It’s spun as a F.A.I.R. Plan, But How Will It Play In Peoria?
Or Penfield? Or Henrietta?
Brooks/Minarik are spinning feverishly to do damage control on the F.A.I.R. (Freely
Acting Irresponsible Republicans) plan they rammed through the County Legislature. The local media, to their credit, seem to be getting that not only is the plan a bad idea, the way the local GOP handled it is even worse.
But that’s the media. What do everyday folks, less plugged-in to the news than you readers, think of all this? Hint: it’s not pretty.
To answer, let’s look at a story a reader mailed in to us Wednesday night, after seeing news of this fiasco.
I just received a phone call from my mother-in-law and she was hopping mad about what transpired last night. The conversation started at full volume. Her first reaction, “How could they do this, putting politics ahead of children?” You have to understand, I was pretty shocked by her level of frustration, given she typically has very little interest in current events of a political nature.
She had just turned on Channel 13 and watched Superintendents from across the county criticize the actions taken by Maggie Brooks and the Republican county legislators. Apparently, reporters tried to visit Maggie, but she wouldn’t address their questions in person (I haven’t watched the news to verify). My mother-in-law asked me to explain the legislative package in more detail, and then wondered where such a scheme could have come from. I told her what I personally believe; it came from the Chair of the Republican Party in Monroe County, Steve Minarik. Of course, this opened up a completely new front of vituperative comments. She asked, “How could the Chair of a political party be making such important policy decisions? Isn’t Maggie Brooks the County Executive? Of course this is the type of swill one would expect from the Chair of a political party, but it’s the public official’s responsibility to draw the boundary.” I said, look, I don’t have all the evidence, but his interference has been documented by the local media, I’ve heard about it from some of my friends who are active Republicans, and folks who attended the special session last night said he was sitting in the front row making facial gestures as if things had unfolded according to plan.
At this point, she stopped the conversation and said, “It’s gone too far! I’m about to jump through the roof and every other parent with a child in K-12 must be flipping out as well tonight.” What more could I say?
What more? How about “This is why politics matters– vote the bums out!”
hey thanks for the nod of approval
So why is it that Republicans hate children so much? On a national level, there’s a full scale attack on a plan to improve children’s health insurance. And here, stealing school funding in order to make it look like they’re reducing taxes - it’s like they’re taking our children’s lunch money. (Never mind what’s being done to children in Iraq. Or how they treated children in New Orleans. But I digress…) I’d love to see an ad with a young child asking someone who looks like Maggie Brooks- “Why are you doing this to me?” Or maybe an ad where all the Democratic candidates for the Monroe County Leg tell everyone that if they’re elected, these back room, sneaky deals will stop. Everything will be made public, the public will have a chance to comment, and there won’t be any ridiculous plans with 1984ish names like “FAIR”, hurting our community while pretending to help it. Let’s give it an appropriate name, like you did - or how about “SCREWed” (School Coffers Robbed - Education Weakened) or something like that?
Got a special e-mail from the Pittsford school superintendent last night –she was NOT happy
Yep, got the same email. They awoke a sleeping giant.
SCREWed†(School Coffers Robbed - Education Weakened)
Another great line a la RT!
Nice post.
[...] Strong reports on his “dialog” with Maggie Brooks over F.A.I.R. IÂÂ got a call tonight asking me to take part in a telephone forum dialogue with Maggie Brooks [...]