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Update for locals:  tonight, Alpine School District will be having a meeting; that’s May 17 at 6 p.m., to discuss the transgender bathroom issue and how it will affect your child. If you have anything to say or if you just want to know what’s happening locally due to Obama’s crazy new policy to let boys into girl’s locker rooms, bathrooms and showers, you might want to show up:  

ASD District Office  575 N 100 E, American Fork, Utah 84003

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Brian Halladay, Wendy Hart and Paula Hill, three members on the board of Utah’s largest school district, Alpine District, have written an open letter to the Utah legislature, governor, and state school board. It is posted here in full.

 

 

May 15, 2016

This letter is to urge you, as the Governor, Legislature, and State School Board to reject the guidance dictating actions regarding transgender students dated May 13, 2016.

The guidance in this letter states:

1. “School staff and contractors will use pronouns and names consistent with a transgender student’s gender identity.”
2.  “When a school provides sex-segregated activities and facilities, transgender students must be allowed to participate in such activities and access such facilities consistent with their gender identity.”

a.  “A school may not require transgender students to use facilities inconsistent with their gender identity or to use individual-user facilities when other students are not required to do so.”

b. “School must allow transgender students to access housing consistent with their gender identity and may not require transgender students to stay in single-occupancy accommodations or to disclose personal information when not required of other students.”

This guidance would allow a boy that identifies as a girl to be allowed to use facilities such as bathrooms, locker rooms and showers with girls.  This is  not just a complete violation of privacy, but is morally reprehensible.  The consequences of this social experiment would be disastrous, not only as an invasion of the rights of a majority, but also with the potential legal liability this could incur upon school districts and the state, if we were to adopt this egregious guidance.

Article X of the US Constitution states, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

The federal government has no power to tell people what to do except in areas specifically authorized in the Constitution.

That means it has no right to invade our privacy, or to dictate that transgender students have access to facilities that would invade the privacy of other children.

The Department of Education has threatened that it may pull education funding from our State if we don’t comply.  This is likely a baseless threat meant to force states into compliance.  However, with only 8% of State funds coming from the federal government, this would be an ideal opportunity to declare Utah’s sovereignty, and to allow our children to be free from the tyrannical mandates of our federal government.

This level of federal overreach is as unprecedented  as it is unconstitutional.  As locally-elected board members, we will be voting for a budget next month that includes no federal funding at all.  While we realize we will have to tighten our belts and reallocate funds to accomodate those necesssary programs, the safety and privacy of the students we were elected to serve outweighs the 6% that our district receives in federal funds.  We would appreciate your support in this endeavor.

I urge you, as Utah’s representatives, to also push back against this guidance, protect the privacy of our children and move forward in making Utah the shining city on a hill.

 

Sincerely,

Brian Halladay, Alpine School District Board Member

Wendy Hart, Alpine School District Board Member

Paula Hill, Alpine School District Board Member

 

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In the moment when the home invader is at the door, yelling that he will break in and rearrange everyone and everything inside, do you panic and plead, hide, try to reason– or do you fight and defend your little ones?

I fight.

This week’s invasion of children’s bathrooms by would-be Dictator Obama is two things.

1.  It is a precedent-setting blast to Constitutionally protected rights.  (He has no authority to do this.   We must call his bluff. )
2. It is a foundational step to tragic sexual abuses and crimes which will take place in children’s and college students’ bathrooms because it’s founded on twisted logic: that  a minority’s desires (not rights, but desires) should trump both the rights and desires of the majority.  It’s absurd and dangerous.

Obama –and the whole world– must know that American people stand up and fight for our little ones.

We are not cowards.  We are not slaves to federal refunding of our tax dollars.  Obama’s planning to withhold funding unless we all cower to his rewrite of what gender and proper values should mean in public bathrooms.   Don’t swallow his incorrect definition.

For the record, here’s the best definition I have ever read.

Yesterday, Friday, May 13th, a letter was issued to all schools from the Departments of Justice and Education threatening to withhold federal funding from any school that fails to make accommodations for gender identity and transgenderism.

The letter calls compliance a “legal obligation” and states, “As a condition of receiving Federal funds . . a school must not treat a transgender student differently from the way it treats other students of the same gender identity . . even in circumstances in which other students, parents, or community member raise objections or concerns.”

The letter then goes into specifics about restrooms, locker rooms, athletics, housing, etc. mandating that, “A school may not require transgender students to use facilities inconsistent with their gender identity or to use individual-user facilities . . ”

Here is Utah’s Governor Herbert’s response:

“Today’s action by President Obama is one of the most egregious examples of federal overreach I have ever witnessed. Schools are the domain of state and local government, not our nation’s president. Unfortunately, this is exactly what I have come to expect from the Obama administration. If we have to fight this order, we will not hesitate to do so.”

