Welcome to the New Reich (Spellcheck courtesy of PSU)

The Seer · Post by **The Seer** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 3:16 pm

Spinach Genie wrote:Punished for expressing a partisan thrust in a high school classroom? No. Punished for calling himself a "teacher" and attempting to draw parallels between Bush and Hitler? Definitely. Anyone who even attempts to do so with any bit of sincerity is a fucking moron. Not suprising to see the likes of Dins and Bsmackless on that list.

The guy should just count his lucky stars he didn't say the word 'Jesus' out loud. Every ACLU lawyer within 500 miles would have swooped in for the attack.

Rack.

Terry in Crapchester · Fri Mar 03, 2006 3:22 pm

Interesting discussion so far, but I think that parsing the Bush/Nazi comparison is getting off track of what the real issue is, or at least should be.

WhatsMyName wrote:A teacher's job is to teach a student how to think, not what to think.

Probably the only thing WhatsMyName has posted in this thread with which I would agree. But the question then arises: how does a teacher teach a student how to think?

By throwing out a provocative opinion and challenging those who disagree with him? Certainly that's one way to do it, and it's far from the worst way to do it. In fact, as 88 will attest, in law school professors teach by employing what is known as the Socratic Method. What Benish did here is not worlds apart from that.

I'll rack any teacher who challenges his students to think, whether I agree with the teacher's viewpoint or not.

Serious question for those on the right who are bellyaching about this guy: If he had praised Bush, and a liberal student had reported him, would you still be standing behind the student?

The Seer · Post by **The Seer** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 3:25 pm

88 wrote:
PSUFAN wrote:
I find this whole episode to be much ado about nothing.
Agreed. I find it interesting that there seems to be a ready market in Colorado for "exposing" teachers in this way. In a prior age, twats like this would be paddled.

Kids sure are uppity in Colorado.
The kid will probably recieve a sucka-punch beat down for getting this mess stirred up in the first instance. But the kid's right to express his opinion on the subject is equal to that of the teacher's. The teacher is clearly a whack job. And the parents and community have a right to know how their civil servants are behaving. More kids should tape their teachers. It might make the teachers step it up a notch.

-Or-

Above every classroom door should be this disclaimer:

The person lecturing to the children in this room is not an authority on anything; and that his/her opinions should NOT be misconstrued with having anything to do with fact or reason; and that his/her purpose here is to ONLY provoke dialogue -regardless of content, accuracy, or relevancy...

Spinach Genie · Post by **Spinach Genie** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 3:28 pm

Praise isn't quite a proper parallel. He'd have to compare Bush to Mother Teresa or the like. The issue isn't necessarily political language, it's the comparison to one of the most murderous dictators in human history...in short, a frightening display of idiocy. You can make kids think without stooping to those levels. Grand scheme, no big fucking deal. But teaching is a job, and in the professional world what you say and do can effect your position. If he chose to be careless with that, he can reap all benefits and consequences just like any other of us would. It's not like the federal think police swooped in and locked this guy up...well, if your name isn't "Bsmack" anyway.

PSUFAN · Post by **PSUFAN** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 3:28 pm

I'll rack any teacher who challenges his students to think, whether I agree with the teacher's viewpoint or not.

That's really the point that I'm taking from this as well. It's problematic for folks who are used to steeping themselves in polemics, though. Labels exist for idiots to abstract vast political territory and set it aside for non-analysis - fertile ground for manipulation, misunderstanding, and ignorance to fester.

PSUFAN · Post by **PSUFAN** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 3:31 pm

Above every classroom door should be this disclaimer:

To hell with disclaimers. Let the kids figure out what they're dealing with themselves. It stands as good mental exercise. They'll survive it - most of us did.

Van · Post by **Van** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 3:40 pm

PSU, so, I take it then you'd also be applauding any school that hired Ted Kaczynsky to be your kid's algebra teacher?

Rather than teach algebra, hey, as long as he's spewing something that gets your kid questioning him then the school's done its job and the teacher's to be applauded?

Again, let's remember what we're talking about here: Fifteen year olds in a public school geography class being taught by their teacher that their president is comparable to Adolph Hitler.

This wasn't some talking head on tv, or some guy pushing a shopping cart down a street while mumbling to himself.

