posted August 23, 2004 11:26 AM            

Although his approval ratings have slipped somewhat in recent weeks, President George W. Bush still enjoys the overall support of nearly half of the American people. He does not, however, fare nearly so well among professional historians.

A recent informal, unscientific survey of historians conducted at my suggestion by George Mason University’s History News Network found that eight in ten historians responding rate the current presidency an overall failure.

Of 415 historians who expressed a view of President Bush’s administration to this point as a success or failure, 338 classified it as a failure and 77 as a success. (Moreover, it seems likely that at least eight of those who said it is a success were being sarcastic, since seven said Bush’s presidency is only the best since Clinton’s and one named Millard Fillmore.) Twelve percent of all the historians who responded rate the current presidency the worst in all of American history, not too far behind the 19 percent who see it at this point as an overall success.

Among the cautions that must be raised about the survey is just what “success” means. Some of the historians rightly pointed out that it would be hard to argue that the Bush presidency has not so far been a political success—or, for that matter that President Bush has not been remarkably successful in achieving his objectives in Congress. But those meanings of success are by no means incompatible with the assessment that the Bush presidency is a disaster. “His presidency has been remarkably successful,” one historian declared, “in its pursuit of disastrous policies.” “I think the Bush administration has been quite successful in achieving its political objectives,” another commented, “which makes it a disaster for us.”

Additionally, it is, of course, as one respondent rightly noted, “way too early to make a valid comparison (we need another 50 years).” And such an informal survey is plainly not scientifically reliable. Yet the results are so overwhelming and so different from the perceptions of the general public that an attempt to explain and assess their reactions merits our attention. It may be, as one pro-Bush historian said in his or her written response to the poll, “I suspect that this poll will tell us nothing about President Bush’s performance vis-à-vis his peer group, but may confirm what we already know about the current crop of history professors.” The liberal-left proclivities of much of the academic world are well documented, and some observers will dismiss the findings as the mere rantings of a disaffected professoriate. “If historians were the only voters,” another pro-Bush historian noted, “Mr. Gore would have carried 50 states.” It is plain that many liberal academics have the same visceral reaction against the second President Bush that many conservatives did against his immediate predecessor.

Yet it seems clear that a similar survey taken during the presidency of Bush’s father would not have yielded results nearly as condemnatory. And, for all the distaste liberal historians had for Ronald Reagan, relatively few would have rated his administration as worse than that of Richard Nixon. Yet today 57 percent of all the historians who participated in the survey (and 70 percent of those who see the Bush presidency as a failure) either name someone prior to Nixon or say that Bush’s presidency is the worst ever, meaning that they rate it as worse than the two presidencies in the past half century that liberals have most loved to hate, those of Nixon and Reagan. One who made the comparison with Nixon explicit wrote, “Indeed, Bush puts Nixon into a more favorable light. He has trashed the image and reputation of the United States throughout the world; he has offended many of our previously close allies; he has burdened future generations with incredible debt; he has created an unnecessary war to further his domestic political objectives; he has suborned the civil rights of our citizens; he has destroyed previous environmental efforts by government in favor of his coterie of exploiters; he has surrounded himself with a cabal ideological adventurers . . . .”

Why should the views of historians on the current president matter?

I do not share the view of another respondent that “until we have gained access to the archival record of this president, we [historians] are no better at evaluating it than any other voter.” Academic historians, no matter their ideological bias, have some expertise in assessing what makes for a successful or unsuccessful presidency; we have a long-term perspective in which to view the actions of a current chief executive. Accordingly, the depth of the negative assessment that so many historians make of George W. Bush is something of which the public should be aware. Their comments make clear that such historians would readily agree with conclusion that then-Democratic presidential hopeful Richard Gephardt pronounced a few months ago: the presidency of George W. Bush is “a miserable failure.”

The past presidencies most commonly linked with the current administration include all of those that are usually rated as the worst in the nation’s history: Nixon, Harding, Hoover, Buchanan, Coolidge, Andrew Johnson, Grant, and McKinley. The only president who appeared prominently on both the favorable and unfavorable lists was Ronald Reagan. Forty-seven historians said Bush is the best president since Reagan, while 38 said he is the worst since Reagan. Almost all of the historians who rate the Bush presidency a success are Reagan admirers. Indeed, no other president (leaving aside the presumably mostly tongue-in-cheek mentions of Clinton) was named by more than four of the historians who took a favorable view of the current presidency.

Ronald Reagan clearly has become the sort of polarizing figure that Franklin Roosevelt was for an earlier generation—or, perhaps a better way to understand the phenomenon is that Reagan has become the personification of the pole opposite to Roosevelt. That polarization is evident in historians’ evaluations of George W. Bush’s presidency. “If one believes Bush is a ‘good’ president (or great),” one poll respondent noted, he or she “would necessarily also believe Reagan to be a pretty good president.” They also tend to despise Roosevelt. “There is no indication,” one historian said of Bush, “that he has advisors who are closet communist traitors as FDR had. Based on his record to date, history is likely to judge him as one of America’s greatest presidents, in the tradition of Washington and Lincoln.”

The thought that anyone could rate the incumbent president with Washington and Lincoln is enough to induce apoplexy in a substantial majority of historians. Among the many offenses they enumerate in their indictment of Bush is that he is, as one of them put it, “well on his way to destroying the entire (and entirely successful) structures of international cooperation and regulated, humane capitalism and social welfare that have been built up since the early 1930s.” “Bush is now in a position,” Another historian said, “to ‘roll back the New Deal,’ guided by Tom DeLay.”

Several charges against the Bush administration arose repeatedly in the comments of historians who responded to the survey. Among them were: the doctrine of pre-emptive war, crony capitalism/being “completely in bed with certain corporate interests,” bankruptcy/fiscal irresponsibility, military adventurism, trampling of civil liberties, and anti-environmental policies.

***

The reasons stated by some of the historians for their choice of the presidency that they believe Bush’s to be the worst since are worth repeating. The following are representative examples for each of the presidents named most frequently:

REAGAN: “I think the presidency of George W. Bush has been generally a failure and I consider his presidency so far to have been the most disastrous since that of Ronald Reagan--because of the unconscionable military aggression and spending (especially the Iraq War), the damage done to the welfare of the poor while the corporate rich get richer, and the backwards religious fundamentalism permeating this administration. I strongly disliked and distrusted Reagan and think that George W. is even worse.”

