Grading Schools, Grading Society?

I WAS GETTING MY HAIR CUT LAST SATURDAY and while waiting had time to read a good portion of the Cincinnati Enquirer. One story noted that President Obama’s “approval ratings” were going up. That’s good.  

I usually vote Democratic. 

There was a story about Joey Votto and how the Reds’ playoff loss stings. A third article focused on a missing bulldozer and driver down in Kentucky after his machine slid off a steep embankment into a coal slurry pond. That sounded a lot worse than losing a deciding fifth game to the Giants. 

I also had time to read two stories that touched on education. The headline on one read:  “What Makes a Grade A School?” The other might not have looked like an education story; but considering the other it was:  

“Teen Inmate Seeks Parole in Resentencing.”

 

I suppose I could say, “Hell, I’m retired. Why do I care?” But it troubles me that in Ohio and elsewhere, politicians believe we can grade schools in simplistic ways. The school where I taught, Loveland Middle School, would doubtless earn high marks from the State of Ohio under the new system. (Rich, suburban district’s usually do.) I’m just not sure what that proves. We had our slice of dysfunctional families and messed up kids; but for the most part, I was seeing bright, motivated teens come through my door. 

So, how do you measure schools? Based on the dropout rate? We now have a system that says you do. I scratch my head on that one. Can a teacher make a kid drop out of school? A teen can join a gang and get in trouble with the law and drop out, as a result. A teen can get pregnant by mistake and drop out of school. A teen can get addicted to drugs and drop out. Is this the fault of the school? 

I once had a student (a really nice kid, too) who, by the time I had him in eighth grade, had piled up an incredible record of unnecessary absences. In seven years in the Loveland City Schools, John had racked up 452 missed days of class. 

That’s the equivalent of 2 1/2 years. So, do we grade the school in this situation, if John fails to make adequate yearly progress? The new system says we do. (I’m thinking we grade his parents. Or maybe we grade pediatricians!) If you’re not a teacher, you might believe kids like John are rare.  

You would be mistaken. 

A study recently for the Chicago Public Schools found that the “average” student was out of class 26 days each year. That means for every kid who shows up diligently and misses 1 or 2 or 4 days, you have another who misses 51, or 50, or 48. 

Try that at your job and see if the boss feels he deserves a failing grade based on your failure to appear for work.  

I TAUGHT A LONG TIME. I KNOW there are crappy teachers. I understand that; and we need to do the best job possible to get them out of America’s classrooms. But grading schools is a shotgun approach and a stupid idea.  

I also understand that teachers must try to save every child. I think I only gave up on one kid out of the 5,000 I taught during my career. 

That doesn't mean it isn’t ten times harder to save some than to save others and nearly impossible to save some. Since I taught seventh and eighth grade, I saw girls come to school who were pregnant; and many ended up wrecking their educations. That wasn’t the fault of teachers. I remember a girl, so wasted on drugs that she shit herself in class, passed out, and left our building on a stretcher. I remember a young man who came to us after release from juvenile detention. At the time he had the longest criminal record of any teen in Hamilton County. And his chances for a quality education were hardly enhanced one afternoon when he told his science teacher he was going to kill her. 

So, what do our politicians decide to do to address these kinds of problems, which, to a greater or lesser extent, beset all schools? Um....grade schools. 

How does the other story fit in, you ask? The one about the teen seeking parole? It involves the case of Emily Ball, 14, when she was charged with involvement in the murder of another teen, Travis White, 17. At a hearing to discuss her fate (now that she has turned 18 and is old enough to go to an adult facility) her public defender, Amanda Mullins explained to the judge: 

“I’m not here to talk about a 14-year-old Emily Ball whose life was characterized by violence and chaos and extreme poverty. We are here today to talk about the 18-year-old Emily whose life is now filled with growth and progress and hope.

 “This is a girl that has had an unwavering hope that life has something better in store for her. You have the opportunity today to let her continue to grow, progress and hope.”

 
As a former teacher I notice that line about a girl “whose life was characterized by violence and chaos and extreme poverty.” I worked in a good district but taught a few kids like that. My wife taught in a poor district and had to save all kinds of young kids like Emily Ball. 

Regardless, the prosecutor countered testimony in Ms. Ball's favor, calling retired Covington police Detective Mike McGuffey to the stand. Mullins had explained to the judge that while her client did lure White into ambush she left the scene before she knew what was going to happen.

McGuffey disagreed: 

“[He explained that] Emily left only after the ambush began and then returned three times to check on the progress. McGuffey knew this because Emily’s whereabouts was being tracked by an ankle monitor she was ordered to wear because she was a habitual truant.

 “He had never investigated a crime where someone was so severely beaten during his 26 years in law enforcement.

 “McGuffey recounted finding the ‘huge’ wrench, hammer and baseball bat used to kill Travis, whose body was stripped to his underwear, rolled into a red carpet and dumped along train tracks. Travis had been stabbed or hit more than 40 times. There were crude gang or satanic symbols carved into his chest. Cigarette burns were too plentiful to count.”
 

It’s a sad story, no matter what the judge might decide. But I read it like a former teacher. I wonder: “How is grading schools ever going to help these kind of kids, kids who absolutely need help the most?”

 

I DON’T KNOW THE ANSWER. I do know politicians and school reformers are ignoring this critical question.

Saving Emily was never going to be easy?
How do we justify grading schools if they fail to do it?

P. S. Think this sort of case is rare? Think that schools can be tasked with saving every single child? Google “teen murders” and start asking yourself how.

