Lost On The Shore

Lubyanka on the Severn

The Baltimore Sun, Washington Post and a host of other newspapers report today that the Maryland State Police have repeatedly spied on groups opposed to the death penalty or opposed to the war.  Despite the fact that the police spies reported no plans for illegal activity or any illegal activity itself, the State Police reported the names of some participants to the Federal government to be entered into the national database of people thought to be terrorists or drug traffickers.

This is both stupid and dangerous.  Stupid because it diverts scarce resources from fighting crime to unproductive spying on people who are peaceful and law-abiding.  Dangerous because it erodes popular support for the police and damages their credibility.  Who can trust them?  Many in Maryland oppose the death penalty, the war in Iraq or war in general.  Why would our state police spy on them and report them as, of all things, potential terrorists? 

The right to dissent and protest are important American values - they help keep our democracy strong and have played an important part in the evolution of our country, from the very founding of our country to the abolitionist movement that helped raise public consciousness about slavery to the suffragette movement that won the right to vote for women to the civil rights movement that helped to finally bring equal rights to African-Americans and to the anti-war movement that helped end the fruitless war in Vietnam.  Dissent is important because it helps us examine our assumptions and see others' points of view.

Of course, some of this can be attributed to sheer laziness.  The agents that the Maryland State Police sent to spy on the peaceful and law-abiding citizens of the state repeatedly reported that no illegal activity was planned or had taken place.  Yet they consistently recommended the spying be continued.  Why would they do that?  Well, going to meetings of peace activists and anti-death penalty types is certainly easier and safer than going after criminals!

Governor O'Malley needs to get to the bottom of this.  Those responsible for this fiasco need to be terminated - there's no place in our state government for this kind of nonsense.  Investigating and spying on people simply because they dissent is an affront to our American way of life.  After a full disclosure of what went on, the records of this spying need to be purged to protect the reputations of those who were spied upon.  And our police need to get back to enforcing the law and catching criminals - certainly there is enough crime in Maryland to keep them busy.

The photo above is of the KBG headquarters on Lubyanka Square in Moscow.  Russians used to joke that it was the tallest building in Moscow because 'from its basement you can see Siberia'.  We don't need any secret police in Maryland. 

Performance in Education

Several newspapers and TV stations, including the Daily Times here on the Shore, recently carried an article discussing the increased use of 'performance pay' in Maryland schools.   According to the article, Prince George's County schools are instituting a series of 'performance bonuses' for teachers while Harford and Anne Arundel schools offer modest performance bonuses to principals.

Now, if you believe, as I do, that government has the power to improve people's lives, you must also demand that government, at all levels, perform at the highest levels of effectiveness and be transparently accountable to the taxpayers.  After all, money to run the government is not contributed voluntarily but is taken involuntarily.  If we fail to demand and expect the highest levels of performance from our government then we are playing into the hands of those to whom all taxes are anathema and government is just a wasteful boondoggle.

And in many areas, government is becoming more accountable.  In Maryland, Governor O'Malley has introduced 'statestat' and 'baystat' which, although imperfectly, try to publicly and transparently measure the performance of the various state agencies.  And in many areas of the government, pay has been tied to performance, although the measures are sometimes crude and the system is often not administered in a transparent fashion.

But not in education.  For some reason or other, we don't pay our teachers according to their performance.  The primary reason for this, of course, is the violent opposition of the teachers themselves.  They would have us believe that there is no way to effectively measure the performance of teachers and that, anyway, they're all good. 

Of course, that's absurd.  Anyone who's been a student or anyone who is a parent of a student can tell you that there are good teachers and bad teachers and, quite probably, can tell you, with a fair degree of unanimity, which are good and which are not.

Many of our school systems have salaries based on performance for other staff but not for teachers.  Somerset County schools have performance pay for secretaries, custodians, receptionists, classroom aides, cafeteria workers and administrators - but not for teachers.  Here in Worcester County, there is no thought to performance pay for teachers.  According to the spokeswoman as long as they get enough money, they'll do fine.

And that's the crux of the matter.  For most of our local jurisdictions, schools take the lion's share of the budget.  And they get what they ask for almost always - cut their budget request by even a small fraction of a percent and there will be predictions of doom.

Anyone who has read this blog knows that I am a big fan of education.  It's the key to our ability to compete in a global economy and to the relatively high income levels we enjoy in Maryland.  And that's even more reason why we should have the highest expectations of our educational establishments and our teachers and why they should be held to the highest standards of accountability and transparency.