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A Democrat’s Praise for Republicans

I’m not sure how many of you caught this, but Mitch McConnell took a stand yesterday I hope indicates sanity could begin to prevail in Washington. The fact that I’m praising this man surprises me as I fervently abhor his politics in general, but I think we need to separate character from political opinions, and Mitch just showed a lot of character. He also knows his words could do him much political damage with voters he needs for support, but spoke the truth even when it could and probably will hurt him. He did this because he obviously took our country’s welfare over his own, the true mark of a leader deserving respect, something we’ve had darn little of the past four years in American politics. In reference to Trump darling, the newly elected congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, Mitch said the following:

“Somebody who’s suggested that perhaps no airplane hit the Pentagon on 9/11, that horrifying school shootings were pre-staged, and that the Clintons crashed JFK Jr.’s airplane is not living in reality,” He called Greene as he saw her “looney.” Continue reading “A Democrat’s Praise for Republicans”

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White on Black: RIP James Charles

Just this past month America lost a great man who wasn’t famous nationally although I know locally he was well known and highly respected. I share his memory now with a wider audience because he epitomized what great leadership is all about. I think, especially during these troubling times, it’s important to know we do indeed have people who can lead us to better ways. James Charles, who died May 20 after a long career serving others, was one of them.

Mr. Charles was my principal for two years during one of the most difficult times of my life and enormously influential in shaping my vision of the world around me. Mr. Charles didn’t just teach me about how a school should be directed and improved, he taught me how to be a better man, and did so mostly by example. Continue reading “White on Black: RIP James Charles”

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Little Richard Cures Covid-19

So I’m pushing a cart in Walmart while wearing a mask made out of a blue shop towel and two red rubber bands. Had I added a splash of white I’d have been downright patriotic. I feel like I’m on some sort of dangerous safari, surrounded by masked men and women with fear in their eyes, at least the smarter ones look this way. The usual clueless boobs who seem to live in Walmarts all across America are here as well, oblivious as always. It’s about at this juncture it suddenly occurs to me I’m actually enjoying the fear factor some.

Yeah, I know I’m weird, as off kilter as the 350-pound woman who almost runs me over with a motorized cart apparently reserved for the morbidly obese. Usually, I hate to be inside of Walmart and left this odious chore to Mary, but these are unusual times and a person with a compromised immune system has no business being here. Me? Just another masked man looking for toilet paper.

I just read bandits now take advantage of the mask thing. When this all started I told Mary it would be a great time to rob a bank, and she just shook her head and made the usual expression she has for me when I say something dumb, which I do many times a day, but some of it’s funny, so she puts up with it, or at at least she has for the past 40 years, a pretty good run for a guy like me. Continue reading “Little Richard Cures Covid-19”

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The Day I Almost Brought a Gun to School (Part 2 of 2 )

Steven’s “I’m gonna get you man,” and his demented eyes resurfaced as I walked back to my classroom after meeting with the principal and police officer. I thought he was disturbed enough to follow through on his threat of another student and also knew he was now armed with a handgun and roaming free. In my entire career, I’ve never been more frightened of the possible future and never endured a longer work day, every hour seeming like ten.

I always parked my truck right across the street from the building I worked in, and instead of entering it, I walked to my truck. As I crossed the street I pictured Steven slipping by our police officer who could not guard three different buildings at once. I visualized Steven shooting out the window of the outer door in my building, opening it, and then shattering the glass in my classroom door so that he could have a little target practice. This all could have happened in under a minute. Jack Nicholson’s role in “The Shining” never seemed more real. Continue reading “The Day I Almost Brought a Gun to School (Part 2 of 2 )”

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The Day I Almost Brought a Gun to School (Part 1 of 2)

Before I dive into my next diatribe, I do want to make it clear I’m far from anti-gun and actually own lots of them, rifles, handguns and at least one firearm, a 30 cal. M1 semiautomatic with a 30 shot clip, which would have to be considered an assault rifle. I’m not about to jump on the ban the guns bandwagon for reasons I’ll leave for some other time. However, a most recent movement to arm teachers serves only one good, and that’s demonstrating how ignorant and out of touch legislators are when it comes to issues regarding education and schools. Teachers packing heat? Good God, how wrong can this idea be? Continue reading “The Day I Almost Brought a Gun to School (Part 1 of 2)”

