User profile: lv_john_galt

How quickly people forget history. 46 Democratic senators voted against Clarence Thomas in 1991. I guess they are all racists and African-Americans should never vote for a Democrat again.

Shockingly enough, race is not a prerequisite to being a Supreme Court Justice.

Really? A survey based almost solely on the number of students who take AP tests cannot possibly identify how good a school is or is not.

Clark HS has a graduation rate of 57% and Valley's was 42%, both numbers are from the 2007-08 school year.

Any school could make almost every kid take an AP exam, but did they actually pass the exam? I am surprised to see that this study wasn't financed by the College Board who requires a fee (almost $90) for each AP test that a student takes. This is a non-profit who made more that $53 million "in excess" last year.

A more important question is, did these students actually receive college credit for taking and passing these AP exams? The trend among colleges is to no longer accept AP scores as a replacement for a college class. There are many reasons for this including putting too much importance on a single test and how is a college supposed to make any money if kids don't need to take four or five classes at their university because they passed an AP exam with a 3.

The casinos will never allow solar manufacturing in Nevada. Why? The solar companies want an educated work force and the casinos don't.

Considering this town's views on education and the lack of support that parents give for their own children's education, any industry that requires a brain will not come to Nevada.

The governor probably should have gone to a business that didn't sell $50,000 luxury toys to sell his proposal to the public. A small increase in taxes is not going to kill the man's business. The fact that he is in the business of selling expensive toys is what will cause the demise of his business.

People who are going to spend $50,000 on a boat in this economy are not going to flinch about spending an extra $500 if the sales tax increased by 1%. If you think $500 is going to stop someone from buying a luxury item, you obviously don't make enough money to buy it in the first place.

There are enough businesses and industries in Nevada that don't pay enough or any in taxes and it is time their free ride ends. Does anyone actually believe the mining companies or Wal-Mart will leave Nevada if they are taxed?

The tax structure in Nevada is broken, the problem is not entirely to blame on spending, but there are problems there. The biggest problem is that the state is gambling on tourists to fund the budget. Most smart investors diversify their portfolios to reduce the amount of risk. The State of Nevada needs to diversify its tax structure. Mining and "big box" retailers need to start paying their share and the casinos should actually take a reduction in their taxes. Putting all of your eggs in one basket, the casinos, is a recipe for disaster.

NCLB has done some good things to get schools focused on subgroups that were historically ignored - special education, second-language learners, but to identify an entire school as needs improvement because of one small subgroup is unfair to the student body of that school. The labeling of schools should be modified to give parents a true sense of what is happening at a school.