Knowing that this letter on Transgender Students went out to schools, transgender students could force the issue on Monday.  Schools need to know that they can and must say “NO.”

We need the Utah State School Board to communicate that message to all the schools in Utah.  Then, we need the state legislature to address the problem in special session this week.

THE SCHOOL BOARD NEEDS TO HEAR FROM US TODAY, BEFORE THEY SEND A CLARIFICATION LETTER TO SCHOOLS.

Please, please, act.

Below are Utah contacts who need to hear from courageous and moral voices.

THE GOVERNOR AND THE STATE LEGISLATURE NEEDS TO HEAR FROM US TODAY BECAUSE THE DEADLINE FOR MAKING IT AN ISSUE FOR THE SPECIAL SESSION IS MONDAY.

Please, please act.

CHECK LIST:

1) CONTACT State School Board members to ask them to reject the edicts in the letter and support Utah schools in adopting policies which protect our children from being forced to co-mingle in bathrooms and showers;
2) CONTACT Governor Herbert to ask him to make this issue a matter for the Special Legislative Session this Wednesday, May 18th;
3) CONTACT State Legislators to ask them to support adding this issue to the special sessionn and to pass legislation that will protect our children AND their schools.
4) SPREAD THE WORD.   The societal shift that the Obama administration is proposing would be viewed as abhorrent to all generations before us and to moral people worldwide.  Now we are supposed to make it the norm for children across America?  Everyone who loves children and wants to protect them will care about this issue.  Tell them, so they can help guard our children’s innocence and moral privacy.

Send this on to family, friends, groups. Please use email, texting, social media, etc.

IS THIS AN EMERGENCY? . . . YES!!!! Please drop everything and make time for this today.  There is no time for cowardice.

State Board of Education Contacts:

District 1 – Terryl Warner . . . 435.512.5241
District 2 – Spencer Stokes . . . 801.923.4908
District 3 – Linda Hansen . . . 801.966.5492
District 4 – David Thomas . . . 801-479-7479
District 5 – Laura Belnap . . . 801.699.7588
District 6 – Brittney Cummins . . . 801.969.5712
District 7 – Leslie Castle . . . 801.581.9752
District 8 – Jennifer Johnson . . . 801.742.1616
District 9 – Joel Wright . . . 801.426.2120
District 10 – David Crandall . . . 801.232.0795
District 11 – Jefferson Moss . . . 801.916.7386
District 12 – Dixie Allen . . . 435.789.0534
District 13 – Stan Lockhart . . . 801.368.2166
District 14 – Mark Huntsman . . . 435.979.4301
District 15 – Barbara Corry . . . 435.586.3050

Terryl.Warner6@gmail.com
utahboard2@gmail.com
linda.hansen@schools.utah.gov
dthomas@summitcounty.org
lbelnap@utahonline.org
b4cummins@gmail.com
lesliebrookscastle@gmail.com
jj@jenniferajohnson.com
joel.wright.uted@gmail.com
crandall@xmission.com
jeffersonRmoss@gmail.com
dixieleeallen@gmail.com
stanlockhartutah@gmail.com
mhuntsman@sunrise-eng.com
Barbara.corry@schools.utah.gov

REMEMBER TO BLIND COPY.

Governor Gary Herbert:  801.538.1000

Utah State Legislature:

