Happy Flag Day, folks:
- Gunman in GOP baseball practice attack dies after shootout — I don’t know what to say, but maybe y’all do. Oh, I can say this: There are too many nuts out there, and it’s too easy for them to get guns. That’s it for now. Wait; I’ll add this: NPR notes that the ballgame the members were practicing for is one of the few bipartisan traditions Washington has left. And now this.
- Four dead in San Francisco shooting after UPS worker opens fire at facility — I include this to illustrate the points I made above — too many nuts chasing too many guns.
- Think you’re lucky? One Little River man won the Powerball lottery twice this week — No, I don’t think I’m lucky — that way. But we’ll never know, since I don’t intend ever to buy a ticket. However, I do consider myself blessed in terms of the things that count in life.
- Thoughts on the Sessions testimony yesterday? — Yeah, it’s old, but we haven’t talked about it. Personally, I missed it, and haven’t read much about it. But maybe y’all have observations.
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I find it hard to believe they were practicing for a “baseball” game, “softball” more likely. I doubt there’s anyone on Capitol Hill that can throw or hit the high hard one.
You’re assuming there’s someone on the Hill who can throw a high, hard one.
Anyway, as I understand it, it’s an actual baseball game. It started 108 years ago, when EVERYBODY played baseball. I’m not even sure softball existed then…
Let’s look it up: Huh. It was invented, inadvertently, in 1887…
I like it. I like that our elected representatives here in America play baseball, rather than the less rigorous softball. Good for them.
I mean, just to take one example, the rule that the distance of 90 feet from home to first hasn’t changed since time out of mind, and is the perfect (absolutely perfect) distance is one of the signs that baseball is such a great game.
Was it in Leviticus, or Proverbs, that God ordained that?
What’s 90 feet in cubits?
I just wrote a whole post about how outraged, OUTRAGED, I was that I couldn’t watch the ballgame tonight without a cable subscription.
But then I found this, so for the moment I am mollified…
Of course, if I’m unable to project that up onto my TV using my Apple TV, I’m going to be outraged again…
And yeah. I like that they do that, too.
The game should be broadcast live every year, and not on C-SPAN. The FCC should mandate that every channel using the public airwaves pre-empt all normal programming, and show this game live.
I’ve been wondering whether I’ll be able to watch it tonight. Probably not, since it’s highly unlikely to appear on a channel I get with my HD antenna…
The lottery is essentially a tax on the arithmetically illiterate.
True, but at some point someone has to win. You can’t win if you don’t play. Just don’t spend your whole paycheck on tickets. I have no problem with the lottery, it’s voluntary.
Uh Uh. I play it when the prize gets over 180 million. I figure at a dollar for a 180M prize and 1 in 176M chance of willing, it’s an even bet. Besides, for me a prize of a bunch of millions is the difference in being a comfortable retiree and a philanthropist – and I really want to be a philanthropist.
You can’t play Powerball for $1.00.
Megamillions is a buck. I wait ’til Powerball gets to about 400 Mil – unless I’m feeling lucky.
I want to be a philanthropist who can also afford to pay someone else to hand out the money. And to pay all my bills, and otherwise deal with it so I don’t have to spend a moment of my life thinking about money. THAT would be freedom.
Yeah, I know — impersonal philanthropy doesn’t sound very spiritually ennobling, does it? But I’m trying to take the dictum a step further — I don’t want my right hand to know what somebody else’s left hand is doing…
Actually, I shouldn’t make a joke about what Jesus said there. And I’m sorry.
I was just confessing what I think about when I fantasize about great wealth, and the whole “not thinking about money” is a huge part of it…
I could stand the John Beresford Tipton role myself. As a philanthropist without money all these years, though, I’ve found the small acts of kindness done personally, but discretely, to be quite satisfying anyhow. Of course, you know I’m much cooler (and more generous) online as well.
I had to look up “John Beresford Tipton.” I watched that show when I was a kid, but I’d forgotten the guy had a name.
I learned something basic about numbers from that show.
In one episode, the new millionaire went straight out and bought a $10,000 necklace for a woman.
Then, he went out and bought some other stuff. And I said, “Hey, wait a minute: He already spent his million on the necklace. How does he have anything left?”
