Let's Get Back to the Issues that Matter!

Bill Neinast

IN PERSPECTIVE

The six bullet points on a resume’ with a job application are:

  “Man of Faith

  “Husband and Father

  “Committed Conservative

  “Pro-Life Leader, Endorsed by Texas Alliance for Life Pac

  “Defender of the 2nd Amendment--”A” Rating from the NRA

  “Proud Graduate of Texas A&M University”

If you assume that this application is for a church pastor’s position, you are wrong.  This is ¼ of the top of a one-page vote solicitation from Ryan Sitton.  He wants your help in getting him on the November ballot as a candidate for a commissioner’s seat on the Texas Railroad Commission.

He gets around to that in a short paragraph below the bullet points that reads, “But what qualifies him the most to serve as Railroad Commissioner is his experience as an oil and gas engineer who has worked in the energy industry his entire professional career.”

Of the four endorsements on the ad, only two deal exclusively with his qualifications to be a Railroad Commissioner.  The other two, both of which are at the top of the endorsements, emphasize his pro-life credentials.

Sitton may be the best qualified person to ever seek a seat on the Railroad Commission.  That determination cannot be made, however, from the ad that is the basis of this column.

Who is a man of faith?  In what religion does he have faith?  Is someone with faith in another religion less qualified than Sitton just because of their differences?  Is one without faith in any religion totally disqualified?

“Husband and Father” is code speak that he is not homosexual and is opposed to same sex marriage.  Does this mean that homosexuals need not apply?

A “committed conservative” means what today?  Is he a Tea Partier?  A far right Republican?  A middle of the roader who can work with individuals with different views? What is this committed conservative’s opinion on fracking?  What does he think about the Keystone Pipeline?  What is his position on liquifying natural gas for export?

How does a pro-life and pro-gun ownership stance relate to making rules for drilling oil and gas wells?  Does this mean he would deny a drilling permit if Planned Parenthood had an acre or two of land in the 650 acres designated as the pool for an oil/gas well?

An over riding concern about this particular type of campaigning is that it is endemic in today’s Republican Party.  No matter what office is being sought, the “base” must be wooed first.

The courting involves convincing voters that the candidate is more conservative than his or her opponent.  Today, that means the candidate is more opposed to abortion, same sex marriage, and “amnesty” for undocumented visitors than the opponent.  Important issues like balanced budgets, elimination of the deficit, freedom from government intrusion in private matters. and similar concerns about Big Brother have to take a seat way back in the campaign.

This type of fratricide over who is the most conservative wrecked the last two Republican presidential campaigns and, because of idiotic statements about abortion by three Republican senatorial candidates, probably kept Republicans from winning control of the Senate.

Capturing the base, as discussed above, controlled the campaigning in the Republican runoff election yesterday.  There was also the usual mix of character assassination of opponents.  Discussions of real issues were rare.

Fortunately, there is light at the end of the tunnel.  Dr. Monica Wehby, a pediatric neurosurgeon and pro-choice Republican, won the primary for an Oregon U.S. Senate seat. 

Wehby told a GOP forum that she was personally pro-life but did not want the government involved in a woman's decision on whether to have an abortion. She believes that abortion is a personal decision.

Her pro-choice stance did not keep her from out polling  four other Republican candidates.  Her opponents included a state representative and a former Republican county chair, one of whom was endorsed by the Oregon Right to Life organization.

Current polls indicate that she has an excellent chance of  winning the general election in November to take the seat of Democrat Senator Jeff Merkley 

This apostasy also had a nod of approval from another Republican currently in the headlines as a potential presidential candidate.  Dr. Ben Carson, also a neurosurgeon, said of Wehby. “She has a very good value system.  Now she is criticized by some because she's pro-choice. Personally, she's pro-life and does everything just like I do to try to preserve life, but she's pragmatic also and she knows that there’s no way you're going to win in Oregon with that stance." 

But win she did, even over allegations that she had “stalked” two former boy friends.

So here’s the perspective. 

Maybe, hopefully, Republican candidates will get back to campaigning on issues instead of who is the most conservative.  

Maybe Dr. Wehby will teach them that they can win without the open support of the “base.”  By following in the doctor’s footsteps, they may learn that a discussion of real issues attracts more independents and “moderate” Republicans.

Those independents and moderates will more than offset the ultra conservative Republicans upset because there is no “conservative” candidate.  The ultra conservatives may stay away from the polls, but they will not even think of voting for a Democrat.

Let’s get back to the issues that matter.

Moe, Larry & Curly!

Bill Neinast

IN PERSPECTIVE

Moe, Larry, and Curly are familiar names to senior citizens.  They were the Three Stooges of slapstick comedy fame on the vaudeville stage and in film during the first part of the last century.

Today, when Barack, Joe, and John are mentioned, the Three Stooges come to mind.  This modern day, real life version, however, is much too real to be laughed off

Barack Obama, Joe Biden, and John Kerry are the foreign affairs team of the U.S.  Although they are the laughing stock of the world, particularly of Russia and Iran, the consequences of their actions and utterances are too serious to be regarded as vaudeville.

The best description of this country’s current foreign relations is that it is abysmal.  No one in the triumvirate exhibits any awareness of geography, history, or geopolitics.  

 Unfortunately, this view of the world as you wish it were rather than the real world is prevalent among the lackeys and stooges in the ranks of media commentators.  They are the ones who harrumphed or shook their heads in disbelief when Mitt Romney stated during a debate with Obama that Russia is “our number one geopolitical foe.”

