There is an old line in the manufacturing industry that goes like this, if you can’t meet the spec, change the spec. Meaning if you can’t make the product the specs the designer intended, then you just ease up on the specs instead of making the product better.
According to this article, that mentality is what the principal at an East Harlem school is endorsing with his teachers. If the students can’t pass the curriculum, instead of failing the students, or making the students do extra credit, or even stay after school for extra help, he says just make the curriculum easier.
Here are some excerpts from a memo the principal sent out to his teachers:
“If you are not passing more than 65 percent of your students in a class, then you are not designing your expectations to meet their abilities, and you are setting your students up for failure, which, in turn, limits your success as a professional.”
“Most of our students come from the lowest third percentile in academic achievement, have difficult home lives, and struggle with life in general. They DO NOT have a similar upbringing nor a similar school experience to our experiences growing up.”
The principal said that isf 65% of the students don’t pass than the students are being set up for failure, and the teachers have unrealistic expectations. Let us assume that a teacher is teaching a class using grade appropriate material. I think that is a reasonable assumption to make. I don’t think it is absurd to assume a sixth grade teacher is using sixth grade material. If a teacher is using material designed for the proper age group, and the students are failing the subject it can only be one of two possibilities, in my opinion. One, the teacher is not a very good teacher and is unable to teach his/her students, or two, the students that are failing need to be in a special education program where they can get the help that they need to improve and learn.
What this principal is recommending is to change the expectations of the teachers in regards to what the students should be learning. He is telling his teachers to make the class easier. I don’t understand how this will help the student in the long run. Sure, it may help with their self esteem right now, but they won’t be learning what they should be. If these students fall behind now, intentionally, how will they ever make this up down the road? The principal says in his memo that the teachers are setting their students up for failure by trying to teach them age appropriate lessons? I say this policy of dumbing down the students is what will set the students up for failure down the road.
The students need to either stay after school for extra help, do extra credit, or be placed in a special education program. Hell, it is better for the student to stay back now, than to be pushed ahead when they are not ready to move up a grade. This may hurt their self esteme a little now, but it will benefit them in the long run.
This mentality of not hurting a child’s feelings by subjectiong them to the trauma of an “F”, is the same mentality that has some schools banning red pens in favor of purple ones because it is less traumatic for the children. And it is dangerous to our future. These children are our future and they need to be raised and educated properly, we cannot have students graduating high school who are not ready to enter into society, and be a contributing member of society.
The Department of Education has stepped in and demanded that the principal of this school, Bennett Lieberman, not advocate this dumbing down of students. There is a $3,000 bonus for all teachers if this school improves, and I am sure there is even a larger bonus for the principal if the school improves. I hope this is not his motive for this memo.
I hope the teachers and the principal aren’t putting money ahead of properly educating our children. That would be really sad.
Ted Nugent Writes About “Gun Free Zones”
Here is an article written by Ted Nugent on gun free zones.
Hat tip: American And Proud
By Ted Nugent
Here we go again. Someone tell me why, with nearly 3,000 articles written worldwide within 48 hours following the tragic slaughter at the Omaha, Neb. Westroads Mall last week, not a single article mentioned the most important fact of all — that there were “no guns allowed” in the mall?
What helped cause the tragedy is the liberal dream known as “gun-free zones.” Guns also weren’t allowed at Columbine High School, Virginia Tech University, Luby’s cafeteria in Killeen, Texas, and every other location where the wanton slaughter of unarmed, helpless victims is a virtual guarantee.
It is truly anti-American and downright bizarro that private property and business owners can deny (that is, “infringe” on) this “inalienable” right bestowed upon free men by our Creator.
Consider what happened last year at a Salt Lake City mall. An armed off-duty cop properly defied that mall’s “gun-free” policy and thwarted a mass shooting that was about to unfold.
How dense must someone be to hide from this information? Denial runs deep in a growing population of “we the sheeple.” For shame.
When did a nation of rugged individuals turn into helpless whiners, crying and running in fear from danger and evil?
When did we abandon our natural instinct to counterpunch and attack evil, overpowering it and neutralizing it into submission?
When were we forced to dial 9-1-1, wasting precious, decisive time, instead of doing the right thing and stopping bad guys ourselves? When did we trade in independence for dependency? It’s pathetic.
Every day in this country, according to the Department of Justice and other studies, armed, law-abiding citizens stop dangerous, violent confrontations from escalating into death and tragedy simply by having a gun handy to provide real “equality” on the mean streets of America.
Dedicated cops will tell you that they can’t possibly be there to protect us. By the time the police show up, many innocents will likely perish at the hands of evil while good people hang around hoping and praying.
