisdiction over each other, but certainly the actual task of regulating alcohol and tobacco today is not so monumental as to need a chimera-like monstrosity of regulatory cluster fething that is the ATF.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Vaktathi wrote:
I would be perfectly ok with losing the ATF, but that said, it does a lot more than just stuff related to individuals, it has a big role in industry regulation and technology compliance for firearms and explosives that the FBI just isnt set up for, and many firearms laws are actually set up to function in ways that dont necessarily flow through to the FBI well.

This too.

Why does the Federal govt need some kind of overarching alcohol and tobacco enforcement powers over the states? We've let individual states break Federal drug laws and legalize marijuana and everything seems to be working out fine. Marijuana laws can be different in Colorado and Nebraska and alcohol laws can be different in Texas and Oklahoma, that's not a problem we need to solve.

The most confusing aspect of Federal firearms laws are the seemingly arbitrary distinctions the ATF makes between something that is legal versus illegal. The most confusing aspect of state firearm laws is why some states need to have severe draconian gun laws while states that have more pragmatic gun laws get along just fine.

Prestor Jon wrote:


Why does the Federal govt need some kind of overarching alcohol and tobacco enforcement powers over the states?

I'm not talking about keep the current scheme, but tobacco and alcohol are still major industries and there's a need for oversight and some of that is best managed at the federal level. Specifically I was referring to things like cigarette runners. New York's ability to keep people from smuggling tobacco products up I-81 from Georgia ends at their border, and Georgia's ability to help ends at theirs. A federal agency can get all parties organized and on board to make sure existing laws are being respected and followed.

And of course I'd point out that the last time the Federal government passed a law and expected the states to sort it out, we had 10 years of on again off again quasi-martial law throughout the South trying to get the point across that "sort it out" was not a gentle suggestion. The frank reality is that the states are no more noble than the federal government, and expecting them to be able to handle things themselves is like expecting five-year-olds to go unsupervised for two hours and not do something potentially harmful.

We've let individual states break Federal drug laws and legalize marijuana and everything seems to be working out fine.

I don't think it's fine. What point is there to legalizing marijuana, when you never know if a change in Federal attitudes will have some federal agency kick your door down and arresting you for possession and intent to distribute? What point is there in having weed be illegal if someone can just drive over the border and get all the weed they want? There is a point where "its a state matter" stops making any sense. There needs to be at least a basic national policy strategy for these things and that necessitates some kind of federal regulation/enforcement need even if it's a very small one.

The most confusing aspect of Federal firearms laws are the seemingly arbitrary distinctions the ATF makes between something that is legal versus illegal.

Agreed.

 LordofHats wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
horse . That would mean every police department in the US must have an intelligence unit.

They basically do...

I mean they're obviously not roped into the national intelligence network, but the FBI, DEA, ATF, and whatnot do send information down the line for the purpose of coordination and someone in the NYPD has to manage that (not to mention the NYPD probably has its own city oriented intelligence interests).

Most police departments in major cities have dedicated intelligence and counter-intelligence officers working there, and not just in gang-related units.

With the Fed, each agency's intelligence unit is tasked for a specific purpose. DEA is narco. CIA is foreign governments/insurgents. ATF is gun running/smuggling. I don't see how you effectively consolidate all those disparate purposes under one roof. Another thing to keep in mind is that the CIA isn't worried about prosecuting people whereas the DEA is. The need for warrants really impacts what can and cannot be done in the name of gathering information.

@Prestor Jon
Just to address your bit about the Fed collecting less taxes for education: ideally, that money should help even out schools to ensure all children across the country have an equal education. If left purely to the states, then poorer states will have poorer education as they'll have less money per student compared to richer states. No child should be punished educationally because they live in state X instead of Y.

That's the ideal, anyway.

I've decided to tune out of US politics for the next 4 years and just adamantly believe that Vermin Supreme had actually became the president. :(

 Wyrmalla wrote:
I've decided to tune out of US politics for the next 4 years and just adamantly believe that Vermin Supreme had actually became the president. :(

Tune out? While we're imploding with mutual hatred for one another? I say get get some frigging entertainment out of it...someone should!

Prestor Jon wrote:


Most of what the Dept of Ed does is handing out federal funding, making sure the right amounts go to the right schools with the right strings attached. It's a big factor in a lot of the problems we have in public education. The qualifications that schools have to meet to get their federal funding is primarily getting good test scores on federally mandated end of grade tests. That's why 3rd graders at my kids elementary school get stress counseling and teachers get stuck having to teach to the test, because if the kids don't get good marks on their EOG standardized tests then the school loses money. If you don't like economic policy that just amounts to the rich getting richer then I don't know why you're a fan of this education policy. Schools that do well on the test get money schools that don't do well get less money/no money so the nice suburban schools in areas with good household incomes get plenty of federal funding and the inner city schools plagued with problems lose their money because their test scores are low. Of course parents are still bound by law to send their kids to those failing public schools that lose federal funding and they'll run afoul of truant officers and child services if they don't send their kids there and voucher programs to help those parents be able to afford to send their kids to better schools are an evil Republican plot to destroy teacher unions so they can't have that either.

Instead of having the Federal govt collect Federal taxes from state residents just to then send that money back to the schools those residents use via a convoluted Federal program the Federal govt should collect less tax revenue, not give money to schools and leave the states and local govts to run the schools and collect taxes to fund them. The Dept of Ed has no idea what my local schools are like, there are no Dept of Ed employees who take the time to research the schools and find out exactly what the successes and failures of each are and how they're doing. The Dept of Ed only knows my local schools as a table of test results that is used to determine federal funding payments. My county school board, school superintendent, principals, state representatives and state dept of Education actually know what's going on with my local schools, collects data on the schools and student performance and most importantly they are much more susceptible to the desires of the public they serve than Federal bureaucrats and cabinet appointees that don't give a feth about my kids because they don't even know they exist.

It's always been like this every since the Federal government decided to stick it's nasty paws into what is essentially a State and local matter (education), playing fast and loose with the Interstate Commerce Clause to justify it. It's mostly just a means for cynical/greedy politicians to score brownie points with voters during Federal elections.

There have been calls to get the Feds out of the education business since the 1980's. And in my view, it's long overdue.

Trigger warning for those sensitive souls that love Trump and hate celebrities there is a live feed happening right now of a protest against Glorious Leader and our soon to be Russian Puppet-masters.

Seriously though I am pretty sure I saw Michael Moore and... he's just awful. If you want to sink a protest though his involvement is probably a pretty good way to do it.