This wasn't some private industry think tank discussion or a post graduate Ivy league round table..

No, this was the guy whose words were supposed to carry great weight with these impressionable young kids since he's their 10th grade teacher. What he presents in class is supposed to be knowledge. That's what the tax dollars of those parents who are paying this guy's salary supposedly bought for their kids: Knowledge, to be imparted to their kids.

Instead, they get a whack job getting on a soapbox to spew absurd anti U.S. rhetoric in the middle of a geography class.

Great. Yeah, I'm sure those kids heard the Hitler reference and were immediately imbued with the knowledge of where Liechtenstein and Costa Rica are located...

PSUFAN · Post by **PSUFAN** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 3:48 pm

PSU, so, I take it then you'd also be applauding any school that hired Ted Kaczynsky to be your kid's P.E. teacher?

Histrionics, much?

Geography is a lot more than "where Liechtenstein and Costa Rica are located". It certainly was for me by the time I was in high school, and I hope it was for you. The memorization of places and placenames hopefully will have been accomplished for those that it's going to take with.

By the time No Child Left Behind has ensured that our high school students already have mastered the basics, we'll be enjoying the rewards due us by teaching our kids about discourse, right? Clearly there's some work to be done there.

BSmack · Post by **BSmack** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 3:49 pm

Van wrote:PSU, so, I take it then you'd also be applauding any school that hired Ted Kaczynsky to be your kid's algebra teacher?

Oh, so now you're comparing this teacher to the UNIBOMBER?

I guess you decided to walk a mile in his shoes?

Idiot.

Van · Post by **Van** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 4:13 pm

PSUFAN wrote:
PSU, so, I take it then you'd also be applauding any school that hired Ted Kaczynsky to be your kid's P.E. teacher?
Histrionics, much?

The guy compared George Bush to Adolph fucking Hitler.

Next, please...

BSmack · Post by **BSmack** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 4:33 pm

mvscal wrote:We put American citizens in concentration camps and shut down the free press during WW2. But a Democrat did that, so he gets a free pass.

From who? Michelle Malkin?

Wake up.

PSUFAN · Post by **PSUFAN** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 4:36 pm

I totally agree that they need to focus on the basics, because increasingly, the basics aren't taking very well.

However, in most high schools there are students who have mastered the basics, at least where geography is concerned. I'm guessing that this suburban Colorado school has a few of these kids.

poptart · Post by **poptart** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 4:43 pm

Van wrote:The guy compared George Bush to Adolph fucking Hitler.

Next, please...

So what...?

Did he make the kids take a T-F test, and count them wrong if they answered F when asked if Bush is like Adolph Hitler...?

Teachers say a LOT of wack shit.

Dinsdale · Post by **Dinsdale** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 4:47 pm

Van wrote:Dins, teaching a 10th grade geography class is not the time to be practicing your freedom of speech rights. You're there to teach geography. You're not there to give political science editorials.

Wrong message, period, and definitely the wrong venue for it.

And a Carvin is cooler than a Fender? Up is greener than down?

WTF did that "rebuttle" have to do with any point I made? I made no comment whatsoever about the appropriateness of the teacher's comments in his particular venue -- I only said (CORRECTLY, might I add), that there's very valid comparisons between Hitler and Bush.

Of course most of the members of this site are drooling fucking nitwits, so they have to take their standard "NOOOOO!!!!!! THIS IS AMERICA! WE'RE NUMBER 1!" stance and ignore what is FACT.

FACT -- Hitler curtailed civil rights.

FACT -- Bush has curtailed civil rights, and continues to do so.

FACT -- Hitler advocated pre-emptive strikes againt those he saw as "dangerous" to his nation, and often "fixed the facts around the policy."

FACT -- Substitute the name "Bush" for "Hitler" in the above statement.

These are FACTS. This was the comparison I made...and once again, it's FACTS, and is valid.

I didn't say the United States was about to start exterminating Jews (or Muslims for that matter). I didn't say Bush is about to start bombing London. Nowhere did I say that Bush is secretly planning to grow u funny looking little mustache and start threatening to send dissenters to the gas chamber. Like most of the other political threads, you have the reactionary, rose-colored-glasses-to-get-them-through-their-day types, who find the need to bolster the superiority of their own viewpoint by embellishing the viewpoint of others to make everyone else seem whacky, and make themselves look like a pillar of reason. Par for the course.

