So the Secretary of Defense is “accepting” the resignations of the Air Force Secretary and Chief of Staff due to some slip ups in Nuclear security. That seems like a good reason. I do love the wording of accepting resignations instead of firing their butts!
(HT: Two Babes and a Brain)
Kindergarten is the easy grade to try out public school, right? The kids are to young to really corrupt each other and kindergarten teachers are sweet people who love little kids (why else would they choose to chase them), right? Not so much.
So here is our first situation. First imagine an adorable 5 year old boy (and I do me cute!) who has some discipline problems so mom takes him to outside doctors (as recommended by the principal) and they start the process to get him officially diagnosed with Aspberger’s. Some 5 year old boys can have discipline problems to begin with but pile on Aspberger’s and I am sure it can be rough. But how rough would it have to be for a teacher to pull this kid up in front of the class, have every student say what they don’t like about him and then vote as to whether they want to keep him in the class. That is exactly what what Wendy Barton did in Florida.
If that isn’t bad enough here is the second situation. So your five year old comes home and complains that his teacher doesn’t like him and that he kids don’t either. While your child is saying all this you are getting progress reports that are well mixed in the good marks and the bad. The teacher says sometimes your child is disruptive and can’t keep his hands to himself. But when you ask the teacher if you should set up a “behavior plan” with the teacher she says she doesn’t have time. So it must not be that big of a deal. Well, many times you would say that the kid is being to sensitive to limited correction and isn’t really reading the situation properly. Well, what if that kid started acting out at home? The parents of Gabriel Ross decided to send a tape recorder in his pocket to see what is really going on. The results were shocking.
What they heard over four hours of tape shocked them. Woodward can be heard telling Gabriel that he had “tortured and tormented” her and other teachers all year.
“I’ve been more than nice to you all year long and you’ve been ignorant, selfish, self-absorbed, the whole thing! I’m done!” Woodward says to Gabriel on the tape. She continues: “Something needs to be done because you are pathetic! If me saying these words to you hurt, I hope it does because you’re hurting everyone else around you.”
Gabriel can be heard crying on the tape.
Now I am hearing some people say this is evidence of a bad school system and that is why you should homeschool. I am looking at it a little differently. Apparently all the training these teachers got didn’t prepare them to actually deal with kids. I think this should be empowering to any parent who has ever doubted that they can teach their own kids. Do you think the home environment will be healthier than this? Now, I am not saying that all teachers are like this because they aren’t. But, all the training can’t be the end all and be all to teaching your child so have a little faith in yourself, your intelligence and your love. You can do it!
Technorati Tags: Alex Barton, Gabriel Ross
Apparently they will be starting to have same sex marriages(or gay marriages for the search engines;) in California on June 17, 2008. According to this article, the state said that the date is set that far in the future to give the state Supreme Court time to step in. It seems all that will stop it in the near future is for the Supreme Court to issue a stay.
The new procedure isn’t really all that shocking. The paperwork that the county clerks will have with not say bride and groom. Also if registered domestic partners are marrying the same person, they don’t have to dissolve the partnership first.
I am interested in seeing how this all shakes out.
I was just alerted over at Rocks in My Dryer that Steven Curtis Chapman’s youngest daughter, Maria, was killed in a car accident. This is a double tragedy for the Chapman family because she was run over by her older brother.
The teen was driving a Toyota Land Cruiser down the driveway of the rural home at about 5:30 p.m. and several children were playing in the area, McPherson said. He did not see Maria in the driveway before the vehicle struck her, she said.
“It appears to be a terrible accident,’’ McPherson said.
No charges are expected, she said. The accident was witnessed by two other children; the entire family was home at the time, McPherson said.
My deepest sympathy and prayers go out to this entire family and all those who know and love them.
So I heard on Rush, while coming home from the doctor, that a survey would be released today saying that 1/2 of all doctors want Universal Health Care. This sounded shockingly untrue so I came home and googled it. So there has been a survey released today. Here is the “big” news according to Reuters:
Of more than 2,000 doctors surveyed, 59 percent said they support legislation to establish a national health insurance program, while 32 percent said they opposed it, researchers reported in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine.
