Meet MO State Senator Jane Cunningham, proud member of ALEC.
According to her official website,Senator Cunningham was Chairwoman of ALEC's Education Task Force and also served on the Board of Directors.
ALEC even gave her an award: "Legislator of the Year," presented by the Education Task Force of ALEC.
Her education and experience is in business and finance. And as we all know, being an expert in business automatically means you are an expert at everything else. Especially education.
This year in the Missouri legislature, she's really been going to town.
Among the legislation introduced:
-A bill that guts the Child Labor Laws. It removes restrictions on children under 14 working, removes the requirement for work permits and removes the ban on children working in hotels and motels. (This one failed, after recieving a great deal of negative attention from around the country.)
-A bill that revokes the tenure of all teachers, and requires that their pay and their contracts be based on the comparative test scores of the children they teach. All teachers, regardless of the subject they teach, even ESL or special ed, would be penalized if the children do poorly on standardized tests. Contracts will be awarded for up to 4 years. Also, the bill removes minimum pay for teachers that have a master's degree and 10 years of teaching experience.
-A bill that requires all libraries to keep "obscene" and "pornographic" materials out of the reach of minors.Libraries that adopt a "parental permission" system for "restricted" materials will be the exception to this rule. Libraries that fail to restrict what minors can read or watch, must post a sign that says: "The library may contain uncensored materials that may be objectionable and offensive to minors." Any library employee would be subject to a misdemeanor charge for violating this rule. (This one was tabled in committee.)
-A bill that limits compensation for workers that file worker's compensation discrimination complaints, and worker's that file suit under the Missouri Human Rights act. The bill also exempts the State of Missouri from any punitive damages under these laws.
She supports the deeply restrictive third-trimester abortion law that would restrict the women's health provision. Under this law, a woman would have to be in immediate danger of death, or in danger of permanent damage or loss of function of a major organ. Two doctors would be required to verify that she is in this danger. Hospitals found to have violated this law could have their licenses suspended.
Oh yes, and the famous "Puppy mill" law that was voted into law by Missourians last year: she totally supports removing all of its teeth and turning it into a kind of "guideline" for abusive breeders. (Full disclosure: My in-laws have a puppy-mill rescue. She does not bark, is afraid of the back yard, and one of her legs looks like it was broken and left to mend on its own.)
Show-me Kossacks, lets keep our eyes on Crazy Jane.