in a democracy, I think a lot can be said for making sure we keep things simple and straightforward. It is beyond foolish to muddy the waters and make everything be federal when each of the 50 states is plenty large enough to handle/debate these concerns
Defund public libraries
- Thread starter Cypress
- Start date
in a democracy, I think a lot can be said for making sure we keep things simple and straightforward. It is beyond foolish to muddy the waters and make everything be federal when each of the 50 states is plenty large enough to handle/debate these concerns
Agreed. Actually a small percentage of educational spending is federal (about 6%?)
Some of the pressure comes from national corporations and local business communities that want the schools to hold bond elections for building programs, buy more AV equipment, have a successful sports program, etc. because they benefit financially. I saw a roundtable discussion on C-SPAN with former school superintendents who talked about the pressure to build new construction projects by local businesses. Members of Congress always want projects to benefits businesses in their districts.
Monad Portal
Was it me?
why should the government pay for roads?
the people pay for the roads. all a government does is take from those that produce
Which is why it should be easier to extract the federal government from this operation.
the hidden truth is the federal government wants to be able to blackmail states into submission - which is horribly undemocratic
Yakuda
Verified User
Because that's a proper function of govt like maintaing an army.
Monad Portal
Was it me?
Yakuda
Verified User
Ok. I'm not. I'm fine with having a conversation about that but the govt presently does way more shit than it has authority to. There is no authority for the govt to have a federal dept of education or transportation or energy. The list goes in and on.
I wouldn't call it blackmail. If members of Congress are being lobbied by educators across the country to help them with various educational expenses, they are just trying to meet the needs of their constituents.
If they are going to provide money for free they naturally will include some guidelines and regulations about how the money is spent. If those schools don't like those regulations, they don't need to apply/accept federal funding. How is that blackmail?
At the college level, pork projects are more to bring money to a school rather than perform some useful function.
In addition to providing the community digital content, printed material, entertainment, and music, libraries are one of the only places that provide public space and facilities for community meetings, classes, book clubs, and presentations for little or no cost.
You would be hard pressed to convince Twitter or Netflix to let you use their facilities for club meetings, classes, demonstrations, presentations, seminars, etc.
And how would you provide this "cheap and easy access to the internet" for those who cannot afford computers and wifi? Would you support the taxpayers providing such access to each household, based on income? If so, why not just fund a building where low income people and students can go use public-supported computers and access other educational materials? Or is it the educational materials you object to?
I can just see the haters' heads exploding now if we expanded Internet access to those who can't afford it, and provided them with devices to utilize it. There would be even more poutrage than there is now about "welfare bums" who have cell phones.
It comes from the well of truth, actually.
Who said that it is involved? The OP is about a STATE defunding public libraries.
facts say they are involved.
Excellent. I read the convo between you and Flash; he says that a small part (6%?) of libraries' funding comes from federal grants. Small libraries like ours up here apply for the grants because our local tax base can't support them 100%. Every penny that they get from the government is used for the library, which benefits our entire community.
Into the Night
Verified User
Books and scripture associated with the Church of Perversion is not a valuable resource to the public.
Libraries are not a barometer. Apparently you don't know what a barometer is.
Define 'advanced civilized society'.
Into the Night
Verified User
So you don't go the library. I already knew this.
Not now, no. Do you?
Into the Night
Verified User
Sure they can. Indeed, that's the whole point of some private libraries.
Some public libraries are great resources. Others are not. State funding is not the only funding of public libraries. The Missouri State legislature has decided to let cities and counties fund their own libraries and not contribute State money to them anymore.
State parks are often poorly or not maintained properly and some have become havens for homeless camps. Some of these weed infested places of human rot is not a benefit to society.
State schools are often not a public good anymore, since they fail to educate kids in read, writing, math, history, or science. Schools are not libraries. False equivalence fallacy.
State roads are only part of the roadways in a State. There are also federal roads, county roads, city roads, and private roads. Roads are not libraries. False equivalence fallacy.
There are private parks. Some are quite beautiful. Locally around here, the Butchart Gardens is one shining example (built in an old quarry pit).
There are private schools. They can operate profitably and can turn out much better educated students.
There are private roads, even multilane limited access highways. Often they are the only way to get somewhere, or are faster to get somewhere than using the freeways (federal public multilane limited access highways). These private roads are paid for by tolls.
There are private libraries, even private libraries that circulate books. Typically, you pay for a membership in such libraries.
One of the most impressive private libraries is the Jay Walker library (no membership or public access). A beautiful piece of architecture, and an amazing collection.
Into the Night
Verified User
Maintaining a library is a proper function of any government.
The Library of Congress, for example, is used by Congressmen to research information related to current issues. It is also open to the public, but the public cannot check out any books.
Various State funded universities have libraries for their students. Some of them have an impressive collection of books, and some are also quite beautiful architecturally. The Graduate library at the University of Washington contains an wonderful collection of books, and it's like a literary rabbit's warren, with hallways and nooks and crannies everywhere, even seeming like some obscure side hallway, but it eventually opens up into a whole new section of the library.
City libraries can have nice collections too. Some accept State funds, others do not. Seattle's public library does accept State funds, and is unique in it's architecture. Unfortunately, being in downtown Seattle, it has become a haven for homeless to hang out, along with their drug problems and crime.
King County Libraries is not funded by any State money at all, instead getting funding from the county portion of property taxes. This is a set of smaller libraries, but together has an impressive collection of books. It is easy to get a book shipped from library to library so you can check it out. This tax was voted on by the people of King County.