This political correctness will be the death of the West.

Thank you God for giving the Founding Fathers of this great country the courage and foresight to legislate the SECOND AMENDMENT.

We're going to need it.

Surely the NEA's approach is warranted in this case, considering how widespread and vicious the acts of intolerance against Muslims have been since Sept. 11.

Ahem.

You want kids to understand 9/11? Show them that tape of the puppy being gassed. I promise you, they'll understand it with crystal fucking clarity.

Perhaps people should e-mail the NEA and ask why this action wasn't taken when union members targeted serb-american elementry children in Chicago.

Perhaps we've been going about this all wrong... what we should do, in effort to foster understanding of Islam's peaceful and tolerant nature, is actually force our schoolchildren to live under Shari'a law for a week or two.

Perhaps, after some 16 year old Brittney Spears fan has been forced into an abaya, and beaten by her 17 year old brother for not covering her hair...
and after we've chopped off his hand for snaking a piece of candy out of the bulk food bin at the grocery store...
perhaps after a couple of classes full of elementary school children are beaten for laughing when we explain to them that if they fart during their prayers, they have to stop and perform their ablutions again...
perhaps after a sufficient number of adolescent girls are humiliated by being told they are unclean and unfit to pray because they're on their period...

... perhaps then, we can have a rational discussion of what islam is really like, instead of letting some over-sensitive twit fill our children's minds with cotton-candy nonsense.

You want kids to understand 9/11? Show them that tape of the puppy being gassed. I promise you, they'll understand it with crystal fucking clarity.

Sorry NC you miss the main tenet of PC. It is never a minority's fault when they act deviantly, it is society's fault for not understanding why they act deviently.

Blaming Islamicism does not get at the root, why the Islamicists are angry. Then of course that opens the door to blame the US and Israel.

You see in PC land, blame is only a word that can be ascribed to white establishment, who cannot possibly understand what these poor people are going through. PC argues that if we could just understand them, then we could change so that they wouldn't hate us anymore. By making it seem like we don't understand them, they can place the blame on us and the impetus to change upon us.

Rather than understanding the true motivations, they start out with the precept that all minorities and religions are inherently good and it is us that makes them do deviant things.

So under the PC precept, any deviant act can be blamed on the "power" not the actor. Thus in PC land, the US is at fault for that dog being gassed because we didn't understand enough to prevent it.

It is truly a logic prison, and one which we cannot escape if PC is allowed to run rampant.

Teachers.....the PC equivalent of mullahs, both expounding hatred of the west.

One of the major networks have said they will not show the images of the airplanes slamming into the WTCs. This is beyond comprehension. Don't remember who did this barbarian act that is the largest terrorist attack in our history.

I went to Pearl Harbor 4 yrs ago. My wife and I went on our honeymoon. We went through the visitor center, saw the videos of the attack, and I was able to SEE and I will NEVER FORGET what happened.

Another reason why when my twins get to school age they will be in charter schools, away from the reach of the NEA.

No wonder kids can't read or add. The teachers are spending all their time on this crap.

This is typical of the NEA. However, critics should temper criticism in light of the abilities of the typical NEA member. Honestly, folks, this really is about the best they can do.

Did you know that the National Teacher Examination (NTE) was originally the Graduate Record Examination (GRE)? However, the scores from students in teachers colleges were so embarassingly low that they renormed the GRE down to the NTE.

Do you recall the scandal several years ago in Massachusetts? About half the working, "certified" teachers were found to be more or less functionally illiterate.

Did you know that, according to Thomas Sowell's sources, teachers' college students constitute the lowest one-third of the college - oops!, sorry, NEA - colledge populayshun? (NEA union activists like phonetic spellings when they akshually reed something) By the way, activists, one-third means that, if you have a brown, a white, and a black puppy, one-third of your puppies are white.

But skool teechers can spell OBE. That means "outcome-based education". Which means more dollars for political indoctrination. OBE is the teeching "theory" that permits - ahem - "broad, inclusive interpretations" of history to ensure the correct political outcome.

Forgive my ignorance, but what is that "puppy being gassed" tape everybody mentions?

Advocacy of neutrality in the face of monstrous evil is complicity in future horror.

Watch and remember:

[Link: www.politicsandprotest.com...]

L.

"Blaming is especially difficult in terrorist situations because someone is at fault. In this country, we still believe that all people are innocent until solid, reliable evidence from our legal authorities proves otherwise."

It's not that tough - we've got bodyparts from at least nine of the hijackers. The others got smooshed or incinerated. But you can extrapolate from the nine that succeeded who the rest are.

And cast the damn blame. No wonder America isn't full of fury, we're feeding our kids gruel instead of the truth.

What's the possibility we could get LGF introduced into the lesson plans? howabout in a study of "comparative and alternate media?"

Cowardly Pundit,

I think "gruel" is an inappropriately negative term.

"Swill", on the other hand, is -to me - appropriately negative.

Even in a sleepy little Western town it goes on. There was a recent school dedication with a time capsule. They put in a yearbook, a newspaper, some CDs...and a copy of Noam Chomsky's 9-11! Good thing I wasn't there! Bad thing; my child attends this district...for the time being. I guess they WANT us to homeschool, or private school, so they can run the dis-education camps with a free hand.
..." Little Albert, is that a book from your faith tradition? How did you get that past the Federalized Education Screeners? Oh, the Bible detectors were unplugged again? You know the penalty...report to Priciple Rodham's chamber. The cameras will follow you." (sounds of wailing & gnashing of teeth).
"Now class, we are going to study Palestinian Poetry. Today's Question: How do we get 'Kill all Jews' to rhyme with 'Death to America'?"

The moral blindness of the NEA is no surprise, given that it operates in a state-run environment. Further proof that the sooner the U.S. (and my own country, Britain) gets school vouchers and can smash the educational establishment, the better. Teachers have often peddled silly ideas. The tragedgy is that poorer parents in the West often have few chances to send their kids to somewhere else.

No wonder home schooling is taking off.

While I am and always have been critical of the pathetic and evil activities of the radical(?) Islamic factions, I wouldn't attach the gassed puppy as a real good idicator of their nastiness.

God knows I'm no PETA member, but I have to point out that we beat the crap out of the animal kingdom too. Cats, dogs, monkeys, they're all tortured and killed by us in the name of science.

If it's for a good cause, I don't even really have a problem with it, at least any more than when I pause to reflect upon a hamburger I'm about to scarf down, but just because they killed a little puppy and we actually had to see it doesn't mean they're any worse in that regard than we are. They see animals as utilitarian, serving a purpose. So do many of us.

The reason they're evil is because they are out to kill any human that doesn't toe their ideological line. If anything, the fact that a dying puppy can make us angier than we were just illustrates that we weren't angry enough in the first place.

Celeste #4:

Actually, the California public schools are way ahead of you.....

[Link: www.freerepublic.com...]

This is exactly why I am pulling my kids (4th and 7th graders) out of school on September 11th. I do not want them sit in their classrooms on that day and be handed a load of PC crap, in conjuction with the rah-rah wave your flag stuff that is surely going to happen.

I want them to know what happened for real. I want them to know who killed their grandfather's best friend, and they are not going to get that lesson in a school assembly.

"The only thing needed for evil to prosper is for good men to do nothing."
In this case, it's the polically correct people who are assisting evil. Much worse than nothing. God help us all.

One of the major networks have said they will not show the images of the airplanes slamming into the WTCs. This is beyond comprehension.

No, it isn't. Decades ago, the press decided their job wasn't to report facts and let you make up your own mind, but to promote causes and tell you how you're supposed to feel. They don't want Americans to get mad, so they'll sanitize history.

When the press wants to cause action, they'll show graphic, disturbing images. Look at their coverage of famines and "politically correct" massacres -- blood, corpses, starving children, all during the dinner hour. When they'd rather no one do anything, the pictures are either "too disturbing for TV" or there are no news crews around.

Q--

The tape of the puppy being gassed is an Al Qaeda instructional video for its members on the effect of chemical weapons. CNN recently discovered it in Afghanistan and aired the clip this morning at 7 a.m. They've also got the clip on their website, where it can be downloaded. Charles posted an item about it yesterday.

I'll spare you the ordeal of having to watch it by describing it briefly. A puppy is chained to a wall; some white goo seeps into the room on the floor and starts to smoke. The puppy starts to lick its lips as the gas fills the room. This takes two to three minutes; the puppy starts licking its lips more and more. Suddenly its hindquarters give way and it starts to struggle. It kicks a little then starts to lose control of its front legs. Finally it keels over on its back and begins to squeal.

It's obscene.

If you really want to get up close and personal with the pap that is fed to schoolchildren at the behest of the NEA, then I suggest that you go to their website (NEA.org) and click the first item, going into "Health . . .". There you will find the lesson plans and suggestions for the 9/11 anniversary based on NEA's PC ideology and "nonjudgementalism" that makes a mockery of real values and normal human emotions. I often get the impression that these are not real people that we are dealing with here. There seems to be some essential part of the human psyche that our homegrown variant of Stalinism has wiped from their skulls.

"Blaming is especially difficult in terrorist situations because someone is at fault." Especially difficult, mind you -- more difficult than, say, when no one is at fault. It is shocking to think that people this seriously logic-impaired teach children.

I was going to post Churchill's comment about pacsifism dealing with hopes that the crocidle would eat you last but instead I think I can sum this whole thing up with my favorite Quote from Mr. Mark Twain;

"Schools Getting in the Way of My Education"

I went to public school in California and let me tell you, this type of crap goes on all the time. Welcome to the land of the victim... where American is to blame for everybody's problems.

Please check your logic at the door.

Also normalamerican (#14) - I think I learned that poem in school, didn't it go something like;

"Kills All Jews, Said our Great Mulla
Then Kill All Infidel, Death To America."

?? Or do they teach a different one in your local Federal Penaten... err.. Education System?

Henry S. #17,

I recall the flap over that. I was one of the ones squawking. Now I'm thinking that maybe they're on the right track.

I think we should implement California's cutting edge teaching techniques nationwide. However, since Saudi Arabia is our best friend and ally in the middle east, (right, boys and girls?) I think it is especially important that we teach our children the Saudi brand of Islam, don't you?

Yes, a few children will end up stoned to death or otherwise executed for what we would consider hardly worth lifting an eyebrow... but its a small price to pay to foster tolerance and understanding of the islamic world, isn't it?

Shari'a for the NEA! (At least until they wise up).

Social Suicide is what the liberals hope for.

They want to keep blacks and minorites down. "No School Vouchers for the poor, public schools are great!"

They want to weaken America so their guilt will subside.

They would love if America was Nuke it would level the playing field for our enemies. Like the EEOC.

What is a better way to weaken American than with the PC cultural revolution from the inside with nice terms like 'peace acitivists' and 'recycling babies at planned parenthood'

Maybe they can rewrite history quickly before the NEA becomes obsolete.

American Education Board of Public Schools gets a big fat F on their report card.

American Education Board of Public Schools Don't Want School Voucher for America's Poor and Want's to Blame the USA for 9.11
[Link: www.washtimes.com...]

Maybe they will rewrite and distort the historical facts of the inep schooling system they are in charge of as well...?

Charles, sad to say they don't have to think were weak, we are weak.

And I don't mean militarily either, we are weak because liberals made us think its one or the other security or freedom, they aren't honest and tell the truth they you can have both.

Brutality must be fought with stronger brutality, liberals dont want us to cause they know that mewasn we would win and wars would end. they need war to contiue so they can say 'no war'

They dont want wars to end, soldiers who are brutal in crushing the enemies do.

Same reason why liberals want to continue to tell blacks they are weak and need their help, school vouchers would help them realize blacks aren't weak, but liberals need them to think they are.

The PCists think that social programs will end 4,000 years of human history.

All of a sudden food stamps will make people stop killing...?

Idiots are in charge of the world.

The UN, ICC, EEOC, NEA, OPEC...

Terrorists aren't smart, we're dumb for allowing them to continue.

There is no will in the West to crush the enemy, so the enemies thrive.

Terrorism isn't hard to end it is hard to get people to do the right thing to end, by brutally crushing them once and for all to end it.

This could be over today, but no one has the courage who is in charge to end.

Men of Courage Built the Civilized world that we know today,

Men of cowardice will destroy it all with one fell swoop and they'll be overjoyed when we can all share meagerness and savagery 'equally.'

Liberals dont want terorrism to end they want us to all be terrorists.

They want the whole world to be one big savage cold, dark, evil world, then at least everyone is equally insane...?

This is what happens when basica common sense values are compromised and etched away slowly but surely.

Anything goes, and everyone goes to Hell!

Ahem.... I teach public high school.... enough of the teacher bashing. Do I need to post my SAT scores to prove that not all teachers are morons? It's insulting.

MOST teachers I know would be whole- heartedly insulted by the NEA's Sept. 11th lesson plan. Of course in every school there are the blind progressives who overly romanticize their own Che Guevara qualities. These teachers are certainly in the minority at my school.

I do think that students today need a better understanding of Asia, so that they don't go out and beat up a bunch of Sikhs. It happens! But that curriculum can wait until after Sept. 11. This is a day of remembrance- of the victims, of the heroes and also of the hate that caused this travesty.

I'm thinking of purchasing the book WOMEN OF GROUND ZERO to use as part of my curriculum on this anniversary. This book focuses on the female firefighters, policewomen, paramedics who risked their lives at the World Trade Center.

We must understand that concepts like objectivity, neutrality and nonjudgementalism are utopian fatasies. Human beings are incapable of such states.

These notions are used as pretences to advance a political agenda.

This particular agenda was written in Moscow in the 19060s and 1970s and kept alive by our nation's upper middle class discontents. It is purely anti-American. It has NO positive aspets.

Unfortunately, those discontents are disproportianatelly represented in education and are teaching our kids.

Marduk,

A big difference, however, is that we do not laugh at the death of animals used in research. I did animal research on monkeys, rats, and mice and, yes, many of the animals died but I, nor my associates, drew any happiness or joy from their deaths. One of the ladies in the group even cried each time a mouse died.

That's the difference. We do some unpleasant things to animals, but not for joy (at least I hope not).

Alexia -- why focus on the women?

Robert,

I was about to ask the same...

..."fostering an anti-Muslim phobia..."

I'm sorry, isn't a phobia an irriational fear? I think we've been pretty effing rational for the last year. I think the phobia comes out of the people who know their religious brethren are to blame, whether or not they agree with their particular sect. The american people, on the whole, have acted pretty damn maturely about what happened on 9/11 (except for a few in the weeks immediately following). We do not have mass executions happening at Guantanamo, we aren't looting and destroying the property of Muslims who live here. We are not sending our kids into Iraq with explosive belts strapped on.

It seems wherever you find Islamic fundamentalists, you find death, destruction and chaos. Who is so blind they don't see THAT?

NEA delenda est.

You know, I remember my 8 year old son asking me about a week after 9/11 when TV was going to be normal again. I don't think any crap his school could spout (which I doubt they would, it's a great school) could or would change his mind on what he already knows to be fact.

As the old saying goes "you can only be smart so much but there is no limit to stupidity". In this case this is unfortunately a criminal stupidity.

I think I'm to have my kids focus on the dogs that died on 9/11. Why in the world would anyone even write a book focusing on women only dying on 9/11? That is disgusting and insulting to all boys and men especially in a classroom. I would be outraged if my son came home from school and said he learned about the women who died--screw the men--they don't matter, even though almost every firefighter and cop, if not all, were men. I suppose that's why you can write the book--it's only about the measly few women who rushed in to save people--how pathetic.

Next thing you know, they'll be teaching the kids that the 15 Saudis on the hijacked flights were trying to help protect the cockpits from the terrorists.

"By Allah's will, we shall help our allies in their time of need! Defend the pilots!"

Robert & Addison,

Thank you, I'm not the only one asking that. You want to show the kids something they can get into, give them the Marvel Comic "Heroes" or perhaps the two DC Comics titled "9/11", those who what people should be feeling about this whole thing.

As for the kids beating up those who are differemt, your classes aren't going to change that. I got my arse kicked repeatedly growing up with the teachers saying they were 'unable" to do anything. It wasn't until a coach (bless her heart) told me to fight back and gave me a few ideas how. I never got picked on again.

I'd also like to point out to Alexia that your SAT scores don't prove a thing. I can show test scores for years that show I'm above par and an IQ that says the same, that doesn't mean I know anything.

The teacher bashing IS wrong as I did have some damn fine teachers in school, I can name maybe 8 in my whole K-12 experience (not counting college of course) and I went to roughly 19 schools in that time.

Just because a teacher isn't a social retard doesn't mean that his/her bosses aren't. Remember, those are the people who approve the lesson plans.

