Happy Circumcision Day!

January 1 is a weird day for the first day of the year.  It is not astrologically significant as in a solstice or equinox.  It is an arbitrary date rooted in other religions as in the worship of the Greek God Janus, and rooted in Christianity as the day Jesus was circumcised, 8 days after his birth.  Ugh.  Not a source of celebration as far as I am concerned.  Clearly sexist as women do not experience this ritual cutting, but last time I checked a New Year’s party is not really a party without both sexes present and no male is asked to verify circumcision at the door.  Regardless, by the mid 1700’s most western civilizations had adopted January 1 as the first day of the new year.  We just as easily could make it any other day.  If I had a vote it would always fall on the spring equinox somewhere around March 20^th, but I do not have a vote.

However the wizards and politicians selected this date, our tradition is to review the year just ending and make projections for the year to come.  Zealots will make resolutions regarding what individual accomplishments they seek to implement in the coming year.  From my point of view anyone who wants to make a change can do so and not have to wait until January 1 to start.  I see most resolutions as statements of future guilt trips.  I don’t do resolutions.  I do evolutions, as in what direction I want to grow, but that is fodder for another post.  I shall begin with observations of the year ending.

2016 was the year truth died at the hands of falsehoods.  Americans chose to believe falsehoods over truth.  I remain in shock and fear.  Trump did not win by a landslide.  He lost the popular vote and in terms of electoral votes he ranks 42^nd among all presidential candidates. This is the same man who said Obama was a Muslim and was not an American born citizen, both falsehoods.  The economy is not in bad shape.  It is in the best shape it has been in over 20 years and all the data support that.  It is the year when accusations of guilt equaled guilt.  Clinton was charged with a record number of legal infringements, millions were spent trying to prove there was evidence that merited prosecution and nothing was found.  And yet, most believe she lied and should be in prison.  I remain amazed that a lie can be told three times and forever be perceived as the truth.  This was the year a candidate for president promised the American people what he would do as president, and as soon as he was elected starting saying he wasn’t going to do those things.  This was a year when fossil fuel producers convinced a lot of people that there was not global warming caused by human behavior, an undisputed fact among scientists who are not on the payroll of fossil fuel companies.  This was the year the broadcast falsehoods of some media outlets that were constantly shown to be perpetrating lies were believed by the American people.  “Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters.” Albert Einstein.

2016 was the year that bigotry overcame the goal of equality.  I believe that many Americans awoke in 2009 and realized we had elected our first Black President.  Few in this group would admit to bigotry, but on the other hand took joy in any little criticism of President Obama.  We saw the rise of the KKK in the election and the rise of the Alt-Right, both groups advocating for an America of the Anglos, by the Anglos and for the Anglos.  After years and years of progress in the arena of civil rights we have now elected a man who is clearly a bigot.  His talk of walls, immigrants, judges, etc. are laden with bigotry, hard for other bigots to hear.  He advocates making America great again, but when pressed to identify when America was great he points to the turn of the last century and the industrial revolution, and the 1940’s and 50’s.  He dreams of the Ozzie and Harriet Days, he longs for an Archie Bunker approach to life.  The days he cites as great in our history were in many ways terrible.  Those days were before we integrated public schools, segregation was the norm, women were not expected to work and if they did it would be in clerical, nursing or teaching.  No one could imagine a Black or female president in those days.  Workers were abused and the growth of unions stemmed from those days.  Children and adults with special needs were ignored and sent home, as were pregnant girls.  These may have been a wonderful time for the educated, prosperous Anglo males in American, but it was a terrible time for anyone else.  A return to those days does not advance our culture.  It is not a time when America was great.  It was the stone age of civil rights.  Even worse, our courts have now allowed discrimination based on the religious beliefs of the discriminator, the most twisted ruling in the court’s history as far as I can tell.  Tantamount to allowing people of one faith to kill people of another faith because it is their religious right.

2016 was the year that wealth became a protected class and poverty was attacked.  With the SCOTUS ruling by 5 to 4 in Citizens United that corporations were entitled to the same 1^st amendment free speech rights as individuals thereby opening the door for huge corporate donations to political campaigns.  Such donations were limited prior to Citizen’s United.  Such large donations continue to shape American election outcomes especially in favor of corporations, the wealthy, and opposed to civil liberties and labor unions.  The new President-elect has proposed revamping the tax code so that the wealthiest individuals receive a tax break with more of the taxation burden falling on the middle class.  Talk in Congress of reducing funding for Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid out of proposed fear of insolvency would only benefit the wealthiest Americans.  The insolvency is not real in that it exists because Congress continually takes money from those funds to finance other projects, and because the wealthy to do not pay the same share of taxation for these programs as does the middle and lower class.  The rumors of welfare fraud are consistently debunked but not reported.  No study has found more than 1% fraudulent use of the funds, making welfare the least fraudulent of all federal programs, another fact not widely disseminated.  Programs that support the poor and lower middle class are under attack.  Labor Unions are under attack.  For the first time low income Americans have access to medical insurance and 20 million Americans have signed up.  But because conservatives are loath to give credit where credit is due the Affordable Care Act has been subject to conservative attack since its passage.  And the gap between our poor and our rich grows annually as the rich continue to benefit from protected status.

2016 was the year when winning meant more than integrity.  The notion that all is fair in love and war implies that winning means more than integrity.  We have consistently seen candidates boldly lie and gain in credence at the same time.  When Trump announced that John McCain was a loser because he was captured during the Viet Nam war my jaw dropped.  Trump has yet to reveal his tax returns.  We know he has not paid taxes for years.  Saying whatever it takes to get elected is an announcement that outcome means more than integrity.  Doing whatever it takes to win is an announcement that integrity takes a back seat.  Assuming people of wealth are somehow smarter, more deserving, more qualified to manage industries they know nothing about is another example of winning in one area and celebrating the victory across other areas.  If you lie, cheat, steal, or withhold information to win, there is no integrity.  If making money means more than protecting American citizens then winning means more than integrity.

2016 was the year that we ignored history in favor of delusions.  There has never been an effective wall erected between people to keep one group out and another group safe within.  There has never been a time when trickle-down, supply-side or “voodoo economics” has successfully improved our economy.  There has never been a time where discrimination by ethnicity, race, gender, or beliefs has improved the climate in a company or a country.  The notion that Hobby Lobby and Chick-fil-A can discriminate in their hiring practices because of their religious beliefs is unholy and delusional.  We have been though these times before.  They were not times when we were great.  They were times that we admit now were mistakes.  And yet, the delusional continue to want to return to those times ignorant or oblivious to history. 

And my hopes and projections for 2017?

My hopes: Truth will reign, bigotry will be replaced by efforts to increase civil liberties, wealthy people become engaged in supporting the US and withdraw from political ambitions, integrity means more than winning, and we review our past efforts in light of results and ethics. 

My projections:  I believe that Trump’s audacity and lack of global view will engage us in another military conflict.  I believe that Trump is better able to alienate than he is to ameliorate.  I believe the hostility between income groups, racial groups, gender groups and sexual preference groups will escalate.  I believe 2017 will be worse than 2016.

But as I prepare to celebrate Circumcision Day, rather than be totally depressed and very concerned about our nation, it occurs to me that it would be nice if I lost a few pounds next year.

Regardless, I hope your wishes and resolutions come to be and that yoiu feel OK when you wake up on Circumcision Day.

End of Public Education?

If you are a public school employee and you voted for Trump, this post is for you. 

First, some simple and verifiable facts.  Trump never attended a public school.  All his pre-college education was received in very expensive private schools.  Trump has vowed to end the public school monopoly of education.  He is pro school choice.  His choice for Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, is an unashamed opponent of public education who has never worked in a public school or public school system.  She is a billionaire and believes that charter schools and vouchers are the way to improve education.  Both Trump and DeVos are billionaire “school reformers.”  Both are hostile to public education.  Both want to see money earmarked for public education re-directed to charter school operators and parents via vouchers.

If Trump and DeVos have their way, the dismantling of public schools will not only continue, it will accelerate.  Four years of such an effort will decimate public education.

