legacyofCangelosi

You ignore the reality of this issue. The intelligent leaders of the democratic party realize that an all or nothing bill has the potential to seriously backfire, not on thier political careers, but for our troops or the nation. This isn't a sell-out by them its a cautious approach. Remember they'll have another chance in setting the budget next time, which will give them more time to see how this bill proceeds. I disagree with the waivable benchmarks, they should have been solid, although the dems will look like they made the right choice down the line when the time comes for assessing if a benchmark was met. In a heavily split nation as it is right now, neither side has a mandate (as can be seen by how close the 04 and 06 elections were), so the best move is to make a compromise. I don't support the war but i have a new found respect for pelosi and her prgamatism.

Chewbacca, was the public school system down here better before? The answer is no. I agree with you F_M, the test should be more dynamic. But the higher funding doesnt go to A schools, it goes to bad schools that have gotten better. If anything it provides an incentive for mediocrity aside from perfection. Then you see all these principals from the bad schools driving corvettes while the buildings are falling apart. But the school system hasn't improved. And we are just pouring money into it hoping it will, but it never will. We need to try something new. Just because it isn't worse than before doesn't mean we should keep doing it. The higher funding does go to A schools that maintain their A's. It also goes to schools that improve from d-c, c-b, etc. And the money doesn't go to the students, the majority of it goes into teacher's pockets, which is why they teach to the test. Thats all they care about, and it is hurting the students. They need to make sure the money goes to resources that the school can use, because as it is, the money does not help the students. The fact that principals mismanage funds has nothing to do with the FCAT, thats a seperate issue. And the truth is that SAT scores have been up since the FCAT started so it is better than before. The improvements just aren't enough to maintain the status quo. Whether its with or without the FCAT, the system needs to add accoutability measures, more funding oversight, and increase options for parents and students. Magnet programs are a good idea as are vouchers. The argument I have against the teaching to the test argument is that, teaching to the test as opposed to what? The test should be changed to reflect what children should know at that grade level and then teaching to the test is ok. Another problem is the U.S. puts a lot of emphasis on standardized testing in general which I have a problem with, but thats a stor yfor another day.

Ive always defended mitre around here. Sinker ball pitchers are always a plus, true he will get killed sometimes if he comes out and the sinker isnt working. However, you can't say a pitcher is bad or not as good as his stats indicate b/c of unearned runs. In fact the first game mitre pitched this year against philly. 3 of the runs scored came in innings where the inning would have been over had it not been for an error or a misplayed ball even if it wasnt an error on the board. Mitre isn't an ace, but he can be a solid #2 or #3.

peavy is pretty fun

The FCAT is a joke. For the kids who pass it easily, it's a waste of time to learn. And for the kids who need help, they are taught the test and nothing else. And the whole giving extra money to schools that improve and not to ones that aren't improving is just ridiculous. Cypress Bay High School really needs more money while schools that consistently have lower scores definetly don't need funding. My sentiments exactly. At least make the test dynamic so that schools have to teach students to grasp the concepts and not how to pass a test. And what would it be like if the NBA, NFL, or MLB punished low market struggling teams by taking away draft picks and the large market successful teams got extra draft picks and extra money? How does a school in the inner city that is operating with struggling resources, lower end teachers, and kids who are much more difficult to teach and more of the difficult kids, compete with a school in a wealthy neighborhood, with students who have great parents, where students get tutors when they struggle, and have amazing resources and top of the line teachers? It's like saying let's give the revenue sharing to the Yankees and take money away from the Drays. I'm not specifically familiar with how Florida does it's thing, but this mentality that bad schools are bad because they can be bad is ridiculous. Chewbacca, was the public school system down here better before? The answer is no. I agree with you F_M, the test should be more dynamic. But the higher funding doesnt go to A schools, it goes to bad schools that have gotten better. If anything it provides an incentive for mediocrity aside from perfection. Then you see all these principals from the bad schools driving corvettes while the buildings are falling apart.