I thought that since 10 was 10 times one, and 100 was 10 times 10, and a thousand was 10 times 100, the next word up, a million, must be 10 times a thousand.
Once my mother straightened me out on that, a million seemed way more attractive than it had before…
Sessions missed the hearing too.
If we’re going to have a state operated lottery we really should legalize all forms of gambling including video poker machines. One of the most asinine government decisions in my life was outlawing the machines while at the same time sanctioning a state run lottery.
Casinos in Myrtle Beach and a horse racing track in Camden or Aiken would also be beneficial to the economy. Oh. nevermind. I forgot we still have a bunch of people who think they know what’s best for everyone else: when and how people should consume alcohol, when stores should be allowed to be open, whether people should be able to use marijuana to alleviate symptoms of disease (or just use it because they want to).
Yeah, yeah, yeah.. I get it. People with addictive personalities might abuse the privileges. Like they do already without the privileges.
The things that I noticed most about the video poker era was the addictive nature of having the machines on every street corner. At the time, I was in favor of concentrating the gambling in a few casinos and racetracks people would have to purposely travel to for participation.
Harry, the problem was that the poker barons were not satisfied to make a lot of money according to the rules. They ignored some rules, and pressed the Legislature to change others, and when the Legislature didn’t, they started spending their wealth to elect people who would, and lawmakers walked in fear of them.
Just like with Howard Rich and the “abandon public schools” crowd later…
We should not have a state-run lottery, and we should not have video poker machines (we tried, and it greatly corrupted our political system). And that’s that.
Ron Aiken on Quorum has a story up today about what appears to be a major issue with discipline at Hand Middle School. Bullying / physical attacks of black students who were “acting white”.
Here’s the first few paragraphs.. the link below to the full story probably is behind Quorom’s paywall (which I gladly pay for because Aiken is doing a fantastic job on breaking news stories that matter).
“To feel safe, if only for an hour, India Jones ate lunch in a bathroom stall.To eat in the cafeteria at Hand Middle School, where the group of boys and girls who had teased, harassed, shoved, slapped and kicked her were waiting, was too much of a risk to take.Just walking past them, the seventh-grader said, fear would consume her whole body.
“I’d start sweating, shivering and get really nervous,” she said.
“Oreo,” they’d call her, meaning she was black on the outside but white in the middle, or sometimes just “white girl” as a way of putting her down for speaking well and excelling in school.
Her parents didn’t know. How could she tell them? They already were outraged with school officials over what they considered the administration’s apathy toward their concerns after two incidents on back-to-back days in November when she was violently shoved by a 250-pound boy into a table and then followed into the hall where a girl slapped the glasses off her face. The next day the same girl kicked her from behind so hard she had trouble sitting comfortably for a month.
Young’s mother, Toschia, filed a police report on the boy. It wouldn’t be the last.
In March, the same boy hit her in the face with a backpack, chipping two teeth and causing her nose to gush blood. The incident was caught on video and the school promised to keep him away from India.
It didn’t work.
The day she returned to school after recovering from the attack was the first day the boy was back at school after being suspended. When Young went to drama practice after school and walked out on the stage, the boy, who had skipped his bus, was there in the seats, waiting for her, hitting his palm with his fist until the drama teacher intervened and made him leave.
By then, India was afraid to go to school, shaking and vomiting in the mornings and living in fear of the day to come.
So, to survive the only time of the day she was outside the safety of her honors classes, she hid where she could in a bathroom stall in constant fear of discovery.
For as bad as that is, there’s something worse.
She wasn’t alone.
Brian Goins
“Two other girls would hide in there with me,” she said. “We were all scared.”
Over the course of the 2016-17 school year, parents say discipline broke down so badly under first-year principal Brian Goins that unruly students ran wild in the halls and cursed at teachers and administrators while fights and bullying went unchecked and, parents say, unreported in an effort to keep the problems in-house. They blame a young, first-year principal, Brian Goins, who they believe could not enforce discipline and lacked accountability, especially when he abruptly cancelled a scheduled meeting to address concerned parents and instead asked them to complete a survey online, the results of which parents were denied access to.
