Litmus test for new teachers

Here's more on the public university University of Minnesota's new criteria on training teachers. Not only will prospective teachers have to pledge allegiance to the principles of "diversity," but that the U of M will be "screening" even the applicants. This is getting scary:

Future teachers will recognize that schools are socially constructed systems that are susceptible to racism. That schools and classrooms are often structured in ways that advantage and disadvantage some groups but are also critical sites for social and cultural transformation.

In this area, teachers' "Autoethnography should reflect appreciation for how dominant pedagogical styles, school curricula, behavioral expectations, personal prejudices of school personnel (among other things) often convey overt and covert messages that devalue the culture, heritage, and identity of minority students. Writings must show awareness that, when minority individuals actively resist and reject the implicit and explicit messages attacking their ethnic identity, educational achievement is negatively impacted.... Future teachers create & fight for social justice ..."

Oh, great

We can look forward to seeing the First Lady in thigh high boots:

MICHELLE Obama has kicked aside controversy over her expensive French sports shoes and ordered thigh-high luxury boots from the same country, her new shoemaker said today.

Robert Clergerie said the US first lady had chosen a black pair with flat heels as well as another pair of calf-length boots in soft beige buckskin, both in size 41 (US size nine-and-a-half, British size seven).

Obamas greet Muslims at Hajj

Cut the Hanukkah party by half and then make a special effort for the Hajj:

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Feeling down? A little broke for the holidays?

Well, take joy in the fact that The One's wife, Michelle, is wearing a SPECTACULAR gown that took 40 people three weeks to make in India, doubtless all paid union wages and receiving health care. Oh, and she described herself as a "swan" in the process of putting on their first state dinner.

Khan told CNN talk show host Larry King that he wanted something "Indian, chic, simple but very glamorous" for the First Lady, adding that the dress took 40 people and three weeks to create in India.

Unbelievable arrogance AGAIN

From NRO Corner....OH, and, of course, there's the picture of The One carrying the GQ magazine for weekend reading between golf outings that has his picture on the front. Look closely. Heh. Is there no limit? No bounds?

Why Thank You, Your Lordship [Kevin D. Williamson]

President Obama welcomed Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to the White House with words that have inspired snickers in New Delhi:

"Yours is the first official state visit of my presidency, its fitting that you and India be so recognised," 48-year-old Obama told the 77-year-old Indian leader.

The general reaction in India has been: Who the heck does this guy think he is? Note to the Great Diplomat: When you do a head of state an honor, you don't remind him, in public, of the fact that you have done him an honor, particularly in self-aggrandizing terms of this sort.

I cannot imagine Dr. Singh responding to Obama: "I am the first state visitor of your presidency, and it is fitting that you and the United States be so recognized. Especially considering that I have the guts to stand up to the Chinese from time to time, whileyou're basically groveling and praying that they don't decide to divest their dollar holdings. Did I mention our 7 percent economic growth, compared to your ... 3 percent, 3.5? Now, what did you want to talk about?"

Climategate

Of course, the blogosphere is abuzz with climategate, the revealing of the hacked emails from the British climate research center. Here are a few details:

More bowing

This time, the Chinese. Diss our friends and bow to the opposition. Read over at NRO:

Bowing should not matter either. Obama did not bow to the Queen of England, but rather sent her I-pod photos of himself; yet he did kowtow to a Saudi royal, a Japanese emperor, and now a Chinese head of state. Like it or not, the image conveyed is that an American president defers to non-Western royalty and grandees in a way that is supposed to suggest, in symbolic fashion, that America is just one of many countries, without much exceptional about it and without much of an affinity for the West.

If multilateralism was the objective, it came out instead as obsequious deference. Whereas Bush's backrubs and Carter's frontal kisses were reflective of American casualness and too much informality, the bowing seems for some reason a far more bothersome gaffe. And as with Obama's apologies, what we thought was a one-time slip turns out to be a systematic pattern that reflects an apparent worldview.

