Tuesday, June 11, 2013

Why does our education system not work? UNIONS!

‘Teacher of the Year’ earns $20,000 less than average, thanks to union rules

Posted By Robby Soave On 1:02 AM 06/11/2013
District Superintendent Dr. Thomas Harwood called him “a teacher amongst teachers.”
Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder described him as an outstanding math and science instructor with a tireless dedication to his craft.
So why does Gary Abud, the 2013-14 Michigan Teacher of the Year, make well below the average salary for teachers in his district?
The answer lies with the anti-meritocratic compensation rules governing teachers unions in Michigan.
Abud, a Grosse Pointe North High School math teacher, made $56,876 last year, according to data obtained by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. That’s about $20,000 less than the average teacher salary in the Grosse Pointe Public Schools system — a relatively affluent suburban district.
In fact, Abud’s salary doesn’t even beat the Michigan average of $62,631 in 2012.
Union compensation rules are to blame. Teachers are generally paid based on their seniority and level of educational achievement, rather than on their record as educators. Veteran teachers with advanced degrees receive higher salaries, regardless of whether their teaching methods are shown to work.
That pay system doesn’t encourage excellent teachers like Abud, said Michael Van Beek, director of education policy at The Mackinac Center.
“Paying teachers as if they are assembly line workers is not a good way of rewarding teachers who do a great job,” he said in an interview with The Daily Caller News Foundation.
Abud agreed in part, and said teacher compensation should be based on a multitude of factors, including merit.
“Ultimately, effective teaching should be evaluated and compensated using a multi-faceted approach determined at the local level with educators at the decision-making table,” he said in a statement.
House Bill 4625 would achieve just that. The bill, which was recently approved by the Michigan House Education Committee and will now move to the full House of Representatives, would require districts to use objective merit as one basis for determining pay.
“The assessment of job performance shall incorporate a rigorous, transparent, and fair evaluation system that evaluates a teacher’s or school administrator’s performance at least in part based upon data on student growth as measured by assessments and other objective criteria,” reads the text of the bill.
Van Beek called the bill a good start, but stressed that districts should not be forced to become overly reliant on standardized tests.
“We don’t want to go to a place where the only thing that matters is student performance on standardized tests,” he said. “Private companies use many different metrics, so I think there should be room in there for school districts to look at a wide range of metrics. But definitely move away from seniority-based pay.”
The Michigan Education Association — the state’s largest teachers union — opposes the bill, as does the state Board of Education. Both organizations cited the importance of compensating teachers based on the number of degrees and certificates they have earned as a prime reason to oppose the merit pay bill.
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Article printed from The Daily Caller: http://dailycaller.com
URL to article: http://dailycaller.com/2013/06/11/teacher-of-the-year-earns-20000-less-than-average-thanks-to-union-rules/

Monday, June 10, 2013

Any one who argues that there is not a Muslim sympathizer (and perhaps even a Muslim) in the White House needs to explain this



June 10, 2013

DHS, IRS, CAIR, tea parties


Today we bring you two different articles that have a common theme.

The first is a WorldNetDaily story that begins this way:

You can thank the Electronic Privacy Information Center for forcing the Department of Homeland Security to release its list of “keywords” that are used by its agents to monitor you on Twitter, Facebook and other social networking sites.

The story then lists the various “key words,” and here’s what’s revealing. You’ll find “militia” but not “jihad.” In fact, you won’t find any “key word” that links specifically to radical Islam.

The second article is also a WorldNetDaily story, that exposes how the IRS restored tax-exempt status to CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations).

In 2011, the IRS stripped CAIR of this non-profit status for failing to file non-profit tax returns for years. Yet the IRS restored CAIR’s status despite the fact that CAIR still has not filed all the information required for previous years!

Meanwhile, of course, we’ve all read about the IRS targeting of tea party, pro-national security and pro-Israel organizations.

Do these two stories suggest a pattern to you?

