There are certainly good reasons for a dress code in public schools, however, there should be more reasonable guidelines to govern the dress code and punishments should be less devestating to the students’ educations.

I have personally observed these types of problems in East Baton Rouge Parish and in Livingston Parish. I’ve heard from other students and parents in these parishes as well. The level of stricture with regard to the dress codes have bordered on the obsurd especially among high school students. They are nearly adults and are being treated like small children by being forced to submit to uniform inspections each morning.

Students are not being allowed to express themselves as individuals through any means at all. They cannot color their hair or wear a tie or wear certain types of jewelry or add a splash of color to their wardrobes. They can’t even choose the style of clothing they feel comfortable in because it isn’t acceptable to be an indivitual anymore.

America is supposed to be the greatest nation in the world because people are not forced to conform to other peoples ideals, values, or religions. The stricture of the enforcement of our dress codes seems very un-American. Isn’t it time to revise that stricture to give our children a chance?

Al Gore lives in a house that consumes 20 times the anual mElectricity of the Average house, is that the kind of activity one would expect from someone so concerned about YOUR electric usage ?

from 1700 to 1900 the CO2 rate increased 180 Parts per Million…all without the aid of the Dreaded Internal Combustion Engine, the SAME engine Al Gore wanted to “BAN” during his run for president against Bush

Can anyone here say that banning the internal combustion Engine would be something you would consider a sane person would say?……not likely,

This truly galls me. If Chairman Baucus and his “gang of six” feels that so much variation in the health insurance premiums should be based on age, what value does the prohibition against denying coverage for pre-existing conditions have? I am 58, that provision is going to negatively impact me.

I don’t see why the federal government can’t just subsidize the state high risk pool instead of having demanding that private insurers insure those with pre-existing medical conditions. Frankly, I see no need to continue the silly portability unfunded mandates on employers if we were to subsidize the state high risk pools for those with pre-existing medical conditions.

If we want to provide group rates for those without employer provided medical coverage, it could be done through the same state administered high risk pool by just fully funding the excess risk for those with pre-existing conditions.

Chairman Baucus seems to think that unfunded mandates are the “magic bullet.” Unfortunately, that is what Congress did in 1996 with the “portability” mandate on employers. It obviously didn’t work!

Furthermore, Chairman Baucus and many of the Republicans are asking for tort reform. They say that tort reform will bring down costs. They ignore the fact that there were 96,000 people who died in 2004 because of medical errors and that only 2.696 doctors were disciplined by state medical boards.

Medical errors cause complications and longer hospital stays which are very expensive. I believe tort reform will perversely cause medical errors to balloon in the US, killing even more patients.

Besides, I don’t see what provision of the US Constitution gives Congress the right to legislate tort reform, particularly in view of the seventh amendment and other provisions protecting the viability of contracts.

In short, funding is what is needed, unfunded mandates are not. And Tort Reform is not all its cracked up to be. Besides, it is probably unconstitutional. I suspect that these unfunded mandates may be unconstitutional as well.

Keith Edgerly