With the election less than 60 days away, there is a tremendous hype surrounding all things political. The media is providing non-stop coverage of the candidates, the candidates are making continuous appeals via TV, telephone and internet ads, and even businesses are capitalizing on the craze by targeting consumers with everything from “Yes We Can” Cola to Sarah Palin wigs. In short, the focus of the media, the candidates, and the retailers is on likely American voters.
In honor of Constitution Day (that’s today), I wanted to take moment to direct the focus to a different demographic: American children. Today’s American child is tomorrow’s American voter so we should be instilling in our children now what it means to be an American citizen.
Lynn Cheney, America’s Second Lady and author of five best-selling children’s books, has just published her sixth book called, We the People: The Story of Our Constitution. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Mrs. Cheney explains that she wrote this book after the National Endowment for the Humanities found that most 17-year olds don’t know what’s in the U.S. Constitution. In fact, when given a passage written by Karl Marx, over half of the students thought it was taken from the Constitution.
My Constitution Day question to all of you is: Do you think your children are learning everything they need to know about the U.S. Constitution and our American government? Do they understand what it means to be an American citizen? If not, how can we do a better job of educating them?
September 17th, 2008
With the election less than three months away, Republican candidates running for the Illinois House of Representatives have announced an Agenda for Action to reform Illinois state government. Candidates from across the state have been promoting this new agenda in a series of town hall meetings over the past month.
The agenda has seven objectives ranging from returning fiscal responsibility to state government to protecting children from online predators, but here are some specific proposals from the agenda that I think Illinois taxpayers will appreciate the most:
- Creating REAL balanced budgets. The way the State currently operates, any expenses that the State can’t pay for out of the current year’s budget can be transferred to the next year to create the appearance of a balanced budget. This just pawns the responsibility for reducing the budget deficit onto future generations. The Agenda for Action includes measures to ban the transfer of unpaid obligations from one fiscal year to the next and require that proposed budgets be available for public scrutiny before legislators vote on them.
- Cracking down on “Pay to Play” politics in Illinois. The Agenda for Action calls for enacting the Nation’s toughest Anti-Corruption Laws by banning government officials from soliciting contributions from contractors conducting business with the State and increasing public disclosure requirements for consultants and advisors to State boards and commissions.
- Making Higher Education More Affordable. Education is key to ensuring Illinois children can compete in a global economy. The Agenda for Action seeks to reduce tuition rates and increase financial aid opportunities at state universities. It also calls for placing a greater priority on accepting qualified in-state students for admission.
What I like about the Agenda for Action is that this isn’t Republicans complaining about what’s wrong in Springfield — instead they are offering some real, constructive solutions to the problems facing our State.
As the Daily Herald reflected in an editorial following one of the town hall meetings:
“Illinois House Republicans are saying the right things on what the state must do to honor its commitments to the public to be ethically and fiscally responsible in managing tax dollars and providing services.”
But in order for them to do the right things – voters need to elect them in November. Here are some local women candidates who participated in the town halls to show their support for the Agenda for Action: Peggy Brothman of Hoffman Estates, Anita Forte-Scott of Schaumburg, Kay Hatcher of Yorkville, Rep. Rosemary Mulligan of Des Plaines, Christine Prochno of Elk Grove Village, and Darlene Senger of Naperville.
If you agree with what’s on the agenda and you live in district of one of these candidates, I encourage you to contact them to see how you can support their campaign efforts. And, as always, please voice in and let us know what you think of the Agenda for Action.
Posted by April Green
August 25th, 2008