The Scandal du jour

CBS News: State Department covered up misconduct, interfered with IG probes
posted at 10:01 am on June 10, 2013 by Ed Morrissey
With apologies to Sheriff John* and “The Birthday Party Polka,” it’s time to sing the Scandal Song: Put another candle on the scandal cake … another week starts today.  CBS News reports that the State Department has interfered in internal investigations into criminal conduct and wrongdoing by high-ranking officials, including one ambassador who prowled public parks for prostitutes.  A very familiar name appears in this exposé, too: 
CBS News has uncovered documents that show the State Department may have covered up allegations of illegal and inappropriate behavior within their ranks.
The Diplomatic Security Service, or the DSS, is the State Department’s security force, charged with protecting the secretary of state and U.S. ambassadors overseas and with investigating any cases of misconduct on the part of the 70,000 State Department employees worldwide.
CBS News’ John Miller reports that according to an internal State Department Inspector General’s memo, several recent investigations were influenced, manipulated, or simply called off. The memo obtained by CBS News cited eight specific examples. Among them: allegations that a State Department security official in Beirut “engaged in sexual assaults” on foreign nationals hired as embassy guards and the charge and that members of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s security detail “engaged prostitutes while on official trips in foreign countries” — a problem the report says was “endemic.”
And here’s a good way to exercise diplomacy in a critical theater — allow your personnel to get strung out on drugs:
The memo also reveals details about an “underground drug ring” was operating near the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad and supplied State Department security contractors with drugs.
What did Foggy Botton do when the allegations came to light?  The case of the prostitute-patronizing ambassador ends up involving Patrick Kennedy, a familiar name from the Benghazi scandal and cover-up:
In one specific and striking cover-up, State Department agents told the Inspector General they were told to stop investigating the case of a U.S. Ambassador who held a sensitive diplomatic post and was suspected of patronizing prostitutes in a public park.
The State Department Inspector General’s memo refers to the 2011 investigation into an ambassador who “routinely ditched … his protective security detai” and inspectors suspect this was in order to “solicit sexual favors from prostitutes.”
Sources told CBS News that after the allegations surfaced, the ambassador was called to Washington, D.C. to meet with Undersecretary of State for Management Patrick Kennedy, but was permitted to return to his post.
Remember that State Department whistleblower Eric Nordstrom publicly rejected the Accountability Review Board on Benghazi, claiming that it purposefully pushed responsibility onto lower-level careerists, and specifically charged that the ARB was trying to protect Kennedy at a minimum.  It seems a little coincidental that Kennedy’s name pops up in another cover-up at State now. What did Kennedy do about the oversexed ambassador, especially considering the risk this created for security and for potential espionage penetration of the State Department?
Congress needs to find out who ordered the cover-ups on these investigations — and how much else might be going on at State now.
* – Sincere apologies, too; Sheriff John wouldn’t have put up with this nonsense. He’d have sat the State Department in the corner and sternly read them a safety bulletin for their own good.

Friday, June 7, 2013

Hey, all you union members...justify this

Liberals have Corrupted Unions With Absolute Power

By Jay Taylor, Senior Vice President – Liberty Alliance, LLC

When talking to fellow conservatives, one interesting question to ask them is why they are registered Democrat when they have nothing in common with them. The answer inevitably comes back to Labor Unions. The Union Movement was founded to protect workers, and has a great history in its founding with gaining worker protections, fair wages, and benefits. But now the power has gone too far, and instead of being concerned about workers, Unions seem to be more worried about electing liberals to office. The once proud union history has turned into one of bankrupting companies through ridiculous pensions that no one would be able to pay. Pensions should be outlawed and replaced with retirement accounts, but that’s a story for another day.
Some states have Right to Work laws where union membership is voluntary and you can’t be forced to join as a condition of employment. One of the arguments against Right to Work is that workers enjoy the benefits without paying dues. This is not true. The National Labor Relations Act makes it so unions can represent all, but are not required to do so.1 If union membership is all it’s cracked up to be, then why in Right to Work states do they have lower unemployment?2 You would think that pro-choice liberals would like the ability for workers to be able to choose their membership. They can have separate contracts for their members and if their benefits are competitive for the dues paid, wouldn’t members join? There is the true power of the unions as they collect $9 billion in union dues.2 Which in turn seem to be paid out to liberal politicians that frequently don’t have workers best interests at heart.

