Don't worry! This time the Stand for Children crowd will make sure to pay top dollar for votes. And then we can follow the "public-guided charter" to "we didn't believe they'd give vouchers to mooslims" trajectory that Louisiana followed. And like the La. Superintendent of Schools says: if parents don't like the schools they can just move.

If we give Eyman a lifetime achievement award, will he just go away?

Well, Costco proved you can buy your way onto a ballot but even they lost the first time.

There is nothing "reasonable or modest" about this initiative. Even if you like the idea of charters, this initiative has embedded in it the following:

- takeover of ANY existing school (failing or not), building and all, by a charter that submits a petition with signatures from a majority of parents OR teachers. If an elementary school has 30 teachers, 16 can sign away a school.

How does this help public education to take mid/high-performing schools off-line?

- forces districts with closed or for-lease buildings to sell/lease to charters at or BELOW market value. That means you as a taxpayer could lose a public school building for LESS than it's worth.

- the newly created Charter Commission? No one who does not fully support charters should apply. You must be a true believer (where's the objectivity in that)? There is NO mechanism to remove any Charter Commission. There is NO oversight - elected or otherwise - of the members of the Commission. The Commission gets to select charters differently from School Boards.

- new costs forced on school districts struggling to support their own schools

- charters have to be started by non-profits but can farm out nearly everything, including management, to FOR-PROFIT companies.

- this idea of charters being created to help at-risk kids? Two things. One, understand the term, within the initiative also includes highly capable students.

Two, the initiative asks authorizers to give preference to charters who serve these students but doesn't say how. And, if more than 8 charters (the number that be authorized in a year) are approved by various authorizers, ALL the proposals go into a lottery.

So much for being able to control who gets a charter and who it serves.

We voted charters down 3 times and it can be done again.

Also, why is the CEO of Netflicks who lives in California giving money to the campaign? He gave $100k.

Timmy is like black mold. Never goes away, damages everything he touches.

Its a shame he spends so much time with the 2/3rd initiatives, he could yield a slam dunk with one that requires cyclists to register their bike or add a bike endorsement to their license to use roads with posted speed limits of 15 mph or higher. Seriously, rest of the state would love to stick it to Seattle (where the majority of cyclists roam wild and free), it would be an easy sell.

Anyone who signs any initiative (Eyman, booze, pot, whatever) that employees paid signature gatherers is culpable in slowly killing our democracy.

I hope nobody tells Dominic that we're also voting for governor (again), AG (again), legislators (again), congresscritters (again), and of course president (again).

Seriously, we settled this "president" thing back in 1788, why do we have to keep rehashing it?

But making everything private is better right? I mean look at the banks, look at medical insurance, look at booze? I mean the magic hand of the market makes it better! Why? Cause it's MAGIC!!!!!

Oh well, it's entertaining watch the USA flush itself down the toilet. I feel like a Roman back around 400 C.E. Just watching everything crumble to pieces.

How is Eyman able to put an unconstititional measure on the ballot? I don't understand.

"How is Eyman able to put an unconstititional measure on the ballot? I don't understand."

Kersy - it's because there is no prior review of initiatives. Meaning, initiatives are not checked for validity or constitutionality before they go on the ballot, like they are in other states.

In Alaska, there was an attempt to do a similar measure - in 2007, actually, the same year Tim Eyman got I-960 on the ballot with Michael Dunmire's money. It wasn't even allowed to get to the signature collection stage because the Alaska Department of Law - and later, the Alaska Supreme Court - concluded it would be unconstitutional. NPI had a post about this a couple years back:

Initiative 1053 wouldn't fly in Sarah Pa…

Sorry, link didn't post:

Initiative 1053 wouldn't fly in Sarah Pa…

Initiative 1053 wouldn't fly in Sarah Palin's home state: What we can learn from Alaska
http://www.nwprogressive.org/weblog/2010…

Vote "yes" on Charter schools and school vouchers. Right-wingers always shit themselves when they find out that public dollars can go to support Islamic-based curriculum.

@10 Thanks!