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Spring training is underway. Home Openers are not far off.
This is our year! Go Tigers!
Here’s clip to get you in the mood for batting. Come on! You’ve got 5 minutes to honor the Great American Pastime.
Consider it spring tonic. Pass it on. We all need it.
h/t American Digest
Robert Reich: I’ve never liked that little man. Here he is reminding me why. (hint: e-l-i-t-i-s-t i-d-i-o-t)
Damn the economics, damn the will of the little people, damn the torpedoes: full speed ahead.
Thanks, George, for being there. I’m sure batting away these little gnats is the high point of your week; but even so, I hope they pay you well for fielding an endless stream of leftist lunacy.
Oh, and regarding the “race to the bottom:” Nobody gets there faster than the federal government.
Click on the link, above, to enter. Once the picture opens, click on any number and when it’s done loading you will be able to navigate around the room or view in panorama with the arrow buttons. Alternatively, you can hold the left mouse button down and use the cursor to "fly" around the room (not too fast – you’ll get dizzy). The screen also has a + and -- for Telephoto or Wide Screen. Truly an amazing journey of an amazing place.
via Larwyn’s Links. Thanks!
We’ll Meet Again: Vera Lynn (1939)
March 6, 1943
Your first anniversary together, again.
Through the Ether to you,
Happy Anniversary!
Oh dear! The School Board President from Detroit can’t write. That’s all I’m going to say about that.
But The Blog Prof has details.
It’s bad enough that Detroit Public Schools (DPS) graduates a pathetic 1 in 4 students, the worst in the nation. That obscene graduation rate is only that high because DPS commits ’social promotion’ – the practice of passing students onto the next grade who are not ready, a practice that DPS emergency financial manager Robert Bobb has just ended (Detroit Public Schools Finally Ends “Social Promotion” – Passing Students That Can’t Read Their Diplomas). That same Robert Bobb has been fighting with the teachers union and with the Detroit school board for academic control of the district. The school board is led by Otis Mathis, who wrote a mass email last August:
Do DPS control the Foundation or outside group? If an outside group control the foundation, then what is DPS Board row with selection of is director? Our we mixing DPS and None DPS row’s, and who is the watch dog?
And here’s the beginning of an email to supporters a few days ago that started with this:
If you saw Sunday’s Free Press that shown Robert Bobb the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools, move Mark Twain to Boynton which have three times the number seats then students and was one of the reason’s he gave for closing school to many empty seats.
Do this explain anything about the Detroit schools?
On the healthcare bill: while everyone is busy worrying about “reconciliation,”we need to be more concerned about the real nuclear option lying in the weeds.
As I understand the plan, in order to reach the Senate’s reconciliation, the House must first pass the exact Senate bill that was passed on Christmas Eve. The intent is to then send it back to the Senate to “fix it up” with a few fillips and get it passed with a simple majority by submitting it to the reconciliation process.
But technically, once the House passes the Senate’s version of the bill, the bill goes to the President for signature. What’s to ensure that anything happens after that? As reported by Legal Insurrection, apparently nothing and nothing, again. Not that the “fix” will fix anything anyway, but there’s no guarantee (unless you’re given to trusting the President and the leaders of the Senate, because they’ve never lied to us before) that the Senate will even play with a “fix”. Since the President has made it clear that he doesn’t care whether this gets bipartisan support or not, don’t expect much.
We’re knee deep in the hoopla now, and spinning fast.
UPDATE: Further Confirmed by NRO
From Greg Gutfeld’s Daily Gut, this Martin Short classic: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. interviews Nathan Thurm about global warming.
Greg’s notes:
Here’s Martin Short playing his legendary corporate lawyer sleazebag character named Nathan Thurm.
He’s being interrogated by Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
It’s hilarious.
But it’s even more hilarious, that four years later, folks like Kennedy and Gore have now become the Nathan Thurms.
As an aside, Michigan’s literate and highly entertaining Congressman Thaddeus McCotter is a semi-regular guest on Red Eye. A funny Congressman – on purpose! How unique. And while he really has to work on that monotone, he can actually deliver a cogent sentence without a single, umm, ahhh, or teleprompter.