Romney recently restated that belief.  On March 17, he wrote in The Wall Street Journal:

“Able leaders anticipate events, prepare for them, and act in time to shape them. My career in business and politics has exposed me to scores of people in leadership positions, only a few of whom actually have these qualities. Some simply cannot envision the future and are thus unpleasantly surprised when it arrives. Some simply hope for the best. Others succumb to analysis paralysis, weighing trends and forecasts and choices beyond the time of opportunity.

“President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton traveled the world in pursuit of their promise to reset relations and to build friendships across the globe. Their failure has been painfully evident: It is hard to name even a single country that has more respect and admiration for America today than when President Obama took office, and now Russia is in Ukraine. Part of their failure, I submit, is due to their failure to act when action was possible, and needed.”

The current debacle of Russia expanding its borders, Iran moving full speed ahead on developing nuclear weapons, Syria maintaining its stockpile of chemical weapons (which are Saddam Hussein’s cache that some claim he never had), Iraq and Afghanistan refusing to allow American service personnel to remain in country under U.S. jurisdiction, is the sole responsibility of Barack, Joe, John, and, as noted by Romney, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton..

That may be an unfair criticism of Joe, John, and Hillary.  The basic cause is Barack.  He naively believes that the sheer force of his intellect and suave personality will cow any world leader into adoring agreement or submission.  His words, in his opinion, are more powerful than any weapons made by man.  In reality, however, as Romney noted, “We give.  Russia Gets.”

The way the rest of the world now views us, the former leaders of the free world, proves Barracks’s belief in his invincibility is as erroneous as his repeated promise that, “You can keep the insurance and doctors you have if you like them.”

If he had the understanding of world affairs of Mitt Romney and knew American history, he could have taken a page from President John F. Kennedy’s history and gotten serious attention from Russian President Vladimir Putin over Ukraine.

 JFK told tSoviet Union Premier Nikita Khrushchev to keep his missiles out of Cuba.  To make sure the Soviets knew that we meant business, JFK quarantined Cuba with the U.S. Navy and began moving combat troops into Florida.  Very quickly, the Soviet ships carrying missiles to Cuba reversed course and the missile sites being built were abandoned.

Obama could have replicated that strategy in Ukraine. A replay of meaning what you say, would have been to quickly arrange for joint military maneuvers with the Ukrainian military.  Several U.S. Army and Marine battalions could have been airlifted to the Ukrainian military bases in Crimea.  The troops would have raised American flags to fly beside the Ukrainian flags in their new encampments.

As those flags were unfurled, the applause and nods of approval from the heads of various NATO nations might have gotten Putin’s attention as quickly as the JFK’s troop movements gave Khrushchev second thoughts.

Instead of acting JFK tough, however, Obama talked softly to the bully.  He said, “We are going to impose economic and travel sanctions like we are so effectively doing in Iran.”  The Russians’ reaction, when they got through laughing, was to impose similar sanctions on Americans like Speaker of the House John Boehner and other congressional personnel.

So here’s the perspective.

Comparing President Obama to one of The Three Stooges was not the best comparison to make.  A much better comparison might be to call him “Neville” after a former Prime Minister of Great Britain.

An appreciation of this comparison requires a review of the history of the Sudetenland, a German speaking province of France in the 1930s.  That history reads like a screen play for the Ukraine of 2014.   

When reading the chapter on British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain meeting Hitler in Munich in1938 and agreeing not to oppose Hitler’s absorption of the Sudetenland into Germany, visions of Ukraine dance over the pages.

On 30 September 1938, Chamberlain returned to London with the Munich Agreement in hand and announced that he was, “bringing peace with honour. I believe it is peace for our time.”  Instead of peace, however, the world exploded into WWII.

Sound familiar?  So is it Barack, Mo, or Neville?

The Republican's Must Quit Imploding if they are to Win IN 2014.

Bill Neinast

IN PERSPECTIVE

This is the time for New Year’s resolutions.  So here’s one for the Republican Party.

The Party resolves to stop or quit imploding in 2014.  The exact time a deadly virus started this implosion of the GOP--the Grand Old Party of small republican forms of government guaranteed by the Constitution that stay off the backs and out of the bedrooms of people--is the morning of Jan 22, 1973.

That is when the U.S. Supreme Court released its decision in Roe vs Wade.   That seven to two decision decreed that the Texas law prohibiting abortion was unconstitutional. 

The Republican Party had been the stalwart for free enterprise and keeping the government at bay and was thus an illogical nesting place for any movement to reinstate abortion and intrude into bedrooms.  Nonetheless, that is where the virus to control women’s lives established its home.

The virus is so virulent that it has turned Republican against Republican.  No longer are contests for Republican votes based on issues of governance like the economy, national security, a fair tax, and the environment.  Now the contests are about which candidate is the most conservative; i.e., who is the staunchest opponent of abortion, gay rights, and citizenship for illegal aliens.

This social agenda was most apparent in the 2012 contests for the Republican nomination of a candidate for the Presidency.  In the debates, the candidates literally slaughtered each other in trying to prove which one was the most opposed to abortion under any circumstances.  

The virus was also deadly in down ballot races.  Two Republican candidates for the U.S. Senate blew their excellent chances to unseat Democrat opponents by not taking the usual tactic of obfuscating or refusing to answer questions designed to trap them.  When asked about their stance on abortion, instead of answering that that was not an issue in the campaign and segueing into a discussion of the fair tax, they would expound on their beliefs that, regardless of the circumstances, when a sperm meets an egg in a woman’s uterus, the union must be borne to term.

Republican candidate Todd Akin was expected to unseat a weakened Senator Clair McCaskill for the Missouri Senate Seat in the 2012 elections until he let himself be drawn into his beliefs on abortion.  To make sure he was in with the Republican social base, he claimed to be against all abortions, even if rape is involved because, in his view, "If it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.”  The result was that McCaskill retained her seat.

