Tuesday, April 16, 2013

Barker's Newsbites: Tuesday, April 16, 2013


Just something to think about...

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4 comments:

William R. Barker said...

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/04/15/nation-biggest-movie-theater-chain-cuts-workweek-blaming-obamacare/

The nation's largest movie theater chain has cut the hours of thousands of employees, saying in a company memo that ObamaCare requirements are to blame.

* COULDN'T FIND A LINK TO THE MEMO; VERIFIED THIS IS REAL, HOWEVER.

Regal Entertainment Group, which operates more than 500 theaters in 38 states, last month rolled back shifts for non-salaried workers to 30 hours per week, putting them under the threshold at which employers are required to provide health insurance. The Nashville-based company said in a letter to managers that the move was a direct result of ObamaCare.

* QUOTE:

“To comply with the Affordable Care Act, Regal had to increase our health care budget to cover those newly deemed eligible based on the law's definition of a full time employee.”

- Memo sent to managers of Regal theaters

* QUOTE:

“In addition, some managers have requested guidance on what they should tell those employees negatively impacted and, at your discretion, we suggest the following,” read the memo obtained by FoxNews.com. “To comply with the Affordable Care Act, Regal had to increase our health care budget to cover those newly deemed eligible based on the law's definition of a full-time employee.”

“To manage this budget, all other employees will be scheduled in accord with business needs and in a manner that will not negatively impact our health care budget,” the message continues.

Regal, which had revenue of $2.8 billion in 2011, is the latest company to respond this way to the Affordable Health Care Act's requirement that employees at companies of a certain size who work more than 30 hours per week be provided health coverage.

Applebee's and Olive Garden also scaled back the hours of workers.

A handful of colleges have cut hours because of the law, including Palm Beach State College in Florida and New Jersey’s Kean University.

Critics say the law is boomeranging on working folks. "If you want to have reduced work, lower wages and economic stagnation, this is a great way to do it, said Ed Haislmaier, senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation.

One Regal theater manager told FoxNews.com the move has sparked a wave of resignations from full-time managers who have seen their hours cut by 25% or more. “In the last couple weeks, managers have been quitting on a daily basis from various locations to try and find full-time work,” said the manager, who asked not to be named. “Regal up until now has never restricted anyone to anything below 40 hours.” The manager told FoxNews.com ObamaCare has had the unintended consequence of taking food off his table.

“Mandating businesses to offer health care under threat of debilitating fines does not fix a problem, it creates one," he said. "It fosters a new business culture where 30 hours is now considered the maximum in order to avoid paying the high costs associated with this law.

* FOLKS... AS I'VE ALWAYS SAID, EMPLOYER PROVIDED HEALTH INSURANCE IS A HUGE PART OF THE PROBLEM! YOUR EMPLOYER SHOULD NOT MORE BE PAYING DIRECTLY FOR YOUR HEALTH INSURANCE THAN HE/SHE/THEY SHOULD BE PAYING DIRECTLY FOR YOUR FOOD, CLOTHING, HOUSING, OR SEX TOYS (TO GO ALONG WITH THE BIRTH CONTROL)!

“In a time where 40 hours is just getting us by, putting these kind of financial pressures on employers is a big step in a direction far beyond the reach of feasibility for not only the businesses, but for the employees who rely on their success," he said.

* REALITY... DOESN'T... MATTER... TO... THE... OBAMAITES!

In addition to the movie theater chain and several restaurants, the state of Virginia also rolled back the hours of all part-time employees back to 29 per week in February, with officials from the state claiming that the new mandate would cost the state tens of millions of dollars a year.

April 16, 2013 at 7:55 PM
William R. Barker said...

http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20130416/NEWS0107/304160065/Nun-pleads-guilty-voter-fraud-escapes-prison?gcheck=1

Marguerite Kloos walked into court Tuesday as a nun who devoted her life to her religion. When she walked out, she was a convicted felon who escaped a prison term.

Kloos, 54, of Delhi Township, pleaded guilty to illegal voting, admitting to filling out and filing an absentee ballot for Sister Rose Marie Hewitt, Kloos’ friend who died before last November’s election.

(Hewitt requested an absentee ballot from the Board of Elections in September. It was mailed to her Oct. 4, the day she died.)

In a brief hearing before Hamilton County Common Pleas Court Judge Robert Winkler, Kloos pleaded guilty as charged but was sentenced to the diversion program. If she stays out of trouble, usually for a year, her record will be erased and legally it will be as if it never happened.

* WHAT A COUNTRY, HUH!

* SERIOUSLY, FOLKS... I CAN ACCEPT NO JAIL TIME. (BY THE SAME TOKEN, A SHORT JAIL SENTENCE WOULDN'T HAVE BOTHERED ME, EITHER.) BUT THIS WHOLE "IT WILL BE AS IF IT NEVER HAPPENED" IS BULLSHIT. (AND THE NORM; WHICH IS ONE REASON OUR LEGAL SYSTEM IS OFTEN HELD IN SUCH HIGH CONTEMPT.)

After the allegation was made public, Kloos resigned as The College of Mount St. Joseph's Dean of the Division of Arts and Humanities.

(*CLAP...CLAP...CLAP*)

* YEP... "EDUCATORS." YET ANOTHER SHINING EXAMPLE OF MORAL AND ETHICAL RECTITUDE FOR OUR NATION'S YOUTH TO LOOK UP TO!

Hers was one of three cases Hamilton County decided – so far – to prosecute from last fall’s elections.

