Category Archives: ethics and morals

A letter to Boston

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The Indignant Teacher has  a post up highlighting Diane Ravitch and her letter to Bostonians.

Bostonians being recently threatened with the bombing perhaps can understand a bomb has gone off in the public school system–put there by billionaires who wish to destroy it for their own greed.  Unfortunately, it’s not as easy to see as a bombing in a public space…it’s much more stealth than that…and the damage done is not felt in real time, but in years past it.  It will be hard for some to realize the connection to the destruction to society and democracy…making it easier for those doing it to not be held accountable.

The Racism of Charter Schools

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Ani McHugh, a high school English teacher in New Jersey has a letter to Bill Gates and questions all the evidence pointing to racism.

Also from teacherbiz blog, she has this up–requesting that Arne Duncan and all of the pro-testing, testing, testing reformers take the  tests they require of the kids and publish their results.

…because we need to know if they are qualified to run schools.

Forcing chemo

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This is outrageous.  The child does not want it.  The parents do not want it.  But a gov’t bureaucrat has once again decided they know what’s best for someone else better than they do.

I would want to know their genetic background–most Amish came from Dutch/German stock…so it is possible that this family has the dreaded gluten intolerance and her immune system might be unable to fight off the cancer due to an inflamed gut.  Not to mention whatever chemicals she has been exposed to from industry and farming.

But…no…the medical nazi’s will force her to take a highly toxic chemical that may or may not cure her of cancer.  And they will turn their heads if by chance she is cured of this cancer, but later on develops yet another, more aggressive form of cancer due to the toxic chemicals they are putting into her now.

Like I have said many times–if I am stricken, I won’t go the chemo route, but try to fight it naturally and let nature take its course.

No one should be forced to take any medical treatment.  Ever.

 

Another reason to hate F_cebook **edited

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Creepy guy “friends” high school and junior high kids while pretending to be someone else.  Oh, and he “just wanted to see how friendly” they were is a load of crap.  Good on the Momma Bear who spotted it and followed her intuition.

Oh, and I recently found out that F_cebook “owns” any images one puts up there.   Not own as in has copyright, but they have it in their agreement that they have liberal use of those photos to do with what they wish.  And you don’t even have to belong to the wretched site–if your family or friends put your picture up there, you’re SOL.

**Edited to add this:  Gov’t data requests

Syria, Syria, Syria

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Coming from a military officer in Canada–“we should learn from history…”  and try diplomatic avenues.

The title of the piece is misleading, because from what I’m hearing, the UN has not been shown evidence of chemical weapons being used….why not?

Timeline of Syria’s uprising here.

From the timeline:

February 4, 2012

UN resolution vetoed

Russia and China veto a UN resolution backing calls for Assad’s resignation as president of Syria. The veto prompted international outrage, coming hours after the regime’s bloodiest crackdown in the 10-month old conflict, which the UN had already characterized as a civil war. At least 200 people were reported killed in heavy shelling in Homs. Read more

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May 26, 2012

Alleged Houla massacre

Activists say Syrian regime forces have killed more than 90 people in the Houla area, many of them women and children. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says Arab nations and the international community were “partners” in the killing “because of their silence about the massacre that the Syrian regime has committed.” Read more

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June 16, 2012

UN suspends observer mission

International efforts to stop the violence is Syria are disintegrating after the U.N. suspends its observer mission. Major Gen. Robert Mood said rising bloodshed over the past 10 days was posing significant risks to the lives of the 300 unarmed observers in the country, and was impeding their ability to carry out their mandate. Read more

(the UN does go back within a short time period)

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June 25, 2012

Military defections

Dozens of military personnel defect to Turkey overnight. A total of 33 soldiers – including a general and two colonels – slip across the border in the largest defection of members of the military since the uprising began. It comes at a time of heightened tensions between the two countries after Syria shot down a Turkish

warplane.

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July 23, 2012

Chemical weapons threat

The Syrian regime threatens to use its chemical and biological weapons in case of a foreign attack, in its first ever acknowledgement that it possesses weapons of mass destruction. Read more

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May 3, 2013

Israeli air strikes

Israel launches air strikes into Syria over 48 hours. One appears to target a military complex. An Israeli official says they were targeting missile shipments bound for Hezbollah. Read more

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Well…this is disturbing.  Jim White writes that the Kerry tried to interfere with the UN gathering evidence for an independent report on whether chemical weapons are being used. And if you follow the NYTimes link, it states that if Sarin was used, the chemical would linger for a long time, and therefore it could be detected long after it was used.  Kind of like DDT, eh?

IF there were chemical weapons used…I wonder who sold either the chemicals or the technology to them?  Gah, it wouldn’t be Monsanto, now would it?  /snark

 

 

Education News

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A Chicago Alderman has proposed drones in Rahm Emanuel’s Safe Passage routes.  I kid you not.  If you continue with the next blog of Fred Klonsky, he questions the “none of your business” attitude of CPS on emergency preparedness plans.  At the end, there is another link “continuing the story” which has this:

In a written statement, CPS officials insisted that every school in the district does, in fact, have a plan but said they were limited to “management level staff within the Office of Safety and Security,” building principals and assistant principals, and officials of the Chicago Police and Fire Departments.

