by Cal Thomas
The Spokesman-Review

“Don’t it always seem to go

That you don’t know what you’ve got

Till it’s gone” – Joni Mitchell, “Big Yellow Taxi”

Some conservatives are prematurely salivating over President Obama’s declining poll numbers. According to a recent Gallup daily tracking poll, “the nine-point drop in the most recent quarter is the largest Gallup has ever measured for an elected president between the second and third quarters of his term, dating back to 1953.” That may comfort some Obama opponents, but three years is a long time until the next presidential election, so conservatives and Republicans (not always the same) had better think of a long-range strategy if they want to save the country from the long-term consequences of what many call “socialism.”

Matthew Spalding, of the Heritage Foundation, offers one component of that strategy in his new book, “We Still Hold These Truths: Rediscovering Our Principles, Reclaiming Our Future.” Spalding believes, “America is unique in that universal principles of liberty are the foundation of its particular system of government and its political culture.” He lists them and explains their history: liberty, private property, consent of the governed, equality, natural rights, religious freedom, rule of law, constitutionalism.

Middle-age and older Americans recall that these subjects were part of their high school and college curricula. Younger Americans may be less familiar with them, as the public schools no longer seem to emphasize what once held us together, preferring to teach “diversity” instead.

Six years ago, Sen. Lamar Alexander, a Tennessee Republican, introduced a bill to require a greater emphasis on American history and civics in public school classrooms. Alexander quoted federal Judge Aleta Trauger, who spoke at a swearing-in ceremony for 77 new citizens in Nashville: “We are Americans because we also share certain fundamental beliefs. We are bound together by the unique set of principles set forth in documents that created and continue to define this nation. We find our heritage and inspiration in the profound words of the Declaration of Independence: ‘All people are created equal and endowed with unalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.’ We pledge allegiance to the Republic as one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. But the greatest expression of our national identity is the Constitution of the United States, which established the responsibilities and rights that go with citizenship.”

All true in the past, but what if today’s schools no longer teach those principles and the Constitution is not supreme? What then?

Last week in New York City, the Children’s Scholarship Fund held a dinner in honor of Eva Moskowitz, who runs the Success Charter Network, which operates four charter schools serving about 1,500 students in Harlem. One of the speakers was Jaime Martinez, an eighth-grader who was rescued, along with his sister, Ashley, from a failing public school where he says he experienced bullying and fighting. Jaime’s grades are up at his Catholic private school; he sings in a choir and takes ballroom dancing lessons. (See his remarks at www.scholarshipfund.org.)

Children’s Scholarship Fund President Darla Romfo wants the education conversation to go “beyond arguments about vouchers, charter schools, and test scores into the newer territory of empowering parents and children with real information about how to choose schools and demand excellence, with the ultimate aim of expanding good options for every child.”

It is this objective that should be embraced by those wishing to “reclaim America,” not only for ourselves, but also for future generations.

If conservatives and Republicans support an exodus from public schools as a strategic goal, they will strike at the heart of liberalism, while simultaneously liberating minorities trapped in failed government schools. To free them and teach them about America and its promise of hope will produce everything they are looking for but can’t find in politics. It will also pay political dividends as children and their parents see which party and persuasion cares about them enough to bring real change to their lives.

It’s either this approach, with results, or continuing to put faith in politicians, who have proved themselves unworthy of such faith. If parents fail to act, they won’t know what they had till it’s gone.

Cal Thomas is a columnist for Tribune Media Services.

By Michael Scherer

There was never a single moment when White House staff decided the major media outlets were falling down on the job. There were instead several such moments.

For press secretary Robert Gibbs, the realization came in early September, when the New York Times ran a front-page story about the bubbling parental outrage over President Obama’s plan to address schoolchildren — even though the benign contents of the speech were not yet public. “You had to be like, ‘Wait a minute,’” says Gibbs. “This thing has become a three-ring circus.” (See who’s who in Barack Obama’s White House.)

For deputy communications director Dan Pfeiffer, the more hyperbolic attacks on health-care reform this summer, which were often covered as a “controversy,” flipped an internal switch. “When you are having a debate about whether or not you want to kill people’s grandmother,” he explains, “the normal rules of engagement don’t apply.”

And for his boss, Anita Dunn, the aha moment came when the Washington Post ran a second op-ed from a Republican politician decrying the “32″ alleged czars appointed by the Obama Administration. Nine of those so-called czars, it turned out, were subject to Senate confirmation, making them decidedly unlike the Russian monarchs. “The idea — that the Washington Post didn’t even question it,” Dunn says, still marveling at the decision. (Read Mark Halperin’s grades for the Obama Administration.)

All the criticism, both fair and misleading, took a toll, regularly knocking the White House off message. So a new White House strategy has emerged: rather than just giving reporters ammunition to “fact-check” Obama’s many critics, the White House decided it would become a player, issuing biting attacks on those pundits, politicians and outlets that make what the White House believes to be misleading or simply false claims, like the assertion that health-care reform would establish new “sex clinics” in schools. Obama, fresh from his vacation on Martha’s Vineyard, cheered on the effort, telling his aides he wanted to “call ‘em out.”

The take-no-prisoners turn has come as a surprise to some in the press, considering the largely favorable coverage that candidate Obama received last fall and given the President’s vows to lower the rhetorical temperature in Washington and not pay attention to cable hyperbole. Instead, the White House blog now issues regular denunciations of the Administration’s critics, including a recent post that announced “Fox lies” and suggested that the cable network was unpatriotic for criticizing Obama’s 2016 Olympics effort.

White House officials offer no apologies. “The best analogy is probably baseball,” says Gibbs. “The only way to get somebody to stop crowding the plate is to throw a fastball at them. They move.”

The general in this war is Dunn, 51, a veteran campaign strategist who arrived at the White House in May. She has been a force in Democratic campaigns since the late 1980s and helmed Obama’s rapid-response operation during his run. At the White House, she has become a devoted consumer of conservative-media reports and a fierce critic of Fox News, leading the Administration’s effort to block officials, including Obama, from appearing on the network. “It’s opinion journalism masquerading as news,” Dunn says. “They are boosting their audience. But that doesn’t mean we are going to sit back.” Fox News’s head of news, Michael Clemente, counters that the White House criticism unfairly conflates the network’s reporters and its pundits, like Glenn Beck, whom he likens to “the op-ed page of a newspaper.”

As a mother — who plans to transition to a new job later this year in order to spend more time with her 13-year-old son — Dunn is a rarity in the almost all-boys club that is Obama’s inner circle. But her impact on the White House has been unmistakable. Since her arrival, the communications operation has been tightly refocused, with greater emphasis on planning ahead to shape the news cycle and controlling staff contacts with the press. In daily internal meetings, she points out where to strike back or admit error.

It is not hard to awaken her fiercer instincts. “Here in the White House, you are reluctant to feel like you have to go to that place,” she says. “But we have to be more aggressive rather than just sit back and defend ourselves, because they will say anything. They will take any small thing and distort it.” In other words, after eight months at the White House, the days of nonpartisan harmony are long gone — it’s Us against Them. And the Obama Administration is playing to win.

Read a brief history of presidents and the press – see below:

Brief History: Presidents and the Press
By Randy James

Barack Obama: The inescapable president. From Good Morning America to televised town-hall meetings, ESPN to Men’s Health, the leader of the free world misses few chances for free publicity. In his first six months in office, Obama gave three times as many interviews as either of his two immediate predecessors, according to the White House Transition Project. He’s already held more prime-time news conferences than George W. Bush did in eight years.

Presidents weren’t always so eager to meet the press. Thomas Jefferson had little use for the ink-stained wretches, believing newspapers offered “the caricatures of disaffected minds.” During Theodore Roosevelt’s presidency, reporters were forced to remain outside the White House gates, until Teddy took pity on them during a rainstorm (the voluble T.R. would later enjoy bantering with scribes while getting a shave). Many Presidents required the press to submit questions in writing and barred them from printing direct quotations; access was so limited the New York Times’s Arthur Krock won a Pulitzer for scoring a sit-down with FDR. Advances in technology have compelled recent leaders to engage with the media more often, albeit reluctantly. Dwight Eisenhower was the first to allow TV cameras into his press conferences; live telecasts, with all their pomp, began with JFK.

The press has only expanded since then, but savvy White House media teams now seize on tactics to reach voters directly. George W. Bush spoke before backdrops bearing the day’s message (like STRENGTHENING OUR SCHOOLS or the notorious MISSION ACCOMPLISHED). And on Sept. 21, Obama becomes the first sitting President to grace David Letterman’s couch–a day after he hits the Sunday-morning news shows. On five networks.

George Nethercutt represented Eastern Washington in Congress from 1995 through 2004.

Kathleen Parker is a columnist for the Washington Post Writers Group. Her e-mail address is kathleenparker@ washpost.com.

Derrick Skaug (former MSHS AP GO PO Student)

The Daily Evergreen

Published: 08/31/2009 6:49pm

Being called a liberal used to be an insult, but after eight years of former President George W. Bush, being a liberal is not only acceptable, it is preferable. Now that conservatives have realized tarring someone as a liberal is not an effective election strategy, dirtier words are being slung.

President Barack Obama’s economic policies are being labeled as socialism, communism and even fascism. I will not speak for the legitimacy of communism or fascism because both systems are, at best, ineffective and, at worst, dangerous. Socialism, on the other hand, should not be considered an insult or something to be feared because we are all socialists.

It’s true. No matter what Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity or Glenn Beck say, the U.S. has been a socialist state for a very long time. Not one country on earth operates under a true laissez-faire economy.

Every single student at WSU is supporting a socialist program – public schools. A socialist education system still offers choice unlike communist systems. Parents can pay to have their children attend a private school, or they can send their kids to a taxpayer-supported public school.

The shipping and mail industry is the same way. When I buy products off of Ebay or Amazon, some of my products are delivered by FedEx. On the other hand, the U.S. Postal Service, which is an independent government agency, which provides jobs for Americans, delivers the rest of my mail.

The U.S Constitution actually gives Congress the right to set up post offices. Apparently, that dreaded socialism even managed to taint our sacred constitution.

Another government-funded segment of society interfering with the free market nature of raging wildfires is the fire department. A scene in Martin Scorsese’s film “Gangs of New York” depicted two private firefighting companies grappling over who would get to put out a raging inferno that was destroying an entire city block. This was not drawn out of thin air. A vast multitude of private fire companies did exist. Thankfully, very few still do. A true, free market supporter should find the closest private firefighting company and put that number on speed dial.

It’s ironic that the only socialist program that conservatives like to support is the military, which tends to have a monopoly on national defense. Most Americans seem to prefer the military rather than their private sector counterpart, Blackwater. And there seems to be no private sector competitors to the police, except maybe bodyguards.

The question boils down to how conservatives can support so many socialist programs, including the bailouts of entire industries, but not a public health care option.

Medicare, Medicaid and SCHIP are all popular socialist health care programs that conservatives would never tamper with. Yet these programs let many Americans fall through the cracks – those with preexisting conditions, the lower-middle class and many others. Most Americans just want to be able to make their own choice between a public or a private option when it comes health care.

Supporters of a public option are socialists, but then again, aren’t we all?

Objectors call Tuesday’s broadcast political move

Linda P. Campbell is a columnist for the Fort Worth Star- Telegram. Her e-mail address is lcampbell@star-telegram.com.

July 21, 2009 in Nation/World

By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN and CARL HULSE

WASHINGTON — House and Senate leaders on Wednesday struck a deal on a $789 billion economic stimulus bill after little more than 24 hours of rapid-fire negotiations with the Obama administration, clearing the way for final Congressional action later this week.

The package of spending increases and tax relief, intended to spur an economic recovery and create jobs by putting money back in the pockets of consumers and companies, ended up smaller than either the House or Senate had proposed.

Many Democrats would have preferred a larger bill, but agreed to pare back, including cuts to favored education and health programs, to win three crucial Republican votes in the Senate.

“Legislation is the art of compromise, consensus building, and that’s what we did,” the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid of Nevada, said in announcing the accord.

The House was poised for a final vote as early as Friday, with the Senate to follow, clearing the way for President Obama to sign the bill by Monday. The White House is considering a prime-time bill signing ceremony, and on Wednesday asked the television networks if they would air the event.

In a statement, the president thanked Congress for agreeing to a measure that he said would save or create 3.6 million jobs.

“I’m grateful,” Mr. Obama said, “for moving it along with the urgency that this moment demands.”

The deal reflected a calculated gamble by Mr. Obama in the first weeks of his term. To win Republican votes, the final stimulus package is considerably leaner than what many economists say is now needed to jolt the economy, given its grave condition.

But it is unclear if Mr. Obama will be able to claim credit for bringing change to Washington by winning bipartisan support for his first major piece of legislation. Not a single House Republican voted for the bill when it came to the floor two weeks ago, and despite many compromises in the Senate, only three Republicans came on board.

The final bill includes $507 billion in spending programs and $282 billion in tax relief, including a scaled-back version of Mr. Obama’s middle-class tax cut proposal, which would give credits of up to $400 for individuals and $800 for families within certain income limits. It will also provide a one-time payment of $250 to recipients of Social Security and government disability support.