One of the most outrageous things was Coal Unions supporting Obama.3 There is no defense for anyone wanting to mine coal to support Obama when he has declared war on coal. It doesn’t make any sense if you want to keep your job. The auto bailout was for the unions since their pension had finally gotten to the breaking point and why the American auto industry has trouble competing.4 Hostess went bankrupt because of union greed.5 We’ve seen numerous cities go bankrupt as their unions demanded more and more of the limited city budgets.6 How are these good for jobs?

The strange relationship between liberal democrats and the union movement is tied to their march towards socialism.7 Both want more government with greater rules and control. The only problem is that once the collective has total control, freedom is lost and becomes a moot point. We need a balance where reason is the centerpiece. Unions started out as a good thing, but have traveled down a dark path where greed and power have corrupted them and now they have forgotten who they are.8

I’ve been forced to join two unions in my life. First was at Kroger and later at the hospital union. Both were college jobs, but they taught me a great deal about unions. I attended a Union Steward class to learn more about the Union but found this to be a two day Republican bashing session. When it did come time to learn about filing a grievance it was a 5 minute “here is this form” and where to turn it in. There was nothing about what a legitimate grievance is, or how the union rules work. My experience was that the Union prevented the lazy workers from getting in trouble or fired and got the same amount of money from the part time people in dues to pay for political activities. The only benefit I see from the Union is padding the liberal’s pockets at the expense of workers.

If you are in a union you need to look carefully at where your dues are being spent and who they are supporting in elections. Unions present a pretty picture of how much they say membership can bring you, but is it a short term gain that in the long run will be a bankrupt mess? Do your homework and research out the facts. For those conservatives out there who register as Democrat because of their union, the facts will amaze you. Don’t be used as a sacrificial political pawn for the liberal socialist agenda. Your fellow conservatives are ready for you to come home.  

 

Liberals never learn lessons of the past...they much rather repeat their mistakes over, and over, and over again. Someday, someone will pay for the murders of the four brave Americans in Benghazi. Justice delayed will not be justice denied. You can run Hillary, but you cannot hide.

 
Reprinted from Townhall.com
June 7, 2013

Report: Inadequate Security at "Decrepit" US Embassy...in Beirut

6/7/2013 1:07:00 PM - Guy Benson

Echoes of pre-attack Benghazi.  What could go wrong?  The Washington Guardian reports:

The State Department is failing to adequately protect U.S. diplomats in Beirut, leaving them without necessary counterterrorism training and serving in a decrepit, aged embassy compound that fails to meet security protocols, according to an internal investigation that raises new questions about the Obama administration's commitment to protecting Americans overseas in the aftermath of the Benghazi tragedyIn fact, the department did not place Beirut on its latest list of high-threat diplomatic missions even though Lebanon is listed at the "critical" threat level for potential violence with its frequent rocket attacks, spillovers from the Syrian civil war and heavy presence of the terror group Hezbollah, the agency's inspector general said in a report reviewed by the Washington GuardianBeirut was also the site of one of America's deadliest terror attacks, the 1983 bombing of a Marine barracks that killed more than 240 servicemembers...

Diplomats face serious threats while working at the 18-acre “cramped, aged and difficult to maintain office" located on a "steep and hilly compound” located 20 minutes from downtown Beirut, the report said. And their superiors back home in Washington seem unaware of the threat level, failing to harden weak physical security or provide needed counterterrorism training, the inspector general observed. The risks remain high as the civil war in Syria continues to threaten the stability of Lebanon due to the influx of more than 325,000 refugees, and tensions with Hezbollah remain high with frequent rocket attacks and other skirmishes.