Alexia,

No need to publish your SAT scores (although those particular scores are collected when you finish high school, rather than when you finish college). Highly intelligent teachers obviously exist, it's just that they are extremely statistically rare according to the national results based on the NTE (but that's probably a patriarchical, racist, sexist, ableist, homophobic, etc. etc. test, eh?). You do know about standard deviations, don't you? After all, if any profession in the country should understand the most basic concepts of testing, it should be teachers, right?

I do note that you made no attempt to contradict the comments I posted, but rather "threatened" to tell us how smart you are. Well, maybe you are, but when I went to graduate school, Changing The Subject was not considered to be an effective tool when making a counterargument. I hope you weren't attempting to use the Fallacy of Composition by applying the characteristics of some particular (albeit rare) teachers to the whole population. Naaah, you wouldn't do that, would you?

Now, with regard to the "Women of Ground Zero" plans, that fits perfectly with my comments about OBE. Thank you for providing such a shining example of modern teaching doctrine. Dr. Dewey would be bustin' his little metaphorical buttons with pride.

I rest my case.

Quote:

Muslim groups applauded the NEA's efforts, saying the critics' statements are centered around "an anti-Muslim phobia."
"The NEA's [lesson plans] provides teachers with a well-balanced, wide range of resources teachers can use to help teach students how to appreciate diversity," said Hodan Hassan, a spokeswoman for the Washington-based Council on American Islamic Relations

End quote.

It's a pretty safe bet that anything that the CAIR endorses is wrong, in direct proportion to how loudly CAIR endorses it.

If life isn't about making judgments, it is purposeless, undirected, dangerous wandering.

Laurence Simon (#40) -

bwahaha... can you imagine the course?

By Allah! The Box Cutters Are Taking Control! Save Our Friends and Allies Or we Shall Be Doomed!!

How sad and pathetic indeed.

Patrick (#39) -

They write such books in order to show that the few women who died are worth as much effort and memory as the hundreds of men who did. After all, when the world ends the headline will be;

World Ends, Women and Minorites Hit Hardest

...looks like Alexia touched a nerve here.

I can understand why. A lot of people would find it distasteful to bring sexual politics into an event that transcends any whining about glass ceilings or harrassment.

However, offering a book that concentrates only on a certain group of heroes of Sept 11th, is NOT the same as refusing to teach the facts about Sept 11th. Would the outcry be the same if someone decided to do a special session on the heroism of Todd Beamer, to the exclusion of any of the firefighters or policemen in NY? Someone is still being left out then.

We're beating up on the NEA here, lets beat up on feminist discrimination against men and boys later.

Well said Celeste.

First the NEA, then the Feminazis... Round #1 anybody?

Ok. I'm gonna get all teachered out on you by asking you, class, before I answer....

Can anyone think of why it might be fitting to use the book (on the anniversary of Sept. 11) WOMEN OF GROUND ZERO in an urban classroom of immigrant students who are from Bangladesh, Nigeria, Haiti, Pakistan and Mexico?

Alexia (30):

How about the MEN who actually GAVE their lives? Have the PC cops put you on probation or something?

The "Women of Ground Zero" - a book as thick as "Arab Nobel Prize Winners".

My SAT scores are nonexistent, and I'm smarter than you! neener neener neener. haha

So, who else is up to debate? haha

Alexia, go on post your SAT scores.

before or after redoing the test in 1994?

Most of your colleagues are offended by the NEA's lesson plan...

Offended enough to refuse to be a member of the NEA?
Offended enough to ignore their "curriculum" for 9/11/02?
Willing to ascribe blame to al-Qaeda?
Willing to discuss just war theory and how it applies to Afghanistan and potentially Iraq?

I'll change my opinion of public school teachers when I see some change in the schools.
Just saying you don't like the curriculum the NEA is trying to force down kids' gullets doesn't cut it anymore.

#48 -

Because one is affraid that by teaching a non-biased point of view said students might not grow up to embrace their minority status thusly turning a blind eye to the Left Social organization that uses said minorities to help further their goals of destroying this nation?

Or perhaps it has a lot of pictures and you don't want to have to teach them to read English as it might ruin their culture and again stop them from being minorities?

Those who rail against the book Women of Ground Zero, especially Patrick Martin in #39, miss the point. From all the media coverage of 9/11, you'd think that all the police officers and firefighters who died at Ground Zero were men. This isn't the case. Most were men, of course, but there were more than a few "measly" women heroes (I hate the word "heroine;" it conjures up bad Victorian melodrama).

We should, of course, hail the men that died as heroes. They were. But I don't think it's ridiculously PC to publish a book that says, "Hey, y'know, there were women who made the ultimate sacrifice, too." The kids especially should know this.

As long as Alexia doesn't give her class the impression that the only heroes on 9/11 were women, I don't think the idea deserves all the opprobrium it's getting here.

#53 -

Maybe you should think of this point -

Could we publish a book titled "The Men Of Ground Zero" ingoring the women who gave their lives?

Could we teach that in schools?

this may be off topic......

In the end, more than they wanted freedom, they wanted security - they wanted a comfortable life and they lost it all - security, comfort, and freedom.

When the Athenians finally wanted not to give to society but for society to give to them, when the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free. --
Edward Gibbon,

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

ploome (#55) -

Don't start with that whole reading thing and those pesky logic issues, we don't want to get off subject...

btw - Very very good call.

Alexia,

I'm with Josh on this one.

SAT scores mean nothing.

I wouldn't be surprised if decision-makers at the NEA had great SAT scores, and yet...well you know the story.

A comment like "would you like to see my SAT scores" doesn't really lend itself well to what could be described as an intelligent statement.

Why don't you challenge somebody to a spelling-bee or a math contest while you're at it.

I'll be at the spelling-bee, as long as it's a minority-biased one where I get to use my ESL dictionairy and prober usage of ebonics is key.

btw- wow, somebody agreed with me.

This is not teacher bashing. I do not fault the teachers in my childrens' schools for doling out what is put before them as curriculum.

My main problem with not teaching the blame is that it sets a precedent which American kids can hardly afford to follow. By saying no one particular cause/country/fringe radical group is to blame, and by further stating that perhaps it is our fault for some reason, they are only reinforcing the idea that pervades in our school system that it is not necessarily a need to accept responsibility for your actions.

It's just a microcosm of the "mediation groups" that pervade in schools, where the bully and the picked on kid meet up with a group of peers and the peers tell the picked on kid that he is either a) sending out signals that he wants to be picked on or b) a victim of society. No real blame is ever set. It's not PC to tell the bully that he is a fat coward who needs his ass kicked.

Why should we expect the public school administrators to deal with the outside world any different than they deal with the children of their schools?

Back to the issue at hand -

The NEA is one of the many things in this country that need to be whiped clean in order to stop the fall of America from happening.

If we are to survive and if my friends in the military are to be saved from dying needlessly, then we need to know who we're fighting and finish the fight. By waiting and saying that we're unjust in doing anything is just beyond ignorance, it's something that should be taught only at Berkeley.

And yet somehow, people wonder why so many od us don't trust the education system... gee...

I say we kick the Fat Bully's Ass.

Thank you Reginleif.

I feel like it would be very patriotic to focus on the women of ground zero because i myself feel very lucky to be a woman in the united states. we have the freedom to be firefighters, policewomen, doctors, lawyers, anything. we have the freedom to be heroes. Personally, I feel that capitalism has given women a lot of freedom. This is certainly not to detract from the men of ground zero.

In addition, I think my school could use as many good female role models as possible. My female students have such low self esteem and the violence towards women in my school has been clear. A female student of mine died a few years ago after having her ninth abortion. A female teacher was raped by a male student last year. And shall we also consider the treatment of women in the countries that my students come from? I'd like to offer a portrait of empowered American women. Women we can be in awe of. And we saw the best of American men and women last year in NYC.

How can it be insulting to offer a portrait of brave american women on this date of remembrance?

... anyway, everyone knows the only TRUE test of intelligence is how much money you make. Which would mean that public school teachers are all SOL. (with tongue firmly in my cheek)

intelligence tests are meaningful in some sense, meaningless in another sense, and both meaningful and meaningless in still another sense.

Someone please remind me who the Axis powers were in World War II? Canada? Brussells?

Based on the logic of the NEA, students should not be taught anything of value...like history.

There's no need for a "Women of Ground Zero" book, it's ridiculous to think that anyone out there would refute that many women died in those towers and on those planes:

"The "Women of Ground Zero" - a book as thick as "Arab Nobel Prize Winners". Post 49

Oops. Maybe that book is a good idea.

The mention of posting my SAT scores was sarcasm meant to adress the absurdity of teachers always having to defend their intelligence.

Sometimes sarcasm doesn't translate well in writing.

I think that the focus on the gender issues misses the point here. While its true that the agenda of many radical feminists is the destruction of Western civilization (I suppose to replace it with matriarchial society?), it distracts us from our manin struggle.

Indeed, one of the things that makes our society superior to Islam is the equality that women share in our society (as per Bernard Lewis). No other country gives women as many rights and freedoms as the US.

Alexia, may I suggest that you involve more women in uniform in your classes. They are empowered and sworn to defend our great nation.

#62 -

A female student of mine died a few years ago after having her ninth abortion. A female teacher was raped by a male student last year.

You're joking right? All this shows me as how little our "Education System" is working.

One would think after say, 2 abortions she would get the hint. 9? I'm sorry but I fail to feel any pity for somebody who shows such blatant misuse of their body.

The Rape is another story, obviously, and what happened to the teacher is sad, but your point is still moot.

I can talk about tragedy after tragedy too, doesn't mean anything. My Mother was attacked and almost Raped (had my step-father not been in the house and had a gun to scare off the attacker outside), one of my shot himself when I was 16, what does this prove? Life sucks, get a cup.

Don't try and speak of women as if they are the only ones who get shat on, I myself got abused for years at the hands of my peers, you don't need to teach a course on it.

Fine, teach them about the women as those women deserve to be remembered but also teach them about the men and men the boys can look up to, offer a portrait of empowered American Men if you will.

I'm sorry Alexia, (#66) but having public school teachers defend their intelligence isn't absurd, which is why we took your offer seriously.

When we have schools that: habitually practice peer promotion; punish both students when a child is abused by another; teach feelings and self-esteem over facts and skills that would actually give students a sense of self-worth; push blame-America propoganda; promote feelings of victimhood and grieviance for minorities; distort historical facts in order to suit their own political agendas; and, oh!, don't bother teaching children how to read, it is perfectly acceptable that we question the intelligence of folks in charge.

From all the media coverage of 9/11, you'd think that all the police officers and firefighters who died at Ground Zero were men.

No, you wouldn't. Well, I wouldn't. You might.

How can it be insulting to offer a portrait of brave american women on this date of remembrance?

Only idiots would deny the bravery of those women, but I just wonder why it's necessary to go out and find a book that focuses solely on them. Aren't there any books that, say, show a cross-section of the people there, men and women?

As for the treatment of women in your school -- that's horrible, but I don't see how that particular book will help. Maybe the problem's more with the examples the boys see, and not the examples the girls see?

Feminist dogma is not supposed to be taugt at a public school. I would think you would understand that since students in the US get worse scores in math and science and everything else than the rest of the civilized world. Now, we know why.

"A female student of mine died a few years ago after having her ninth abortion."

revenge of the fetus?

I think i offer portraits of empowere men everyday when I teach. Is there a problem with that?

One last thing before I stop this posting nonsense that I've been too much of.

The NEA is a group of incompetents and they are ruining our Once Great Nation with their absurdity.

The only way we're going to survive this is to learn from our mistakes and not repeat them. Perhaps we shouldn't have blamed the Japanese for attacking us WWII? Perhaps we should have shipped the downed Zero's back to them and said; "Sorry, I think you dropped these"?

Maybe Hitler was just misunderstood and we should all embrace Stalinism for a week as well? Perhaps these people who make such ludicrous decisions need to visit the Museum of Tollerence, the Vietnam Memorial Wall (where people are ALWAYS crying), Pearl Harbor, and finally Ground Zero. For only then will they know why we have always fought and why we always need to fight those who would pick a fight with us.

I missed the opprobrium towards Alexia. Robert (I think I speak somewhat for him here) and I simply were curious why she mentioned that book. I was simply curious...

Nine abortions, huh? Words fail me.

I don't teach math or science. I teach high school literacy and English as a second language. (Some of my immigrant students did not receive an education in their native country, thus I also teach them how to read). If i xeroxed a page from this book, we would be working with literacy and English vocabulary and grammar, not math or science. This would not be a day for me to get on my feminist soap box.

In defense of Alexia, she did say she was going to use the book as *part* of her curriculum, not the focus of it.

I used to be a teacher, and one of the reasons I'm not anymore is because teachers are often blamed for what is entirely beyond their control. I was unable to have a Christmas party at school for my students as the Board and the Administration felt it would alienate students of other faiths. Instead, I chose to invite students to a party at my home, and I still got in trouble and was threatened with suspension. I was told it appeared that I was forcing my beliefs on innocent minds. I'm not even that religious -- I just wanted to share the holidays with my students. One family, (atheists, and their child wasn't even my student) wanted me fired and then wanted reevaluations of every teacher, because if I could be so deviant as to peddle Christianity under the guise of a party, imagine what the other teachers must be doing.

This nasty incident eventually blew over, but because of it our collective morale as teachers plummeted, and the students suffered. Often you're told what to teach, whether you want to or not, and if you don't you'll lose your job. The reason there are so few good teachers out there is because they've left the profession to earn more income or because of the politics, or they've become uncaring slaves to the system just to keep their jobs. Don't spread a blanket statement of blame on teachers for the shameless PC stupidity of the NEA.

Jeezus my Grammar sucked in that last post, I think I need some coffee before my brain goes into overload. And yes I know I said that was my last post but still.

Alexis, you should offer knowledge and let the kids find their own heroes.

edgarthomson - Revenge of the Fetus? bwahahaha

My female students have such low self esteem and the violence towards women in my school has been clear. A female student of mine died a few years ago after having her ninth abortion. A female teacher was raped by a male student last year.

And let me guess, the teachers union really helped out that raped teacher didn't they? My sister had her leg broken by a student at a school where her own students were visiting for an athletic event. Both her school administration and her union strongly discouraged her from taking action.

As for self-esteem, just about anything of any value was created by men and women who had "low self-esteem". OTOH, our prisons are full of people with high self-esteem.

The fact is that The Women of Ground Zero was published specifically because feminists were unhappy with the positive images of men that came out of the attack and response. Men cannot be portrayed sympathetically. It is completely unacceptable to feminists for men to be portrayed as anything other than hulking rapists and child abusers. Since the heroism of the men of 9/11 is unquestionable, The Women of Ground Zero instead was part of an attempt to de-masculinize the heroism.

Do I even need to mention the illiteracy rate? I was talking in general about the public school system--your attitude concerning social enginnering is commonplace.

unfortunately, Alexia, perhaps holding up a student on her ninth abortion wasn't the best example to present to the readers here. i gather that most of us are the sort who feel that anyone dumb enough to get pregant nine times when they could have used birth control or kept their legs together, really shouldn't be breeding. all a teenager on their ninth abortion says to me, is that sex education in schools is an obvious and complete failure.

so score another point for the NEA!

we've got teenage pregnancy, sexually transmitted disease, illiteracy, and ignorance rates that can all be attributed to the politics and teaching practices promoted by the NEA.

Alexia,

> enough of the teacher bashing...
> MOST teachers I know would be whole- heartedly
> insulted by the NEA's Sept. 11th lesson plan.

Fair enough: let's see a great outpouring of guest
op-ed's, "My Turn" columns, and so forth from actual
working teacher taking the NEA to task for this.
In my experience, the reason teachers get lumped in
with the idiot union officials is that they _don't_
protest when the unions do something idiotic.
Or are you afraid of the backlash from the union if
you do speak out?

I missed the opprobrium towards Alexia. Robert (I think I speak somewhat for him here) and I simply were curious why she mentioned that book. I was simply curious...

Yep.

In defense of Alexia, she did say she was going to use the book as *part* of her curriculum, not the focus of it.

True -- I just get worried when I see teachers relying on something as one-sided as that title appears to be. The book may be perfectly reasonable.

If the public schools are abolished, this country has a chance.

sepschool.org

I think the real issue is here is not what the NEA propose for the curriculum for September 11th, but what they are not proposing.

If they are going to do anything in schools that day, it should not be lessons about who isn't or is to blame. It should not be about reasons for terrorism or directing anger at those responsible, or about tolerating other cultures.

Why not just remember those that died that day? A small vigil or memorial service dedicated to those who lost their lives would be way more appropriate than skewed history lessons would be.

Yeah, I thought it was stupid too when I just heard the title. Then I looked at the book.

What might the NEA have to say about the following?