House Democrats, angry over some cuts, particularly for school construction, initially balked at the deal and delayed a final meeting on Wednesday between House and Senate negotiators.

Democratic officials said Speaker Nancy Pelosi felt that Mr. Reid went too far by announcing a deal before it was vetted by her office and discussed by House members in an emergency caucus meeting, setting off the last-minute flare-up.

Ms. Pelosi said at a news conference that the delay helped House Democrats win some final concessions, including an agreement to let states use some money in a fiscal stabilization fund for school renovations. “There is no question that one of our overriding priorities in the House was a very strong commitment to school construction,” she said. “That’s still in the bill.”

But they soon relented and the meeting got under way in a packed Lyndon B. Johnson Room on the Senate side of the Capitol.

Despite the show of pique, for Democrats the stimulus bill is the most prominent display yet that they now fully control Washington. Their ability to push the package forward represented a turnabout from years of losing battles under President George W. Bush. For Republicans, it underscored the limits of their diminished ranks.

Even trimmed to $789 billion, the recovery measure will be the most expansive unleashing of the government’s fiscal firepower in the face of a recession since World War II.

And yet it seemed almost trifling compared with the $2.5 trillion rescue plan for the financial system — a combination of loans to banks and incentives to bring private capital into the banking system — announced on Tuesday by Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner.

Although the final legislative language was not immediately available, lawmakers said the bill contained more than $150 billion in public works projects for transportation, energy and technology, and $87 billion to help states meet rising Medicaid costs.

Despite intense lobbying by governors around the country, the final deal slashed $25 billion from a proposed state fiscal stabilization fund, eliminated a $16 billion line item for school construction and sharply curtailed spending to provide health insurance for the unemployed.

In driving down the total cost — from $838 billion for the Senate stimulus bill and $820 billion for the House-passed measure — lawmakers also reduced the Senate’s proposed tax incentives for buyers of homes and cars, which hold big public appeal.

The final agreement retained a $70 billion tax break to spare millions of middle-income Americans from paying the alternative minimum tax in 2009. Some Democrats decried the provision as a costly addition that would not lift the economy and that Congress would have approved, regardless of the recession.

After huddling in Ms. Pelosi’s office on Tuesday until nearly midnight, top White House officials and Congressional leaders had all but ironed out the differences between the House and Senate versions of the stimulus by noon on Wednesday.

Even before the last touches were put to the bill, some angry Democrats said that Mr. Obama and Congressional leaders had been too quick to give up on Democratic priorities. “I am not happy with it,” said Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa. “You are not looking at a happy camper. I mean they took a lot of stuff out of education. They took it out of health, school construction and they put it more into tax issues.”

Mr. Harkin said he was particularly frustrated by the money being spent on fixing the alternative minimum tax. “It’s about 9 percent of the whole bill,” he said, “Why is it in there? It has nothing to do with stimulus. It has nothing to do with recovery.”

But even as Congressional leaders and top White House officials went through the package with a carving knife, it was clear that the three Republicans who agreed to support the bill in the Senate wielded extraordinary power, and along with conservative Democrats, had put a firm stamp on the stimulus package.

For instance, negotiators opted to keep many of the Senate’s reduced spending provisions, but they were careful to maintain an additional $6.5 billion for medical research that was inserted at the insistence of Senator Arlen Specter, Republican of Pennsylvania, who is a cancer survivor. He was one of the three Republican supporters of the recovery package.

“I think it is an important component of putting America back on its feet,” Mr. Specter said, though he added that it was still a difficult vote “in view of the large deficit and national debt.”

The Senate bill came together only after a bipartisan group of centrist senators, led by Susan Collins, Republican of Maine, and Ben Nelson, Democrat of Nebraska, reached a deal to trim the cost of the package to $838 billion from more than $920 billion.

“These aren’t easy times, obviously for America,” said Senator Olympia J. Snowe, Republican of Maine, who was also a member of that group. “Given the gravity of the circumstances economically, I thought it was important to be part of a process that could yield a consensus-based solution.”

But the majority of Republicans continued to criticize the stimulus measure on Wednesday as a bloated and ill-designed spending bonanza by Democrats on favored projects that would not help lift the economy out of recession but would permanently expand the federal government and plunge future generations of Americans deep into debt.

“Yesterday the Senate cast one of the most expensive votes in history,” said the Republican leader, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. “Americans are wondering how we’re going to pay for all this.”

Indeed, the formal House-Senate conference meeting, usually an elaborate parliamentary ritual with reams of legislative paperwork strewn across cluttered conference tables, instead served mostly as a live, televised forum for some of the most powerful Democrats and Republicans in Congress to trade barbs.

Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, complained that despite Mr. Obama’s call for bipartisan cooperation, Republicans had largely been shut out. “We didn’t have a chance to negotiate,” Mr. Grassley said.

Robert Pear, Kate Phillips and Jeff Zeleny contributed reporting.

December 22, 2008

By Ed Gillespie

As the year draws to an end and President Bush enters his final month in office, there is much commentary about the Administration’s record over the past eight years. Unsurprisingly, many of these stories assail and distort the President’s record and recycle myths and unfounded allegations that have been leveled for the better part of his two terms. Historical accuracy requires a response to the litany of attacks leveled against President Bush, and while there’s not enough space to respond to all of them, here are five of the most egregious:

Myth 1: The last eight years were awful for most Americans economically and President Bush’s deregulatory policies caused the current financial crisis.

Reality:

President Bush’s time in office is ending as it began, with our economy under stress. The recession President Bush inherited as he entered office ran through the attacks of September 11, 2001, but during the recovery that followed, and due in no small part to the tax relief President Bush worked with Congress to provide, this country experienced its longest run of uninterrupted job growth – 52 straight months, with 8.3 million jobs created.

This reflected six consecutive years of economic growth from the Fourth Quarter of 2001 until the Fourth Quarter of 2007. From 2000 to 2007, real GDP grew by more than 17 percent, a remarkable gain of nearly 2.1 trillion dollars. This growth was driven in part by increased labor productivity gains that have averaged 2.5 percent annually since 2001, a rate that exceeds the averages of the 1970s, ’80s, and ’90s. In the same period, real after-tax income per capita increased by more than 11 percent, and there was a 4.7 percent increase in the number of new businesses formed. The current economic challenges, which the President and his Administration have responded to aggressively, threaten to reverse some of these gains – but the gains cannot be denied.

As for the current crisis, the President and his economic team have taken unprecedented actions to stabilize the financial sector and avert a collapse. While there are a number of causes of the housing and credit crises that are at the root of our current economic troubles, deregulation by the Bush Administration is simply not one of them. In fact, one of the circumstances that contributed to the crisis was the failure of the government sponsored enterprises (GSEs) Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which President Bush long tried to subject to greater regulation. In April 2001, three months after taking office, the President warned in his first budget that the size of the two GSEs were a “potential problem” that “could cause strong repercussions in financial markets, affecting Federally insured entities and economic activity.” In 2003, the Administration began calling for a new GSE regulator, and over the next five years, the Administration continued to call for GSE reform only to be accused by Democrats in Congress of creating artificial fears and advocating for ill-advised proposals. By the time Congress finally acted in 2008 to provide the oversight the President requested, it was too late to prevent systemic consequences. Had the Administration’s initial reform proposals been adopted, some of today’s turmoil in our financial markets may have been averted.

Myth 2: President Bush’s tax cuts only benefitted the wealthy and were paid for by sacrificing investments in health care and education.

Reality:

There are not 116 million “wealthy Americans,” but that’s how many taxpayers benefited from the President’s tax relief. The across-the-board tax cuts provided tax relief to every American who pays income taxes, created a new bottom 10 percent bracket rate, doubled the child tax credit to $1,000, and actually increased the share of the Federal income tax burden paid by the top 10 percent of individual earners from 67 percent in 2000 to 70 percent in 2005. Furthermore, this Administration removed 13 million low-income earners from the income tax rolls completely.

The economic growth spurred by tax relief also spurred growth in Federal tax receipts. In fact, the Federal Treasury realized the largest three-year increase of revenue in 26 years, and tax receipts grew more than $542 billion between 2000 and 2007. And yes, much of that money went to investments in health care and education.

President Bush provided more than 40 million Americans with better access to prescription drugs by creating the market-based Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit. And it is one of the rare government programs that actually costs less than expected. Projected overall program spending between 2004 and 2013 is approximately $240 billion lower, nearly 38 percent, than originally estimated, thanks to the market-oriented principles included at President Bush’s insistence.

Despite the heated rhetoric over children’s health insurance (S-CHIP) legislation last year, estimates from a 2007 Federal survey show that the number of uninsured children under the age of 18 actually declined by 800,000 from 2001 to 2007. From 2007 to 2008, the number of people covered by affordable and portable Health Savings Account-eligible plans increased 35 percent. Additionally, since President Bush took office, more than 1,200 community health centers have opened or expanded nationwide, which has helped provide treatment to nearly 17 million people.

Federal spending on education has increased nearly 40 percent under President Bush. Additionally, Pell Grant funding nearly doubled during the Administration, which is expected to help more than 5.5 million students attend college in the 2008-09 school year, 1.2 million more students than were assisted by Pell Grants in the 2001-02 school year. This financial aid assistance also helps account for the fact that 66 percent of high school graduates from the class of 2006 enrolled in colleges, compared to 63 percent in 2000.

Perhaps more importantly, the President’s No Child Left Behind Act has delivered tangible results to students. Since the law was enacted, fourth-grade students have achieved their highest reading and math scores on record, eighth-grade students have achieved their highest math scores on record, and African-American and Hispanic students have posted all-time high scores in a number of categories, narrowing the gap between minority students and white students.

Myth 3: The President’s “go it alone” foreign policy ruined America’s standing in the world.

Reality:

Rarely can one see revisionist history occurring in the present, but this charge is nothing short of that. The United States acted with a multilateral coalition of partner nations to remove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq after he failed to comply with the will of the international community, including numerous United Nations Security Council Resolutions. To ignore this fact is not only a distortion of history, but it is also an insult to the service members of our coalition partners who sacrificed their lives to contribute to the success we are now witnessing in Iraq. And in Afghanistan, approximately forty countries are currently deployed with American forces, including every one of our NATO allies.

The President also created a worldwide coalition of more than 90 nations to combat terrorist networks by sharing information, drying up their financing, and bringing their leaders to justice. To date, we have captured or killed hundreds of al-Qaeda leaders and operatives with the help of partner nations. Furthermore, the Administration established the Proliferation Security Initiative, which now includes more than 90 nations, and other multilateral coalitions to stop the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

The President successfully pushed for expanding NATO membership, generated international pressure on Iran to stop it from developing nuclear weapons, and organized the Six-Party Talks, which have resulted in North Korea committing to give up its nuclear weapons and abandon its nuclear programs. Verifying North Korea’s commitment will be a challenge, but at the most recent Six-Party Talks meeting, there was strong consensus among the five parties that North Korea must submit to a comprehensive verification regime that accords with international standards.

U.S. ties in Asia have been strengthened over the past eight years, and the Administration has built strong relationships with China, Japan, and South Korea, among others. We have signed an historic civilian nuclear power agreement with India, reflecting a fundamental change in our relationship. Pro-American leaders have been elected in Germany, France, and Italy. Eastern European countries such as Georgia, Ukraine, and Kosovo treasure their relationships with the United States, and no president has done more to improve health and security in the nations of Africa. We have also strengthened cooperation with Latin America, including initiatives with Brazil on biofuels and with Mexico and Central America on fighting organized crime. Finally, when the President took office, America had trade agreements in force with only three countries, versus 14 today – with three additional agreements approved by Congress but not yet in force and agreements with three countries that are awaiting Congressional approval.

Myth 4: The war in Iraq caused us to “take our eye off the ball” in Afghanistan and with al Qaeda.

Reality:

Iraq and Afghanistan are two fronts in the same war, and while the success of the surge in Iraq has been visible, we have also had a quiet surge in Afghanistan. The U.S. has continuously and aggressively fought side-by-side with Afghans and our allies to defeat the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan. The United States has provided nearly $32 billion for security, political, and economic development assistance and the international community has provided more than $55 billion to Afghanistan since 2001.

An additional U.S. Marine battalion deployed to Afghanistan in November and they will be followed by an Army combat brigade of about 3,400 troops in early 2009. U.S. forces now total approximately 31,000, and are joined by nearly as many coalition troops. The United States and our allies are working with Afghanistan to help it nearly double the size of the Afghan National Army over the next five years, from 79,000 now trained to 134,000 in 2014.

We have also deployed Provincial Reconstruction Teams to ensure security gains are followed by real improvements in daily life, and we have helped local communities strengthen their economies and create jobs, deliver basic services, improve governance and fight corruption, and build or repair key infrastructure such as roads, bridges, hospitals, and schools. More than six million children, approximately two million of them girls, are now in Afghan schools, compared to fewer than one million in 2001.