Rep. Scott Sandall . . . 435-279-7551
Rep. David Lifferth . . . 801-358-9124
Rep. Jack Draxler . . . 435-752-1488
Rep. Edward Redd . . . 435-760-3177
Rep. Curt Webb . . . 435-753-0215
Rep. Jacob Anderegg . . . 801-901-3580
Rep. Justin Fawson . . . 801-781-0016
Rep. Gage Froerer . . . 801-391-4233
Rep. Jeremy Peterson . . . 801-390-1480
Rep. Dixon Pitcher . . . 801-710-9150
Rep. Brad Dee . . . 801-479-5495
Rep. Mike Schultz . . . 801-859-7713
Rep. Paul Ray . . . 801-725-2719
Rep. Curt Oda . . . 801-725-0277
Rep. Brad Wilson . . . 801-425-1028
Rep. Stephen Handy . . . 801-979-8711
Rep. Stewart Barlow . . . 801-289-6699
Rep. Timothy Hawkes . . . 801-294-4494
Rep. Raymond Ward . . . 801-440-8765
Rep. Becky Edwards . . . 801-554-1968
Rep. Douglas Sagers . . . 435-830-3485
Rep. Susan Duckworth . . . 801-250-0728
Rep. Sandra Hollins . . . 801-363-4257
Rep. Rebecca Chavez-Houck . . . 801-891-9292
Rep. Joel Briscoe . . . 801-946-9791
Rep. Angela Romero . . . 801-722-4972
Rep. Michael Kennedy . . . 801-358-2362
Rep. Brian King . . . 801-560-0769
Rep. Lee Perry . . . 435-225-0430
Rep. Fred Cox . . . 801-966-2636
Rep. Sophia DiCaro . . .
Rep. LaVar Christensen . . . 801-808-5105
Rep. Craig Hall . . . 801-573-1774
Rep. Johnny Anderson . . . 801-898-1168
Rep. Mark Wheatley . . . 801-556-4862
Rep. Patrice Arent . . . 801-889-7849
Rep. Carol Moss . . . 801-647-8764
Rep. Eric Hutchings . . . 801-963-2639
Rep. Jim Dunnigan . . . 801-840-1800
Rep. Lynn Hemingway . . . 801-231-2153
Rep. Daniel McCay . . . 801-810-4110
Rep. Kim Coleman . . . 801-865-8970
Rep. Earl Tanner . . . 801-792-2156
Rep. Bruce Cutler . . . 801-556-4600
Rep. Steve Eliason . . . 801-673-4748
Rep. Marie Poulson . . . 801-942-5390
Rep. Ken Ivory . . . 801-694-8380
Rep. Keven Statton . . . 801-836-6010
Rep. Robert Spendlove . . . 801-560-5394
Rep. Rich Cunningham . . . 801-722-4942
Rep. Greg Hughes . . . 801-432-0362
Rep. John Knotwell . . . 801-449-1834
Rep. Mel Brown . . . 435-647-6512
Rep. Kraig Powell . . . 435-65-0501
Rep. Scott Chew . . . 435-630-0221
Rep. Kay Christofferson . . . 801-592-5709
Rep. Brian Greene . . . 801-358-1338
Rep. Derrin Owens . . . 435-851-1284
Rep. Val Peterson . . . 801-224-4473
Rep. Brad Daw . . . 801-850-3608
Rep. Keith Grover . . . 801-319-0170
Rep. Jon Stanard . . . 435-414-4631
Rep. Dean Sanpei . . . 801-979-5711
Rep. Norman Thurston . . . 385-399-9658
Rep. Francis Gibson . . . 801-491-3763
Rep. Mike McKell . . . 801-210-1495
Rep. Marc Roberts . . . 801-210-0155
Rep. Merrill Nelson . . . 801-971-2172
Rep. Brad King . . . 435-637-7955
Rep. Kay McIff . . . 801-608-4331
Rep. Brad Last . . . 435-635-7334
Rep. John Westwood . . . 435-590-1467
Rep. Mike Noel . . . 435-616-5603
Rep. Lowry Snow . . . 435-703-3688
Rep. Don Ipson . . . 435-817-5281
Sen. Luz Escamilla . . . 801-550-6434
Sen. Jim Dabakis . . . 801-815-3533
Sen. Gene Davis . . . 801-647-8924
Sen. Jani Iwamoto . . . 801-580-8414
Sen. Karen Mayne . . . 801-232-6648
Sen. Wayne Harper . . . 801-566-5466
Sen. Deidre Henderson . . . 801-787-6197
Sen. Brian Shiozawa . . . 801-889-7450
Sen. Wayne Niederhauser . . . 801-742-1606
Sen. Lincoln Fillmore . . . 385-831-8902
Sen. Howard Stephenson . . . 801-815-6800
Sen. Daniel Thatcher . . . 801-759-4746
Sen. Mark Madsen . . . 801-360-9389
Sen. Al Jackson . . . 801-216-4479
Sen. Margaret Dayton . . . 801-221-0623
Sen. Curt Bramble . . . 801-361-5802
Sen. Peter Knudson . . . 435-730-2026
Sen. Ann Millner . . . 801-900-3897
Sen. Allen Christensen . . . 801-782-5600
Sen. Scott Jenkins . . . 801-731-5120
Sen. Jerry Stevenson . . . 801-678-3147
Sen. Stuart Adams . . . 801-593-1776
Sen. Todd Weiler . . . 801-599-9823
Sen. Ralph Okerlund . . . 435-979-7077
Sen. Lyle Hillyard . . . 435-753-0043
Sen. Kevin VanTassell . . . 435-790-0675
Sen. David Hinkins . . . 435-384-5550
Sen. Evan Vickers . . . 435-817-5565
Sen. Stephen Urquhart . . . 435-668-7759

