I slept well after the start of World War Three…

…but only for four hours. I came home feeling that a bottle of wine might help me settle my nerves from the Pre Kangerooo Court that Dr. Gronseth seems intent on pulling out of thin air to no good purpose. He’s a lay Methodist minister so there may be methodist in his manner.

Always eager to have his picture taken with high school students in their selfies to be tweeted over the Internet he may not appreciate the attention his allegations of assault that he’s leveled against my poor but proud ally Art Johnston. But Art’s not nearly so mad at the Superintendent for his treatment but for the underhanded treatment of his partner of 14 years, Jane Bushey. District Administrators and Board members only discovered to their shock and horror recently that the lowly District nurse was affiliated with their most ferocious gadfly. Apparently they deemed her worthy of a swat but only “for her own good.”

Art’s reaction is rather like that of President Harry Truman after a theater critic ridiculed his daughter Margarets piano playing in a national news paper after she gave a recital. Harry penned a letter telling the man that his gratuitous contempt ought to be repaid with a punch in the nose. That and a few well chosen profanities got Harry attention in the news across the country. Republicans and the cultural elite sniffed at his primitivism but in a few years time Harr would win reelection with the ad hoc motto “Give’m hell Harry!”

The chief distinction between the two men is that Art, unlike Truman, didn’t threaten to punch anyone. I’m not so sure I could have been as controlled under the same circumstances. By the way. Jane Bushey is still under threat of being removed from the medically fragile and multiply handicapped children that she has cared for for six years despite her contractual rights of seniority. I’m sure that with the help of an AFSCME business agent like Board member Rosie Loeffler-Kemps husband Ken this will all be worked out. Certainly Rosie had comforting words for the community near the end of the meeting she helped call. According to the Duluth News Tribune’s even handed story on the outbreak of the war Rosie soothed, “We as a board have a code of ethics for School Board members,” she said. “It was with a lot of thought and consideration that we came to bring this resolution forward, and I hope the public can understand that.”

Yes, well, time will tell. So will this blog.

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