NIXON: “Actually, I think [Bush’s] presidency may exceed the disaster that was Nixon. He has systematically lied to the American public about almost every policy that his administration promotes.” Bush uses “doublespeak” to “dress up policies that condone or aid attacks by polluters and exploiters of the environment . . . with names like the ‘Forest Restoration Act’ (which encourages the cutting down of forests).”

HOOVER: “I would say GW is our worst president since Herbert Hoover. He is moving to bankrupt the federal government on the eve of the retirement of the baby boom generation, and he has brought America’s reputation in the world to its lowest point in the entire history of the United States.”

COOLIDGE: “I think his presidency has been an unmitigated disaster for the environment, for international relations, for health care, and for working Americans. He’s on a par with Coolidge!”

HARDING: “Oil, money and politics again combine in ways not flattering to the integrity of the office. Both men also have a tendency to mangle the English language yet get their points across to ordinary Americans. [Yet] the comparison does Harding something of a disservice.”

McKINLEY: “Bush is perhaps the first president [since McKinley] to be entirely in the ‘hip pocket’ of big business, engage in major external conquest for reasons other than national security, AND be the puppet of his political handler. McKinley had Mark Hanna; Bush has Karl Rove. No wonder McKinley is Rove’s favorite historical president (precedent?).”

GRANT: “He ranks with U.S. Grant as the worst. His oil interests and Cheney’s corporate Haliburton contracts smack of the same corruption found under Grant.”

“While Grant did serve in the army (more than once), Bush went AWOL from the National Guard. That means that Grant is automatically more honest than Bush, since Grant did not send people into places that he himself consciously avoided. . . . Grant did not attempt to invade another country without a declaration of war; Bush thinks that his powers in this respect are unlimited.”

ANDREW JOHNSON: “I consider his presidency so far to have been the most disastrous since that of Andrew Johnson. It has been a sellout of fundamental democratic (and Republican) principles. There are many examples, but the most recent would be his successful efforts to insert provisions in spending bills which directly controvert measures voted down by both houses of Congress.”

BUCHANAN: “Buchanan can be said to have made the Civil War inevitable or to have made the war last longer by his pusillanimity or, possibly, treason.” “Buchanan allowed a war to evolve, but that war addressed a real set of national issues. Mr. Bush started a war . . . for what reason?”

EVER: The second most common response from historians, trailing only Nixon, was that the current presidency is the worst in American history. A few examples will serve to provide the flavor of such condemnations. “Although previous presidents have led the nation into ill-advised wars, no predecessor managed to turn America into an unprovoked aggressor. No predecessor so thoroughly managed to confirm the impressions of those who already hated America. No predecessor so effectively convinced such a wide range of world opinion that America is an imperialist threat to world peace. I don 't think that you can do much worse than that.”

“Bush is horrendous; there is no comparison with previous presidents, most of whom have been bad.”

“He is blatantly a puppet for corporate interests, who care only about their own greed and have no sense of civic responsibility or community service. He lies, constantly and often, seemingly without control, and he lied about his invasion into a sovereign country, again for corporate interests; many people have died and been maimed, and that has been lied about too. He grandstands and mugs in a shameful manner, befitting a snake oil salesman, not a statesman. He does not think, process, or speak well, and is emotionally immature due to, among other things, his lack of recovery from substance abuse. The term is "dry drunk". He is an abject embarrassment/pariah overseas; the rest of the world hates him . . . . . He is, by far, the most irresponsible, unethical, inexcusable occupant of our formerly highest office in the land that there has ever been.”

“George W. Bush's presidency is the pernicious enemy of American freedom, compassion, and community; of world peace; and of life itself as it has evolved for millennia on large sections of the planet. The worst president ever? Let history judge him.”

“This president is unique in his failures.”

And then there was this split ballot, comparing the George W. Bush presidencies failures in distinct areas. The George W. Bush presidency is the worst since:

“In terms of economic damage, Reagan.

In terms of imperialism, T Roosevelt.

In terms of dishonesty in government, Nixon.

In terms of affable incompetence, Harding.

In terms of corruption, Grant.

In terms of general lassitude and cluelessness, Coolidge.

In terms of personal dishonesty, Clinton.

In terms of religious arrogance, Wilson.”

***

My own answer to the question was based on astonishment that so many people still support a president who has:

Presided over the loss of approximately three million American jobs in his first two-and-a-half years in office, the worst record since Herbert Hoover.
Overseen an economy in which the stock market suffered its worst decline in the first two years of any administration since Hoover’s.

Taken, in the wake of the terrorist attacks two years ago, the greatest worldwide outpouring of goodwill the United States has enjoyed at least since World War II and squandered it by insisting on pursuing a foolish go-it-almost-alone invasion of Iraq, thereby transforming almost universal support for the United States into worldwide condemnation. (One historian made this point particularly well: “After inadvertently gaining the sympathies of the world 's citizens when terrorists attacked New York and Washington, Bush has deliberately turned the country into the most hated in the world by a policy of breaking all major international agreements, declaring it our right to invade any country that we wish, proving that he’ll manipulate facts to justify anything he wishes to do, and bull-headedly charging into a quagmire.”)
Misled (to use the most charitable word and interpretation) the American public about weapons of mass destruction and supposed ties to Al Qaeda in Iraq and so into a war that has plainly (and entirely predictably) made us less secure, caused a boom in the recruitment of terrorists, is killing American military personnel needlessly, and is threatening to suck up all our available military forces and be a bottomless pit for the money of American taxpayers for years to come.
Failed to follow through in Afghanistan, where the Taliban and Al Qaeda are regrouping, once more increasing the threat to our people.
Insulted and ridiculed other nations and international organizations and now has to go, hat in hand, to those nations and organizations begging for their assistance.
Completely miscalculated or failed to plan for the personnel and monetary needs in Iraq after the war, so that he sought and obtained an $87 billion appropriation for Iraq, a sizable chunk of which is going, without competitive bidding to Haliburton, the company formerly headed by his vice president.
Inherited an annual federal budget surplus of $230 billion and transformed it into a $500+ billion deficit in less than three years. This negative turnaround of three-quarters of a trillion dollars is totally without precedent in our history. The ballooning deficit for fiscal 2004 is rapidly approaching twice the dollar size of the previous record deficit, $290 billion, set in 1992, the last year of the administration of President Bush’s father and, at almost 5 percent of GDP, is closing in on the percentage record set by Ronald Reagan in 1986.
Cut taxes three times, sharply reducing the burden on the rich, reclassified money obtained through stock ownership as more deserving than money earned through work. The idea that dividend income should not be taxed—what might accurately be termed the unearned income tax credit—can be stated succinctly: “If you had to work for your money, we’ll tax it; if you didn’t have to work for it, you can keep it all.”
Severely curtailed the very American freedoms that our military people are supposed to be fighting to defend. (“The Patriot Act,” one of the historians noted, “is the worst since the Alien and Sedition Acts under John Adams.”)
Called upon American armed service people, including Reserve forces, to sacrifice for ever-lengthening tours of duty in a hostile and dangerous environment while he rewards the rich at home with lower taxes and legislative giveaways and gives lucrative no-bid contracts to American corporations linked with the administration.
Given an opportunity to begin to change the consumption-oriented values of the nation after September 11, 2001, when people were prepared to make a sacrifice for the common good, called instead of Americans to ‘sacrifice’ by going out and buying things.
Proclaimed himself to be a conservative while maintaining that big government should be able to run roughshod over the Bill of Rights, and that the government must have all sorts of secrets from the people, but the people can be allowed no privacy from the government. (As one of the historians said, “this is not a conservative administration; it is a reckless and arrogant one, beholden to a mix of right-wing ideologues, neo-con fanatics, and social Darwinian elitists.”)
My assessment is that George W. Bush’s record on running up debt to burden our children is the worst since Ronald Reagan; his record on government surveillance of citizens is the worst since Richard Nixon; his record on foreign-military policy has gotten us into the worst foreign mess we’ve been in since Lyndon Johnson sank us into Vietnam; his economic record is the worst since Herbert Hoover; his record of tax favoritism for the rich is the worst since Calvin Coolidge; his record of trampling on civil liberties is the worst since Woodrow Wilson. How far back in our history would we need to go to find a presidency as disastrous for this country as that of George W. Bush has been thus far? My own vote went to the administration of James Buchanan, who warmed the president’s chair while the union disintegrated in 1860-61.

