Whether one agrees with the philosophy behind federal stimulus money, it is difficult to argue with the practice of accepting the dollars once they are offered. If you (as a state) turn away the cash, it will go somewhere else.

Another story is how to use the funds, particularly in the case of the soon-to-be-arriving education stimulus. One can make a strong argument for a cautious approach; in other words, why go out and spend now when you’re likely going to need it even more later?

State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett put it this way when informing school districts how much they should receive come November. (The federal law says the money does not have to be spent until September 2012).

"With your staffs and budgets set for the 2010-2011 school year, I urge you to be careful with how and when you spend these funds. Please consider reserving this one-time funding until the level of resources budgeted by the General Assembly in the upcoming budget cycle become clearer."

That won’t be clear until late April in 2011, if then.

While timing may be a consideration, I suspect that taking the education dollars and using them to fill a Medicaid budget gap was not what those doing the allocating had in mind. But that appears to be the case in Rhode Island. The Providence Journal reports:

Instead, Governor Carcieri intends to use the $32.9 million Rhode Island is eligible to receive to plug an estimated $38-million deficit in this year’s budget.

His plan drew a strong protest from Education Commissioner Deborah A. Gist, Congressman James R. Langevin and representatives of teachers unions and the state’s school committees.

School districts across the state were hoping that more than 400 teaching jobs would be restored or protected after Congress passed the bill in August. Nationwide, the law allocates $10 billion for schools and $16.1 billion to prevent Medicaid cuts.

Rhode Island is eligible to receive more than $100 million, $32.9 million intended for education jobs and about $70 million for Medicaid reimbursements.

But that’s about $38 million less for Medicaid than the state was counting on when it passed the 2010-11 budget, said Carcieri’s spokeswoman, Amy Kempe.

“While I’m sure it may be technically allowable and that the governor’s office is doing the appropriate thing, I don’t think we are acknowledging the intention of President Obama, [U.S. Education Secretary Arne] Duncan or Congress had for these funds,” Gist said.

Gist said she is especially concerned because the state is facing an even worse budget gap in fiscal year 2012 and the education jobs money could be spent during that year as well. According to the state Budget Office, the overall deficit could be as large as $320 million next year.

The executive director of the National Education Association of Rhode Island also criticized the governor’s plan, particularly after Carcieri and the General Assembly reduced state education aid to schools by 3.6 percent this year, a $29-million cut.

“I voted for this bill to help keep Rhode Island teachers on the job,” Langevin said in a statement. “Properly supporting our state’s education system is the best way to reverse our current economic situation over the long term.”

Officials at the U.S. Department of Education said Tuesday that using the federal money to supplant state funding is not expressly prohibited, although they cautioned they will carefully review each state’s application to ensure it follows the guidelines.

Most Hoosiers are familiar with the BRAC — Base Realingment and Closure — process that the military executed several times over the past few decades. Hoosier installations, vital parts of local communities, were sometimes directly impacted and other times spared.

Military cutbacks are expected to come again in the effort to trim defense spending, but the targets could be overseas this time. I was unaware that the U.S. has 702 bases or other facilities in 63 countries. Also unknown was the fact that 80% of the international forces are stationed in Germany and South Korea.

Politically, it will easier to save dollars by trimming overseas bases than cutting domestic weapons programs.

Possible closure targets, according to the Kiplinger report: Kadena Air Base, Torii Army Station and Camp Butler Marine Corps Base, all in Okinawa, Japan; Army stations in Stuttgart and Schweinfurt, Germany; an airfield in Heidelberg, Germany; Aviano Air Base in Italy; and an Army garrison in Schinnes, the Netherlands.

If the effort goes toward somehow reducing the massive federal deficit and shifts some of the world’s peacekeeping responsibilities to other countries without jeopardizing our safety, it sounds like a sensible plan. 

Recent reading included a short piece about a potential change to the filibuster law. If pursued, it would not come without controversy.

For those following the goings-on in Washington over the past couple of years, 60 has been the magic number for the Senate to cut off debate on legislation that lacks bipartisan support (which has been harder to find than "insert your own joke here"). Republicans have used their now 41-seat minority to block action on several issues, while Dems have offered various "perks" to gain support. The current party in power wants to lower that number to 55.

It can be done on the first day of the next session. Vice President Joe Biden can overrule the certain GOP objection and set the stage for the rule change, but how will voters react in 2012? Will they take it out on the Democrats as a "power grab?" The determining factor might be the final tally after this November’s election. A 54-46 majority might be enough to convince Dems this is their only course of action in order to achieve their objectives.

By the way, there was no cloture (the official name for the filibuster rule) before 1917. Debate could not end as long as one senator was willing to keep talking on the Senate floor. The original cloture required 67 votes; Democrats lowered that number to 60 in1975. 

By a 53 percent to 41 percent margin, Americans say they do not believe that the spread of affordable broadband should be a major government issue. After an extended period of sustained growth, there was little change this year in the adoption of broadband service across the United States. A new survey from Pew Internet has these results and more:

Americans have decidedly mixed views about the problems non-broadband users suffer due to their lack of a high-speed connection. There is no major issue on which a majority of Americans think that lack of broadband access is a major disadvantage.