I would highly recommend that we finally learn from all these senseless tragedies. Get real. Get rid of politicians who support gun-free slaughter zones. Get rid of gun-free zones. Get a gun, learn to use it and do the right thing.
Bad guys should be shot dead, not Christmas shoppers.
I also decided to use this post to show a Ted Nugent video of him defending the second amendment. This is really going to piss off the libs out there.
Hillary Clinton’s Campaign is in Disarray
I have to say, I am enjoying watching what has happened to Hillary Clinton’s campaign in recent weeks. Just watching her fall in the polls and move into panic mode has brought a smile to my face. I understand that Obama and Edwards are probably even further to the left, and would be worse for the country than Hillary, but still, this has been very entertaining.
Here we can read about her latest woes as her campaign begins to point fingers. That is what the Clinton’s do best, isn’t it? Mark Penn appears to be the guy that is going to take the fall for Hillary, although she denies there will be a shake up in her campaign. Her arrogance appears to be her downfall here. She and Mark Penn thought that because she was the inevitable Democrat nominee, and that it was her birth right to be president that they would run a campaign as if she was already president and running for a second term.
“There are two people who have come up with this strategy — one Hillary Clinton and one Mark Penn,” said a top Clinton ally, speaking on condition of anonymity. “Mark wanted to run her, basically, for re-election, and we are seeing what happened.”
This article goes on to say that their is a split between the “Hillary” part of the campaign team and the “Bill” part of the campaign team. As the race tighten up, the split is becoming wider.
For months, tension has been building between the “Hillary” and “Bill” parts of the team, say several people familiar with the situation. Bill Clinton — along with former White House hands — have counseled her to adopt a far more aggressive approach with Obama.
The division wasn’t a major issue when Clinton enjoyed a modest edge in Iowa and big leads in South Carolina and New Hampshire. But the acrimony has grown as all those races have become toss-ups.
The one thing that we thought we knew about the Clinton’s was that they had one of the greatest political machines in history. Perhaps they do, perhaps this kind of conflict in their campaign is what makes them such great campaigners. But I don’t think so, I don’t think this is normal for them. As the weeks roll on Mrs. Clinton has appeared more and more vulnerable. Democrats are realizing that she has very few debate skills. When she tries to sound passionate about an issue, she comes off shrill. When she tries to inject humor, and then laugh at herself, it sounds contrived. So she has been losing the debates to Obama, and her lead to Obama, and Democrats also believe that Obama is more electable than she is. This makes for a difficult road ahead.
The road ahead appears bumpy for New York’s junior senator. I hope you have your seatbelt on, Hillary.
United Nations Calls for a Global Carbon Tax
I have long held the belief that global warming was a hoax designed to tax the shit out of us. Have you ever noticed that all of the solutions to global warming involve you and I paying more taxes? Now the UN has said that a global carbon tax is needed to save the planet.
A global tax on carbon dioxide emissions was urged to help save the Earth from catastrophic man-made global warming at the United Nations climate conference. A panel of UN participants on Thursday urged the adoption of a tax that would represent “a global burden sharing system, fair, with solidarity, and legally binding to all nations.”
Personally I don’t see how a United States citizen could be legally bound to pay a tax to any other entity besides the United State government. Isn’t that part of what triggered the Revolutionary War? Now they are telling us we will be legally bound to pay this bounty? Rest assured that if any Democrat is elected president we will be paying this tax. After all, as John Kerry said, we have to pass the global test.
“Finally someone will pay for these [climate related] costs,” Othmar Schwank, a global tax advocate, told Inhofe EPW Press Blogfollowing the panel discussion titled “A Global CO2 Tax.” Schwank is a consultant with the Switzerland based Mauch Consulting firm
Schwank said at least “$10-$40 billion dollars per year” could be generated by the tax, and wealthy nations like the U.S. would bear the biggest burden based on the “polluters pay principle.”
The U.S. and other wealthy nations need to “contribute significantly more to this global fund,” Schwank explained. He also added, “It is very essential to tax coal.”
What come next is probably the most disturbing part of this whole summit. It is something that arclightzero has written about before on Pro Patria, and that is the fact that the Untied Nation’s whole purpose has turned into redistributing wealth, AKA socialism, from the United States to other countries. You can read arclightzero’s post on this here. They have now come out and confirmed what arclightzero has said before.
The environmental group Friends of the Earth, in attendance in Bali, also advocated the transfer of money from rich to poor nations on Wednesday.
“A climate change response must have at its heart a redistribution of wealth and resources,” said Emma Brindal, a climate justice campaigner coordinator for Friends of the Earth.