In this Global War on Terror, we do not have the luxury to fight on one battlefront at a time. To defeat the terrorists, we must fight them overseas so we don’t have to fight them here at home. Since 9/11, we have successfully captured or killed dozens of al-Qaeda’s senior leadership and hundreds of al-Qaeda operatives in two dozen countries, removed al-Qaeda’s safe-haven in Afghanistan and crippled al-Qaeda in Iraq, and disrupted numerous al Qaeda terrorist plots against the U.S., including a 2006 plot to blow up passenger planes traveling from London.

Myth 5: This Administration has been bad for the environment and ignored the problem of global warming.

Reality:

Given the liberal media’s failure to acknowledge this Administration’s true record on alternative energy, conservation, and climate change, it’s not surprising this charge has stuck. But here are some irrefutable data points: From 2001 to 2007, air pollution decreased by 12 percent, and fine particulate matter pollution is down 17 percent since 2001. Ethanol production quadrupled from 1.6 billion gallons in 2000 to 6.5 billion gallons in 2007, wind energy production has increased by more than 400 percent, and solar energy capacity has doubled. In 2007, solar installations increased more than 32 percent and the U.S. produced 96 percent more biodiesel (490 million gallons) than in 2006. The Administration also provided nearly $18 billion to research, develop, and promote alternative and more efficient energy technologies such as biofuels, solar, wind, clean coal, nuclear, and hydrogen.

This Administration has improved and protected the health of more than 27 million acres of Federal forest and grasslands, protected, restored, and improved more than three million acres of wetlands, and established the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument, the world’s largest fully protected marine conservation area (nearly 140,000 square miles).

Much of the misperception about the President’s environmental record is born out of the President’s withdrawing the United States from the Kyoto Protocol, which did not include the effective participation of major developing countries such as India and China. Instead, the President worked to address climate change by launching the Major Economies Process, which convened the leaders of the world’s major economies, both developed and developing, to work on ways to further reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve energy security without harming our economies or giving any nation a free ride. Finally, the President set the country on course to stop the growth of greenhouse gas emissions below projected levels by 2025 and invested more than $44 billion in climate change-related programs.

Some other items that are infrequently mentioned about the real record of the Bush Administration but are worth noting: Teenage drug use has declined 25 percent; in 2007, the violent crime rate was 43 percent lower than the rate in 1998; between 2005 and 2007, the chronically homeless population decreased approximately 30 percent; funding for veterans’ medical care has increased more than 115 percent; and as of 2005, the most recent abortion rate is at its lowest since 1974.

And one last fact: Our homeland has not suffered another terrorist attack since September 11, 2001. That, too, is part of the real Bush record.

More on RCP: Gas Prices Shouldn’t Set Our Energy Policy

Page Printed from: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/12/myths_and_facts_about_the_real.html at December 22, 2008 – 04:44:29 AM

NOTE:  If you read this article after Thursday 12/4 at 9:45, you must use something other than the “Mass Paradox of Politics” as your connection – you have been warned! – Kautzman

Kathleen Parker
Orlando Sentinel
November 28, 2008

So much for the wisdom of The People.

A new report from the Intercollegiate Studies Institute on the nation’s civic literacy finds that most Americans are too ignorant to vote.

Out of 2,500 American quiz-takers, including college students, elected officials and other randomly selected citizens, nearly 1,800 flunked a 33-question test on basic civics. In fact, elected officials scored slightly lower than the general public with an average score of 44 percent compared to 49 percent.

Only 0.8 percent of all test-takers scored an “A.”

America’s report card may come as little surprise to fans of Jay Leno’s man-on-the-street interviews, which reveal that most people don’t know diddly about doohickey. Still, it’s disheartening in the wake of a populist-driven election celebrating joes-of-all-trades to be reminded that the voting public is dumber than ever.

The multiple-choice quiz wouldn’t deepen the creases in most brains, but the questions do require a basic knowledge of how the U.S. government works.

Think fast: In what document do the words “government of the people, by the people, for the people” appear? More than twice as many people (56 percent) knew that Paula Abdul was a judge on “American Idol” than knew that those words come from Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address (21 percent).

In good news, more than 80 percent of college graduates gave correct answers about Susan B. Anthony, the identity of the commander in chief of the U.S. military and the content of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech.

But don’t pop the cork yet. Only 17 percent of college grads understood the difference between free markets and centralized planning.

Then again, we can’t blame the children for what they haven’t been taught. Civics courses, once a staple of junior and high school education, are no longer considered important in our quantitative, leave-no-child-behind world. And college adds little civic knowledge, the study found. The average grade for those holding a bachelor’s degree was just 57 percent – only 13 points higher than the average score of those with only a high school diploma.

Most bracing: Only 27 percent of elected officeholders in the survey could identify a right or freedom guaranteed by the First Amendment.

Forty-three percent didn’t know what the Electoral College does. And 46 percent didn’t know that the Constitution gives Congress power to declare war.

What’s behind the dumbing down of America?

The institute found that passive activities, such as watching television (including TV news) and talking on the phone, diminish civic literacy.

Actively pursuing information through print media and participating in high-level conversations – even, potentially, blogging – makes one smarter.

The institute insists that higher-education reforms aimed at civic literacy are urgently needed. Who could argue otherwise?

But historian Rick Shenkman, author of “Just How Stupid Are We?” thinks reform needs to start in high school. His strategy is both poetic (to certain ears) and pragmatic: Require students to read newspapers, and give college freshman weekly quizzes on current events.

Did he say newspapers?! Shenkman even suggests government subsidies for newspaper subscriptions, as well as federal tuition subsidies for students who perform well on civics tests. They could be paid from a special fund created by, say, a “Too Many Stupid Voters Act.”

Not only would citizens be smarter, but also newspapers might be saved. Announcements of newsroom cuts, which ultimately hurt quality, have become routine.

In his book, Shenkman, founder of George Mason University’s History News Network, is tough on everyday Americans. Why, he asks, do we value polls when clearly The People don’t know enough to make a reasoned judgment?

The Founding Fathers, Shenkman points out, weren’t so enamored of The People, whom they distrusted. Hence a Republic, not a Democracy. They understood that an ignorant electorate was susceptible to emotional manipulation and feared the tyranny of the masses.

Both Shenkman and the institute pose a bedeviling question, as crucial as any to the nation’s health: Who will govern a free nation if no one understands the mechanics and instruments of that freedom?

Answer: Maybe one day, a demagogue.

Michael Smerconish
November 28, 2008

Every election season seems to introduce us to a slew of new pundits, even if many have resumes that don’t add up to the title on the screen underneath their television images.

Take, for example, Martin Eisenstadt, a self-described neoconservative who found his opinions in demand during the presidential campaign. Eisenstadt, identified on his blog “a senior fellow at the Harding Institute for Freedom and Democracy,” made waves by outing himself as the source of the rumor that Sarah Palin thought Africa was a country, not a continent. That Eisenstadt would know such information would not seem unusual given that the “bio” section of his blog identifies him as “an expert on Near Eastern military and political affairs” who “works alongside Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign, offering advice and liaising with the Jewish community in particular.”

And it wasn’t the first time Eisenstadt had achieved mainstream recognition. A Los Angeles Times blog had picked up on his July comments after the McCain campaign’s portrayal of Barack Obama as a celebrity akin to Paris Hilton.

There was just one problem: Eisenstadt is the Borat of the campaign season, a fictitious character created by a pair of aspiring filmmakers, Eitan Gorlin and Dan Mirvish, in their quest to get a TV show. Now, plenty of media outlets have egg on their faces.

“I think we’ve learned that often in the 24-hour news cycle, bloggers and even mainstream media work so quickly that they don’t really have the chance to check,” Gorlin told me last week. “I think also where news has become entertainment … where I think political news is almost following, now, celebrity news … where it doesn’t matter what you say about Britney Spears, as long as something was said. Basically, gossip posing as news.”

This incident is bigger than Gorlin and Mirvish. It speaks to a larger problem of what happens in an age of newsroom downsizing. It reminded me of something I read months ago in the entertainment bible Variety about the “domino” nature of today’s media.

There, columnist Brian Lowry observed: “Shrinking print coverage threatens to trigger a ‘domino effect’ as news operations downsize, feeding the strange Internet age conundrum where there’s more information — courtesy of blogs and the Web — but less real news, especially as it pertains to backyard issues.”

I am one such domino.

My day begins every morning at a local convenience store, where at 3:40 I greet a truck arriving to deliver the Philadelphia Inquirer and Philadelphia Daily News. Two hours, 20 minutes later, I begin a live, current-events-driven radio show that lasts three hours. Although about half of the content for my show is determined the day before, I will use those newspapers and a variety of other news sources available in the studio to plan the remainder of the morning. If something leads the local newspaper, it most certainly makes my broadcast. I always offer attribution, and I attempt to expand on a given story with personal opinion. As a radio or television talking head, I don’t do reporting. I repeat. I analyze. I offer my opinion and I gauge the opinions of others. There are many like me in today’s media world.

But what happens if we remove newspapers from that equation?

It seems like hardly a week goes by without a headline about a major publication trimming newsroom staff. Earlier this year, the New York Times succumbed to “growing financial strain” by cutting 100 newsroom jobs – despite reported earnings of $209 million last year. This month it was Time Inc. beginning the process of cutting 600 jobs.

Unfortunately, those who report the news are a dying breed, even in the Internet world. The dearth of hard news and investigative journalism leaves the always-expanding number of outlets – 24-hour cable networks, satellite radio stations, blogs, podcasts – scrambling for anything they can parrot to a hungry audience.

The result? People eager for the next piece of news are easily taken in by characters such as Martin Eisenstadt. And those bad habits will continue to inch their way into cash-strapped, understaffed traditional news-gathering outlets where legitimate reporting is falling by the wayside.

October 05, 2008

By David Ignatius

“Piece by piece, the nation’s credit structure was becoming paralyzed. Crisis was in the air, but it was a strange, numbing crisis. … It was worse than an invading army; it was everywhere and nowhere, for it was in the minds of men. It was fear.”

— James MacGregor Burns, “Roosevelt: The Lion and the Fox.”

WASHINGTON — It may be the end of an economic era on Wall Street, as commentators have noted over the past few weeks. But it is not yet the beginning of a new political era in Washington. In that gap lies the opportunity for Barack Obama to explain to the nation how he proposes to make a new start.

The frantic debate over the $700 billion bailout plan has obscured the reality that a new framework for recovery will have to be built by the next administration. The crisis package is important, but it’s the political equivalent of an overnight loan, a short-term fix to keep the system functioning. The definition of the new era — the post-crash era — hasn’t really begun.

To win, Obama will need to give voters a clearer sense of how he will govern in this new era. He still talks like a lawyer, making debating points and rebutting arguments, but not explaining how he will rebuild a shaken and traumatized country. This “vision thing” will become all the more important in coming weeks, as the economic crunch moves from Wall Street to Main Street and the country begins to feel real pain.

Franklin D. Roosevelt is the obvious model for a new president taking office amid severe economic difficulty. But what are the lessons that FDR teaches?

A first FDR decision, before he took office, was that he wouldn’t get caught up in the flailing rescue measures of the lame-duck Hoover administration. Then, as now, the problem was a paralyzing credit crisis. A desperate Hoover sent Roosevelt a handwritten note on Feb. 18, 1933, pleading with him to endorse a common program to restore confidence: “The major difficulty is the state of the public mind, for which there is steadily decreasing confidence in the future.”

Roosevelt ignored the plea. He felt that working with the discredited Hoover would undermine public support for his own recovery program when he took office a few weeks later.

By backing the Bush rescue plan, Obama has lost that complete freedom of action. But he didn’t really have a choice. More worrisome is that he hasn’t yet articulated a larger plan for economic reconstruction. Indeed, he ducked the issue in the first presidential debate. That’s a mistake.

A second Roosevelt lesson is that the heart of the problem is psychological. As FDR wrote his March 4, 1933, inaugural address, he had open a volume of Thoreau with the passage, “nothing is so much to be feared as fear.” That became the famous, ringing line: “First of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Within a few days, he had received half a million enthusiastic letters and telegrams.

A third FDR precept was to accompany his ringing words with decisive actions. Roosevelt announced a “bank holiday” his second day in office, making a virtue of the fact that panic-stricken banks had shut their doors. By the end of his first week, he had passed an emergency banking bill that reopened the banks on what the public perceived as sounder footing. The bill passed Congress in just eight hours. A GOP floor leader, Rep. Bertrand H. Snell, said simply: “The house is burning down, and the president of the United States says this is the way to put out the fire.”

A final FDR lesson is that in crisis, it’s sometimes better to go by instinct than to wait for a systematic plan. FDR considered sending Congress home after it passed the emergency banking bill so that he could come up with a comprehensive recovery proposal. Instead he went piecemeal, cobbling together the package of 15 major bills that made up the famous “First Hundred Days.”

Roosevelt understood that it was a confidence game. He surrounded himself with smart people and good ideas. But his real success in 1933 was that he conveyed to a frightened country that he knew what he was doing, and never let on the fact that he was, as his biographer Burns says, “playing by ear.” It’s that sense of pitch that the public wants to see in Obama.

Leonard Pitts Jr.
The Miami Herald
September 22, 2008

Of course, we all have questions for Sarah Palin:

Does she actually think living across the Bering Strait from Russia constitutes foreign policy expertise? Does she really take the parable of Adam and Eve as literal truth? How, exactly, does one field dress a moose? And why would one want to?