"They're out there, they can't stand the thought of America being a hospitable society to many cultures. They can't stand the thought of a society which worships an almighty God in different ways, a society which is tolerant to different approaches to religion. They really hate the thought of us being a society in which we are able to speak our mind, a society which values the individual worth of each person. And so long as we uphold those values, which we will do, they're going to try to strike us.

...But the best way to protect the homeland, the best way to secure freedom for this country is to chase the killers down one person at a time and bring them to justice, which is what the United States is going to do.

...I say that because I want the world to be at peace, but I know the nature of the enemy. We can't talk them out of their ideas. We can't hold their hands and hope they change their attitude. We must bring them to justice."

-- President Bush, Milwaukee, WI, Aug 14, 2002

I guess the NEA would say he's intolerant? Or maybe a tad judgmental when he says "we can't talk them out of their ideas?"

Spare me the progessive crap.....

Wow, the comments section here today really has degraded into a bunch of Idiotarian drivel, hasn't it? At least on this thread it has.

Some people are showing themselves to be the batty knee jerk right idealogs they are.

If you go back and read some of the comments from the teacher, and those who made points in support of hers, you may see the benefit of teaching student immigrants (from nations with no respect for women) about empowered American women. But you seem to prefer the overly emmotional vitriolic sarcasm that most of us usually ascribe to the left.

Actually think about what you read before you attack it. I've seen these types of posts in the past here on LGF, most recently during the July 4th timeframe. There is a gradient of views that are valuable within our own shared principles.

Not all women who want to improve women's rights are Femanazis, and not all teachers who want to reduce racial hatred in urban schools are appeasers of Arab terrorism.

These comments are bankrupt of any real substance. I know from reading LGF for a while now that there is better material lurking in the minds of its readers.

Nice stereotyping and prejudging there Ben Noah. You don't know me or anything about me. Aren't you violating your own tenets by stereotyping and prejudging people?

Before I had to leave for work a little while ago, I was going to point out that Women of Ground Zero is a welcome antidote to all the rapture about "the return of masculine virtues" seen on conservative sites for the past year. As if heroism, courage, making the ultimate sacrifice, etc. were strictly male traits -- a belief contradictd by the simple fact that that women did put themselves on the line, and die, on 9/11. Thanks, Ronnie (#79), for giving me some more fodder for this argument.

(But please, spare me the hysteria about how "all feminists hate men," blah blah blah. It's as much a distortion as it is to say that all men consider women their lessers.)

Robert and Addison -- the "opprobrium" comment was directed at Patrick Martin's rather incontinent rant in #39. I'm sorry to have overgeneralized.

While the NEA certainly does deserve our anger and contempt, I don't think anything is gained by beating up on teachers like Alexia, who may be too liberal for this crowd but is certainly not an idiotarian. I think conservatives and libertarians would do better to try to woo the good teachers who exist over to the side of school choice and vouchers. After all, competent and caring educators have a lot to gain if public education goes under. They'd be better paid and better respected, they'd have less union B.S. to deal with, and, best of all, they'd get to watch the kids thrive in an atmosphere of intellectual honesty and stimulation.

By the way, here's the contact information for the NEA, if you feel like giving them a piece of your mind:

Emai: [Link: www-feedback@list.nea.org...]

Phone: (202) 833-4000
Mon-Fri 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. EST

Fax: (202) 822-7974

Snailmail: 1201 16th Street N.W.
Washington, DC 20036-3290

You can also leave feedback here.

Ben, I am so far from the right I can't even see it. But there has to be a line drawn somewhere. I would much prefer my kids be taught something based on reality, no matter how ugly it is, than to have history lessons turned into a political correctness seminar.

Nice stereotyping and prejudging there Ben Noah. You don't know me or anything about me. Aren't you violating your own tenets by stereotyping and prejudging people?

No Patrick, I speak to those who know whom I speak of, if you get my drift. You can judge for yourself which comments in particular I may have been speaking of.

There's no sense in me attacking individuals, when the overall tone of the dialog has been mired down by the shallow commentary.

Enough with the teacher bashing, most of my family are/were teachers so I've heard all the arguments.

There's several problems you're not looking at here:

1) Most of this crap being put out by the NEA, etc, is dictated by "Administrators" rather than teachers, often with little or no classroom experience. They turn political, and we all know that politics=bullshit.

2) I've only run across a couple of teachers who were actually even bordering on incompetent in their subject areas, the Illiterate Teacher thing is more of an urban legend.

3) You Get What You Pay For. In many places teaching barely provides a livable salary...most garbagemen get paid more. How do you expect to attract the Best And Brightest with no financial incentive? How do you expect to keep them? (For reference: I'm in the military, and my annual pay is approximately twice that of either parent when they retired after 25 yrs. It's that bad. )

4) It's really easy to use the teacher as the scapegoat, rather than to keep looking for other problems. Do you have any idea how many Idiot Parents there are out there? When you combine Idiot Parents with Idiot Adminstrators what you get is a mess that the teachers take the blame for, and the cycle continues. If you'll recall the Scopes Monkey Trials, it wasn't the teachers railing against evolution, it was the parents--who make up the School Board, who are usually more interested in the football team's chances against Rival High than in education, etc etc.

Michele, I agree totaly. There's nothing wrong with saying so. Its just the treatment of the teacher (Alexia) and the assumptions made about her argument.

If one reads her comments closely, you see, as Reginleif the Valkyrie pointed out that she's not an idiotarian. Many Anti-Idiotarians are former liberals.

As Reginleif said, our ideas and goals would be better served by trying to woo certain people, not bash them blindly.

And I guess I should say it, there were some excellent comments in this thread, my point was that they were drowned out by a plethora of shallow attacks on a teacher for voicing an opinion slightly to the left.

This thread is making me sick.

I enjoy being a part of these discussions from the sidelines muttering my own responses to myself, but I feel I have to post something to defend myself and the profession I love. I am a teacher, dammit, and I am sick of the teacher bashing I am reading.

I have never had the NEA breathing down my neck to force me to teach a certain way. I teach US History and you can bet your ass I am going to explain what happened on 9-11. I refuse to bring the weepy PC revisionist nonsense into class, I explain things how they were at the time. For example: I tell them that it seemed right at the time, but herding Japanese citizens into internment camps today is not really a good idea.

Another thing, I never was the one who sat at the front of the class with my pencils sharpened and a bright smile on my face. I got average grades in college, I was lazy and perhaps partied a little too much. I firmly believe there is a LOT more to teaching than being a 'super-genius', especially at the high school level. You have to be able to present information to a group of 16-17 year olds who think US History is a terribly boring and worthless class. "Who cares, those guys are dead, man!" High school juniors have an excellent bullshit detector and can tell after 3 minutes if they are going to listen to you or care about what you are teaching for the rest of the year. A collegue of mine has published a book on Harry Truman and is three times smarter than I am. Almost all (at least 90%) of the students in this person's classes say they learn nothing because my collegue is so "lame and boring".

Yes there are teachers who may march in lock step with the NEA. But I would bet that there are many more that do not and it is a gross inservice to lump them in with the twits in the NEA.

Many of my teacher friends would laugh at the NEA 'suggestions' if we ever read their literature.

Bash the NEA, but do not bash the teachers in the classrooms.

Reginleif #90,

Perhaps the rapture about the 'return of masculine virtue' and such was actually reaction to men being demonized at a pretty much constant rate for the past 30 years?

I've heard plenty of women bemoan the loss of 'real men' these days, never seeming to realize that they're to blame for the loss of these men. You can't raise a man on a diet of 'oppressor!' 'rapist!' 'sexist!' 'harrasser!' 'pig!'. The bile I hear spewed about men from victim groups on a regular basis rivals the crap about jews that I read on the Arab news.

No surprise to me that people leap at the chance to celebrate heroism in men when they've been told for the past 30 years that they're all potential rapists, abusers, oppressors, racists and sexists.

Roger that, Jolley Roger. Have people any idea how pathetic the sallary is in NYC for teachers? Its absolutely absurd to expect greatness from them. Are teachers perfect? No. Are they all stupid? No. Are they underpaid? Yes (at least in NYC they are. Yet I know many who still do the work because they love kids. For many its that simple.

If anyone here has ever lived in NYC, try working 60+ hours a week, facing hostile dangerous kids who don't give a rats ass about education (neither do their parents), and making a paltry 30k for it. Let me know which soup kitchen you're staying in and I'll come by and visit you.

The point here is that teachers are often a scapegoat. Are they not part of the problem at all? No. But the comments today on this thread don't demonstrate or question the real problem of education in our country.

The only way war has ever ended and peace was brought forward was by an overwhleming use of force that crushes the enemy into undeniable submission.

Here are some other things you all might want to think about. The reason why teachers generally measure poorly on tests is because they are paid so poorly. Maybe if people were willing to pay them, there would be better teachers.

Of course, any teaching system needs a way to get rid of teachers who are underperforming.

With a higher pay scale and attrition of underperformers, the public school system could be systematically improved.

As to Alexia, I think she is right to be emphasizing the Women of 9/11 for a group of kids from those countries. In general, I would disagree with it - but not if the kids are from Pakistan, etc.

And I think a lot of you need to tone down your attacks on other people. Alexia writes intelligently, which is more than can be said for some of her detractors - and I think we should try to keep this debate somewhat intellectual and considerably less personal.

A few comments earlier, someone commented that, though from the press coverage, you would think that all of the firefighters and police officers who were killed on 9/11 were men. Actually, there was only one woman killed from the uniformed services at the World Trade Center - Moira Smith, a police officer - the fire department, which took most of the casualties has only a microscopic percentage of female fire fighters.

Let's see, we can't talk about teachers working less than an eight hour day for about nine months out of the year. Why not? We'll be subjected to endless whining about having to spend hours a night correcting tests and papers and getting up early every morning to prepare lesson plans.

In the Detroit area, a teacher with some experience and a masters degree can expect to make significantly more than 30K a year. But assuming that it's 30K a year, that's not bad pay for someone working a partial workday for only 3/4 of the year.

Teaching children is not a matter of high intelligence. Skill at the teaching itself is what is paramount--assuming they at least know how to read and write and do basic math themselves. Some of the worst teachers I have had through college and graduate school were the smartest ones.

For heaven's sake! We're turning into France circa 1938!

Ben Noah - to expand on my previous sarcasm (sorry that you don't approve), but people who wish to contribute to the Balkanization of America by including books with titles like "Women of Ground Zero" to be paraded as gospel should be mocked. Is the book "Famous Lesbian Poets of Nicaragua" out of print?

Some of us just wish that the education establishment would just get back to teaching kids things like writing & reading. Math, too. Until that time returns or charter schools get a firm foothold, I consider criticizing teachers fair game.

And don't start w/ the pay issue. Teachers work approximately 180 days of the year. I wish I had every summer off. Output is proportional to input.

Sorry, my sympathy meter's still at zero.

to Luke #11
Thanks for the link, I watched it and remembered. I cried my eyes out. "We will never forget." It hurts to watch and remember but it's important. Thanks again.

*sigh* Ariel #99 -

You write: The reason why teachers generally measure poorly on tests is because they are paid so poorly. Maybe if people were willing to pay them, there would be better teachers.

Since when does giving someone more money make them smarter? Given the current average test scores of american children, and how appallingly low they are compared to other first world countries, I'd say we're paying teachers too much.

This is always a pet peeve of mine. You can polish a turd all you want, and put gold-plating on it, its still a turd. If you have a stupid person teaching, it doesn't matter if you pay them 30k (which is a perfectly liveable wage in most areas of the country) a year, or 80k a year, they're still stupid.

No, teachers aren't the entire problem. However, given the power the teachers unions hold, and how adamantly they are against what improvements are suggested (vouchers, standards, accountability), they're definitely doing their damnedest to keep the problem from going away. If most public school teachers actually cared about making sure their students learned, then why are the unions fighting so hard against that?

I'll stop complaining that public school teachers are part of the problem when I hear public school teachers come out in favor of school choice, accountability, less administrators and administrative overhead.

Interesting thread.

Mike in #3, can you give some details on what this union did to Serb-American kids in Chicago?

Cowardly Pundit in #12, I'd like to see some of those hijacker body parts you refer to or at least some attribution of where you got this information.

From all of this teacher-bashing, it seems there is a lot of unresolved hostility from some peoples' school experiences.

The best teachers present many (or at least two) sides of values-laden issues. I want teachers to encourage kids to examine cause and effect. If a teacher doesn't specifically ask kids to examine how America's actions affect our relation to the rest of the world, don't discount the likelihood that your neighbor's kid will bring it up. That's the great thing about living in a "free country". At any rate, all teachers teach "values" implicitly if not explicitly.

If you've got a problem with the quality of public school teachers and how the NEA is destroying our society, you can home-school your kids, work on getting vouchers passed, support charter schools, send your kids to a private school or hire tutors. You could lobby for teachers to be paid a decent wage for what they have to deal with. You could also teach your kids to think critically and question everything they are presented with by their teachers, the media, etc.

Anyone who works with kids knows the amount of baggage that comes along with them that you have to deal with to try to get your job done. If you're shaking your head or snickering up your sleeve about the girl dying after 9 abortions, let's not forget we're referring to a girl here: probably under 18; possibly raped; possibly raped by her father, step-father, or mother's "boyfriend"; certainly ignorant of or unable to get contraception. Such conditions do complicate teaching.

Pat et. al.

"Bash the NEA, but do not bash the teachers in the classrooms."

Hmmm. Bash??? Pat, have you actually ever been bashed? That means to strike violently, according to Herr Webster's book.

No, I haven't "bashed" you, but that is a typical hyperbolic response to any sort of criticism of the educational bureaucracy. Let me address a few of the arguments about the NEA and classroom teachers that have been put forward....

With regard to brilliant teachers... First, the SAT, the NTE, and the GRE are all achievement tests, not intelligence tests. And, no, not all brilliant teachers are good, nor are all stupid teachers bad. However, that does not address the point that teachers, as a group, scored so badly on a common post-graduate test that the test had to be renormed for both for appearance's sake and to give it enough "bottom" to make statistical distinctions.

The Massachusetts state test scores... Are not an "urban legend", they are a matter of public record.

Family history of teachers... My grandfather and two great-aunts were teachers, my only aunt was a teacher, and I was employed in a professional consulting capacity by a Board of Education. In addition, I was a teacher, albeit at the Universtity level, where I witnessed the fruits of our remarkable teachers (and teacher's colleges) first hand. I have no axe to grind with teachers except that they support the interests of children by teaching factual history, mathematics, written and spoken language, and simple reasoning. And they should teach spelling.

Well, uh, gee, I partied a lot... Well, uh, gee. So did I. But along the way, between parties, I learned the difference between "bash" and "criticize". "Bash" is now like "phobia". If you can't adress a critic's argument, then either accuse them of being violent ("bashing") or paint them with a psychological disorder - e.g., the latest psychobabble hoot of the year: "Islamophobia".

Women of 911 or whatever it's called... Obviously, anyone is free to write a book about anything they wish to write about. As to the point that teaching about only Mr. Beamer would have left out a lot of other sacrifices; well, yes, but I don't recall seeing that suggestion. Can you spell "straw man"? That straw man was pretty well demolished. Congratulations, teachers. My compliments. To the larger point, however, teaching "empowerment" is one of those fuzzy feel-good concepts like teaching "conflict resolution". I doubt you can even define "empowerment" using criteria such that most people could observe someone and say that the person had it, or didn't. But I invite you to do so.

The NEA doesn't represent me... Oh, I see. You pay your dues and vote for for your representatives, but the stuff they do just has nothing to do with you. You're just a victim of institutional tyranny.

Teachers are underpaid... For what? For graduating class after class of students whose performance that, on a global level, is nothing short of embarassing? If teachers were paid more, they would teach more??? If a correlation exists between public investment and student achievement, it is demonstrably negative, based on a mountain of data. Over the last twenty years, if teachers were paid for what they produce in real benefit, they would be making less money.

Joe Schmo is a smart teacher, but his students are bored... Oh, gee! No wonder teachers want more money! They think they're in the entertainment industry! Personally, I was not too eager to attend geometry class (Like, Coach Wiseman was soooo boring, ya know?), but I still learned how to bisect and angle and Pythagoras' Theorem.

Blame the Administration... I know. You're victims of a bad system (here we are again). Regarding the blithe comment that admin people don't have classroom experience - that may be true in your district, but in the district where I went to school, and the district that employed me, administrators were selected from the ranks of classroom teachers or school principals (who were also selected from the ranks of classroom teachers).