I suppose that first each of us must decide whether the idea of educating every child in this nation is a good idea.  Should we do as many other nations do and simply give a test at the end of 8^th grade that determines who gets to continue their education and who is done?  Should we do as private schools and charter schools do and simply expel students who are low-performing or trouble makers or are in need of special services?  Should we as a nation accept the notion that not all kids will get a high school diploma?  Should we as a nation accept the notion of vouchers so that people of wealth will not have to pay school taxes and private school tuition?  Should we as a nation accept the notion that public dollars may be used to duplicate the public school system in a charter school system that operates with much more flexibility than public schools?  Should we accept the notion that after years and years of data collection it is obvious that charter schools do not outperform public schools and that they can serve as a new tool for segregation?  If your answers to these questions, or even some of these questions, are “yes” then you voted for the correct candidate in the election.

If, on the other hand, you answered “no” to these questions then I surely hope you did not vote for Trump.  A source of real anger and confusion for me is the perpetrated belief that lack of expertise, training, education, knowledge and experience means less in the governing of public schools than wealth.  It is as though one earns a billion dollars and becomes qualified to “fix” public schools.  It is as though one wins an election and becomes qualified to “fix” public schools.  Both theories are seriously flawed.  Neither the wealthy and/or the winning candidate is qualified by the nature of their victory or wealth to make rules governing the medical profession, engineering profession, legal profession, or even ship-building or airplane manufacture, carpentry, plumbing or welding.  And yet we continue to listen to uneducated billionaires who propose a gross array of improvement and reform strategies.  If this were not so ludicrous it would be hysterical.  It is for me a declaration of ignorance to declare I can fix something that I do not understand and admit I do not even know what I do not know and that I do not need to learn.  Why in the world would we listen to the ignorant in an effort to improve the educational system?

Most sad to me is that it looks like we are going to get more money siphoned away from public schools and placed in the hands of the CEO millionaire charter schools and the pockets of wealthy parents who currently still pay school taxes.  As money leaves public education the number of public school employees will also drop.  As money leaves public education the performance outcomes of the most challenging students will drop.  As money leaves public education to flow to charter and private schools we are robbing the poor to feed the wealthy.  Even if charter schools outperformed public schools, which they do not, the real ethical question for me is how are those students remaining in public schools performing after the money has flowed elsewhere?  If charter schools and vouchers were the savior they are lauded as being we should see an improvement in the performance of all kids, those in charters and in private schools and in public schools. But if we see what we continue to see is that public school students suffer when money flows elsewhere, then simply backing strategies that we know harm a majority of the kids in the US is, by definition, immoral.

Unless you are OK with a “yes” answer to the questions in the fourth paragraph.  If you are, then you really do not believe in public schools at all.  If you are an employee of a public school and do not believe in public schools you should probably resign, or do so before your job is cut as the money flows elsewhere.  This nonsense must stop.  I for one want to see every single child in this nation receive a top-notch education in ways that do not line the pockets of charter school CEO’s and wealthy parents.  Unless there were an equal number of seats in charter and private schools to serve all the public school kids there will never really be school choice.  Such a rally cry is just money-driven smoke and mirrors.

Please support public education.  You can do so by opposing more charter schools and vouchers. You can do so by not voting for people who do support charter schools and vouchers.  It is too late for now to cast your vote for President, but in the next two years you will vote for school board members, and state and national legislators.  If the 300,000 employees of public education in Texas voted with one mind they would determine the election outcome.  It is time we do so.

Trump is Not New

Just read an interview with Steve Bannon, Trump’s appointed Chief of Staff.  He went on and on about how Trump gets it, he is a nationalist, that the globalists eliminated America’s middle class and created an Asian middle class.  He claims this is new thinking.  He wants to re-shape the Republican Party to align with Trump’s view.  Bannon believes this is revolutionary, new and in the best interest of the USA.

Poppycock.

There is absolutely nothing new in such beliefs or in the strategies triggered by such beliefs.  In fact, they are the oldest beliefs in the U.S.  Isolationism, protective economic practices, nationalism have been with us from the very beginning.  Add to such thinking a dash of prejudice and the belief that somehow white males should rule, and you have the exact arguments made in the following settings: 

Prior to the Civil War such arguments were made by southern legislators regarding the economic impact of freeing the slaves.  Their sense of globalism was the entire US.  Their sense of nationalism was the southern states.  Read George Fitzhugh’s position in 1854 and it sounds like Trump.  They rebelled and they lost.  Human rights prevailed over provincial thinking.

In 1918 the Republicans in Congress voted against the Treaty of Versailles effectively rendering the League of Nations without power.  They were isolationists and nationalists and did not want any part of an international organization dedicated to resolving international conflicts.  Read Henry Cabot Lodge’s speeches in 1918 and he sounds just like Donald Trump.

In 1939 the US was very reluctant to enter World War II.  94% of the American public opposed such entry into foreign entanglements on the heels of World War I.  The height of this isolationism was embodied in the Neutrality Act.  Hitler attacked Poland in 1939.  America did not join the war until 1941 with the attack on Pearl Harbor.  Though Democrats controlled both houses of Congress, Republican opposition to entering the war in Europe was very vocal.  The America First organization espoused tenets of isolationism and protectionism that read just like a Trump stump speech.  This organization had 600 chapters and hundreds of thousands of members. 

And on and on.  Trump’s ideas are not new.  They are old.  And they have shown failure at every step of the way.  Plans grounded in nationalism and isolationism and scientific denial and the persecution of minorities have historically failed.  If we must endure another round of such efforts here and now let’s at least admit this is not new, this is not making America Great Again.  The Trump platform is returning to failed policies of the past.

Trump Won. What Lost?

I love America.  I love democracy.  I firmly believe in the notion that the citizens of this nation speak at the polls and the majority rules.  But I also recognize that belief is based on the assumption of an educated electorate.  Trump won the election, and in doing so made clear to us not only who lost the election, but what lost in the election.  So this morning as I reel in shock and pain, these things are obvious to me:

• Inexperience won over experience and expertise and knowledge.

• Bigotry and prejudice won over civil liberties.

• Fear won over reason.

•  “Right” think and “right” belief won over pluralism, openness and support of diverse beliefs and thoughts.

•  Anger won over understanding.

•  Reprisal won over forgiveness.

•  Dictatorial thinking won over democratic thinking.

•  Isolationism won over global thinking.

•  Past won over possible futures.

•  The US government as our enemy won over the US government as protector of its citizens.

•  Chauvinism won over liberation.

•  False economic assumptions won over reality.

•  Support for the few won over support for the many.

•  False campaign claims won over the truth.

•  Retreat won over progress.

•  Ignorance won over enlightenment.

•  Closed doors and hearts and minds won over open doors and hearts and minds.

The Trump Presidency begins in January with Republican control of both houses of congress.  For the next two years the full responsibility for the progress or failure of our nation, our economy, our standing in the world, and the status of the poorest among us lies at their feet.  We will learn, as we have so many times in the past, that such philosophy when implemented benefits the rich, hurts the poor, triggers global conflict, and accelerates immoral market tendencies over decency and human liberties.  I hope we are OK in two years and have a chance to fix the problems that are coming.  But that will be up to the voters.  Again.

Two Donalds

You may remember Donald Sterling.  He was the owner of the Los Angeles Clippers.  In 2014 he was taped without his knowledge making racial slurs against African Americans.  These were not public statements.  These were statements made during an argument with his girlfriend.  When the tape got out it was labeled “scandalous”.  Sterling was fined $2.5 million dollars and ejected from professional basketball forever.  Wow. 

Donald Trump can stand at a public podium, covered by all available news sources, and intentionally make racial slurs, make slurs against women, make slurs against the disabled, etc.  He is not fined.  He is not banished from politics.  He is selected as the Republican nominee for President of the United States.

Times change.  Do values?

Clinton and Trump: Down to the Wire

The 2016 Presidential election ends next week.  None too soon for me.  I am sick of watching our nation tear itself apart over the most outlandish campaigns and candidates of the modern era.  This is one for the books and that book becomes the only one I would support burning.

