The Reuters news agency has reported that 50% of American Teachers quit after two & one half years. These teachers are leaving their chosen careers citing bureaucratic stress and low pay, and nearly all have "masters-degrees". Many are not able to pay-off the ever-ecscalating costs of student-loans with the poorly paying teaching jobs. A comparably-educated College-graduate generally earns about 15% more in "The private-sector" than they do teaching. It's easy to "coin a phrase" like "NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND", it's quite another to actually DO something about America's education-crisis. Meanwhile, America's ability to produce scientists and engineers is in a "death-spiral", causing increasing numbers of "technical" jobs to be "outsourced" to foreign countries.... All that "Dubyuh" has to say is: "It's hard work"!! On a related note: a 10-year-old girl in Florida was prepared to sing a song in her school's "talent-show". It was a song by the singer known as "Pink", called "Mr. President" It's lyrics make reference to it being "Hard Work" to raise a family on minimum-wage, being "Hard Work" to make a home from a cardboard-box, etc. The obvious lyrical barbs directed at "King George" seemed too controversial for the school administration, and she was denied the right to sing it. It seems that "political-expression" and the rights of "free-speech" are not guaranteed in Florida... Much like the case of one Albuquerque high school teacher named Alan Cooper; Mr. Cooper was fired from his teaching job when he would not remove "anti-war" posters which had been hung by his students. Alan Cooper allowed both "pro-patriotism" and "anti-war" posters to be hung, but in the "post 9-11 " fanatacism his Constitutional rights were trampled, and his "voice was silenced. It's fortunate, that Alan Cooper was not "of Middle Eastern descent"; He would probably have ended up in Guantanamo Cuba, or some foreign prison as the result of a "rendition" by the C.I.A.!!Is this the "Democracy" for which SO many Americans have died?? Is this the "Democracy" which we hope to export to the rest of the world? George Washington and Thomas Jefferson are TURNING OVER IN THEIR GRAVES!!! George Bush II has signed over 700 "Executive orders" since he stole the presidency. Many of these allow him to flagrantly ignore and violate laws passed by Congress. In one such case, he "over-ruled" a law which makes it illegal to seek reprisal against any "whistle-blowers" who disclose the wrong-doings of Federal agencies. Is this not ILLEGAL??? Is he exempt from ALL law? What ever happened to "balance-of-power"? Is the president allowed to IGNORE laws which he doesn't like? The list of such "Executive-orders" is mind-boggling... a clear indication of his dictatorial, fanatical hubris. Remember when he said that "it would be a lot easier if this were a dictatorship, as long as I'm the dictator"???? It appears that he IS a dictator!! (not a "uniter" or a "decider")
- posted by Dave @ 1:03 AM