ssandall@le.utah.gov
dlifferth@le.utah.gov
jdraxler@le.utah.gov
eredd@le.utah.gov
curtwebb@le.utah.gov
janderegg@le.utah.gov
justinfawson@le.utah.gov
gfroerer@le.utah.gov
jeremyapeterson@le.utah.gov
dpitcher@le.utah.gov
bdee@le.utah.gov
mikeschultz@le.utah.gov
pray@le.utah.gov
coda@le.utah.gov
bradwilson@le.utah.gov
stevehandy@le.utah.gov
sbarlow@le.utah.gov
thawkes@le.utah.gov
rayward@le.utah.gov
beckyedwards@le.utah.gov
dougsagers@le.utah.gov
sduckworth@le.utah.gov
shollins@le.utah.gov
rchouck@le.utah.gov
jbriscoe@le.utah.gov
angelaromero@le.utah.gov
mikekennedy@le.utah.gov
briansking@le.utah.gov
leeperry@le.utah.gov
fredcox@le.utah.gov
sdicaro@le.utah.gov
lavarchristensen@le.utah.gov
chall@le.utah.gov
janderson34@le.utah.gov
markwheatley@le.utah.gov
parent@le.utah.gov
csmoss@le.utah.gov
ehutchings@le.utah.gov
jdunnigan@le.utah.gov
lhemingway@le.utah.gov
dmccay@le.utah.gov
kimcoleman@le.utah.gov
earltanner@le.utah.gov
brucecutler@le.utah.gov
seliason@le.utah.gov
mariepoulson@le.utah.gov
kivory@le.utah.gov
kstratton@le.utah.gov
rspendlove@le.utah.gov
rcunningham@le.utah.gov
greghughes@le.utah.gov
jknotwell@le.utah.gov
melbrown@le.utah.gov
kraigpowell@le.utah.gov
scottchew@le.utah.gov
kchristofferson@le.utah.gov
bgreene@le.utah.gov
derrinowens@le.utah.gov
vpeterson@le.utah.gov
bdaw@le.utah.gov
keithgrover@le.utah.gov
jstanard@le.utah.gov
dsanpei@le.utah.gov
normthurston@le.utah.gov
fgibson@le.utah.gov
mmckell@le.utah.gov
mroberts@le.utah.gov
mnelson@le.utah.gov
bradking@le.utah.gov
kaymciff@le.utah.gov
blast@le.utah.gov
jwestwood@le.utah.gov
mnoel@kanab.net
vlsnow@le.utah.gov
dipson@le.utah.gov
lescamilla@le.utah.gov
jdabakis@le.utah.gov
gdavis@le.utah.gov
jiwamoto@le.utah.gov
kmayne@le.utah.gov
wharper@le.utah.gov
dhenderson@le.utah.gov
bshiozawa@le.utah.gov
wniederhauser@le.utah.gov
lfillmore@le.utah.gov
hstephenson@le.utah.gov
dthatcher@le.utah.gov
mmadsen@le.utah.gov
abjackson@le.utah.gov
mdayton@le.utah.gov
curt@cbramble.com
pknudson@le.utah.gov
amillner@le.utah.gov
achristensen@le.utah.gov
sjenkins@le.utah.gov
jwstevenson@le.utah.gov
jsadams@le.utah.gov
tweiler@le.utah.gov
rokerlund@le.utah.gov
lhillyard@le.utah.gov
kvantassell@le.utah.gov
dhinkins@le.utah.gov
evickers@le.utah.gov
surquhart@le.utah.gov

 

What to say:

Utah is leading the way in the fight against pornography. We have declared it a public health hazard. Making girls shower with boys and vice versa is insanely counter-productive to that. Virtue and innocence must be protected at all costs.

No one should be forced to be part of something that violates time-tested  standards and values.
The Obama administration has no authority to blackmail school districts or mandate this type of policy.
Protecting our children is more important than federal funds, especially when they come with all kinds of strings attached.
This policy will cause an exodus from public schools to private schools and homeschool.
Withholding federal funds will hurt poor students since most of that money goes to programs for under-privileged children.

 

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick described the situation:

“. . it is the biggest issue facing families and schools in America since prayer was taken out of public school. [Obama] has set a policy in place that will divide the country . . he says he’s going to withhold funding if schools do not follow the policy . . he can keep his 30 pieces of silver, we will not yield to blackmail.”