Well, I have serious doubts about the veracity of this statement. First of all it was done in 2002 in Indiana. What took so long to get the results out? Oh, thats right an election. Secondly, I also don’t believe that these 2,000 doctors out of Indiana are representative of the 800,000 in the US. I find it boggling. Will Universal Health Care really fix the problems facing doctors today. Isn’t Oregon one of the states that malpractice insurance for OBGYN’s is so high that they are leaving the state? I think this would just make it harder for doctors to make a living and pay for insurance.
That is separate to the issue of patient care. If choice wasn’t positive we would all choose to be on the existing Universal Health Care system, Medicare. Then look at Canada. If Universal Health Care is so great why do people cross the border to come here? We must be doing something right medically because people from all over the world come here to be treated for serious illnesses. It is the fact that medicine is a private industry that motivates and pays for medical research. It is also the private industry aspect that enables us pick and choose our doctors, our hospitals, and encourages speed of service that isn’t seen in countries with Universal Health Care.
Well, that is my rambling on this. What do you all think?
Technorati Tags: Universal Health Care, Reuters
For all those keeping up on the California Homeschooling drama, the court is going to reconsider their decision. As far as I can tell in the first article I have found, this is not a complete rehearing of the case. They are inviting educators and teacher’s unions to submit written arguments. We shall see.
There was an article in the AP about people losing jobs and money and their parents bailing them out. They specifically talking about 40-50 year old kids. What do you think about this? These parents are putting their retirements in jeopardy for kids that are old enough to fend for themselves. Now I am not saying that because money is more important than people but it will create a bigger financial problem. Will the kids they use their retirements to help be able to help them when they retire in just a few years? I don’t think they could even if they wanted to. If you take that money and invest it into someone’s life I don’t think they could turn it around to make enough money or stability to support their parents.
Dr. Helen brought up a really good point on this issue also.
If their kids are self-centered enough to take their parent’s retirement from them, will they really help the parent later on down the road or will they be more like this woman, who wrote to the Huffington Post complaining that her mom was a pain in the ass?
She went on to mention a book, Scratch Beginnings: Me, $25, and the Search for the American Dream
(HT: Dr. Helen)
So a Maid in Atherton, CA is suing a former employer for wages and damages. This seems pretty normal until I read the rest of the article. A maid was fired because she left chicken bones in a garbage can. Ok, this may have been an overreaction but we don’t know the history but it wasn’t totally unjustified so what is the problem? She doesn’t think she was paid fairly for her work when she worked there. She said she was paid $1000 a month to clean a 9000 square foot house, make meals and take care of 1 kid. She claims she could work 14 hours a day. Apparently she would work up to 7 days a week and up to 14 hours a day. Now this all appears agreeable while she was employed but now she is suing for $120,000 in wages, damages and penalties.
What!?!?!?! She agreed to do a job for a price and if she didn’t like the price she should have gone somewhere else. I agree that they were getting a bargain but that was her fault. Yet another example of how we have become way to litigious.
I first heard about the issues surrounding Eliot Spitzer on Monday. He has been caught up in the call-girl scandal that was discovered by a wire tap. All along I heard he was going to resign but never did. Well, he has now. The part I don’t buy in the whole story was:
Gov. Eliot Spitzer resigned in disgrace Wednesday after getting caught in a call-girl scandal that shattered his corruption-fighting, straight-arrow image, saying: “I cannot allow my private failings to disrupt the people’s work.”
Yea right. He resigned after he go his plea bargain. I don’t view this as a resignation but a excuse. You know what I mean, a “this is why I won’t be at work any more” excuse. What do ya’all think?
William F. Buckley Jr. died today. There is already a touching tribute, or more appropriately a series of tributes up at National Review. He is an icon in the conservative movement. I personally enjoy the debate he had with Gore Vidal (due to language I am only posting a link). He wasn’t a party man but a man of principals and he would take on anyone. May there be more like him. My sympathies and prayers to all who loved him and cared for him.