Similarly, in the race for an open Indiana Senate seat, Republican candidate Richard Mourdock blew his lead in the polls by claiming, "And I think even when life begins in that horrible situation of rape, that it is something that God intended to happen."  The Democrat candidate Joe Donnelly went on to win the race.

Until Republicans learn to delete these issues from their platforms and to avoid any mention of them in debates, the chances of the party becoming the majority party are slim to none.

There are already indications that the lessons mentioned above are going to be ignored.  In a recent campaign solicitation letter for a Republican candidate for a statewide office in Texas, the very first plank in his platform or argument was his strict opposition to abortion.  He got around to things like the economy, the budget, and education way down on the bottom of the page.  

Conversely, the mail also brought an indication that serious work is being done to maneuver the virus into remission.  A letter from the College Republican National Committee almost went immediately into File 13.  On a whim, however, I decided to see what the youngsters are up to and opened the file.

What a refreshing breeze that brought.  The opening statement is, “Today I want to share with you some of the results of our report ‘Grand Old Party for a Brand New Generation’.”  Then the letter focuses on these five action points.

Focus on the economic issues that affect young people today: education, the cost of health care, unemployment. Capture the brand attributes of intelligence, hard work, and responsibility. Don’t concede “caring” and “open-minded” to the left. Fix the debt and cut spending, but recognize that messages about principle and “big government” are the least effective way to win this battle of ideas with young voters.  Go where young voters are and give them something to share.

There was not a single word about those social issues that are strangling the grey beards and blue hairs now controlling the party.  That gives some hope that the patient will survive and that the virus can be controlled.

So here’s the perspective.

New Year’s Resolutions normally are observed and followed for about two weeks.  The resolution suggested above for the Republican Party to quit imploding in 2014 probably will not survive that long.

That would require putting social issues on the back burner.  The Republican campaign literature already circulating for state wide offices indicates that is not likely to happen.

The political climate today is excellent for the Republicans to regain control of the Senate. The only hope for Republicans to do so, however, is to follow the lead of the College Republican National Committee.

Unfortunately, however, it appears that following that lead has about the same chance as any New Year’s Resolution.

An Epidemic of Stupidity

by Bill Neinast

IN PERSPECTIVE

Anne Murray”s song “A Little Good News” is a lament about the prevalence of bad news in 1983.  If penned today, the longing for a little good news would be even stronger, because bad news has become even more dominant.  

The little good news that does exist is being pushed further back by the growing evidence that stupidity is contagious. 

The contagion has spread to Texas.  The outbreak of the affliction in the state dominated the national news last week just below the coverage of the tanking of ObamaCare.

The severe case of stupidity in the state is being treated in Aledo. That is the home of the football coach whose team beat the Western Hills team 91-0.  The coach pulled his first string after the first 21 plays, played the last strings of his team for all of the second half, and the game clock was not stopped through much of the 3rd and all of the 4th quarter. 

So what is stupid about that?  It is not the game or the coach.  Stupid comes in as the father of a player on the losing team.  He accused the Aledo coach of bullying.  Even though the coach of the losing team has no complaint with his competitor, the Aledo school system was still required to investigate the complaint.

If Mr. Stupid, the father, is ever identified, there should be no objection to picketing his home with signs reading simply “STUPID.”

On the other hand, maybe there should be more sympathy than signage.  After all, as mentioned above, stupidity is contagious.

The bullying complaint was filed just after the publicity of sheer stupidity in another state.  That is the case of honors high school student Erin Cox, who was captain of her volley ball team in a school near Boston.  She went to rescue a friend who had become wasted at a party and realized that she was too drunk to drive.  So she called her friend to come and take her home.  The sober friend did so in her own car.

The not so brilliant administrators in the school of those two young ladies took disciplinary action against both.  Among the punishments of the girl who kept her drunk friend from being a danger behind a steering wheel is removal from her leadership position on the volley ball team and suspension from five games.

This news was being broadcast over radio stations that are airing the Ad Council’s “Friends Don’t Let Friends Drive Drunk” ads involving the young girl whose arm was broken in an auto accident caused by her friend who is “just buzzed, but not too drunk to drive.”

Are the administrators who disciplined one of their sober star students for “associating” with other students who are drinking, stupid or just caring?

To repeat, stupidity is contagious and is spreading rapidly.  The rare day of news is one in which there is no case of applying rules without exercising one iota of common sense.  

The senseless or stupid actions frequently occur under policies of zero tolerance.  

This altering or closing of the thinking process leads to actions like suspending two students from school for playing with air guns that shot soft plastic balls.  They were not on school grounds but were in front of the home of one of those “dangerous shooters” that the administrators thought was too close to school. 

In another recent case, a high school student was suspended for bringing his fishing tackle box to school.  The box was locked in the trunk of his car in the parking lot, but nestled with the tackle was his fishing knife.  That’s it!!  Another case of zero tolerance.

That case could possibly be fodder for a spirited discussion about what is essential to protect school kids left under the wings of school authorities.  If the conclusion, however, is that there can be no exceptions, even for fingernail clippers in one’s pocket or purse, avoiding use of the word stupid becomes increasingly hard.

Less difficult to place in the stupid column is the case of suspending the two youngsters for playing the ageless boy’s game of cops and robbers and pinging each other with their hands cupped in the form of pistols.  Right beside that one is the suspension of the young boy who ate his pop tart into a shape that looked like a gun to his teacher.

The peak of stupidity, however, is reserved for the federal government.  The brains in Housing and Urban Development spent 2.6 million of your dollars to build a complex of 75 apartments specially designed and equipped for the hearing impaired in Tempe, Arizona. Wait a minute, however, denying residency in those apartments for people who can hear would be discrimination.  As a result, only 18 of the units will be made available for the deaf.  