Who has been the biggest beneficiary of the horrible terrorism that struck our nation in September of 2001? The answer to that question should be obvious to anyone who considers where the popularity ratings and reelection prospects of a president with the record outlined above would be had he not been able to wrap himself in the flag, take advantage of the American people’s patriotism, and make himself synonymous with “the United States of America” for the past two years.

That abuse of the patriotism and trust of the American people is even worse than everything else this president has done and that fact alone might be sufficient to explain the depth of the hostility with which so many historians view George W. Bush. Contrary to the conservative stereotype of academics as anti-American, the reasons that many historians cited for seeing the Bush presidency as a disaster revolve around their perception that he is undermining traditional American practices and values. As one patriotic historian put it, “I think his presidency has been the worst disaster to hit the United States and is bringing our beloved country to financial, economic, and social disaster.”

Some voters may judge such assessments to be wrong, but they are assessments informed by historical knowledge and the electorate ought to have them available to take into consideration during this election year.

posted August 23, 2004 12:43 PM            

Seems Bill Clinton was voted the most corrupt President in American history by those historians.

I don't really care what a bunch of academics think about the President. He's attempting to reform education in America and it's long past due that the pointy headed types got their acts together and started engaging in the education of pupils instead of spreading Marxist theology and ideology in the American school systems and Universities.

posted August 23, 2004 01:06 PM            

Parents disturbed by the one-sided teaching and partisan indoctrination in the nation’s secondary schools will now have a new organization to express their concerns.

Students for Academic Freedom, leader of a year-old national movement to promote intellectual diversity on America’s college campuses, has just announced the launch of a new organization – Parents and Students for Academic Freedom – whose agenda is to promote intellectual pluralism and fight political indoctrination in the nation’s primary and secondary schools.

A case that poignantly illustrates the problem of indoctrination took place at a Delaware public school last spring. An eight-year-old second grader wrote a composition saying that he wanted to be a soldier like his grandfather. “If you ever write anything like that again, you are going straight to the principal’s office,” the teacher threatened. When his parents complained, the teacher denied the incident and accused the child of making the story up. But the mother was able to confirm the story with two of the child’s classmates. The child himself was so upset that he didn’t want to return to class.

Another example occurred at a Catholic high school. During the war against the Taliban following 9/11, the administration set up a table in the cafeteria where they encouraged students to send bags of rice to President Bush to show him that the Afghan people need food, not war.

In California, “Wheels of Justice” a group organized by pro-terrorist organizations has been allowed by high school administrators to use classrooms to proselytize students with anti-Israel, anti-American agendas.

“My own U.S. history teacher instructed us that our nation’s past fears about Communism were unjustified; in fact, that capitalism had been a sinister force in the world,” reported one student, a recent graduate from Santa Monica High school. “We were told that through America’s history as a ‘terrorist nation,’ she brought upon herself the sinister attacks of 9/11.” And that same school, teachers recruited their students to anti-war demonstrations and union picket lines with the support of the school administrators.

“Partisan ideologies have no place in education at any level,” said David Horowitz, the founder and chairman of Students for Academic Freedom. “Parents and Students for Academic Freedom will remind school administrators that they must treat all children with fairness and equality, and show respect for the values that their parents have chosen to teach them.”

Parents and Students for Academic Freedom (K-12) will provide support to parents who are concerned about their children’s ability to freely express their political and religious views in the classroom, or are worried that teachers are pressuring them to adopt a particular worldview. The organization encourages parents and students to band together to create PSAF chapters which will pressure school administrators to enact safeguards which explicitly promote diversity of opinion and outlaw any attempts by faculty to indoctrinate students in a particular ideology.

The basic principles of the organization will be familiar to anyone acquainted with the tradition of academic freedom: 1) a school is an educational institution not a political party; 2) a school’s resources and educational authority should be used to further learning and the disinterested pursuit of knowledge, not to indoctrinate students in partisan political ideologies; and 3) the principles of academic freedom and a good education require that students have access to a diversity of viewpoints in courses, required reading texts, and in campus activities programs.

The inspiration for this new organization stems from the incredible response Students for Academic Freedom has received in the past year. Ever since the inauguration of the collegiate organization, SAF’s leaders have been continually besieged by parents to expand their efforts to include the primary and secondary schools, where parents report that partisan indoctrination is just as rampant.

Students for Academic Freedom has seen tremendous growth at the collegiate level in its first year of operations. The organization has inspired legislators in at least ten states and the U.S. Congress to take up the Academic Bill of Rights, and students on 135 campuses across the nation are now working to persuade their school administrations to adopt the Academic Bill of Rights and enact reforms promoting intellectual diversity on campus.