We have a choice between a man who does not believe he can do anything wrong, say anything wrong or ever lose, and a woman who is very scared that someone might find out she did something wrong.  The man harkens back to a time as the model for future greatness that was a terrible time for anyone other than Anglo Americans with steady income and no disabilities.  The women dreams of a future time free of discrimination and rife with opportunity.  Their separate visions of the future are telling, and the model they would use to move toward their vision is equally telling.

Even when Trump was way behind in the polls his response was the polls are wrong.  Even when it appeared clear Clinton would win, he said if Clinton won the election must be rigged.  The man cannot fathom failure or misstep.  There is no compromise in him because he has never had to compromise.  He has never been put in a position other than the boss.  At the risk of being drafted, where he surely would not have been the boss, he dodged.  He does not want to be President as much as he believes he should be the boss of the USA.  He can insult anyone he wants because he is the boss.  He can assume any political or economic position he wants because he is the boss.  His model for male/female relationships was formed in the 1950’s when a woman’s place was in the home or on her back.

Clinton on the other hand has been shaped by the expansion of civil liberties in the 1960’s.  Women, children, minorities have all been the focus of her life’s work and work she has.  She is a Washington insider which may sound like a curse to many and a blessing to some.  She knows how to get things done.  But she carries baggage.  It is not the baggage of discrimination or misogyny, it is the baggage of mistrust arising from her emails, her handling of Benghazi while Secretary of State, and a bunch of random quotes taken out of context from speeches made years ago.  The American people are having a hard time forgiving her for lack of transparency while she claims to be the most transparent candidate. 

The main difference in the shortcomings of the two candidates is that Trump’s shortcomings are revealed via the words out of his own mouth and his own behaviors, while Clinton’s shortcomings are part of the narrative of the Republican Party who argues she is hiding something.  After months and months of hearings and investigations no agency has found any evidence that merits the prosecution of Clinton.  And yet the narrative has become so strong as to be believed by many.

I am oh so worried about this election, not because of whomever the winner is, but because this election will more than anything in recent history reveal America’s core values.  A Trump victory will send a loud and clear message regarding civil rights, inequality of wealth, consumer oriented protection agencies like OSHA, Office of Civil Rights, FDA, etc.  Those agencies will be abandoned while taxes on the wealthy will decrease.  Trump has said he will end the “monopoly” of public education.  Holy Cow.  It will also say that what Trump has said and done is forgivable, and perhaps worse, supportable.

The mere fact that the candidates appear to be running neck-and-neck down to the wire is as discouraging a piece of news as I have heard in a long time.  It should never have been close.  It should never have been Trump.  The fact that it is both is the scariest thing I can think of on Halloween.

Politically Correct is Morally Correct

It has been difficult for me to understand much of what is happening politically and socially in our nation right now.  In so many ways I am naive.  But with the latest discussion regarding Trump’s comments about women some of the fog in my mind has cleared.

My childhood included seeing three restrooms and two water fountains everywhere I went:  Men, women and colored, White and Colored.  I grew up in the Ozzie and Harriet world.  I grew up when every elected official south of the Mason Dixon line was a Democrat.  I grew up when smoking was cool.  My family did not own a TV until I was 8 years old and the shows were all black and white.  I grew up when the CEO and Congress were all men, almost all white men.  I grew up seeing the riots in Watts and at the Democratic convention in Chicago.  I grew up when there was both a draft and a war and women were not part of the effort except in voluntary support roles.  I grew up at a time when the locker room talk among high school boys and those men who did not mature beyond high school was similar to Trump’s comments.  I grew up at a time it was just assumed that women and Blacks were somehow inferior to white males.  I grew up in a time when people with special needs were ignored and kept at home.  I grew up in a time when being homosexual was a deep, dark secret.  I grew up in a time where using slang words for Muslims, Blacks and women was OK.  It was politically correct to use discriminatory language for any group that was perceived to be sub-white male:  wet-backs, niggers, fags, retards, pussies, camel jocks, and on and on.

I am naive in that I thought as a nation, as a pool of human beings, we had progressed beyond the acceptance of such nonsense in the 1950’s through the confrontation of such nonsense in the 1960’s to a world of accepting diversity, to a world where we all recognize that every race, every ethnic group, both genders, and people of various sexual preferences have the potential to make major, positive contributions to our world.  Contributions that are not grounded in characteristics determined at birth and religious belief or absence thereof, and determined by zip code.  More than that, I thought we had reached a time when we recognized the inherent worth of humanity.  I have been foolishly wrong.

I get it now when Trump says “Make America Great Again.”  He wants to return to the time when white men ruled and there was no such thing as being politically correct.  He can wave his arm and make derogatory remarks about all women and individual women and that should be OK.  He can wave his arm and make generalized statements regarding immigrants to this country.  He can mock people with special needs.  He can wave his arm and make generalized statements about any group that in his 1950’s mind merits a slang term. 

Political correctness, that is eliminating bias and discrimination from our speech and our behavior, is in fact moral correctness.  If one believes we can prejudge entire groups of human beings and lump them under some derogatory heading, then one feels freed from both political correctness and moral correctness.  And people who still harbor those old 1950’s notions that were part of our heritage at the time have not matured socially or morally.  Women did not earn the right to vote until 1920, and even then the vote was very close.  It was not until 1900 that women throughout the nation could own property separate from their husbands.  Blacks earned the right to vote in 1870, 50 years before women.  It has always been assumed in this nation that white males, especially white males who own property, have the right to vote and control.  Political correctness is our effort to express our moral correctness.  Any effort to return to the days of discriminatory language and behavior is, by definition morally wrong.

I hear pundits including women saying ignore Trump’s comments in all these areas.  Boys will be boys.  Poppycock and balderdash.  To forgive Trump is to sink to a moral depth we should have escaped by now.  To forgive Trump is to return to the time where discrimination was politically acceptable.  Such a regression is immoral.  It represents a culture and belief system that is immoral.  It represents our bigoted childhood which we should have abandoned long ago.  It should never, ever be the model we wish to re-establish.  It is wrong.

So, if it bothers you that I carefully edit my language to exclude discriminatory nouns and adjectives it is because I believe human beings regardless of characteristics deserve our respect.  Anything we say or do that implies some humans are inferior to or subordinate to other human beings is morally wrong.  Political correctness is moral correctness.  Abandoning that is not returning to a time of greatness.  It is sinking to a depth of moral morass from which we should have escaped to higher ground long ago.

Obama is a god

We are experiencing trying times.  Law enforcement officers are shot on the job.  Horrible, scary events that should never happen.  Unarmed men and women are shot by police.  Horrible, scary events that should never happen.  We see all this as a new problem.  It is not.  We have had separate but unequal races in this country for generations.  More of one race in prison.  More of one race dies via gunshot wounds.  More of one race experiences unemployment.  More of one race in colleges.  More of one race teaching in the classrooms.  More of one race in law enforcement.  We are lopsided.  We can scream all day that these differences are due to the behaviors of one race more than another.  Perhaps.  But we should be screaming that we must stop judging people by skin pigment, hair style, holes poked in their bodies, ink injected under their skin, and the relationship between their belly buttons and the top of their pants.  (I have contended all along that if teenage girls simply laughed at and refused to date any teenage boy who allowed his underwear to show above his belt the fad would disappear quickly.)

The problems are huge, both races have responsibilities.  Both races have tough steps to take to fix it because both races must modify their culture and their beliefs to end the disparity in data that confirms one race is treated differently and/or behaves differently than another.  That will be very hard.  Or so I thought.

Until I listened to my conservative friends.  Perhaps I should say my very conservative friends.  My moderately conservative friends and my liberal friends are not promoting the same message.  Just those folks on the far right.  Only they have seen the light.  And here is what they are saying.

The violence in our country is Obama’s fault.  Shooting police officers is Obama’s fault.  Increased racial tension is Obama’s fault.  Still no affordable universal health insurance is Obama’s fault.  Proliferation of semi-automatic rifles is Obama’s fault.  Probably sexual harassment at Fox News is Obama’s fault.  He caused it all.  He did it.  He is the villain!