My first question, though, would not be one of those. I’d simply ask which books she wants to ban – and why.

Yes, there’s a list of titles floating around the Internet right now, but it’s a fake. It is, however, established fact that our would-be vice president has in the past tried to pull books off library shelves.

The New York Times reports that as a member of the City Council of Wasilla, Alaska, Palin complained to colleagues about a book called “Daddy’s Roommate,” described in promotional material as being “for and about the children of lesbian and gay parents.”

Laura Chase, who ran Palin’s campaign for mayor, explained that the book was harmless and suggested Palin read it.

Chase told the Times that Palin replied she “didn’t need to read that stuff. It was disturbing that someone would be willing to remove a book from the library and she didn’t even read it.”

Later, as mayor, Palin reportedly asked the town’s librarian three times whether she would agree to remove controversial books from the shelves. Three times the librarian refused. Palin fired her, but eventually bowed to public pressure and gave the woman her job back.

“I’m still proud of Sarah,” said Chase, “but she scares the bejeebers out of me.”

And in that context, it seems apropos that next week is Banned Books Week. As you doubtless know, that’s the week set aside each year by the American Library Association to bring attention to attempts by some of us to regulate what others of us may read. The ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom reports that it has seen 9,700 “challenges” – a challenge is defined as a formal written request to remove a book from a library because the content offends or is deemed inappropriate — since 1990. Chillingly, the office suggests that’s probably an undercount. It estimates that for every challenge reported, four or five are not.

So Palin has company, to say the least.

Count among that number the woman from a Cuban exile group who bragged to a Miami Herald reporter how in 2006 she checked out and kept an elementary school library book that she felt painted too rosy a picture of life on that communist island. Like Palin, she thought she had good reason. Would-be book banners always do.

I’m reminded of how someone challenged me the other day on my contention that anti-intellectualism has overtaken this land. I mentioned by way of example Palin’s Bible literalism, but really, there’s so much more. There’s the “Jay Walking” segment on Leno. There’s this notion that “elite” is a four-letter word. There’s the White House’s censorship and politicization of science. There’s the recent survey which found that more people can name all five Simpsons than all five freedoms enumerated in the First Amendment.

And there’s this: as many as 50,000 incidents since 1990 in which a book was forced to justify its existence. We’re talking books like “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” books like “The Color Purple,” books like “Harry Potter” and, yes, books like “Daddy’s Roommate,” books that offended because they expressed ideas that made someone uncomfortable. As if any other kind of idea was worth expressing.

We are becoming the stupid giant of planet Earth: richer than Midas, mightier than Thor, dumber than rocks. Which makes us a danger to the planet – and to ourselves. This country cannot continue to prosper and to embrace stupidity. The two are fundamentally incompatible.

So do us all a favor: Annoy Sarah Palin. For goodness’ sake, read.

Gene Policinski
September 9, 2008

School administrators can gain from a recent court decision some much-needed guidance on how to react to student voices they dislike.

The good news for students – and for all Americans – is that this newest legal lesson supports more speech instead of placing more limits on student expression.

A landmark 1969 U.S. Supreme Court decision – Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, involving students and Vietnam War protest armbands – put forth the idea that young citizens don’t automatically surrender their First Amendment rights at the schoolhouse door.

But since then, courts at various levels have set about defining when and how officials legally could shut down student expression. A number of those legal limits have been driven by security, education or drug-related concerns.

No principal, no superintendent – and no judge, for that matter – wants to be the person whose inattention, inactivity or decision results in another Columbine-style massacre. Judges have recognized that teachers cannot teach and students cannot learn amid chaos or fear. And the dangers of drug use are painfully obvious.

Still, in various cases in just the past five years, students have been silenced because the message was politically incorrect or offended administrator sensibilities or community views. After voicing or writing sharp political views about the war in Iraq or illegal immigrants or gay rights or after penning provocative illustrations involving Old Glory, students have been told to sit down, shut up and wait their turn as citizens until they leave school – or face suspension or worse.

Many disputes are settled out-of-court, more often than not with an apology to the student and reinstatement. But the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals weighed in on Sept. 2 with a common-sense decision supporting the rights of students to object to – of all things – a school policy.

A three-judge panel agreed that school officials in Watson Chapel, Ark., violated the constitutional rights of three students in 2006 who were disciplined for wearing black armbands or wristbands to school to protest a new policy enforcing school uniforms and for handing out a flier objecting to the policy.

The administrators agreed in court that the student protest did not disrupt classes or order at the school.

The 8th Circuit panel said that despite restrictive decisions since it was handed down, including the 2007 Supreme Court decision in the so-called “Bong Hits for Jesus” case, “Tinker remains good law.” Students in both Tinker and the Watson Chapel case were exercising a right of protest against a government policy – something officials in every school ought to celebrate by example, not denigrate.

Advocates for student expression have feared that school officials and lower courts would expand legal controls into other areas of student free expression based on the ruling in that “Bong Hits” case. In that case – officially called Morse v. Frederick – the high court said officials may clamp down on student speech regarded as encouraging drug use.

School officials in Arkansas even argued that the subject matter was too mundane to get constitutional protection. The decision in the Watson Chapel case, however, squarely affirms that non-disruptive student speech, be it on issues of international interest or on local policies such as school uniforms, is protected by the First Amendment.

In an era in which educators struggle to motivate students to think critically, and to instill basic American values of good citizenship, arbitrarily denying basic rights to speak out, to write in protest, to assemble and to peaceably “seek redress” seems wrong-headed.

Students should learn about First Amendment freedoms in the classroom rather than the courtroom.

By: David Paul Kuhn August 30, 2008 02:54 PM EST

Barack Obama’s post-convention bounce has taken him from a tied race at the start of last week to an 8-point lead, and he’s now matched the peak of his support in the general election as multiple polls show that just short of 50 percent of voters intend to support him. Two daily tracking polls, though, appear to show that few voters shifted camps based on the big events of the previous two days, Obama’s convention speech and the unveiling of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as John McCain’s running mate. Gallup Daily tracking reported today that Obama is ahead 49 percent to 41 percent, the same breakdown as yesterday. The week began with McCain and Obama knotted up at 45 percent support. In the 22 major-party conventions since 1964, the nominee walked away with, on average in most years, a 5-percentage-point uptick in Gallup’s polls. It remains to be seen if the surge in Obama’s support will continue after the Republican convention concludes next week. The Rasmussen Reports daily tracking poll also finds that Obama has taken his largest lead since July. Rasmussen pegs Obama with 47 percent of the vote to McCain’s 43 percent, a lead that expands to 49 percent to 45 percent when “leaners” are included. Rasmussen also found that little impact on voters in polling conducted after Obama’s speech and Palin’s announcement. See Also 6 things the Palin pick says about McCain The story behind the Palin surprise Obama ad portrays McCain as clueless Politico’s guide to the conventions In the 22 major-party conventions since 1964, the nominee walked away with, on average, a 5-percentage-point uptick in Gallup’s polls. Next week’s Republican convention will almost certainly register some shift in public opinion toward the Republican ticket, though the condensed schedule leaves scant precedent. There have been only three previous back-to-back conventions, most recently in 1956. It is also a unique election cycle in that there is only a weekend separating the vice presidential announcements from each party’s convention. Not since 1992 has the time between selections and conventions been nearly this compressed. That year, Bill Clinton announced only three days ahead of the Democratic convention that Gore would be his running mate. Clinton would go on to have the largest convention bounce in modern history, a 16-point increase. But that surge was more likely due to the announcement by popular independent candidate Ross Perot, which he later recanted, that he was stepping out of the race. Perot went on to offer a quasi-endorsement of the Democratic ticket. “The Democratic Party has revitalized itself,” Perot said at the time. The addition of Palin to the ticket could also undercut Obama’s resurgence. Gallup’s tracking from Monday to Wednesday, when Obama’s 6-point bounce first appeared, indicated that Obama’s gains were largely due to increased favor among conservative Democrats. Those same Democrats are more likely to be onetime Hillary Rodham Clinton supporters. Palin’s status as potentially the first female vice president could draw some Clintonites — particularly middle-aged or older white women — away from the Democratic ticket. It remains to be seen if adding Palin to the ticket will have a long-term effect in the polls. Walter Mondale’s choice of Geraldine Ferraro in 1984 may have been historic—marking the first time a woman ran on the ticket of either major party—but after a 9-point post-convention bounce, the Democratic ticket went nowhere fast. Adding to the difficulty of measuring the effect of the Democratic convention, fewer Americans respond to phone surveys over Labor Day, as they enjoy the final days of summer vacation.

Northwest signers Among the college presidents backing the Amethyst Initiative are Robert Hoover of the College of Idaho, Thomas Hochstettler of Lewis & Clark College, Phil Creighton of Pacific University, Loren J. Anderson of Pacific Lutheran University and M. Lee Pelton of Willamette University.

Justin Pope
Associated Press
August 19, 2008

College presidents from about 100 of the nation’s best-known universities, including Duke, Dartmouth and Ohio State, are calling on lawmakers to consider lowering the drinking age from 21 to 18, saying current laws actually encourage dangerous binge drinking on campus.

The movement called the Amethyst Initiative began quietly recruiting presidents more than a year ago to provoke national debate about the drinking age.

“This is a law that is routinely evaded,” said John McCardell, former president of Middlebury College in Vermont who started the organization. “It is a law that the people at whom it is directed believe is unjust and unfair and discriminatory.”

Other prominent schools in the group include Syracuse, Tufts, Colgate, Kenyon and Morehouse.

But even before the presidents begin the public phase of their efforts, which may include publishing newspaper ads in the coming weeks, they are already facing sharp criticism.

Mothers Against Drunk Driving says lowering the drinking age would lead to more fatal car crashes. It accuses the presidents of misrepresenting science and looking for an easy way out of an inconvenient problem. MADD officials are even urging parents to think carefully about the safety of colleges whose presidents have signed on.

“It’s very clear the 21-year-old drinking age will not be enforced at those campuses,” said Laura Dean-Mooney, national president of MADD.

Both sides agree alcohol abuse by college students is a huge problem.

Research has found more than 40 percent of college students reported at least one symptom of alcohol abuse or dependence. One study has estimated more than 500,000 full-time students at four-year colleges suffer injuries each year related in some way to drinking, and about 1,700 die in such accidents.

A recent Associated Press analysis of federal records found that 157 college-age people, 18 to 23, drank themselves to death from 1999 through 2005.

McCardell’s group takes its name from ancient Greece, where the purple gemstone amethyst was widely believed to ward off drunkenness if used in drinking vessels and jewelry. He said college students will drink no matter what, but do so more dangerously when it’s illegal.

The statement the presidents have signed avoids calling explicitly for a younger drinking age. Rather, it seeks “an informed and dispassionate debate” over the issue and the federal highway law that made 21 the de facto national drinking age by denying money to any state that bucks the trend.

But the statement makes clear the signers think the current law isn’t working, citing a “culture of dangerous, clandestine binge-drinking,” and noting that while adults under 21 can vote and enlist in the military, they “are told they are not mature enough to have a beer.” Furthermore, “by choosing to use fake IDs, students make ethical compromises that erode respect for the law.”

“I’m not sure where the dialogue will lead, but it’s an important topic to American families, and it deserves a straightforward dialogue,” said William Troutt, president of Rhodes College in Memphis, Tenn., who has signed the statement.

But some other college administrators sharply disagree that lowering the drinking age would help. University of Miami President Donna Shalala, who served as secretary of health and human services under President Clinton, declined to sign.

“I remember college campuses when we had 18-year-old drinking ages, and I honestly believe we’ve made some progress,” Shalala said in a telephone interview. “To just shift it back down to the high schools makes no sense at all.”

Voters can check registration, read up on contenders

Elections – Washington state

Jim Camden
Staff writer
August 7, 2008

With ballots for Washington’s top-two primary streaming in to county elections offices, state officials are unveiling a Web site to help voters with their ballots and registration.

The new site, dubbed MyVote, allows voters to check their registered address and correct it if it’s wrong. They can also see which candidates are on their ballots and go to the state’s Voter Guide to see those candidates’ entries. The site lists places where voters can drop off ballots if they don’t want to put them in the mail.

Secretary of State Sam Reed said voters seem to prefer the new voting system, in which they can vote for any candidate in each race, to the “pick a party” primary in 2004 and 2006. In those years, voters could cast a ballot that had only one of the major party’s candidates on it.

Under the previous system, “I was getting an e-mail on the average of every two seconds, and they were not kind e-mails,” Reed said at a press conference Wednesday in Spokane. Voters didn’t like being restricted to a single party, he said.

The top-two primary closely resembles the system called a blanket primary, in place between 1935 and 2003, when it was ruled unconstitutional by federal courts. The two candidates getting the most votes will move to the general election, regardless of their stated party preference. That means it’s possible for the general election race to be between two Democrats or two Republicans, one major party candidate and one minor party candidate, or two minor party candidates.

The biggest change is for minor party candidates, Reed said. But it’s a good-news, bad-news kind of change.

“The good news for them, it’s the easiest and best access to the ballot of any state in America,” Reed said. All they needed to do was file a candidacy petition and state a party preference.