Except that there have been improvements in the average SAT scores county-wide in Dade since its implementation. Maybe that isn't enough evidence but the status quo was not getting anything done. Sure, theres a lot of work to be done, but if the FCAT is done away with there needs to be new innovative methods to improving education, not just a return to the laughing stock system of the pre-late 90s we had in this state. Perhaps a different system of allocating funds based on performance of schools vs. past performances and such on regular exams. Grading teachers on class performances over periods of time. More funds for voucher programs. I'm throwing suggestions, but I won't criticize a system without mentioning superior alternatives, and the pre-FCAT system was definitely not better.

Fine by me, they should cut back on the number of appeals for death row inmates though. Then again if someone did that to my niece, they wouldnt get the chance to go to death row. I would kill them myself. Can't cut the appeals b/c theres always that chance the person is innocent. Government cant be going around killing people unless there as sure as possible that the person is guilty of the crime they were convicted of and in the way they allegedly committed it.

Posted on Thu, May. 24, 2007 FCAT gain keeps 5-year trend alive in Dade BY MATTHEW I. PINZUR, PETER BAILEY AND LAURA MORALES Miami-Dade County students scored slightly higher again this year on the state's benchmark standardized test, continuing a trend that adds up to dramatic improvement over the last five years. According to test results released Wednesday by the Florida Department of Education, more than half of Miami-Dade's students read at their grade level and 57 percent meet the same standard in math. Five years ago, fewer than 40 percent met the reading proficiency standard, and 41 percent met the math one. Such long-term trends are more meaningful than year-to-year comparisons, testing experts say, because they are less affected by hops and dips that randomly occur in large sets of data. ''I just feel so good and excited,'' Tashira Sheftall, 11, a fifth-grader at Bunche Park Elementary in Miami Gardens, said as her classmates screamed, hooted and pogoed about wildly when they heard about their school's success on the test. ''This is the consistent pattern that you want to see,'' Superintendent Rudy Crew said of the five-year positive trend. ``This is sustainable. This is exactly what you want.'' This biggest blips on this year's Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test results were among seventh-graders, who had eye-popping gains, and sixth-graders, with equally jarring declines. The explanation dates back to 2003, when the state began requiring students who failed the reading test to repeat third grade. That created a fourth-grade class in 2004 that had left behind its lowest-performing students. That group is now finishing seventh grade, and reading and math scores -- 59 and 55 percent proficient, respectively -- were six and seven percentage points ahead of last year's seventh-graders. The class one year behind, which includes some of the poorer readers who had been retained a year, has always been weaker in comparison. This year, its reading and math proficiency rates were 55 and 44 percent, a decline of seven and five points, respectively, from 2006. Educators expect that ''bubble'' to continue until the class of 2012 graduates. Outside that bubble, the 2007 scores mirrored previous years'. Few groups' scores were more than one or two percentage points different from the year before. Elementary-age students' scores were generally high -- about 64 percent performed at grade level or above on the math and reading tests. But older students continued to lag. In high school, only 33 percent of ninth-graders and 27 percent of 10-graders were proficient in reading but much better in math -- 51 percent for freshmen and 57 percent for sophomores. Broward, too, has improved at almost every level since 2003. It has usually outperformed its more urban neighbor and settled into a pattern of slight annual changes, usually for the better. There is no easy way to prove whether students are better at learning today than five years ago, or simply better at taking tests such as the FCAT. But in a state that continues to base much of its education infrastructure on those scores -- high-school graduation, teacher bonuses, school grades -- the overall gains are crucial. Parents look at results when choosing between the district and its charter- and private-school competitors. Voters look at the results when electing School Board members. Lawmakers look at the results when weighing Miami-Dade's pleas for more money. ''Here's the return on your investment for the past few years,'' said Associate Superintendent Alberto Carvalho. Even before they begin taking the exam in third grade, Florida students are injected with FCAT expectations. When the results are good, as they were at Bunche Park, reactions tended toward euphoria. Principal Beryl James burst into tears Wednesday. ''It's been such a challenge,'' she said. Her school showed gains across the spectrum, exceeding administrators' expectations for reading, math, writing and science. For the first time, science scores will count toward school grades, which will be released next month. Unlike the math and reading exams, which students take every year from grades three through 10, the science test is given only in grades five, eight and 11. Science scores increased statewide over 2006 results, though fewer than half the students scored at grade level. In Miami-Dade, 34 percent of fifth-graders scored at grade level or above, up from 29 percent last year. Scores for 11th- and eighth-graders increased from 32 percent last year to 34 and 36 percent, respectively. ''It was a lot of stress placed on everyone, but we asked the students to drive us forward and they did,'' said Miami-Dade district science supervisor Cyd Heyliger-Browne. The School Improvement Zone, a Crew innovation that provides intensive-care academics for long-struggling campuses, continued to close its gap with the overall student population. Reading gains at Zone middle schools and math gains for elementary and middle Zone students were particular standouts. It was impossible to predict Wednesday whether those gains were sufficient to nudge the county's lowest-performing schools above an F. But Wednesday's news was encouraging. Edison Senior High, which has received five F's in a row, improved in every test subject this year. Crew has all but staked his superintendency -- and national reputation -- on pulling those schools out of the statistical cellar despite the challenges of immigration, language and poverty. He said Wednesday's results were further proof such success is attainable. ''This isn't something for privileged children,'' he said. ``This is something that can happen any place we choose to make it happen.'' Miami Herald staff writers Tania deLuzuriaga, Nirvi Shah and Hannah Sampson contributed to this report.