So here’s the perspective. 

The spreading rash of stupidity can be traced directly to the current passion for political correctness.  Everyone is a winner, no one can be a loser.  If a student gets a failing grade, his or her self esteem may suffer, so do not let anything put anyone else in a losing column.  Treating individuals differently, like recognizing some of their unique abilities, would be unfair and politically incorrect.  So everyone always wins an “A” and “F” and thinking is banished from the dictionary.

This list of idiocy proves the validity of the adage of stupid is as stupid does, meaning that an intelligent person who does stupid things is still stupid. 

Henny Penny or Chicken Little is at it again!

IN PERSPECTIVE

   by Bill Neinast

Henny Penny or Chicken Little is at it again.  This time, however, she has morphed into members of Congress and the TV networks.

Her message has changed too.  The sky is no longer falling but all the guns going off have her clucking that Armageddon is just around the corner.

Members of Congress are getting hours of free TV time bemoaning the spate of mass shootings in this country.  Their agitation, of course, is that the government must do something to prevent this from ever happening again.

Henny Penny did not convince anyone that the sky was falling.  Will Congress have better luck in panicking the country?   

This is not to belittle or treat lightly the tragedies of the Navy Yard, the theater killings in Aurora, Colorado, the Newtown school rampage, the Fort Hood terrorist attack, and similar incidents.  None should have happened.  None should happen again.

The task facing Congress, however, is much  simpler than the one faced by the chicken. Why can the hand wringers not see it?  

All that is needed is a law to prohibit such activity.  Just make it a crime for anyone to kill another person and impose a punishment of life in prison or execution for anyone who violates the law.

What?  You mean there are already laws on the books that do just that?

Well, then pass laws to keep guns out of the hands of individuals who might use them to kill someone.  Requiring back ground checks on anyone who wants to buy a rifle might be the answer.

What?  There are already laws requiring such checks?

Gee, this is harder than it first seemed.  Is there not a single new law that can be dreamed up to stop this slaughter?

What about prohibiting assault weapons with magazine clips that hold more than ten bullets?  That, at least, would prevent incidents like the one at the Navy Yard.

What?  Aaron Alexis did not use an assault weapon?  TV newscasters reported for 48 hours or more that the murder weapon was an assault weapon.

What?  You say he used a 12 gauge shot gun like the one quail and water fowl hunters use in their fall and winter outings?

Well, unless those things are plugged to the three shell limit, they can be loaded with six shells.  So why not ban all weapons that hold more than two or three bullets or shells?

What?  That would ban weapons like the old faithful “six shooters” that helped tame the west?

All of this seems to leave only one solution.  The possession of any weapon, regardless of size, shape, magazine size, and possible use, will have to be prohibited.  This is a law abiding country and every man, woman, and child with access to any prohibited weapon will certainly scamper to turn it in for scrap metal.

OK, it’s time to take my tongue out of my cheek.  The foregoing is a facetious attempt to illustrate the obvious.  Laws to prevent the rash of mass shootings were already in effect when the killings occurred.  In every case, the weapons were either legally acquired or stolen.

Unfortunately, also, the recent mass murders are nothing new in this country.  Grant Duwe’s  2007 book Mass Murder in the United States: A History chronicled 909 cases of mass murder between 1900 and 1999.

There is, however, one major difference between the murders of the 20th and 21st Centuries.  That difference is today’s instantaneous, mass communication, particularly TV coverage.  There is concern by some that flooding the airwaves with the repetition of what was done and how it was done may encourage copy cats or some who want to make a name for themselves.

Aggravating that weeklong repeating of the gruesome pictures and detail of each crime scene is the tendency for the news coverage to be slanted and inaccurate.

An example is the totally inaccurate reporting of the Navy Yards massacre for at least 48 hours.  That slanted reporting was that Alexis entered the facility with an AR 15 and several pistols. 

The facts that finally broke through are that he entered the installation where he worked with a 12 gauge shot gun that he had bought legally a few days previously and acquired the pistols from security guards that he killed or wounded during his shooting spree.

So here’s the perspective.

The loss of the innocent lives mentioned above is hard to understand and accept.  

The grieving surviving family members deserve our sincere sympathy and understanding.

The number of innocent lives lost is those massacres, however, pales in comparison with the number of lives lost in automobile accidents caused on highways every day by drunk driving, speeding, reckless driving, texting, inattention and negligence of every imaginable type.  

There are ample laws on the books to prevent every one of these deaths at the end of a gun, in an automobile, or under other circumstances.

Let’s send Henny Penny back to her cage.  Quit screaming about the lack of protection of life and begin enforcing existing laws.  One more law will not avert a single heinous act being hatched in the minds of sick individuals.

Communism never works, but progressive liberals keep trying!

Bill Neinast

IN PERSPECTIVE It would be wise to read and heed History!

Twenty years ago my wife and I visited Poland.  Our focus was the area that was Prussia until after WWI.

The first night, we rented a room in a new motel near the village of Liebenau from which my ancestors migrated to Texas in 1856.  That night, someone tried to steal our rental vehicle and left it inoperable. 

While trying to navigate the antiquated telephone system the next day to get a replacement car, we met Stanley.  

Stanley was reared in the area but had migrated to California and was back home for his annual visit.  We met him through his cousin, Wanda, who was the cook in the motel and who had called him to tell him that we, the first Americans to stay in the motel, were there.

Stanely became our guide for the next three days and we got to see and learn things and meet Poles rarely enjoyed by individual visitors to a foreign country.

Our visit was just a few year after communism had fallen under its own weight in Poland and throughout Eastern Europe and new forms of government and private enterprise were emerging.  Stanley, for example, was highly critical of what communism had done to his homeland and his people.