Your non-arguments notwithstanding, in my opinion, the following points hold:
(1) The teaching profession is, on average, the least-educated single profession with a college degree.
(2) The NEA is the largest teachers union in the country.
(2) Teachers support the NEA and their political activities with dues and elections.
(3) The NEA's official position is to whitewash the horror of mass murder with some postmodern psychobabble about "American guilt".
(4) The NEA sees no problem with teaching educational swill because its members are, on average, poorly educated.

And by the way, Pat, that's a "disservice", not an "inservice". An "inservice" is when the teachers take a paid day off on the taxpayer's tab to shoot the bull about incisive topics like how to avoid that ninth abortion with yet greater investment in sex education and higher pay. I'd call it a Freudian slip, but even Freud wouldn't be a Freudian in 2002.

As an unabashed, hardcore, right-winger, I have to give the star to Alexia.

The points made about the demonization of masculinity are generaly correct IMO, but we're discussing the NEA and this particular bit of PC stupidity.

The points Alexia makes are excellent regards the culturally diverse kids she teaches. One of our mad-ons against the islamists is there treatment of women.

I am a student at Old Dominion University, I work with exchange students, both getting them situated and with conversational tutoring. Even students from Asian countries we consider civilized and advanced have a low regard for women. The women from other countries have a far harder time. Although the comments regards the oft referenced War on Boys have merit in many threads, the students Alexia is refering to, both Boys and Girls need to know that the rules are different here and women have rights, abilities and worth far beyond childbirth. This is tired old news to us, but for the people from much of the third world it is a new and important lesson.

I despise the notion ( widely held in a certain arts and letters building) that men are (expletives deleted) and strong male role models are a threat to womens self esteem, however, to cringe anytime a strong woman is presented as a role model for little girls; to deny the existance of an Annie Oakly, a Joan of Arc, a Rosie the Riveter, a Sally Ride or Phyllis Schlafly; is to show the same cowardly hipocracy and bigotry of the "Feminazis" so many of us deplore. It also plays into their propoganda to be getting all in a tizzy over strong women.

Back on topic, teachers have to eat, I know a few teachers and being politically incorrect can bring NEA grief down upon them. I'm sure this varies widely between school districts, but to assume a teacher is goose-stepping happily to the NEA because he or she doesn't fall on a sword in a quixotic fit of futility is IMHO naive.

Just my two cents. :)

Celeste, #96: I hear a lot of comments in the blogosphere about how women these days bemoan "the loss of 'real' men." Funny, but I have quite a few straight female friends, both single and paired off, and I've never heard them complain about that. Usually they're complaining about behavior that's stereotyped as being that of "real men," which I'm not going to detail because I don't wish to drag the tone of the discussion down any further. For the sake of balance, when I hear men complain about women, they're usually complaining about stereotypically feminine traits.

Again, not all feminists are knee-jerk man-haters. Yes, some are. Unfortunately, they're the most vocal and visible face of feminism, and they're also the ones the media tend to latch onto because it's easier to resort to stereotypes than to delve into complex issues, especially in a newscast.

Conversely, not all the women who demonize men are feminists. Remember the John and Lorena Bobbitt debacle? As I remember, most anti-male comments heard were from working-class and conservative women, while feminists were biting their tongues. I recall reading about a hairdresser who expressed delight at Mr. B.'s (literal) dismemberment, then clapped her hand over her mouth and said, "I'd better stop talking like that or I'll never get a man." I myself was friendly at the time with a pro-life Republican woman who organized a coffeeklatch to celebrate Mrs. B.'s acquittal on the grounds of insanity, which I found distasteful.

You can email the NEA at their new 9.11 website
href="http://www.nea.org/nr/nr020819.html">Ne w 9.11 Website Press Release from NEA
href="[Link: neahin.org...] New 9.11 Website

This is my email to the NEA:

You make me sick, you aren't Americans at all.

I blame you for 9.11 your liberalis and retardation of pure truth.

You are why poor kids need school vouchers.

Thank you for the media examples released to put yourselves out of work.

Use this link to send them your own:
[Link: www.nea.org...]

Proper Ganda #108 -
I realize there are a lot of comments in this forum, but I can spell strawman. Can you spell the phrase "reading comprehension"?

No one suggested teaching a course only on Mr. Beamer. My point, convoluted as it appears to have been, was that to teach a course on Mr. Beamer would exclude others worthy of rememberance, just as concentrating on the women of 9-11 would. However, while concentrating on the women of 9-11 exludes the men of 9-11, it does NOT gloss over the events, nor does it attempt to blame America for them. Therefore, it does not, in my opinion, deserve the same level of outrage that the NEA's "america the evil" lesson plan does.

Reginleif #110 -
When I talk about women complaining about the loss of 'real men' the complaints I hear are normally about the perceived increased timidity in men these days. Maybe its moreso in the DC area (don't know where you live) but men around here act afraid to even pay you a compliment. Or if they do give us one, it normally sounds like this "I don't want you to take this the wrong way, and I'm not trying to offend you, but I just wanted to say that I think that red jacket you have on looks very professional."

The sense I've gotten from women around me is a mixture of frustration and guilt. Frustration that men just don't seem to act like they have a pair any more, and guilt because we know why. No man is going to offer an unqualified compliment or hold the door for you if its just as likely he'll get a dirty look or a harrassment lawsuit as it is that he'll get a 'thank you.'

I'm the last person who'll be voting to return to the days of skirts and aprons, but I also think that men have generally received a much worse rap than they deserve.

To all the teachers who complain about being tarred with the same brush as the PC extremists….what exactly are you doing to oppose every PC motivated initiative introduced into the teaching profession?

You are beginning to sound like all those moderate muslims we hear or rather don't hear about.

I can't help but look back on my college graduation from Michigan in 1991 when then President Bush gave his "Good Society" speech, and realize how we have not learned the true value of free speech. Bush warned of the dangers of PC thought, but even in 1991, who would have thoght that PC thought would threaten America's very existence.

Ironically, on the 200th anniversary of our Bill of Rights, we find free speech under assault throughout the United States, including on some college campuses. The notion of political correctness has ignited controversy across the land. And although the movement arises from the laudable desire to sweep away the debris of racism and sexism and hatred, it replaces old prejudice with new ones. It declares certain topics off-limits, certain expression off-limits, even certain gestures off-limits.

What began as a crusade for civility has soured into a cause of conflict and even censorship. Disputants treat sheer force -- getting their foes punished or expelled, for instance -- as a substitute for the power of ideas.

Throughout history, attempts to micromanage casual conversation have only incited distrust. They have invited people to look for an insult in every word, gesture, action. And in their own Orwellian way, crusades that demand correct behavior crush diversity in the name of diversity.

We all should be alarmed at the rise of intolerance in our land and by the growing tendency to use intimidation rather than reason in settling disputes. Neighbors who disagree no longer settle matters over a cup of coffee. They hire lawyers, and they go to court. And political extremists roam the land, abusing the privilege of free speech, setting citizens against one another on the basis of their class or race.

But, you see, such bullying is outrageous. It's not worthy of a great nation grounded in the values of tolerance and respect. So, let us fight back against the boring politics of division and derision. Let's trust our friends and colleagues to respond to reason. As Americans we must use our persuasive powers to conquer bigotry once and for all. And I remind myself a lot of this: We must conquer the temptation to assign bad motives to people who disagree with us.

If we hope to make full use of the optimism I discussed earlier, men and women must feel free to speak their hearts and minds. We must build a society in which people can join in common cause without having to surrender their identities.

You can lead the way. Share your thoughts and your experiences and your hopes and your frustrations. Defend others' rights to speak. And if harmony be our goal, let's pursue harmony, not inquisition.

Celeste #106,

You wrote,
Since when does giving someone more money make them smarter?

That's exactly the point - my comments as a whole were a suggestion for completely revamping the system. Not simply giving more pay, but giving pay in exchange for performance.

Right now, a 3.7GPA Ivy League grad can make an easy $60-80K straight out of school, by going into investment banking. In five years, they can make $150K (without killing themselves). A teacher will make $30K forever ( a little).

If you want to attract better teachers for the future, you need to raise the incentives for them. And you need to incent teachers to perform well. And you need to get rid of teachers who don't do well.

So I am not parroting the low pay argument - I am saying the unions need to be busted by bringing in a cadre of teachers with better education, at higher pay, and trying to actually reform the school system. I am not a defeatist - one who assumes that the public education system must be completely abandoned. Radical reform is possible, and may save the system.

Most of the problems rehearsed on this thread can be addressed by emphasizing the fact that we are individuals first, before we are women, men, black, European, Muslim, or any other catagory the collectivists love to shove us into. Respect goes to the individual. The individual chooses whether to believe in one thing or another. The individual mind is what learns; there is no such thing as a collective mind.

Multiculturalism and all it stands for is merely the latest form of collectivism used by those who would have power over men. The lessons are there in history - but you won't find them in Social Studies (or any of the bogus "Studies" programs that tell our children that they are a part of a group or they are nothing).

Alexis: Teach your girls that they have the right - as individuals - to be whatever they want. There are both men and women who are models to be considered when forming their characters.

Value the individual first. Everything follows from that.

Dee Bates,

I believe you missed Alexia's point. Its her male pakistani students who she is trying to teach women's rights too.

And to the fella above who alleged that teachers aren't doing anything, stuff it. Have you checked that before you made that gigantic gross generalization? Educational politics are incredibly challenging on local levels, and you're not likely to hear about it on CNN or whatever news show you watch/read. And comparing them to so-called moderate muslims and their silence shows a sickening vitriol brewing in your far-right mind.

On a more positive note, since about half-way through this thread, I'm glad to see there have been some voices of reason speaking out against this nonsensical teacher and feminism bashing. These types of idealogs alienate potential partners and alies on otherwise closely shared values.

And if anyone cares to do a search on her past posts, I think its clear she is well within the bounds of thinking one would ascribe to an Anti-Idiotarian.

Lastly, J. Lichty, I think you were addressing the whole of PC which I agree with very much. But to be clear, Alexia's purpose for using the Women of 911 book was clearly focused on her student body and she voiced her displeasure with the NEA recommendation at the outset of her post.

My letter submitted to:

[Link: www.nea.org...]

RE: 9/11 lesson plans

The position of the NEA is "Blaming is especially difficult in terrorist situations because someone is at fault. In this country, we still believe that all people are innocent until solid, reliable evidence from our legal authorities proves otherwise."

Would a videotaped admission of guilt suffice as evidence?

[Link: www.cnn.com...]

[Link: www.cnn.com...]

Also, are you implying to these children that our leaders are liars, and acting without sufficent evidence?

Children should be made aware that America was unjustifiably attacked (or do you feel flying airliners filled with hundreds of people into buildings containing 50,000 people justifiable?), and who attacked them.

They should know this group responsible is brutal, oppressive, irrational, and is essentially a Doomsday Cult seeking to destroy modern society, which threatens their desire to force 12th century living on the world. Afghanistan was their model of a pure "Islamic State".

American children should be taught what went on in Afghanistan under the Taliban, and what goes on in Saudi Arabia, and the rest of the Arab world today. They will appreciate their freedom.

American children should see how Palestinian children are indoctrinated and brainwashed to hate jews, and are told on a daily basis in Arafat's PA-run media machine "kill the jews wherever you may find them", and "ask yourself why you are not already a martyr". They will appreciate civil society, and learn about morality, and not to hate.

Discussion of the articles available at [Link: www.memri.org...] will help American children understand that in some places of the world, there is vile hatred and resentment by Arabs because their fundamentalist religious culture locks them a self-inflicted backwards, medieval world.

Do not hide factual information from the children in the name of politically correctness. It is completely wrong.

You 'Blame America' crowd make me sick.

Ronnie Schreiber, #101,

I think you might have some misconceptions about the work that teachers do. The hours they spend in the classroom in front of the students comprise less than half of the hours they work.

I'm a new teacher - just got my first job teaching ESL (before that I was a librarian). In school my profs told me that for every hour in front of the class I'd spend two hours preparing lessons and materials. After about a year, I could expect that to fall to about a 1:1 ratio, or slightly above, on the preparation side. That does not include marking papers or tests. So far, they're right. But I work from 6 in the morning to 6 at night, while teaching for only 4.5 hours a day, because I truly enjoy the work. There's nothing like the rush you get when you see "Oh! Now I understand!" in the student's eyes. In the summer, yes, you could take more time off, but chances are you'll spend it in seminars and classes to become a more effective teacher. Either that, or you'll have to teach summer school to supplement your income, which is not at all high.

I suppose that there are many teachers who use cookie-cutter lessons and slack off as much as they can - but I don't know any and I don't intend to become one of them. Teachers work WAY more than you think - you just don't see it.

Anyway, enough free time, and thanks for reading this far; I have a lesson plan to write for Wednesday.

I'll be the first to admit I'm jaded against the education system. I went to 19 Public schools between K-12. I was home-schooled for half a year until my Mother had to go back to working 60+ hours a week at the two hospitals she worked at. I got my arse kicked by a group of no less than 8 kids for 3 years in school while the teachers sat back and asked me what "Year Round" group I was in then proclaiming they could do nothing about the problems. I hated school.

I went through teachers like Al Gore goes through Motivational Tapes. I have a great Bullshit detector because of it.

I attend college (yet didn't finish high school as I was working and homeless at 18) and I can tell you that there is no acountablility in the schools.

A few students at my local college put up a website where fellow students could discuss which teachers were worth taking and which ones were not. Several teachers sued. Why? Because they were getting bad results in the polls is why. Because their failings were being shown.

In one of the General Ed classes (Speech) one of the teachers (getting bad results) straight tells her students that she doesn't like how women sound. No girl in the class (so far as my friends, male & female, tel me) ever scores as high as their male counterparts. I've been told to take her class as I would recieve an "Easy A". No thanks, I'm here to learn and not recieve a worthless piece of paper.

Looking (right now) at the college Speech classes offered this semester? She teaches 20% of those offered.

Let me give three examples of why I'm jaded to put things into perspective and then you can judge me.

#1 - In high school I used to copy the homework of friends (who in turn would copy mine in other subjects) for papers I deemed to be busy work (Funny how I could still Ace the tests). In one class (Chemistry), while talking to fellow classmates (jokingly) about my low respect for certain cheerleaders I was informed that my Chemistry teacher was, in fact, the cheerleading coach and she heard me. I thought nothing of it, thinking teachers were above petty retribution, I was wrong. On the subsequent paper that was due I recieved a D. Big deal, perhaps I deserved it. Here comes the interesting part, a female friend of mine who had plagaraized my paper (and was a cheerleader) got an A on it and was commended in front of the class for such a good job.

#2 - One of my best Friend's Mother works for my local high school district on the district level and has been told by her bosses that she cannot enforce certain rules because the school board is afraid to be sued by teachers who perform badly. The school district pays a Janitor upwards of 80K a year to live on one of the campus' while others do the actual work because he threatened lawsuit. I'm working on getting copies of the paperwork.

#3 - My Neighbor, who attends UCLA, got where she is because everytime she recieved anything lower than an A in a class her mother would fight with the school board, in which she worked. I watched as an F in Calculus turned into an A- in three weeks before graduation. Anybody care to think about the probablity of that happening to anybody else?

I have many examples of varying degree and could explain my personal reasons why I dislike the educational system for days.

As do many of us. We see the problems and as for the solution what do we hear? PAY US MORE!! Garbage Men make more than! We Need more Money! Yeah, so do I. I just don't follow the Mantra of "Work Less, Work Union".

While it is true that it's not the individual teacher who is to blame for such atrocities as the NEA lesson plans, it is their fault that they do nothing to stymie such things.

When it comes to the question of getting what you pay for? What if you can't afford better?

My mother worked two jobs, my Step-father worked a hell of a job at a grocery store all for much much less than your average teacher. I got most of my education from reading my set of encyclopedias and asking questions. While I did have several great teachers I had more than my fair share of horrible ones. They were horrible not in that they "Were so boring man" but because they were more interested in making sure I could regurgitate the text than in making sure I could understand it.

I've grown tired of the whole "Oh those Poor Poor Teachers who always get shat on" drivel that gets pounded and pounded away. For once I'd like to see some aco****ability brought into the schools and homes. Parents think the schools are babysitters and teachers agree with them.

You want to convince me that teachers won't support the atrocity of NEA lesson plans than maybe you should show me the websites, newsreels, or even articles of Teachers avidly condemning them. Until then the "We can't do anything about it" arguement is moot.

Perhaps I'm off base as I'm not nearly as smart as many people on here (I'm not affraid to admit that) but I'm yet to see any real proof otherwise. If there is some, show it to me, I'm always open to learning a new viewpoint.

Holy Jeez.. didn't realize I wrote that much. whoops, sorry people.

Joshua,

I don't think you're completely off-base. I think that the teaching system needs radical reform.

A friend of mine just graduated from an Ivy and is teaching in the Bronx right now. She's going to teach there for a little while to get some experience and then try to do the reform from within the system.