Right-to-Work Laws, Horse Meat and Wal-Mart

WELL, WHAT’S NEW IN RIGHTWINGLAND? Oh boy! In Michigan, GOP lawmakers have passed a “right-to-work” law in an attempt to break labor unions. 

The Koch brothers, Charles and David (and isn’t there a third brother, Beelzebub) are really happy. 

They might even donate another ten bazillion to right-wing political causes. 

This means, according to voices on the right, that great days are ahead for American business. Jobs will be created left and right. Crappy paying jobs, with no benefits, true. Still, as Gertrude Stein once said, a job is a job is a job.  

Isn’t that right? 

It’s gospel if you listen to Tea Party voices that Big Government and Big Unions are crippling the economy. (Not to mention terrible public schools, producing uneducated workers and terrible unionized teachers). We must free Business Heroes from regulation. We must defeat the machinations of unions, which are collections of greedy bastards.  

We must hand over control of public schools to corporations. 

That’s the Tea Party mantra. Business Heroes are always good. Not half the time. Not ninety percent. Always. 

ALWAYS? YOU MIGHT THINK TWICE if you’re planning a trip to Europe any time soon and plan to do a little eating. It has long been legal to ship broken-down American horses to slaughterhouses in Canada or Mexico. Then the slaughterhouses sell the meat for consumption on the other side of the Atlantic. In Paris horse meat is considered a delicacy. Lately, though, there have been concerns about what’s in the food chain. It seems at race tracks across the United States sleazy owners and trainers (no, wait, we mean Business Heroes) have been shooting mounts full of steroids and anti-inflammatory drugs and pain killers. This allows badly injured horses to keep running, even if they tend to break down at times in the middle of the races that they are running. 

See! We’re already talking job creation! After all, someone has to inject those drugs into the animals. 

Someone has to shoot all those horses.  

Wait…what was the big problem in America again? Oh yeah, unions. And too much government regulation. Canadian authorities just had to start meddling when they found phenylbutazone and clenbuterol, which mimic anabolic steroids, in slaughtered horse meat. You damn Canadians stick to your hockey and leave our Business Heroes alone.  

If restaurants in Paris want to serve horse meat let them.  

Trust the Koch brothers and the Business Heroes. These people aren’t greedy bastards doing everything they can to drive down wages for working men and women. They’re humble bazillionaires who happen to have bazillions of dollars. 

UNIONS…THOSE ARE SOME GREEDY BASTARDS, driving jobs away from places like Michigan. Then Business Heroes have no choice but to send those jobs to Bangladesh. No greedy unions there. No stupid safety regulations, either.  

Great place to do business and pile up stacks of money. No, no. These business folks aren’t greedy.  

You say a factory in Bangladesh, where clothing was being produced for Wal-Mart, went up in flames a few days after Thanksgiving? A hundred and twelve workers died as a result? Hell, in a way, that’s job creation. Kill off one set of underpaid, non-union workers, with no health benefits (who don't need them anymore, anyway) and replace them with another set of desperate human beings. 

Down with unions! Up with right-to-work freedoms! Let’s have some horse meat for supper and go Christmas shopping at Wal-Mart because their checkout people and greeters and truck drivers aren’t unionized. This is America friends. And Merry Christmas to bazillionaires everywhere and good night. 

If you think unions are the problem in America today, you’ve been listening to way too much right-wing horseshit.

___________________________________________________________________

 
ADDENDUM: For the poor fools who think unions are ruining America (see comments at end of this post) here are a few facts: 

The average construction worker in a union makes $361 more weekly than a non-union worker in the same field. This is partly true because non-union jobs often go to illegal immigrants. Unions used to be able to protect such jobs. 

Factory workers in unions make $56 more per week. That might not sound like much but it comes to $2,912 per year.  

Transportation and warehousing:  union guys make 30% more than non-union workers. 

Even a business newsletter, citing advantages of non-union workers, admits that union workers make $200 more per week ($917 vs. $717). So: you’re either for the average working guy getting higher pay. Or you’re not. Unions fight for the average American who wants to insure a place in the middle class. 

The billionaires and millionaires are doing fine. Think Wal-Mart couldn’t pay more? Think the Koch brothers are hurting? 

Go to the Forbes 400 list for 2012. Unless you’re blind you might notice some eye-popping figures.

 4. Charles Koch is worth (in billions): $31

5. David Koch: $31

6. Christy Walton $27.9

7. Jim Walton $26.8

8. Alice Walton $26.3

9. S. Robson Walton $26.1

 
No wonder these people fear unions and their wild wage demands, like for a Wal-Mart clerk to make $13.50 an hour and not $12. 

Other famous right-wingers to make the cut:  Sheldon Adelson, who gave more than $100 million to GOP candidates in 2012. He’s not greedy at all, way down there in 12^th place, just getting by on $20.5 billion. 

Ron Perelman? He might not support the GOP (that I don’t know). But he did make his money in leveraged buyouts, which is the very essence of killing American companies and jobs with it. He’s in 26^th with $11 billion.

Rupert Murdoch, owner of Fox News—which fills the empty heads of viewers every chance it gets with hatred for greedy unions? Poor Murdoch. How does he get up every morning, realizing he’s mired in 36^th with only $9.4 billion? 

It’s interesting to note that Ann Walton Kroenke shows up at #79 on the list, with a crappy $4.5 billion.  

Every family has at least one loser.