That is the true agenda of the global warming hoax, taxes and the redistribution of wealth. If a Democrat is elected president I guarantee we will be forced to pay a global tax to the United Nations.
We need to stand up and let our voice be heard or else we will lose more of our money, money we earned, to this global warming farce. All in the name of saving the planet.
The heat is rising, only it’s not the planet that is heating up. It’s the pressure we need to put on the politicians to just say no to this fraud that is heating up.
Read more here.
Former New Hampshire Governor’s Husband Forced to Resign From Hillary Clinton’s Campaign
One of Hillary Clinton’s national co-chairs was forced to resign today because of comments he made about Barack Obama’s teenage drug use. First Hillary had to fire a couple people on her campaign because they sent out emails that suggested that Obama was a Muslim who wanted to destroy America, and now this. Of course I do believe Obama WILL destroy America, but not for the bigoted, hateful reasons that Hillary’s campaign members, and Hillary by proxy, but because he is a socialist.
So here is a quick recap of this latest development in Hillary’s campaign. First we learn that Hillary has some major dirt on Obama, but her campaign will not use it. Obama, knowing that the Clinton’s are the most ruthless people in politics, comes forward with his prior drug use thinking this is what the Clinton’s have on him. A little preemptive strike by Obama. Now we fast forward to yesterday. Bill Shaheen comes out and says that Obama’s drug use WILL be an issue in the general election.
“It’ll be, ‘When was the last time? Did you ever give drugs to anyone? Did you sell them to anyone?’” Shaheen said. “There are so many openings for Republican dirty tricks. It’s hard to overcome.”
Of course Hillary says she doesn’t condone any of the recent controversies that have ravaged her campaign, and knew nothing about them. The reality here is that Hillary’s campaign, which is in panic mode due to her free-falling poll numbers, wanted to get this issue in the limelight without it appearing as though they were attacking Obama and resorting to mud-slinging. So they had Bill Shaheen come out and mention all of the questions that Republicans would raise about Obama’s drug use as a reason that voters should vote for Hillary. By telling voters Obama would be open to Republican dirty tricks, and by throwing out the questions Republicans would ask, he was basically asking the questions for the Hillary campaign in an abstract way. This was a Clinton campaign dirty trick. Today Bill Shaheen resigned.
But there is another aspect to this whole issue, and it is an aspect that will not garner national coverage, but it should be remembered by New Hampshire voters. That is the issue I want to write about today. Bill Shaheen is considered on of New Hampshire’s most powerful Democrats, his wife Jeanne Shaheen is a former governor of New Hampshire. Jeanne Shaheen ran as being opposed to taxes but she instituted the statewide property tax we all must now pay here in New Hampshire. Many liberals here now want a sales tax to offset and lower the property tax. Of course we all know that if a sales tax is instituted it will simply mean more money for the state and the property tax will not be lowered. Especially with the fact that the state is going to have to come up with four hundred million dollars to pay for Governor Lynch’s education plan which was unaccounted for in his budget with the 17.5% increase in spending.
I’m sorry, I got off topic, let me get back to my point. My point is that Jeanne Shaheen gave up her governor position to run for the United States senate. A bid she lost in a close race to current senator John Sununu. Well now she is running for senator once again, along with a couple of other Democrats. She appears to be the Democrat favorite to win the nomination and face John Sununu in the general election. New Hampshire polls show her leading Senator Sununu. Senator Sununu’s seat is considered by the Democrats as one of the most vulnerable in the country. We now see the kind of dirty tricks her husband is willing to play, and the type of person be is. He tried to blame Republicans for an attempt they may make on Obama by telling America what they should be questioning about Obama. He wasn’t even man enough to throw the questions out there himself. He hid behind the vast right wing conspiracy.
So I ask New Hampshire residents, is this the type of person we want behind the scenes of a person running for United States senator? Someone who will stoop so low?
Please remember this when you go to the polls, vote for Senator John Sununu over Jeanne Shaheen and her despicable, dirty trick playing husband. We don’t need another pro-tax, tax and spend Democrat in the United States senate, and we certainly don’t need her husband behind the scenes firing shots across the bow.
Read more on Bill Shaheen’s resignation here.
Congress Passes a Resolution Recognizing Christmas
File this under the “doesn’t the house have anything better to do” department. Tuesday the house voted on a resolution that said Christmas was important. Evidently fighting the war on Christmas has been taking a toll on them, and now that conservatives are fighting back and trying to take back the holiday season, Democrats are doing what they do best, cutting and running.
