Archive for August, 2011

“The US ranks 19th…

Wednesday, August 31st, 2011

Hidden due to dubious accuracy.

(more…)

Willie’s best gig since farmaid

Wednesday, August 31st, 2011

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Everyone is looking for more money

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

Including one-third of all Minnesota School Districts.

The DNT’s two cents

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

At least the DNT didn’t endorse my self appointed assassin for the School Board. There were no other endorsements because this was the only School Board primary contest. They’ll have three endorsements in October for the general election.

Another big purchase

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

I can’t blame the new superintendent for this. He has little choice but to finish Dr. Dixon’s work. Still the District hasn’t finished buying up quarter million dollar properties. Here’s an email I got this morning:

You may have missed under Business/Real Estate transactions in Monday’s DNT–the article is not there today–
the 709 purchase of Rantham house across the street, south, of Congdon…purchased for $337,500—this is the second home they bought on this street. Heck, at that rate, your house should bring a million plus.

It would be interesting to know just exactly what programs, courses and facilities they will now have for students who will not have their secondary technical center. Once they find out they cannot accomodate these needs, it will be time to expand…of course there is no room to expand as is predictable by the dumbest of dumb.

No beefs with my BFF

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

A real friend sent me the latest on Dr. Dixon and called him my BFF in the subject line. (Best friend forever) Very cruel.

Dr. Dixon has discovered the value of putting money into the classrooms instead of buildings. Better late than never.

Me too Governor Christie!

Monday, August 29th, 2011

My first experience with a Muslim in America was my family’s AFS foreign student from Eritrea. He never mentioned Sharia law. He seemed mostly interested in living the happy life American kids did with sin, sex, booze and affluence at the ultimate goal. He was probably killed by Christians when he returned home. Talk about the rule of law.

Brooks won’t write the column attacking Perry…

Monday, August 29th, 2011

…but he sure sounds like he’d like someone to write it:

Here’s David’s column.

Blame it on my A D D

Monday, August 29th, 2011

Pretty pictures

Sunday, August 28th, 2011

I looked at the Trib’s pretty pics of the new East High School. They’ve described a school that should be a delight to the eyes if not the safety of students trying to park their cars. I hope for the sake of Duluth that the school is a delight and that my concerns for safety are overblown.

The Trib has to try to rehabilitate their tattered credibility by persuading us that the new schools were worth everything we sacrificed to have them built. Good luck with that. I feel no need to link to the story. Go to the library if you must and read it there.

For my part I spent my day with my visiting brother from Missouri and at a birthday party for my grandson. Blogging simply took a back seat. I did get an interesting email from a friend who made a few caustic comments about the Trib. She mentioned that KBJR did a story a few days ago about how medical folks had discovered that smart boards were hard on our children’s eyes. (This is another television report on the same phenomena)

What do I know? I wear glasses which is par for the course for kids who are literate and who read from a tender age. According to some, reading put glasses on hundred’s of thousands of us and is still doing it. Of course, if a decade from now I hear reports about the eye problems of our Duluth children I will happily lay them at the feet of Dr. Dixon.

Excelsior!

Saturday, August 27th, 2011

Bakk is too busy to run for Congress.

He needs to help his friends back home.

The Rave Review

Saturday, August 27th, 2011

Fortunately I can access DNT stories in a hotel’s computer. Here’s the editorial I couldn’t link to on my home computer.

A reader sent me a helpful email explaining that he had had the same problem until he went to his email inbox and clicked the Trib’s confirmation reply. Sadly I did that to to no avail.

Maybe when I get back home this afternoon the issue will have resolved itself.

PS. Yesterday was a fine day at the Great Minnesota Crammed Together. I sang YMCA at the group Karioke and ate Sweet Corn Ice Cream with honey bacon topping.

The baby girl that Ronald Reagan didn’t kill afterall

Saturday, August 27th, 2011

I won’t mind if her Father is taken out nearly so much as was angered at her death.

The Gore in Perry’s past

Saturday, August 27th, 2011

Curtesy of my Buddy, David Brooks on Rick Perry:

First, Romney could accuse Perry of being the latest iteration of Tom DeLay Republicanism. On the one hand, he is ideologically slippery. The man who sounds so right wing today was the Texas chairman of the Al Gore for President campaign in 1988. The man who now vows to appoint only anti-abortion officials to relevant administration jobs endorsed Rudy Giuliani four short years ago. On the other hand, he is unwavering in his commitment to the government-cash nexus. Even this week — amid much attention to his pay-to-play proclivities — Perry named two big donors to powerful state jobs.