 

Amen.

 

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I  love to watch my favorite thinkers from the left and the right wing agree that “college- and career- ready standards” or Common Core– aka ObamaCore –along with its CEDS  data-grabbing plot in cahoots with the CCSSO — is utterly unacceptable and has got to go.  

Today I read Stanley Kurtz (conservative writer) who praised Diane Ravitch (liberal writer) for her public call for Congressional hearings on Common Core.

Both are must-read articles.

They explain why in recent cases of states dropping Common Core,  leading events appear to be bipartisan efforts.  Nobody likes to be micromanaged.  And the Constitution protects us all.

Along this path, major efforts along the path have come from both liberals and conservatives.  (To catch you up if you haven’t followed things closely: Oklahoma has now officially dropped Common Core.  South Carolina has agreed to drop it.  Indiana pretended to drop it, but actually only rebranded it.  North Carolina and Missouri  look like they’re about to drop it.  I wish I could say Utah had made headway in dropping it. )

Look at a few highlights of the Stop Common Core fight:

Last year, in February, liberal educator/historian Diane Ravitch announced  that she could not support Common Core.  In  April, eight Republican senators wrote an open letter decrying Common Core.  The same month, the national GOP met to discuss (and then passed) the anti-Common Core resolution.  In August, Dr. Joseph Rella, a superintendent of Comsewogue District in New York, led 1,500 parents in a rally against Common Core.  In October, Democratic Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey penned an open letter to Secretary Arne Duncan, also attacking federal-corporate education “reforms” in student data collection. The next month, 132 Catholic scholars wrote a letter to U.S. Bishops, voicing their concerns about Common Core.  Following several governors who wrote executive orders” against Common Core, a group of Florida parents launched a parental national executive order against Common Core and student data mining.   And the teachers!  Look at heroic progressive Democrat teacher Paul Horton alongside conservative Republican teacher David Cox — two examples of thousands from both political camps, equally opposed to Common Core.

Look at the groups linking arms on this issue, coming from philosophies as varied as 132 Catholic scholars,    Oklahoma pastors,  Pioneer Institute, the BadAss Teachers Association,  the Left-Right Alliance for Education, Truth in American Education, Conservative Teachers of America,  Glenn Beck, Michelle Malkin and concerned parents in literally almost every state:  Oklahoma, Indiana, New York, Utah, Maine… (Do an internet search and you will find your state’s parent group fast.)

Just today, conservative author Stanley Kurtz wrote that he agrees with liberal education historian Diane Ravitch’s recent call for congressional hearings  on Common Core, writing:

“The misguided notion of social justice that stands behind the Common Core excuses in the minds of its advocates… silly little things like the consent of the governed… Congress is obligated to investigate.”

Ravitch wrote:  “The story about Bill Gates’ swift and silent takeover of American education is startling. His role and the role of the U.S. Department of Education in drafting and imposing the Common Core standards on almost every state should be investigated by Congress.

“The idea that the richest man in America can purchase and–working closely with the U.S. Department of Education–impose new and untested academic standards on the nation’s public schools is a national scandal. A Congressional investigation is warranted.

“The close involvement of Arne Duncan raises questions about whether the law was broken.

“Thanks to the story in the Washington Post and to diligent bloggers, we now know that one very rich man bought the enthusiastic support of interest groups on the left and right to campaign for the Common Core.

“Who knew that American education was for sale?

“Who knew that federalism could so easily be dismissed as a relic of history? Who knew that Gates and Duncan, working as partners, could dismantle and destroy state and local control of education?”

——————

Ravitch and Kurtz make me proud to be an American.  This is what freedom of speech, freedom of political choice and the national tradition of lively debate can do.

God Bless America.

 

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If you scour the official Common Core websites, ed.gov website, and the official speeches of Secretary Duncan and President Obama and the Pearson CEA on education, as many of us have done, you may at first knit your eyebrows in confusion.

It all sounds sweet.

How would education reforms that use such pleasant words ever be taking away my constitutional rights? Did the reformers really aim in completely opposite directions from their peachy words in arrangements and mandates and deprivations written elsewhere, in contracts and speeches and grant documents and regulatory changes on the same subject, written by the same groups of people?

Yes, they did.

Government and CCSSO/NGA sites come across as harmless, toothless, and positive, making it nearly impossible to interest the masses in fighting education reforms even though they are hurting our children and our country’s future. It’s even harder to change the direction of state school board members, governors and business people who also see nothing wrong with implementation of Common Core.