Thad’s synopsis of what he called the “Shamwow Healthcare Summit” (which we’re contending he stole from us, but that’s ok; we “friended” him) is as follows:
History will record that in a time of war and recession, this was how the duly elected leaders of the greatest nation on earth spent their day.
So be sure to watch Greg Gutfeld on Red Eye, in can be quite entertaining, although not informative. And you might just catch Thaddeus. Sure it’s on at 3:00 AM, but it still has more viewers than any of CNN’s prime time shows. The brass at CNN is still trying to figure it out.
Closing on a serious note, and reflecting Congressman McCotter’s serious side, here’s the take away from the address he gave at CPAC :
"We must empower the American people to channel necessary instructive change. We must defend America from her enemies. And pursuing these goals we abide five permanent principles:
...Our liberty is from God not the government.
...Our sovereignty is in our souls not the soil or the scepter.
...Our security is from strength, not from surrender or appeasement.
...Our prosperity is from the private sector, not the public sector.
...And our truths are self evident, not relative."
Not bad. Not bad at all. How does “Senator” McCotter roll off your tongue? It would be nice if Michigan could put one in the R column again.
Citing a story in the Detroit News, the Blogprof explains (again) why teachers unions are bad for the state, bad for education, and bad for children:
About a year ago, I wrote a post about the outrageous, shameless tactic that Detroit Public Schools teachers unions took in killing a program that brought well-educated teachers into the schools to improve student performance. It was about a program back in 2001-03 called TFA (Teach for America), where some gifted education graduates, of their own volition, volunteered to help underprivileged students in the inner city. By all account, it was a huge success and a boon to students afflicted with the DPS (and yes, it is just as bad as a viruses). Unfortunately, the irresistibly force came up against immovable object: the teachers union. From my prior post:
Why would the DPS want to get rid of these volunteers that had such a positive impact on the students, whom the DPS is chartered to provide for? ...by 2003, the school district's union leaders felt increasingly threatened by Teach for America's talented presence in classrooms. Some leaders demanded the district rid of TFA, say sources who were on the district's school board and others who worked with the district then.
Real nice, huh? So much for "we are all about education of the children" coming from the MEA, no? Well, one year later, the Teach for America initiative is in the news again, and the teachers union is still opposing it in a district that graduates only 1 in 4 students. From The Detroit News: Union opposition to Teach for America volunteers blocks progress in Detroit:
No other big city needs great teachers more than Detroit, home to the nation's worst-performing urban schools. Yet the city's teachers union is trying to undermine efforts to bring some of the country's brightest young educators to the Motor City.
As they say read the whole thing. The MEA keeps telling us it’s all about the kids, but every time we hear from one of their spokespersons, it sounds like it’s about them.The TFA program is not the answer to public school woes, but when teachers’ unions oppose them, you’ve got to assume they will oppose anything else that threatens the status quo as well.
On a related note, from City Journal, an excellent article on why liberals and conservatives might agree on education reform: We’re All Right-wing Bastards Now. It discusses the NEA’s opposition to charter schools and vouchers, and shows how it set its sites on Washington D.C.’s tiny voucher program that parents loved, but was dutifully killed by Congress at the NEA’s behest.
Here’s what NEA president Dennis Van Roekel wrote to Democratic congressmen last March:
The National Education Association strongly opposes any extension of the District of Columbia private school voucher . . . program. We expect that Members of Congress who support public education, and whom we have supported, will stand firm against any proposal to extend the pilot program. Actions associated with these issues WILL be included in the NEA Legislative Report Card for the 111th Congress.Vouchers are not real education reform. . . . Opposition to vouchers is a top priority for NEA
Funny, a lot of parents in underperforming school districts think vouchers are a good start.
The report card is in on President Obama’s annual physical:
Barack Obama should not only try harder to kick his smoking habit, his team of doctors warned, but they also recommended 'moderation of alcohol intake'.
How are you all feeling about that 3:00 AM phone call now?
In related news, President Obama gave himself a B+.
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