Unions combined with lawsuits prevent underperforming teachers from being fired. But some people, like my friend, are trying to change the system.

And one of the problems is not that these people get paid too much. It's that there is no tying of pay to performance. Good teachers (as measured by tests, e.g.) are not rewarded. Bad teachers are not eliminated.

That is the crux of the problem. Give raises/promotions/bonuses to good teachers. Give bad teachers a kick in the rear.

That's the way things ought to work.

And some people are trying to change that. Instead of taking all of the money away from the school system, we should try to fix the system, no? Who's to say that vouchers, etc, won't be just as bad as the current school system once they get all of the funding?

You want to convince me that teachers won't support the atrocity of NEA lesson plans than maybe you should show me the websites, newsreels, or even articles of Teachers avidly condemning them. Until then the "We can't do anything about it" arguement is moot.

What has to be done is to change the system, not blame the teachers. You vote, I vote, we all vote (presumably) and therefore the goal should be revamping the system. As its been said by those with some reason in this thread, the fault lies on no one party as a whole. The whole system is flawed. Surely there are teachers who should be let go, and surely there are those who deserve greater regard.

The point is not a "whoah is me" defense of teachers, but its to condemn the tone of "teachers are stupid and lazy". There is a reasonable debate to be had, and although some on this thread have tried repeatedly to engage in it, others are not interested.

Celeste:

I understood your point. And my point was: so what? I wasn't as outraged. In fact, I wasn't outraged about teaching about the women at all. My point was twofold: (1) the argument was a straw man argument, and (2) the free add-on point was that teaching "empowerment" is a pointless exercise because, since no one has ever defined it, one can never know whether it was successfully taught or not.

Ariel:

You hit the nail on the head. Ramp up the academic requirements, ramp up the academic content, ramp up domain knowledge requirements for certification, dump tenure, establish criterion-based pay, establish a hassle-free channel in the union to handle Beck requests when the union supports political activism that individuals don't agree with, and rock on.

Ariel,

I'm all for everything you speak of, I truly am. But how about a shining example of good teachers (based on results).

90% of Harvard Grads Graduate with Honors. There's a nice IVY for you.

[Link: www.boston.com...]

According that, the teachers are doing on hell of a job because there is no way that they would be inflating the grades to look better would they? No.

Just like Riverisde Calif (I think it was Riverside, the link is dead) didn't Grauate students who had dropped out to raise their success rates.

I'm not seeing the problems going away. Sure, fire the bad teachers and praise the good ones. Show me where to sign up and I'm game.

Joshua,

I'm not sure how to fix the system. The one thing I am sure about is that draining the system of all of its money will not fix the system. I support my friend in her efforts to try to reform the system from within, and I'm sure you have friends like her too.

Sure 90% of Harvard students graduate with Honors. And each school has a different curve. So what? Employers and grad schools are aware of the different curve in each school - and calibrate the employees appropriately. Dartmouth is an IVY which has bucked the trend on grade inflation. But their grads don't suffer for it. Penn, Yale, and Columbia all inflate less than Harvard. Everybody knows about it and sets their expectations appropriately.

Joshua,

If you want a shining example, look at South Korea. Ranked first in terms of math/science in industrialized nations, south korean teachers have relatively competitive pay scales. And there is no tolerance for failure.

The better schools employ the better teachers. In order to go the better schools, the students have to do well on the entrance exams.

Yes Ariel, I do know of great teachers as I posted before. One of my best friends just married a great teacher from a local high school.

I'm not interested in pulling the money out of the system but I am in favor of changing where it goes. When I was referring to the ca$h complaints I was referring to bad teachers making excuses and not that we should cut funding. An Audit would be nice though.

As for the grade infaltion, so what? Grade inflation is one of the many problems in the education system. I don't go to a school where I can benefit from such things. So I suffer for it. I didn't go to the right school so instead of getting a 4.2 I get a 3.6 and lose that high end job I was hoping for. I thought it was about fair advantages and making sure people were educated and not trying to make one group look better than others.

Also, Not everybody knows these things happen. Not everybody knows and thusly they vote on measures without realizing the implications.

A bond issue of $239,000,000 was passed in this past primary for my local college. The sample ballot in front of me promises new classes and updated structures, rewiring the WPA buildings which are around campus and adding parking structures to help with the traffic.

What has happened so far? A few signs outside the shcool were built, a few higher-ups got new offices and oh yes, for the 3rd year running they just started to work on the bathrooms as school started today. Lord knows they couldn't fix anything when school is out of session and allow us more than one restroom on campus to use.

Is the oldest building on Campus (The Art Building which houses the Computer Graphics lab) going to get new, much needed, wiring? No. Why? The money isn't allocated for that.
Instead we have banners flying around campus telling us where we go to school, just in case we forget between classes.

Is the Anthropology lab going to get new wiring or new equiptment to replace our broken scales that predate me? No. Why? Wrong department kids.

Funny how none of this is in the ballot. All over my area I saw signs from the Teachers union proclaiming how great this measure was. It was specifically written to accomodate our 70,000 students but it isn't doing that. Instead the Board of Trusties has allocated the money elsewhere.

I understand that things need to be fixed, but I just don't see it happening. Instead I see teachers helping with the problem. (The vocal ones in my area at least)

Ariel,

I think the key there isn't that the teachers have competitive pay as much as it is that they don't tolerate failure.

I was denied AP classes in high school because I didn't register in time (sorry, I was too busy going through a custody battle and didn't live in the area in time). So, although I had the scores I didn't get in due to red tape. Therein lies the problem.

I'm not going to say all teachers are bad because they're not. I'm sure as hell going to agree that good teachers need to be paid more, but first I want to know how we can ensure this.

All that is going to ensue is you saying the schools need to be fixes, followed by me saying the schools need to be fixed, us disagreeing on the details of how and why, but nothing really getting done to fix them. I'm seriosuly curious how things ARE going to get fixed?

btw- I hope you're not taking this personally as I enjoy hearing opposing viewpoints and thank you for sharing yours with me.

Jolly Roger (who knows a lot of teachers) said in comment #93

Enough with the teacher bashing

You Get What You Pay For. In many places teaching barely provides a livable salary...most garbagemen get paid more. How do you expect to attract the Best And Brightest with no financial incentive?

So let's see:

- You get what you pay for.

- What we pay for is something less than garbagemen.

It follows from this that if we were to fire all the teachers and hire garbagemen instead, the level of teaching competency would go up.

Yes, it might just work.

Joshua,

Not taking this personally at all. Like you, I enjoy the debate and thank you for sharing your views.

You bring up good examples of waste. And I think that no system will ever be free of it. I think that the system right now is not the best system and needs to be reformed. You're right also that we're talking in circles.

How are things going to get fixed? Here's my guess:

1) Local organization. Schools funding is from the local tax base. Reform comes from here.

2) Successful models. Let's say my community creates the ideal system (impossible really, but for the sake of argument...). Let's say we do it in one small locality. Property values go up as people start to move there because of the school system. The tax base goes up, providing more funding for the school. Virtuous cycle ensues.

3) Imitation of successful model. People in other counties realize that they can raise their property values by competing with other school systems in neighboring counties.

The other alternative is:

1) Local organization to remove taxes from the system. Vouchers ensue. The public school system begins to fail, lowering property values. The tax base reduces.

2) Competition kills the public school system except for the most disadvantaged kids. They have no money from their tax base and consequently have poor teachers (both in $ and quality).

3) Vouchers create a new system in xx% of the counties where people can afford the balance due for schooling. This system becomes the only viable alternative. Corruption ensues. The system fails.

This is all IMHO, btw.

I've been a high school teacher for 28 years. I have written an e-mail of protest to the NEA about their idiotic, PC-oriented curriculum suggestion, and I am considering leaving the union now. But the anger I'm seeing directed at ALL teachers in so many of these posts is disturbing. It's hard not to be angry in reply. So I'll just say this: You don't know me. Please don't generalize about me. I guess it wouldn't be seemly of me to detail my academic achievements, so I won't, but to be blunt I'll put myself academically and intellectually up against any of the more virulent anti-teacher critics who have posted in this thread. The vast majority of those who despise people like me for simply being teachers have never taught, and would probably fall flat on their faces if they tried.

I am a proud supporter of Israel, I love America fiercely, and I fervently support the war against the Islamofascists. If you want to discuss issues with me, and the e-mail link on my post doesn't work, I'm at:

jmiller@lwhs.will.k12.il.us

I look forward to hearing from you.

Joseph A. Miller

Ariel,

A few more things good old cynical me would like to point out.

#1 - The only funding at my local college (which is State run) and my local University, that has had any positive benefits is from Private Grants. The only reason Cal State Fullerton Got a new Geology lab was because part of the movie "Evolution" was filmed there and they recieved $5,000 for it. Nevermind that the school has used the tax dollars for new bonus' and offices on the board levels.

Problem? Until we can root out those in power who are hurting the system we can't fix the situation.

#2 & 3 - The Edision School in San Francisco was the first one to work (Charter School) on any real scale. The students were reading whereas they hadn't been reading before. What happens when those who have no want to make things better get threatened by the success of others? They respond in mass. In this case they moved to revoke the charter.

[Link: archive.salon.com...]

#4-7 - The local system fails and more students go without education for a few years and we get knee-jerk policy that makes things worse than they are now.

I know I'm cynical but the model sure seems to be in place. We're more worried about making students feel good than we are about teaching them (on a political level), thusly ensuring that we don't succeed in either.

I hate to generalize, but the left is hardly ready to lose it's prestige and admit that Multiculturalism is a joke & the Unions are in no coming time going to admit that they need to be abolished.

We appear to be at an impass. Now where did I put that Iocane powder... (Princess Bride Referrence)

I've been involved professionally in education for 25 years. I have watched these idiotarian trends develop and flourish. I kicked and screamed and protested the whole way, to no avail. The rot is too deep, the mythology too ingrained; especially now that we have a second generation of teachers who have been brainwashed in the perversely evolved worldview that underlies the NEA's curricular advice. I have opposed school vouchers, tending to see them as a pork-barrel scheme for creationists, Bible-thumpers, and suburban New Age ashrams. I am not so sure now, for every creationist fruitcake who wants to set up his own school, there may be 10 rationalists who want to stop the insane 60s fantasy that passes for public education these days. We should give it a chance, it is unlikely to be any worse than what we have now.

I Rule This Board With An Iron... uhh... Keyboard... kidding... kinda..

I, being a Fruitcake, am not setting up my own school. It shall forever now be known as the "Love Me Or Die School For The Gifted (Who Are Easy To Brainwash)".

I shall hire only non-idiotarian teachers and will give pay based on how smart the students are at the end of each year. First though, I need a few hundred million, then we're good to go....

Oh yeah... and a body guard... as I'm not going into the street without one after I open it... and maybe a medal or two... perhaps the Nobel Prize?.. hmm... (My Brain hurts, I need to have a little fun too you know)....

Joshua,

I agree: we are at an impasse. And yes, the Iocane would be good (thanks for pointing out the PB reference - I might not have gotten it!)

I agree - every system will have corruption. And you have pointed some out in yours. What I am saying is that a virtuous cycle could be created if a community tried to see itself as a unit and compete against other communities.

Ariel,

First, people would have to get over their personal needs to outdo the Jones' and try to make things right as a whole. Yes, this is true but is as likely as to happen as the RIAA being willing to allow free music downloads.

It would be great if it would work but I just don't see it happening. Instead of progress we get more and more ideals like this NEA garbage. Perhaps a forum should be created specifically for this result of making education better (or if there is a legit one it should have better publicity). Something like a national PTA for those who seek change for the better instead of abstract solutions to rational problems.

Who knows.

Joshua,

While people do tend to want to outdo the Jones', we still have a functional national military. On a local basis, we still have functional fire departments.

Just two quick examples. If we make things a priority, people can try to come together and make things better.

Ariel,

Good call, now we just need a functional Education system.

One quick question though,

Aren't our Military & Fire Departments suffering from the same kind of Idiotatian ideals? My Uncle is a Fireman (Ex-Marine) and he assures me they are.

It looks as though we might need another revoltuon to fix this mess.

Joshua,

All I can do is laugh...

I was hoping to pick two institutions that no one could impugn - ah well - you called my bluff.

But I think the military took women in (to allay the concerns of the PC crowd) and women now play a role in the military (can't speak to the magnitude - but I presume that man for man it's similar).

Ariel,

I am the ever amazing cynic, I can impugn anything. hah.

So, basically this 'PC' crowd needs a quick kick in the collective cabasa? Or would a groin kick work better?

So, back on the subject of the NEA for a second, does anybody have any idea how many emails J&J has recieved or if anywhere else is talking about this and the need to yell at them?

Celeste, #112: I understand what you mean. Several years ago, I was going out with a man who actually said to me, "I don't know if this is a sexist thing to say, but I keep thinking of how you look without clothes on." I had to tell him, "Sexist, my @$$...we're dating, not working together!" :-)

I live in the very politically correct city of Boston, but not all of my friends are liberal, and those who are, aren't what you'd call PC. Also, I work in an office where most people haven't gone to college -- it's not exactly prissy. The department next door has kind of a frat-boy feel to it. Still, I haven't really heard many complaints about timid men. What I hear is the usual "Men: you can't live with 'em, [insert your own punchline here]" pissing and moaning.

I guess it also depends on the woman's taste. I don't go for the "man's man" type. More the quiet, vulnerable, geeky type. I'd rather have the interesting conversation about the SF novel I just read or Cthulhu or whatever than pretend I like sports.

Alexis writes that she teaches English.

She also writes this:

"I think i offer portraits of empowere men everyday when I teach. Is there a problem with that?"

One must wonder if she--an English teacher!--knows and can teach the difference between "everyday" and "every day." Let's not even think about whether she teaches her students to check their work for things like spelling and capitalization before they submit it.

Yes, Alexis, we do seem to have a problem here.

Lucian,

Your callous attitude would be amusing if it weren't just sad. Would you mind checking your own diatribe for spelling errors?

Perhaps in your quote of Alexis you could Capitalize the I, or perhaps spell empowerment properly.

Let he who is without sin cast the first stone Lucian for surely it is not you.

No Joshua, a quote is a quote - no need to correct the spelling.

Lucian and Joshua,

Speaking of spelling mistakes — a transgression that for self-serving reasons I don't consider very important — the "Alexis" you refer to is actually "Alexia".

Mr. Miller (#132)

No, I don't know you. I almost hestitate to point out, however, that it is logically impossible to generalize about you in particular. You see, generalization is the process of coming to conclusions about a whole from information about the parts of that whole.

Now I know that we're going to see some complaints about reading too much into things, or not reading enough into things, and that I'm being picayune about this.

But the devil *is* in the details, Mr. Miller. Your academic achievements and/or your native intelligence notwithstanding, either you were taught illogic, or you were never taught how to avoid illogic. You cannot teach your students logical thinking if you cannot recognize illogic yourself. No matter how smart you are.

And this precisely captures one of my points. Schools and departments of education are notorious - and please remind yourself that this is a statement of empirical fact as well as a criticism - for being academic backwaters. (How many teachers you know took Logic 101 in college, Mr Miller? Yet the profession wishes to teach "critical thinking" skills???) The backwaters, on average, attract the students who are least motivated (the "easy A" classes), or the students that are the least capable, or both. It's unfortunate that it is necessary to do so, but I remind you and your fellow teachers again that this general fact says nothing about your capabilities, achievements, or motivations, or about any individual teacher, despite your collective flights of illogic in this thread. But I can tell you that having the least collectively well-educated post-graduate cohort teaching America's children is nothing short of frightening to me.

Why do I go on about this? Because I care deeply about America's children and, yes, because I hail from a family of teachers and I am sickened by what passes for teacher education these days. And, yes, I know precisely what I am talking about. In an earlier professional incarnation, I wanted to serve in the public schools (not as a classroom teacher, as my professional background lay in different territory). To do so, I had to be certified. So, I obligingly signed up for the first two of the required graduate-level "education" courses at a nearby university (a university lauded, at least regionally, for its teachers' college). I was appalled at the course content at a graduate level. Amid vacuous material detailing crackpot educational theories backed up by what may charitably be called junk science (Ed.D.s are the general laughingstocks in the academic community), one could indeed find a section discussing early childhood neural and cognitive development. Surely an area that primary teachers should *want* to know about, wouldn't you agree? The basic coverage was: this is very complicated stuff - the brain develops in complex ways - now, back to John Dewey.

And you and your fellow teachers have the audacity to defend this system of institutional mediocrity? I am embarrassed for you.