Rape is a capital crime. Most states just don't treat it as such anymore, but most do have some sort of law in the books that makes it capital. Life in jail/death sentence is what I have always considered a capital offense. Rape of a minor is a capital crime. Rape of an adult woman isn't, the supreme court said so like 15-20 years ago in a case I believe was called Coker v. Georgia.

In our brief histories, wild cards have been lost and won in phillies-marlins serieses. In 2000, the marlins were hanging around until the phillies swept us in 5. In '03 it was a marlins-phillies struggle to win the wild card. In '04 and '05 the same, both teams in the hunt, neither made it, but the games were like playoff games all year. Thats why marlins fans dislike the phillies. The mets have never really competed with us in our years when we're in the hunt and the braves usually win the division, so it isn't neck and neck between them and us. In fact the one time we played the braves in a real meaningful series was 97 NLCS, which we won. So the phillies have been our main rival and as such is why we dislike them. Although I must say I did like some of the early 90s phillies teams with dykstra, morandini, daulton and that bunch

The offense isnt the problem. Scoring 7 is good. This game was lost by the bullpen.

Had to dig this thread up from a few months ago.... since it's still ongoing. I just caught this article from WaPost the other day. This was from before Gonzalez was Attorney General, but nevertheless, pretty low. I'm more than a little surprised he hasn't been asked to resign yet. link some excerpts Gonzales's Signature Moment __ By Eugene Robinson Saturday, May 19, 2007; Page A17 It just gets worse and worse. We already knew that Alberto Gonzales -- who, unbelievably, remains our attorney general -- was willing to construe the Constitution and the Geneva Conventions however George W. Bush and Dick Cheney wanted. We knew he was willing to politicize the Justice Department, if that was what the White House wanted. Now we learn that Gonzales also was willing to accost a seriously ill man in his hospital room to get his signature on a dodgy justification for unprecedented domestic surveillance. The man Gonzales harried on his sickbed was his predecessor as attorney general, John Ashcroft. The episode-- recounted this week in congressional testimony by Ashcroft's former deputy, James Comey -- sounds like something from Hollywood, not Washington. It's hard not to think of that scene in "The Godfather" when Don Corleone is left alone in his hospital bed, vulnerable to his enemies, and Michael has to save him. It was the night of March 10, 2004. Several days earlier, Ashcroft had been stricken with a severe case of pancreatitis and was rushed to George Washington University Hospital, where his gallbladder was removed and he was placed in intensive care. Ashcroft's wife had banned all visitors and phone calls. Ashcroft's illness came amid a fight between the White House and the Justice Department over the program of warrantless domestic electronic surveillance that Bush had authorized after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Justice had reviewed the program and expressed doubts about its legality. Comey, serving as acting attorney general because of Ashcroft's illness, refused to sign off on a reauthorization of the program until changes were made. The night before the current authorization was to expire, Comey said, he was being driven home when he got a call from Ashcroft's chief of staff, who had just heard from Ashcroft's wife that Gonzales, then serving as White House counsel, and White House chief of staff Andrew Card were on their way to the hospital. They wanted to get the ailing Ashcroft to overrule Comey and sign the reauthorization. Comey ordered his driver to turn around and managed to get to the hospital first. Rather than wait for the elevator, he ran up the stairs. "And Mrs. Ashcroft was standing by the hospital bed," he testified, "Mr. Ashcroft was lying down in the bed, the