Because the Trib has frozen me out…

Friday, August 26th, 2011

I can no longer read their Online paper. A pop up keeps preventing me from getting into their news.

Fortunately I still get a newsprint copy delivered to my door.

If I could I’d link to the astonishing editorial noting that Kerry Leider’s family think he’s done a fabulous job spending $40 million dollars to make the mundane Ordean Junior High an “awesome” High School. Good work Kerry.

Too bad you can’t do anything about the teaching end of the Duluth Schools.

The Trib has frozen me out…

Friday, August 26th, 2011

…and they didn’t fib. I filled this all out and now every time I go to the DNT’s website I get it back again even though I got their, no fib, verification email. I can’t read anything on the site though. When I hit a link to the news I just get the pop asking me to verify who I am. Its like the Twilight Zone. No wonder they are apologizing to their Online Public on their website:

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Zip Code: (US or Canadian)

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Dixon destroyed Duluth’s confidence…

Thursday, August 25th, 2011

…in our public schools.

How do I know? I’ve been stewing over the incredibly low level of confidence in our schools revealed by the recent community survey. Duluthians have a lower regard for the performance of our public schools than All of America has in the Congress. That was not always the case. I was pretty sure that by the time I left the School Board there was about 75% satisfaction with our schools. I might have a survey or newspaper clipping in my attic but I don’t have the week it would take for me to find it.

But then I remembered Dr. Dixon’s sham survey to prove that all of Duluth wanted to dispense with a referendum on a school building plan. It was a monstrously big survey and I guessed it had a question that asked folks how good they felt our schools were. I was right and I had put the entire survey on the Let Duluth Vote website:

Here’s what Duluth told Dr. Dixon’s surveyors six years ago before the Red Plan and the theft of our referendum:

2. How would you rate the quality of education provided by the Duluth Public School District — excellent, good, only fair, or poor?

EXCELLENT………….12%
GOOD………………63%
ONLY FAIR………….17%
POOR……………….2%
DON’T KNOW/REFUSED…..6%

So, in 2006 75% of our citizens felt Duluth had “good” or “excellent” Schools. By 2008, two years into the Red Plan, only 26% of Duluthians reported we had “quality” public school education. Today it 21% who feel we have quality schools. I realize the questions have been asked differently but the only way my interpretation of the results fails is if we treat a “Good” school as not being a quality school. That makes very little sense.

75% to 21%. Thank you Dr. Dixon.

MLK

Thursday, August 25th, 2011

“I’ve been to the Mountaintop.”

A teacher per acre

Thursday, August 25th, 2011

Nothing like building a school on land that is too small before you line up adequate space for it. Otherwise known as asking for forgiveness instead of for permission.

Render unto Caesar that which is Caeser’s…

Wednesday, August 24th, 2011

…because Caesar is a Christian and he’s busy fending off the Demons who are running America.

In my lifetime:

first there was the apolitical Youth for Christ.

Then in the Reagan years it was the very political Moral Majority.

Then Pat Robertson of PTL fame organized his followers to show up secretly in Minnesota precinct caucuses and hide their affiliation with him when he ran for President. It was about this time that I began feeling that I was in a strange sequel to Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Post Reagan Evangelism then became more rampant in the GOP and while operatives like Karl Rove called evangelical leaders “crazies” when he spoke off the record to the press he worked diligently to keep them happy.

Today anyone who does not claim to abide by the most extreme right Christian points of view is a RINO. To keep harmony in the GOP such entities as the Wall Street Journal and Fox News simply do not challenge the tenets of this wing of the GOP. No one does. Governor Rick Perry the champion of Federalism and the Tenth Amendment backtracked almost instantly after suggesting that each state should be allowed to decide for itself whether to permit same sex marriages.

This element within the Party wants to prepare for the rapture. That can’t be done as long as Demons run the nation. Their’s is an uphill fight. Demons are getting the upper hand in persuading Americans to be much more relaxed about issues like homosexual marriage. Quick. Build an Ark!