While American educators are paying obesiance to the cult of self-esteem, facilitating creativity, teaching critical thinking (pardon the smirk) and confidently, creatively, and fulminating about how to "logically" make America the bad guy and the Islamofascists victims of patriarchical hegemonic Western civilization that had the audacity to abandon the 13th Century, Mr. Miller, Asians and eastern Europeans are learning history, literature, mathematics and science. And they are filling the graduate slots in mathematics, engineering, and physical sciences in our very best universities (and more power to them, Mr. Miller, for they are excellent students). Meanwhile, Mr. Miller, American students, on bumble about smoking dope, watching MTV, and taking remedial coursework as freshmen in part because your profession, Mr. Miller, abdicated its responsibilities for the lure of more "in-service" days, higher pay, and tenure.

Congratulations on your IQ and GPA.

As a 20 year veteran of the NY public school system, I become more embarrassed by the crap that teachers are supposed to disseminate to their students. For us to completely ignore the facts of September 11 and revise history is just sickening.

Teachers can be some of the most stupid people at times. As a former union rep, I've seen my colleagues at their worst. This is such an occasion.

Seems to me there's a very practical reason not to dedicate Sept. 11 to teaching the kids all about fundamentalist Islam-- a Manzanar relocation center approach to this problem is simply not possible. There's also a lot to be said for the idea of allocating responsibility for terrorism to the specific individual perpetrators rather than to the jerks who stand on the sidelines cheering terrorists on. (How much courage or effort does it take to yell "Kill the ump / infidel / Iraqi" when you're in the middle of a crowd anyway?) So throw tomatoes at me, my mom was a teacher, my relatives have been school board presidents, and I like the NEA. Teachers are underpaid, and often required to work ridiculous overtime grading papers, doing continuing education, etc. If teachers didn't have summers off to recover, we'd have to give them more reasonable working conditions.

Reginleif #142 -
I still hear plenty of complaints on the order of "women are crazy" and "men are pigs" on a regular basis. And I'm not the sort of girl who gravitates towards 'a man's man'. I would, however, appreciate dating a fella who does not spend the majority of his time watching his mouth and his actions to avoid any possibility of being accused... (of sexism, harrassment, attempted rape... etc)

It's gotten bad enough that I was reprimanded after a sexual harrassment training class, for suggesting that in most cases, a woman should actually confront her harrasser, and see if the behaviour stops, before going to HR over it.

'Course, all of this fits in with Ariel and Joshua Ferguson's request to move away from PC thinking. I'd like that too.

Ariel #115 - now that you've explained yourself in more detail, I'm in full agreement. However, the original statement you made was: The reason why teachers generally measure poorly on tests is because they are paid so poorly.

I have to disagree with you on vouchers, though.
1) For every voucher program I have so far seen implemented, the amount of money handed off to the parents is a fraction of that given to the schools. In other words, if the school is getting 4500 dollars per student, and the parents get a 2500 dollar voucher, the school is still getting 2000 dollars, and without having the additional body to teach or provide textbooks or class-space for.
2) I doubt this will have any more affect on property tax assessments than already occurs where parents with the income to make a choice, will choose to settle in a neighborhood belonging to a good school.
3) So, as I see it, if a school falls prey to voucher-mania, what will happen is: the school will have fewer students, which means less crowding; the school will have an increased amount of funding per student (since they are still getting money from the district for a student they aren't teaching); the additional money can be used to make the sort of reforms (be it teacher pay, performance bonuses, equipment upgrades) that will help keep further voucher-flight from occurring.

It sounds to me like some folks are mixing up the idea of vouchers and charter schools.
Charter schools are independent schools created around different models of learning, or with different concentrations. Vouchers are generally a refunded portion of your property taxes returned to you, to allow you to send your child to a) another public school, b) an accredited private school. Vouchers are simply an attempt to give poor people the same mobility and choice that a large number of our elected representatives who are against school choice enjoy.

Sassafras,

You make a large leap between teaching the kids about fundamental Islam and putting Muslims in camps.

You believe that only the terrorist perpetrators are responsible, which suggests that you do not believe that their financiers are responsible. That their imams (who encourage them) are responsible. That their spokesmen, who always say it is the fault of the US, are in any way responsible.

Could it be the case that the Muslims actually do hate us? There certainly has been very little coming out of Muslim communities to the contrary, while there is a plethora of quotes suggesting that this is the case.

Sassafras,

I do generally agree with you that teachers are underpaid - but can't say I agree with the NEA.

**

Celeste,

Let me address #3 first.

Funding per student is particularly important for things like xerox copies, books, etc. Total funding is particularly important for things like teachers, school maintenance, etc. (given that teachers can not be fired - which I am opposed to).

Therefore, while funding per student may increase with vouchers, total funding decreases.

While I'm not sure, I would venture that the variable costs of running a school system are considerably less than the fixed costs.

This should address #1 as well.

#2 - I believe that's the case - you disagree. I think that we have to agree to disagree.

Vouchers only give mobility to folks who can afford to pay the balance for other public education or private education. That excludes most of the poor.

Radical reform of the current system could, on the other hand, benefit more of the poor.

Proper Ganda,

You take Mr. Miller to task for not employing rigorous logic, then make the assertion that education colleges are well-known backwaters. What scientific, empirical study have you undertaken to determine this fact? You are of the opinion that you had a sub-par experience in a teacher's college and you generalize your experience to most, if not the entire academic field. To quote Mr. Spock, "highly illogical".

Anybody who claims to care about the children should know that teaching requires a lot more than learning about teaching and cognition. A college degree and letters after ones name are over-rated. I'll take experience anyday. A new teacher's real education begins the day they interact with a classroom full of students.

Ariel -
Perhaps we've been looking at different voucher programs, but none of the programs I've seen require the parents involved to make up the difference in tuition cost. With the program the Supreme Court just ruled on, one of the requirements for the schools on the list of those accepting vouchers was that the voucher covered tuition cost... which was why there were so many parochial schools on the list. This program was intended expressly for the poor, not as a gimme to middle income parents.

Total funding for a school may be quite important, but its not a static cost, its one that is generally figured on an annual basis. So a school (in a grossly simplified scenario) has 100 students, and a budget allocation of 4500/student. 450,000 dollars total. 20 students leave, each taking 2000 dollar vouchers out of that pool. That still leaves the school with 410,000 dollars to operate on, to teach 80 students. They've lowered their student body by 20%, but decreased their funding by less than 10%. In another light, they've reduced school crowding by 20% and increased their funding by 10%. Either way, we're not talking about serious harm to a school, that by virtue of ending up a target for voucher programs in the first place, wasn't serving its children anyway.

I think its also important to mention that studies so far have shown that voucher programs work. Students who've been able to take advantage of school choice see marked improvements on their test scores and reading abilities. To me, results like that count far more than the protestations of schoolteachers who have had their chance, and failed.

Celeste,

Now assume that 75% of the $450K was fixed costs. The school now costs $337.5K in fixed costs. Previously, they had $112.5K in variable costs, or $1,125/student/yr.

Their budget is now $410K. They still have $337.5K in fixed costs. Now they have $72.5K to cover variable costs, or $906.25/student/yr, represening a 19.4% decrease in expenses per student.

In the new scenario, instead of replacing books every five years, a school will replace them every six. If they replaced them every ten years before, now they replace them every twelve. I believe that knowledge evolves at such a pace that a 20% change is considerable.

Obviously, there is a high dependency on the percentage of fixed and variable costs. Because I assume that school buildings, maintenance, and teacher salaries are fixed costs, I believe that 75% is reasonable - leaving 25% for books, xeroxes, etc. (Books are frequently old, for example).

And Celeste - thanks for clearing up some of my ignorance wrt school vouchers. If that is indeed the case, then all the more reason to oppose them. The whole church and state separation thing is part of why we're fighting the Islamofascists, remember?

I agree that vouchers work - I'm just not sure that they make things better (especially long term).

As you point out, they bring the church and the state closer together.

Many of the teachers have had their chance and failed. We need to try and find successful models (there are some good school systems) and replicate them. Instead of trying to kill off all school systems.

I'm fascinated by this thread (and by the whole blogging world, to which I am totally new) and I can't resist adding a couple of ideas, which I have not seen mentioned so far (tho I certainly coulda missed them).

First, the link at the top of this page is to an article in the Washington Times, which is a very conservative paper. As a resident of the DC area, a favorite pastime when I have a lunch hour to myself is to get copies of the Times and the Post (which conservatives describe as liberal left-wing etc) and to look at the differences between how each paper reports on the same story. From my middle-of-the-road perspective, I find the Times way more overtly partisan than the Post, especially on the Op-Ed pages.

B) Perhaps I'm not reading closely enough, but there seems to be curious lack of discussion of teaching and learning about the history leading up to Sept 11. Specifically, how did the Middle East get so farked up as to spawn the people responsible for Sept 11? Maybe it's just my bias towards understanding history as a way of understanding our present, but I believe there's limited utility in simply pointing out how backward those countries are and how much better it is to live in America than in an Islamist state. We need to understand how things got this way, but instead I see most people limiting themselves to what's going on today.

III. I think that the "Blame America" label is an oversimplification about those of us who believe B). It's too easy to jump from "let's examine history" (and thereby learn about mistakes that superpowers made when they divided up the Middle East, not to mention other parts of their crumbling empires), straight to "you're blaming America for Sept 11". Another example from history: I think there's wide agreement that the massive reparations imposed on Germany by the victors in WWI helped create a climate that allowed Hitler to rise to power and then to get regular Germans to go along with his evil plans. But it's not right to blame those countries for causing WWI.

Phew! Sorry for rambling on so...

Ariel -
Since neither of us know exactly what percentage of a school's budget is fixed, until we get someone in here who does, the argument won't go much further. I think, perhaps, that a figure of 75% is a bit high. I'll do some research on it.

Also, the idea that allowing a poor parent to choose to send their child to a parochial school, a private school, or another public school would erode the mythical wall separating church and state is bunk. The Supreme Court says so as well. Choice of where to send a child rests in the parents. Even participating in the voucher program is a matter of choice. Therefore, no establishment of religion. If the government set up a taxfunded program that sent inner city children to catholic schools, or if the only schools that were allowed to participate in the voucher program were parochial, perhaps there'd be an argument there. But they haven't, and they don't.

And separation of church and state isn't the reason I think we're fighting the islamofascists. I thought it had a lot more to do with the fact they have an expressed intent and desire to kill us. The fact that they happen to be muslim enters into it only in that such a backward religion is creating people who have an expressed intent to kill us.

Tony,

I don't think many disagree with you. We need to understand how things got this way. How it was that kleptocratic governments stole the oil wealth from their populace without ever building any industry. How they encourage imams to yell to kill Americans and Jews. How their government controlled press only criticizes America and Israel.

Yes, we need to understand the enemy.

We need to understand history as well. We do need to know about colonial history. But the fact that there was colonialism a couple of generations ago does not excuse the Islamofascism of the present. And I think that's what everyone is trying to say.

The intent and desire comes from the fact the church is married to the state. Islam married to fascism, no? We'll kill all the non-Muslims by leveraging the resources of an ultra-nationalist state - that is their point, no?

If the only schools who are allowed to participate are those which are completely covered by the voucher money, and 90% of the schools that fit this bill are parochial, then this is equivalent to a state-subsidy of a church.

The Supreme Court can say what it will - I'm still allowed to disagree.

Ariel -
You absolutely are allowed to disagree with the Supreme Court. I'm confused, though, how a program as completely voluntary as this one is, can be construed to establish religion. Simply because most of the schools that choose to participate in the voucher program are religious, does not mean that the state has established a religion, especially since there is no impediment to other schools signing on to accept vouchers... all they have to do is be willing to teach the child with the money given to them.

"The intent and desire comes from the fact the church is married to the state. Islam married to fascism, no?"
Well, No. At least not the way I read it. The fact that islamic countries have religious governments is not what makes them a threat to our existence, Islam preaching the killing of jews and christians is. And we're capable of being threatened by secular governments as well... I know the cold war has been over for more than a decade, but I'm sure you've heard the term "godless commie", no? Other folks religious dictatorships are not our immediate concern. Anyone trying to kill us, religious or not, is.

Celeste,

OK, points for you on the Islam thing.

Totalitarianism, whether clothed as fascism, communism, or Islamofascism is the threat, though, IMHO.

**

Most of the schools choosing to participate are parochial. Most of the funding will go to parochial schools. They have the cost structure to be able to have lower tuition - subsidized, as they are, because of being tax-free organizations and through the donations of their members. A private school simply cannot provide quality education at $2K per head.

Mr. John K (#153),

Ahhh. Another fan of Mr. Spock. He was one of my heroes.

Had you read my earlier postings you could have answered these questions for yourself, but I'm in a generous mood today.

And, no, I have not personally done any empirical studies. In fact, I have not personally done any studies that show the speed of light to be a constant. I rely on published studies in the area to convince me.

You may wish to consult some published studies supporting my perspective. I refer you to Gross, M. (1999) and Ravitch, D. (2000, 1985). In fact, Ms. Ravitch is a professor in the school of education at NYU and a Senior Fellow with the Brookings Institution.

My personal perspective was added for local color.

As to your comment that anyone who cares about children should know that teaching requires more than learning about cognition is very un-Spockian, Mr. K. A mere glance at what I wrote will confirm to even the least attentive among us that I did not claim that more was not required.

With regard to your commentary about degrees, where else but college will a math teacher learn enough about calculus or trigonometry to teach it? Biology? Chemistry? Social studies? Literature? Your position seems to me, in the words of Mr. Spock, "highly illogical".

Ariel,
I think we're about on the same page. Certainly there's no excuse for kleptocratic regimes and murderous, hate-spewing zealots, just as there was no excuse for slavery or for how native Americans were treated, but there are certainly explanations, and the better we understand the explanations, the more likely we are to not repeat mistakes that were made in the first place and along the way, and to increase the probablility that circumstances will change for the better.

And that, afterall, is the point of this exercise, no? Actually, the point of commemorating Sept 11 is to help us all as we continue to grieve, but one of the objectives has to be helping us work towards making this kind of atrocity less and less likely. To point to these backward countries and simply say that "they need to more like us, they need to separate church and state, and mandate women's rights, and basic civil rights etc and we need to 'go in" and impose our ideals on them" does not go far enough towards bettering the situation. I believe this simply perpetuates the cycle of violence that we're in.

Talk of invading Iraq is like throwing fuel on the fire, giving extremist Arabs yet another reasons to rail against the US and to perpetuate the behavior we're trying to end. We should be stepping up efforts to secure peace between Israel and its neighbors, and using our status as The economic and miltary superpower to impose that peace, even if it means (which it inevitably will)pissing off the Israeli government and American Jews. President Bush has taken a bold step toward that goal by publicly calling for the establishment of a Palestinian State, but he seems to have not followed through with much (or any) conviction. We need a President and Congress with the spine to stand up to the pro-Israel lobby, and an Israeli Prime Minister to stand up to the extremists in the Knesset.

We should be thinking more seriously about the next generation of leaders in that part of the world. We often hear people wonder about who is going to take power when Saddam's reign is over, or when the Saud family is toppled, or in Iran, or when Arafat is done. If a Palestinian state can be established and nurtured, the importance of the Arab-Israeli conflict will wane in the minds of ordinary Arabs, and they're more likely to call for leaders who will look West for governmental and economic guidance rather than buying the BS of leaders who use religion and anti-Israel sentiment to unite their people in hatred. For now, the Israel-Palestine issue is foremeost in their minds, and I can't blame them for that. And as long as that is the case, we're guaranteeing that the next generation of Arab leaders will hate America, and will continue the bloodshed that we witnessed on Sept 11.

Phew... (wipes brow)

This is just a little note to those who unfairly painted teachers as the same as the "silent peaceful muslim" community. A full day hadn't gone by since the original NEA story broke before people on this thread were slamming teachers as having no balls to speak out agains the NEA recommendations.

Eat this!

"The American Federation of Teachers disagrees with the lesson plans found on the NEA Web site," said Janet Bass, a spokeswoman for the union. "The AFT does not support a blame-America approach in particular and wishes to distance itself from the entire document."

Full link here: [Link: www.washtimes.com...]

Come on now, let's see you own up to jumping the gun on this.

Speaking of "fat cowards who need their asses kicked" (#59): I wonder what they'll be teaching in Riyadh on Sept. 11?

Tony,

Up through paragraph 1, you're spot on.

After that, I couldn't disagree more. The "cycle of violence" is they attack, we run (e.g. Beirut 1983), we make weak counterattacks (e.g. embassy bombings 1998), or we make minimal legalistic probes (e.g. WTC bombing, v1, 1993).

Your presumption is that Arabs will react just like we would. Fact is, as OBL has pointed out, Arabs will follow the strong horse. And the US needs to show that we, and not the fundamentalists, are the strong horse.