If they are right, then Obama is God.  I have been praying to God to stop the violence, but Obama still made it happen.  I have been praying to God to stop senseless shootings of suspects and police, but Obama still made it happen.  Therefore I guess I should agree with my conservative friends that not only is Obama at fault, he is more powerful than we ever imagined.  More powerful than the god I followed.  It is time to worship Obama, pray to Obama, and ask him please to stop all the violence, all the killings.  If he caused it, he can stop it.  I am so surprised that enterprising right wingers have not marched out evidence of Obama’s deity status which should be easier for them to get than his birth certificate, and establish the Church of Obama, tax free. 

Why, now that we know Obama is a god the violence in France must be his fault too!  In fact, violence everywhere must be his doing.  Intolerance of other races everywhere must be his fault too!  Even global warming must be his fault. 

Yes dear conservatives, such a powerful deity merits our awe and respect.  Thank you for enlightening me.

Deplorables?

Clinton has ignited a lot of discussion this week identifying some Trump supporters as "Deplorables."  I disagree with Hillary.  The people, the human beings, that support Trump cannot be deplorable by definition.  However, they can hold deplorable beliefs and deplorable attitudes that inspire deplorable behaviors.  They carry the cancers that are eating away at our culture and I wish I knew the cure.  I have spoken to this issue already and re-post that piece from May of this year.  (At the time I wrote this piece I chose "cancer" as my metaphor for the diseases carried via the beliefs some hold.  Had I written it today I would have used STD's because if Trump is elected and institutes his vitriol we will all get screwed and thereby get sick.)

Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Trump Metastasizes Cultural Cancers

Donald Trump has secured the number of Republican delegates to become the Republican nominee for President of the United States.  Wow.  Trump could be our next President.  If so, I believe our nation will survive.  However, I believe we will do an about face on the march to a healthier nation, a better nation, a world leader, and a nation that stands for what is right.  We would become a sick nation if Trump were elected President.  I am aghast that so many do not see this.  Or perhaps it is not that so many do not see it, it is that so many want to endorse and spread the diseases Trump promotes.  I will use the term cultural cancers to attempt to capture the nature of those diseases.  Diseases that make us weak and make us sick.

But before that, we need to discuss the attributes of a healthy national culture.  As I think about America I want a nation of people who value diversity.  People who do not discriminate based on any variable that is determined at birth including gender, sexual preference, gender identity, race, and ethnicity.  I picture a nation where people do not discriminate based on many attributes that are self-selected such as religious preference, hair color, addictions and weight.  I picture a nation of people who promote and protect the minority, the underdog, knowing that God does not make junk.  I picture a nation of people who stand for justice, who do not shoot from the hip, who do not judge at first glance, and who respect the law and the peacekeepers.  I picture a nation of people who are positive, open, welcoming and free of fear.  I picture a nation of people who are generous to all who are in need whether they are our own or are victims abroad.  I picture a nation where protecting your rights means more to me than implementing my beliefs in law.  I picture a nation of people who value the arts, creativity, knowledge and learning.  I picture a nation of people who understand that by protecting industries such oil and guns that we are hurting everyone and are spreading cancers.  I picture a nation where human beings mean more than wealth accumulation.  I picture a nation where the people know that we should judge our success by the fate and status of the least among us.  And I picture a nation who will stand for democracy and human rights abroad.  Those are attributes of a healthy culture and a culture where I would want to live.

But cultures can be sick, can be cancerous.  The cancers I fear in our culture are those attributes that are the antithesis of those listed above.  Discrimination, prejudice in any form is a cancer.  Insistence that my way is the right way is a cancer.  Demanding that my religious beliefs entitle me to discriminate, to judge, to damn others and demanding that such beliefs whatever they are become the law of the land.  Believing that building walls against other human beings based on geography and damning other human beings based on religious belief is a good thing.  It is not.  It is a cancerous belief.  Promoting strategies that help those who need it the least at the expense of those who need it the most is cancerous.  Promoting industries that are resulting in untold deaths and untold damages to our planet is cancerous.  Promoting fear to attain power is a cancer.  Promoting ignorance rather than knowledge is cancerous.  Promoting my way of thinking by attacking others is a cancer.  Sending the message that self-service and self-defense are superior to serving and defending others is a cancer.

You will likely not agree with everything I have listed both healthy and cancerous.  But those are my beliefs.  In a healthy culture it will be OK for me to have those beliefs and I will not merit assault.  Our culture grows ill if we attack folks with differing beliefs.

Given all that, Donald Trump is not promoting the attributes that I believe would make our nation healthier, happier and better.  He is promoting the spread of cancerous beliefs.  From his views of women, Mexicans, Muslims, the families of terrorists, foreign policy, gun accessibility and wealth accumulation he is metastasizing cancer in our national body.  It is my fervent hope that enough Americans see what Trump represents, rejects those notions, and when those Americans go to the polls in November they opt to stop the spread of cancers.

How do we stop promoting the spread of such cancers?  I do not believe chemotherapy will work.  Drinking more scotch will not make him go away.  It is going to take surgical amputation.  Such amputation is only accomplished by thoughtful educated voters.  This fall, please amputate the cancer.

Ambition and Integrity

Ambition.  The desire to get more, have more, rise higher, and improve one’s status and prestige and power.  A subset of ambition is a high sense of competition.  Most folks believe that people do not become CEO’s, governors, presidents, school superintendents, etc. without at least some detectable amount of ambition in their composition.  I see it clearly in Trump and clearly in Clinton.  That drive to excel, to be the alpha, to be the boss, to control, to be on top is very near the surface in both these candidates.  I have seen it very clearly in many of the educators I have worked with, especially administrators.

Integrity.  The commitment to do what is right, to tell the truth, to do no harm to any other, to honor and serve humanity.  Most folks believe that people do not become teachers, nurses, preachers, social workers, or counselors without a detectable amount of integrity in their composition.  I have seen it clearly in many of my fellow church members, in my fellow educators, especially teachers.  That drive to serve, to stand for what is best in all of humanity, to make lives of others better, and to do so with humility is near the surface in the folks we know who have integrity.

So my query is, can one have both ambition and integrity?  I am not so sure.

Among other activities I was in the band in high school.  I played the clarinet.  I loved playing in the band, I loved knowing I was a part of something bigger, something beautiful.  I really did not care about competition with fellow band members, I cared about the sound we were making together.  I sat first chair, placed there by an audition everyone took at the beginning of school.  The band director placed us based on our musicality and technical skill.  Deanie was second chair.  She was very competitive and felt from the beginning that she should have been first chair.  I did not care, first chair and second chair played the same music.  So after a couple of weeks of her loud sighs and deep moans, and what appeared to be real joy on her part when I missed a note or a beat, I asked her if she would really like to be first chair.  She said “yes.”  I said it was OK with me, and the next day when we walked into band Deanie sat first chair and I sat second chair.  My role in the band had not changed, my music had not changed, but I had won a new friend.  Deanie was all over herself thanking me.  The director came in and rehearsal started.  Suddenly he stopped and pointed out that Deanie and I were not sitting in our assignment chairs.  I told him that I had told Deanie she could be first chair, I did not care.  The director blew up and called us both in his office.  

His complaint was that he will make all chair decisions and he did not want anyone in his band who did not have the desire to improve.  I told him I had taken private lessons since 6^th grade, I practiced at least an hour each night, and I was fully aware that I was the best in the section, and that improving my ability to play the clarinet was very important to me, but that where I sat did not matter to me.  He blew up and asked me to leave the band.  I packed up my instrument, grabbed my books and went to the counselor to have my schedule changed, never again to play the clarinet or perform or march with the band.  And though I had been all region in band and won numerous UIL solo and ensemble awards, I was done.  I was re-assigned to speech and debate, and two years later won the state debate competition and oratory competition.  If there is competition someone wins and someone loses.  I had a great time in band and a great time in speech and debate.  The band director lost because he was so full of ambition and competition that he could not relinquish control.  He could not even picture making a decision for the greater good even if it meant self-sacrifice.