• Job opportunities and career skills: 43% of Americans believe that lack of broadband is a “major disadvantage” when it comes to finding out about job opportunities or gaining new career skills. Some 23% think lack of access is a “minor disadvantage” and 28% think it is “not a disadvantage.” 
• Health information: 34% of Americans believe that lack of broadband is a “major disadvantage” when it comes to getting health information. Some 28% think lack of access is a “minor disadvantage” and 35% think it is “not a disadvantage.”
• Learning new things to improve and enrich life: 31% of Americans believe that lack of broadband is a “major disadvantage” when it comes to learning new things that might enrich or improve their lives. Some 31% think lack of access is a “minor disadvantage” and 32% think it is “not a disadvantage.”
• Government services: 29% of Americans believe that lack of broadband is a “major disadvantage” when it comes to using government services. Some 27% think lack of access is a “minor disadvantage” and 37% think it is “not a disadvantage.”
• Keeping up with news and information: 23% of Americans believe that lack of broadband is a “major disadvantage” when it comes to keeping up with news and information. Some 27% think lack of access is a “minor disadvantage” and 47% think it is “not a disadvantage.”
• Keeping up with what is happening in their communities: 19% of Americans believe that lack of broadband is a “major disadvantage” when it comes to finding out about their local community. Some 32% think lack of access is a “minor disadvantage” and 45% think it is “not a disadvantage.”

A fifth of American adults (21%) do not use the internet. Many non-users think online content is not relevant to their lives and they are not confident they could use computers and navigate the web on their own.

Getting more of the education dollars into the classroom has been a constant theme for Gov. Mitch Daniels and Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett. But in July, the State Budget Agency released a report that indicated Hoosier districts spent an average of 57.8% in the classroom in the 2008-2009 school year, a decrease from 60.6% the previous year.

These numbers always come with controversy. Districts themselves are much more generous with what qualifies as a classroom expenditure, so their numbers can often dramatically differ from what a government or independent review will find. The goal of 65% into the classroom is also not without dispute.

What makes this interesting at this time is that a Pepperdine University review of California education spending from 2003-2004 to 2008-2009 found that direct classroom expenditures statewide went from 59% to 57.8%. Yikes, we’re tied with California. When it comes to money and expenditures, that can’t be a good thing.

A couple of other nuggets from the Pepperdine report (where they evidently do have more than surfing as a major; really, it must be the college campus with the most scenic views):

• School spending increased by 25.8% per capita during the five-year period. So much for all that talk about spending cuts
• Teacher salaries and benefits accounted for 48% of spending, a lower number than I would have anticipated
• The president of the California Foundation for Education and Commerce stated: "If California had the extra $1.8 billion that went to things other than teaching, we might have been able to hire more than 22,000 teachers statewide."

Just before heading home for its August recess, the U.S. Senate passed a $26 billion mini-stimulus that it struggled with for months. And House leadership decided to call its members back from recess to act on the legislation, which has two main components: (1) $16.1 billion to extend increased Medicaid funding for states (what is referred to as FMAP or Federal Medical Assistance Percentages); and (2) another $10 billion said to be needed to prevent teacher layoffs.

The debate involved both fiscal prudence and the perceived benefit of these state subsidies, as well as the specifics of how to pay for them. Proponents say $9 billion is to be generated from a "provision that closes corporate tax breaks on income earned overseas." Proponents think this ends an incentive to "export jobs overseas." A different – and more accurate – description would be that this is nothing more than a tax increase for businesses that happen to employ workers both in the U.S. and overseas.

The debate took its own politically charged form in Indiana this week, as efforts were made to characterize Gov. Daniels as inconsistent on the FMAP funding issue. He and 42 other governors sought the funding in a joint letter from the National Governors Association, with some qualifying statements, back in February, but Gov. Daniels has consistently pointed out the detrimental effects of the federal government continuing to spend money it doesn’t have while putting this particular legislation in that category.

The federal package would provide an estimated total of $434 million to Indiana: $227 million for six months of additional FMAP funding (an extension of provisions in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, aka the stimulus bill) and another $207 million under the teacher funding element. A $227 million subsidy to our state finances would be helpful as the General Assembly prepares for what all agree will be a brutal budget session in 2011. And school districts no doubt would welcome the money as they grapple with their budgets. But, the situation seems to pit practicality against principle. Regardless of your philosophy or political affiliation, the question remains: Why shouldn’t Indiana citizens and businesses who pay federal taxes receive the benefit of money that the federal government insists on distributing?

Some people think public employees get paid too much. Some say too little. I’d imagine that really depends on the situation, though both examples can likely be found. However, a report from USA Today indicates federal employees may be getting seriously overpaid compared to going rates in the private sector. Public employee unions argue, however, that this is due to an increase in educational requirements to perform federal jobs. Not sure, but it’s tough to see these numbers and not think something is askew:

At a time when workers’ pay and benefits have stagnated, federal employees’ average compensation has grown to more than double what private sector workers earn, a USA TODAY analysis finds.

Federal workers have been awarded bigger average pay and benefit increases than private employees for nine years in a row. The compensation gap between federal and private workers has doubled in the past decade.

Federal civil servants earned average pay and benefits of $123,049 in 2009 while private workers made $61,051 in total compensation, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The data are the latest available.

The federal compensation advantage has grown from $30,415 in 2000 to $61,998 last year.

Public employee unions say the compensation gap reflects the increasingly high level of skill and education required for most federal jobs and the government contracting out lower-paid jobs to the private sector in recent years…

What the data show:

• Benefits. Federal workers received average benefits worth $41,791 in 2009. Most of this was the government’s contribution to pensions. Employees contributed an additional $10,569.

• Pay. The average federal salary has grown 33% faster than inflation since 2000. USA TODAY reported in March that the federal government pays an average of 20% more than private firms for comparable occupations. The analysis did not consider differences in experience and education.

• Total compensation. Federal compensation has grown 36.9% since 2000 after adjusting for inflation, compared with 8.8% for private workers.