Emails from a Texas public-school district revealed that liberal school leaders evaded a state law in order to obtain explicit sex-ed lessons.
Texas state law forbids public schools from working with abortion providers such as Planned Parenthood to present explicit sex-ed curriculum, but Austin Independent School District cooperated with Canadian-based Alberta Health Services – and yet claimed it did no such thing. Continue reading
The raids constituted a horrific, shameful episode in American history, one of the lowest moments for liberty since King George III quartered troops in private homes.
Exactly a hundred years ago this morning – on January 3, 1920 — Americans woke up to discover just how little their own government regarded the cherished Bill of Rights. During the night, some 4,000 of their fellow citizens were rounded up and jailed for what amounted, in most cases, to no good reason at all and no due process, either. Continue reading
”We hold the balance of power. Put up your best men for office, and we shall support the better one.”
Bishop Potter told how an alleged representative of Tammany Hall asked him in effect if he would cease his warfare upon the Police Department if a certain captain and inspector were dismissed. He replied that he would never be satisfied until the “man at the top” and the “system” which permitted evils in the Police Department were crushed.
The Bishop has just spoken of a condition of things which none of us can deny, and which ought not to exist; that is, the lust of gain – a lust which does not stop short of the penitentiary or the jail to accomplish its ends. But we may be sure of one thing, and that is that this sort of thing is not universal. If it were, this country would not be. You may put this down as a fact: that out of every fifty men, forty-nine are clean. Then why is it, you may ask, that the forty-nine don’t have things the way they want them? I will tell you why it is. A good deal has been said here tonight about what is to be accomplished by organization. That is just the thing. It is because the fiftieth fellow and his pals are organized and the other forty-nine are not that the dirty one rubs it into the clean fellows every time. Continue reading
If there was any doubt that the Common Core standards have been harmful to American academic achievement, that doubt should be erased by the 2019 results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), the Nation’s Report Card. Continue reading
November 4, 1865 – When President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated on April 14, 1865; a war-weary nation was plunged into shock. The last great battles of the Civil War were still a recent memory, and the murder of the president seemed to be a bloody, pointless coda to four years of conflict and instability. There was a great outpouring of grief across the country, and poems and songs were written mourning the nation’s loss. Continue reading
Lee’s letter to his wife, in response to a speech given by then President Pierce, dated December 27, 1856.
I was much pleased the with President’s message. His views of the systematic and progressive efforts of certain people at the North to interfere with and change the domestic institutions of the South are truthfully and faithfully expressed. The consequences of their plans and purposes are also clearly set forth. These people must be aware that their object is both unlawful and foreign to them and to their duty, and that this institution, for which they are irresponsible and non-accountable, can only be changed by them through the agency of a civil and servile war. Continue reading
In the South, the term “swallowing the dog” meant pledging allegiance to the United States
What is the meant by the phrase “swallowing the dog”?
For Confederate veterans, the term “swallowing the dog” meant being forced to repeatedly pledge allegiance to the United States whose military forces were occupying the Confederacy. Continue reading
Between 165 and 300 innocent men, women, and children who were slaughtered at Wounded Knee, South Dakota by murderers that the US government deemed worthy of receiving Medals of Honor for the soldier’s “heroic stance” on the battlefield. Hello!? It wasn’t a Wounded Knee battle but a gruesome massacre! Continue reading
My eight-year-old daughter Abby recently started reading Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder. It was prompted, in part, by watching the Little House on the Prairie television episodes with her great-aunt. Coincidentally, I have been reading more lately about some of the key women in history who promoted the ideals of individual freedom, limited government, non-coercion, and voluntary cooperation through trade. Rose Wilder Lane is one of these women. She was born on this day in 1886.
Liberty Should Always Trump Coercion
The daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder and Almanzo Wilder, baby Rose is the child many of us remember from the ninth Little House book, The First Four Years. Continue reading
Back in the 60s and early 70s, some of the best minds were in the education field. These were veteran teachers, who had begun their careers in the 50s, some earlier, but their sole purpose was to TEACH, TO EDUCATE, not indoctrinate, not by rote or Common Core….. The methods taught by these teachers, by which we serious students learned to think for ourselves, grasped our studies in civics and government, how to figure math in our heads, learn to parse sentences, spell, read profusely, and use critical thinking skills, are probably verboten or not used any more. Continue reading
“Deep Equity”, developed by the Corwin company, is quickly becoming the new standard curriculum being taught in our public schools. If you’ve never heard of it, you soon will. It’s in San Tan valley in Arizona, Chicago, Illinois, Louisville, Kentucky, the entire Cleveland, Ohio public school district, charter schools in California and many more American cities as well as Canada. Continue reading
Him and Her – or They and Zee?
When the National Education Association (NEA) partnered with a radical homosexual and transgender group known as the “Human Rights Campaign” to create “welcoming schools,” a lot of public-school teachers felt uncomfortable, if not outraged. But when the groups sent out a mass e-mail encouraging teachers to ask young children what “pronouns” they prefer — he, she, they, z, tree, and so on — that was a bridge too far for many.
In a video produced as part of the campaign, two transgender children discuss their preferred pronouns with each other. One of the children prefers the plural pronoun “they,” while the other, who claims not to be a boy or a girl, prefers “zee.” Seriously. After that, the two children discuss the alleged need to “educate” their own teachers, especially substitutes, on the supposed importance of using the newly invented pronouns that students choose for themselves. Continue reading
In another example of why our schools fail to teach anything to kids, a new law in California now prevents schools from suspending kids for rebelling against teachers. The new law that bans suspensions takes effect on January 1, 2020. Continue reading
Christmas Eve by Thomas Nast published 1863
Following the stunning Confederate victory at the Battle of Balls Bluff on October 21, 1861, Leesburg welcomed a host of Southern soldiers. Young men from near and far wintered near the Northern Virginia town, and it was the first Christmas away from home for many. Families across the Heritage area were already separated by the Civil War, and darker days lay ahead. The holidays blanketed the area with cheer, even though the weather was warm and clear. Thomas E. Caffey, an Englishman, signed up with Co. D, the “Hamer Rifles”, 18th Miss., and had this to say about the regiment’s Christmas celebrated in their winter quarters at Morven Park: Continue reading
There is this idea Prime Minister Dr. Mahathir Mohamad asking Malaysians to emulate Japan and Korea as models, of showing recordings of good teachers teaching. The 94-year-old prime minister liked it a lot and wants school to adopt and implement. I suppose his minister of education would also abide by the wishes, as a loyal party member. But I hope I am wrong. That this is not to be the solution to improve our education system, any for that matter. If this is so, I believe this is an idea whose time should never come. Continue reading
In an interview with Ebony magazine, the reverend diagnosed the problems in American schools and offered some surprising solutions.
As someone who slides into the back-end of the Gen-X generation, my view of the Rev. Jesse Jackson has always been basically the same. My charitable view of Jackson had been that he is a gifted speaker with a great deal of media savvy; that he cares deeply for people, but sometimes offers dubious solutions to social problems because he can misdiagnose the cause of a given social affliction.
My more cynical view has been that he is a typical politician: a person who will use his cause to get on television to promote his own brand. These types of politicians usually “believe” in their causes, but at some point the cause becomes secondary to their own star and spotlight. Continue reading
Have you ever wondered how the American Founders were able to spew forth such wisdom and establish a new country at such young ages? I have. The mere fact that 10 of the signers of the Declaration of Independence were under the age of 35 blows my mind.
But as I learned recently, these men did not create the Declaration and the Constitution out of the brilliance of their own minds. In fact, their brilliance hinged on one fact: they were imitators. Continue reading