The State Department hasn't seen fit to classify its top diplomatic outpost in a Middle Eastern nation in the thrall of Hezbollah, with a brutal civil war raging next door, as "high risk."   Worse, our embassy compound there failed to meet basic security protocols.  Sound familiar?  Sec. Kerry has been on the job for four months and may have been blindsided by this IG report.  What is Sec. Clinton's excuse?  This assessment would be damning under any circumstances, but it's completely intolerable in the shadow of September's terrorist attacks that killed the US ambassador to Libya and three other Americans.  In their efforts to fend off questions and probes into the massive failures that occurred on September 11, 2012, the Obama administration has taken umbrage at any accusation of wrongdoing or negligence.  They routinely retreat to warmed-over bromides about "taking the steps necessary to ensure that something like this never happens again."  That's the only lesson they want anyone to derive from the Benghazi massacre -- yet they themselves evidently have not internalized it.  In the days following the lethal raid, the president told a Univision audience that his "number one priority is to keep our diplomats safe."  Number one, he said.  Just words.  Obama's most notable tangible action in response to Benghazi is to promote some of the central figures of the administration's cover-up.  Susan Rice ascended to the perch of National Security Adviser this week, and Victoria Nuland will reportedly be nominated as an Assistant Secretary of State.  GOP Senators vow to use her confirmation hearings as a leverage point to extract more information from this secretive administration.  Democrats are pre-emptively denouncing Republicans' truth-seeking efforts, complaining that their opponents "are wrong to keep the Benghazi scandal alive."  Sen. Diane Feinstein said it's time to put the issue "to bed."  The American people disagree, according to a NYT/CBS poll released this week:


Amid investigations into the terrorist attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, a majority of Americans - including more than three in four Republicans (77 percent) and six in 10 independents (59 percent) - think the Obama administration is mostly hiding something on the issue of Benghazi. A majority of Democrats (59 percent) think the Obama administration is mostly telling the truth.

Overall, 53 percent of Americans believe the Obama administration is "mostly" covering up the real story on Benghazi, while 34 percent say they're mostly telling the truth.  What's plain as day is that the Left desperately wants to shut down debate on this issue.  Witness MSNBC primetime anchor Lawrence O'Donnell's repulsive tweet:


So eager was O'Donnell to punish unwelcome commentary on Benghazi that he defiled the sacrifice of New York's bravest in order to level the cheapest of nonsensical shots.  Sick.

If I recall, Obama the Marxist Muslim has never recognized D-Day...guess he didn't read the newspaper article covering it yet

You SOB Liberals, Communists, Socialists, lame Democraps who still support this horrific mistake of a President really ought to leave this country. 

June 7, 2013

Obama Fails to Commemorate D-Day

6/7/2013 8:37:00 AM - Katie Pavlich
Yesterday was the 69th anniversary of the D-Day invasion and President Obama failed to say anything about it. There is no released statement on WhiteHouse.gov and nothing on the White House or Barack Obama twitter feeds about the anniversary. President Obama did not make any public remarks about the anniversary yesterday, either.

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

We need to completely gut this entire anti-Christian, anti-American, pro-Muslim, Socialist regime from top to bottom

Another great post following the article...well worth the time to read.

WND EXCLUSIVE
FBI expert: Quran is 'revealed word of God'
Agency sterilizes records to satisfy Muslim critics
Published: 1 day ago

The FBI has censored and modified hundreds of pages of materials to satisfy Muslim critics, including a change that was made because an agency “expert” insisted the Quran “is the revealed word of God.”

 

The details come from Judicial Watch, which obtained documentation of the hundreds of pages of FBI memos, training documents and other paperwork that the agency purged on the demands of Muslims.

 

“The FBI is rewriting history in order to help al-Qaida,” said Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton. “This shows that the law enforcement agency is in need of serious top-to-bottom reform.”

 

Fitton said a lesson learned from the Boston Marathon terrorist attack is that the country is less safe when it allows radical Muslim organizations to tell the FBI how to train its agents and do its job.

 

“The FBI’s purge of so-called ‘offensive’ material is political correctness run amok, and it puts the nation at risk,” he said. “The Obama administration needs to stop putting the tender sensibilities of radical Islamists above the safety of the American people.”

 

The organization recently released hundreds of pages of documents from the FBI that demonstrate the effort to purge from anti-terrorism training materials and curriculum anything that a number of unidentified “subject matter experts” deemed “offensive” to Muslims.