What kind of a military do we have?

This is unbelievable. How are we ever going to maintain a military defense with idiots like this in charge? The terrorist has a bloody lip after being turned over to the IRAQIS?

Navy SEALs have secretly captured one of the most wanted terrorists in Iraq — the alleged mastermind of the murder and mutilation of four Blackwater USA security guards in Fallujah in 2004. And three of the SEALs who captured him are now facing criminal charges, sources told FoxNews.com.

The three, all members of the Navy's elite commando unit, have refused non-judicial punishment — called an admiral's mast — and have requested a trial by court-martial.

NEA values money more than students

A fascinating theory

Okay, we love this blog. We don't see the world exactly the way the writers of Hill Buzz do, but there is some genuinely interesting and insightful thinking going on over there. Read this column and see what you think. The writers are reformed liberal gay guys living in Chicago; they also published an apology to Dubya. That takes nerve:

Burris, for his part, gets to watch the White House that maligned him self-destruct. Emanuel and Jarrett must be apoplectic over the forced issue of public option. There is no good that can come of this for the White House, because Burris-Leiberman forced there to be just two paths taken, both leading nowhere:

(A) Public Option is dropped, so liberals go to war with the White House and remove his strongest, most active, most Kool-Aid crazed supporters for 2010 and 2012 (remember, everyone, the excuse for losing New Jersey and Virginia in the elections earlier this month was that Dr. Utopia’s voters didn’t turn out because they didn’t know he wanted them to; well, Democrats need those voters to turnout in 2008 numbers to avert a midterm debacle…and Libs won’t want to turn out if public option wasn’t pushed through).

(B) Public Option is kept, and moderates and blue dogs in red states bail on this bill because they know voting for a public option ends their Congressional careers instantly.

Why are they doing it?

When they know public resistance is so strong? When the percentage of people who approve of it has sunk to a new low? When more people than ever are ADAMANTLY against it?

Everyone agrees that the nation is on an unsustainable fiscal path. So Democrats will add a $2.5 trillion entitlement to hurry us further along the path. Tax hikes that could go to reducing the deficit they'll plow into the new entitlement. Medicare cuts that could shore up Medicare's own shaky finances, they'll plow into the entitlement too (if the cuts happen at all). The new entitlement will grow at a projected 8 percent a year, and it's only through gimmickry it's made to look deficit neutral in the first decade. The cost curve of health care will be bent up, and insurance premiums, too, will rise. For all of this, ObamaCare will still leave 24 million people without health insurance.

If nothing else, watching the Democrats sacrifice so much on behalf of this monstrosity is fascinating, appalling -- and dramatic. Common sense suggests that they shouldn't do it. The basic laws of political physics say they can't do it. And yet on they march.

More interest compounds on debt

So let's go on another spending spree!!! Let's replace health care with a worse health care program! YEAH!

Our nation has been borrowing money to finance the spending spree the politicians have been on at the rate of about $1 trillion a year. And a lot of that borrowing has been done at lower rates. But now with the “stimulus” spending spree and the bailouts adding to a pile of newdebt on top of the debt pile that’s been growing for decades now the Treasury is suddenly faced with making some painful payments to our creditors.

Think a balloon payment on a subprime ARM mortgage, except with a $12 trillion principle.

Illegals pay nothing, citizens pay penalty for health care

The Reid amendment:

Under Leader Reid’s amendment, in the year 2019 about 16 million U.S. citizens would be uninsured and be forced to pay a penalty tax of almost $800 per year. About eight million illegal aliens would be uninsured and would owe no penalty tax. Both groups would get their health care through a combination of out-of-pocket spending and use of uncompensated care in emergency rooms and free health clinics.

Saving the post office

Huh. Another government entity.

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Who do they think they are?

All those "common" people having opinions, contrary to the ruling elite. Read it at Wizbang:

There's a trend emerging in American politics. I don't think it's a new one, but it's growth is disturbing to me. And it's the amazing hostility to the common people.