I have watched parents at little league games, boys and girls, football, baseball, softball; and parents of integrity regarding their kids in most settings become ambitious monsters if they believe their child has somehow been slighted, or has not been given enough playing time, or someone is picking on them, etc..  How many videos of fights at little league games do we have to watch to see ambition blinding reason.  When the desire to be the best at any cost drives our ambition, then we are willing to sacrifice even the most fundamental rules of human interaction to have our way.

I have seen parents of school children verbally assault school employees because they wanted something special for their kids.  Usually they could not recognize that universal fairness eliminates special treatment.  In cases of unusual needs, special treatment is warranted, but not because the parent perceives his or her kid to be gifted or somehow immune to the rules everyone else is asked to follow.  Such parents’ ambition for their kids blinds them to the integrity incumbent in any group setting.

I worked for 19 years in a Houston school district.  I had many roles from campus to central office leadership positions.  One weekend the superintendent, who was mad at one of us on the executive director level, re-assigned all of us by simply rotating executive directors from their current job to someone else’ job.  I ended assigned to take the job of a woman who loved program evaluation and assessment.  I would hate that job.  She was assigned to elementary instruction, and she hated that job.  My best friend was bumped from leading secondary instruction to staff development.  I could not remain in a system that advocated collaborative decision making, advocated involving the participants in decisions if the decisions affected them, and advocated everyone working in an area of their own interest while behind the scenes people were moved like pawns with no consultation or involvement.  I quit.  So did a dear friend who was moved to staff development.  She was most hurt by all of this and I could not tolerate such.  Ever since, I have watched the overly ambitious accept jobs at the expense of others, somehow rationalizing that if it is good for them it must be good. No, to accept a position that requires someone else who is competent to leave what they love is the epitome of high ambition and low integrity.  People of integrity would recognize what the system must value to effect such a change and leave that system.  I did.  Do no harm applies to others, not one’s self.

Through all the pain and agony and death and anger of 9/11 the only real joy was the unification of the citizens of this country, however brief, toward the same goals.  We honored first responders, those in the military, families who had lost loved ones, and stood in awe and celebration of individual self-sacrifice for the good of others.  Our definition of heroes changed. Heroes were now people of integrity.  They were not people of ambition.

I know that people of ambition tend to earn more money and sit in seats with greater power.   Or so it seems.  But for the rest of us working with or for people of ambition our respect drops substantially.  We most respect people who serve others more than self.  I am in shock every time I hear of a CEO getting a bonus while the company lays off workers.  There is no integrity in such a decision.  Only ambition. And any time someone tells you that they are the only one who can do it and that others are failures, it is an announcement of incredible ambition at the expense of integrity.  Any time a person’s list of accomplishments includes only those ventures that earned them more money or power they are not a person of integrity.  Give me a leader who strives if nothing else to do no harm.

So, I find it rare to see in any person an even balance of ambition and integrity.  When push comes to shove, people will jump either for self-service or service to others.  And in that jump we see their true colors.

Homework

Despite all we know we continue to assign kids homework.  I want to think that through with you and will do so via several scenarios.

I have just taught some brand new material and the kids did not have time to apply their new knowledge so I send them home to accomplish such an application.  Really?  You are willing for a kid to make a mistake with brand new material, a mistake that will take more time to un-teach than to teach?  You are willing to let the kid use trial and error, mom and dad, boyfriend and girlfriend to try to figure this stuff out?  I think you are nuts.  Don’t assign homework, and model and practice in class tomorrow.

I have just gone over a review of what will be on a major test in a few days.  I assign the kids a review sheet as homework to complete and turn in for a grade.  Really?  If the kids knows the stuff they will simply be frustrated doing busy work on content where they have already demonstrated mastery.  If the kids do not know it, completing a review sheet won’t teach it.  Or, if completing a review sheet could teach it, why not hand it out at the beginning of the unit and take a few days off.  Nope, if you want to be sure your kids know what they need before the test you have waited too late to find that out just a day or two before.  Don’t assign the homework and work on ways to spiral past knowledge into each lesson to keep previous learnings fresh.

I want to teach some content yet to be introduced so I assign the kids to read the next chapter and answer the questions at the end so they will be familiar with the content before I teach.  Really?  If that worked you do not need to teach.  Just let them read.  (This is the shortfall of many on-line courses.)  You would be so much better off to introduce the concepts and terminology yourself so that you know the kids have a good scaffold to build on from previous learning.  You waste their time asking them to read what they do not know. 

There are caveats to these scenarios.  If, for instance, I am introducing a literary form or process or characteristic it seems perfectly appropriate to ask the kids to read content prior to the class where you teach it.  You are not asking the kids to understand your form or process or characteristic.  You are providing background knowledge that it can become hooks to hang new knowledge on. 

Likewise, if I am introducing the philosopher John Locke it seems perfectly OK for kids to Google him before class so that we have rich resources to share when we discuss his influence on the USA.

Likewise, if a teacher wants the kids engaged is some sort of summative project, a research paper, a science fair project, a welding project, an art project or practice for a UIL musical event, etc., then assigning the bulk of that work to be done outside of class with careful monitoring during class makes sense to me.

Likewise, if I am a math teacher and math teachers just give homework every night then it seems – no wait a minute – that seems like a total waste of every one’s time.  If the kid knows it there is little reason to practice.  If they do not know it practicing won’t help.  If they can teach themselves how to solve the problems what the heck are we paying you for?

In other words, most of the homework assignments I have observed over the past 40 years have been a total waste of time and energy.  Do not tell me you are teaching kids responsibility.  Especially if you use some kind of punitive system for those who blew-off, forgot or whose canine consumed their homework.  If you are willing to practice such negative effects in the name of teaching responsibility just let me know and I will set up a punitive system for every day you are late to work, stay at lunch too long, leave campus without signing out, fail to turn in lesson plans on time, or forget your assigned duty.  If punishment works to teach responsibility by now all the teachers should be master models of responsibility, and we all know that is not always true.  Holding kids accountable for the completion of homework is rewarding or punishing a clerical task, not a learning task, and that is not what we should be teaching!

Homework does not work.  If it did, that is all we would ever need to do.  Let go of your urge to socialize kids with appropriate responsibility using homework as a tool.  Homework is a terrible tool to teach that skill or knowledge, and there are other tools so much more powerful.  If you are bogged down in grading make a list of the things you have learned about the kids’ knowledge from grading their homework.  You will learn individual attributes, but if the entire class save one can do it, there was no point in assigning it.  And vice-versa, if the entire class cannot do it save one, there was no point in assigning it.

I would posit one more ground rule.  Never assign a kid homework that you ignore, that you cannot do, or that you do not intend to grade.  Any of those no-no’s sends a quick message to kids that you really don’t care and the clerical is more important than real learning.  I believe deeply the same is true for any book a student reads.  If you have one of those ultra-expensive non-effective reading programs where kids read, take a test, get points, ad naseum then you better darn well have read every book they are reading and you better darn well be able to answer the questions on the computer.  If you do that you will quickly learn that some of those books merit classroom discussion, so wouldn’t it be nice if we all read the same book at the same time.  Last time I checked the only people who claim good results with these sorts of programs are hired by the authors and vendors of the programs.  Much like the only “scientists” who deny human influenced climate change are paid by oil companies.  Go figure.

OK.  I want you all to go home and think about this and write a 900 word response by tomorrow, with appropriate heading and use of APA style.

I don’t think the above assignment will help, do you?

How about, consider your homework assignments.  Can you confirm learning using another strategy?  Can you teach using another strategy?  Can you foster accountability using another strategy?  And it may come as a shock to some, but grades can be awarded for things other than paper.

I believe all your answers will be yes.

You get an A!  My work here is done.

Beef Loving Texans

Have you seen the advertisement for Beef Loving Texans?  This ad pops up and plays first when I click on a video I want to watch on CNN or wherever.  I have seen it on TV as well.  It is a wonderful, pastoral scene.  Set on a large ranch, a tall, thin Anglo male in western dress plays with his Anglo boy and girl in a great outdoor expanse with a background of round bales of hay strewn across the field, while the attractive Anglo mother works dutifully at home.  The narration talks about Texas and our values and our history and how much we value eating beef.  The final shot shows the family gathered around the table as the father slices a nice rare brisket.

I thought it was a joke the first time I saw it, and was laughing before it ended.  Only then did I realize this ad was serious.  It is the most gross stereotyping I have seen in a long time and completely oblivious to the current reality of Texas.

These folks are not typical Texans by any stretch of the imagination.  The typical Texan is a Latino who lives in an urban area and rents an apartment.  He or she does not own land, much less a ranch.  Where are the real Texans in this ad?  Where are the Blacks, the urban dwellers, the McDonalds eating Anglos?  No, this is visual painting of the nation’s stereotype of Texas and it is false.

Worse, if the target audience is Anglos and no one else, because of the income disparity in Texas most of those with enough education are vegetarians, not meat eaters.  Is the point here to convert healthy Texans to a food source that will hurt them?  Is the point here to let our majority/minorities know that beef is only for white folks?  That owning land is only for white folks?  That a typical family is a rugged cowboy like husband, attractive rancher mom and 2.0 kids, one a boy and one a girl and only they should eat beef after they have romped unfettered on their family’s huge spread?

I eat beef.  I know it is not good for me, but I eat beef.  Why must the beef industry promote such narrow thinking in an effort to sell their product?  Or, is the ad a subtle ploy by wise thinkers to encourage the dinosaurs among us to eat more beef so that their extinction is accelerated?

Is It Possible?

As I watch the news and read Facebook it appears to me I must live in a parallel universe.  Evidently, I believe contrary and contradictory things.  Deeply.

Is it possible that I truly respect, value, admire and support our law enforcement officers while hating every single time an unarmed person dies at the hands of police, especially Blacks?

Is it possible that I truly respect, value, admire and support our armed services and our veterans while hating the wars that they have been sent to fight, especially when I see those wars as politically motivated?

Is it possible that I support private gun ownership while hating how easy it is for anyone to get a gun and the sheer number of guns out there?

Is it possible that I have deep religious feelings while hating any believer of anything who wants to force their beliefs on someone else and believes that their beliefs are the only acceptable beliefs?

Is it possible that I deeply support the right of everyone to have their own opinions and attitudes while hating attacks on anyone else’s opinions as though people who think differently are fools and idiots?

Is it possible that I love America and deeply support the Constitution while hating the attacks on our own government from within and the unwillingness to support dissidence even if one disagrees with the dissidents?

Is it possible that I am a financially comfortable heterosexual Anglo male while hating poverty, bigotry and discrimination based on race, gender, and gender identity?

Is it possible that I promote reading, writing, and thinking on divergent topics and with divergent sources while hating those who would censor anything shared with kids at school that is in opposition to their own beliefs?

Is it possible to support a market economy while hating greed as a motivator and immoral production to enhance wealth without oversight?

I believe all of these beliefs are possible because I hold the all these beliefs.  However, my experience remains that if I do not think like the majority I am by definition an evil fool for whom harassment, name calling, and banishment must be justified.  Sadly, such behavior on the part of others continues to re-affirm my beliefs.

Yes, it is possible.  It is just not easy.  

Teachers Know

First day of school.  Parents don’t know what is in store for their children this year.  Principals kind of know, superintendents don’t know, school boards don’t know, legislators don’t know and billionaires for sure don’t know.  Teachers know.  Only teachers know.  Teachers have the map, they know the journey of this year, and they look at their students as passengers and fellow-travelers on this journey.  Teachers will quickly learn where the journey starts for each student and how far each must go to successfully arrive.  And in that way a relationship is formed with each student.  There are some who will promote high priced computer assisted instructional programs for kids.  Alas and alack, those may help somewhat, but they are incapable of forming a relationship with the kids and are, in my humble opinion, mostly a waste of money.  Teachers do not survey their classroom and see the kids as a lump, as a group, as a large blur who somehow represent lots of little data sets.  Teachers see each and every student.  Only teachers know the necessary journey in each class with each student.

In addition to teaching kids the actual content, teachers learn that some kids may have a tough time growing up as they need to this year.  There are steps, there are milestones, kids need to accomplish.  Some kids will have a tougher time taking the next step than other kids.  Most likely those kids will have it harder because their parents really do not want them to grow up.  They want their children to remain dependent on them.  They want to protect their kids, spoil their kids, earn the love of their kids and hopefully their kids will return to the roost and take care of them in later years.  Parents like these want to be the first line of defense against a teacher who does not understand their child and somehow their child feels unappreciated and non-rewarded by some task-master teacher.  Sadly, the teacher will know that child better in many ways than the parent.  Whatever the crime perceived by a parent from picking on my kid, to failure to turn in an assignment, the teacher will view the crime as an instructional and emotionally developmental issue, not some kind of personal affront.  I remember my guffaw when a parent said, “But Johnny never lies to me!” and/or, “Sally would not be caught dead with a boy like that.”  And, if the parent appeals a ruling and explanation beyond a truly professional teacher, woe to a principal who backs the parent and not the teacher.  Why?  Because teachers know. 

When a parent or a community member or a board member approaches a principal or a superintendent regarding the performance of a kid, or an issue with the kid, or the performance of a whole group of kids, the principal and the superintendent do not know the setting, context and events leading up to the incident.  He or she has no clue what has transpired in the classroom, what the teacher expects and what the student has done.  Superintendents and principals tend to be risk avoidance type folks and do not want to make parents mad or board members mad or legislators mad, so the administrator is likely to say he or she will look into it.  If they are really wimps they worry about making the athletic director mad.  But that’s just silly.  The AD works under the supervision of the administration.  Supes and principals that support AD’s over teachers end up all tangled up in complicated mixed loyalties.  I have actually heard of athletic directors who would call an ARD to change a kid’s IEP just so they could play Friday night.  Such bastardization of the purpose of schools is both sinful and illegal.  Athletic Directors do not know.  Superintendents and principals should simply say, “Talk to the teacher first.”  Why?  Because the teacher knows.

Every day, likely for at least an hour, this highly trained and educated adult interacts with a group of kids.  Some of these groups are way too large, some are small.  Some are 4 years old, some are 18.  But in every single instance, the teacher knows what is to be done, what is to be learned, what is to be experienced, what is to be thought about, what is to be created.  And in every single instance the teacher monitors the progress of these 20 or 30 or (Lord help them) 40 or more kids move from step 1 to step 2.  The teacher sees those who leap.  The teacher sees those who do not want to go on and want to retreat.  The teacher sees those who move only if cajoled, bribed, or threatened.  The teacher sees.  And the teacher knows.

Somewhere, way outside the classroom, a school board member is saying not all kids need to go to college.  He is wrong in the sense that all kids need to be prepared to go to college.  The gap between middle class and upper middle class is drawn by those who have a college degree.  The days of earning high income via a skilled trade are virtually gone, and if we are not preparing every single student to attend and be successful in college we are doing a terrible disservice to those kids and their parents.  We need to totally debunk the argument that "some kids are just not made to go to college."  That is BS.  Successful college grads do not all love college, reading, writing, thinking, homework and long essay tests.  Saying kids should be exempt from college preparation because that is outside their make up is equivalent to telling Uncle Sam you did not file a tax return this year because math is just not your thing.

Somewhere way outside the classroom a school board wants to see standardized test results assuming that somehow that is good measure of what the teacher did.  They are wrong.  Teachers do not take those tests.  And the results for students are spurious at best.  The linkage between the teacher and the student's performance is mostly poppycock and balderdash.  The strongest link we know relative to student performance on a high stakes standardized test is not the teacher-student link.  It is the parental income link, the zip code link, the racial identity link.  To argue that a great teacher failed to get all students to pass the test is as silly as arguing that the oncologist did not prevent lung cancer in all his patients that smoke. 