Parents and Students for Academic Freedom will also promote legislation at the state and federal level to ensure that students are protected by a Bill of Rights designed to guarantee them an education that is fair, inclusive and non-partisan. A sample resolution and contact information is available on the organization’s new website at www.psaf.org.

posted August 23, 2004 01:19 PM            

SPOON!

posted August 23, 2004 02:09 PM            

About Bill Nevins
Bill Nevins, a published poet, journalist and teacher, was assigned to teach at-risk and other students at Rio Rancho High School and to establish a student writing club and performance-poetry team. Nevins' efforts were very successful. Hundreds of students packed the RRHS auditorium and joined nationally-famed New Mexico poets onstage for a December, 2002 poetry reading. Dozens of students joined the Write Club, developing literacy and public-expression skills in a multicultural, multilingual context under Nevins' guidance. A Slam Poetry Team formed, with students joyfully performing their original compositions at school, at local "open mikes" and over the RRHS closed-circuit tv public address system. Nevins and his student poets won high praise from teachers, administrators, parents, and the press. Nevins was asked to extend his poetry work to Rio Rancho's Independence High, an alternative public school. Nevins' innovative literacy and critical-thinking- enhancement work in his own classroom also was praised by colleagues and parents.

Then things changed.

In February, 2003, one of Nevins' Write Club members read her original, iconoclastic poem, "Revolution X" over the RRHS pa system. Immediately, a staff member identified on the school website as the RRHS Military Liaison publicly objected to the reading of the poem, deemed by him to be disrespectful to US government authorities, among other things. The RRHS administration questioned the student poet and "investigated" the poem for "profanity and incitement to violence", though neither were contained in this clever, inspirational poem.

In March, 2003, Nevins was suddenly suspended from teaching and from coaching the Write Club/Poetry Team, which then disbanded. Public readings of student poetry were banned by the RRHS administration. A multicultural poetry assembly set for April was cancelled. Student protests against Nevins' removal were silenced by the school administration and at least one student who refused to stop speaking out was encouraged to drop out of RRHS. In May, 2003, still under suspension, Nevins was informed by the RRHS administration that his contract will not be renewed for the coming school year.

A cloud of silence, censorship and fear hangs over the RRHS school district. A once-vibrant student literacy and critical-speaking/critical-thinking initiative has been crushed. In May, 2003, the RRHS Military Liaison and the Principal triumphantly raised a flag on school grounds and read out a poem telling critics of war policy to "shut your faces". Principal Gary Tripp told local press that this was "a high point" of his principalship.
http://aaf.virtualactivism.net/nevins.htm

Student poets victimised for anti-war stance
NEW MEXICO, USA — On March 17, the day of US President George Bush's televised announcement of the imminent US military attack on Iraq, Green Left Weekly writer Bill Nevins was suspended from his teaching job at Rio Rancho New Mexico public high school. The student Poetry Slam Team/Write Club, which Nevins organises and sponsors, was also barred from performing their outspoken words in public.
This took place after an anti-war poem written by a Rio Rancho New Mexico poetry team member read out a poem over the in-school closed circuit TV system. Following the reading, the student's parent (also a teacher at the school) was ordered by an assistant principal to go home and search the student's room for a print copy of the poem. The parent declined to do so. All members of the poetry team were individually interrogated by the school administration.

The charge against Nevins is that he permitted students to perform at public poetry readings without approved ``field trip'' forms being on file. Nevins is fighting the suspension with the strong support of the New Mexico teachers' union.

The Slam Team/Write Club has achieved local fame for the courageous way that multicultural youth from the school and the community had put their words of anger and protest into fine-crafted poetry. They have delivered these bursts of truth on local television, in print and at frequent poetry open mikes throughout central New Mexico.

The team was planning to appear at the Taos State Wide Youth Poetry Slam on March 21 but was told by the Rio Rancho High School administration on March 17 that they may be barred from going there by the school. Several students vowed to go to Taos anyway and to speak out there against repression in the USA, denial of free speech at their school and the suspension of Nevins.

GLW readers are asked to send protest letters to New Mexico governor Bill Richardson from his web site at <http://www.governor.state.nm.us>.

Below is the poem that was read out:

Revolution X
Bush said no child would be left behind
And yet kids from inner-city schools

Work on Central Avenue

Jingling cans that read

Please sir, may I have some more?

They hand out diplomas like toilet paper

And lower school standards

Because

Underpaid, unrespected teachers

Are afraid of losing their jobs

Funded by the standardised tests

That shows our competency

When I'm in detox.

This is the Land of the Free ...

Where the statute of limitations for rape is only five damn years!

And immigrants can't run for President.

Where Muslims are hunted because

Some suicidal men decided they didn't like

Our arrogant bid for modern imperialism.

This is the Land of the Free ...

You drive by a car whose

Bumper screams

God bless America!

Well, you can scratch out the B

And make it Godless

Because God left this country a long time ago.

The founding fathers made this nation

On a dream and now

Freedom of Speech

Lets Nazis burn crosses, but

Calls police to

Gay pride parades.

We somehow

Can afford war with Iraq

But we can't afford to pay the teachers

Who educate the young who hold the guns

Against the "Axis of Evil"

Land of the Free ...

This is the land

If you're politically assertive

They call you a traitor and

Damn you to ostracism.

Say good-bye to Johnny Walker Lindh

And his family.

Bye Bye.

American Pie.

So maybe

My ideas about this nation

Don't resolve around perfection

But at least I know

Education is more important

Than money.

Land of the Free . . .

If this was utopia

We'd have to see each other naked

Before we got married

But instead, we see each other naked all the time

Because the government has my social security number

And the name of my dog!

And then we make babies,

But don't worry, they won't be left behind

And they grow up saying

God bless America!

But they don't know who Bush is

Because they never learned the Presidents.

And they will ride the ship Amistad

To our dreamland shores

Bearing the same shackles as us.

I'm here to say that

Generation X

Is ****** and we are taking over,

Ripping down the American illusion of perfection

We are the future generation

I have my qualifications

I know it looks like Angel Soft paper,

But don't worry

It's a diploma

Do I look qualified?

You can take our toilet paper,

But you can't take our Revolution.