Your prescription is even more off. Israel, along with Turkey and Australia, has been one of our only constant, true, reliable allies. Why stand up to them?

More importantly, this makes clear that there is a reward for terrorism. If you attack the US with a 9/11, you get some land for a Palestinian terrorist state. It only encourages these people.

What makes more sense is to stand up to the Arabs. After all, they are the ones with kleptocratic, undemocratic regimes. They have no conception of human rights. And in their media, there is endless incitement against the US and Israel.

You've bought the canard that Israel is the most important thing on the Arab mind, and I suppose that I should congratulate Arab propaganda for that success. You might want to think a little about that though. My mother is from Morocco, and I can guarantee you that there is nothing of such primacy in the Arab mind as hate of the West. They don't understand how they can be the people of the last prophecy and yet be so poor. Or how they can have not done anything significant since algebra.

Sure, if we have you as a president you can toss Israel to the Arabs. What will you do, though, when they ask for Belgium? Or Michigan?

Ariel -
The thing I like best about you is that you can disagree with me on some points without discarding every thing I say. :) Totalitarianism IS the enemy.

With regards to vouchers... the concept has worked, and I'm in favor of giving anyone stuck in a bad school the opportunity to take their child out, rather than wait for years for the system to be reformed.

However there are other methods of doing this, not just through the voucher program. One state (Arizona or New Mexico... too lazy to do the research to remember) implemented a plan that I think is utter genius. It allows taxpayers the opportunity to make tax-deductible contributions to scholarship/schooling funds... with the stipulation that the money you contribute can't be used for your own children. I think Bush actually proposed a similar plan at a national level.

I sincerely believe that the key to success, and out of poverty, is found in the three Rs. I just want children, regardless of their parents' income, to be able to attend a good school with a safe learning environment, that will teach them how to read. There are a lot of public schools out there right now that don't fit the bill. I'm for any solution I see that will fix that. Since the public schools appear to be unwilling or unable to change, vouchers, parochial schools, charter schools, homeschooling... anything that is getting results, and teaching children how to read (and thus learn for themselves) will have my support.

Celeste -

Right on. I think that we agree on the fundamentals.

1) Totalitarianism is evil
2) Results are what counts for schooling

And that's why we can agree and/or disagree intelligently.

I agree about the 3 R's.

I just hope that the voucher regime will not have the same problems as the public school system in 10 years. And I can see that happening.

And I'm concerned that if too many kids are sent to parochial schools, for purely economic reasons, we may see some problems as well.

I went to a school that was nominally parochial (sponsored by the Church of Canada). There were many missionary kids there. And they tended to be about 50/50 really good kids (praying, etc) and really bad kids (punk, drugs, etc). So I have some objections to these schools as well.

Basically, these other systems are better than the current one now - but we should look with a slightly longer perspective, and hope that that will be the case in the future too.

Salut Ariel!

First, let me say that this is a lot of fun. I'm totally new to this blogging thing so forgive me if I rant. Also, if I come across as a smartass, it's because I am, but I mean no harm or disrespect. OK...

Hyperbole aside, the Palestinians, as far as I know, have never made claims on Belguim or Michigan (and, by an odd coincidence, I lived in Brussels for several years where les morrocains are everywhere, and have extensive family outside Detroit, where there is a huge Arab-American population). They do, however, have a reasonably solid claim to land that was known, not too long ago, as Palestine, from which they were unceremoniuously ejected and placed in refugee camps that exist to this day. I'm not saying that Israel doesn't have the right to exist; I'm just saying that given the way in which Israel was formed, and given the way Israel has treated Palestinians since then, it's not very surprising that there is an ongoing Palestinian struggle to get back the land that they see as theirs. If you were a Palestinian, would you shrink quietly in the desert?

You're right about the Arab hatred of the West being the overarching sentiment, but I suspect that if we were to ask the average extremist Arab to give an example of something the West has done to inspire such hatred, support for Israel will trump economic considerations most if not every time.

Regarding Arabs following the strong horse: I'm just guessing that OBL meant that Arabs would follow the strong Arab horse, not just any old strong horse. Israel is a pretty strong horse, but their strength didn't win them many friends when they moved into the neighborhood.

Also, if we consistently stood up to kleptocratic, undemocratic regimes, we'd be busy all over the world, not just the Middle East. In fact kleptocratic tyrants have been some of our favorite friends at times (when it suited us).

Your final comment notwithstanding, I think you understand that I wasn't suggesting that Israel be "tossed" to the Arabs. I was merely advocating for a stronger US role in settling a seemingly intractable dispute.

And since you brought it up - What exactly would be involved to "standing up to the Arabs"? Invading Iraq? Do you think all the Arab countries would simply fall into line if we occupied Iraq? Or would we have to take on Iran, and Saudi Arabia, and Syria, etc? How many years do you think we'd have to occupy Iraq before they would manage their own affairs the way we think they should? Isn't that what started the whole problem in the first place? Outsiders imposing themselves on the people of that region?

Whomever (I forgot who) said that everything starts from the individual was really on the mark. In Europe everything is weighed collectly which means they won't be able to spot the difference in religions like we can in the american hemisphere.

We do know that the radical chauvanistic Wahhabi muslim faction (of the mid-east) is not the more progressive women friendly version that exists in calmer, more stable countries.

Looking at things "collectively" like euros do will make anti-muslim sentiment go to irrational levels--but the american tendency to seperate say, a Cahtolic priest from a Branch Davidian depends on looking at the INDIVIDUAL variations of religion from region to region or country to country.

In America we start with the individual--because it DOES work to prevent a blanket condemnation of an entire people.
Europe is AGAIN about to slit it's own throat.

Oh, my god I'm the blind typo queen of the world. I now leave in embarassment.

They do, however, have a reasonably solid claim to land that was known, not too long ago, as Palestine, from which they were unceremoniuously ejected and placed in refugee camps that exist to this day. I'm not saying that Israel doesn't have the right to exist; I'm just saying that given the way in which Israel was formed, and given the way Israel has treated Palestinians since then, it's not very surprising that there is an ongoing Palestinian struggle to get back the land that they see as theirs. If you were a Palestinian, would you shrink quietly in the desert?

Are you being a smartass here or do you care to back up this insidious piece of Arab propoganda?

Salut Tony!

While the Palestinians have not made a claim on Michigan or Brussels, the Arabs have. And the fact is that there is nothing to differentiate the Palestinians from the rest of the Arabs. Not language. Not literature. Not history. Nothing.

Most "Palestinians" moved into "Palestine" from Syria/Lebanon. Pre-1967, no people called themselves Palestinian. On numerous occasions, "Palestinian" spokesmen such as Arafat have said that the moniker was only useful insofar as it dispossesed the Israelis.

The British Mandate of Palestine was created to form a Jewish National Home. When this happened, the Arabs rejected it and declared war. They lost. Consequently, they lost land.

If, notwithstanding all arguments to the contrary, you disagree, I'll continue with more.

Yet, what strikes me, is that you decry the way Israelis treated the Palestinians. That's why they're so angry, right?

So why are they not angry at their Arab brothers? Who kept them in refugee camps for 50 years and counting? Who used them when it was convenient to stir up regional wars? Who expelled them when it was inconvenient (see Kuwait, 1991)?

When Jordan claimed the West Bank and Egypt claimed Gaza, there were no suicide bombers in Jordan or Egypt. Syria occupies Lebanon now - there are no Lebanese suicide bombers.

**

Yes, the Arabs will only follow an Arab strong horse. But if the fundamentalism horse is weakened - the other horses seem stronger, no?

**

WRT standing up to kleptocratic regimes - it only makes sense where we have interests. By some coincidence, oil ended up in the ME. So, we need to stand firm to the totalitarians.

The problem with totalitarianism is that people need to stand up strong to these dictators. For a reference, please see the Sudenten territory, 1938 ().

What makes you think the other Arab countries wouldn't fall in line if we invaded Iraq? And who cares if they didn't? W/o any oil revenue, they could have no significant impact on the West.

After WWII, we occupied Japan until 1960, and Okinawa until 197x. We still have more troops in Japan than almost anywhere else. We occupied Germany briefly, and still have a lot of troops there.

Japan and Germany, incidentally, are fairly successful countries. G-7. Democracies.

Both were totalitarian dictatorships. And, in the case of Japan (and I suspect Germany), they had no history of democracy whatsoever.

What started the problem was not outsiders imposing themselves - it was outsiders imposing themselves without understanding some basic things about the tribal divisions, etc.

Also, you might note that in India, the British killed the custom of burning wives after the husband died. That's not a bad thing in my book. (Though I don't defend all imperialist history.)

Tony--With all due respect, you need to educate yourself a little more on the history of the Middle East, ancient and modern, before you present hearsay from your Arab acquaintances as fact.

Check out any encyclopedia, for a start. Ceck out this website:

[Link: jewishinternetassociation.org...]

There has never been a country called Palestine. The term Palestinian was originally used to refer to Jews living in Palestine, which they did, as a minority, continuously since the second diaspora. The term was adopted by the Arabs as a rallying point when they refused the land set aside as a homeland for them, which also means that your point about it being about Israel not permitting the Palestinians a homeland is in error. The Palestinian Arabs couldhave had a homeland at any point; they have refused it. What they want is Israel. Period.

Some of you guys may not know that most European countries ARE NOT showing the CNN videotapes of the radical terrorists practising gassing techniques on the dogs and on one of their friends.

(The BBC gave the quickest attention to it, so much so--Jesse Owens couldn't have beat them. Instead they lingered on the possibility that American troups were present or near when the Northern Alliance troups (warlords helping us in Afghanistan) were killing their old enemies.)

(And the US thought that a UN court (the ICC)would be used by anti-american forces...Gee, why not. The BBC is?)

The governments of europe don't want the tapes on their nightly news in an effort to keep their muslim sectors from getting upset at, ahem--having been caught red handed being anything less than charming bedouin victims.

You might be preaching to a heavily censored audience on the euro side.

Proper Ganda--

The bottom line is that I stuck with it and made a difference, I waded through all the ridiculous education courses and I got my certificate and I've contributed. I guess you just didn't have the patience or the dedication to do so. BTW, my major areas are history and political science. My major was not "education." You also have ignored the fact that I'm on your side politically in many ways. You are so angry and eager to drive home your points you seem to ignore a great deal. Again, you generalize about people (teachers) you do not know very well. Come on, Proper Ganda, show me how it's done. Become a teacher and find out what it's really like. BTW, I'd like to see how you'd do in my "easy A" courses of American Constitutional Law, Russian History to the 19th Century, and Soviet Government and Politics--not to mention my graduate courses in German and Russian history, including those in a PhD program.You talk big--let's see what you can you can do.

And by the way, why don't you tell us your real name instead of hiding behind a silly e-mail name.

Joseph A. Miller

Damn this technology!!! I spent my last little bit of mental energy tonght responding to you Ariel and to mommydoc, then I absent-mindedly clicked on the link that mommydoc posted and poof! all my writing is gone. So, I'll have to be brief.

First, I'll concede that I'm not a Middle East historian, and that I may have been a little groggy during some of those classes in college, but I do try to stay informed about what's going on today, and I try to understand today's events in their historical context.

mommydoc - i never said there was a country, as in, nation-state, called Palestine. I used the word as it has been used for thousands of years, in the sense of a region named Palestine. Perhaps I should have written "Palestine".

And mommydoc, is it not true that Arabs and Jews coexisted, albeit not so peacefully at all times, in "Palestine"? Of course they rejected the land so generously "set aside as a homeland". Isn't that the same language used by the architects of Aparthied to describe the townships? "Homeland" is a euphemism for I'm taking your land and shipping you off to this land that nobody else wants.

Also mommydoc, with all due respect, the fact that you directed me to the Jewish Internet Association Web site, which purports to present "History (which conveniently starts in 1920) in a Nutshell" in a series of a dozen or so slides with at most a couple hundred words of text, belies your objectivity. How about directling me something that isn't so blatantly one-sided, something that at least pretends to be objective? Surely you'll admit that there is more than one side to this story.

Ariel - well I'm happy to hear you concede that European colonialism had its drawbacks :) Perhaps we can continue this another day, after I've had a chance to study up on the history. Now I'm pooped, primarily from tonight's tennis match, but I also need to rest my little brain after all these mental gymnastics.

G'night.

Just read all this stuff, bit late to the party though. Its been a while since I've come across such a lengthy display of xenophobia and misplaced aggression, and all the more amusing for it.

It may come as a surprise to many that generally in these arguments there is no right or wrong there are just varying shades of uncertainty.

Is the concept of America as a nation actually looking at itself (for blame) so radical? The UK did this as their empire collapsed. So what, the Uk is no superpower, but their leader was voted for by the majority (a simple measure of democracy) and is at least able to distinguish his arse from his elbow.

What foxes me is why you lot really think that by 'evening out' the casualties ("Ok coach, so we're 3000 down lets give 'em a wooping and kick 10,000 of their asses") it makes anything better?

I don't how much censoring you get over there, but you do realize that both the Palestinians AND the Israelis promote terrorist activity don't you. And that the US supports Israel.... So the USA jumps through the roof when they get terrorised - c'mon, you dumbass b'stards have been supporting the IRA since the year dot.

Stop being so goddamn righteous and 2-faced. None of the Western world is innocent, much like the Arab world - 'we' just happen to be richer.

NB Europe is not a country. Europe is a continent made up of several countries - please do not refer to us as one.

Mr. Miller (#178)

My kudos to you for wading through those courses. Frankly, as you note, I didn't have either the stomach or the time for trivia. I was too busy making a living and pursuing professional goals.

And I am delighted to hear that there is a teacher out there (and I am sure there are a few others, relatively speaking) who actually have an education. I'm positive your students benefit.

Regarding the anger, good try but no banana. The responses I've received are actually rather amusing, and I've enjoyed responding to them. Which, by the way, is why I continue to do so long after the real interest in this thread has subsided.

You sound miffed, and I understand why. I report statistical generalizations about your profession that do not reflect your personal history and achievements. Sorry. Those are the data.

As to becoming a teacher, no thanks. My brief and only experience (except for university-level) was supervising a class of 10 primary-level Special Ed. students while the classroom teacher answered an urgent telephone call in the principal's office. By the time she returned (about 15 minutes), the classroom was in chaos. I really don't have the talent for it. I still chuckle about that experience (although I was not chuckling at the time) and what I learned about myself from it. I have toyed with the notion of a mid-life career as a high school math or science teacher, but my state requires those boring Dewey courses (in spite of the fact that I hold a Ph.D. in a scientific field), and I still don't have the stomach or the time.

Having said all that, the facts about departments of education remain. Your experience may have been different, and I applaud your working from the inside to change things, but - based on the data - your average peer in the education community is, well, a dolt. In my opinion. My sympathies. You have selected a difficult path to walk. I wish for your success.

Finally, should you wish to correspond personally, I'll watch this thread for further postings from you to that effect, and I'd be happy to figure out a way to do that and retain my public anonymity. Having enjoyed this medium of communication since it was ARPAnet, though, I've had quite enough bad experiences with lunatics.

Swall,

The Israelis promote terrorist activity? Howzzat?

Actually, the policy of "evening out" casualties came from the British. When the Arab terrorist gangs attacked the British (pre-1948), the British had a 10:1 retaliation policy.

Let's say you don't believe that retaliation works (despite the huge amount of evidence to the contrary). What's your strategy? What would you do as Israel when someone attacks you?

If you think cease-fires work, there have been maybe a dozen since sept 2000. Yasser Arafat violated 17 when he was in Jordan, and a similar number in Lebanon. To him, cease-fires are to be used to re-arm, re-form, re-organize, and attack.

Ariel,

Israel can rest on a simple argument. Palestinian authorities are not recognized, so any violence is called (rightly or wrongly) terrorism. When Israeli forces trundle around Palestine territory, 'accidently' kill Palestinian doctors and civilians it is merely collateral damage in order to ensure their own security. This is bullshit and both sides know it.

Who cares who started what in history - no-one is suggesting we all return to barbaric tribal factions are they? Maybe send in a million people to sit in trenches for 5 years and die sounds like a good idea? Not in the 21C. Perhaps a long term view needs to be taken. Lets be honest, both sides want to occupy the same piece of land - some compromise has to be reached. But with the Yanks quietly ignoring Israeli genocide and the Arab world polishing their swords in the light of the last 12 mnths, a war on Iraq is going to solve shit.

Since you mentioned British history I fully support the UK in returning the favour of the US during WW2. How about we all let US invade Iraq, continue war for 5 years before we all join in to help out? After all, the yanks have such a great track record in foreign dispute resolution.....vietnam.....et al.

"An eye for an eye leaves all the world blind"

Swall,

Actually, terrorism is not defined by what entity it comes from. It is defined by its tactics and motives - deliberately targeting civilians for political purposes. Therefore, by definition, you are wrong.

