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This site is a member of WebRing. To browse visit here. Saturday, March 25, 2006 Gosh, that sure was generous of Barbara Bush I've been up to my ears in work and family stuff, but I couldn't pass this up.The former First Lady donated an undisclosed amount of money to the Houston educational system. That was good of her. She specified that it was to be used to purchase educational materials produced by the company owned by her son, Neil Bush. That was not so nice of her. The article in the Houston Chronicle's online site points out that Mrs. Bush was not the only one to earmark funds. One man wanted his money to go to Habitat for Humanity, for example. I'll bet she was the only one whose money was earmarked to benefit a family member, though.Her spokesperson insisted that she was genuinely enthusiastic about the value of the educational software."Mrs. Bush wanted to do something specifically for education and specifically for the thousands of students flooding into the Houston schools," said Jean Becker, former President Bush's chief of staff. "She knew that HISD was using this software program, and she's very excited about this program, so she wanted to make it possible for them to expand the use of this program."What I want to know is whether Mrs. Bush's donation covered the entire cost of the software, or only half of it. In the past, private donations have paid for half of the typical $10,000 cost per installation. If her donation didn't pay the entire amount, then the schools still had to cough up the rest of the money in order for her donation to be any use to them. Not much of a gift, in that case.An HISD (Houston Independent School District) spokeswoman acknowledge that information about the effectiveness of the program was "not readily available."Sounds to me like a cool way to make a tax-deductible donation.UPDATE: Even better. It turns out that Barbara Bush is an investor in son Neil's company. So even if her donation isn't tax deductible, it still comes back to benefit her. Must be nice to be rich. posted by Liz @ 4:21 PM | The template is set to display 10 posts. To see all the posts for this month, click on the month name in the Archive section RSS Feed PERSONAL Send email toliz at life-as-a-spectator-sport.com Home I'm a mother, grandmother, a computer professional, Democrat, Christian. I welcome politely worded comments and email, my spam filter throws the rest away, so don't bother to flame me WHY 'LIFE AS A SPECTATOR SPORT' "If you're lucky not to live in the gutters of a slum, but still can't afford to take vacations in the Alps, you're part of that enormous middle class who lives life through the medium of the television, further separated from "real" life by air conditioner, by automobile, by dishwasher, microwave and ice-in-the-door refrigerator, by automatic washer and dryer, and all the other appliances and conveniences that make it possible for America to live life at second hand. I'm not sure why Americans decided that televised drama was better than the real thing, that cardboard microwave food containers were an adequate substitute for real dishes, and their contents for real food, or that cooking, dishwashing and face-to-face conversation wasn't worth the effort and time it required. Someone fed this nation a plastic crate of out-of-season tomatoes and told us it was life and we took them at their word, and we're so much the poorer for it that it's hard to know where to start to list the shortcomings." I wrote this a couple of years ago, but I have to admit it's much less amusing than I thought it would be to see the artifical construct falling apart. 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I've been up to my ears in work and family stuff, but I couldn't pass this up.The former First Lady donated an undisclosed amount of money to the Houston educational system. That was good of her. She specified that it was to be used to purchase educational materials produced by the company owned by her son, Neil Bush. That was not so nice of her. The article in the Houston Chronicle's online site points out that Mrs. Bush was not the only one to earmark funds. One man wanted his money to go to Habitat for Humanity, for example. I'll bet she was the only one whose money was earmarked to benefit a family member, though.Her spokesperson insisted that she was genuinely enthusiastic about the value of the educational software."Mrs. Bush wanted to do something specifically for education and specifically for the thousands of students flooding into the Houston schools," said Jean Becker, former President Bush's chief of staff. "She knew that HISD was using this software program, and she's very excited about this program, so she wanted to make it possible for them to expand the use of this program."What I want to know is whether Mrs. Bush's donation covered the entire cost of the software, or only half of it. In the past, private donations have paid for half of the typical $10,000 cost per installation. If her donation didn't pay the entire amount, then the schools still had to cough up the rest of the money in order for her donation to be any use to them. Not much of a gift, in that case.An HISD (Houston Independent School District) spokeswoman acknowledge that information about the effectiveness of the program was "not readily available."Sounds to me like a cool way to make a tax-deductible donation.UPDATE: Even better. It turns out that Barbara Bush is an investor in son Neil's company. So even if her donation isn't tax deductible, it still comes back to benefit her. Must be nice to be rich.
"Mrs. Bush wanted to do something specifically for education and specifically for the thousands of students flooding into the Houston schools," said Jean Becker, former President Bush's chief of staff. "She knew that HISD was using this software program, and she's very excited about this program, so she wanted to make it possible for them to expand the use of this program."
The template is set to display 10 posts. To see all the posts for this month, click on the month name in the Archive section
RSS Feed
PERSONAL
WHY 'LIFE AS A SPECTATOR SPORT'
"If you're lucky not to live in the gutters of a slum, but still can't afford to take vacations in the Alps, you're part of that enormous middle class who lives life through the medium of the television, further separated from "real" life by air conditioner, by automobile, by dishwasher, microwave and ice-in-the-door refrigerator, by automatic washer and dryer, and all the other appliances and conveniences that make it possible for America to live life at second hand. I'm not sure why Americans decided that televised drama was better than the real thing, that cardboard microwave food containers were an adequate substitute for real dishes, and their contents for real food, or that cooking, dishwashing and face-to-face conversation wasn't worth the effort and time it required. Someone fed this nation a plastic crate of out-of-season tomatoes and told us it was life and we took them at their word, and we're so much the poorer for it that it's hard to know where to start to list the shortcomings." I wrote this a couple of years ago, but I have to admit it's much less amusing than I thought it would be to see the artifical construct falling apart.
THE NON-ELECTRIC HOME
Cleaning, 1 Cleaning, 2 Cleaning, 3
KNITTING BLOGS
Extravayarnza Knitting Heretic Mind of Winter Pie Knits Persistent Illusion See Eunny Knit The Keyboard Biologist Taleweaver's Ramblings TECHnitting Wendy Knits
FINISHED PROJECTS
SELF-RELIANCE AND THE FUTURE
POLITICAL BLOGS and SITES
BOOKS I'M READING
How to Grow More Vegetables, etc. Small Scale Grain Raising
ARCHIVES
February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 August 2008 July 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003 August 2003 July 2003 June 2003 May 2003 April 2003 March 2003 February 2003 January 2003 December 2002 November 2002 October 2002 September 2002 August 2002 July 2002 June 2002 May 2002 April 2002 March 2002 February 2002
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