From Green Left Weekly, March 26, 2003.
Visit the Green Left Weekly home page.
http://www.greenleft.org.au/back/2003/531/531p22.htm

--------------------------------------------

That's right, nobody talks bad about Bush and his Adimastration in a public school, even if that means that the media will sometimes(or most) state otherwise!

posted August 23, 2004 02:51 PM            

If it wasn't for teaching Marxist theory in the school systems, there wouldn't be anything for teachers to teach at all. They sure aren't teaching math, English, literature, science, etc., and student achievement test scores prove that better than I ever could.

posted August 23, 2004 03:09 PM            

The only improvement that I've ever seen Bush do to education is to make absolute sure that he can cover his tracks in the school systems,like altering the truth and rewriting history, but you know, those coke addicts really DO know how to keep cover from most things anyway.

YES, Bush will improve the learning of children, by having them think exactly what he wants them to think, so in the future, nobody will even every complain about another Bush ever again, in hopes that nobody remembers what he has done to this country!

I got news for you JW...

posted August 23, 2004 03:13 PM            

What, you call working from right out of high school and bounce back and forth to one McDonald's franchise to another(KFC) is a "real job"?

posted August 23, 2004 03:29 PM            

I wish even 5% of what you think is fact was really true...well perhaps not in your case Ozone since most of what you think is anti America drivel.

What the President did was make local school districts accountable by insisting students be proficient in academic subjects and proficient at their grade level.

Needless to say Ozone, teachers sure don't want that because it clearly shows that some teachers and school districts aren't doing the jobs they are being paid to do.

I reject your assertion that Clinton improved the public school systems. Student achievement test scores continued to decline during the Clinton administration.

You're just going to hate the next 4 years and 4 months Ozone.

Speaking of coke Ozone; it was Roger Clinton who said Bill Clinton has a nose like a vacuum cleaner. So Ozone who are you going to believe, Bill Clinton's brother or the lying webmaster of the far radical leftist websites you get your drivel from?

It was Bill Clinton who refused to make his medical records public and for good reason, not President Bush.

As for the McDonald's burger flipping jobs Ozone; you know people need to have done something in school other than sit on their dead butts to learn some marketable skills while they were in "free" school. Those are entry level jobs Ozone and not intended to be lifelong positions. People are actually expected to develop more skills as they go along. Imagine that...what a drag huh?

That has such a nice ring, doesn't it.......President Bush.

posted August 23, 2004 03:47 PM            

Wow, you really do listen to the Clintons, but all of the wrong ones:

New Questions About Roger Clinton's Slippery Schemes
For Clinton pardongate investigators, the former First Brother is the gift that keeps on giving. A TIME exclusive by Viveca Novak and Michael Weisskopf
By VIVECA NOVAK AND MICHAEL WEISSKOPF

Saturday, Jun. 30, 2001
Call him the brother who couldn't shoot straight. While Bill Clinton ran the nation for eight years, his half brother, Roger, lived in Bill's shadow. Now Roger is sweating under the hot lights as questions pile up about whether he had a role in an outrageous array of slippery and ill-fated schemes ranging from Mafioso pardons to Chinese scooter imports to Venezuelan coal mines. Though he always seemed to be the slacker Clinton, Roger now appears to have been a very busy man after all.

For Clinton investigators, Roger is the gift that keeps on giving. Last week, the House Government Reform Committee wrote him asking about his role in clemency pleas made by six convicted felons, including Rosario Gambino, a jailed New Jersey restauranteur reputed to be a soldier in the Gambino crime family. Committee documents show that Rosario Gambino's daughter wrote a $50,000 check to one of Roger Clinton's companies in September, 1999, some months after Roger sought leniency from the U.S. Parole Commission for Rosario, who is serving a 45-year sentence for heroin trafficking.

More than a year ago, sources told TIME, the FBI learned of Clinton's efforts with the parole board. Suspicious of his motives, agents wanted to set up a sting operation. Members of the Clinton-appointed Parole Commission are said to have asked Justice Department officials to nix the FBI probe. The Department refused, but that investigation petered out anyway.

In Bill Clinton's final days in office last January, a White House lawyer included Rosario Gambino on a list of pardon candidates to be screened by the Justice Department, documents show. No pardon was granted. But at least Gambino — the former owner of Valentino's Supper Club of Garden City, N.J. — seems to have been considered for a pardon. The White House Counsel's office included Gambino's name on a list of pardoned candidates to be sent to the DOJ for criminal background checks. That's more than a handful of other convicts whose lawyers or relatives sought help from Roger Clinton got out of their deals.

One of them was J.T. Lundy, former head of the famous Calumet Farms who was sentenced last year to 4 1/2 years in prison for bank fraud. Lundy had given Roger Clinton a job at his Kentucky race horse stud farm after Clinton served a prison term in the 1980s for dealing cocaine. By late 1999, Lundy began asking Clinton for help — even before his trial began. Sources told TIME he suggested Roger try to help delay legal action until the final days of the Clinton presidency, a time in which presidents usually grant pardons.

Lundy offered to reward Roger Clinton with stock in a Venezuelan coal deal, sources told TIME. To protect Clinton from discovery of the payment and assure it remained tax free, the sources said, Lundy suggested to Clinton in November, 1999 that Lundy would transfer the stock to a mutual friend, Dan R. Lasater, a Little Rock financier who was convicted in the mid-1980s for buying drugs from Roger Clinton. The House committee has obtained records showing that Clinton deposited in his bank $100,000 in travelers checks on Nov. 30, 1999, with some of the checks purchased in Venezuela.

Lundy's lawyer, David McGee, told TIME his client had no Venezuelan coal interests to transfer. But a source close to Lundy said a group of his friends from Kentucky did, and Lundy hoped they would facilitate a deal with the president's brother. Roger Clinton's lawyer, Bart Williams, said his client never received payment from Lundy and never recommended him for a pardon. Lasater refused comment.

As the days of the Clinton presidency dwindled, Roger Clinton was in great demand by pardon seekers. Lawyers for two of them shipped documents to Roger Clinton at the White House in care of the usher's office, sources said. Neither of them received clemency.

The House committee is not the only investigative body interested in Roger Clinton and pardons. The office of U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White is examining allegations by a Texas family that they paid two associates of Roger Clinton, George Locke and Dickey Morton, more than $200,000 in late 1998 to have Roger secure a pardon for a relative. Business sources say White also is focusing on a firm, CLM — for Clinton, Locke & Morton — and the activities of Locke and Morton. Sources said they invoked Roger Clinton's name to line up investors for a scheme to import wallboard, scooters and other products from China. Their pitch: Roger is "the president's man in China," two sources told TIME. Locke and Morton have claimed their Fifth Amendment right not to talk to investigators.