For one mother of a student who spoke only on condition of anonymity, the transformation of Hand from a National Blue Ribbon School to one where children disrespect and threaten teachers, bully classmates with impunity and keep getting chance after chance to return to school is hard to swallow.
“I had a child at Hand for four years who’s now at Dreher, and under the old principal (Marisa Vickers) it was a fantastic school,” she said. “Now, I’m afraid to send my child to school. My daughter tells me kids smoke marijuana in the parking lot and brag about it, kids who have older family members in gangs.”
http://quorumcolumbia.org/2017/06/15/hell-at-hand-middle-assaults-gang-bullying-lack-of-discipline-alleged-by-parents-students/
I hope Ron is really easygoing about the whole Fair Use thing…
My excerpt is probably about 20% of the full article.
The report he did on Norman Jackson recently was exceptional.
My kids went to school and the experience was excellent. My son did have his phone confiscated by the principal, as he should have, but otherwise all was good. (I had to personally go to the school to get the phone back. The incident was handled appropriately.) If true the offending bullies should be transferred to the alternative school. We shouldn’t give up on these problem kids but neither should bullying ever be allowed.
My kids went to Hand.
That’s basically the gist of the story – that Hand Middle was excellent but since the switch to a new principal last year, it’s become much worse. The story mentions that in a meeting with the principal with the the parents of the girl who was being harassed that he said that they needed to understand that the bullies come from poor families and need to be given some leeway in terms of their behavior. Also that after one meeting with the school improvement committee, students were openly cursing the principal in the hallways.
I’m sorry to hear that about Hand. Especially since the twins will be going there in a couple of years. When their big sister went there, I never heard of any problems…
That’s because years ago Hand was in a decent neighborhood, now it’s borderline ghetto.
It must be a middle-class white ghetto, since two of my kids live within walking distance.
I mean, come on — it’s Shandon!
When our son was in middle school, a special needs student who was big enough to play high school football and his “toady” decided to start picking on our son. Our son did not say anything until it got worse and one day the “toady” goaded the other student into picking our son up and body slamming him on the ground. Our son did the wise thing, he curled up and didn’t move. After kicking him a couple of times and the big kid being encouraged to do more damage, the two finally left. When I was told about it, I went to the principal and as expected, all she did was say she would look into it. When nothing was done, I went to the superintendent’s office to talk to him about the incident. He wouldn’t see me but the asst. super did. So, in no uncertain terms I made it clear that if the student who committed violence against my son was allowed back on the school premises and come near my son, I would take care of the problem myself. No mincing of words, I made it very clear, I am not one to allow anyone to do harm to my family and not do something about it. The next day the student was transferred to another school.
Unfortunately if a parent complains about a student who is a “person of color” in our present racially charged climate, they are accused of racism, bigotry, and just about any other accusation possible. And what is worse is the incident with the young black girl who was being harassed, physically attacked and harmed by other students of color, the principal didn’t have the gonads to take action. Instead he made excuses for their behavior.
Is there any wonder private schools are springing up across the nation and parents have lost faith in the public school system? I do not envy any teacher who must contend with students who believe they don’t have to follow the rules and at least behave in a civil manner. I know some who frequent this blog are teachers or work with the public school system. All I can say is I sincerely hope you are not facing the same situation at your school like the one at Hand. Personally, if I had children today and had the choice to send them to a private school or a public one, if necessary I would work as many jobs as necessary to pay private school tuition.
“The story mentions that in a meeting with the principal with the parents of the girl who was being harassed that he said that they needed to understand that the bullies come from poor families and need to be given some leeway in terms of their behavior.” My family was just as poor, maybe in worse condition than anyone attending Hand Middle School but if I had behaved badly or the way they did toward the young girl, my parents would have made it difficult to sit down for a few days. Your financial, social, racial, or any other situation one lives in has not one damn thing to do with your ability to behave in a civil manner. The principal should be fired immediately and replaced with someone who is willing to enforce the rules of civility and behavior. If the students cannot adhere to the rules, expel them and send them home. If they don’t want to learn, why should the students who do want to learn be penalized because of the behavior of disruptive students? To be fair since we have nieces and nephews in public school, not all have problems and if they do, they are usually very minor.