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Facebook Pardons a Sinner

Facebook in its divine benevolence apparently just pardoned a poor digital sinner who for the past five years has been barred from the hallowed halls of electronic chitchat. I relate this because it’s an interesting story from one who really does not get social media. Maybe this is age talking and maybe it’s more a case of fearing an invisible chain where every move is monitored and recorded today, I really don’t know, but I do know I made the great Facebook god mad a few years ago and now he (or she?) has apparently forgiven my great transgression, or more likely, just forgotten about it when rolling over a new data bank to monetize. Continue reading “Facebook Pardons a Sinner”

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How School “Reform” Impacts Teacher Training and Retention

One might suppose upon superficial analysis of my various rants that I’m of the mind that a school cannot be improved without a change in the community it serves. This is inaccurate and I’ve personally experienced the opposite several times. A school can most definitely improve greatly irrespective of its student population and surrounding circumstances; I just fervently argue that the improvement in impoverished communities will still fall short of what can be accomplished in mostly middle and upper class environments, and have considerable hard and irrefutable evidence to support such thinking beyond my own experiences. This disadvantage is not due to some sort of natural inferiority of the people in poorer communities, but directly the product of the many more challenges poor people face in life just trying to survive. There’s no money for tutors when it’s hard to pay the rent each month. Basic survival will always come first. However, I do commonly call “school reform” an illusion and most definitely believe this to be true more times than it is not. Continue reading “How School “Reform” Impacts Teacher Training and Retention”

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The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down

If we really want to honor Southern heritage today, more of us should heed the words of the most famous of all Confederate heroes, Robert E. Lee, who in his great wisdom argued against Civil War monuments, saying that these “kept open the sores of war.”

My journey to greater understanding began many years ago in Louisiana when this now old Yankee married a charming daughter of the Confederacy. She is a big part of the reason I fell in love with the South and remain enchanted with much of its culture. Embracing my new life, I mounted a large Confederate battle flag in our living room. I thought it looked cool and was a lot cheaper than other art we couldn’t afford. Continue reading “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down”

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Small Town Journalism: Mr. Magoo Meets Blind Bob

For entertainment’s sake, I recently made light of much of my first experiences working as a small town journalist, although there was great truth in the comedy and nothing fictional at all in the account. Mostly, I over-simplified and under-explained a great many complex factors that often led me to sitting in an uncomfortable, hard backed wood chair or even more unpleasant metal folding ones for two hours or more listening to the specifications of roofing tar, the need to keep the family dog from using a neighbor’s yard as his restroom, why some potholes can’t be fixed, and the ever-evolving mystery surrounding who siphoned gas from DPW vehicles every Saturday night. Sometimes I could almost cut the high tension with my trusty pen that everyone likes to say is mightier than the sword but in my case was more like a bent butter knife. I was totally unprepared for the monumental importance of issues with earth-shattering consequences that challenged me by the moment, and soon recognized I couldn’t truly convey the deep inner meaning of petroleum products and dog poop. Continue reading “Small Town Journalism: Mr. Magoo Meets Blind Bob”

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The Kavanaugh Conundrum

“It is of great importance in a republic, not only to guard the society against the oppression of its rulers, but to guard one part of the society against the injustice of the other part.” James Madison, often referred to as “The Father of the Constitution”

It’s not often we get to witness a major historic event live, but the Kavanaugh hearings certainly qualify. I don’t recall being so emotionally moved and feeling I viewed something that will be long remembered since I watched Jack Ruby shoot Lee Harvey Oswald on live TV when I was a little kid. I will always view both events as assassinations, but the Kavanaugh hearings slowed the bullet down to a crawl so that we could all witness in stop action vividness and instant replay the blood and bone hit the cameras. I never thought I’d ever agree with Lindsey Graham, but I’d have to call the whole scene a dehumanizing display. The thing Graham conveniently forgot was that Republicans were every bit as guilty as the Democrats, but a good case can be made the Democrats constructed the original bomb. Continue reading “The Kavanaugh Conundrum”