Why don’t they see the shackles?

It’s all about the language.

Daniel Greenfield at the Sultan Knish Blog has shed light on the deception. He illuminates the differences between the “new speak” envisioned by “1984” author George Orwell, and the actual “new speak” deceiving people in 2013.

Below are highlights from Greenfield’s explanation.

Read his full article here.

———-

“Orwell’s mistake in 1984 was assuming that a totalitarian socialist state would maintain the rigid linguistic conventions of bureaucratic totalitarianism…. Liberal Newspeak is the hybrid product of advertising, academia and bureaucracy. It takes ideas from creative leftists, rinses them in conformity, uses techniques from the ad world to make them as safe as possible and then shoves them down everyone’s throat.

[In Orwell’s “1984”] Newspeak’s objective was to enforce linguistic schizophrenia… making opposition into a form of madness. Liberal Newspeak’s is less ambitious. It settles for muddling your brain.

Like modern advertising, its goal is to make you feel comfortable without actually telling you anything.

Liberal Newspeak is the chirpy announcer in a drug commercial soothingly telling you about all the fatal side effects while on screen couples have romantic picnics and go whitewater rafting.

That is the job of most of the news media… to be that announcer telling you that… your taxes will go up, your job will go to China and you will die, without getting you upset about the terrible news.

The dictionary of Liberal Newspeak is full of empty and meaningless words. Community, Care, Access, Sharing, Concern, Affordability, Options, Communication, Listening, Engage, Innovating and a thousand others like it are wedged into sentences. Entire pages can be written almost entirely in these words without a single note of meaning intruding on the proceedings.

… The techniques of advertising have been used to pluck up words that people once felt comfortable with and wrap them around the agendas…

Liberal Newspeak is concerned with making people safe while telling them absolutely nothing. It’s a new language that conveys reassurance rather than meaning. Its totem words are almost pre-verbal in that they mean nothing except “You are safe” and “We are taking care of you.”

That is what gibberish like, “We are improving access options for all community interest groups” or “We are striving to innovate while listening to everyone’s concerns” means. Daily life has become filled with meaningless pats on the head like that, which dedicated liberal newspeakers spew up like newborns. This empty babble says nothing. It’s the hum of the beehive. The signal that keeps all the drones headed in the same direction.

… It owes less of its perversity to Marxism than it does to Madison Avenue. The language that was used to convince millions to buy junk that was bad for them or that they didn’t need is used to convince them to buy liberalism.

While the implications of Liberal Newspeak are ominous, its tones aren’t. It deliberately embraces the feminine side of language. It strives to be comforting, nurturing and soothing. It never tells you anything directly. Instead it makes you read everything between the lines. It rarely answers questions. Instead its answers indirectly explain to you why you shouldn’t even be asking the questions.

… Its terminology is so vague that specific questions require a convoluted assemblage of words … There is no room for thoughts, only feelings. You can feel guilty in Liberal Newspeak. You can be outraged, self-righteous or concerned. But you can’t weigh one idea against another because it isn’t a language of ideas. It’s a vocabulary of emotional cues that could just as easily be taught to a smart animal.

… what they are really doing is maintaining conformity in the same way that the Soviet and Red Chinese engineers constantly discussing Lenin and Mao as inspirations for their work…Liberal Newspeak is full of terms about listening, engaging and sharing, but it’s a closed loop.

It’s language as a command and control mechanism for establishing conformity… It’s an unbroken loop of reassuring gibberish punctuated by bursts of anger at outsiders who are not part of the hive and don’t understand how important community access and engaged listening really are.

… It has emotions, but no ideas. Its purpose is to take an individualistic culture… and reduce it to a conformity that promises safety in exchange for never thinking again.”

———–

COMMON CORE (AKA VOLDEMORT)

If you want to see one example of Greenfield’s idea applied to Common Core, simply look at the word Common Core.

It is the phrase that is most often unspoken. Like Voldemort.

In Utah, they call Common Core the “Utah Core”. In other states it has other names.

On the federal website, it is magically defined without even using the term at all!

“College and Career Ready Standards” are defined there as standards common to a significant number of states.

So any time –ANY TIME– you hear the phrase “college and career ready” you are being talked at, about Common Core.

But you don’t know that, or most people don’t.

You think it could be anybody’s legitimate definition of what makes a student prepared for a great career or a great college. Right? Nope. It means a mediocre standard that may or may not mean a student even studied as high as what used to be a normal course of high school math. (Just ask the NCEE or Jason Zimba.)

It’s all about the language.