Fox News: When Crap Passes for Chocolate Pudding

IN SMALL DOSES, WATCHING FOX NEWS can be almost as much fun as watching Jon Stewart’s Daily Report. What passes as “fair-and-balanced” news in the eyes of right-wingers is just as comical. There’s additional pleasure to be found in knowing that regular Fox viewers are never in on the joke. Instead, they’re part of the joke. Roger Ailes feeds them crap and they think it’s chocolate pudding.  

On Fox and Friends one morning last week, Gretchen Carlson was going after the Buffalo, New York, teachers’ union. 

What had Ms. Carlson fired up? The fact that union members’ health benefits included coverage for plastic surgery. Taxpayers, she fumed—and nobody fumes with more conviction than Gretchen Carlson—were stuck with $2.7 million in bills. 

Fox News hates unions, and Fox News wants viewers to hate unions. That much about News Corporation is clear. 

What’s harder to grasp, unless we consider the possibility that Fox is nothing more nor less than the mouthpiece for a Plutocrat Class, is why Carlson never seems to get fired up about the bad behavior of our nation’s corporate citizens. They are citizens aren’t they? Didn’t conservative justices on the U. S. Supreme Court decide corporations are people with free speech rights? Too bad we can’t jail some of these “people.”  

How about solitary confinement for JPMorgan Chase and Credit Suisse, after they agreed to pay $417 million “to settle federal civil charges of selling risky mortgage bonds to investors that the banks knew could fail ahead of the 2008 financial crisis.” Screwing investors out of $417 million? Or evil unions and $2.7 million in plastic surgery?  

Do the math. Which is the bigger story? 

If Fox wants to do “righteous indignation” why not this story from today’s New York Times, about an investigation involving “wiretaps, cooperators and informants—[techniques] once reserved for infiltrating the Mafia and narcotics rings.”  

Who are the crooks in this sleazy tale? Not greedy unions. Nope. Hedge fund managers. White collar types, up to the tops of their $500 imported Italian loafers in shitty dealing. In fact, in this case the brown footprints lead upward, through the ranks of SAC Capitol Advisors, and stop, for now, but only for now, at the door of billionaire Steven A. Cohen.  

(Remember, Fox viewers, we can’t raise his taxes!) 

It’s a long, winding trail. So here are the bread crumbs. April 2009:  an F.B.I. agent visits with Richard Choo-Beng Lee in Silicon Valley. The agent explains that the government has proof he has engaged in insider trading. Lee promptly confesses and agrees to cooperate. Eighteen months later the same agent stops Noah Freeman in the parking lot of a school and plays back a secretly recorded conversation of Freeman getting insider tips from a woman named Winifred Jiau. Freeman quickly agrees to help investigators and save his own neck. In the winter of 2011 F.B.I agents visit Mathew Martoma. Confronted with evidence of his own illegal activities, Martoma faints on the lawn in front of his 8,000-square-foot Florida mansion.  

(Don’t raise that man’s taxes!)  

When he recovers he calls his lawyer. 

The plot thickens, as they say. Mr. Lee has close ties to Raj Rajaratman, the since-convicted billionaire head of Galleon Group.  

(Oh, oh, oh, woodman spare that billionaire and don’t raise his taxes!)

Lee is heard in 2008, on a recorded conversation, receiving insider tips from Danielle Chiesi, who works for Galleon. Pressed by the F.B.I. he reveals a sub-culture of “expert-network firms” that are “cesspools of inside information.” These firms feed tips to the Big Boys on Wall Street, allowing them to buy stocks they know—and smaller investors do not—are going up and sell stocks they know are going down—same idea as above—to suckers.  

Meanwhile, Freeman, a Harvard graduate, is hired by SAC Capitol Advisors at a guaranteed salary of $2 million per year for two years.  

(Do not, we repeat, DO NOT raise his taxes by 3% to help keep the country from plunging over the fiscal cliff!)  

As noted, recorded calls pick him up, receiving insider information from Jiau. Freeman passes on the tip to a friend and colleague at SAC, Donald Longueuil, who uses it to earn SAC a quick $1.1 million.  

(That would get you plenty of plastic surgery.) 

The F.B.I continues to follow leads in the investigation. Ms. Jiau is charged, convicted, and sent to prison. Longueuil, who served as best man at Freeman’s wedding, joins her behind bars.  Seven individuals at two more hedge funds are ensnared in an expanding federal net, as well as an SAC tech-stock analyst named Jon Horvath. Horvath admits to insider trading, agrees to cooperate, and points a finger at Michael S. Steinberg, a SAC manager, who is named in court filings as an “unindicted co-conspirator.” 

The case continues to build. Evidence is uncovered that Martoma was receiving insider info from Dr. Sidney Gilman, a neurologist involved in clinical trials of a new drug to fight Alzheimers, then under development by Elan and Wyeth, two pharmaceutical giants. The drug was failing, Dr. Gilman warned. SAC quickly sold out its huge holdings and then turned around and made negative bets on Elan and Wyeth stock to plunge. News of the failure broke and down the stock went and SAC was $276 million to the good, in terms of losses avoided and profits garnered.

(That would buy a hell of a lot of plastic surgery; but, still, don’t raise taxes on capital gains, whatever you do!)
 

THESE STORIES AREN’T DIFFICULT TO FIND. Maybe a producer for Fox and Friends could try Google.  

How about Hyundai and Kia inflating gas mileage figures to bilk customers? That meant a $100 million hit to unsuspecting consumers.  

How about UBS, the Swiss banking company, preparing to pay $450 million in fines to settle claims by British and U. S. regulators that they manipulated interest rates to the detriment of ordinary folks seeking home or auto loans?  