He believed that, among other things, living under a government offering to be responsible for everyone from the cradle to the grave had destroyed the work ethic of the country.  There was no pride of workmanship and even the simplest of jobs required four or more workers when one could have done the job adequately.

In discussing the loss of the work ethic and the pride of workmanship, he pointed to several things in our motel room.  The baseboards in the bathroom did not meet in the corners.  One or more had been cut an inch or two short.

Then, pull an extension cord out of a wall socket.  The entire socket comes out of the wall, as junction boxes were either unavailable or forgotten.  We saw further evidence of that in a fairly new home in which we were visiting.  The chandelier in the living room hung from the ceiling on its electric wires.  There was no junction box or connection cover.

Stanley also introduced us to a spry octogenarian who was reared in Poland before communism and who had worked for the Germans during the WWII occupation.  He had learned to be responsible for his life and had begun a savings plan for his retirement when he began working.  He now had a comfortable retirement based on his savings and a government pension.

Later in the evening, we joined some younger men around their Stamntisch (reserved regulars table) in a local eatery.  They were commiserating about their circumstances under communism and now without it.  They relied on the government’s utopian promise of taking care of them from the cradle to the grave.  They had lived from day to day with no thought or plans for the future and were now left to exist on meager pensions. 

Finally, we visited the ruins or remnants of the Liebenau brick factory.  The unique clays in the Liebenau area when the factory was built under a free enterprise system in the 19th century made Liebenau bricks premier building materials.  That clay was depleted by the time the communist government assumed ownership, but the anti-capitalist bureaucrats kept the plant open by importing inferior clays from other regions.  As soon as the plant reverted to private ownership with the fall of communism, it could not compete with plants in areas where clay did not have to be imported and ceased operation.

So here’s the perspective.

Hold the picture painted above in front of a mirror.  What do you see?  The image reflected back could be one of Detroit.  The one looming dimly in the background could be Washington, D.C., and the whole nation.

Detroit, once the fourth largest city in the U.S. and the one with the highest per capita income in the nation, is now in bankruptcy with debts it cannot pay.  The city was brought to its begging knees by a half century of inefficient, corrupt, and illegal administration and union contracts that promised cradle to grave care.

Remember the Liebenau brick factory?  Could it be reflected in Detroit?  Although the city is broke, it still maintains a bloated city work force with twice as many municipal employees per capita as comparable cities.  It even maintains a farrier or horse shoer on the water and sewer department pay roll even though it keeps no horses.

The city’s debt of 18.5 billion dollars is tottering on a rapidly deteriorating tax base.  That sounds like the 16 trillion dollar federal debt tottering on tax payers’ pocket books that are becoming very frayed.

Do you now see the images of Detroit and the U.S. reflected in the images of Poland from 20 years ago?    

Who Should Prepare Lesson Plans for Public Schools?

Bill Neinast

IN PERSPECTIVE

There was an interesting discussion at the Brenham Independent School District Board of Trustees meeting last week.  The discussion was over who should prepare lesson plans.  Should it be the teachers or unknown bureaucrats of unknown lineage in unknown hideaways?

The wrong question, however, was being debated.  The question should be why instead of who.  Why are lesson plans required?

Not too long ago, public schools were expected to prepare children for life by teaching the three Rs--reading, righting, and rithmetic.  The schools were funded with taxes on property in the district and controlled by local property owners.

Students passed or failed on the judgment of their teachers and there were no “social promotions” to keep failing students from “losing self esteem.”

Graduates of that system were able to communicate among themselves orally and in writing and were able to cipher (youngsters may have to find the meaning of that word in a dictionary, if any such are still around) well enough to make change even when the computer operated cash register is down.  Those graduates were able to construct huge military bases almost over night, to build the largest, most deadly military force in history, invent the computer and nuclear weapons, and on and on.

After the big war, however, things began to change in the education community.  Learning the three Rs was no longer sufficient.  Now every student had to be prepared to earn a college degree.  Every student meant every child of school age.  

Mentally disabled or learning challenged children had the right to be in the class rooms of their age group and they had to be taught at the same level.  This was the genesis of the dumbing down in education where instruction had to be geared to the lowest level in the class room.

Concomitant with this move to teach to the lowest level was the curtailment of teachers’ authority to maintain discipline and decorum in the class room.  To  publicly humiliate or punish a student might hurt his or her self esteem.

Then it was noticed that some city schools were more modern and nicer than the rural schools with smaller tax bases and that the city teachers were being paid more than their country cousins.

That was not “fair,” so more money had to be funneled into those poor school districts.  The only source for that money at the time was the state government.

So the big guys in Austin who are very magnanimous with other people’s money stepped in to equalize the system.  Big Mistake!  With money comes control.  

Government bureaucrats are not going to ladle out money without the authority to direct and supervise how that money is spent.  And how will they know if the money is spent wisely?  By testing, of course. 

The old testing or teachers’ judgment is no longer reliable.  Only smart bureaucrats isolated from the classrooms can develop tests to discern if the students have really learned whatever it is that they were being taught. 

If too many students from one school fail the tests from on high, it is obvious that neither the teachers nor their supervisors are doing a good job.  So to incentivize   them, we will prepare and require more tests.

These tests then changed character very quickly.  They were no longer viewed as tests of students knowledge, but were tests of teachers ability to impart knowledge.  Failing grades are now the fault of teachers, not of students.

When teacher employability, promotion, and salary became dependent on the grades of their students on tests developed by personnel outside their schools, instruction had to change.  School text books became largely irrelevant if they did not relate directly to those foreign tests.