With the explosion of the internet, Andy Warhol's "15 minutes" theory seems to have developed a variant: under the right circumstances, anyone can become a superstar overnight, over the most trivial of reasons -- and fall just as quickly. Even in politics.

But in politics, there is a growing trend to take that nobody, that average person, and treat them just like we do hardened political professionals -- and attempt to destroy them in the process.

Take, for example, this guy named Joe. He's playing with his kids in his front yard one fine fall day a bit over a year ago when this horde descends on his neighborhood. He recognizes the guy at the head of the mob -- it's the Democratic nominee for president, and Joe doesn't particularly like the guy. So he figures he'll ask him a rather pointed question, take what will likely be his only shot in life to make a big shot squirm a little. It's not the greatest of questions, but the big shot bobbles it a little -- and suddenly Joe finds that he's the talk of water coolers across the nation.

Re-educating teachers who don't fall in line

Remember the American Dream? You must renounce it in the Brave New World of Minnesota education camps. This is appalling: LINK ONLY

Former CBO director predicts disaster

In case you didn't know, there are some serious problems on the horizon.

Our fiscal situation has deteriorated rapidly in just the past few years. The federal government ran a 2009 deficit of $1.4 trillion—the highest since World War II—as spending reached nearly 25% of GDP and total revenues fell below 15% of GDP. Shortfalls like these have not been seen in more than 50 years.

Going forward, there is no relief in sight, as spending far outpaces revenues and the federal budget is projected to be in enormous deficit every year. Our national debt is projected to stand at $17.1 trillion 10 years from now, or over $50,000 per American. By 2019, according to the Congressional Budget Office's (CBO) analysis of the president's budget, the budget deficit will still be roughly $1 trillion, even though the economic situation will have improved and revenues will be above historical norms.

Lies about health care "reform"

Ugh. One of the last phases is done. Now the debate.

"The Democrat plan would make life harder for the vast majority of Americans. It raises their taxes, it raises their health care premiums, it cuts their Medicare and drives millions off the private insurance they currently have,” McConnell said.

Democrats accused them of scare-mongering and said the bill is a sensible and long-overdue fix to a badly broken health care system.

“The key elements of this health care reform bill, I repeat: reduces short-and-long term debt, expands coverage, promotes choice and competition, reforms the insurance market, improves quality of care,” Reid said.

Playing politics

It was just mentioned on Fox this morning that Obama hinted to Democrats that he will NOT run again in 2012 because his policies are so unpopular and he knows that the programs he is supporting will bankrupt the country. It was suggested that Obama did this because he knows that the Dems who vote for these debacles face losing in 2010 and he's trying to make it sound like he is willing to sacrifice his own political future to get the government's grip on all our lives so firm that we will never be able to shake it free. Of course, he WILL run again even though lots of Dems will fall because they are voting to bankrupt the country against our will. It's all about him, of course. That's all that matters.

Can you believe this is happening in our country?

NRO has another stimulus watch expose. Be sure to go do your own search at Stimulus Watch: Re: Your Stimulus Dollars at Work [Veronique de Rugy]

From Oregon’s capitol city, Salem. $13.5 million to release druggies back into the community against the voter’s expressed wishes to keep them in prison longer.

Award Description: Oregon voters passed Measure 57, a citizen initiative that increased prison sentences for non-violent property and drug offenders. The Oregon Criminal Justice Commission (CJC) will use (these funds) to divert some of the offenders convicted of Measure 57 crimes from prison if they complete intensive drug court type programs. These programs will focus on intensive supervision and treatment, and immediate sanctions and rewards. These programs are expected to serve approximately 720 offenders per year for four years.” ($4687.39 per offender per year! – Your Reader).

No matter what one's position is on the drug war, it's hard to see how this spending is consistent with the promise of creating jobs that was made by the administration.