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This is ridiculous.  The schools that I have taught at had plans the teachers knew and the children went through drills so they would know what to do.  It is important because their teacher may be incapacitated, so the children all the way up to the principals need to know the plan.    I found it highly ironic one year when we had a small earthquake while I was teaching.  I asked the kids if they knew what to do in case of an earthquake, which they didn’t, so I told them to stay under their desks until the shaking stopped, and then we would leave the building in the usual emergency route.  One of the regular instructors thought that I had needlessly worried the children….all the while they have been  put in “lockdowns” for some terrorist going to attack the school.  <sigh>
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The Indignant Teacher has a post up on a petition to remove David Koch from the board of WGBH Boston’s PBS station.  I have always admired WGBH and WTTW PBS stations, and now that Kochs are trying to control the media, it is even more imperative to get them out.
More moneyed influence on campaigns of the anti-public school crowd.  Good God, this guy is a liar.  A bold-faced one at that.
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More here on John Pelto’s blog that Diane links to:
The evidence is clear that income inequality is a major factor in educational inequality. Children living in poverty experience prolonged stress that affects their brain development in the regions associated with learning. There is a strong correlation between socioeconomic status and standardized test scores. As proven by Stanford’s Sean Reardon, the widening of the achievement gap results from additional opportunities affluent parents provide their children out of the K-12 environment: high-quality pre-K, tutoring, and after-school and summer enrichment. Reardon demonstrated that the test score disparity between low-income and high-income children is not the result of schools.
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See, the pro-Charter $$ folks would prefer to ignore this important fact that impacts learning….it’s much more fun to blame unionized teachers…and watch them scramble to put out fires the Charter proponents deliberately set.
This is pretty powerful.  He puts it so well–that every child develops in different ways and at different speeds and those differences should be honored, not ridiculed by failure of a “skills” test.  (hat tip to Diane Ravitch)
Finally, a wonderful history lesson here by Diane.  She was there on the March on Washington.

Absolute Immunity

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Never mind absolute power….how’s absolute immunity grab ya?  Good God.

Why is it wrong to shoot down an unarmed black child in Florida, but okay to shoot down brown people in Iraq–especially under the lie of weapons of mass destruction perpetuated by Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Wolfowitz??

1/9/03   After nearly two months, UN’s Hans Blix says his inspectors have not found any “smoking guns” in Iraq.

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2/27/03 US diplomat John Brady Kiesling resigns, citing the “distortion of intelligence” and “systematic manipulation of American opinion.“

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3/8/03 On CNN, Joe Wilson says, “I think it’s safe to say that the US government should have or did know that [the Niger documents were] fake before Dr. ElBaradei mentioned it in his report at the UN yesterday.” Decision to discredit Wilson made at a meeting within the Office of the Vice President. [Date the public knew: 5/3/04]

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I saw where the President was going to hand out yet another Medal of Honor.  I couldn’t stand to watch it.  I’m sure this veteran should have been a better candidate for the Medal of Honor.  He actually knows right from wrong.

Dolphins dying in record numbers

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Organic Consumers has this link up.  It leads to this link.

Here’s a much better report.

In the CNN piece, she mentions lesions in their respiratory systems…and my mind went to petroleum products as a cause.  Notice that the reporter briefly mentions pollution as a problem, and immediately goes to bacteria and elaborates on that without discussing what pollution does to marine animals.

So….I searched and found this on the effects of the BP oil spill on the dolphins.  (Apparently, BP didn’t get rid of ALL the evidence. /said with dripping sarcasm.)

Wow, look at this.  The picture is showing globs of oil still sticking to a grad student after he had showered.

And remember “corexit”–the controversial *cough* clean up chemical (because it makes perfect sense to use chemicals to clean up petroleum chemicals…natch.   /said with even more dripping sarcasm…)

Well…corexit is apparently still in the water, along with the globs of oil:

Tiny globs of it, mingled with the chemical dispersant that was supposed to break it up, have settled into the shallows, mingling with the shells, he said

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Geologist  James Kirby states that he wouldn’t want his grandchildren playing in the surf, and says this:

“The dispersant accelerates the absorption by the skin.”

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The dispersant accelerates absorption by the skin...meaning it’s making the oil even more toxic.  Even worse is that corexit is interfering with bacteria that normally eat the oil after spills.  Holy crap.

As always, it is wise to know who is funding research, and am glad to hear that Kirby’s funding is from a group independent of BP.

Also on my mind for a cause is mercury–which could be combining with the toxic petroleum and corexit–

I found this paper that I haven’t seen before on the connection between mercury and dolphins beaching themselves.   This is important because it compares the dolphins that beached themselves with the same group.    They were also going to test mercury levels in fossil teeth…gotta love the Aussies.

I thought this paragraph was interesting:

Historical gold mining, which up until the 1930s used mercury in gold extraction, is the likely main source of the heavy metal in the waters, says Thompson. The mercury has gradually washed down the Yarra and other rivers, and accumulated in the sediments of the bay. Current dredging work could further increase mercury levels in the food chain, he adds. The mercury levels he measured were already higher than those found in dolphins in other populations in polluted waters around the world, from the Mediterranean to costal India.

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This is not something I have come across before–mercury being used in gold extraction.  Wonder how that has affected gold miners and water supplies in the U.S.?

Finally, I’ll leave you with this–Note the video clip of the trail of oil spilled that also follows the east coastline where the dolphins are beaching themselves: