Tag: Barack Obama

California Classrooms:  From “Yes, Ma’am” to “F Off”

California is fighting back.  No.  Not against crime.  Not against sky-high gas prices.  Not against overregulation.  My home state is fighting back to keep obstinate, disruptive kids in classrooms with your kids. 

In a Los Angeles Times article by Daniel Miller, he explains that President Trump signed an executive order on April 23 that directed the Education Department to “root out school discipline frameworks based on discriminatory equity ideology and issue new commonsense practices in the nation’s K-12 schools.”  In other words, President Trump does not think school discipline should be a matter of skin color.  The state of California worries that this will lead to legal challenges, because their school discipline policies were changed in 2019 based entirely on woke, racial ideologies.  They passed a law that year that banned suspending students who were “willfully defiant.”   

Willful defiance is not an accident.  It is, by definition, a purposeful act.  Imagine a teacher who sees a kid with his cellphone out during class and tells him to put it away.  In the past, kids would say, “Yes, Ma’am,” and put it away, knowing they had been caught.  If they instead kept tapping at their phone and told the teacher to “F Off,” that would be willful defiance.  Until 2019, schools could respond to such bad behavior by suspending the kid from school.  After 2019, that student could not be suspended.

Why would California want to protect a willfully defiant student like that?  The answer should not surprise you.  California is woke, and based its decision on twisted, misused, and incomplete statistics on race and suspensions.  Miller writes that “President Obama had directed schools to avoid enacting discipline policies that disproportionately punished underrepresented student groups – a stance later supported by President Biden.”

The state of California is allowing willfully defiant students to disrupt your child from learning because they say that black students are more likely to be suspended for willful defiance than white students, once again falsely implying that racism is rampant in our country.  Here is the problem.  California bases its claim that black students are disproportionately punished on twisted statistics.  Miller’s article says that “Black students accounted for 17% of total suspensions in California – despite making up less than 6% of the student population.”  That does not mean that black students are disproportionately punished.  The article does not give you the relevant information to know that.  The implication is that since only 6% of the students are black and 17% of the suspensions are black, those students are overrepresented by 11%.  The problem is, the 6% number is entirely irrelevant, and the one statistic that is important is not even mentioned.  The statistic that you actually need to know is the percentage of willfully defiant students who are black.  That number is likely right around 17%.

To make it easy to understand, say there are 10,000 students in your school district.  If 6% of the students are black and 94% are white, that means 600 students are black and 9,400 are white.  Then, say that 100 of the students are willfully defiant; 17 blacks and 83 whites.  According to the logic of Obama, Biden, and California, if you do not suspend 94 whites and 6 blacks, that would be disproportionate and racist.  That would mean you have to let 11 of the willfully defiant black students get away with it, and worse, you would have to suspend 11 innocent white students.  While this solution makes perfect sense to Democrats, they realize it would be hard to explain to the public, and especially to the parents of those 11 innocent white students.  That led them to an alternative solution; to stop suspending any of the willfully defiant students.  Now, the 9,900 other students have to sit in class with willfully defiant brats disrupting them, both black and white.

As you can see, the relevant number in that scenario is not the percentage of the 10,000 students who are black.  It is the percentage of the 100 willfully defiant students who are black that is important.  The article does not tell us that number.

The divisive left does the same thing when talking about people in prison for murder.  They often claim that there is a disproportionate number of blacks in prison for murder than whites because more than 50% of the people in prison for murder are black, and only about 12% of the U.S. population is black.  The 12% statistic is, of course, irrelevant.  They fail to mention the one relevant fact, that more than 50% of murders are committed by blacks.  That means that the number of blacks in prison for murder is proportionate to the number of murders they commit.  Hopefully, their solution is not the same as it is with willfully defiant students; to stop putting any murderers in prison.

The list of reasons you should never let your child attend a public school is as long as Santa’s naughty and nice lists put together.  The fact that they have to deal with willfully defiant students in class can now be added.

In Defense of Naps, Golf, and Cancun

I am going to defend Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and Ted Cruz from some undeserved criticism.  As you can see, I am very consistent on this stance whether the person involved is someone I generally agree with or someone I almost never do.  Both the right and the left are guilty of this attack and should both stop it. 

Let’s start with the latest example.  Recently, Texas Senator Ted Cruz was predictably blasted by the left for going with his wife and two daughters to Cancun during a terrible ice storm in his home state.  My first thought was, “That sounds like a pretty good idea to me.  If I had a choice between sitting in an ice storm with no electricity and sitting on the beach with a margarita, I know which one I would choose.”  My next thought was, “Is that my reaction just because I like Senator Cruz?  Would I have a different reaction if it was Bernie Sanders?”  This is a normal question for me because we as conservatives should not have double standards like the left does.  You know, like how Democrats cheered on rioting thugs for a year and then started denouncing rioting thugs on January 6 when they thought they could win political points.  My conclusion:  No.  I would not feel differently if it was a political opponent. 

I reached this conclusion by looking at times when Democrats have been criticized for wasting time on leisure activities instead of “doing the work of the people.”  The example that came to mind was something that Donald Trump, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, and many other presidents have been criticized for:  golf.  I specifically remember those three presidents being attacked for spending too much time on the golf course during their term in office.  In every case I defended them, whether they were Republicans or Democrats, for this simple reason:  the less politicians do, the better it is for us.  As another golfer president once said, “government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem.”

Both the left and the right need to stop with this criticism.  Ideally, politicians would spend more time, not less, golfing or on vacations.  Pondering this reminded me of one of our very best presidents.  Calvin Coolidge was known for sleeping 10 to 11 hours a night and then taking a long nap in the afternoon.  How much better off would our country be if politicians spent more time sleeping and less time interfering with our lives?

This gave me an idea.  As you know, I almost always oppose government regulations, but I actually want to propose a rule for anyone elected to public office.  Upon election, each office holder must take up a new hobby that occupies at least 5 hours per day.  It’s a brilliant law because nothing would help the American people more than to keep politicians busy and out of our lives.

To help get them started I even have some ideas for current politicians. 

Senator Elizabeth Warren – Gardening:  Senator Warren famously claimed to be an American Indian, earning her nickname, “Pocahontas.”  Since American Indians taught the settlers how to plant corn, gardening would be the perfect hobby for her to reconnect with her roots.

Representative Adam Schiff – Writing:  I don’t mean writing political op-eds for the Washington Post.  I mean writing fiction books.  Mr. Schiff is known mostly for pushing imaginary claims that President Trump colluded with foreign countries to interfere with the U.S. election in 2016.  I think his wild imagination could come up with some crazy international political thrillers.  He could be the next Tom Clancy!

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer – Poker:  One of the skills that makes a good poker player is bluffing.  Bluffing is simply the ability to look right at people and lie with a straight face.  Speaker Pelosi and Senator Schumer have been perfecting this skill for years.  They wouldn’t have any trouble setting up games either.  We could fill the Amazon Room at The Rio with lying politicians!

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell – Yodeling:  Honestly, I just want to see this.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo – Calling bingo at senior living communities

Senator Mitt Romney – LARPing:  LARPing stands for Live Action Role Playing.  Basically, a group of guys get together and pretend to be people that they’re not, like knights, elves, and wizards.  Senator Romney should be good at that since he has pretended to be a Republican for years.

Senator Bernie Sanders – Stand-up comedy:  I hear he looks a lot like Larry David.

Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Pressley, and Rashida Tlaib, aka “The Squad” – Start a band: “Performing next on New Year’s Rockin’ Eve, singing their hit single, “Israel Has Hypnotized the World,”… The Squad!” 

Joe Biden – Massage therapy:  We all know that Joe Biden has already been known to massage women who cross his path.  He may as well take some classes and get a little side gig going. 

Ultimately, whatever they decide to do it will be better for the country than anything they are doing now. 

Is President Trump Our King Josiah?

As President Trump leaves the White House I have been contemplating his similarities with another great leader who challenged the status quo and “drained the swamp.”  The biblical king, Josiah, was the last good king of Israel’s southern kingdom of Judah before they were defeated by the Babylonians and taken into captivity. 

Both the United States and Judah had gone downhill quite a ways after some downright bad leaders who “did evil in the sight of the Lord.”  Don’t get me wrong, both nations also had some good leaders, except that they failed to roll back all of the evil policies of the bad rulers.  When reading through the books of Kings and Chronicles you begin to notice a pattern arise where the good kings usually had one fatal flaw mentioned.  It seemed to always be described like it was here with King Jotham:

And he did what was right in the sight of the Lord; he did according to all that his father Uzziah had done.  However the high places were not removed; the people still sacrificed and burned incense on the high places. – 2 Kings 15:34-35

These high places were generally set up in Israel by the bad kings and were used for pagan worship and idolatry.  Even the few kings who “did what was right in the sight of the Lord” failed to remove the high places, with two exceptions:  King Hezekiah and his great-grandson King Josiah. 