A California businessman, Davey Crockett (distantly related to the frontiersman, he says), took the pair to China in 1999 to set up a wallboard exporting business. When they had trouble making connections there, they called Roger Clinton on more than one occasion hoping he could open doors for them, sources said; Clinton was supposed to join them but in the end didn't show up.

Roger Clinton's lawyer, Bart Williams, said that his client "has never received any money in connection with a pardon request," though he has received funds from people who have separately asked such favors. Clinton recommended six people for pardons, all of whom were denied, Williams noted.

Roger may be keeping up the Clinton tradition of ethical vagaries. But it's not clear that any of his activities are illegal. That was the conclusion of a high-level Justice Department meeting late last year involving Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder, independent counsel Robert Ray, and top FBI officials, sources told TIME. They'd been investigating various allegations about the trouble-prone half brother, but concluded that there wasn't enough evidence to proceed. Justice Department officials told the FBI to feel free to present new material if it turned up.

All they had to do was wait.
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,165992,00.html

As in what Bush did for education in America?

Bush Education Ad: Going Positive, Selectively
Bush ad claims "dramatic results" in Texas schools, but fails to mention data-manipulation scandal.

May 12, 2004
Modified: May 12, 2004

Summary

Bush released an ad May 12 claiming "dramatic results" from his Texas school reforms and touting his "No Child Left Behind" law as "the most significant education reforms in 35 years."

But some of those Texas claims were scaled back last year after school officials were shown to be fudging the numbers to disguise high drop-out rates. And many state officials are complaining that Bush's policies impose expensive new requirements without a large enough increase in federal aid to pay for them.

Analysis

After weeks of misleading ads attacking Kerry's record on taxes and military spending, the Bush campaign finally had something nice to say.

Bush Cheney '04 Ad

"Key To Success"

Bush: I'm George W. Bush, and I approve this message.

Announcer: As governor, George Bush enacted reforms that produced dramatic results.
As president, he signed the most significant education reforms in 35 years.
Because accountability and high standards are the keys to quality schools, the president's reforms give parents the tools needed to measure a child's progress.
Today public schools require raised standards, well-qualified teachers, accountability to parents.
Because no child in America should be left behind.

The ad shows Bush hugging a school child, and paints a glowing picture of the federal education reforms he pushed through two years ago. It accurately summarizes the main points of his No Child Left Behind Act, saying "public schools require raised standards, well-qualified teachers, accountability to parents."

The act is indeed giving parents new tools for holding public schools accountable and measuring progress. Already, detailed data on schools in many states are available on the Internet, for example.

Dramatic Results?

But when the ad claims that Bush's Texas reforms "produced dramatic results" it omits a key fact: those results were inflated to some extent by school officials who reported false information about drop-out rates to improve their statistics.

In Houston, investigators found 3,000 students who should have been listed as dropouts but weren't. A local television station, KHOU-TV, called citywide dropout statistics a "lesson in lies." The station found one former student working at a Wendy's fast-food restaurant after her public high school reported that she had left to attend private school. The Washington Post later found another high school that reported an unbelievably low 0.3 percent dropuout rate when in fact up to half its students failed to graduate. The CBS program "60 Minutes II" reported that Houston's entire school system reported a city-wide dropout rate of 1.5 percent when the true dropout rate was somewhere between 25 and 50 percent, according to educators and experts checked by CBS News.

It's true that drop-out rates were not the only statistics used to measure progress, but the scandal happened in Houston -- where Bush's Education Secretary Roderick R. Paige had been superintendent. That has raised questions about how well reforms really worked in Texas, and also about whether school officials nationally will manipulate statistics to look good under the new standards imposed by the No Child Left Behind law.

The Question of Money

Also left unmentioned in the Bush ad is the question of money. As we've pointed out before, federal aid to education has increased sharply under Bush. Funding for the Department of Education rose 58% during Bush's first three years, a bigger increase than during the previous eight years under Clinton.

But many say even that increase is not enough, considering the demands the law imposes on schools. Funding is still $7 billion a year under what was envisioned in the authorizing legislation for No Child Left Behind, according to the National Education Association.

And it isn't just Democrats and the teachers unions saying it. In Republican-dominated Utah, the superintendent of the state's largest school district estimated it would cost $182 million over the next 10 years to implement all the provisions of No Child Left Behind, compared to the $2.2 million per year it now receives in federal aid. And in Republican-dominated Ohio, a study for the state department of education estimated the cost of compliance with the law to be $149 million per year.

Even one former Bush administration official is now lamenting the lack of resources. Susan B. Neuman was the U.S. Department of Education's assistant secretary for elementary and secondary education until January 2003. She recently told a meeting of the International Reading Association in Reno, Nev., that she worries that the most vulnerable children are still being left behind, despite the law that she helped implement:

Neuman: In [the most disadvantaged schools] in America, even the most earnest teacher has often given up because they lack every available resource that could possibly make a difference. . . . When we say all children can achieve and then not give them the additional resources . . . we are creating a fantasy.

Neuman has now returned to the University of Michigan, where she is a professor of education.
http://www.factcheck.org/article.aspx?docID=181

--------------------------------------------

Are you sure that this is all good JW?

posted August 23, 2004 04:30 PM            

Bill Clinton was implicated in granting a pardon for pay when Clinton pardoned Marc Rich. You can begin to find out about your fair haired boy Clinton here Ozone.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=21595

You seem to be saying the President is responsible for education in the United States Ozone and nothing could be further from the truth. Local school boards and the respective states are responsible for educating students which is funded by local property taxes. Nor is the President responsible if some teachers or school districts attempt to game the system and phony up test scores. I've already told you the President increased federal funds for education more than Clinton ever did.

The rest of your post is even worse nonsense. The President signed a form 180, which is an authorization for the military to release all records pertaining to the war record and medical records of military personnel.

It's John Heinz Kerry who refuses to execute a form 180 so everyone can see how he earned those purple hearts, bronze and silver stars.
It's John Heinz Kerry who is suspected of writing up his own recommendations for purple hearts and at least one of his stars and it's John Heinz Kerry whose accounts of his exploits in Vietnam differ sharply with those who served by and with him.

posted August 23, 2004 11:30 PM              

I think 9/11 is much more important that what was going on in Clinton's urine.