So teachers can no longer teach to the texts, they have to teach to the tests.  This is a big difference.  The teachers can have a text book in front of them and know how to impart the knowledge in that text to their students.  Those foreign made tests looming at the end of the semester, however, might emphasize things in the text different from what teachers think is important,

So forget what’s in the text, just make sure the students know what bureaucrats think is important.  In other words, teachers must teach to the tests.

The best way to do that is to follow lesson plans developed by bureaucrats on the same plane as the bureaucrats who draft the tests.

That is why the question should be why rather than who.

So here’s the perspective.

Local control of schools in Texas is a fiction.  To keep funds rolling in from higher sources, local schools must bow toward Austin every morning and pray for guidance on how the bureaucrats want the students taught.

We asked for it. We got it.  We must live with it.  There is no turning back. Government bureaucracies are the most intransigent things on earth and no school wants to bite the hand that feeds it.

If a bet is ever proposed on what is more permanent, the pyramids of Egypt or government bureaucracies, put your money on the bureaucracies.

For all Liberals, all History begins Tomorrow AKA the Stupidity of Political Correctness

Bill Neinast

IN PERSPECTIVE

The light flicker of common sense early last week was quickly snuffed out by the end of the week.

The flicker of hope was the announcement by the Suffolk, Virginia, School Board that it was canceling the zero tolerance policy that eliminated the discretion of administrators in some cases of “misconduct.”

This sensible action was a response to the two day suspension of Driver Elementary School second grader Christopher Marshall on May 3. 

Marshall’s misconduct?  He pointed a pencil at a classmate and made machine gun noises.  The classmate, who was also suspended, then pointed his pencil at Marshall and mimicked a rifle shot.   

In my school days, that every day occurrence was called playing war, cops and robbers, or cowboys and Indians.  No one was ever hurt and many who played those games went on to become The Greatest Generation in defeating Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.

The Virginia incident was just one act of craziness in a string of lunacy. 

In January, an elementary school student was sent home for building a gun out of legos. In February, school administrators in another Virginia district suspended a youngster for bringing a toy gun to school.  In the same month, a Colorado grade schooler was suspended for pretending to throw an imaginary grenade and trying to save the world from evil.

The same thing happened in Massachusetts and Colorado in March. In the latter case, a seven year old was suspended because his teacher thought the breakfast pastry he was eating was shaped to look like a gun.  The boy claimed that he was merely shaping his strawberry pastry into a mountain, but the teacher believed it looked more like a gun and took him to the principal’s office.

Calmer, saner heads began to realize the absurdity of the actions about 18 months ago. The first to return discretion to administrators may be the Philadelphia public school system.  In September, 2011, that district removed the "zero tolerance" policy from its student code of conduct.

Other districts began to follow Philadelphia’s lead and the Suffolk, Virginia, board joining the crowd was that flicker of hope welcomed last week.

On Friday, however, political correctness (PC) stormed right back in.  This was the absurdity of the Paula Dean saga.

Dean was born in Albany, Georgia, in 1947 and now lives in Savannah.  Hearing just two words out of her mouth will convince anyone that she was bred, born, and reared in the South.

Through grit and determination, she built a successful business empire of a TV  cooking show and a restaurant chain and has published a number of cookbooks.

Recently, she was sued by a former restaurant employee for failure to promote or  improper termination.  In giving a deposition in that case, she was asked if she ever used the “N” word.  Without hesitation, she answered, “Yes, some years ago.”

Dean’s acknowledgment that she had used a common word of her day that is now taboo went viral on the internet, and her TV contract is not being renewed because of her “insensitiveness.”

This craziness is due to the PC crowd’s disdain for history.

History is a record of facts.  As some facts are unpleasant, those hooked on PC urge that they be ignored.

This is the history or facts of Dean”s early years that some wish to ignore.  

Humanity was considered to be composed of four races:  Caucasoid (white + south west Asian people), Negroid (black people), Mongoloid (east Asian + indigenous American people), and Australoid (Aboriginal Australian + south Indian people).  

The terms  Black and African-American had not been invented. Both white and black southerners called members of the Negroid race either coloreds or niggers.  With the rare exception of someone saying Negro, there was no other reference recognizable for them.  Colored was normally used in reference to a group or organization, such as the Colored Methodist Church.

The fact that this now maligned word was common in every day conversations  is best illustrated by the American literary classic, Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn.  The book first published in 1885 is a scathing look at entrenched attitudes, particularly racism. 

Nonetheless, and despite the fact that both Huck Finn and the tenor of the book, is anti-racist, because the word nigger is used more than 200 times, the unedited book is anathema in public schools today.  Youngsters must not be capable of learning the real history of the country.

With that history, asking anyone who was reared in the South during Dean’s young years if she ever used the word nigger is like asking anyone six years old or older if he or she ever used the word Mom or Dad.

Even worse than asking the question, is firing or refusing to renew the contract of someone who admits to using that word when it was common among both whites and blacks and is still in use in the black community.

So here’s the perspective.

This is not an argument to accept the use of words of any kind that are considered offensive to others.  It is an argument, however, that punishing someone today for using a word 60+ years ago when it was a common expression is equivalent to suspending grade schoolers for pointing their pencils at each other.

So let the hackles rise over repeating or acknowledging facts, but let common sense reign when someone admits living through those facts. 

Shucking and Javing in DC - How to Lie to America

By Bill Neinast

IN PERSPECTIVE

last week, the definition of one word became obsolete in every dictionary on the shelves.  A lie is no longer an intentionally false statement.

In a committee hearing on March 12, Senator Ron Wyden  asked James Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence, whether the National Security Agency collects “any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans.”

Clapper, who was under oath, answered, “No sir.” After rubbing his ear for a moment he added, “Not wittingly.”