How about news this week that Bank of America (BoA) is facing potential penalties of $3 billion related to “brazen fraud” in the mortgage business? The company has already paid fines of $2.4 billion for fleecing investors. BoA’s legal troubles are far from over, having to do with ties formed with Countrywide Financial, a company at the epicenter of the 2008 home-mortgage crisis.  

Let’s hear it for former Countrywide CEO Angelo R. Mozilo who agreed to pay $67.5 million to settle civil fraud charges. Or David Sambol, second in command at Countrywide, who got off with a lighter fine:  only $5.5 million for crooked dealings. 

If you look at it realistically, which means doing something besides swallowing the Fox News line, you come to realize unions aren’t the problem. The boys and girls who keep Big Business in this country running smoothly are willing to do anything to pile up huge profits.  

If they can close down American factories and ship jobs to China, they’ll do it and be glad they did. If they can simultaneously break labor unions in the U. S. and hire illegal immigrants to drive down wages, they’ll do it and be glad. At times, the whole ugly picture can seem surreal, like Salvidor Dali explaining economics. 

One final example should suffice:  this time involving James F. McCann, minority stock holder of the New York Mets, and founder of 1-800-Flowers. According to documents in a recent federal lawsuit, McCann and other retailers were involved in a carefully designed scheme to rip off customers. The deal went like this, according to plaintiffs:  Callers dialed up the number and asked for a dozen roses for mom on Mother’s Day or their special girl on Valentine’s Day. They entered a credit card number, hit “purchase,” and were told they could apply for a rebate. Great! Or was it?  

According to the New York Times:

“If the customer clicked on the rebate option and failed to read the fine print, however, he or she wound up registering for a near-worthless club membership that would charge the credit card for months, sometimes years, before the expenses on the credit card statements were detected. Outfits like 1-800-Flowers.com received a cut of the operation, what regulators and others have called ‘bounties.’”

 
“A recent legal filing by lawyers in the case asserted that ‘1-800-Flowers was well aware that its customers were getting defrauded.’”  

So there you have it loyal Fox viewers. Next time you see Carlson having a bad day, fuming about greedy unions, send her some flowers. 

Do Right-Wingers Really Read the Constitution?

OKAY, PRESIDENT OBAMA WON THE ELECTION. The right-wingers got crushed. How are they handling the truth? 

Perhaps we should begin by revisiting the five stages of grief and see how our conservative friends are dealing with their emotions: 

1.     Denial: (leading up to the 2012 election) the polls are skewed and Romney is going to win; Rush Limbaugh says Romney is going to win. So does Sean Hannity. As late as 9 p.m. election night Karl Rove says the votes in Ohio are still being counted...and...(9:05 p.m.)…dear God, no...

2.     Anger: Why did Romney have to be such an asshole? Obama supporters wanted handouts. They don’t love this country as much as we do.

3.     Bargaining: Obama won; maybe we can secede.

4.     Depression:  We lost the youth vote; we lost the women’s vote; we lost the Asian American vote. We lost the Latino vote. We lost the vote of Americans with advanced college degrees. We lost left-handed voters. All we have left is grumpy old white folks.

5.     Acceptance:  Too early? Yes, too early.

 

If contributors to www.reagancoalition.com are a fair sampling it’s going to be a long time before the right accepts basic math and admits President Obama won re-election fairly.

Uh...maybe we should say “never.” 

In fact, if you listen to them, the way they listen to themselves there’s still a way to snatch victory from the iron jaws of defeat. And they’re ready to try anything, because, well, they’re just that freedom-loving. 

According to Darin Scott http://www.reagancoalition.com/articles/2012/20121121003-obama-loophole.html here’s how they might stop Obama’s return to the Oval Office:

According to Article II of the U.S. Constitution AND the 12th Amendment - if 1/3rd of the States do not cast their votes in the Electoral College, then the matter falls onto the House of Representatives to choose the President. In other words, if we pressure Congressmen, State Party Officials, and groups such as Tea Party Patriots, Heritage Foundation, etc., to call on RED States to NOT have their Electors cast their vote - then the House of Reps CAN choose the next President (and Republicans still have the majority - 233 (R) to 195 (D) - in the House of Representatives)!!!

 
Here’s the Scott scenario:  The right-wingers need 18 states to refuse to cast electoral votes. (There were 24 red states.) The people of these states (those who voted for Romney, anyway) rise up to demand that electors agree to overturn accepted electoral process. In other words, what the right-wing wants is to save the U. S. Constitution from assaults by liberals. So they blow up the Constitution in order to save it. 

Best of all, Scott continues: “We do NOT have to convince ANY democrats –at all.” 

Here’s how it all works (he thought):  Red states like South Dakota and North Dakota and Montana withhold their electoral votes. Then the election goes to the House and right-wingers get a president to their liking and nobody in Pennsylvania or New York or California can stop them.  

IT’S BAD ENOUGH THAT SCOTT’S PLAN is stupid to begin with. Worse yet, Scott was too obtuse to imagine that the majority of Americans might not approve of a tricky scheme to overturn the results of an election.

Worst of all, Scott’s blog post got 20,000 views in less than 24 hours—and what made it all pathetic was that Scott was an idiot and none of his 20,000 viewers had the brains to figure it out. Scott soon had to post an admission:

The original intent of this post was to present a plan, from a fellow patriot, that seemed to be bullet proof. After consulting legal professionals and others, I have am [sic] not certain this plan will work. One of the contentions is that the 2/3rds "quorum" requirement does not apply to the Electoral College; after much deliberation, I believe this is the case, and therefore the strategy as posted below is not as bullet proof as suspected.

