My column this week is on the need to develop more homegrown scientists, engineers, and other smart people. I base it on numerous reporting encounters I have had in which the person producing the gee-whiz technical advancement almost always seems to be someone born in another country. This isn’t an anti-immigrant column; we need to continue to attract the world’s best minds at the same time they are developed here at home. Because someday those best minds may not feel a need to come here.

Here’s the column.

My column this week is about the Common Core State Standards, a state-led initiative that has created national standards in English language arts and math for all participating states. Arkansas is one of 41 states that have signed on to the Common Core, plus the District of Columbia.

The Common Core is meant to ensure that students in Arkansas learn something close to the same material as students in Louisiana because in our mobile society, it’s entirely possible that they might live there. The reverse certainly was true after Hurricane Katrina, when Arkansas was inundated with students from New Orleans who might as well have come from a foreign country.

The standards are also more focused than what is currently taught. The current state of education is a mile wide and an inch deep – students cover a lot but don’t learn enough. Common Core seeks to address that.

I think it’s a good thing. Here’s the column.

My Arkansas News Bureau column this week is about a legislative committee’s decision to vote against a bill that would oppose the health insurance mandate passed last year by Congress and signed by the president. (I don’t like calling it “Obamacare.”)

My point is that the Constitution is clear that state law can’t trump federal law. In fact, it’s pretty hypocritical that legislators would attempt to do something unconstitutional because they say that the health care law is unconstitutional. Dang, I should have written that in the column.

And then I go on a brief rant about how to “fix” health care, as if I know. Basically, I think the big problem with our health care system is that consumers don’t act like consumers. We pay a big lump sum to our health insurance company (or a lifetime of taxes to Medicare) and then access the system without much pain at the point of purchase. We need to pay for more of our health care at the doctor’s office or hospital. That way we’ll use less of it and demand better prices and service.

Here’s the column.

Talk Business’s Roby Brock has a detailed explanation of the $330 million the state owes the federal government thanks to the depletion of its state unemployment tax assistance contributions. This is a problem that gets glossed over every time the state’s “balanced budgets” are mentioned.

According to Brock, the state typically has a balance of $200 million in the fund, but the recession has turned that surplus into a deficit. He further explains that while some legislators have presented proposals, no one is actually offering any leadership – including Governor Beebe.

Brock writes:

State Senator Johnny Key, R-Mountain Home, has introduced a bill, SB 87, to tighten requirements for receiving unemployment benefits, especially for those fired for misconduct or criminal activity.

Rep. Denny Altes, R-Fort Smith, has proposed legislation, HB 1057, which would take an additional half-percent of wages from workers – not employers – to shore up the fund. Altes has two other bills that would require greater scrutiny of those filing for unemployment.

Sen. Larry Teague, D-Nashville, head of the Senate Revenue and Tax Committee, is a vocal advocate of addressing the issue, but he doesn’t see a resolution coming together.

“I don’t know where we’re going. I don’t know if we’ll deal with it at all in this session,” Teague said, noting that Arkansas owes $518,000 in interest to date and its accruing daily.

You can read all of Brock’s post here.

No, Sarah Palin did not have anything to do with what a madman did in Arizona.

Yes, some are taking advantage of this to try to discredit conservatives, or at least vent their frustrations.

But yes, it’s time for Palin and fellow Republicans to tone down the “Don’t retreat, just reload” rhetoric.

And yes, it’s worse on the right. Please, Palin’s people, don’t try to tell us those weren’t gunsights on your map.

No, that’s not really the problem. The problem is the attitude that dehumanizes anyone that doesn’t agree with one’s side 100 percent, and yes, both sides are equally at fault. It’s the attitude that accuses President Bush of plotting 9-11. That turns President Obama into a “Muslim socialist who wants the terrorists to win.” That sells a book defining conservatives as “The American Taliban.” That calls someone “The Worst Person in the World.” (I’m sure they’re not.) That spends three hours on the radio and all day on television inflaming passions and mischaracterizing the other side. That defines “real Americans” as those who vote properly. That separates the coasts from the heartland and red from blue.

That secretly, or not so secretly, is glad this happened.

No, we don’t have to hold hands and sing “Kumbaya.”

But yes, we do have to get along.

I close with this plea for reasonableness from Jon Stewart from his Rally to Restore Sanity.

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