And... it was John Heinz Kerry who had the personal courage and strength (regardless of his family's money) to go to war in his country's honor... unlike SOME people who could only think of where the next party was.

posted August 24, 2004 01:03 AM            

quote:

---

You seem to be saying the President is responsible for education in the United States Ozone and nothing could be further from the truth. Local school boards and the respective states are responsible for educating students which is funded by local property taxes. Nor is the President responsible if some teachers or school districts attempt to game the system and phony up test scores. I've already told you the President increased federal funds for education more than Clinton ever did.

---

...and you never read a single word from my last post JW!

posted August 24, 2004 01:07 AM            

The President, far from obstructing the work of the commission, cooperated fully, making anyone in his administration available for testimony, including himself and Vice President, Dick Cheney. The President even declassified files so the commission could review them.

In fact, the President gave the commission all the time they desired to question him and fully answered every question commission members put to him. The Vice President did the same.

There is not one shred of evidence the President ever did coke but you can make the allegation as leftist webmasters have done.

As for the President's academic credentials, I have covered this in other posts and the President has those academic credentials beyond the scope of Kerry, beyond the scope of Algore and beyond the scope of the vociferous NY Times reporters and their publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr who failed the entrance exam for the Harvard School of Business that Bush passed and earned an MBA in his younger years.

Time to get off that issue. It's a dead bang loser.

posted August 24, 2004 01:17 AM            

My writing style is direct and yours is sometime oblique.

posted August 24, 2004 01:37 AM            

But many say even that increase is not enough, considering the demands the law imposes on schools. Funding is still $7 billion a year under what was envisioned in the authorizing legislation for No Child Left Behind, according to the National Education Association.

Then answer this JW!
--------------------------------------------

When you say:

quote:

---

My writing style is direct and yours is sometime oblique

---

I don't think that I am devious, misleading, or dishonest, I think that I've been pretty up front with you and everybody else JW! Hey, once again, if you want to make this a more personal issue JW, I'll be much "obliged", if that's what you mean.

posted August 24, 2004 01:58 AM              

In regard to those historians, all I can say is "Hear hear!" I approve so 100%.

posted August 24, 2004 02:02 AM            

As previously stated, there is not enough money in America to satisfy the bottomless pit of public education and the nay sayers of the teacher associations, the NEA and the FTA.

The President has increased federal funds to education well beyond the expenditures of the Clinton administration or any other yet the teachers and their groups whine, moan and say it isn't enough. It could never be enough.

My point is that we need to reform the entire education establishment in America.

posted August 24, 2004 02:31 AM              

"A case that poignantly illustrates the problem of indoctrination took place at a Delaware public school last spring. An eight-year-old second grader wrote a composition saying that he wanted to be a soldier like his grandfather. “If you ever write anything like that again, you are going straight to the principal’s office,” the teacher threatened. When his parents complained, the teacher denied the incident and accused the child of making the story up. But the mother was able to confirm the story with two of the child’s classmates. The child himself was so upset that he didn’t want to return to class."

A reasonable teacher would never threaten to send a child to the office for wanting to be in the military, and most teachers are reasonable people (those that haven't cracked under the strain of teaching and gone into psychiatric care). The explanations are, then:
a. The statement, "Be a soldier like my grandfather" was followed by another, such as, "and kill lots of Jews and colored people with my M-16";
or
b. The little boy's two little friends lied. Little kids do that all the time, and the mother, or the little boy, may have pressured them into it. Why would you take a child's word over an adult's?

"Another example occurred at a Catholic high school. During the war against the Taliban following 9/11, the administration set up a table in the cafeteria where they encouraged students to send bags of rice to President Bush to show him that the Afghan people need food, not war."

And what, precisely, is wrong with that? Are you saying that the Afghan people need war more than food? Has the author cracked?!

"In California, “Wheels of Justice” a group organized by pro-terrorist organizations has been allowed by high school administrators to use classrooms to proselytize students with anti-Israel, anti-American agendas."

I have a feeling that the adjectives 'pro-terrorist' and 'anti-American' are a bit strong for what the group actually stands for. Probably, Socialist Peaceniks would be more accurate. But no matter what they are, they have a right to free speech... as do people like the author.

'“My own U.S. history teacher instructed us that our nation’s past fears about Communism were unjustified; in fact, that capitalism had been a sinister force in the world,” reported one student, a recent graduate from Santa Monica High school. “We were told that through America’s history as a ‘terrorist nation,’ she brought upon herself the sinister attacks of 9/11.” And that same school, teachers recruited their students to anti-war demonstrations and union picket lines with the support of the school administrators.'

Proof, please. Name of high school, other names too. The student undoubtedly exaggerated his teacher's statements to make them more theatrical. Furthermore, it is perfectly all right for teachers and students to picket and protest together, especially if it is for a politically oriented club in which both teachers and students participate, such as the Young Republicans.

“Partisan ideologies have no place in education at any level,” said David Horowitz, the founder and chairman of Students for Academic Freedom. “Parents and Students for Academic Freedom will remind school administrators that they must treat all children with fairness and equality, and show respect for the values that their parents have chosen to teach them.”

The difficulty is that it is actually quite impossible to teach anything without some kind of a bent on it. You think a teacher can just lay out what happened like a timeline and call it objective? It doesn't work like that. Every group and party has its own read on history, its own ideology, which they consider to be the truth. How is a teacher to integrate all these 'truths'? If certain versions of history have fallen out of favor and are no longer being taught (to the dismay of those who still believe in them) maybe it's because. they're. wrong.

And what if some of those good old-fashioned homey values Horowitz mentioned happen to include things that simply aren't permissible on campuses, such as racism, sexism, hate, or homophobia? Is a teacher supposed to allow someone to trumpet their hate and bigotry in the name of free speech?
No. There is a point at which free speech crosses the line into hate speech, and at that point teachers have the right to tell their little KKKers to shut it.

It really does all come back to free speech. Just as people like the Wheels for Justice or whatever are allowed to voice their opinion, people like the author are allowed to voice their opinions too. The difference is, WoJ is simply explaing their point of view, whereas the author is trying to keep the opposition from talking.

posted August 24, 2004 02:54 AM            

It a formulation of a programed truth onto the youth of America that needs to stop yesterday and in that, veering a child to obtain all the resourses to find the path(s)that they "walk" they're "1000 mile journey" on, could be more of a fundamental thing for society to embrace!