No telling which legal professionals Mr. Scott consulted. No way of knowing how many hours of anguished deliberation he completed. Suppose we stick with what we know:  Mr. Scott’s plan was absurd from first syllable to the final bit of punctuation; and thousands of angry right-wingers were too dense to notice or too lazy to check what it says in the U. S. Constitution.  

Article II, Section 1, outlines a fairly simple process for choosing a president and vice president. In fact, the simplicity of it all led to unforeseen difficulties (including a tie vote in 1800 between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr, when electors failed to specify which man they wanted for which office). Still, it does say clearly that the states shall cast their electoral votes and then send them to the U. S. Senate. There, before a gathering of interested members of both houses of Congress, these votes shall be tallied. 

The 12^th Amendment was ratified in 1804 to insure that tie votes would not occur again. On this topic, however, Article II, Section 1, and the 12^th Amendment are equally clear. The electors send in their ballots to the Senate.  

There the ballots are counted. 

If no candidate has a majority of the votes—and only if no candidate has a majority—then the election goes to the House of Representatives. There each state shall have one vote and then the states shall vote to select a president.  

At that time only does the idea of a 2/3^rd’s  vote matter: “A quorum for this Purpose shall consist of a Member or Members from two thirds of the States, and a Majority of all the States shall be necessary to a Choice.”  

So let’s spell it out for the 45,698 Americans who “like” www.reagancoalition.com.  

If a candidate has a majority of electoral votes—as in Obama 332, Romney 206—you can’t defeat that candidate through trickery in the House of Representatives. 

Sad to say, if 17 red states were to withhold their electoral votes it wouldn’t matter.  

The blue states would still send in their electoral votes. Obama would still get 332. There are 538 possible electoral votes. So, 332 is still a majority. 

(This is what liberals like to call “math.”)

If you’re a true American, and don’t like President Obama, and you’re not much in the mood for partying now, you need to realize it’s time to move on to Stage 5: Acceptance. And might those of us on the left offer a helpful hint: If you love the U. S. Constitution as much as you say you do you might try reading it before the next election.  

The First Thanksgiving: What Your Third Grade Teacher Didn't Mention

WITH THANKSGIVING UPON US it is time once again to tabulate our blessings. (If you're Donald Trump or any member of the Walton clan that may take longer.) For many Americans it's enough that the Yankees didn't get to the World Series. A majority of our citizens, who apparently received lavish gifts, are thankful Mr. Obama won reelection.

And speaking of stuffing, Rush Limbaugh has angrily been threatening a move to Costa Rica. We should all be so lucky.

Sometimes, you look at the world and wonder if humankind has lost its collective grip on whatever marbles it once had. We might even wonder (if we live in a red state) whether God has forsaken our nation. Our Pilgrim ancestors and their neighbors, the Native Americans, would scoff at our whining.

Maybe, this Thanksgiving, we should start by thanking God for the First Amendment. Religious freedom, which we take for granted (unless we worry about the War on Christmas), was a rarity in the 1600s. In those days it was still possible for judges to order heretics branded on the forehead with an "H" for questioning accepted religious belief. Sometimes you could cut off an ear or two to make the lesson clearer.

So, no. Life wasn't better four centuries ago. When the Pilgrims left England for exile in Holland in 1608, the King James Bible did not yet exist, although arguments about correct church doctrine were still common. Fifty scholars would gather together in 1611 to work on a definitive translation of the ancient texts into English.

Perhaps we should count modern health care among our blessings--including, perhaps, a prayer of thanks to the U. S. Supreme Court for upholding the constitutionality of Obamacare. Disease in the Pilgrim days was a major factor in shaping history. Outbreaks of Black Plague, for example, regularly closed London theaters in the time of Shakespeare, who died in 1616. (Be thankful today that none of your loved ones have to worry about rat-borne killer diseases.)

That same year Shakespeare died (and Pocahontas, visiting England died as well) an epidemic of smallpox brought to the shores of Massachusetts by fishing vessels plying the coastline in search of codfish swept away most of the native population and left the land more or less open for English settlement.

IN 1620, THEN, 105 PASSENGERS BOARDED THE MAYFLOWER and headed for America. Only half of the people aboard, however, were "saints" or church members, technically, real "Pilgrims." London city officials saw a chance to thin out the ranks of orphans, whose support was a drag on the taxpayers. So they packed off Richard More, 7, and Ellen More, his little sister, just to be rid of them. Paul Ryan might have applauded their fiscal discipline. (Then again, Mr. Ryan might recall that the Pilgrims, and the English generally, were no fan of the Roman Catholics.)

Other passengers included William Bradford, who would go on to lead the colony and write a book about it, John Alden and Priscilla Mullins, whose romance became the focus of a famous poem by Longfellow (which few today read) and Elizabeth Hopkins, well advanced in her pregnancy. (She gave birth to a child named "Oceanus" during the voyage.) There were also a number of goats on board; but the goats do not play a role in the story.

The Mayflower finally dropped anchor off Cape Cod in November and scouting parties were soon sent out to locate the best possible site for a settlement. In the cold winter ahead tuberculosis, pneumonia and scurvy took a heavy toll among the settlers. Bradford described the Pilgrim’s lowest point:

That which was most sad...was that in 2 or 3 months time half of their company had died, especially in Jan. and February, being in the depth of winter, and lacking houses and other comforts...There died some times 2 or 3 of a day...[so] that of 100 and odd persons, hardly 50 remained. And of these in times of most distress [trouble], there was but 6 or 7 sound [healthy] persons.