I said none of these things. Nor would I, since that would be a quick way to turn a VERY VALID comparison into the silliness that you're trying to embellish it to be.

I simply made two STRONG comparisons. They are correct, and I stand by them. Anything else you read into that exists only in your own mind, which you should maybe think about why it is that you needed to read so much more than was there to try and make a point.

poptart · Post by **poptart** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 4:48 pm

Dinsdale would make a fine school teacher.

ChargerMike · Post by **ChargerMike** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:00 pm

...some very interesting thought provoking stuff amongst the usual rhetoric and bullsh!t.

I'm driving by this sucker, but have to throw out scoreboard to "Spinach Genie".

Dinsdale · Post by **Dinsdale** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:02 pm

ONE MORE TIME FOR THE FUCKING MORONS, while we're on the subject:

BSmack wrote:wars of premptive agression, limits on personal liberty, spying on American on American soil without warrants.....

These are "LIBERAL" policies. They differ from the status quo, which is what the word "liberal" means in the pure political definition.

Furthermore, not every person who thinks poorly of Bush is a liberal.

People who think poorly of Bush are often "conservative." Since Bush is anything BUT "conservative." I'm not sure how these definitions became so warped in the last few years, but they have.

No, those who SUPPORT Bush's policies are "LIBERAL." Probably the most "LIBERAL" president since FDR.

You people (or about 95% of you) should fucking shoot yourselves for allowing yourselves to be "educated" by radio talk show hosts, who are mere3ly dropping catch-phrases on you to make a buck...they probably don't even believe the crap they sell you tards as polrelirion.

Yet, you bash on a teacher for delving into politics, when you don't know what the words you toss about so freely even mean...priceless.

Dinsdale · Post by **Dinsdale** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:05 pm

poptart wrote:Dinsdale would make a fine school teacher.

If it was at an all-girls school, I would preside over the class known as "Hey, Are You 18 Yet? 101"

If it was a boy's school, I would teach "How To Exploit The Low Self Esteem Of Slightly Overweight Girls."

Terry in Crapchester · Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:10 pm

mvscal wrote:And another public school life failure chimes in with his ignorant, totally uninformed opinion.

So says the GED-toting high school dropout.

Cuda · Post by **Cuda** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:11 pm

Van wrote:PSU, the goals and tactics weren't the least bit similar.

Joe MCarthy never espoused or practiced the condemnation/scapegoating and literal segregation and then branding of an entire religious group that had been living peacefully in the U.S. forever.

He went after political individuals, and he sure as hell didn't go after an entire religious group using an escalating and opportunity driven blanket plan of property seizures, physical brands, terrorism, herding into ghettos, forced starvation and genocide.

There's just no comparison. Mountains vs molehills.

McCarthy had the added advantage of being right. Everybody he said was a security risk was not only a security risk, but was also a communist.

PSUFAN · Post by **PSUFAN** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:15 pm

McCarthy had the added advantage of being right.

Maybe we were too hasty attributing successes to the Colorado public school system after all...

Cuda · Post by **Cuda** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:19 pm

PSUFAN wrote:
McCarthy had the added advantage of being right.

Maybe we were too hasty attributing successes to the Colorado public school system after all...

Name anyone McCarthy called a security risk who wasn't a security risk

Name anyone McCarthy called a security risk who wasn't a communist

Dipshit

Dinsdale · Post by **Dinsdale** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:21 pm

TenTallBen wrote:Not to go dins or anything, but both sides of the political spectrum make me want to yak. I just tend to lean one way more than the other.

Welcome to the world of the Enlightened Ones.

I think anybody who supports the current incarnation of the two-party system is a complete fucking idiot.

I suppose I tend to lean very slightly towards one side, although my reasoning is less than thrilling. I hate the republicans ever-so-slightly more than I hate the dems because...well, they're both inherently evil, to their very core, but the dems are at present a party of in-fighting and ineffectiveness, and are therefore a little slower when it comes to imposing their brand of evil. Plus, in my lifetime, I seem to be holding a little smaller bill for dem evil, as opposed to the bigger, grander, more expensive version of evil that the repubs sell.

I'm a devout member of the Hang 'Em All Party. Chances are, if a person is running for public office, they're out to get you, and have done something at some point that deserves an execution.