The bad news: It will be difficult for minor party candidates to finish first or second in the primary and advance to the general election in most races, he said.

“There’s always a possibility of a Green Party candidate making it in Seattle, or a Libertarian candidate over here in Eastern Washington,” Reed said.

Under previous systems, minor party candidates bypassed the primary and went directly to the general election if they filed enough signatures. “There are no free passes anymore,” he said.

Reed predicted a statewide turnout of 46 percent, which would be higher than 2004 or 2006. Spokane County Auditor Vicky Dalton said her office has received nearly 19,000 ballots, just under 8 percent of the nearly 244,000 mailed out last week.

 

By Roland S. Martin
CNN Contributor

Join Roland Martin for his weekly sound-off segment on CNN.com Live at 11:10 a.m. Thursday. If you’re passionate about politics, he wants to hear from you.

ACCRA, Ghana (CNN) — “All I want is for my children to get the best education they can.”

That statement, along with so many others, has been a consistent one that I’ve heard on my radio show and in discussions with parents for years, especially those whose children are stuck in inner-city schools with decrepit buildings and a lack of critical resources.

And for the past 20 years, one of the most talked-about solutions for parents stuck in dead-end, failing schools is to give them the option to use vouchers to send their children someplace where they could get a quality education.

Republicans have made vouchers a linchpin of their education overhaul initiatives. Democrats have steadfastly refused, saying it would take vital dollars out of the public school system.

This year’s presidential candidates are lining up right along with their parties. Sen. John McCain, the GOP nominee, says vouchers are the right way to go to give parents an option for a better education, while Sen. Barack Obama says the GOP has talked and talked about vouchers, and it hasn’t amounted to much more.

But part of the reason why vouchers have been denounced and dismissed is because Democrats have been far too obstinate on the issue, and have not listened to their constituents, especially African-Americans, who overwhelmingly support vouchers.

There is no doubt that on this issue, McCain has it right and Obama has it wrong.

The fundamental problem with the voucher debate is that it is always seen as an either/or proposition. For Republicans, it is the panacea to all the educational woes, and that is nonsensical. For Democrats, it is something that will destroy public education, and that too is a bunch of crap.

I fundamentally believe that vouchers are simply one part of the entire educational pie. There simply is no one sure-fire way to educate a child. We’ve seen public schools do a helluva job — I went to them from K through college — and so have private schools, home schooling, charter schools and even online initiatives. This is the kind of innovation we need, not more efforts to prevent a worthy idea from moving forward.

Obama’s opposition is right along the lines of the National Education Association, and the teachers union is a reliable and powerful Democratic ally. But this is one time where he should have opposed them and made it clear that vouchers can force school districts, administrators and teachers to shape up or see their students ship out.

It is unconscionable to ask a parent to watch as his child is stuck in a failing school or district, and ask him to bank on a politician coming up with more funds to improve the situation. Fine, call vouchers a short-term solution to a long-term problem, but I’d rather have a child getting the best education — now — rather than having to hope and pray down the line.

McCain and Obama have presented comprehensive education plans, and those are noble. But leaving out vouchers does a tremendous disservice to the parents who are fed up with deplorable schools, and allows school districts to operate with impunity and without any real competition.

Roland S. Martin is an award-winning journalist and CNN contributor. He is the author of “Listening to the Spirit Within: 50 Perspectives on Faith.” Please visit his Web site at http://www.rolandsmartin.com/

This article was suggested by R. Damiano.

by Glenn Beck

Editor’s note: Glenn Beck is on CNN Headline News nightly at 7 and 9 ET and also hosts a conservative national radio talk show.

NEW YORK (CNN) — A few days before the Fourth of July, I read a column in The Philadelphia Inquirer that said America didn’t deserve to celebrate its independence this year.

It claimed that all of our so-called atrocities have shamed the memory of our founding fathers and, as a result, we should cancel our parades, put away our fireworks and all sit quietly while we atone for our sins.

I guess that was one way to go.

Another way to go would be to fire up the grills, bring the kids to the beach,and gather the family on a blanket to watch as your tax dollars ignite into colorful bursts.

I’m guessing that most of us chose the second option.

But just because I had fun with friends and family doesn’t mean that I believe America is perfect. It just means that, for one day, I chose to celebrate the fact that America is still closer to perfect than any other country in the history of the world.

For 364 days a year we talk about high gas prices, crooked politicians, and how much people from one political party allegedly hate everyone from the other. But for 24 hours we get to put it all aside and marvel at how a few brave men risked their lives to stand up for what they believed in. Of course, I would prefer we celebrate that every day, but for now, or at least until that Inquirer columnist gets elected president and bans it, I’ll take the one.

As someone who works in the media in New York City, I’ll admit that I am part of the chorus of people who talk about our problems. But there’s nothing wrong with that, so long as you also occasionally take the time to talk about the other side. And that’s what I want to do now by asking the question that never seems to be of interest to the mainstream media: What’s right with America?

Let’s start with our much maligned economy. I’m not trying to sugarcoat it, times are definitely tough for an awful lot of families right now. But you know what? We’ve made it through a depression; we’ve made it through wars, oil shocks, and major terrorist attacks and we’re still standing. In fact, we’re not just standing, we’re towering over the rest of the world.

Our economy is almost as big as the next four largest economies on Earth (Japan, Germany, China and Great Britain) combined. The state of California alone has an economy as large as the entire country of France. Illinois has the same GDP as all of Mexico. New York matches the entire GDP of Brazil. Florida’s economy is as large as South Korea’s. Texas has a GDP roughly equal to Canada’s. Michigan’s economy is as large as the entire country of Argentina.

It takes a lot longer to turn around an aircraft carrier than it does a dinghy, but the problem we have is with our ship’s captain — the pea-brains in Washington — not her crew.

What’s right with America? How about the way we educate our children. Sure, I complain a lot about left-wing professors and how some wealthy private universities hoard their billions while charging obscene amounts for tuition, but the truth is that our universities are always ranked among the best in the world.

Students aren’t fleeing America to go to college in Japan, India, or China — it’s the other way around. We open our colleges and universities to more than 80,000 foreign professors, scholars and educators a year and we have more students in college right now than those three countries combined.

What’s right with America? Our world-class universities don’t require you to have an elite family name or Rockefeller-type wealth to get in. We don’t care about your race, gender or nationality. You just have to be smart enough and work hard for it. What a concept, huh?

What’s right with America? How about the way we treat the less fortunate? With no help from our government, Americans gave a record $306 billion to charities last year alone. We give twice as much as the next closest country and, relative to the size of our economies, we give 1,000 percent more than the French.

What’s right with America? It’s not just the wealthy who are generous. Two-thirds of American families making under $100,000 a year give to charity. Compassion is ingrained in our culture like no other.

What’s right with America? How about our supposedly third-world health care system? We spend more on health care per person than Switzerland, Germany, Canada, or any other country you can think of. Do we still have problems? Absolutely, but don’t fall for “the grass is greener” crowd; every country has health care problems.

What’s right with America? We love our country. World Values Survey found that 77 percent of Americans are very proud of their nationality. That puts us in a first place tie with the Irish. Australia was next and no one else was really even close.

I could go on and on, but my point is that we don’t need the so often wished for “change” in this country, we just need perspective.

While most of us inherently know that we’ve won the lottery by living here, we don’t often think about the reasons why.

So, for at least that one day, let’s just remember that America still leads the world in the principles that matter most: The rule of law, freedom of religion, equal rights, freedom from an oppressive government and, fortunately for the Philadelphia Inquirer, freedom of speech.

This article was suggested by R. Damiano

 

Susan Estrich
Creators Syndicate
July 26, 2008

The Sunday opinion section is gone. So is the book review section. So are literally hundreds of the reporters I have come to respect over years of reading my local paper. What is happening in my hometown is happening in every city across the country. Layoffs. Cutbacks. Slow death.

Meanwhile, talk show hosts, who don’t pretend to “report,” who don’t try to be “objective,” who will tell you themselves, if they are being honest, that they are in the business of entertainment, sign record contracts. I don’t begrudge them their riches. They’re making money because their shows do. But for those of us who care about the role of a free press in a democracy, something is askew.

Not long ago, a fine newspaper reporter who covers the Supreme Court came to lecture in one of my classes about some of the cases then pending before the court. Frankly, I didn’t expect that many of my students would be familiar with his work. But I was wrong.

How many of you read the paper every day? he asked them. A surprisingly large number of hands went up. We looked at each other, puzzled. We both knew that circulation was dropping, that young people don’t buy the paper in the same numbers that their parents did. How many of you read it on paper, I asked. Most of the hands went down. They read the paper; they just didn’t buy it.

I’m not going to mourn the decreasing demand for newsprint. Let the trees live. The danger of reading newspapers online, I have discovered, is that you miss all the stories you don’t think you’d be interested in until they catch your eye as you’re turning the page. When I read papers online, I always read the political and legal stories, but I miss an interesting book review, a surprising sidebar, an obituary that doesn’t make it to the front index. The challenge for newspapers as they go online and off paper is to find a way to tell me about all the good stuff inside that I don’t know I’m interested in until I read the first few lines or see the picture.

The bigger problem goes to the question of standards. “All the news that’s fit to print,” the motto of the New York Times, isn’t really about printing, but about standards of fitness. It’s about old-fashioned values like professionalism and fairness, about good and demanding editors who take the time to make sure you’ve checked the facts and given everyone a chance to respond before they put the story in the paper. It’s about the difference between the news pages and the editorial pages, the difference between reporting the news and commenting on it, and the need to respect that line and make sure readers can see where it is being drawn.

I’m not a reporter and I don’t pretend to be. I write commentary. I offer opinions. I do so based on many, many years of working in politics and teaching law, not to mention raising kids and taking care of family. I try to be fair and I value my reputation for being honest, but I don’t pretend to be objective. That’s not my job.

But it should be somebody’s. It has always been the job of newspaper reporters and editors to live by a set of rules that ensure that when you read a “news story,” as opposed to an opinion column, you can assume that a substantial effort has been made to document the facts, to tell a story rather than opine about it, to ask the tough questions and fairly report the answers. Moreover, when it comes to news, the evening news still tends to be guided by the morning paper. If the latter declines in quality, so will the former.

Of course, some television and radio reporters try to live by these standards, as do some bloggers. The problem is that the most-watched programs on television, the reporters who make the most money and the sites that get the most hits are not necessarily the best journalistically.

In all the years I’ve done television, I can count the number of times someone has complimented me for what I said. People watch TV; they don’t listen to it. If you do well, they’ll tell you how good you looked, not how smart or knowledgeable you sounded. What’s worse, when it comes to the substance, you get attention not for being well-informed and reasonable, but for being out there and outrageous, even if you know nothing about what you’re talking about.

I want to be a political pundit, pretty young girls and boys tell me all the time. No, they don’t want to actually do politics, study politics, learn the game. They just want to get paid to look good and give opinions. Lawyers barely out of law school, who have never argued a case in their lives, decide to be legal commentators. And too many good reporters, looking for television slots and the paid speeches that come next and trying to dodge the pink slips that are everywhere, are aiming to play the same game. They may win, but the rest of us are losing.

Michael Barone
U.S. News & World Report
July 15, 2008

Sixty years ago this summer, the top story in campaign year 1948 was not the big poll lead of Republican nominee Thomas Dewey or the plight of President Harry Truman. It was the Berlin airlift.

On June 23, the Soviets cut off land access to West Berlin. Gen. Lucius Clay, the military governor in Germany, called for sending convoys up the autobahns, but Allied troops were vastly outnumbered by the Red Army, and everyone feared they would overrun Western Europe unless the United States retaliated with the atomic bomb.

Air Force generals said that there was no way planes could ferry the 8 million pounds of food and coal Berlin would need every day. Secretary of State George Marshall and Joint Chiefs Chairman Omar Bradley, two of America’s most respected generals, felt Berlin was indefensible and we should withdraw. One man disagreed. President Harry Truman, in one crucial meeting after another, said, “We’re not leaving Berlin.”

And we didn’t. Truman had no idea how Berlin could be supplied. But Clay persuaded him to order the Air Force to send more planes that it wanted to keep, pristine and at the ready for other missions, at home. Air Force Chief of Staff Hoyt Vandenberg, at the prompting of Gen. Albert Wedemeyer, appointed Gen. William Tunner, who had run the airlift “over the hump” from Burma to China, to run the airlift in Germany.

Tunner imposed brute efficiencies so a plane landed and took off every 90 seconds, and pilots devised ingenious ways to increase payloads and gain favor from Berliners by dropping handkerchiefs full of candy to the children lining the runways at Tempelhof Airport.

This tale of American expertise, ingenuity and generosity is told vividly by Andrei Cherny in “The Candy Bombers.” Today, we know how it ended: the airlift supplied West Berlin all winter until the Soviets opened up land access in May, and Truman was re-elected to almost everyone’s surprise in November. But Truman couldn’t know those things in those first days in June and July. He only knew that we weren’t leaving Berlin.

There are lessons aplenty in this story. One is that the kindness of American soldiers – the candy bombers – can be a national asset. There are many similar stories out of Iraq and Afghanistan, even if today’s media, unlike the media of 1948, are not disposed to tell them.