Yeah. Good times. (Be thankful for flu shots.)

 

Meanwhile, the Pilgrims had a number of skirmishes with the previous landowners. And the Pilgrims understood if the Indians chose to attack they had little hope of survival. They buried their dead in secret, planted seeds over the graves, and prayed that the “wild men” would not discover their weakness.

Who knows? Maybe God does work in mysterious ways. (Today, we are told he sends Superstorm Sandy to punish America for supporting legalization of gay marriage.) The Pilgrims were lucky, if nothing else. The Native Americans, not so much. The smallpox outbreak of a few years before had been devastating. Thousands of the original inhabitants were wiped from the land, “they not [even] being able to bury one another. Their skulls and bones,” Bradford recalled later, “were found in many places lying still above the ground, where their houses...had been; a very sad spectacle to behold.”

You may recall this part of the story from back when your teacher talked about it in third grade:  How the Pilgrims met Samoset, who stepped out of the forest shadows and greeted them in good English (he had been hanging out with some of the crewmen from those earlier fishing expeditions). He called out to them hearty: “Welcome!”

Then he asked if they had beer. (Fans of watching the NFL this afternoon can relate.)

Anyway, moving along:  Samoset introduced the Pilgrims to Squanto, who understood English even better, since he'd been kidnapped by fishermen and taken to England as a slave, before he escaped, was captured again...and...it's a long story. (See:  People were more religious in those days, more honest, still followed all ten of the Ten Commandments!) Squanto showed his new buddies where to catch lobster and how to raise corn, using fish as fertilizer. (The colony was saved and the way to the foundation of the Red Lobster chain was opened.)

 

The plot thickened. Squanto introduced his new friends to Massasoit, leader of the Wampanoag tribe and ruler of the lands surrounding Plymouth Bay. His people had been hard hit by the plague four years before and he was anxious to sign a treaty of peace. In turn, Massasoit hoped for aid against his powerful neighbors, the Narragansetts, long the Wampanoags bloody rivals, and a people almost unscathed by the great disease outbreak. (Or:  as Mitt Romney once put it, "We need to be sure we always have a strong military. With plenty of bayonets.)

Well, that's pretty much the story. The Pilgrims didn't want to get wiped out after a rough winter. The Wampanoags knew that the enemy of their enemy was their friend and a treaty of peace was signed and both sides kept it for half a century.

The pumpkin pies were baked. The invitations went out. Massasoit, with ninety followers, attended the first Thanksgiving in the fall of 1621. The guests brought five deer. The hosts provided fresh bread, roast duck, goose, and wine. Together they celebrated and feasted for three days. There were foot races and games of shooting skill and much fun to be had. (One drunk settler started going on about how Obama wanted to deny hunters the right to carry assault rifles but he soon passed out and was heard from no more.) 

Believe it or not, turkey is not mentioned by any of the eyewitnesses.

Of course, the Pilgrim's survived and thrived. (This is why NFL players still point when they score touchdowns and thank God for granting us the inalienable right to watch football.) Even troubles with tribes beyond Massasoit’s control could not break their spirits. When a sachem named Wituwamat threatened Plymouth the Pilgrims took quick action. The chief and three followers were invited into the settlements to talk. There, without warning, Captain Myles Standish and his soldiers fell upon them and cut them to pieces. Then they chopped off Wituwamat’s head and spiked it atop their fort wall. It remained there for many years as a warning, but apparently did not spoil anyone's appetite at future Thanksgiving dinners. 

Nothing about humanity has changed in four centuries. The first Pilgrim minister seemed “crazed in the brain” and was booted out of the colony. (Pat Robertson?) John Sprague drank too much and was arrested after riding his horse into a friend’s house. (Lindsay Lohan?) John Billington, an original Mayflower passenger, committed murder and was hanged. A married woman was caught having an affair with an Indian. She was whipped and ordered to wear the letters “AD” for adultery on her sleeve. 

In another case of married people behaving badly, a young wife got in trouble after she was left behind while her husband went away on business. When she, too, had an affair, Pilgrim officials arrested everyone involved. All three individuals, husband, wife, and lover were locked up, side by side, in the stocks. (Hear that Paula Broadwell and General David Petraeus?)
 

Years later, Bradford sat down to write a history of the Plymouth Bay Colony. He was proud that his people had helped English roots take hold in America and compared the Pilgrims to the first candle that helped light a thousand others. (If Wituwamet had been writing the story he might have told it differently.)

With a deep sense of satisfaction Bradford noted:   

Our fathers were Englishmen who came over this great ocean, and were ready to perish in this wilderness; but they cried unto the Lord, and He heard their voice.  Let them therefore praise the Lord, because He is good; and His mercies endure forever.

So, there you have it. The story of the First Thanksgiving, with a few details added. (And I'm sorry I had to leave the story of the two Indians who mooned the Pilgrims one day out.) Today, thank God for all your blessings. Be thankful, if for nothing else, that you weren't born in the seventeenth century.

Good wishes to all Americans, liberal and conservative alike. May you all digest your turkey in peace and harmony.

As for Rush? Maybe he'll send us a postcard.



There's myth; and there's history.
Happy holidays to all.

 

A Whole Lotta' Denyin' Goin' On: Dark Days for the Right

THESE ARE BLEAK TIMES FOR OUR FRIENDS ON THE RIGHT as they face up to the horrid reality that they tried to "Take Back America" and failed in ignominious fashion. The only solace they seem to find since Barack Obama won a second term in (to them) a stunning fashion comes from churning out petitions demanding the right to secede from the Union they so badly wanted to take back.