Somewhere way outside the classroom a legislator is thinking public schools would be better if they competed with charter schools.  He or she is wrong.  Teachers frankly do not worry about nor care what is going on in the next wing, much less what may be going on in some other facility designed to make entrepreneurs rich at the expense of public schools.  There is no sense of competition because we all know who works in those schools, and we know they could not hack it in our school.  We know at conferences we do not come to sit at their feet to learn.  It is the other way around. Somewhere, way outside the classroom, multi-billionaires sip brandy and decide to fund their own little experiments in schools, all of which, again I say, all of which have failed.  Making money does not make one smart or a skilled educator.  Getting elected does not make one smart or a skilled educator.  Being a teacher makes one smart.  Being a teacher for a while makes one a skilled educator. or a teacher drop out.

Teachers know. They know the kids, the curriculum, the challenges, and the measures.  No one knows this better than that teacher with those kids in that subject this period.  Period. 

So before you propose some cock-a-mammy cure or program for public education just shut up and ask a teacher.  And if you are making plans to "improve" a school you better ask the teachers.  And if you are even building a new facility you better ask the teachers.  Why?

Because teachers know.

Have a great year.

Hill Yes

I will vote for Hillary Clinton.  That should come as no surprise to those who have been reading this blog and Tardy Belle before this one.  But I live in Texas and that means most of my friends and neighbors, people I know and like, will either enthusiastically vote for Donald Trump or will vote for him as the lesser of two perceived evils.  This post is for my conservative friends, the folks who plan to vote for Trump, and serves less as an apology and more as an explanation of my Hillary support.  I believe I am not crazy and it is important to me that you know that I am not crazy.

I start with the following assumptions, any one of which you may challenge, but to practice full disclosure I must declare these up front.  Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are both human beings.  Ambitious human beings.  Neither are perfect.  Both have proven their humanity through a series of mistakes and half-truths and misdirections.  If we wait for a candidate who is perfect we will never vote.  Therefore, as I make a decision about voting, I discount the claims from the other side about the evil in each candidate.  I set their human traits aside.  I set aside the Republican talk about emails and Benghazi and the Democratic talk about walls, discrimination and tax returns.  I set their looks aside.  I set their ethnicity aside.  I set their gender aside.  They are human.  That should not be a variable in my decision making unless it is an extreme example of flawed human behavior like child molestation, murder, etc. 

So, unlike many of my fellow Americans, I do not believe in voting for the “best person”.  (I think it is real progress that we used to say we will vote for the best man.  Not this year.)  All candidates are human.  And it is impossible to really know a candidate.  We may know what their campaign headquarters wants us to know about both the candidate and the competition, but I really do not know Trump or Clinton as people.  To say I will vote for this person over that person because they are a better person is ludicrous.  To say I will vote for this person because of their gender or race or religious belief is an admission of prejudice, pre-judging, a practice I will not support.  And so, if I will not attempt to select a candidate based on what I think of them as people, how shall I choose?

The key variable in the selection process for me is philosophy.  I see myself as a protestant Christian.  When I move to a new town I do not check out the Catholic churches, the synagogues, or the mosques.  I check out protestant churches even if the most dynamic, impressive pastor around is Jewish I will not attend that church as it is not of my faith.  It is the same with politics.  I will not vote for the person based on affability or my personal connectivity to them, it will be the person who believes as I believe.

There are two major prevailing beliefs or philosophies in our nation, conservative and liberal.  Once I know if I am a conservative or a liberal, candidate selection and support becomes simple.  I see these philosophies through the following lens.  Both philosophies look to a system to resolve conflict, make decisions and promote health and well-being.  The conservative philosophy looks to the individual first to solve his or her own problems, and then to the market place to resolve all other issues and provide all other services.  The system conservatives fear the most and oppose the most is the “government.”  They oppose the growth of government and the intervention of government and the services provided by the government.  They would much prefer that individuals take care of themselves and that free enterprise take care of everything else.

Liberals on the other hand look to the government to solve problems, resolve conflicts and provide services.  Liberals do not fear government intervention, in fact, they support it in areas of injustice and poverty.  Liberals do not oppose the market in the ways that conservatives oppose the government, but liberals are skeptical of the market because those who make market decisions are not elected by the voters and those who control the market are more interested in making money than providing for the common good.  Hence, liberals see the market as immoral, an entity to be monitored.  If one can make money by cutting corners on production, paying labor less money, moving production overseas, ignoring consumer and worker safety, etc., etc. then the market will do so in the name of monetary gain regardless of the human cost .  Liberals will support market oversight and regulation, they will support providing aid to the hungry and shelter for the homeless and mental health support for the disturbed.  Liberals will support governmental provided services such as public education, law enforcement, water certification, food inspection, highway construction, and universal health care while conservatives tend to see all those programs as boondoggles at the expense of the tax payer.  If the government provided fewer services it would be smaller and cheaper leaving more money in the hands of those who have more money to begin with and need those services the least.

(As an aside, several things have fascinated me over the years.  First, conservatives perceive themselves to be the American super patriots while attacking their own government, shrinking their own government, and even shutting down their own government.  Second, despite all the research on government provided services, conservatives still believe that public sector services should be provided by the private sector.  They support charter schools and private sector prisons, etc.  And most amazing to me of all is that citizens who are employed by the government consider themselves conservatives despite the fact that their checks come from the government and from tax payers.  Teachers and law enforcement folks who consistently vote conservatively clearly must support the reactionary interpretation of the second amendment or they could not do such a good job of shooting themselves in the foot.)

As you know, or may have guessed, I am a liberal.  I have seen first-hand what happens when market forces are not monitored, when schools are not funded, when food inspection is not thorough, when work place safety is not enforced and when industry lays off American workers to move overseas to make more profit.  Our economical crash in 1929 happened after 8 years of conservative policies that were summarized by the expression, “What is good for business is good for the USA.”  Our economical crash in 2008 happened after 8 years of conservative policies that dramatically reduced government oversight of Wall Street and the banking industry.  Clearly every time we do that we head for a crash because the market is not ethical, it is not moral, and it will do whatever makes the most money for some very few people.

I love our country.  I love our government.  I love knowing I can turn on the faucet and drink the water.  I can safely buy meat and vegetables.  I can drive a car with required safety and anti-pollution features.  I can apply for work, attend school, open a bank account, and/or buy property without concern regarding my race, gender or religious preference.  I love driving down the interstate highways and seeing power grids.  I do not feel as though my freedom has been limited by the fact that I stop on red and go on green.  Yep, I’m a liberal. 

I understand if you make more than $350,000 per year voting conservative may be tempting in a self-serving sort of way.  If you make less than that and vote conservatively you are hurting yourself, but that is your prerogative.  I understand that if you think the main role of government should be to provide for the common defense and the government should get out of every other facet that you are a conservative.  If so, it is my hope that you have the funds to provide all your own health care and safe water and safe food and private education and your own law enforcement.  I do not understand if you are a conservative and oppose human beings coming to the this country who are responding either to the market, i.e., they come for more economical opportunity, or people who come here pursued and persecuted by terrorists and madmen who rule other governments.  It would seem to me that conservative philosophy would most support an influx of cheap labor and those who are persecuted by their governments.  But it is the liberals who have a hard time labeling human beings born on planet earth as aliens.

Bottom line is to whom do you turn to solve our problems, resolve conflicts, set foreign policy, and implement strategies to improve life in America?  If it is mostly private sector and you fear the government you are likely a conservative.  If it is the government and you believe we should monitor the private sector you are most likely a liberal.

So, Donald Trump is for the most part a conservative.  Hillary Clinton for the most part is a liberal.  Trump is not as conservative as Barry Goldwater, nor is Hillary as liberal as Bernie Sanders.  But Trump leans right and Clinton leans left.  My decision to support Hillary is based on my philosophy and the fact that she is most likely to implement my philosophy.  If that sounds logical to you, then you know I am not crazy.

If not, if you believe you should vote based on your guts and your bias, then I probably still seem crazy to you.  Just know, however, I may not be the crazy one.