The only way to fight manipulation of words and of truth is with its opposite: clear, direct, truthful language.

Thank you, Daniel Greenfield.

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Folks, there can be no question that the federal government is using Common Core to take away our freedoms.

So why do many people still believe that “there’s no federal control of Common Core”? Because trusted education leaders are not being forthright with –or are not in possession of– the truth. Here in Utah, for example, the Utah State Office of Education, has a “fact-versus-fiction” pamphlet which still says that the standards “are not federally controlled.”

The fact is that states that adopted Common Core standards are being co-parented by two groups in partnership, neither of which takes seriously the constitutional rights of the states to govern education locally: these partners are 1) The federal government and 2) Private trade clubs financed by Bill Gates– NGA and CCSSO.

So first, here’s evidence of terrible federal controls: (click to fact check, please)

1. Federal micromanagement in Common Core testing grant conditions and now, Race to the Top grant lures that go directly to districts and ignore state authority over districts.
2.Federal ESEA 15% capped waiver conditions that deny states the right to add more than 15% to our standards;
3. Federal reviews of tests
4. Federal data collection
5. Federal disfiguration of previously protective FERPA laws that removed parental rights over student data;
6. President Obama’s four assurances for education reform which governors promised to enact in exchange for ARRA stimulus funds;
7.Obama’s withholding of funds from schools that do not adopt Common Core as read in his Blueprint for Reform (aka The Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act) which says, “Beginning in 2015, formula funds will be available only to states that are implementing assessments based on college- and career-ready standards that are common to a significant number of states.”

And here’s evidence of unelected, corporate controls of Common Core:

1) Common Core copyrights (and “living work” alteration rights) are held solely by two unelected, private clubs, the superintendents’ club (aka CCSSO) and a governors’ club (aka NGA).
2) These two clubs’ Common Core creation was influenced and funded not by voters/taxpayers, by the politically extreme Bill Gates, who has spent over $5 Billion on his personal, awful version of education reform– and that dollar amount is his own admission.
3) No amendment process exists for states to co-amend the “living work” standards. The “living work” statement means that OUR standards will be changed without representation from US as the states; it will be controlled by the private trade groups CCSSO/NGA.
4) Bill Gates and Pearson are partnered. (Biggest ed sales company partnered with 2nd richest man on earth, all in the effort to force Common Core on everyone.)
5) The speech of corporate sponsor Bill Gates when he explains that “We’ll only know [Common Core] this works when the curriculum and the tests are aligned to these standards.” This explains why he is giving away so much money so that companies can be united in the gold rush of creating Common Core curriculum.
6. Virtually every textbook sales company now loudly advertises being “common core aligned” which creates a national monopoly on textbook-thought. This, despite the fact that the standards are unpiloted, experimental (in the words of Dr. Christopher Tienken, Common Core is education malpractice.)
7. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and many huge corporations (ExxonMobil) are loudly selling Common Core as a way of creating wealth, despite the standards’ untested nature.

The federal partnering with the private groups like CCSSO/NGA, means that mandates and thought-monopolies of Common Core are truly beyond even legislative control. –Because they are privately controlled, they’re beyond voters’ influence.

This is why nothing short of an outright rejection of all things Common Core can restore us to educational freedom.

Why should you care? Why should you fight this, even if you don’t have children in school? Because of the Constitution.

The Constitution sets us apart as the only country on earth that has ever truly had the “freedom experiment” work. This makes us a miraculous exception. Why would we ever shred the Constitution by accepting initiatives that disfigure our representative system?

The G.E.P.A. law states that “No provision of any applicable program shall be construed to authorize any department, agency, officer, or employee of the United States to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over the curriculum, program of instruction, administration, or personnel of any educational institution, school, or school system, or over the selection of library resources, textbooks, or other printed or published instructional materials by any educational institution or school system…”

So the federal government is prohibited from creating tests or instructional materials– but the private groups NGA and CCSSO, funded by Gates, are not! This is why the federal Department of Education officially partnered with these unelected, private corporate interests –groups which are not accountable to G.E.P.A. laws, to teachers, principals, taxpayers, voters or children. (This may also explain why Arne Duncan goes to such great lengths to distinguish between standards and curriculum. Everybody knows that standards dictate curriculum like a frame dictates the height and width of a house. But GEPA law doesn’t use the word “standards.”)

We are in unrepresented dire straits: In no way do voters or teachers (or states themselves) control what is now set in the Common Core standards.

This is true in spite of the so often-repeated “the standards are state-led” marketing line. Don’t believe the marketing lines! So much money is money being spent on marketing Common Core because of Bill Gates. Gates sees this whole Common Core movement as a way to establish his (and Pearson’s) “uniform customer base.”