But we can never have reform and change while assclowns defend the people inflicting the evil, just because they were told to. Political dissent is VERY MUCH American. Speaking out against wrongdoing when you see it, or at least cultivating a discussion of it when you fear it is how this country came to be in the first place, you fucking tards. Standing up for what you believe in makes you a patriot. Trying to supress that voice of dissent is traitorous.

The only thing really up for debate was the appropriteness of when this teacher chose to let his voice be heard in front of a captive audience. That's what's at issue here. Somehow, the anti-American traitors have used this as another opportunity to try and quiet the voice of dissent...much the way plantation owners tried to quiet that same voice of dissent that led to things like the Emancipation Proclaimation and those sort of things.

Fucking buncha fascist commies up in this bitch..."Don't you dare compare Bush to Hitler!"

If the shoe fits, motherfucking fascists.

Terry in Crapchester · Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:22 pm

PSUFAN wrote:
McCarthy had the added advantage of being right.

Maybe we were too hasty attributing successes to the Colorado public school system after all...

Since we're now on McCarthy, please allow me to square the circle.

Back in the Stone Age when I was in high school, I recall my European history teacher telling us that McCarthy should be praised, rather than villified (and yes, I have a very long memory). I disagreed vehemently with that comment. Did I report him? Hell, no. Was I somehow emotionally scarred by the experience of being exposed to an opinion I disagreed with as an impressionable teen? No way.

So tell me, what is any different at all about this situation, other than the fact that Cuda disagrees with this teacher but apparently agreed with my teacher?

PSUFAN · Post by **PSUFAN** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:26 pm

Gen. George C. Marshall

Millard Tydings

Cuda · Post by **Cuda** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:31 pm

Terry in Crapchester wrote:Since we're now on McCarthy, please allow me to square the circle.

Back in the Stone Age when I was in high school, I recall my European history teacher telling us that McCarthy should be praised, rather than villified (and yes, I have a very long memory). I disagreed vehemently with that comment. Did I report him? Hell, no. Was I somehow emotionally scarred by the experience of being exposed to an opinion I disagreed with as an impressionable teen? No way.

So tell me, what is any different at all about this situation, other than the fact that Cuda disagrees with this teacher but apparently agreed with my teacher?

1. McCarthy has a lot more to do with history than the president has to do with geography

2. If your teacher's comments were delivered in the same type of hysterical rant that Bennish was into, a time-out would have been a good idea for him too.

3. If you thought McCarthy should have been villified, you were just as big a cum-drunk moron as a child as you are as an adult.

Cuda · Post by **Cuda** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:32 pm

PSUFAN wrote:Gen. George C. Marshall

Millard Tydings

He didn't accuse either of them of being security risks, dumb fuck

BSmack · Post by **BSmack** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:34 pm

Dinsdale wrote:I think anybody who supports the current incarnation of the two-party system is a complete fucking idiot.

Do you pay your taxes?

I think you see where I am going with this. Right?

Then again, we do have Cuda posting round these parts. So I will explain. You see, it is all too easy to say you hate the 2 party system. But you also support it, albiet kicking and screaming the whole way. So tell me, what viable system do you propose replace it?

Me, I would like to see a modified Parlimentary system. Modified meaning that elections would still be at predetermined intervals, not whenever the hell the PM felt like it.

BSmack · Post by **BSmack** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:36 pm

Cuda wrote:
PSUFAN wrote:Gen. George C. Marshall

Millard Tydings
He didn't accuse either of them of being security risks, dumb fuck

Tydings was elected as a Democrat to the 68th and 69th sessions of the U.S. Congress (March 4, 1923-March 3, 1927), and was not a candidate for renomination in 1926, having become a candidate for the United States Senate. He was elected to the Senate in 1926, 1932, 1938 and 1944 and served from March 4, 1927, to January 3, 1951. During this time he headed a committee to investigate the early claims of Joseph McCarthy and the penetration of the federal government and military by communism. The committee published a report denouncing Joseph McCarthy and his claims as a hoax. When he ran for re-election in 1950, a composite picture of Tydings with a suspected communist he had never even met was circulated. He was subsequently defeated by John M. Butler. He managed to be nominated in 1956 as Democratic candidate for the Senate, but withdrew before the election due to personal health issues.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millard_Tydings

I guess McCarthy liked to wytch pics?