room was darkened. And I immediately began speaking to him, trying to orient him as to time and place, and try to see if he could focus on what was happening, and it wasn't clear to me that he could. He seemed pretty bad off." Gonzales was carrying an envelope when he and Card arrived. Gonzales told Ashcroft they were there "to seek his approval for a matter," Comey recalled. Ashcroft refused to sign anything, told them why and said that, in any event, Comey was the acting attorney general with the full powers of the office. "I was very upset," Comey said. "I was angry. I thought I just witnessed an effort to take advantage of a very sick man." Now let's fast-forward a couple of years -- to February 2006, after the secret surveillance program had become public. Gonzales, testifying before Congress, said there had been no serious disagreement within the administration about the legality of conducting such widespread electronic eavesdropping without seeking court warrants. In fact, there was nearly an insurrection. Comey and other high-ranking Justice Department officials threatened to resign if the White House continued the surveillance program as it then was constituted. "Mr. Ashcroft's chief of staff asked me something that meant a great deal to him," Comey testified this week, "and that is that I not resign until Mr. Ashcroft was well enough to resign with me." Ultimately, Bush and Cheney agreed to modifications that addressed Justice's concerns. ...... The image I can't get out of my head is of Alberto Gonzales carrying a document for Ashcroft's signature into the man's hospital room, attempting a sneaky end-run around the deputy whom Ashcroft left in charge of the department, knowing full well that Ashcroft was seriously ill and almost certainly medicated. What did he intend to do, guide the man's hand? This is the attorney general of the United States, ladies and gentlemen. Heaven help us. Where is Ashcroft's statement on this matter? I tried to find it but couldn't. Does anyone have that information? And my understanding back in '04 was that the evil Ashcroft supported the wiretaps.

Saying we brought him in to early is just speaking in hindsight. Say the bulls dont blow the last game of the year and we have a more favorable matchup in the playoffs and actually advance. Then no one would be saying it was a bad decision to bring wade back.

I've been to home games for half of the teams you mentioned and noticed the same trend. At baseball stadiums more people leave early in tight games, have to worry about their idiot kids, drag SOs there, and are the product of free tickets. Hell, when I go there I don't hang on to every pitch but I don't leave a close game. I think the root of the problem is the length of the schedule and the fact that many people buy season tickets for business/corporate reasons. Many people feel obligated to go. Most other professional sports games have less of that. The worst I ever saw of this was during the marlins word series run. I went to WS game 3 and these imbecils sitting behind me were smoking cigarettes the whole time, one of the women had an extremely annoying voice and was yelling profanity the whole time (unrelated to the game), and one guy kept doing this unnecessarily loud whistle in my ear. Terrible time. Its baseball not a monster truck show. Furthermore, yankee stadium, most people aren't interested in the game. Too mnay businessmen just brokering deals.

I agree with eddie, no need to move uggla down now that hes hitting, wait for him to slump first

:lol I agree with most of what this Rudy poster is saying, but I find hilarious how the bull pen has become a breeding ground for amateur history experts. We all have degrees, many of us in areas that deal directly with issues such political ideologies and the policies guiding certain regimes in history.

His numbers w RISP so far don't indicate he's useless in the 3 hole. Thats kind of a luck stat in my opinion anyway, if a guy is batting in the mid .300s he'll start getting those hits with guys on.