Still, there are embers in the ashes of even the worst defeats. The Nut Job right still rules the radio air waves. Fox News has four more years to convince unbalanced individuals that Obama is a Muslim or maybe a Cylon. And the U. S. House of Representatives is still firmly in their all-taxes-are-poison political grip. Michele Bachmann, the queen of the Nut Jobs, returns for another term, ready to deny that gay people actually exist. Steven King is back, too, prepared to go to his grave denying that President Obama has ever had a valid U. S. birth certificate. In fact, when last heard from on the topic, King was insisting that Obama's parents might have faked the birth announcements that appeared in two Hawaiian newspapers, which announcements poor Steven King was forced to admit during a town hall meeting that he had personally seen in the Library of Congress records, by sending a telegram from Kenya.

What we're saying, all boiled down, is there's a whole lot of denyin' goin' on!

Marco Rubio doesn't exactly deny that he once supported Mitt Romney long ago; but he has been busy this week denying that he agrees with Romney's post-election statements, which sound suspiciously like Romney's pre-election statements when you think about it. No, says Rubio. The GOP doesn't hate people on food stamps. No. The GOP doesn't think Latinos and women and young voters are stupid and only voted for Obama because he promised lavish "gifts." No, no, no. Rubio denies that Republicans believe any of this. Indeed, based on answers to questions in an interview he did this week, Rubio seemed to be warming up for a possible Nut Job-backed run at the White House in 2016. Talking to a reporter from GQ magazine, Rubio stood by his party's basic position of denial on gay rights. That is:  gay people should vote with us next time around, even if they don't exist, and even if the loudest voices on the right insist God sends hurricanes to punish America for giving gay people who don't really exist something akin to equal rights.

The reporter, apparently realizing that our friends on the right are know at times to deny...well, let's just say basic science...asked Rubio if he might care to comment on the age of the earth. Rubio answered carefully, knowing that on the Nut Job right the deniers are always ready to explode into anger:

I'm not a scientist, man. I can tell you what recorded history says, I can tell you what the Bible says, but I think that's a dispute amongst theologians and I think it has nothing to do with the gross domestic product or economic growth of the United States. I think the age of the universe has zero to do with how our economy is going to grow. I'm not a scientist. I don't think I'm qualified to answer a question like that. At the end of the day, I think there are multiple theories out there on how the universe was created and I think this is a country where people should have the opportunity to teach them all. I think parents should be able to teach their kids what their faith says, what science says. Whether the Earth was created in 7 days, or 7 actual eras, I'm not sure we'll ever be able to answer that. It's one of the great mysteries.

Meanwhile, three GOP experts in climate change denial now stand in line, one of the trio almost certain to become the next head of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology! (Ironically, this committee oversees NASA, the National Weather Service and the National Science Foundation among other entities.) Representative James Sensebrenner from Wisconsin is mildest in his denunciation of scientists, who he believes are twisting the facts to make climate change sound worse than it is. Lamar Smith of Texas sees it in a more sinister light and sniffs out willful bias in reporting on global warming at ABC, CBS and NBC.

Not Fox, of course. Oh no, oh no.

Dana Rohrabacher, goes all-in on the paranoia when he insists there's an an even bigger conspiracy afoot. As Christine Gorman reported for Scientific American, in a speech on the floor of Congress this past December Rohrabacher warned about an "insidious coalition" of research scientists and politicians:

[A] coalition that has conducted an unrelenting crusade to convince the American people that their health and their safety and–yes–their very survival on this planet is at risk due to manmade global warming. The purpose of this greatest-of-all propaganda campaigns is to enlist public support for, if not just the acquiescence to, a dramatic mandated change in our society and a mandated change to our way of life. This campaign has such momentum and power that it is now a tangible threat to our freedom and to our prosperity as a people.

AT THIS POINT, IT'S GETTING HARD to keep track of all the Nut Job right's denials and a brief recap is probably in order. As it stands, our friends on the right don't believe in:

Thermometers--as in National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association records that show September 2012 temperatures marked the 331st month in succession during which global temperatures were above the 20th century average.

Photographs--as in NASA satellite cameras that showed the Arctic ice sheet had been reduced by fifty percent this summer compared to historic coverage limits.

The speed of light--which would seem to prove, according to scientists (but not necessarily anyone like Marco Rubio who might want to run for president with support from the Nut Job right) that the universe is a little older than a few thousand years.

Fossils--sure those ancient sea creatures and dinosaur bones embedded in limestone appear to be tens of millions of years old; but who are you gonna' believe? Scientists, who insist on considering evidence, or Steven King and a book written thousands of years ago to guide the Jews, at a time when no one had heard of light-years or dinosaurs or Bunsen burners.

Sperm--as we all now known, sperm don't work in cases of rape.

Lamestream media--everyone except Megyn Kelly at Fox News and Glenn Beck, in whatever bunker he's currently hiding, hates the right-wing with implacable resolve.

Percentages--as in percentages in any opinion poll that might have shown that President Obama might actually win a second term in office. Which of course, the Nut Job right absolutely knew was mathematically and politically and morally impossible.

Liberal pollsters-- people like Nathan Silver and their lamestream math, with their liberal bias, insisting that President Obama would win all the battleground states except North Carolina, win the popular vote, and pile up more than 300 electoral votes. Which all the real news people at Fox said was impossible, and Rush Limbaugh said it, too. And who are you gonna' believe, real patriots with tea-bag hats or these fossil-loving commie freaks?