Another is that presidential determination to avoid defeat and retreat can prevail against the advice of experts. Just as Truman’s Pentagon opposed the airlift, so George W. Bush’s Pentagon mostly opposed the surge strategy in Iraq. In late 2006 and early 2007, the advice from experts, notably the Baker-Hamilton Commission, was the same as that Marshall and Bradley gave Truman: get out with whatever fig leaf you can. The surge, like the airlift, was said to put undue strain on the military, to degrade the readiness of men and materiel for other missions. All these claims were plausible and, in the case of the surge, dominated press coverage and were supported by the incoming leaders in Congress.

But Bush, echoing Truman, said, at least in effect, we’re not leaving Iraq. He embraced the proposals for the surge, which had been worked up by retired Gen. Jack Keane and American Enterprise Institute scholar Frederick Kagan. He found a commander, Gen. David Petraeus, who had rewritten the Army’s manual on counterinsurgency and who had the character and skill to put the surge into effect.

As was the case with Tunner, the men and women serving under him showed unexpected ingenuity and the ability to adapt to unpredicted turns of events, like the Anbar awakening, which enabled them to convert Iraq’s deadliest province into a friendly, peaceful territory. And, I am sure we will find out sooner or later, those troops also performed acts of generosity, which made their task easier and will produce goodwill that will last for decades to come.

The lessons are clear. Stand fast. Put the right men in charge. And never doubt the capacity of the men and women of the American military, when given the right orders, to perform far better than the experts predict.

Karen Heller
The Philadelphia Inquirer
July 8, 2008

When did teen pregnancy become entertaining?

You know, the stuff of a break-out summer comedy, an Oscar-winning independent film, and now the ABC Family series “The Secret Life of the American Teenager.” Nothing quite says “a new kind of family” – the network’s slogan – like a 15-year-old’s unplanned pregnancy.

It’s only a matter of time before some artist makes “Large Times at Gloucester High.”

Apparently, pregnancy provides a better plot device than abortion, especially since the procedure has become one of culture’s dirty words. In “Knocked Up,” one pothead slacker is so uncomfortable he calls it schmabortion, putting a lie to Hollywood’s leftist tendencies.

Teen pregnancy is on the rise for the first time after a 14-year downturn. In real life, misguided teens think pregnancy is a wondrous adventure – that is, until they have to care for a baby on a daily basis.

“A teenage pregnancy immediately turns the odds against mother and baby,” says Dayle Steinberg, president of Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania.

Teens believe they’re superheroes when it comes to birth control and health care. Young expectant mothers, the poor ones not depicted in “Juno” or on ABC Family, are more likely to risk unhealthy behavior (smoking, drinking) and less likely to receive prenatal care, putting mother and child at risk.

A baby proves a powerful hindrance to schooling, while tethering young mothers to government services and financial dependency. Education, not family income or background, is the great indicator of economic success. Teen pregnancy stagnates education, obstructs future career choices and clogs income.

“Hollywood entertains and Planned Parenthood prevents,” Steinberg says. “Responsible behaviors aren’t promoted enough.”

Studies show teenagers aren’t receiving adequate information at home or in the classroom about sex and reproductive health. Abstinence-only sex education, granted substantial federal funding in recent years, teaches the fallibility of contraception and inaccurate information about abortion, according to a congressional investigation.

The lessons have had no effect on curtailing teenage sexual activity, which nearly half of 15- to 19-year-olds experience. Meanwhile, one in four teenagers contracts a sexually transmitted infection. They represent a fourth of the sexually active population, but half of the people with sexually transmitted infections, suggesting a laxity when it comes to prevention. Last year, an 80 percent increase of gonorrhea cases occurred in Delaware County, Pa., for example, more than a quarter among teenagers.

But that doesn’t exactly make for entertainment, does it?

“Secret Life” offered a public-service announcement on teens talking to adults, though the show seems more likely to boost pregnancy-test sales. Scenes from future episodes suggest that the heroine will continue school and get help from her mother.

If only. Teenagers come to Philadelphia’s Women’s Medical Fund when life doesn’t work out like that.

“These are teens who can’t tell their parents, and they don’t have any money and don’t have access to help,” says executive director Susan Schewel.

Recently, the Women’s Medical Fund helped a 16-year-old obtain an abortion. She felt she couldn’t tell her mother – her father isn’t in the picture, and the father of her child isn’t, either.

“By making my decision,” the girl wrote to the fund with her $25 contribution, “I am now able to move forward in my life and continue my schooling, knowing I can still reach for the stars.”

There’s a secret life of an American teenager you don’t tend to see in movies or on television.

Thursday, Apr. 03, 2008

By NANCY GIBBS

Back in olden days–in 1974, to be exact–Mr. T. Harding Jones of the Concerned Alumni of Princeton lamented how “coeducation has ruined the mystique and the camaraderies that used to exist” on campus. Admitting girls to Princeton, he predicted, was “going to prove a very unfortunate thing.”

I landed at college a few years later, at the very moment the number of female undergraduates nationally reached parity with that of men–though my school was still 3-to-2 male. Like my peers, I suspect, for every pterodactyl who thought I had no business being there, I found three gentle mentors who smoothed the way.

But a gender gap has reopened: if girls were once excluded because they somehow weren’t good enough, they now are rejected because they’re too good. Or at least they are so good, compared with boys, that admissions committees at some private colleges have problems managing a balanced freshman class. Roughly 58% of undergraduates nationally are female, and the girl-boy ratio will probably tip past 60-40 in a few years. The divide is even worse for black males, who are outnumbered on campus by black females 2 to 1.

While educators debate whether there is a “boy crisis” that warrants a wholesale change in how to teach, colleges are quietly stripping the pastels from brochures and launching Xbox tournaments to try to close the gap in the quality and quantity of boys applying. “It’s a gross generalization that slacker boys get in over high-performing girls,” says Jennifer Delahunty, dean of admissions at Kenyon College, “but developmentally, girls bring more to the table than boys, and the disparity has gotten greater in recent years.”

Of course, admitting this is taboo, as Delahunty learned two years ago. She was in marathon committee meetings, stacking glorious girls on the waiting list while less accomplished boys wiggled through, when she got an e-mail informing her that her own daughter had been wait-listed. The experience inspired her to write a confessional Op-Ed, “To All the Girls I’ve Rejected,” for the New York Times, responses to which lit up her inbox. “It pissed off the feminists and the misogynists–I got both sides of the spectrum,” she told me. “The misogynists said women already have too many advantages. And the feminists said, How dare you not treat women like men.” But what most amazed her was the reaction of young women: by and large, they assumed this is just how things work. “Why aren’t they marching in the streets? That’s the part that slays me,” Delahunty says. “It isn’t fair, and young women should be saying something about it not being fair.”

But when it comes to private-college admissions, the law is murky, the process opaque, the needs of the institution primary. This includes ensuring that the freshman class is not 70-30 female, because that makes the school less attractive to male and female applicants alike. U.S. News & World Report found that the admissions rate of men at the College of William and Mary, for example, was an average of 12 percentage points higher than that of women–because, as the admissions director memorably told the magazine, “even women who enroll … expect to see men on campus. It’s not the College of Mary and Mary; it’s the College of William and Mary.”

But the gap persists on campus, where women tend to win more honors, join more clubs, do more volunteer work. “We sit and talk about why no men are applying for leadership roles,” says Jason Zelesky, associate dean of students at Clark University in Massachusetts, which is 60-40 female. “Do we need to concentrate more on traditional masculine words–’Be a leader on campus,’ as opposed to ‘Come join our team’?” He’s launching a “men helping men” support program to help boys adjust to their minority status.

I wonder if there’s a price boys pay for the “soft bigotry of low expectations.” The college deans I talked to worry that there is some message boys are not receiving, role models they are missing, that speaks to the importance of an education both broad and deep. “I found it harder to talk to guys in interviews, even after 40 years,” says Haverford dean Greg Kannerstein, “because they seem narrower in their interests than the women.” He wonders if schools and parents have wrapped boys in cotton, focused on “support” at the expense of accountability. “For a long time, guys were left on their own, which was not so great either,” he says. “Now maybe we’re shielding them a little too much.” That would be the crowning irony, if it turns out that girls emerge stronger somehow from having the game rigged against them.

By Donald C. Orlich Special to The Spokesman-Review

January 31, 2008

On Jan. 21, as our nation observed Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday, many statements focused on his famous “I have a dream” speech. Unfortunately, a dream is all that the majority of minority children have in Washington state. Why? Because of the devastation that the Washington Assessment of Student Learning is having on children of color, standards notwithstanding. The WASL is administered in grades 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 10. The total direct and indirect costs associated with the WASL are over $1 billion. For that tidy sum, let us review the results for only grade 10, a very critical point in high school where students often decide to stay on or drop out. Data for all 10th-graders – approximately 75,000 – who took the WASL in 2006-07 show the following: The percentages meeting standard — that is, passing an arbitrary score — were 80.8 on reading, 83.9 on writing, 50.4 on math and 36.4 on science. White and Asian students exceeded those performances in all categories. But the percentages for black students were 37 for reading, 39.3 for writing, 14.2 for math and 9.2 for science. Among students with limited English, the percentages passing were 38.3 in reading, 37.7 in writing, 10.7 in math and 2.9 in science. For American Indians, the corresponding figures were 68.4 in reading, 72.4 in writing, 31.3 in math and 19.3 in science. For Hispanic students the percentages were 66.1 in reading, 68.6 in writing, 25.6 in math and 15.5 in science. Low-income 10th-graders receiving free and reduced-price lunches recorded passing percentages of 68.2 in reading, 72.3 in writing, 30.5 in math and 18.7 in science. A detailed analysis for all grades in which the WASL is administered would show a similar (and most depressing) pattern, although there has been some improvement since 2000. The WASL and the costly nonsense of school reform, including the No Child Left Behind Act, flat out discriminate against poor and minority children and carry more than a hint of institutional racism. Yes, there are isolated instances where schools with large populations of minority or poor children have substantially higher passing rates on the WASL. But those schools are anomalies. Those increased scores cost students their chance for a well-rounded education – dropping art, music and vocational education. The percentages of 10th-graders meeting the WASL science standard range from 2.9 to 41.4. Is this an indication of poor science instruction? No. It is a dramatic illustration of a terribly constructed science test. Science is an important subject for our state. Science teachers have been subtly informed to shut up and do the WASL. School board members have been far too silent on the negative impact that the WASL is having on a balanced curriculum. A small number of brave superintendents are now fighting for changes in the graduation requirement, as are the state Parent Teacher Association and the Washington Education Association. Others have protested the adverse effect that the WASL has on all children, regardless of race, color or creed. Spokane and several other school districts face severe budget cuts for instruction and elimination of library services. This is in the face of the governor now wanting to waste more than $38 million on a new form of WASL. Take time to stand up and be angry. Dump the WASL and all its trappings. It is time to end this miscarriage of justice and end the WASL now. Only by eliminating this costly moral and educational blunder will that dream of Martin Luther King Jr. have a chance of becoming a reality. Contact your state senator and representatives to de-link the WASL from high school graduation. Better yet, suggest that the entire WASL reform package be thrown out.

State of the Union Reflects New Focus on Money Matters
By Michael Abramowitz and Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, January 29, 2008; A01

President Bush told the American people last night that his strategy to stabilize Iraq is achieving results “few of us could have imagined just one year ago,” even as he sought to reassure the public that his new stimulus plan will stave off a recession that threatens to hobble the nation’s economy during the final year of his presidency.

Appearing before Congress for his seventh and last State of the Union address, Bush claimed vindication for his controversial decision a year ago to send a “surge” of about 30,000 additional troops to Iraq. “The enemy is still dangerous, and more work remains,” Bush acknowledged, but with a decline in the number of high-profile attacks, sectarian violence and civilian deaths, he said, progress is unmistakable.

“Some may deny the surge is working,” Bush said, “but among the terrorists there is no doubt. Al-Qaeda is on the run in Iraq, and this enemy will be defeated.”

Bush’s address highlighted the shifting priorities of an administration that had planned to focus its final year on the war and other international challenges but has found itself moving quickly in the past month to address the growing crisis in the economy. The past year has brought an increasing tide of bad economic news, culminating in last week’s global stock market panic over a collapsing housing market and other financial woes in the United States.

The president called on Congress to finish work quickly on a $150 billion stimulus package, urging lawmakers not to “load up” the initiative with measures beyond the tax rebates and business incentives he agreed to last week with House leaders. “That would delay it or derail it, and neither option is acceptable,” said Bush, who also repeated his long-ignored call to make permanent his early-term tax cuts.

The president avoided grim economic talk and instead described conditions as mixed. “In the short run, we can all see that growth is slowing,” he said. “America has added jobs for a record 52 straight months, but jobs are now growing at a slower pace. Wages are up, but so are prices for food and gas. Exports are rising, but the housing market has declined.”

Bush appeared in a cheery mood during his valedictory State of the Union. He chuckled at the partisan rites of the annual speech, in which Democrats and Republicans roared at different junctures, interrupting him with applause more than 70 times in the 53-minute address. His remarks, however, came amid a fierce political campaign season in which many voters are looking beyond the Bush presidency to his potential successors.