 

For example, according to Judicial Watch, one expert insisted that a particular slide in a training program describing the Quran as the teachings of Muhammad be removed or changed.

 

The reason?

 

“The Quran is not the teachings of the prophet,” wrote the expert, “but the revealed word of God.”

 

According to Judicial Watch, another criticism was leveled against a particular article because it “inaccurately argues the Muslim Brotherhood is a terrorist organization.”

 

Also, another document “inaccurately states” that al-Qaida “is responsible for the bombing of the Khobar Towers and that AQ is ‘clearly linked’ to the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center.”

 

Judicial Watch got the materials in two deliveries earlier this year following a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit that was filed last July. The original request for the documents, made March 7, 2012, asked for records regarding a Feb. 8, 2012, meeting that FBI Director Robert Mueller set up with various Muslim organizations.

 

Judicial Watch wanted “any and all records setting criteria or guidelines for FBI curricula on Islam or records identifying potentially offensive material with in the FBI curricula on Islam.”

 

Judicial Watch explained: “During the February 8 meeting, Mueller reportedly assured the Islamic groups in attendance that the agency had ordered the removal of presentations and curricula on Islam from FBI offices around the country that were deemed ‘offensive.’ As reported by NPR: ‘The FBI has completed a review of offensive training material and has purged 876 pages and 392 presentations, according to a briefing provided to lawmakers.’”

 

The Washington Examiner noted that while the Muslim Brotherhood is not on the U.S. State Department’s official list of international terrorist organizations, some of its offshoots, including the Palestinian group Hamas, are.

 

In fact, Mueller himself has described the Muslim Brotherhood as the inspiration for terror in the U.S. and overseas.

 

Mueller’s comments came in a 2011 House committee hearing, when he was joined by other Obama administration intelligence and law enforcement officials to discuss the Muslim Brotherhood.

 

The Brotherhood’s motto is: “Allah is our objective. The prophet is our leader. The Quran is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.”

The Muslim critics also didn’t like a statement in the FBI training material that “young male immigrants of Middle Eastern appearance” fit a terrorist profile.

 

Another document, the objected, “seems to conflate ‘Islamic militancy’ with ‘terrorism.’”

 

The FBI also acted on a claim from one of its “experts” that the anti-terror training needs to accommodate “the current political context.”

 

It’s just the latest example of the Obama administration’s accommodation of Muslims, critics say.

 

The administration also has launched a series of Muslim Outreach Summits so that Muslims can tell federal officials how they better can serve their community.

The administration also is holding educational outreaches to let people know that Internet postings that violate civil rights are subject to federal prosecution.

Bill Killian, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Tennessee, has scheduled an appearance at an American Muslim Advisory Council of Tennessee meeting to

 

“provide input on how civil rights can be violated by those who post inflammatory documents targeted at Muslims on social media,” according to the Tullahoma News in Tennessee.

 

“This is an educational effort with civil rights laws as they play into freedom of religion and exercising freedom of religion,” he said. “This is also to inform the public what federal laws are in effect and what the consequences are.”

 

Killian said everyone needs to understand that Internet postings that violate civil rights are subject to federal jurisdiction.

 

He asserted that while some Muslims may blow up buildings, hijack airliners and kill thousands, there are terrorists of other religions as well.

 

Oklahoma City bombers Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols “were both Christians, as was the guy who shot up the Sikh temple” in Wisconsin,” Killian claimed.

 

The federal strategy made Judicial Watch’s “Corruption Chronicles” feature.

“In its latest effort to protect followers of Islam in the U.S. the Obama Justice Department warns against using social media to spread information considered inflammatory against Muslims, threatening that it could constitute a violation of civil rights,” the organization said.

 

Judicial Watch noted that the Obama administration already has reached out to personally reassure Muslims that the DOJ is protecting them. In that unprecedented move, Attorney General Eric Holder assured a San Francisco-based group called Muslim Advocates, which urges members not to cooperate with federal investigations, that he is grateful to have Muslims with whom to partner.