They actually had to have a vote to show Christians that they supported them. This could be for more than one reason. The first reason is that they are finally starting to feel backlash from the obliteration of Christmas from the public common. They have tried to make people feel dirty for uttering the curse word, Christmas, and people are fed up. You can’t go Christmas shopping in a store and find the word Christmas anywhere. I believe they started to feel the backlash last year as stores started accepting the fact that they were making money off the Christmas season, not the other holidays, and stores began to say merry Christmas again.
The second reason, I believe, that the house felt it necessary to hold this useless vote was to show Americans during an election year that they really do like Christians even though they try to shut them up the rest of the time.
The final vote on this resolution was 372 to 9, 10 gutless cowards only voted “present”, afraid to show their true colors, and 40 didn’t vote at all. Needless to say, all nine of the members who voted against Christmas were Democrats, here is the roll call:
Gary Ackerman (N.Y.)
Yvette Clarke (N.Y.)
Diana DeGette (Colo.)
Alcee Hastings (Fla.)
Barbara Lee (Calif.)
Jim McDermott (Wash.)
Bobby Scott (Va.)
Fortney Stark (Calif.)
Lynn Woolsey (Calif.)
The gutless ten, who were afraid to vote included Republican John Conyers (Mich.), the other nine Democrats:
Barney Frank (Mass.)
Rush Holt (N.J.)
Donald Payne (N.J.)
Mike Pence (R-Ind.)
Janice Schakowsky (Ill.)
Allyson Schwartz (Pa.)
Debbie Wasserman-Schultz (Fla.)
Peter Welch (Vt.)
John Yarmuth (Ky.)
Here is what the resolution said:
the House recognizes “the Christian faith as one of the great religions of the world…expresses continued support for Christians…acknowledges the international religious and historical importance of Christmas and the Christian faith…acknowledges and supports the role played by Christians and Christianity in the founding of the United States and in the formation of the western civilization…rejects bigotry and persecution directed against Christians…and expresses its deepest respect to American Christians and Christians throughout the world.”
Wasn’t that nice of them to say all those wonderful things? This definitely sounds like a move designed to woo Christian voters during an election cycle. Me? I find this terribly wasteful of time. Don’t they have a war to lose? Don’t they taxes to raise? Don’t they have to stop the warming of the Earth? Don’t they have legislation to pass? Let me take that last one back, they haven’t passed any legislation since the Democrats gained control.
This is a very important moment in time in regards to the future of this country. There are many serious issues that the voters need to be focused on, that is why I have mixed emotions about this vote. I feel as though we are making progress in beating back the war on Christmas, and this is an example of that. The fact that congress had to come out and vote on being pro-Christmas means we are making strides. But, I can’t help but wonder if congress doesn’t have anything better to do then come out and tell Christians “we really do love you, you can vote for us”, which is what I think this vote was about.
Okay, now that you told Christians how much you love and respect them, you can now get back to work on the issues we face as a nation. And we will get back to putting up our family trees and out holiday shopping.
Oh yeah, I almost forgot, MERRY CHRISTMAS!
The information in this post was taken from CNS News.
Latest New Hampshire Primary Poll (12/12)
Hillary Clinton once held a seemingly insurmountable lead in New Hampshire of over 20%. That has now been surmounted.
She now has 31 percent support, with Barack Obama in a statistical tie at 30 percent. John Edwards is third with 16 percent, and Bill Richardson has slipped slightly to 7 percent.
This lead has been dwindling for weeks now, and Obama, with Oprah’s help, has finally caught her. I don’t know what this says about voters if they let a celebrity decide for them who they should vote for.
Nothing has changed on the Republican side.
Mitt Romney is leading with 32 percent support. Rudy Giuliani and John McCain both have 19 percent. Mike Huckabee has climbed slightly to 9 percent, and Ron Paul has 7 percent.
Newsflash: The Sun is Causing Global Warming
There is a radical new global warming theory that you can read about in this article.
“We are fairly sure that what’s causing the warming are changes in the sun,” he said. “These are very subtle changes that are very difficult to observe. The sun is really a quite variable star.”
That’s right, the SUN IS CAUSING THE EARTH TO WARM. Stop the presses, hold everything, I never thought of that before. That little ball of light and HEAT could actually be heating the earth? This group can kiss their federal grants goodbye for coming up with such a radical, out of the mainstream theory such as this.
They also claim the models that predict our impending doom are flawed.
Singer said the reason why the models “overestimate the effectiveness of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases is that the models ignore what are called negative feedbacks which occur in the atmosphere, such as clouds, which reduce the effect of the greenhouse gases.”
“Their models just don’t consider them properly,” he said.