Iran has a state and supports terrorism. Syria has a state (two, if you count Lebanon) and still supports terrorism. Algeria became an independent country but still sent bombs into the Paris subway. Therefore, by experience, you are wrong.

**

Both sides want to occupy the same piece of land, you say? The problem is not that.

Israel would happily give the Palestinians some land if they stopped blowing themselves up. Evidence: Sinai (w/ huge oil reserves), Oslo, Camp David.

The Palestinians want the whole enchilada. You don't have to go further than their websites - for a summary see: http.... That's the problem. No compromise on the Palestinian side.

**

You're right that the US should have came to Britain's aid earlier in WWII. The president wanted to, but needed an event to galvanize the Americans. Still, it is inexcusable that we didn't join the Brits earlier.

That said, it's inexcusable that the British didn't stand up to Germany in the first instance.

And it's inexcusable that modern-day British don't see the parallels between the 1930s and the spread of Islamofascism.

Stop it early. Stop it fast. Stop it hard.

Only in utter defeat (unconditional surrender) will they understand that they have lost.

Proper Ganda-

Could you give me a link to the "stupid teacher" statistics?

It's interesting.... My first few years of teaching in urban highschools i expected the rest of the teaching staff would be a bunch of nincompoops. i also had low expectations of the talents and intelligence of teachers. i had heard such bad things! i also thought they would be incredibly lazy. in my ego, i thought that i might stand out as an exception.

but i was so wrong! 80% of the staff i found to be intelligent and extremely hard working. i've learned a lot from my peers. of course their are a few "dolts" in the system who should be fired but have power of some sort or tenure.

so i want to know, are the schools i've worked in somehow the exception? the schools i've worked in are rough urban schools, certainly not the most desirable places to teach! i can't even imagine that these schools would attract "the best".

Ariel,

There seems little point in arguing over definitions of terrorism. You revealed your true colours with your comments about needing to wipe out the entire Islamic community - or am reading too much into your war-mongering rhetoric?

This is most definitely a case of the blind leading the blind.

God help us all if the US decides to put their money where their mouth is - coz I bet a lot more shit hits our fan than yours.

Swall,

I have made exactly zero comments about wiping out Islam. Actually, if you read other threads, you'll see that I point out to people that I'm quite fond of Turkey.

Just because I'm in favor of liberating Iraq doesn't mean I'm in favor of genocide.

And before you go off on use of the word "liberating" - think about the Afghans who danced in the street. Who listed to music for the first time in years. Who shaved their beards. Think about the women who could shed their burqas.

I am in favor of democracy.

I am not in favor of dictatorship.

That's my position. That's why I like Turkey.

Alexia (#185),

I'm gratified to hear that the teachers with whom you work are bright, hardworking people. And, after all, aren't the "tough" schools where such teachers are needed most? Maybe the best like a tougher challenge. After all, that is the premise of the research I cited - i.e., better students migrate to physics rather than education 'cause it's tougher, and smart, non-lazy people like a challenge.

Anyway, I don't have links 'cause the publications where I got the data I cited were books. Look back about 20-40 posts, and I gave the references.

And good luck with your teaching!

Tony--I never claimed the site to be unbiased, but the history that they present is entirely verifiable. Feel free to fact check and present alternate sources to let me know where they misrepresent.

You may in fact "try to stay informed about what's going on today, and I try to understand today's events in their historical context," but you don't do a very good job.

The point I was making is that the "Palestinians" are a modern construct that postdate Zionism. The Arabs living in what became Israel were more than welcome to stay; the majority of them fled under urging of their fellow Muslim Arabs. They would have had no need for a homeland had they stayed, and the supposed root cause of the current intifadeh is Israel's refusal to grant them a homeland, which, for the reasons I already stated, is patent bullshit.

While it is true that for a brief, shining moment in time, the Muslims and Jews coexisted peacefully in the region, it was during a time when Islam was relatively weak in numbers, and coexistence was expedient. Those times are long past and highly unlikely ever to return.

That being said, the re-establishment of a Jewish homeland was a necessity, since there was no possibility of safety for Jews in the region in any other manner. Given that there was no self-government at that time, and had not been for centuries, Jewish emigration to the area occurred with the permission of the British, who held the mandate.

Twenty years before the formation of the state of Israel, a de novo nation, that of Transjordan (later renamed Jordan) was created out of the bulk of the land of Palestine, with nary a whimper or protest from those living in the area. Of course, Arafat later tried to destabilize that government after they gave him shelter, until they had to throw him out.

What we are left with is this: we have a region that had no government, whose borders were defined only by the borders of other countries, and which was an economic and political non-entity. It fell under the British mandate as a result of the fall of the Ottoman Empire at the hands of the French and British, who divided control but not ownership of the area between them.

As a result of various political and economic issues occurring elsewhere, there was an influx of European Jews, which caused consternation among the squatters who already lived there, although the immigrants purchased their land legally from the actual owners, who lived elsewhere.

At the end of WWII, when the Jewish survivors of the Holocaust had few options as to where to settle, Germany, Poland and Russia hardly being options, and England, France, and other European countries hardly being welcoming, Zionism (which had existed since the previous century) became a logical and necessary approach.

An interesting point brought up in another thread on this site is that, while one argument against the establishment of Israel has been the large Jewish immigration in the years just before partitionment, there was an equally large immigration of Arabs! Relatively few of the indigenous Arabs we now call Palestinians actually trace back to that area for very long before partitionment.

Below, you will find part of a post I originally made in another forum which quotes Encarta, an online encyclopedia fairly extensively. You are more than welcome to fact check me and refute my points with your own references.

First, on the issue of who had "first dibs" on the region:

From Encarta: "The Canaanites were the earliest known inhabitants of Palestine. During the 3rd millennium BC they became urbanized and lived in city-states, one of which was Jericho. They developed an alphabet from which other writing systems were derived; their religion was a major influence on the beliefs and practices of Judaism, and thus on Christianity and Islam.

"Palestine's location at the center of routes linking three continents made it the meeting place for religious and cultural influences from Egypt, Syria, Mesopotamia, and Asia Minor. It was also the natural battleground for the great powers of the region and subject to domination by adjacent empires, beginning with Egypt in the 3rd millennium BC.

"Egyptian hegemony and Canaanite autonomy were constantly challenged during the 2nd millennium BC by such ethnically diverse invaders as the Amorites, Hittites, and Hurrians. These invaders, however, were defeated by the Egyptians and absorbed by the Canaanites, who at that time may have numbered about 200,000. As Egyptian power began to weaken after the 14th century BC, new invaders appeared: the Hebrews, a group of Semitic tribes from Mesopotamia, and the Philistines (after whom the country was later named), an Aegean people of Indo-European stock.

"Hebrew tribes probably immigrated to the area centuries before Moses led his people out of serfdom in Egypt (1270? BC), and Joshua conquered parts of Palestine (1230? BC). The conquerors settled in the hill country, but they were unable to conquer all of Palestine. "The Israelites, a confederation of Hebrew tribes, finally defeated the Canaanites about 1125 BC but found the struggle with the Philistines more difficult. The Philistines had established an independent state on the southern coast of Palestine and controlled a number of towns to
the north and east. Superior in military organization and using iron weapons, they severely defeated the Israelites about 1050 BC. The Philistine threat forced the Israelites to unite and establish a monarchy. David, Israel's great king, finally defeated the Philistines shortly after 1000 BC, and they eventually assimilated with the Canaanites.

"The unity of Israel and the feebleness of adjacent empires enabled David to establish a large independent state, with its capital at Jerusalem. Under David's son and successor, Solomon, Israel enjoyed peace and prosperity, but at his death in 922 BC the kingdom was divided into Israel in the north and Judah in the south. When nearby empires resumed their expansion, the divided Israelites could no longer maintain their independence. Israel fell to Assyria in 722 and 721 BC, and Judah was conquered in 586 BC by Babylonia, which destroyed Jerusalem and exiled most of the Jews living there."

Given this, it would appear that the Israelites/Hebrews (Israelis) and the Philistines (Palestinians) have about equal historical claim to a region that was first conquered by Egypt. In the centuries following the first diaspora, the Jews have attempted to return numerous times. The rest of the article can be found at

[Link: encarta.msn.com...]

It's worth reading from a historical perspective, if nothing else.

To make a long story a little shorter, the region was taken over by the Babylonians, who were then taken over by the Persians, who allowed resettlement and some autonomous control of Judea by the Jews. This lasted until the Persians were defeated by the Greeks, who attempted to force Hellenic assimilation on the Jews, which was continued under Ptolemy of Egypt and the Seleucids of Syria. This lasted until the Maccabean revolt in the 2nd century BC, which established independent Jewish rule until 63 BC, when the Romans conquered Palestine and made it a Roman province ruled by Jewish "kings". It was during Roman rule that Jesus was born.

Encarta continues "Two more Jewish revolts erupted and were suppressed in AD 66 to 73 and 132 to 135. After the second one, numerous Jews were killed, many were sold into slavery, and the rest were not allowed to visit Jerusalem. Judea was renamed Syria Palaistina.

"Palestine received special attention when the Roman emperor Constantine the Great legalized Christianity in AD 313...Palestine, as the Holy Land, became a focus of Christian pilgrimage. A golden age of prosperity, security, and culture followed. Most of the population became Hellenized and Christianized. Byzantine (Roman) rule was interrupted, however, by a brief Persian occupation (614-629) and ended altogether when Muslim Arab armies invaded Palestine and captured Jerusalem in AD 638. [Around the year AD 570 Muhammad, the founding prophet of Islam, was born in Mecca, at the time the central city of the Arabian Peninsula. Some 40 years later Muhammad started preaching a new religion, Islam, which constituted a marked break from existing moral and social codes in Arabia.] The Arab conquest began 1300 years of Muslim presence in what then became known as Filastin. Palestine was holy to Muslims...The Muslim rulers did not force their religion on the Palestinians, and more than a century passed before the majority converted to Islam. The remaining Christians and Jews were considered People of the Book. They were allowed autonomous control in their communities and guaranteed security and freedom of worship. Such tolerance (with few exceptions) was rare in the history of religion. Most Palestinians also adopted Arabic and Islamic culture. Palestine benefited from the empire's trade and from its religious significance during the first Muslim dynasty, the Umayyads of Damascus. When power shifted to Baghdad with the Abbasids in 750, Palestine became neglected. It suffered unrest and successive domination by Seljuks, Fatimids, and European Crusaders."

On the origins ot the Crusades: "After the death of Charlemagne, king of the Franks, in 814 and the subsequent collapse of his empire, Christian Europe was under attack and on the defensive. Magyars, nomadic people from Asia, pillaged eastern and central Europe until the 10th century. Beginning about 800, several centuries of Viking raids disrupted life in northern Europe and even threatened Mediterranean cities. But the greatest threat came from the forces of Islam, militant and victorious in the centuries following the death of their leader, Muhammad, in 632. By the 8th century, Islamic forces had conquered North Africa, the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, and most of Spain. Islamic armies established bases in Italy, greatly reduced the size and power of the Byzantine Empire (the Eastern Roman Empire) and besieged its capital, Constantinople. The Byzantine Empire, which had preserved much of the classical civilization of the Greeks and had defended the eastern Mediterranean from assaults from all sides, was barely able to hold off the enemy. Islam posed the threat of a rival culture and religion, which neither the Vikings nor the Magyars had done.

"In the 11th century the balance of power began to swing toward the West. The church became more centralized and stronger...Thus for the first time in many years, the popes were able to effectively unite European popular support behind them, a factor that contributed greatly to the popular appeal of the first Crusades.

"Furthermore, Europe's population was growing, its urban life was beginning to revive, and both long distance and local trade were gradually increasing. European human and economic resources could now support new enterprises on the scale of the Crusades. A growing population and more surplus wealth also meant greater demand for goods from elsewhere. European traders had always looked to the Mediterranean; now they sought greater control of the goods, routes, and profits. Thus worldly interests coincided with religious feelings about the Holy Land and the pope's newfound ability to mobilize and focus a great enterprise.

"It was against this background that Pope Urban II, in November 1095, called for a great Christian expedition to free Jerusalem from the Seljuk Turks, a new Muslim power that had recently begun actively harassing peaceful Christian pilgrims traveling to Jerusalem."
([Link: encarta.msn.com...]

Modern Zionism did not start with World War II, but in the late 1800's, as Jews in eastern Europe were once again increasingly the targets of religious persecution. They began leaving for Palestine in very small numbers, to join the few Jews who had remained for centuries. By this time, Palestine was largely barren and neglected. It was under a system of feudal control: hardly an organized governmental organization. Land was purchased from absentee Arab landowners, who were often only too happy to sell off the water rights to the Zionist settlers as well, probably expecting that the Zionists would fail and leave. The Zionists, however, reclaimed the land and made it fertile, while still sharing water supplies with the Palestinians. It was only after it became apparent that the Zionists were there to stay, and that there would be more coming, that the Palestinians were incited by outsides Arabs to attack Jewish settlements, generally by frightening the Palestinians into believing that the Zionists threatened their safety. British control occurred with the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War I, and it was under those auspices that the British had the "right" to partitionment. The first partition was actually in 1922--turning the land east of the Jordan River into TransJordan (later Jordan), angering both the Palestinian Arabs and the Jews. Initially, the British aided the Arabs against the Jews, until World War II's end led to the UN resolution creating separate Jewish and Palestinian states and ending the British Mandate. Israel accepted the partitionment. The Arab world did not, and incited Palestinian Arabs to leave by threatening them with dire consequences at the hands of the Jews if they stayed.

Rather than welcoming their Muslim brothers when the refugees reached other Arab lands, they closed their doors to the refugees they had created and put them in camps. This can, at worst, be viewed as a deliberate plan to breed, over generations, intense hatred of Israel. At best, it's the most horrific case of NIMBYism in history. Palestinian Arabs who chose to stay in Israel enjoy full citizenship and access to education and healthcare. The oil-rich Arab countries contribute very little to the economic, health-related or educational benefit of the Palestinian refugees beyond paying families to martyr their children.

I highly recommend "The Haj," written by Leon Uris, for a fictionalized but historically accurate depiction of events in the early-to-mid 1900's. Admittedly, it's by a Jewish author but is decidedly sympathetic to the Palestinian refugees as pawns in the power struggle between the Arab world and Israel.

Sources reprinted with permission:
"Palestine," , "Islam," and "The Crusades," Microsoft® Encarta® Online Encyclopedia 2002
[Link: encarta.msn.com...] © 1997-2002 Microsoft Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Botom line: the "Palestinians" have no greater historical claim to the region than the Jews, either based on ancient or modern history. They have shown themselves unwilling to peacefully coexist, necessitating separate governments. They have been awarded the vast majority of the land, but have refused part of it, in a cheap attempt at creating world sympathy for their self-victimization in order to try to take it all.

And, most frighteningly, what has occurred in the Middle East is only a harbinger of what is threatening to occur in the rest of the world, starting in Europe. I strongly suspect you are European. Have you people learned NOTHING from WWII? Apparently not, Mr. Chamberlaine.

Sorry, Charles, for the disgustingly long post, but I had to give this Euro-small sausage what he asked for.

Dear mommydoc,

Your snarky barbs notwithstanding, thanks for the history lesson. Really. As I think I said before, I'm the first to admit that I don't know it all, and I'm always happy to engage people who do know more than I. So I appreciate all your efforts, and I pledge to become better informed.

As for your suspicion that I'm European, you're mistaken, but I guess there's just a thread of truth in there somewhere. I'm half (Irish-)American, half Latin American. I lived in Europe for several years, and have traveled extensively in Europe and South America. I feel that I have roots on three continents, which gives me a slightly different worldview than most people I know.

Also, I don't think I ever claimed that the Arabs have a greater historical claim on that land than the Jews. It just strikes me that they have enough of a claim that they shouldn't be relegated to second class citizenship. Here's a stupid question (maybe): Do Arabs vote in Israel? Do they have representation in the Knesset in proportion to their population?

So mommydoc, rather than debate the past, let's talk solutions. What do you see as a realistic solution to the Arab-Iraeli conflict? From everything you write it seems that you hold the Israelis blameless in the conflict. Doesn't it bother you that, for example, the Israeli goverment is continuing and even maybe accelerating the pace of building settlements on land that they are certain will be part of any peace agreement? Doesn't that seem disingenuous? Talk about using their own people as pawns.

And I'm curious - What is it that you see "threatening to occur in the rest of the world, starting in Europe" ?

Snarky barbs... Sounds like a great name for a band. Ya that's it... "The Snarky Barbs"... or just "Snarky Barbs"

[Link: www.spinsanity.org...]