101 today by the way

I'm jumping into this late, but its relevant to note that the Cold War 'Communist' countries does not equal "socialism". Althoguh straying from Marxism, the Soveit Union's system of government and economics is what in practice is Communism. Saying the USSr wasn't communist is like saying the U.S. isnt capitalist because we have social programs in the country. So any victory for socialism is not a victory for the Cold War Communists, the cold war communists from the Soviet mold believed in an almost god-like perception of the 'party'. The Chinese system was completely different where legitimization came solely from the worker, especially the agricultural worker (similar mold to pre-USSR (circa 1965) Cuba and Khmer Cambodia.) The collapse of the Soviet Union was the defeat of Communism, all thats left is cold war relics like Vietnam and Cuba. And the pseduo-communist states like China, which has the most laissez-faire economic system i nthe World right now. My argument is not one of causation or effectiveness of the plan, its an argument against the misconceptio nthat Soviet Communism was not communism, but was in fact socialism. That's not accurate. It wasn't Marxism, but it definitely was Communism as much as our policies now are capitalistic. Not pure, but the reality. Edit: I wanted to add that philosophy and theory is one thing and practice and reality is another. Most philosophies don't remain pure at the practical level anyway. Maybe, but there is a difference between the theory/practical divide on average and the difference between communism in practice and what Marx wrote. None of the communist states ever allowed capitalism to create the infinite surplus necessary for communism to exist. Ergo, no practical occurrence of communism. Furthermore, the divide between the US and pure capitalism is different. We have always followed the path described by Smith and the shell of total capitalism, just had some intervention by the government here and there. We never failed to reach capitalism, we've just gone about tweaking it across the years. Different. Different only because of what capitalism theorizes. True the technology never reached the level of self sustainability and abilit yto create an unlimited surplus, diminishing the need for labor, hence products having no more value. However, the same way people now believe that the invisible hand does not exist and cannot truly balance the system, many also believe that Communism exactly like the Marxist theory can also never truly exist. So as such, the differnces are minute enough to stick by my argument.

I'm jumping into this late, but its relevant to note that the Cold War 'Communist' countries does not equal "socialism". Althoguh straying from Marxism, the Soveit Union's system of government and economics is what in practice is Communism. Saying the USSr wasn't communist is like saying the U.S. isnt capitalist because we have social programs in the country. So any victory for socialism is not a victory for the Cold War Communists, the cold war communists from the Soviet mold believed in an almost god-like perception of the 'party'. The Chinese system was completely different where legitimization came solely from the worker, especially the agricultural worker (similar mold to pre-USSR (circa 1965) Cuba and Khmer Cambodia.) The collapse of the Soviet Union was the defeat of Communism, all thats left is cold war relics like Vietnam and Cuba. And the pseduo-communist states like China, which has the most laissez-faire economic system i nthe World right now. My argument is not one of causation or effectiveness of the plan, its an argument against the misconceptio nthat Soviet Communism was not communism, but was in fact socialism. That's not accurate. It wasn't Marxism, but it definitely was Communism as much as our policies now are capitalistic. Not pure, but the reality. Edit: I wanted to add that philosophy and theory is one thing and practice and reality is another. Most philosophies don't remain pure at the practical level anyway.

Throwing hard automatically equals disabled list? Not to say he wont get injured at some point, but plenty of hard throwing relievers have good and long careers.

If a car tries to merge in front of me I speed up cuz i'm an a**hole. :thumbup Naw not an A-hole. That just means you contribute to traffic. Most of the traffic here isn't caused by old folks driving slow. It's by people who hang out in the left lane because they dont know its a passing lane. Also people who thin kthat at all times their foot must be either on the gas or on the brake, and don't understand that if you pace yourself properly traffic can move continuously. And people who cause a bottleneck at the merge lanes by not letting cars merge. In heavy traffic the merge lane should be 1 and 1. I hate it so much when people 'cheat' when a lane is closed ahead. I never let them back in once they do that, and a lot of times I will move my car to block the lane that is ending to keep people from speeding to the bottleneck and forcing themselves back into the proper lane. Yea thats the different, my reference to the merge lane are the people that are coming on from a ramp and have to merge and so forth

When the ball hit olsens foot today, did it hit him in that same heel?

If a car tries to merge in front of me I speed up cuz i'm an a**hole. :thumbup Naw not an A-hole. That just means you contribute to traffic. Most of the traffic here isn't caused by old folks driving slow. It's by people who hang out in the left lane because they dont know its a passing lane. Also people who thin kthat at all times their foot must be either on the gas or on the brake, and don't understand that if you pace yourself properly traffic can move continuously. And people who cause a bottleneck at the merge lanes by not letting cars merge. In heavy traffic the merge lane should be 1 and 1.

Actually I know this isn't the indicator of managerial success, but by this time last season we were worse.