The Republican leadership in the General Assembly made a gamble that North Carolinians were petty, greedy and short-sighted. They bet that we’d be so rattled by the recession that we’d do anything for a one-cent tax break– allowing Republicans to cut our public schools and universities so deeply that it would take years for them to recover.
They bet wrong. A new poll from a Republican firm shows that 78 percent of North Carolinians oppose the massive Republican education budget cuts. I don’t think it’s a mystery why they do.
Our public schools are fundamental to the success of our state. It’s as simple as that. This video, which I hope you’ll forward to your friends, shows why North Carolinians fought to establish that public education system, and why we’ll never stop defending it.
Governor Perdue has proposed a plan that balances the budget, consolidates government agencies to save money AND defends public education budgets. But the Republican majority, having stumbled into control in Raleigh at one of the most difficult times in our history, are behaving like amateurs. They’re clinging to free-market ideology and radical austerity at a time when those things are most destructive. Your Democratic Legislators are ready to invest in the recovery. Their Republican colleagues would send school budgets back to the benighted 1930′s.
But speaking of the Roosevelt administration, Lt Governor Walter Dalton points out a very interesting fact in this video: North Carolina was the only state in the union that kept its’ schools open during the Great Depression.
That points to a singular dedication to the future; a traditional commitment, and one that has always served us well. Let’s keep the heat on our Republican legislators, keep reminding your neighbors what the Republicans are doing with their majority, and keep supporting Democrats as we lay the ground-work for the post-recession future of North Carolina.
Thanks,
David Parker
Chairman
Chairman