Brad, I would suggest doing your homework on the school if don’t you want your twins to be exposed to what is going on at Hand according to what is being reported before allowing them to be placed in a potentially dangerous situation.
Amen, Bart. It starts and ends with the parents. Kids with at least one engaged parent who expect their kids to behave are not generally an issue in school. But then too many people want to blame society and the schools for these kids misbehaving. Just spend more money on schools! That will fix it!! Set the bar lower for them, expect less, punish less, think about their feelings.
I had a similar situation back when my oldest son was in 5th grade. He was getting bullied by one kid. Went to principal, got nothing from her. So one day I happened to be picking up my son after school and the bully was standing at the bus area. I just walked over and, utilizing my full 6’2″, stood over him and asked him if he was going to continue to bother my son. That was the end of the problem.
Good for you Doug, you did the right thing by your son.
“Set the bar lower for them, expect less, punish less, think about their feelings.”
If my teachers had worried about my feelings, they darn sure didn’t show it. You either did the work in class and/or assigned homework and if you didn’t, you got a failing grade. No pats on the head sympathizing with your plight as a product of a financially challenged family situation and if you misbehaved, to the principal’s office for proper discipline. And to set the record straight, the principal never used a switch, paddle, or any other means of corporal punishment when I was in middle and grade school. And no, we were far from perfect. At one time I spent almost as much time sitting in the auditorium as I did in biology class for various reasons. Of course, it was not my fault at all, I was only reacting to stimulus from my friends and a couple of girls I liked. 🙂 🙂
However, in grammar school when we lived in the country, the principal would paddle your behind for consistent misbehavior. And the parents backed the principal 99% of the time. Plus, when you were sent to the principal’s office and punished, the real punishment took place when we got home and our parents were informed by a phone call or a note. 🙁 🙁
Is there any wonder private schools are springing up across the nation and parents have lost faith in the public school system?
Bullying happens in private schools too.
Bullying happens in every aspect of public life whether at work, at school, sports teams, anywhere you have a group of people, bullying bound to happen sooner or later. It may not be the overt physical kind or the open verbal kind but bullying goes on.
The point is that in public schools, the discipline factor is not high on the list but in private schools, it is. How do I know? My niece sent her two children to private schools as long as they could afford the tuition. When bullying occurred, the offenders were promptly disciplined and either sent home for few days or were kicked out and tuition refunded.
I don’t think that it’s quite fair to say that in public schools the discipline factor is not high on the list. It is more accurate to say that private schools have more options in how they can deal with such things.
That being said, I’m not at all defending what has been described as happening at Hand. Even if you want to try to be understanding of the situation the offending students come from, which I don’t entirely disagree with, it is never OK to allow an unsafe situation for other students to continue.
I personally believe there are ways to deal with both situations without negating the other; I believe it is possible to consider the situation of the offending students, while still giving them consequences, and while also still ensuring that the other students are safe.
Ensuring the safety of students should absolutely be the number one priority.
I would hope that this type of situation is not the norm and that the district is taking steps to remedy it.
It is true that Principals have a lot of power over a school for good or for ill. One would hope that with such power also comes accountability.
“I don’t think that it’s quite fair to say that in public schools the discipline factor is not high on the list. It is more accurate to say that private schools have more options in how they can deal with such things.”
And also, public schools have a greater challenge with discipline to start with, since they have to educate everyone – period.
That said, it is definitely true that some public schools meet the challenge better than others. What is described at Hand is not acceptable.
Scout, my apology for leaving out four important words. The point is that in public schools, the discipline factor is not high on the list “as it should be” but in private schools, it is.
There is nothing wrong with being understanding concerning the surrounding conditions or environment of the offending students but at some point, the priorities should be established and civility and good behavior should be paramount, eclipsing environment.
If the schools allow unacceptable behavior because of the students environment, the schools are not only letting the other students down, they are failing the ones exhibiting unacceptable behavior by not holding them accountable. At some point, the school administration, school board, principals, teachers, and especially parents need to be who they supposedly are, the parents or adults in the room.
I think we agree on this.
In private school, the administration does something about it other than make excuses.