And from the peanut gallery…

From this 4Utah.com article:

Gayle Ruzicka:

“Marriage is sacred. It's between a man and a woman and anything other than that violates God’s law and it’s immoral,”
”‘activist judge.’”
“Marriage is a state issue. This is not a federal issue. So a federal judge does not have the right to tell Utah what we are going to do with our marriage laws,”
Blaming the guy who took over for Utah Attorney John Swallow when he resigned a couple weeks ago: “They should've been prepared with their stay, with their appeal ready to go so it could've been stopped immediately instead of waiting now over the weekend while they continue to perform these same sex marriages,”
“I think it'll be quite a battle this will continue and go all the way to the Supreme Court,”

And even my favorite local teabagger, Mia Love, weighed in:

“unacceptable”
“As a President Obama appointee, Judge Shelby used his position on the federal bench to override the will of Utah's voters..."

Yeah, you’re right.  It’s not the Federal Courts’ job to decide if states are violating the U.S. Constitution.  Their job is to, uh, hmmm, I guess I just don’t know what their job is.

And even if it was, don’t state laws outrank the U.S. Constitution?  After all, 66% of the people of Utah voted for Amendment 3, shouldn’t that negate any Federal constitutional rights?  Didn’t the Civil War make the definitive decision regarding States’ Rights?

I do agree with Gayle’s last comment.  The Great State of Utah is always willing to squander tax money on windmill fights.

Clueless Governors

Over 2 decades ago, then Governor of Utah Norm Bangerter, in response to teacher’s complaints about low pay, huge classes and rock-bottom lowest per-pupil spending, responded with something like “They [teachers] just need to take a couple aspirins and go back to work.”

Our current Governor, Gary Herbert, now joins Normie in the Utah League of Dumbass Comments Regarding Education.

“A teacher could have gone to sleep 100 years ago, come back 100 years later and felt very comfortable in the classroom – because nothing has changed.” (Salt Lake Tribune, June 2013)

Nothing has changed?  This comment proves without a doubt that our current Governor either a) is completely ignorant about what is going on in Utah schools, b) is intentionally lying in order to display education in a bad light, or c) both.

I think about education when I started teaching 20 years ago and know that if I had slept the last 15 years I would be flabbergasted being dumped in a classroom in 2013.

Would a teacher from 100 years ago:

1. Be ESL (English as a Second Language) endorsed in order to be better prepared to teach our diverse population?
2. Be able to teach using differentiated instruction in order to address different learning styles?
3. Be able to update their grades at least weekly and have them available to student’s and parents at home?
4. Know how to put worksheets, assignments and even lesson notes somewhere that students who are sick or on vacation could access them and be able to keep up with classwork?
5. Have almost immediate communication with parents on a daily basis?
6. Know how to make a power-point lesson and present it to the class?
7. Be able to set up an online Disclosure for parents and students?  Or even know what a Disclosure Statement is?
8. Know how to show a video from TeacherTube to the class and integrate it into a lesson?
9. Be able to supervise their students taking the online benchmark tests, access the data from those tests, import it into an Excel spreadsheet so they could use it to guide their future lessons?
10. Even understand the importance of the end of the year tests?
11. Be comfortable using a whiteboard, or even know how to use a SmartBoard, Interwrite Tablet or iPad connected to their PC, instead of a chalkboard?
12. Be able to supervise a class of students using the computer lab for research, writing or any of the other online learning programs?
13. Understand how to help a student using a graphing calculator to do their math homework?
14. Set up and give a clicker quiz?
15. Even understand what ESL, 405, SEP, PLC, URL, logon, SID, AP, SpEd, LMITS, MyAccess, Canvas, Digits, Portal or WebStore mean?

And I’m sure teachers out there could think of at least 100 more examples of things that we have had to adapt to over even just the last couple of decades in order to do our best to keep up with a changing society.

No, Mr. Herbert, a teacher from 100 years could not do my job and if you’d get your ass off your high horse up there on the hill and come down and visit a few schools, you would be amazed at how different the job is from even when you were in the public school system.

Amendment 3 Unconstitutional?

One group and several legal analysts have predicted that within the next 5 years we will see same-sex marriage in all 50 states.  I don’t know about that prediction, but I have one of my own.

If and when the U.S. Supreme Court forces Utah to recognize same-sex marriages, and that’s what it will take here, I predict we’ll see this:

And that will be a good thing.

“And there was much rejoicing”

Legislative Follies

Last legislative session a bill that would have made cockfighting a felony was struck down.  One of the opposing legislators said he voted against it because he couldn’t see making cockfighting a felony as long as abortion is legal.

Sen. Gene Davis, (D-Salt Lake City), just pre-filed SB52, word-for-word the same as that bill that he introduced last year.  The opposition has already come out with an asinine response.

“Roosters fighting each other, that comes naturally.  Yes, it’s enhanced by people.  I just don’t believe it deserves a felony.” was Sen. Allen Christensen’s, (R-North Ogden) excuse for opposing it this time.

At least he admitted the comparison with abortion was not the best idea.  “I will still oppose it.  I will be a little wiser in the comparison in the penalties for that and certain other things.”