PSUFAN · Post by **PSUFAN** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:43 pm

Cuda needs to understand that just because Ann Coulter has assigned herself a McCarthy rehabilitator doesn't mean that there isn't a lot of easily available evidence around of his bullshit.

Envisioning cuda understanding anything is a pretty tall order, though. That's generally why he's run in a couple of posts by the least of us.

Cuda · Post by **Cuda** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:50 pm

mvscal, from that article, it appears all McCarthy did was call Acheson & Marshall a couple of bungling fucktards- not security risks; and called Truman a blissful idiot. I can't find any disagreement with those sentiments

Monica, all your quote suggests is that McCarthy may have benefitted from someone wytching a pic on his behalf. You're, as always, a dumb fuck

Terry in Crapchester · Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:50 pm

Cuda wrote:
Terry in Crapchester wrote:Since we're now on McCarthy, please allow me to square the circle.

Back in the Stone Age when I was in high school, I recall my European history teacher telling us that McCarthy should be praised, rather than villified (and yes, I have a very long memory). I disagreed vehemently with that comment. Did I report him? Hell, no. Was I somehow emotionally scarred by the experience of being exposed to an opinion I disagreed with as an impressionable teen? No way.

So tell me, what is any different at all about this situation, other than the fact that Cuda disagrees with this teacher but apparently agreed with my teacher?
1. McCarthy has a lot more to do with history than the president has to do with geography

European history? Remember, that was the course.

BSmack · Post by **BSmack** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:53 pm

Cuda wrote:...all your quote suggests is that McCarthy may have benefitted from someone wytching a pic on his behalf.

Ah, the Claude Rains defense. How typical of you Cooter.

Cuda · Post by **Cuda** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 6:00 pm

Terry in Crapchester wrote:
Cuda wrote:
1. McCarthy has a lot more to do with history than the president has to do with geography
European history? Remember, that was the course.

What part of "McCarthy has a lot more to do with history than the president has to do with geography" don't you fucking understand?

Oh, wait... you're a lawyer; being a moron when necessary is part of the job description. Let me explain it to you. Please read slowly so you get it all

McCarthy is a historical figure. He may even have some plausible connection to European history. The president has no connection to the subject of geography.

BSmack · Post by **BSmack** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 6:02 pm

Cuda wrote:McCarthy is a historical figure. He may even have some plausible connection to European history. The president has no connection to the subject of geography.

You mean other than his attempts to redraw the map of the middle east?

Cuda · Post by **Cuda** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 6:04 pm

mvscal wrote:
Cuda wrote:mvscal, from that article, it appears all McCarthy did was call Acheson & Marshall a couple of bungling fucktards- not security risks; and called Truman a blissful idiot. I can't find any disagreement with those sentiments

He accused the Army Chief of Staff of advancing Soviet interests at the expense of our own. I would have to call that a security risk.

I would call that a bungling fucktard. A security risk is someone who could become- or already is- a spy

PSUFAN · Post by **PSUFAN** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 6:06 pm

He accused the Army Chief of Staff of advancing Soviet interests at the expense of our own.

Wow...what a Great American.

It's awfully funny how McCarthy saw things that way, and now many in the Bush Administration are so admiring of the nation-building efforts of Marshall. We're getting into rarified air for vapid mouth-breathers like Coulter, Hannity, and coodles.

Terry in Crapchester · Fri Mar 03, 2006 6:09 pm

Cuda wrote:He may even have some plausible connection to European history.

Link?

Cuda · Post by **Cuda** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 6:12 pm

PSUFAN wrote:
He accused the Army Chief of Staff of advancing Soviet interests at the expense of our own.
Wow...what a Great American.

It's awfully funny how McCarthy saw things that way, and now many in the Bush Administration are so admiring of the nation-building efforts of Marshall.

After 50 years, the Marshall plan bought us little more than an ungrateful Western Europe.

All the Bush nation building is buying us is ungrateful muzzies.

Terry in Crapchester · Fri Mar 03, 2006 6:14 pm

Cuda wrote:all McCarthy did was call Acheson & Marshall a couple of bungling fucktards- not security risks; and called Truman a blissful idiot. I can't find any disagreement with those sentiments