In a nod to the political realities, the president did not revive the kind of ambitious reforms on Social Security and immigration that animated his past State of the Union addresses. He offered instead a menu of familiar initiatives, mixed in with modest new proposals on education, social services and assistance for military families, that his aides said stand a reasonable chance of congressional passage before the political conventions start in late August.

One new plan would devote $300 million to new grants for low-income children to attend private schools. The president also proposed writing into law rules that require federal agencies to give equal consideration to religious-based groups providing social services to the poor.

Bush, whose administration has come under fire in recent years over the poor treatment of injured soldiers, also unveiled several initiatives aimed at boosting federal assistance to families of veterans and active service members. One proposal would give hiring preferences throughout the federal government to military spouses; another would allow troops and veterans to transfer unused GI education benefits to spouses and children.

Bush’s approach suggested that he remains undaunted by the low approval ratings that have characterized his presidency in recent years. “We have unfinished business before us,” the president said, “and the American people expect us to get it done.”

Democrats chose a centrist red-state governor, Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas, to respond to Bush’s address. She described the stimulus package as only a “temporary fix” and blasted Bush’s foreign policy for leaving the nation with “fewer allies and more enemies.” But her message also struck a conciliatory tone: “There is a chance, Mr. President, in the next 357 days, to get real results and give the American people renewed optimism that their challenges are the top priority.”

The top two congressional leaders, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) offered faint praise for Bush. “We agree with the President that we must work together to make progress on our most pressing challenges,” they said in a statement. “Yet, tonight, the President offered little more than the status quo. At a time when our economy is on shaky ground and our leadership around the world is eroding, the status quo won’t do.”

Bush made clear to Democrats that he intends to employ fully the powers of the presidency until his final hours in office. He reiterated his demand that they approve new surveillance legislation by Friday, when a temporary wiretapping law is set to expire. He also said he will use his veto pen and administrative powers to try to rein in the proliferation of “earmarks,” the projects inserted by lawmakers into annual spending bills and totaling roughly $17 billion in the last budget.

Bush warned he would veto any spending bill that does not cut in half the number and cost of earmarks from the year before. He also said he will sign an executive order requiring agencies to ignore any earmark not included in the language of legislation. “The people’s trust in their government is undermined by congressional earmarks,” Bush said.

Bush’s pledge was met with skepticism from many Democrats and even some in the GOP, who noted that the practice increased dramatically while Republicans controlled Congress. “The number of earmarks exploded under Republican leadership in the House, and for six years President Bush did nothing to slow their growth,” said House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.).

In keeping with the traditional civility of the occasion, Bush was greeted warmly as he entered the House chamber. Among the lawmakers present were two of his would-be Democratic successors, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) and Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.).

The White House invited a customary mix of prominent and ordinary citizens to sit with first lady Laura Bush as a way of humanizing some of the broader themes of the president’s speech. Last night, the guests included a single mother from Tanzania who benefited from the U.S. global AIDS initiative; the co-chairs of his commission on health care for veterans; and several troops who served with valor in Iraq and elsewhere. Bush did not introduce any of the guests, as he and past presidents have done.

Bush devoted special attention to the two main issues that could shape long-term perspectives on his presidency: the souring economy and the war in Iraq.

On Iraq, Bush made clear he is not ready to accelerate a drawdown of U.S. forces, which are scheduled to return to pre-”surge” levels of 130,000 by mid-summer. He cited a warning from Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, that pulling troops out too quickly risks the recovery of al-Qaeda in Iraq and an increase in violence.

“Members of Congress,” he said, “having come so far and achieved so much, we must not allow this to happen.”

Democrats challenged Bush’s upbeat portrait of conditions in Iraq. While even critics concede violence has ebbed because of the troop increase, many military experts are unsure whether this is a temporary phenomenon. And even senior U.S. military commanders are concerned that the military progress has not been matched by steps to forge a more lasting political accord.

Bush renewed his call to strengthen the No Child Left Behind Act, which set up a system of testing and other benchmarks for the nation’s schools, and urged Congress to ratify trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea. He also promised that the United States will do “everything we can” to achieve a peace deal between Palestinians and Israelis, which has become a major goal in his final year in office.

Bush also proposed to contribute $2 billion over three years to an international clean-energy fund. He will seek additional funds from countries such as Britain and Japan, and a donors’ committee will dole the money out in the form of grants, loans and loan guarantees. The money would probably go to firms selling such things as energy-efficient coal plants and would help make those less expensive for buyers from developing countries.

Staff writers Paul Kane, Lyndsey Layton and Steven Mufson contributed to this report.

Robert Archer
Special to the Spokesman-Review
December 29, 2007

T oday, I had four students show up to class with neither pencil nor pen. Another nine had no paper.

Yesterday, I took up student journals to grade. This was no surprise, since it had been written on the board. Six students did not even have their journals with them, even though these are daily required materials in my class.

Last week, I handed out a packet on fragments and run-ons, a packet that was their homework to turn in the next day. At the end of class, I found three of them left behind on the floor of my classroom.

So, just for a quick summary: 15 weeks into the school year, I had 13 students who had either nothing with which to write or nothing on which to write it, six who didn’t have a homework assignment that was a graded daily requirement and three who couldn’t possibly complete the graded assignment for the next day. And all of these numbers come from a single class of 25 ninth-graders!

The numbers are remarkably similar in my other classes.

Yet my department head, my principal, my district, my state, my entire society is mandating that I teach all students assigned to me what parallel structure is, what a comma splice is, what the theme is in “To Kill a Mockingbird,” what the difference is between a simile and a metaphor, what a good thesis sentence looks like, what the typical five-paragraph essay should be, what context clues can be used to decipher unfamiliar vocabulary words. And much more of the same.

Don’t get me wrong. As an English major, I fervently relish these concepts; as an English teacher, I fully appreciate the social value of attaining such skills; and as a professional, I am altogether committed to doing my best to impart such knowledge to every child who passes through my door daily.

The state and the district refer to such skills as GLEs, for grade-level expectations, and they are subject-specific to each secondary core curriculum needed for graduation from a Washington public high school; they are non-negotiable.

However, I’m wondering – just wondering, mind you – if I really am, at the heart of it all, teaching these children what I truly should be teaching them.

Curriculum, curriculum, curriculum – it’s on what the GLEs focus; it’s what the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL) tests; it’s what the PSAT and SAT test; it’s on what the federal No Child Left Behind Act was built.

Thus, it certainly seems that our entire society values curriculum above all. Yet nowhere built into that mandated curriculum is the purposeful instruction in ethical principles. Nowhere. You can even check the Washington Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction Web site ( www.k12.wa.us) if you’d like to double-check my facts.

A solid work ethic? Timeliness? Preparedness? Organizational skills? Responsibility? Socially acceptable behavior? Integrity? Respect? Honor? Diligence? Nowhere to be found in any official curriculum guide; thus, not to be emphasized in the public school classroom.

But a comma splice must be both taught and tested. The same goes for the ability to comprehend a piece of text written by John Steinbeck or Harper Lee or Frederick Douglass. And the same for the definitions of the words “superfluous” and “pernicious.”

I am by no means suggesting that we begin to ignore the aforementioned curricular abilities; to me, they are still absolutely necessary in order for an individual to become a learned and productive member of the greater society. Rather, I desire that some perennial values be deliberately instilled in our children via an ethically comprehensive curriculum in our public schools.

Some may ask me why I don’t have pens, pencils and paper in my high school classroom for thoroughly unprepared students; or why I don’t allow for several days, or weeks even, for thoroughly neglectful students to turn in late work to me; or why I don’t run out and find thoroughly disorganized students in their next classes to get work to them they have left behind in my classroom.

The answer is pretty simple – I refuse to teach just curriculum. There are far more crucial issues that have been ignored in the education of our children for far too long. I want to remedy that deplorable fact. I want our state, our nation, our society to want the same.

Kate Riley
Seattle Times
November 1, 2007

You could have knocked me over with a WASL test book.

My 10-year-old son received a letter signed by Gov. Christine Gregoire and Superintendent of Public Instruction Terry Bergeson. “Congratulations!” it started. “… We are very proud of you, and you should be very proud of yourself.”

Apparently, my son “achieved the state reading, writing and mathematics learning standards.”

Here’s the punch line to my son’s letter. He is autistic in a self-contained special-education classroom with limited mainstreaming, can read some words, can add a little and can barely draw a straight line. Much as it pains me, I told my colleagues a few months ago, there is no way my pride and joy will ever meet state learning standards.

And then he did – or so they say.

Recently, a bright young acquaintance confided she didn’t pass the fourth-grade math test. I couldn’t bring myself to tell her my son, whose limitations she is aware of, nailed it!

I’m feeling a little hoodwinked.

I was an editorial writer before I was a mother. I drank the high-standards Kool-Aid way back in 1993 when education reform started. I was moved by my work as a tutor for an adult literacy program. I was stunned to learn my student with a third-grade reading level had graduated high school. If she had gotten help at 10 instead of 30, her whole life might have been different.

Since then, I have written scores of editorials supporting the Washington Assessment of Student Learning. I defended keeping standards high.

“The diploma has to mean something,” I argued. Over. And over. And over.

As the stakes ratcheted up to become the threshold for graduation this year, I was persuaded to spike my WASL Kool-Aid with a little accommodation.

Sure, let’s have alternative ways to pass the WASL. The students still have to meet standards, they’ll just do it in different ways. So a kid who has test anxiety gets to show he meets the same high standards in a different way, in a portfolio of work.

Which is how my son took the test – by portfolio in the Washington Alternate Assessment System. It was a meticulously kept body of work, representing honest, hard effort and, indeed, progress. But it did not – repeat, did not – meet any common-sense interpretation of fourth-grade standards.

Turns out, in education’s semantics wonderland, there are standards and then there are standards. Under the No Child Left Behind policy, the federal government requires states to establish standards for special-education students. In Washington, special-education students have only to meet their own personal “standard” based on the goals in their annually revised Individual Education Plans.

There is no accountability to ensure these individual special-education “standards” aren’t low-balled, although state officials say accountability measures are on the way.

OK. Let’s get this straight. This stupid assessment doesn’t change the worth of my kid, or any kid. He’s still the nicest, most fun member of the family to be around and he’s got great taste in music.

But what these tests should tell us honestly is whether a student meets one reasonable minimum standard of academic achievement – for all kids. Most can – with work and support. Sadly – and this is from one parent who struggles out of denial every day – some cannot. That’s a fact.

“You don’t want him to count against the school, do you?” was a question I heard more than once as I asked questions. Well, no, but I don’t want him to artificially inflate the school’s success rate, either. I especially don’t want to let schools off the hook if they are failing younger versions of my adult student years ago, who, when given a chance, advanced quickly to ninth-grade reading level.

Most troubling to me is the larger public-policy implication of my son’s letter. He goes in the “pass” column for his school, his district and the state. He is a supporting statistic in federal reports to show adequate yearly progress under the federal No Child Left Behind program.

I hold this astonishing letter in my hands, and can’t help but feel like a co-conspirator in a public sham.

William Mckenzie
Dallas Morning News
October 12, 2007

My hunch is that for many of us, our fascination with World War II stems from a deep, hidden yearning for community. We respect the bravery of soldiers who served and bled for their country, but the new Ken Burns documentary, following the Tom Brokaw books, grabs our attention because we envy a time when America had common purpose.

We obviously aren’t united about Iraq. For that matter, except for a few weeks after Sept. 11, we haven’t been a very unified nation since before Vietnam.

World War II was different. One of the more interesting parts of Burns’ PBS series is his look at four communities back home while battles raged in Europe and the Pacific. He interviews people about how the war played out in towns such as Sacramento and how the conflict affected them.

He’s essentially saying that greatest generation wasn’t made up only of soldiers in the field. It was the folks back home, too. Everyone was wrapped up in the cause, right down to girls following their boyfriends’ deployments on maps of Europe and women joining the work force for the first time.

Burns summed up the difference between then and now when he recently told USA Today that we lack “the shared sacrifices World War II demanded that created community and made us spiritually richer.”

Today, “we aren’t asked to give up anything. We’re narcissistic free agents,” he said. “Surfing the Internet alone. Watching TV alone. Driving alone. There’s too much Pluribus and not enough Unum.”

It wasn’t until I considered this element of community – and who makes up the greatest generation – that I was able to put my finger on what I so admire about my mother and the ladies she has banded with for more than five decades. The more I think about them holding together as friends since they were young girls, sharing everything from Pearl Harbor to firstborns to shattering deaths, the more I realize they are a microcosm of the community for which many of us yearn.

These women still meet for cards each Tuesday, but the Poker Club, as it is called, is about much more than the aces, jacks and deuces they put on the table.

They probably wouldn’t think of themselves this way, but together they are the antithesis of today’s go-it-alone ethos. They have been meeting each week since before Eisenhower was president, before many women worked and long before anyone dreamed of the term “greatest generation.”

Like many other wives and mothers of their era, they often made their mark silently. They enjoyed common rites of passage while bearing up through adversity for the good of their families.