Watch Gates say these words in his speech if you haven’t already. This speech needs to be widely known, especially by school boards –so that we can boycott this monopoly on thought and on our precious taxpayer dollars.

Please don’t let people keep getting away with saying that the Common Core is free from federal controls, or that “we can add anything we want to it” and “there are no strings attached.” It simply isn’t true.

(How we wish that it was.)

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I was chatting with an acquaintance as we both watched our kids’ karate lesson today.

She said, “I don’t know what’s different this year.  My kids’ teachers say that there are so many rules: ‘You can’t teach this. You have to teach this.  It’s like the Nazis have moved in.’ ”

She didn’t know what Common Core was.

This is the problem.  Most folks still don’t know what it is.  There was never a vote. There was never a t.v. infomercial.  There was never a cost analysis given to taxpayers nor an academic analysis given to teachers when Common Core got made the tyrant king of American education.

I know because I am a teacher and my credential’s always been up to date, since I began to teach in the 90’s.  And I didn’t get the memo.

Yet Common Core’s taken over.  It’s in the process of forever changing the systems of education in over FORTY SIX STATES in the U.S.A.

And even in the states who were smart enough to reject the federal offer to join Common Core (via the Race to the Top grant application a few years back)– even those states are now being bought by Arne and Barack.

How?

Sad to report:  U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan happily bypassed the wise state superintendents in states like Texas and Virginia who had rejected Common Core, and offered a brand new DISTRICT version (not state version) of the Race to the Middle Top money.

The catch? The districts have to skip to the ever-so-common tune Arne and Barack are fiddling.

Oh, they have other words for it: Career-and-College Readiness is a favorite.  But when you go to the ed.gov website and read the way they’ve nailed education reform definitions to the wall, you’ll see.  Now, Career and College Readiness means you must teach Common Core, no more and no less; you must march lockstep with the nationalized education drumbeat Arne and Barack are drumming.  You can’t (by their definition) be preparing anyone for college and career unless your standards are the same as “a significant number of states.”

That reminds me of Henry Ford’s Model T car ad.

“ANY CUSTOMER CAN HAVE A CAR PAINTED ANY COLOR THAT HE WANTS SO LONG AS IT IS BLACK.”

The famous line of the founder Henry Ford referred to the T model since, due to express production, no other color could dry as fast as black.

   So,  Obama/Duncan’s version is:

“ANY STATE CAN HAVE ANY ED. STANDARDS, SO LONG AS THEY ARE THE SAME AS COMMON CORE.”

  (And as long as we hold the lock and key –no amendability– on these national standards. The lock? NGA/CCSSO copyright. The key? A U.S. Dept. of Education mandate that states can’t add more than 15% to what’s in Common Core.)

Does this sameness mandate not upset anyone?  Especially since Common Core’s full of terrible rules like REMOVING AS MUCH CLASSIC LITERATURE as possible, SLOWING DOWN Jr. high and high school MATH, and totally ELIMINATING CURSIVE at any age.

Does the dumbing down of the older students’ standards not upset you?  Does the force-feeding of the youngers ones not upset you?

I seriously attempted to persuade my friends this week to join me in creating a gigantic banner that would read:  REPEAL COMMON CORE.

We’d bear the banner at this week’s “Meet the Candidates” events.  Then we’d fly it over the State Capitol building.  But this was a fantasy.

–We’ve talked ourselves blue in the face with Rep. Kraig Powell, Sen. Aaron Osmond, Governor Herbert, Lt. Governor Greg Bell, and others.  They all think Common Core is dandy.

So do tons of teachers.  –But not all. I know a few teachers who wish I’d flown over their schools in a small plane with a big banner.

But they won’t say this out loud.  (Spiral of Silence.) They think they’ll lose their jobs. They’re supposed to buy the line that Common Core doesn’t hurt local control in any way, and that it improves education.

They are not supposed to ask why the data collection of students has changed so dramatically, why nonacademic data is now part of the personally identifiable information states are collecting via schools.  They are not supposed to ask why there are no references to any real research showing that Common Core is viable or beneficial or better than the old system.  They are not supposed to notice that it’s a socialist-communist style of national education now, where states no longer have sovereignty over their educational decision making.  They are not supposed to ask why the copyright page of the Common Core standards says that CCSSO/NGA wrote the standards solely, and that “no claims to the contrary shall be made,” even while they were asked to help write portions of the standards. Empty gesture.  Teachers had no voice.

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