Both the senator and Clapper knew that was not true, but they let the matter slide.

After the news broke about the NSA collecting information on every telephone call made in the country, Clapper was pressed about his testimony in March. His explanation brought back memories of that famous Bill Clintonism, “It depends on what the meaning of is is.”

Clapper’s explanation was that  “I was asked [in effect] ‘when are you going to stop beating your wife’ kind of question, which is, meaning not answerable necessarily, by a simple yes or no.’ So ‘I responded in what I thought was the most truthful or least untruthful manner, by saying, No.’”

So, the new definition of the word lie is a statement that is the least untruthful.

Pair this definition with the recent vision of Attorney General Eric Holder dancing on the head of a pin when he tried to explain that he did not lie about not prosecuting news men for doing their job.  He explained so sincerely that swearing out a search warrant for the phone and digital records of a reporter is not a prosecution.

If a search warrant is not a prelude to a criminal prosecution, what is it?  Is there going to be a new definition for search warrants that will be dropped into new dictionaries to accompany Clapper’s definition of a lie? 

These most recent incidents of the Obama Administration’s complete lack of  integrity can best be described as shucking and jiving.   

This rarely used phrase is an African-American slang term from the days of slavery.  The definition is behavior or joking and acting evasively, particularly  the speech and behavioral mechanisms adopted in the presence of an authoritative figure. There is no better description of Clapper’s and Holder’s actions before two different Congressional Committees.

The saddest part of these two instances of shucking and jiving is that no heads have rolled over this and other blatant acts of misconduct.  All of the current indications are that this is perfectly acceptable behavior for officials at all levels of the White House cabal.

So here’s the perspective.

In their shucking and jiving in committee hearings, Clapper and Holder lied under oath to Congress and all Americans.  Both should be fired. President Obama has unfettered power to do so.  Why has he not done so?

Three other instances of officials thumbing their noses at America are not so easy to correct.

One is Nancy Pelosi, when she was Speaker of the House, saying that “We have to pass the bill [legislation to socialize the American health care system] so that you can find out what Is In It.”

“The bill” became a law known as Obamacare and, as what is in it became known,  a substantial majority of Americans do not like it.  

Only the voters in Pelosi’s district can hold her accountable for that outrageous statement to the whole country.

Then there is Secretary Hillary Clinton’s testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Jan. 23  concerning the death of four Americans in the attacks on American property in Benghazi in September of last year.  In a display of fake disgust, she testified, "What difference – at this point, what difference does it make?"

That callous disregard of human life can be remedied only by American voters who remember it and vote accordingly when Clinton runs for President several years hence.

Finally, there is the case of Lois Lerner, the IRS director of tax exempt groups.  Under her watch, her department targeted groups that did not agree with the Obama Administration.

When questioned about this abysmal abuse of power, she claimed that she had done nothing wrong, but then claimed her right under the 5th amendment not to testify.  As such rights are claimed to avoid incriminating oneself in criminal activity, you have to wonder who she is protecting.

As mentioned here sometime ago, it is possible, but extremely difficult, to fire a federal employee, even for misconduct.  

If the government does decide to fire Lerner, she has the option to appeal to the Merit Systems Protection Board.  This board exists almost exclusively as a barrier to prevent federal employees from being fired. The board takes almost a year, on average, to review cases, and the ultimate authority rests in the hands of three unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats–two of whom previously worked as lawyers for public-sector unions.

What a shame that every government official does not subscribe to the Navy Seal Code,which includes as Principle 4: Take responsibility for your actions and the actions of your teammates.

Sleep Well, the Government is Watching Over You!

Bill Neinast

IN PERSPECTIVE

As President Obama and Attorney General Holder undergo their own water boarding, the fear of drowning must be growing. 

The drips mentioned here last week have turned into torrents.  The wet rag of scandals draped over their faces are becoming increasingly hard to breadth through.

So there was an attempt to give them some relief.  To give them a short breadth of air,  information on collecting phone records was released to divert attention from the IRS, the Justice Department, and Benghazi.   

This may have given them a gasp of fresh air.  Conversely, however, opening up about Big Brother watching yet another area of personal information resulted in even more concern about the Administration’s attack on personal liberty. 

Collecting the phone data is legal.  Telephone companies have been doing it since the days of Alexander Graham Bell.  Information about what calls are made from and to what phone numbers plus the date and duration of each call is essential for business purposes.   Statements for billing and decisions on when and where more capacity may be needed are made on these stored records.

There is no need, however, to know either the subject or content of those calls.  Consequently, that information is not collect.

This was temporary storage.  When the needed information was extracted, the records were destroyed.

After 9/11, however, a new need arose.  The phone records of suspected terrorists could lead to other suspects and terrorist cells.  For this purpose, the content of the messages also became important.

This need was one of the reasons for enacting the USA Patriot Act of 2001, which significantly weakened restrictions on law enforcement agencies' gathering of intelligence within the United States.

Under this Act, various intelligence agencies under Presidents George W. Bush and Obama began to preserve the phone records permanently, or at least for a long time.  Accordingly, they required the phone companies to transfer the records to them for permanent storage.

This was necessary because who suspected terrorists were communicating with might extend backward for many years.  Who they were communicating with years ago is as important as who they are talking with today.

Having this information was essential for obtaining legal search warrants from appropriate courts to tap the lines of the suspects and begin recording their conversations.  This is the type of information that foils terrorist attacks.

The procedure described here is thus perfectly legal.  Appropriate committees of Congress were kept informed of the procedures and found no fault.

When the program became public last week, however, pandemonium reigned in the streets.  The procedure was not correctly understood by many who thought they were being spied on every time they picked up a telephone.