The Poker Club members married after World War II, had children, joined the PTA, attended Little League games, drove in carpools, hosted birthday parties, celebrated graduations and watched their children marry and start families of their own.

They also ran into their share of struggles. Together, they endured the dissolution of marriages, their children’s ups and downs and the loss of friends. At any given moment, life wasn’t working for one or more of them.

So they counseled each other, bore up through disease and addictions and survived tears at hospitals.

In other words, they persevered. And they made it through glorious and shattering personal and world events because they stuck together.

We celebrate the men who won World War II, who fought in the trenches and came home to start their careers after liberating a continent and triumphing in the Pacific.

But women like these, whom you can find in every community and whom Burns brought to light in his documentary, are just as important in helping us understand – and perhaps recapture – the sense of community their generation experienced. They may not have won a war, not literally, but they were part of the rebirth of our nation after a long and deadly conflict.

As hard as it is to imagine now, we will find our way past Iraq someday. Maybe then we can recapture that sense of community. If we do, we probably will have an even more direct connection with World War II and the greatest generation.

And may we then recall as fondly the women in our own communities who pushed their families forward, held each other together and looked ahead, not back.

Forget the hype. The ‘57 launch wasn’t such a big shock.
By   Sharon Begley
Newsweek On the Saturday morning in 1957 after the Soviet Union launched the world’s first manmade satellite and inaugurated the space age, President Dwight Eisenhower played golf, a NEWSWEEK reporter in Boston described “massive [public] indifference” and some American papers ran the story as a small box on page three. And why not? The Soviets had announced plans to go into space no fewer than 20 times since 1951: as part of their participation in the International Geophysical Year (IGY), a global program to study Earth’s physics starting in July 1957, they even told an American official the orbital speed and launch site of the little satellite they planned.

It usually takes time for myths to take hold. But in the case of Sputnik—launched on Oct. 4, 1957—myth supplanted reality within days and continues to warp the lessons of that “red moon.” Less than a week after Sputnik began orbiting Earth once every 96 minutes, politicians and the press had spun it into a shocking symbol of Soviet superiority that could soon lead to nukes falling on American cities. But far from being alarmed by Sputnik, newly released archives show, Eisenhower and his military and intelligence advisers welcomed it. The terror triggered by the uninstrumented, 184-pound silvery satellite, roughly the size and shape of a blue-ribbon watermelon and emitting an A-flat beep from its rudimentary radio transmitter, had little basis in reality. With Sputnik’s 50th anniversary this week, we’re in danger of getting it wrong yet again, for the supposed lessons of Sputnik are ones we should actually unlearn. Most important, it is wrong to believe “that the American people need ‘another Sputnik’ ” to increase our competitive juices in space or technology, says historian Walter McDougall of the University of Pennsylvania, author of the 1997 book “The Heavens and the Earth.” The United States “does not need another ill-conceived spasmodic reaction to some humiliation that does not pose an immediate threat.”

The chief myth of Sputnik is that it took America by surprise. Yes, the public was shocked that “the clod-hopping Russians could surpass the U.S. in a vanguard technology,” says McDougall, even though newspapers regularly reported on the Soviet satellite program. But the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency knew the status of the Soviets’ rocket program, and viewed the prospect of a satellite with such complacency that they weren’t even prepared to monitor it. Sputnik passed over the United States twice before the government knew about it, through an Associated Press report. “The Russians had announced they were going to do it, and we even knew what frequency Sputnik would transmit on,” says NASA historian Steven Dick.

Far from being a bitter blow, Sputnik furthered one of Eisenhower’s cherished military goals. Called “open skies,” the policy would allow any nation to undertake aerial reconnaissance of any other. “The administration welcomed Sputnik,” says McDougall. “The Soviets could hardly deny the right to launch satellites over the territory of other countries if they did it first.”

Nevertheless, administration critics and the press seized on Sputnik to pummel Ike for letting the United States fall behind technologically. In fact, the Soviet Union beat the U.S. into space only because the U.S. was in no great hurry to get there. Ike had chosen the Navy to develop a satellite for the IGY, partly because its program seemed more scientific and less militaristic than the Army’s (which was headed by Wernher Von Braun and used Redstone rockets dubbed “city wreckers”). Although Von Braun pushed for his own satellite launch, he was turned down repeatedly by the military brass. If he’d gotten a green light, his satellite might well have claimed the place in history now occupied by Sputnik, argues Paul Dickson in his 2001 book “Sputnik: The Shock of the Century.” When Von Braun’s team launched a rocket from Cape Canaveral in September 1956, it had to use a dummy fourth stage—an engine filled with sand instead of rocket fuel—so it would not accidentally reach orbit.

The shock and panic, misplaced as it was, did light a fire under the American space program. Without Sputnik there would have been no Apollo program, no race to the moon, no 1969 landing. But while Apollo “was a sterling success in the short run,” argues McDougall, “it skewed NASA spending toward a big public relations program that went nowhere in the long run.” A slower, steadier program leading to cheaper rockets, space planes and a sustainable Moon base—which NASA now has its sights on for 2020—would have given the United States vastly more to show for its space investment than it has now. On Jan. 4, 1958, Sputnik re-entered Earth’s atmosphere and burned up, but its wrongheaded legacy persists.
photo
‘DUDNIK’: The U.S. Vanguard missile fails

BETTMANN—CORBIS

Copyright (c) 2007 Newsweek, Inc.

By JULIA PRESTON

Patrick Henry and Francis Scott Key are out, but Susan B. Anthony and Nancy Pelosi are in. The White House was cut, but New York and Sept. 11 made the list. Federal immigration authorities yesterday unveiled 100 new questions immigrants will have to study to pass a civics test to become naturalized American citizens. The redesign of the test, the first since it was created in 1986 as a standardized examination, follows years of criticism in which conservatives said the test was too easy and immigrant advocates said it was too hard. The new questions did little to quell that debate among many immigrant groups, who complained that the citizenship test would become even more daunting. Conservatives seemed to be more satisfied. Bush administration officials said the new test was part of their effort to move forward on the hotly disputed issue of immigration by focusing on the assimilation of legal immigrants who have played by the rules, leaving aside the situation of some 12 million illegal immigrants here. Several historians said the new questions successfully incorporated more ideas about the workings of American democracy and better touched upon the diversity of the groups — including women, American Indians and African-Americans — who have influenced the country’s history. Would-be citizens no longer have to know who said, “Give me liberty or give me death,” or who wrote “The Star-Spangled Banner.” But they do have to know what Susan B. Anthony did and who the speaker of the House of Representatives is. Alfonso Aguilar, a senior official at Citizenship and Immigration Services, the agency that designs and administers the test, said it was not intended to be punitive. “We don’t seek to fail anyone,” said Mr. Aguilar, an architect of the test. Immigration officials said they sought to move away from civics trivia to emphasize basic concepts about the structure of government and American history and geography. In contrast to the old test, which some immigrants could pass without any study, the officials said the new one is intended to force even highly educated applicants to do reviewing. “This test genuinely talks about what makes an American citizen,” said Emilio Gonzalez, the director of Citizenship and Immigration Services, speaking at a news conference in Washington. The $6.5 million redesign was shaped over six years of discussions with historians, immigrant organizations and liberal and conservative research groups. The questions were submitted to four months of pilot testing this year with more than 6,000 immigrants who were applying for naturalization. The agency will begin to use the revised test on Oct. 1, 2008, leaving a year for aspiring citizens to prepare and for community groups to adjust their study classes. The overall format has not changed. Legal immigrants who are eligible to become citizens must pass the civics exam as well as a test of English proficiency in reading and writing. In a one-on-one oral examination, an immigration officer asks the applicant 10 questions of varying degrees of difficulty selected from the list of 100. To pass, the applicant must answer 6 of those 10 questions correctly. The questions released yesterday will remain public along with their answers. Immigrants are eligible to become citizens if they have been legal permanent residents for at least five years (or three years if they are married to a citizen) and have “good moral character” and no criminal record. In the pilot runs of the revised test, Mr. Aguilar said, the pass rates improved over the current tests, with 92 percent of participants passing on the first try, as opposed to 84 percent now. At least 15 questions were eliminated as a result of the pilot because they proved too difficult. For example, a question about the minimum wage was dropped because test takers were confused between federal and state rates, Mr. Aguilar said. In the new test, the pilgrims have been replaced by “colonists,” and they are the subject of fewer questions, while slavery and the civil rights movement are the subject of more. A question was added asking what “major event” happened on Sept. 11, 2001. The new test drops questions about the 49th and 50th states, but adds one about the political affiliation of the president. There are no questions about the White House. Instead, one question asks where the Statue of Liberty is. In a statement today, the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, one of the groups consulted in shaping the new test, denounced it as “the final brick in the second wall.” The group said the test included “more abstract and irrelevant questions” that tended to stump hard-working immigrants who had little time to study. But several historians said the test appeared to be fair. “People who take this seriously will have a good chance of passing,” said Gary Gerstle, a professor of American history at Vanderbilt University. “Indeed, their knowledge of American history may even exceed the knowledge of millions of American-born citizens.” John Fonte, a senior fellow at the conservative Hudson Institute, called the new test “a definite improvement.” But he said it should have included questions about the meaning of the oath of allegiance that new citizens swear. “I would like to see an even more vigorous emphasis on Americanization,” he said. About 55 percent of the applicants who participated in the pilot test were from Latin American countries. Some Latino groups noted yesterday that no question on the new test refers to Latinos. Mr. Aguilar said that the test was not intended to be a comprehensive review, but rather to include “landmark moments of American history that apply to every single citizen.” Naturalizations have surged in recent years, to 702,589 last year from 537,151 in 2004, according to official figures. In July the fees to become a citizen increased sharply, to $675 from $405.

Cal Thomas
Tribune Media Services
September 26, 2007

I would not be as bothered by Columbia University’s decision to host Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad if Columbia and other universities had a consistent policy toward those they invite to speak and the rules applied equally to conservatives and liberals; to totalitarian dictators and to advocates for freedom and tolerance.

Any conservative who has ever tried, or actually succeeded, in speaking on the campus of predominately liberal academic institutions knows it can resemble to some extent the struggle experienced by African-Americans when they attempted to desegregate lunch counters in the South during the civil rights movement.

In the 1980s, I spoke at universities from Smith College in the East to the University of California at Davis in the West. At Smith, lesbians sat in the front row kissing each other while the rest of the crowd shouted so loud no one could hear me. (NPR’s Nina Totenberg witnessed the riotous behavior, prompting me to remark, “I hope you’re getting this on tape, Nina, because this is what liberals mean by tolerance.”)

Former U.S. News and World Report columnist John Leo has been among the chroniclers of the demise of free speech on many college campuses. Writing in last winter’s issue of the publication City Journal, Leo noted that Columbia University officials prevented a large crowd from hearing Walid Shoebat, a former PLO terrorist who is now an anti-jihadist. The reason given was security, which as Leo pointed out is a frequent excuse for restricting speech. Had Shoebat remained a PLO terrorist, Columbia might have allowed the students in, because anti-Jewish rhetoric of the kind Ahmadinejad delivers always seems welcome on too many campuses. Only Columbia students and 20 guests were allowed to hear Shoebat speak.

Why would Columbia expect Ahmadinejad to answer what they promised in advance would be “tough” questions? Have they not seen him interviewed by America’s best reporters? He doesn’t answer questions. He uses the interviews to lecture America and make his propaganda points. The exercise is useless, except to him because he scores points at home for standing up to “the Great Satan,” or whatever the preferred term du jour for the United States is at the moment.

Last October at Columbia, a mob of students stormed a stage, curtailing speeches by two members of the anti-illegal immigration group known as the Minutemen. The students shouted “They have no right to speak,” which was revealing, given the “academic freedom” argument that is used to defend liberal professors and their frequent anti-American rants when conservatives attempt to shut them up.

As John Leo wrote, “Campus opponents of (Rep.) Tom Tancredo, an illegal immigration foe, set off fire alarms at Georgetown to disrupt his planned speech, and their counterparts at Michigan State roughed up his student backers. Conservative activist David Horowitz, black conservative Star Parker, and Daniel Pipes, an outspoken critic of Islamism, frequently find themselves shouted down or disrupted on campus.” The number of instances involving censorship of conservatives on college campuses and denial of honorary degrees to people who don’t toe the liberal line could fill a book.

There is something else about Columbia’s decision to admit Ahmadinejad and that is the notion that by exposing a tyrant and religious fanatic to a liberal arts campus – a man who believes he has been “called” to usher in Armageddon – might make him less genocidal and students and the rest of us more understanding. We understand he and his legion of murdering thugs wish to kill us and are contributing to the death of Americans in Iraq. What part of mass murder do they not understand at Columbia, or don’t they have time to study history these days?

Ahmadinejad is probably using his visit to case our country, like a bank robber does before a big heist.

Before we allow more of our enemies into America and give them a freedom unknown in their own countries, we should at least demand reciprocity. Their president gets to speak in America? Our president gets to speak in Iran. Their president has access to our media? Our president should have access to their media. And while we’re at it, how about for every liberal who gets to speak on campus, the school must also invite a conservative.