But by far, the best argument came from some guy in Oklahoma that called Sen. Davis and told him “George Washington fought cocks, it’s part of our culture.”  Yeah, so was slavery, treating women like property, only allowing male property owners to vote and dozens of other things we have (thankfully) realized needed to end.

Longing for “Watergate”.

I was only 12 when the Watergate break-in happened, 14 when President Richard Nixon resigned.  I was disgusted, embarrassed and convinced he would go down in history as the worst American politician, ever.

40 years and our last president later, Nixon seems more pathetic than criminal.  He was a victim of his own paranoia.  He pretty much had the election locked up, with or without knowledge of the Democrat’s battle plan.  And at least he had the common courtesy to resign so that a country torn apart by his misdeeds could start to heal.

Not so much with Utah Attorney General John Swallow.  He is swimming in allegations of ethical violations, power brokering, bribery and strong-arming.  There are several ongoing investigations into Swallow’s misdeeds, Federal and State.   Whether true or not, these accusations are compromising the ability of his office to do it’s job.

Personally, I don’t trust the guy any further than I could throw him, and I’m convinced that, at best, he’s guilty of unethical political dealings.  I wouldn’t be surprised if he was guilty of some criminal endeavors also, and I definitely believe he should resign.  Even though I don’t know all the details and am in no way a political “insider”, I do know enough about Utah politics to see the writing on the wall.

WRITINGS ON THE WALL:

1. In a political “old-boys” network that recently gave a standing ovation to a legislator that came clean and resigned after it was alleged he had gone hot-tubbing with a teenage girl, several members of the Utah House have sent out emails discussing starting impeachment proceedings against Swallow, who belongs to the same party.
2. Our conservative Republican Governor has publically stated that if it were in his power, he would have already fired conservative Republican Attorney General John Swallow.
3. Paul Mero, President of the Sutherland Institute, a conservative “think” tank here in Salt Lake City, has publically advised Swallow to resign.

John Swallow’s response to all this?

"Why would you step down from a duly elected office when two-thirds of the people in Utah elected you because of your vision and your platform just because of allegations from questionable sources?”

"I’ve looked at the ethics statutes … and don’t see anything I’ve done that gets close to the line."

"I don’t like sweaters,"

Swallow said he asked for a federal investigation into the allegations against him, even though it’s "like putting a fire hose up your nose and turning it on full blast" because he is certain he will be cleared.

"It takes a lot of courage to stand strong in the face of fire, knowing your convictions and knowing what you did or didn’t do,"

I am not a crook.

Worked for Nixon, right?

Gotta love this man.

Sen. Steve Urquhart, R-St. George, as Paul Rolly of the Salt Lake Tribune puts it, is a “low tax, small government, pro-business fiscal conservative.”  But he’s the kind of Republican that pisses off Gayle Ruzicka and the Utah Eagle Forum.  Which, in my opinion, makes him a good Republican.

How does he piss off the Ruzickastanians?  Let me count the ways:

1. He showed his opposition to a bill that would ban the teaching of evolution in Utah schools by wearing a monkey tail during the session the Senate voted on the bill.
2. He sponsored a bill that would make it easier for teachers to discuss contraception in sex education classes.
3. He helped prevent legislation against the IB program by people who think it’s a United Nations socialist plot against the American way of life.
4. When the Sutherland Institute got all bent out of shape over the Sundance Film festival, he compared them to the Westboro Baptist Church.
5. And just this legislative session, he sponsored, and helped push through the Senate Committee with a favorable recommendation, a bill that would have banned housing and employment discrimination against the LGBT community.  (It still failed in full session vote).

Hmmmmm, Gov. Herbert showing rational thought, Sen. Aaron Osmond listening to actual Educators when thinking about education legislation, and now Sen. Urquhart refusing to be a jellyfish and showing backbone by standing up to the Eagle Forum.

Is the Utah Republican Party learning that extremism is what cost them in the last election, or is this just a temporary shift?

Utah Legislators bought and paid for? Pshaw…

Why bother understanding one of your own bills you expect to become law when you can have a representative of the special interest group that is pushing it explain it for you.

At least that’s what a couple Utah Senators from Layton seem to think.  And not too many people up there seem too worried that the group that has sworn to punish the uppity citizens of Utah for a Citizen Initiative that defeated their beloved private-school vouchers knew more about proposed education laws than the people who supposedly wrote them.

But that’s what happened.  When a group asked Sen. Stuart Adams, R-Layton, to explain a bill that would change the way public schools in Utah were graded, all but guaranteeing every one would fail, he sent Judi Clark out to give the details.

Sen. Jerry Stevenson, R-Layton, got the same Judi Clark to explain his bill, establishing a student achievement record for everyone to see, to the Senate Education Committee.

So, “Who is this Judi Clark?” you ask.  Is she the Layton Senator’s personal assistant?  Or maybe a Senate aide they both share?  A paralegal?  Could be she just typed it up for them, so they figured she knew it the best.

Um, no.  She’s the executive director of Parents for Choice in Education, a group hell-bent on decimating public schools so they can foster the use of public funds for private schools.

I know it’s silly, but it all makes me wonder why someone running a group that is working against public schools has so much influence regarding laws that have to do with public education.

Maybe it has to do with all the money they donate to political campaigns.

Nah.