For the individual would grow up to possess they're own formulation on how the world is and it can and should be, but not by anybody elses influance, but for themselves to obtain and to discover down they're own long road to life's path.

posted August 24, 2004 11:44 AM            

quote:

---

a. The statement, "Be a soldier like my grandfather" was followed by another, such as, "and kill lots of Jews and colored people with my M-16";
or
b. The little boy's two little friends lied. Little kids do that all the time, and the mother, or the little boy, may have pressured them into it. Why would you take a child's word over an adult's?

---

Nice mind reading act Queen but since you were not there and several children backed up the statement of the child who complained, I'm prepared to believe the children. Who the hell are you to add racist remarks that were never said by anyone or call someone a liar with absolutely no factual evidence it's true?

quote:

---

"And what, precisely, is wrong with that? Are you saying that the Afghan people need war more than food?

---

Are you saying the Taliban didn't need to be removed or responded against for allowing Bin Laden to use Afghanistan as a base of operations to attack the US? I am saying war was needed in Afghanistan and I hope they capture or kill every member of the Taliban and every member of Al Queda. Relief organizations were distributing food, clothing, medicines and other necessities. A political statement was being made....propaganda which is an inappropriate use of school facilities and it was directed against the children.....as usual. As for who's cracked, I have my own opinion and it isn't the writer.

quote:

---

!"In California, “Wheels of Justice” a group organized by pro-terrorist organizations has been allowed by high school administrators to use classrooms to proselytize students with anti-Israel, anti-American agendas."I have a feeling that the adjectives 'pro-terrorist' and 'anti-American' are a bit strong for what the group actually stands for. Probably, Socialist Peaceniks would be more accurate. But no matter what they are, they have a right to free speech... as do people like the author.'

---

Your "feeling" aside Queen, schools are not the proper place for anti America activities including speech. Take that kind of speech outside, get on your soap box and spout your drivel till your heart's content. But not in an academic setting with a captive audience of impressionable children.

quote:

---

“My own U.S. history teacher instructed us that our nation’s past fears about Communism were unjustified; in fact, that capitalism had been a sinister force in the world,” reported one student, a recent graduate from Santa Monica High school. “We were told that through America’s history as a ‘terrorist nation,’ she brought upon herself the sinister attacks of 9/11.” And that same school, teachers recruited their students to anti-war demonstrations and union picket lines with the support of the school administrators.

---

Again Queen, you presume to put your own spin on what was said without a shred of proof. If you are really interested to know who, where and when, you could inquire here and I've made it easy for you to do so.
Sara Dogan (formerly Sara Russo)
National Campus Director
Students for Academic Freedom
Phone: 202-969-2467
Fax: 202-408-0632
Email: Sara@StudentsforAcademicFreedom.org

You are going to see a marked difference in the way schools operate in the future Queen. Schools and teachers have been preaching their prejudices, theology and ideology to their students for far too long instead of sticking to academic subjects.......against the wishes of parents who mostly didn't know it was going on. I know the Marxist teachers and teacher groups like the NEA and the FTA think they can bring about a Marxist America by propagandizing and indoctrinating our children.

Strange that there are some who think it's OK that little Johnny and Jane can't read, can't write, can't add, subtract or put together a proper sentence but know America is the enemy of the rest of the world. Hogwash.

Lastly Queen, you seem to be the one suggesting racist remarks here. There was nothing of that in the article.

posted August 24, 2004 12:02 PM            

You can find the information on the education budgets online....like everyone else. You can find the education budget for your school district, your state and the Federal budget, all online. If you do, you will find the education budgets of every state is rising steadily and the federal outlay for education up 58% over the Clinton era.

In fact, we are spending something over 400 billion dollars a year on education in America and most of it's going down a rat hole. There is no shortage of funds for education. America spends more per pupil per year than any nation in the world. There is a misuse of the funds by school districts top heavy with administrators and other drones who do not teach anything.

Ozone

quote:

---

Courtney Butler's poem, was just her own opinion that was stifled by those "political organizations".

---

posted August 24, 2004 04:35 PM            

And if that doesn't do the job, most people have computers too!

And some teachers actually make they're students have homework, but you know, those are the things that these Communist teachers are doing now-a-days, rather then just passing them for flunking grades.

Look at Bush Jr., he never had to study and look when he is now, but it shows, everytime he stands on that podium and tries to say a sentence, but that doesn't matter to the other Republicans, he's doing exactly what they want him to do, how to do it and what to say about it and whatever goof that Bush might end up saying, the rest of the right wing just pretends not to notice at all, because he's just doing the right thing, that's all.

Now if you were a teacher and and spent your whole life in a profession that the world relies on them for they're efforts and servitude, to direct them to a more possitive and possible future, but you know that this child is going to need more required attention, for they are not apt to complete the basic tasks that they will need to face in a dire world of advancement and achievement, wouldn't it just behoove you to know that those teachers that care, actually do care and the parents of those children couldn't ask for more? And yet you find yourself in the "hot seat" and your job is on the line and the only way to go around it is that is to resort down to not only to be something that you despise so dearly, but to cover yourself from being spotted by the very peers that look up to you, but yet you still condone to being a cheat and you look around you and you see the same thing going on from all over and you knew that it wasn't always that way, not from the time(of the time) that you were raised to be, wouldn't that just **** you off JW?

Schools are different today JW, I know in my youth that I wasn't packing a gun to class and really to shoot anybody just for kicks and giggles and I know that this couldn't even be preceive in your school days by far! Back in a time that we have bullies in our school, we had fear of them, now we live in a time that the bullies fear an even bigger and stronger bully, "the silent bully", the one that you never know who he is and yet lays dorment,waiting and watching and looking and listening and then one day, someone just says the wrong thing or looks the wrong way or acts funny to the wrong student and then *POW!*, the kid ends up shot dead in the hallway!

Today, the kids don't HATE going to school in they're lives, they are afraid to go to school for fear for they're lives and you got to be a teacher in that kind of atmosphere? Most of the time, most of that money goes to metal detectors and security guards rather then computers, lunches, new gym equipment, after school activities and such!

No, the school campuses today look more like penitentiaries and detox programs then anything else and yet no one cares except for the teachers and the parents that have to send they're children off to that! No JW, maybe you never had to deal with that in your school days, but they do have to deal with that EACH AND EVERY SINGLE DAY and maybe of they're lives, if they don't get to see they're graduation day...

that's not because they might of quit, flunked or got expelled...