This concern is misplaced.  There is no invasion of privacy in storing the records that phone companies have collected for years.  There is good reason, however, to be concerned about how easy it is to misuse that data to invade the privacy of anyone coming to the attention of various political operatives.

For that reason, the leak, if that is what it was, was poorly timed.  The news came in the middle of genuine concern over IRS and Justice Department agents spying on citizens and misusing information they garnered from that spying or prying.

Low level employees of the IRS in Cincinnati who were expected to take the fall for the Administration refused to do so.  Two of them testified under oath that they were ordered directly and indirectly by officials in the Justice Department’s Washington office to target specific organizations opposing Obama and to send certain information to that office.

Simultaneously, news broke that the Justice Department cast an even wider net of spying.  The Internet messages of AP and Fox News journalists were being read in the hallowed halls of justice.

In at least one case, Attorney General Holder testified under oath that he knew nothing about the affidavit bearing his signature that Correspondent James Rosen was a possible criminal conspirator.  That affidavit was taken to three judges for the issuance of a subpoena to monitor Rosen’s internet traffic, and the third judge finally issued the subpoena.

Oh! That’s right.  Holder said he knew nothing about prosecuting reporters.  He did not say that he knew nothing about just accusing reporters of misconduct.  

White House Spokesman Jay Carey has tried to explain the difference between accusing and prosecuting.  Unfortunately for Obama and Holder, few men on the street can understand the difference.

So here’s the perspective.

Big Brother is alive, well, and growing, but there is nothing to fear.  Holder and the new IRS Administrator have been tasked to look into the activities of their departments and to correct any little bitty thing they find wrong.  

Their reports will never be seen in the White House, because “the buck” never gets there.

Benghazi is one of those bucks that never got there.  Why are there no pictures of the President in solemn concentration in the White House as Benghazi was exploding like there were of him watching bin Laden being taken out?  The answer would probably echo former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s, “What difference does it make now?”

Those who believe that the contents of their telephone conversations will never be monitored should talk with Mitt Romney.  Ask him how the information of his donations to a Defense of Marriage organization got into the Gay community.

So sleep well.  Big Brother is watching over you.

How Obama will survive the Current Scandals!

IN PERSPECTIVE

Bill Neinast

What an irony.  President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder believe that making a terrorist who wants to kill Americans think he is drowning is an abominable, illegal torture.  

Ironically, now they are being water boarded by some of their own.  The drip, drip, drip of scandals, with each drip getting a little larger has to give an impression of drowning. 

The fear of drowning currently is most pronounced for AG Holder.  The House Judiciary Committee is now investigating whether he committed perjury when he last testified before the committee.

Holder’s testimony that is now under scrutiny was the Sergeant Schultz response that he and Obama give to every suggestion of misconduct, “I know nothing, nothing.  I saw nothing, nothing.” Every bit of wrongdoing, if there is any, was done by some low grade underling way, way down the chain away from Washington.

The discussions now among media pundits are which of the drips is the most serious and damaging to the Obama legacy.  For the general public, the IRS targeting and harassing conservative groups is the preferred answer to that question.  

This is no surprise.  Every tax paying American has to deal with, and probably fears, the IRS.  Seeing and hearing that the agency is not always fair and even handed should be of concern.

The media, however, has a different dog in the hunt.  Most of the pundits are most concerned about the Attorney General trampling on the 1st Amendment rights of a free press.  If reporters are designated potential criminals for printing material leaked from within the administration, the function of the press as a watch dog for governmental misconduct is severely curtailed.

The concern for those two blots on the Obama legacy must be a blessing for Hillary Clinton.  Interest in the IRS and Justice scandals has moved the spot light off the Benghazi tragedy.  Everyone seems to have forgotten about determining the level of responsibility for the lack of security, the failure/refusal of a rescue attempt, and the cover up.

With those issues off the front burner, the Clintons can breath a short sigh of  relief that questions about Hillary’s qualifications to be the next president are left for another day.

To shove questions about his legacy into the same shadow that Hillary is now enjoying, Obama is saying, “Let’s change the subject.”  Now he wants to talk about ending the “war” on terror and closing what he considers to be a blight on our appearance, the confinement of prisoners of war at the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, or Gitmo.

He may come to regret that tactic.  His remarks on this subject prompted a lengthy review of his concern about Gitmo by Time magazine.  A lead article in the magazine’s June 10 issue is entitled “Why GItMO Will Never Close,” and contains this:

“At last count, military medical personnel at Gitmo were force-feeding 35 of the more than 100 inmates who refuse to eat.  Twice a day those men are strapped into restraining chairs as tubes that run up their noses and down their throats fill their stomachs with a compound called Ensure, a supplement used by everyone from athletes to dieters.  The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights has called force-feeding a violation of international law, and the World Medical Association, of which the U.S. is a member, declared in 1991 that the practice is ‘never ethically acceptable‘ unless a prisoner consents or is unable to make a rational choice.  (The WMA calls it ‘ethical to allow a determined hunger striker to die.)” 

The accompanying photos of the contraption into which the prisoners are strapped and the implements used to force the Ensure into their bodies are not pleasant to view.

As mentioned previously, Obama and Holder believe that making a prisoner feel like he is drowning is torture.  They apparently believe, however, that keeping a prisoner alive when he wants to die and doing so by strapping him down and forcing instruments into his body is in keeping with the highest standards of international law.

So here’s the perspective.

President Obama’s legacy is being written every day.  The revelations of the last few weeks of misconduct in the Justice and State Departments and the IRS are rapidly tarnishing that legacy.

Nonetheless, recent polls indicate that 45% of the population still believe that he is doing a good job in the office.

That is almost 50% of the population and gives credence to Rush Limbaugh’s coining of the phrase “no-info or lo-info voters.