Actual voters--in 2010 the Nut Job right scored a huge victory in the mid-term elections; but actual American voters vanished two years later and idiots and members of the "entitlement class" showed up like herds of sheeple and voted for Obama.

American women--who sometimes lived under the same roofs as American men who tended to go for Romney; but somehow these females went for Obama by a sizable margin, perhaps in part because they fell for lamestream reports about the powers of sperm.

Colleges--Americans with advanced degrees voted in favor of Mr. Obama by a sizable margin. This has something to do with the fact that college students are all brain-washed by professors, and maybe the fact that the educated people prefer actual facts and tangible evidence with their political discussions. Like fossils or birth certificates or the speed-of-light.

Finally, our friends on the seem ready to deny the unique place in history of the United States of America, which is, despite various imperfections, still a land of surpassing freedoms. They say they love freedom more than liberals do. They say they believe in the Founding Fathers more than liberals do. They say they believe in the Bill of Rights more, too. They used to say, if you criticized this country, that you ought to move to Russia or some other communist country.

NOW, THEY LOSE ONE ELECTION and they're ready to bail out, to furl the red, white and blue. They're ready to give up on the country they love.

They reveal themselves as babies, not patriots. But if you point that out, they'll deny that, too.

How long until the right-wingers decide President Obama is actually a Cylon in disguise?

Texas Republican Says "Maggots" Re-elect Obama

LET’S BE SYMPATHETIC NOW. America’s red-state patriots are having a tough time these last few days. Watching Fox News on election night, for example, a liberal might have been forgiven for assuming Megyn Kelly was undergoing an on-air colonoscopy.

She looked that grim.

Meanwhile, Karl Rove couldn’t believe his lying eyes. When Ohio went blue you thought Brit Hume might have to use a stun gun to silence the gibbering fool.

On talk radio, the morning of November 7, Rush Limbaugh had to break the bad news to all patriotic Dittoheads. The black guy was still in the White House. The “entitlement class,” he grumbled, had spoken. The “takers” had elected Obama. Now the “makers” would suffer hideous fates. Like seeing their marginal tax rates rise by 3%! Maybe 5%!

On Thursday Michael Savage assured listeners that, no, their side didn’t lose. Obama had sinister ties to some computer company somewhere that somehow allowed him to rig the election and turn reliable red votes blue.

Only Savage, Savage noted, was reporting the story. Something to do with the liberal media bias. Or Hitler.

Or unicorns.

Down in Texas, Peter Morrison, a Hardin County Republican and county treasurer wanted no part of the awful news. Tea Party stalwart and Ron Paul supporter, Mr. Morrison wanted to know:  “Why should Vermont and Texas live under the same government? Let each go her own way,” he said, invoking the spirit of an earlier age, not 1776, exactly. More like 1860. If the “maggots” voted for Obama, let those “maggots” suffer the consequences. He really called other human beings “maggots.” And by “maggots,” Morrison meant Asian Americans and Hispanics who cast ballots for President Obama and carried him to victory.

Bud Kennedy, writing for the Fort-Worth Star-Telegram broke the story first, adding this reassuring note:  “Oh, did I mention that Morrison was chosen by former State Board of Education Chairman Don McLeroy to help screen Texas public school textbooks?” That ought to make us feel better, don’t you think?

A great guy like Morrison—helping decide what Texas public school students learn! What could be wrong with that?

SO, HOW DID THE GOP LOSE? Did it have anything to do with the fact that they didn’t turn out their side? In 2008 John McCain lost the popular vote by ten million, 69-59. Four years later, with Republicans poised (according to all their pundits) for a landslide win, and Obama actually losing 8 million votes, they pulled in only 58 million themselves. In fact, it might salve Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan’s wounds and sober the right-wing to remember that their side has carried the popular vote only once in the last six tries.

What about this idea that the “takers” are seizing control? Asian Americans, pretty much the “perfect” minority, well-known for their work ethic, went for Obama by something like 74 to 25%. Americans with college degrees split down the middle. According to exit polls reported in USA Today, 46% of this group favored the President while Romney captured only 52% of the “makers” vote. It seemed even “worse” if you looked at the surveys for voters who had done post-graduate study. Here the maggots were truly squirming. Fifty-five percent of the most-educated Americans said they supported Mr. Obama. Damn physicists and geologists and historians with their PhD’s and “taker” mentalities! Even the underclass, the “takers” by any Rush Limbaugh-Michael Savage-Peter Morrison-47%-definition, defied classification. True:  according to a report in the New York Times, Obama won their support by about 28 points, roughly 64-36. But that would still mean more than a third of the “takers” follow the Tea Party Way.

What about all those “taker” females, voting Democratic, 54-44%, forgetting that if they were raped it would be God’s will they become pregnant? And Rick Santorum and Paul Ryan’s will that they not have access to an abortion?

Were Latinos really so stupid as to vote for Obama, 69% to 30%, even after right-wingers in Arizona gave them the right to be stopped and asked to prove citizenship by showing their papers? Not to vote for a party that wanted electrified fences? Not to understand that the Dream Act was tyranny in disguise?

Did young voters stupidly choose to support a man who rammed “socialized medical care” down their throats, so they’d be covered on their parents’ insurance policies until age 26, thereby threatening the “socialized medical care” of people over 65, the retired “makers” in the very same country?

THESE WERE ALL HARD QUESTIONS and might involve soul-searching and thoughtful analysis to answer.

For now, however, the truth as seen through right-wing eyes was clear. Rush and the boys considered the numbers. They studied the democratic process. They looked at the changing makeup of the U. S. electorate.

And they saw maggots.