This Map was spotted in West High School (my alma mater), in Salt Lake City on Saturday, April 24 2010. You may note that there are a few countries missing and they have somehow been replaced with the USSR. Fun fact: As of the day of this blog post, the USSR has not existed for 18 years, 4 months, and 1 day (but it could make a comeback).

But we fund our schools properly.

Well, I have to admit that HB 114 – Disclosure of Donations to Higher Education Institutions is not so much a bad bill as a bill that just makes no sense.

You see, the bill wants to require the disclosure of any gifts from a foreign person to the Board of Regents if the gift is above $50,000.  Now, if any other legislator would have proposed this bill, I probably would have just shrugged my shoulders and simply have said “whatever,” but my sick fascination makes me have to wonder why Wimmer cares so much about this education issue.

Is he concerned that Osama Bin Laden is funding research at Utah State? Is he concerned that no one would notice all the big skull and crossbones on the boxes leaving the lab? Does he think that it is bad for foreign individuals and companies to invest in our schools…where the school would own the rights to the research? Does he think that foreign students would only be allowed in the labs and that none of the students or professors would write down their research? AAAACK!!!! Where is this coming from Representative?! Please tell me.

Perhaps the biggest question – why do we need to spend the time debating this bill in the first place.

So I am going to mark this bill down as one I am against, can someone out their possibly explain why we need this bill?

Click here to send a befuddled email to Representative Wimmer.

I direct your attention to HB 217 – Income Tax Revisions.

I want you all to think back to 2007, times were ok, though not great, but Utah’s economy was starting to settle into nice, steady, growth. The argument was put forward that, because times will always be good, we should simply have a flat tax of 5%, if only because we wouldn’t have to adjust things and upset people when we do – sure, we may loose a few bucks here and there, but overall, the citizens of our state will be happier.

And then the bubble burst. Because we don’t have different taxes for different incomes, it is alot more difficult to balance the budget without going back to the old formula – we would have to raise taxes in an attempt to raise revenue.

So, Wimmer, being the smart policy maker that he is, attempts to balance the budget…by lowering taxes even more.

Yes folks, Wimmer is using the classic “trickle down” argument to justify tax cuts in a year where vital services are being slashed in an attempt to stay afloat. And he is not doing this by a small amount, no sir, he is doing it by reducing the corporate and personal income tax by a full .25%. Now that may not sound much to you, but when your billion dollar plus budget takes a .25% hit, you notice. In fact the fiscal note attached to this bill says that we would notice it to the tune of over $1.6 million over just the next two years.

That is $1.6 million we no longer have during thin times when dollars are already being stretch thin. That is $1.6 million the taxpayer is already used to paying. That is $1.6 million that originally would have gone to our schools, and just our schools – all because Wimmer feels that money will simply trickle down from the top.

Now I have always been a fan of “trickle down economics” because its name is so descriptive – it is literally the rich pissing on the middle and lower classes – they get to buy an extra flat screen TV and we get to buy an extra tank of gas in a given year.Yes, if you earn $20,000, you get a whopping $50 more in a year.

Wimmer fails to realize that, as Oliver Wendell Holmes put it, taxes are the price we pay to live in a civilized society. We are not in fat times where lavish spending is taking place for government services, rather we are living in times where vitally important programs such as meals on wheels and CHIP are being cut in an attempt to maintain some sort of service, we are living in a time where roads go one extra year without maintenance, we are living in a time where schools are asked to use the same books again. We are living in a time where everyone is tightening up – and Wimmer, apparently, wants to take even that away.

This is not the time for tax cuts.  If I am wrong, it means that the recession lasts a bit longer that it could have, but if I am right, we have created long lasting damage that could take years to recover from.

Click here to contact Representative Wimmer.

The bill will give $250,000 to the State Board of Education so that it can award grants to colleges, universities, and non-profit educational groups who set up math teacher training courses.

My only real complaint is that I feel this bill does not go far enough for specialized education funding. I, of course, would like to see our state place a greater emphasis on the arts and science as well. Math is all well and good, but what good is it if all of our students are food eating computers? There needs to be something behind the calculations to make it all make sense. As we move away from a manufacturing and agricultural economy, more and more workers will need to think abstractly – they will need to be able to put the pieces together.

But, this bill is a good thing, we need to fund our schools and we need to produce quality teachers – even if it is in just one field.

Click here to contact Representative Last

Now, before I dive into things, know that this bill has nothing to do with immigration aside from the fact this bill makes clear that children of illegal immigrants still fall under a different set of rules.

No, this bill makes it more difficult for out of state students to get a degree in the first place.

Right now the bill states that your nonresident status is waved if you attended high school in Utah for three years, got a diploma from a Utah high school, or entered school before the 2002-03 school year. This bill would add the requirement that out of state students must not have a job while attending school.

Just sit on that one for a second – you CAN NOT have a job while in COLLEGE if you are not from here.

Now I don’t know what world Representative Greenwood comes from, but a job is all but necessary for students these days. I know I constantly needed a job while in school and I qualified for instate tuition – now pile on to that the fact that you are not from Utah.

How exactly is this supposed to help anyone? Either we make it financially impossible for talent to come to our schools, or we charge the few who do even more money because they are forced to take a job just to stay in school – making these students take even longer to finish a degree.

Is this bill just to be mean to people who want to take advantage of our fine educational facilities? Is this bill somehow supposed to defray the costs for those students who are from this state? Is this bill a giant ‘eff you to other states? I honestly don’t know.

Now if there is one thing I know about education, especially higher education, it is that it needs diversity to truly thrive. If this bill were to pass, we would make it even more difficult for people to gain an education.