The education system with computers at school are not what I’m thinking about. I’m thinking schools should eventually only be used for social stuff, testing, sports, and special tutoring. The main line educational system should be done at home with their own computers. In games or online environments that are fun. Where they get the same social benefits facebook offers while learning. These kids who are texting each other and checking facebook as they wake up clearly have some extra cpu power in their noggins going to waste. We need to tweak this into something productive.

Two questions:

1) How much debt should the federal government carry? (such as a fixed number or a percentage of GDP)
2) What is the maximum amount of our debt should be foreign based? (again percentage or a fixed number)

I have worked (and still do) for IBM for 33 years, so I guess you could say I have a lot of experience with computers. There are certainly many places where more computerization can be introduced in the school systems, but that introduces the whole funding problem. I can see it enhancing a teacher’s curriculum, but I don’t think that is why our schools are failing.

I think poverty is a much bigger issue. I also believe that we are teaching rote memory skills, which is the worse kind of teaching. I don’t blame the teachers, though when you provide a fairly low wage then you do get what you pay for.

I would rather have our children tested a lot less, but develop into critical problem solvers and engaged citizens. The lack of arts in school is appalling to me. Literature, humanities, philosophy, and many other social studies have been dropped off for far too long in our school system.

Careful. You could loose your Libertarian Club membership card saying stuff like that…. ;o)

However I do believe in a balanced budget, within the constraints you’ve pointed out here, and am worried you only see the “cut, cut, cut” side of it. There are many catch-22 situations that could be fixed with a large outlay of money first to set the architecture in place so the balancing and payback can be accomplished. The whole renewable energy field is a perfect example. Education is another. Along with many others.

Fossil fuel and nuclear proponents might see us as wanting to turn off the American way of living. To make us live in caves with electricity only when the sun is out or the wind is blowing. I think you would agree with me these people don’t see the full picture. Libertarians are about the whole picture but I’m sure there are many nut jobs. Just as there are many nut jobs in the Republican and Democratic spheres.

And you yourself believe learning via a laptop is the opposite way to learn. In front of a book though and it’s all good?

May I suggest this not so novel idea of making learning something done via games. So the young like to do it. Make it interactive and well thought out so it has the built in peer approval? To motivate kids from within. Most of which is done via computers?

Yes I had many teachers I thought the world of. There were many other teachers I thought should have been fired. The goal is to improve the educational system which is now one of the worst in all of the industrialized nations while being the most expensive.

Do that and somehow magic happens and the problem is fixed.

I see no difference between Republicans and Libertarians except on social issues. Many Libertarians are for getting rid of marijuana laws and not restricting abortion.

Now, perhaps Libertarians have put forth new solutions to vexing problems other than the government doing less. I haven’t seen them.
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I’ve never seen a Democrat who was opposed to lower taxes or smaller government. As long as the job got done.

I’ve seen a large number of Democrats call for less wasteful military spending and the saved money going to social programs which need more revenue. I have zero doubt that if our military spending (and unneeded corporate giveaways) were cut and social programs adequately funded then most Democrats would be very happy to see taxes lowered.

But fix the problems first, then cut taxes. Don’t simply cut taxes and let the problems get worse.
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I’ve participated in multiple discussions about cutting Post Office services, specifically six day delivery.

We don’t need six day delivery any longer, the time-important stuff travels by the web. The only important mail is basically hard copies of important papers. Only getting your magazines and junk mail on Monday/Thursday or Tuesday/Friday would not harm anyone.

Of course the real financial problem that the Post Office has comes from the unique requirement placed on them by Congress that they must prepay retirement. No other organization or corporation is required to do this.

Some Democrats are opposed to cutting postal services if it means firing large number of Post Office employees. Presenting it as cutting by attrition and giving employees the opportunity to move to other government agencies greatly cuts that opposition.

What I don’t see from Libertarians or Republicans are suggestions along the lines of “Let’s see if we can reduce the size of the Post Office workforce without hurting individual employees.”

What I see is “Cut, cut, cut. Just don’t cut the stuff that is important to me.”

And especially we (the Global people) need ultra high profile space program that is the source of inspiration for all the smart children who are pondering if they want to become unproductive lawyer or productive (Mars rocket) engineer.

But as I said in the first place, these are horrendously difficult and complex matters and any attempt to try to simplify things into simple principles will most likely lead into a failure.

So, your plan is to do away with most of the educational system and have kids sit in front of a laptop to learn? I think our school system could use an overhaul, but taking teachers away is going the opposite direction to improve the situation. Start with eliminating the abundance of testing and concentrate more on critical thinking programs.

You don’t have any teachers in your background that were meaningful role models or catalysts for you in your life?

There is a fine line between being efficient and gutting for short term profits. Removing the need for a meter man to go around reading meters once a month might be viewed negatively. By Democrats. Or using technology so kids can learn at their own pace might remove the need for much of our educational system. Again unpopular with Democrats. Or using video recordings to issue tickets in the mail might greatly upset the police unions because they feel we our cutting their numbers. This is very unpopular with the Republicans. Or cutting down on the military spending since it doesn’t help our economy or our security. A very unpopular move with the Republicans. What they all have in common is that it helps our nation in the long term and are economically viable. It isn’t simple minded cut, gut, and pocket the change caused by hurting others.

Absolutely. At times. When the economy stalls out it pays us to go into debt and get things moving once more.

And in a national emergency we may have no option.

Should we be debt free? Probably not. One reason is that it makes some sense to pay for stuff as you use it rather than pay it off ahead of time, as long as the interest rate isn’t too high. And the US government gets pretty much the best of all rates.

Go ahead, borrow money to build that new highway or school and then let the taxpayers who use it pay for it. Rather than making the generation before them fund it.

Should we spend our selves into bankruptcy? No.

Should we be cutting government jobs? That’s hard to answer as yes or no. We should have some system of determining how much is enough. Cutting numbers just to make some people happy is not the right approach. Cutting numbers when we’re dealing with high unemployment is absolutely the wrong time.

I’d feel much better about Republicans and Libertar-icans if they talked about efficiency, how to do the same job for less or a better job with the same resources rather than cut, cut, cut. When it comes down to it they want the stuff that they don’t need cut, but keep the government’s hands of Medicare.

Way way too high. We’ve been through this before. We agree on renewable energy and removing monopolistic polluting energy companies. We disagree when I say our government should not spend beyond its mean and that we should start paying back our debt.

Is there some reason why our government should spend beyond its means? I’m willing to listen.