Melowese Richardson, 58, of Madisonville, is in court Wednesday charged with eight counts of illegal voting. She was a poll worker accused of voting twice in the November presidential election and for relatives in various elections. Her charges charges carry up to 12 years in prison.

Russell Glassop, 75, of Symmes Township, is in court May 14, charged with one count of illegal voting. He also is seeking diversion. He is accused of voting for his deceased wife who requested an absentee ballot before she died.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

April 16, 2013 at 10:07 PM
William R. Barker said...

* TWO-PARTER... (Part 1 of 2)

https://www.nationalreview.com/nrd/articles/344660/higher-education-revalued

Today, an A is the most common grade given in college — 43% of all grades...

* BUT... BUT... BUT... (*GUFFAW TURNING INTO TEARS*)

...as opposed to 15% in the 1960s, according to Stuart Rojstaczer, formerly of Duke, and Christopher Healy, of Furman, who conducted a 50-year survey of grading.

Arthur Levine, president of the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, has also studied the trajectory of college grades. He finds that in 1969, 7% of two- and four-year college students said their GPA was an A-minus or higher; by 2009, 41% of students did.

(*SIGH*)

Grade inflation is real, rampant, and ravaging a university near you.

* A UNIVERSITY...? HOW'BOUT AN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL... A MIDDLE SCHOOL... A HIGH SCHOOL...

(*SNORT*)

It gets worse. A 2011 national study published as the book Academically Adrift, by Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa, found that our puffed-up prodigies are learning much too little. Thirty-six percent of the students it surveyed show little or no increase in their ability for critical thinking, complex reasoning, and clear writing after four years of college.

* FOLKS... ALL THESE STATS ARE FAMILIAR TO ME. REGULAR READERS KNOW THAT AMERICAN "EDUCATION" IS A PRIME BUG-A-BOO OF MINE.

A bill filed in March in the Texas legislature looks to [shed some light upon what's happening - not just in Texas, but throughout all 50 states]. Called “Honest Transcript,” it is a model of brevity - only a few more than 300 words. ... The bill would require all public colleges and universities [in Texas] to include on student transcripts, alongside the individual student’s grade, the average grade for the entire class.

(*THUMBS UP*)

The Honest Transcript bill was introduced in the Texas house by Republican Scott Turner, a freshman representative and former NFL cornerback (Redskins, Chargers, Broncos), and in the state senate by veteran Republican Dan Patrick. Supporters argue that its modest transparency requirement would show how grade inflation has severely degraded the significance of college degrees.

(*NOD*)

* LET'S SEE IF TEXAS DEMOCRATS OPPOSE THE BILL...

* TO BE CONTINUED...

April 16, 2013 at 10:51 PM
William R. Barker said...

* CONCLUDING... (Part 2 of 2)

Universities have a higher calling than simply preparing future workers. Almost all of them proclaim in their mission statements that they seek to enhance their students’ capacity for independent thought. In undermining this, their noblest calling (which harkens back to Socrates’ declaration that “the unexamined life is not worth living”), grade inflation is especially harmful: It eats away at the essence and morale of an academic institution. For Rojstaczer and Healy, “when college students perceive that the average grade in a class will be an A, they do not try to excel. It is likely that the decline in student study hours, student engagement, and literacy are partly the result of diminished academic expectations.”

* DIMINISHED ACADEMIC EXPECTATIONS... DIMINISHED ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT... YET EVER-INCREASING TUITION BILLS! (NICE SCAM THAT THE INSIDERS HAVE GOING, HUH?)

Will Texas universities oppose transcript transparency? It’s hard to imagine a principled basis for resistance, since universities are defined by the pursuit of knowledge and its dissemination to students and the larger society. Nevertheless, one university has complained to Representative Turner that the bill would create “processing difficulties in the Registrar’s office.”

(*SNORT*)

Nationally, about half of entering students do not complete college; most of those who do finish take longer than four years, which hikes the cost of their degrees. Those who fail to graduate do not fail to acquire student-loan debt, which, lacking a degree, they often find hard to repay. National student-loan debt is approaching $1 trillion and now exceeds total credit-card debt for the first time.

* MULTIPLE-CHOICE QUESTION: IS THE AMERICAN ACADEMY (HIGHER EDUCATION; ACTUALLY... MAKE IT JUST, er, "EDUCATION") RUN BY: A) RIGHT-WING TEA PARTY CONSERVATIVES; B) MOSTLY LEFTIES... "CENTER LEFT" BEING THE "REASONABLE" FACTION.

Honest Transcript’s sponsors also hope that transparency will encourage prospective students and parents who truly care about education to avoid the majors with the easiest grading. But that’s not likely, say Arum and Roksa in Academically Adrift. Criteria other than academic standards, such as “student residential and social life,” likely drive students’ decisions, as does “the ability with relatively modest investments of effort to earn a credential” for a job. Why make things harder with a GPA-reducing return to former standards?

* THE ANSWER IS TO RETURN "COLLEGE" TO THE "NOT FOR EVERYONE" NORM IT USED TO BE, UPPING STANDARDS FOR HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATION WHILE DISMANTLING THE ARTIFICIAL "REQUIREMENT" OF A COLLEGE DEGREE IN FAVOR OF ON THE JOB TRAINING AND PROFESSIONAL EXAMINATION/CERTIFICATION.

Discussing property, Aristotle cautions that “the nature of desire is without limit, and it is with a view to satisfying this that the many live.” Easy grades in vapid courses are a result of the effort to satisfy that desire. The proponents of Honest Transcript aim, in a small way, to turn the many toward something nobler, and their effort may have implications well beyond Texas.

April 16, 2013 at 10:51 PM

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