Liberal hypocrite Chris Christie attacks Bush, Trump

[Horsemask]

How does this make Christie liberal?

Incoming block of text from dudeabides

[dudeabides]

I feel like Jeb! record as Florida Governor is all I read on this board now

Post LePage's record for contrast, lol.

Yeah, post the guy who hires relatives for contrast.

Bush is as bad as Christie lol

I gotta disagree.

Jeb Bush cut taxes every year he was Governor, Chris Christie has not even fought for broad-based tax relief in three years, property taxes are up over 20% under his watch, and he's not been supportive of efforts to reduce or eliminate New Jersey's estate and inheritance taxes. Jeb Bush increased Florida's reserves by $8 billion, vetoed $2 billion in new spending, and his state saw a credit upgrade - each taxpayer in New Jersey has seen their share of our state debt increase from $36,000 in 2010 to $52,000 in 2014, our state has had 8 credit downgrades under Chris Christie, and he has presided over an increase in state borrowing in the last two years. Jeb Bush reformed a major entitlement program, medicaid, during his time as Governor, Chris Christie expanded medicaid under Obamacare. Both Jeb Bush and Chris Christie deserve credit for defunding planned parenthood, the problem is that Christie has appointed and re-appointed pro-choice judges. Both candidates have spend money on corporate welfare - but Bush at least had these corporate subsidies going to an entire industry in the tune of $456 million over his 8 years, Chris Christie has picked winners and losers, sometimes he's awarded campaign contributors, to the tune of over $2 billion in FY2014 alone! Jeb Bush did everything he could to expand second amendment rights in Florida, Chris Christie has supported New Jersey's current stringent gun control laws. Also, while Jeb Bush fought for a statewide voucher program and ending social promotion in third grade which resulted in educational gains, Chris Christie has thrown millions at expensive, failing schools. Most schools in New Jersey are great, but the ones that aren't have received millions in more state aid and students aren't learning and graduating where they should be.

Florida is somewhere around 44th in the nation in public schools.  It has a system where the wealthy, who disproportionately benefitted from the Jeb Bush tax cuts (specifically, abolishing Florida's Intangible tax) have abandoned public schools and don't support them, and don't support funding for them.  How else would you describe a situation in one of Florida's BETTER school districts where a National Honor Society student had to take remedial classes when she entered community college? 

Jeb's tax policies made weathering the recession much harder, given that the boom was fueled by artificially inflated real-estate prices.  Houses were 77% overpriced in parts of Florida that got hit the hardest when the bubble burst.  Jeb didn't care; he was gone when the crap hit the fan.

The reason why Florida's economy took longer than other states to recover is because the tourism industry, which has been thriving in Florida, and construction where hit hard. Florida was not the only state, however, to be hit hard by the recession - my state, Nevada, and others also took longer than average to recover. Before the recession, Florida saw an influx of residents and when the recession hit, people could not afford to move. People were going to Florida because of the weather, but also the positive financial environment. Eliminating the intangibles tax did benefit the wealthy, but it also benefited some who, while well off, are not millionaires. It kept wealth, and attracted wealth, to the state of Florida.

I think Governor Bush's record on education speaks for itsself:

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http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2010/09/closing-the-racial-achievement-gap-learning-from-floridas-reforms

[Fuzzy Bear]

I have two (2) separate generations of kids that I have had educated in Florida's pubic schools.  I can tell you that the gap narrowing is, in no small measure, a combination of teaching to the standardized tests and "book cooking".  Lots of kids, in fact, drop out and get a GED, but they are not counted as dropouts under Florida's system. 

Florida as a whole ranks 44th in the nation in education, at best.  If that's Bush's legacy, it's a poor one.  The Bush years DID see an amendment limiting teacher-student ratios, but that was passed by a public initiative. 

[Senator Cris]

Hypocrite Bush hack attacks Christie --> I'm most proud to support Christie

[dudeabides]

Hypocrite Bush hack attacks Christie --> I'm most proud to support Christie

You say that because you don't understand Chris Christie. He said the right things when he ran for Governor in 2009, he had me fooled and a lot of other people. He will always have my admiration for how he led this state through one of the worst natural disasters in our state's history. But his record is pretty clear: nine credit downgrades, record corporate welfare, new debt, throwing money at expensive failing schools, expanding medicaid under Obamacare, giving up on income tax relief, not making full public pension benefits, raiding our state's Transportation Trust Fund, ignoring the effort to eliminate our state's estate tax or at least reduce it, supporting funding an off-shore wind farm scheme, raising tolls, and opposing the free market as it relates to only allowing casino gambling in one city.

I have two (2) separate generations of kids that I have had educated in Florida's pubic schools.  I can tell you that the gap narrowing is, in no small measure, a combination of teaching to the standardized tests and "book cooking".  Lots of kids, in fact, drop out and get a GED, but they are not counted as dropouts under Florida's system. 

Florida as a whole ranks 44th in the nation in education, at best.  If that's Bush's legacy, it's a poor one.  The Bush years DID see an amendment limiting teacher-student ratios, but that was passed by a public initiative. 

The fact of the matter is, thousands of students in Florida were able to learn outside the public education system, and more kids were able to read at grade level, thanks to the reforms of Jeb Bush's administration. I strongly favor his reforms as it relates to school choice, ending social promotion, and merit pay - these reforms worked.

But, with that being said, this entire nation has a crisis in education. You are right, we have too many standardized tests. In some cases, states have created these standards but in many cases, it's coming from the federal government. I have friends who teach and they are spending far too much time on teaching to these tests. Look, we do need some testing to measure how well students are learning and how well our teachers are performing, but this periodic testing is simply supposed to benefit the for-profit companies that create these tests. I'd be a lot happier if there was one state exam at the end of each school year and that is it, this constant testing has hurt the teaching profession and student's ability to be interested in content.

As for dropping out and getting a GED, I can tell you that if I had kids, that would not even be discussed. I'd want my kids to get a good education, but if someone feels they can earn more money if they skipped part of high school, that is their choice as this is a free society.