Worder Boreding and Other Professional Development Tortures

Soon, if not already, teachers will be reporting back to work to initiate school year 2016-2017.  This annual migration is always full of anticipation, anxiety and dread.  There will be new staff to meet, a room to get ready, and plans to be made.  There will also likely be donuts and luncheons and that will be a good thing because it won’t be provided again for months and months.  And while teachers are totally mentally pre-occupied with preparing their rooms and organizing for kids yet to come, administrators may be planning a host of activities, presentations, speakers, etc., that will do more than rob teachers of the precious time they need.  Such activities may be pointless, or worse, harmful to the professional staff. 

The worst atrocities committed against professional educators may occur in the time set aside for their professional preparation.  Professional Development may earn the descriptor, “oxymoron” if non-professionals have planned it, or school administrators without training in staff development have planned it.  In many cases it is designed to meet the wants, wishes and needs of the administrators and the requirements of the state, and has virtually no benefit at all to the teachers. 

For a professional educator to return to work after a summer break, full of energy and ideas for his or her classroom and learn that the next few days will be spent in professional development hell is one of the great discouragers of teachers.  Some of these sessions will be excruciating.  They will be professional development torture.  I have identified and named a few:

Media Misery

Somebody, somewhere thought it would be a good idea to show a tape, a DVD, a movie to either inform or inspire staff.  So a bunch of people with college degrees gather in some spot where all can see or hear and sit zombie-like while some media plays.  Sadly, the research is very clear.  Such a shotgun approach is rarely heard by teachers.  Why would I want to know what motivates football teams when I teach 6^th grade math?  Why would I want to know how to clean blood borne pathogens when I will never be called on to do so?  This does not apply to me and I turn it off in my head.  And sadly if I am called on to address the issue because a kid has a nosebleed I do not remember what to do because the professional development was more like media misery than learning.  Some, however, will be seriously listening and taking notes.  They will be surprised to know that by the time kids show up they have forgotten all about the media, and come next June when they find the notes they will simply throw them away. 

This all makes perfect sense.  Asking returning staff to watch a disconnected movie while they are already feeling stress about the preparation for the coming year is like forcing a bride to watch an investment strategy tape at the rehearsal dinner.  She just doesn’t care.  Not now.  Other things are much more important.  Media misery is planned by folks who do not know professional development and thereby they torture their staff before the year really begins.

Computer Cruciation

Oh boy!  We bought new software this summer to take care of the problems we were having with the old software.  Of course, by the end of the year we all found work-arounds and everything was humming right along.  But we decided to install an entirely new system so that everyone can look like an idiot other than the IT guys and the superintendent who was told by other superintendents who do not have a clue that this is the software to have.  Teachers must learn this to report attendance, grades, etc. but they resent having this task forced on them when they have so much else to do.  Can’t we ever wait and let teachers select the software and plan the implementation process?  No.  Involving teachers in decision-making is too threatening to someone with a clipboard somewhere.  So even if the software is the latest and greatest and should help kids, handing it to me, telling me I have to learn it, and taking up my time before school really upsets teachers and rightly so.  So we torture teachers on a desktop, or a lap top, or on a tablet of some sort. Regardless, it is torture. 

(If teachers are required to watch something on a computer to learn it, perhaps to take a test at the end, then all the comments about media misery apply plus testing people like giant Accelerated Reader kids.  How insulting!)

PowerPoint Persecution

I was the director of staff development in a large mid-urban school district in 1987.  I remember the arrival of a Macintosh computer on my desk in central office.  It had the first iteration of PowerPoint installed, as the software was written first for the Mac.  It was so easy and intuitive.  I could develop a presentation, add media, move slides around, etc., and print my presentation as a handout.  In other words, everything I knew to be wrong with presentations was now made easier by PowerPoint and I used it because it was so pretty and easy.  I used it for years and years until it dawned on me that by projecting stuff I might be undermining what I knew to be good professional development techniques. 

It is hard to go to a convention, a workshop or a faculty meeting without seeing a PowerPoint. In some cases these projections promote real learning and real professional development.  In other cases they are just fancy ways to tell participants to sit down and shut up because I know stuff you don’t know and I’m going to tell you using these fancy slides on my computer.  In such a case, teachers and others suffer from PowerPoint Persecution, another form of professional development torture.

Worder Boreding

I have saved the most typical and most tortuous strategy for last.  Talking.  Speaking.  Lecturing.  Using words to bore teachers to near death.  Worder boreding.  Invite a guest speaker or a so-called motivational speaker, have a captive audience sit at his or her feet, and for 30 minutes to hours on end have him or her tell them their story, their specialness, and what the audience ought to do because the speaker is so special. 

If this strategy worked it would work at church.  It doesn’t.  People do not leave church, sell all they have and hop on the next boat to remote regions to witness.  If it does not happen in church, it is not going to happen.  A motivational speaker is not hired to motivate staff because he or she cannot and their mere presence makes it less likely that staff will be motivated.  A motivational speaker is a person who is motivated to entertain an audience at some exorbitant fee and never be held accountable for outcomes.  It is a great life to be a motivational speaker.  And yet it eventually dawns on the audience that if I am in an organization where I am not valued, where promotion is based on who you know rather than what you do, where prestige is determined by how well one brown-noses, then no amount of motivational speakers are going to encourage me this coming year.  If the boss hires a motivational speaker it is an admission that the boss cannot motivate.  In fact, because the boss brought them in is an admission that something is wrong.  Frequently, what is wrong is a total misunderstanding of a professional organization devoted to learning.  If there is a morale problem or a motivation problem let’s take the easy way out and hire a speaker rather than really address the issues.  I have observed that the weaker the system the more they talk about motivation.  Stronger systems that exist to promote involvement, purposeful work, and shared decision-making do not evidence poor motivation and do not seek to import such a quack.  Easy for me to say as I made quite a bit of money as a motivational speaker, but that is another story.

Anyone who believes what they say to a group is likely to make a difference is deceiving themselves and torturing the group.  That is not how a sermon works.  That is not how a lecture in a classroom works.  That is not how a good faculty meeting works.  It takes leaders trained in collaborative decision making and not leaders trained in water boarding or worder boreding.

So, what are some good professional development techniques?  Glad you asked. 

Content specific staff development is almost always powerful.  Let the English teachers meet with each other and perhaps an outside facilitator to talk about the issues in teaching English and where they might find new resources to help.  That strategy works great

Study groups work great.  A group of professionals adopt a source of inspiration and read it and talk about it and seek to apply it to their professional lives.

Shared observation works, sometimes with mentors, sometimes with coaches.  When a teacher knows he or she has a professional friend who is more experienced and more successful then helpful ideas are welcomed.  Not so much if it is a guru from the state education agency or a Hollywood star neither of whom have ever taught what I teach.

Action research works.  Teachers are puzzled by either the success or lack of success of something they are doing in the classroom.  As a group they seek to discover research relevant to their puzzle and collect their own data to form their own research conclusions.  This can be so powerful that it is scary.

Sharing days where teachers of similar subjects and similar kids can share what they do, how they do it, and what resources they have.  Technology can be embedded in such a day.  The most powerful staff development is when teachers talk with fellow teachers.

Perhaps you noticed that in none of those powerful, successful professional development strategies is an administrator required to say or do anything other than unlock the doors, turn on the lights and make sure the resources are available.  That is very, very hard for some administrators who suffer from the notion that they were promoted to administration because they knew something teachers did not know and teachers were eager to sit at their feet and learn.  Poppycock.  Want to be a successful administrator?  Serve teachers, serve kids.  Bossing teachers and bossing kids does not work.

It is my fervent wish that every teacher returning for duty this fall walks into a building and/or a system that understands the above and is not likely to torture them in professional development.  If the administration has been trained, has knowledge, and has wisdom there is an odds on chance that teachers will in fact grow in such a rich environment.  The opposite, sadly, is also true.

If we plan pre-school days to support and serve teachers rather than to give them some administrative message we are light years ahead in the process of establishing a successful school system.  Any other strategy may work at General Motors or Alcoa, but those are not professional organizations and to take advice from folks in the private sector on such critical issues is tantamount to allowing the mother of the groom to run the wedding. 

Big mistake.