Al Gore, and the like, conveniently forget to include cloud cover in their models. Cloud cover helps cool the earth and as such is inconvenient for the global warming alarmists.
“We have to remember that the climate has always been changing ever since we have records, and we have geologic records going back millions and millions of years. We know that there have been huge climate changes on the earth long before human beings actually came into existence.
Now while I find the fact that a research group has determined the sun, of all things, is responsible for global warming welcoming, I do have one question to ask. How much did this cost the taxpayers? After all this money was spent we learned two things, that the sun heats the earth and that clouds cool the earth. Let me repeat my question, this cost us how much? I learned this in second grade, and we need researchers to tell us this?
Experts: Baby Tax Needed to Save the Earth
Here we go with more global warming insanity, this time from Australia. It seems as though having children is destroying the planet, so now Australia want to tax childbirth and child raising.
A WEST Australian medical expert wants families to pay a $5000-plus “baby levy” at birth and an annual carbon tax of up to $800 a child.
This story is going to get even more strange as I continue, so hold on. First let me try to wrap my arms around this absurdity. Any species first and most basic instinct is to multiply, to continue the species. This includes man. This is nature, and is natural. We are told that if we do not stop global warming that the planet will be destroyed and man will cease to exist. So in order to ensure that man will continue to prosper we must…..stop multiplying. Okay, I tried to get my arms around it, but I must be stupid because this makes no sense to me.
Evidentally, Australia currently pays it’s new mothers $4133 to have children in the form of a baby bonus. The new plan being proposed would do away with that and punish people who decide to have children.
“Every newborn baby in Australia represents a potent source of greenhouse gas emissions for an average of 80 years, not simply by breathing but by the profligate consumption of resources typical of our society,” he wrote.
“Far from showering financial booty on new mothers and rewarding greenhouse-unfriendly behaviour, a ‘baby levy’ in the form of a carbon tax should apply, in line with the ‘polluter pays’ principle.”
A greenhouse unfriendly behavior? Does anyone else realize how stupid this statement is? It is natural for people to have children, sinse when is it a crime? I suppose it isn’t a crime but rather an opportunity. An opportunity to tax the shit out of the Australian people.
Professor Walters, clinical associate professor of obstetric medicine at the University of Western Australia and the King Edward Memorial Hospital in Perth, called for condoms and “greenhouse-friendly” services such as sterilisation procedures to earn carbon credits.
Condoms and sterilization are greenhouse friendly and should be condoned, while people who are just trying to start and raise a family should be punished.
This is just further proof that the whole reasoning behind politicians pushing this global warming agenda is to tax people for everything they can get away with, all in the name of saving the planet.
There is an upside here though. Once Hillary realizes that her $5000 “baby bond” idea will be an incentive to destroy the planet she will have to take it off the table. If it ever really was on the table in the first place.
University of New Hampshire says no to Hanukkah
The University of New Hampshire was recently asked if a student group could place a menorah in the Memorial Union Building on campus. The school refused.
“I said no,” Lustgraaf told the paper. “We can’t sponsor a religion in a public area without an educational component.”
Can someone explain to me how if a STUDENT puts up a religious symbol that is means the SCHOOL is sponsoring it? Am I missing something in the translation here? But Lustgraaf continues:
“I’m not in any way trying to stop anyone from celebrating their religious holidays or from educating the rest of the campus,” Lustgraaf said. “It is part of our unofficial mission to have students feel like their name is welcome. So, the MUB is agnostic. We could offend someone. Putting a menorah up would be the same as putting out a nativity scene. If you walk through the building you shouldn’t be exposed if you don’t want to be.”
First he says that they want students to feel welcome. How welcoming is it to tell the student that there can be no display of that student’s religion? It sounds rather unwelcoming to me.
He then says that putting up a menorah would be the same as putting out a nativity scene. Oh, the horror!
But it is the last line that I find remarkable. He says people shouldn’t be exposed to the menorah, or the nativity scene if they don’t want to be. He also says someone could be offended. What strikes me about this is not the statement itself, rather the type of person he is talking about. Can you imagine being so full of hate and bitterness that by merely walking past and seeing a menorah or nativity scene you would become offended. How many people of one faith are actually offended by symbols of another? How many atheists are actually offended by symbols of religion.
This type of person is so miserable that they can only be happy by trying to take away other people’s happiness. They are shallow and self-centered and think the world revolves around them.
Well, I am not going to take it this year.
If you are offended by any of these things, I have only one thing to say to you. GO POUND SAND!
I would normally put that a different way, but I decided to clean it up for the holiday season.
Read the New Hampshire Union Leader editorial here.
