I received this in the mail today from the Tennessee Democratic Party. Mostly it was advertising a fundraising and honor ceremony at Al & Tipper's house for Gore, Gov. Ned McWherter, Sen. Jim Sasser, Sen. Harlan Matthews, and Congressman Bob Clement. Then honoring current TN Dem leaders, Bredesen, Ford & so on.
But the interesting part (at least to me) was that enclosed was The Tennessee Democrats' Creed. It follows below.
Stewardship: The Tennessee Democrats' Creed
We Democrats believe that we exist not merely as individual "owners" of those things we possess, but also as stewards on behalf of those in need and those who will follow us.
Therefore:
We will be faithful stewards of our children's education and we will promote quality job training for all citizens seeking the skills to thrive in a technologically and intellectually challenging world;
We will be faithful stewards of our natural resources by pursuing sustainable environmental policies and by leaving this planet in a better condition than we found it so future generations may enjoy its beauty;
We will be faithfulj stewards of our health and well being by promoting policies that will create access to affordable health care, and by supporting research to imporove health conditions and fight diseases;
We will be faithful stewards of our communities by supporting efforts to control crime and promoting policies that will encourage better planning to ensure a rich quality of life;
We will be faithful stewards of our democracy, by honoring those who have sacrificed to safeguard it, and by defending it against all who would threaten it;
And we will be faithful stewards of our freedoms of equality, religion and expression so that men and women of all races and faiths can live, follow their beliefs, and express their views without fear of discrimination or reprisal.
We, as Democrats, understand and accept our responsibilites to our fellow Tennesseans. We follow the scriptural and cultural admonitions that call on us to care for the least among us, and to prepare for that which is to come. We look to the future while living our lives and remembering our past, and we gratefully accept our role as stewards of God's creations.
After reading this, I got to thinking. Look out world, Dittoz is thinking. But anywho, the Republicans are always saying we have no message. We have no plan. All we know how to do is criticize (And who can blame us when we have such easy targets, am I right?) This creed exactly spells out what our message should be in general terms, now we just need to fill in the specifics and present it to the American people. Preferably in plain English where most Americans can understand it, yet not be so simple that it sounds condescending to them.
Lets take this Creed and start to fill in the details. I'll start with the first paragraph and if I ever get around to it, maybe one day take the rest :)
"We will be faithful stewards of our children's education and we will promote quality job training for all citizens seeking the skills to thrive in a technologically and intellectually challenging world;"
Well, No Child Left Behind has just forced TN to begin offering a tier diploma plan. The details haven't been released yet, but basically to bring up our graduation rates we are going to offer different levels of diplomas so everyone can get some kind of degree. How exactly does this improve education? This is a technicality to bring up a statistic. It isn't teaching anyone to read.
This is the typical Democrat response (I know, because this was my first response when I started typing). But what are we going to do?
For starters we can begin by paying teachers like the professionals they are, as opposed to hired help. How much is this? I have no clue. I know starting at $28,000 is too little. You can make more money being assistant manager at the corner convenience store.
Secondly, you can't grade a teacher based on the average of their test scores. What if one teacher has seven resource kids out of 20 total, and another teacher has 0. How can the first teacher ever hope to compete with the second? This is the equivalent of saying the police chief of Detroit is a bad chief because there were X homicides in his city last year, but Andy Taylor didn't have any in Mayberry. Maybe Teacher A was given all of the resource kids because her principal knows what a good teacher she is. Grade teachers on a yearly evaluation method based on classroom management and teaching skills by observation.
Third, we have to improve the overall economic condition of the area we are trying to improve. Face it folks. Poor kids don't test as well in general, as rich kids. May not be politically correct, but there it is. Specifically in the inner cities, we see this as a huge problem. Parents are at work all the time, kids are at home all alone. If you're an 8 year old at home alone, are you going to be watching Spongebob or are you going to be practicing reading? So which came first, the chicken or the egg? In order to improve the economic condition of an area you have to improve education. Better education means better job and better pay.
So what is your specific idea on how the democrats can turn this country around?