 

The Obama administration also has hired a special Homeland Security adviser, Mohamed Elibiary, who openly supports an Islamist theologian who condemns U.S. prosecutions of terrorists, Judicial Watch said.

 

In addition, the president has ordered NASA to focus on Muslim diplomacy, and officials with Homeland Security covertly have met with extremist Arab, Muslim and Sikh groups to talk about national security matters.

 

The State Department lent its weight by sending anti-American imam Feisal Abdul Rauf on a trip to the Middle East for outreach to Muslims.

 

Explained Judicial Watch: “Over the years, the Obama administration has embarked on a fervent crusade to befriend Muslims by creating a variety of outreach programs at a number of key federal agencies.”

 

Tullahoma News said Killian wants to let people know about Muslim culture and civil rights laws.

 

“We want to inform everybody about what the law is, but more importantly, we want to provide what the law means to Muslims, Hindus and every other religion in the country,” he said.

 

“It’s why we came here in the first place,” he continued. “In England, they were using Christianity to further their power in government. That’s why the First Amendment is there.”

 

WND reported last week on the “Muslim Outreach Summits.”

 

WND initially discovered documents referring to the Muslim summits while examining a U.S. Department of Education procurement of data-gathering and report-writing services.

 

The services are specific to information being assembled by the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, or WHIAAPI, which Obama created via executive order in 2009.

 

Upon closer inspection, however, WND learned that the Education Department explicitly will direct the selected contractor to chronicle findings and recommendations gleaned from the Muslim Outreach Summits.

 

The White House views this year’s venues as an extension of a previous outreach to “new immigrants and refugees – some of the most underserved in the AAPI community,” according to a document titled “WHIAAPI 2013 Faith-Based and Community Engagement.”

 

Complementing the prior effort will be the three “regional convenings,” tentatively scheduled June 15 in Chicago, June 22 in San Francisco and June 29 in New York City.

 

“These cities are main AAPI immigrant hubs and entry points for new immigrants/refugees,” according to a related document, “Questions Received from Vendors: Development and Preparation of the AAPI Annual Report to the President.”

 

“Each convening with [sic] include panel discussions/workshops with federal officials on key issues impacting the community and also an open-dialogue session to hear directly from the community about issues of concern.”

 

Sometime after the three Muslim Outreach Summits, the chosen contractor will develop and then present its summary report to the president and to newly appointed WHIAAPI commissioners.

 

The contracting action – the first of its kind since its inception in 2008 – will help lay the foundation for the initiative’s future work, the document says.

 

© Copyright 1997-2013. All Rights Reserved. WND.com.

·         Gary Moscowitz

I'm going to mention it one more time today and probably a 1000 times yet to come! "Manchurian Candidate". Look what has happened to the agencies of the US gov't since 2008. A treasury Dept led by a tax cheat, a UN Ambassador who has not only lied to the American people about Benghazi, but has spearheaded the US's intentions to sign the UN Small Arms Treaty( a clear challenge to our 2nd Amendment rights as well as the Constitution). Now that same person promoted to NSA chief (was it a thank you for all those lies just after the Benghazi murders?). A State Dept some how mixed up with secret dealings with Al Quada, that went amok, costing the lives of 4 brave Americans, including an Ambassador and then began to lie about the causes, incarcerates an innocent US citizen. A Dept of Justice led by a liar. An agency that purposely sent 1000's of guns to Mexican drug cartels resulting in the loss of two US boarder patrol officers, an Attorney General found to be in contempt of Congress yet ignores same, again a DOJ that trumps up "charges" against a journalist and an entire news organization (AP), all US citizens, taking private records, even those of his parents. An IRS that purposely goes after conservative groups making life impossible for them. I should remind you that ALL of the above took place within a year, or two and up to just weeks BEFORE the 2012 Presidential elections. And I haven't even started on B.H.O. This country's ideals are under attack from within. We have a gov't that insists on protecting the rights of radical Muslims yet tramples on the rights of US citizens. There is a motive here and it ain't to make the United States of America a stronger and freer country. "Something is rotten in Denmark".