It made me wonder why the other good kings allowed the high places even though it was obviously wrong.  Then it struck me.  It’s for the same reason that our good presidents have not reversed the immoral policies of our bad presidents.  They knew that many people would not like it and they lacked the political courage to follow through.  There was probably a lot of political pressure by the people who worshipped and sacrificed at the high places, and even the good kings bowed to that pressure. 

Kings Hezekiah and Josiah did not.  They both had the backbone to stand up for what was right and removed the high places from the land.  In the United States, conservatives have been frustrated because even when we elect good leaders they have lacked the courage to do what is right.  Like Hezekiah and Josiah, President Trump has not.  Here are some of his landmark accomplishments:

  • The first wicked king of Judah was Solomon’s son Reheboam.  When he became king the people came to him and said, “Your father made our yoke heavy; now therefore, lighten the burdensome service of your father and his heavy yoke which he put on us, and we will serve you.” (1 Kings 12:4)  In other words, regulations.  The government was forcing them to do too much and interfering with their lives.  Reheboam took the bad advice of his friends and responded, “My father made your yoke heavy, but I will add to your yoke; my father chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with scourges!” (1 Kings 12:14)  Our bad presidents have greatly increased the bone crushing regulatory burden on the people.  Our good presidents, like George W. Bush and his father, said they were for smaller government but did not actually lessen regulations.  President Trump did.  He made a guideline that for every new regulation, two had to be removed.  This led to a booming economy and record low unemployment.
  • Both good and bad presidents have said that we should recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and move our embassy there.  None of them had the guts to actually do it.  President Trump did.
  • Speaking of Israel, President Obama greatly damaged our relationship with God’s chosen people and our greatest ally.  He treated Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with contempt.  His administration chastised Israel for defending themselves.  He backstabbed them and allowed them to be attacked in the United Nations.  Most notably, he put Israel in grave danger by appeasing Iran and making a deal to remove sanctions against them and give them billions of dollars without even forcing them to end their nuclear program.  President Trump was the most pro-Israel president of my lifetime and maybe ever.  He defended Israel in the United Nations, acknowledged their sovereignty over the Golan Heights, and ended the appeasement of Iran by pulling out of the dangerous Iran Nuclear Deal.  He was even able to broker peace deals between Israel and Bahrain, Sudan, and the United Arab Emirates.
  • About ten years ago my health insurance started to rise precipitously in price.  President Obama had forced through the government monstrosity now known as Obamacare, which also took away our freedom with regards to our healthcare decisions.  President Trump eliminated the individual mandate, taking the teeth out of Obamacare and giving individuals back more control of their healthcare.
  • After years of weak defense of our nation’s borders, President Trump was able to get over 400 miles of wall built.
  • There is one rule that is repeated in each of the first five books of the Bible; that murderers should be put to death.  The federal government has failed in this responsibility, as only 3 murderers had been executed between 1963 and 2020.  President Trump has enforced the death penalty for murderers again, with 13 federal executions being carried out in the last year.
  • Good presidents and candidates have been lied about and vilified by our biased and corrupt media for decades, frustrating millions of Americans because previous presidents just took the abuse.  President Trump fought back and constantly called out the media for their unfairness and propaganda.
  • One of the great reforms of King Josiah is found in 2 Kings 23:10.  “And he defiled Topheth, which is in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or daughter pass through the fire to Molech.”  To make your child pass through the fire meant to sacrifice them to the Moabite god Molech.  This evil practice was not only allowed to happen in Israel by the wicked kings, but kings Ahaz and Manasseh actually sacrificed their own sons.  The United States has a similar practice that is protected by the wicked presidents:  abortion.  Unfortunately, even our good presidents have been inept at curtailing this evil act.  President Trump has stepped up to the plate and defended babies.  He was the first president to attend the March for Life.  He has found a way to block funding for Planned Parenthood, the largest abortion provider in the country.  Most importantly, he has appointed three pro-life Supreme Court Justices.

You may be wondering why I chose Josiah to compare President Trump to instead of Hezekiah since they both stood up against the status quo and removed the high places, and I have two reasons.  First, Hezekiah came earlier and that leads me to compare him to another great president who upset the apple cart, President Reagan.  Second, Josiah was only 8 years old when he became king, and President Trump does tend to speak without much tact like a kid might.  It is disappointing that too many people couldn’t get past that lack of tact, because like King Josiah, he may be the last great president we ever have.  Thank you, President Trump, for making us great again.