Muda69

So you believe if Mr. Biden orders a massive U.S. troop deployment to say, Poland, that Mr. Putin will back down from Ukraine?

https://reason.com/2022/02/22/stephen-breyer-makes-the-liberal-case-against-court-packing-2/ Mr. Breyer is correct; court packing is a tit-for-tat race to the bottom.

TJ High School’s Race Problem: https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/tj-high-schools-race-problem/ Experience factors? That basically opened the door to that criterion being “whatever we say it means.” The result at T.J. was a drop of more than 11 percent in the number of Asians, and double-digit growth on the part of blacks and Hispanics, achieved by making being poor a check-off for acceptance. No one cares white students account for only 22 percent of admissions, despite being 65 percent of the county population. This is all the crudest kind of racist thought, the same as practiced by the KKK, thinking all blacks are alike. Progressives act as though everything is fixed if schools just sling a couple more darker-skinned kids into the back row come class picture day. But is it racism? Seems so. One school board member texted another, “I mean there has been an anti-Asian feel underlying some of this, hate to say it lol,” according to correspondence obtained by non-profit Parents Defending Education. In another exchange, Thomas Jefferson’s admissions director asked a school district official if she could “provide us a review of our current weighting (of experience factors) and whether or not this would be enough to level the playing field for our historically underrepresented groups.” The official replied, “My gut says that you may need to double all the points so the applicants can receive up to 200 points overall for these experience factors.” Another school board member wrote we “screwed up TJ and the Asians hate us,” to which another responded he was “just dumb and too white” to address the diversity deficit properly. The school then went further. There will now be three different “pathways” for admissions: the first for 350 high-performing students, the second for 100 students judged on a combination of half academic merit and half external factors, and 50 underrepresented students. Some people in town call them the yellow, brown, and black lanes. We’ve gotten so twisted by thinking America is shackled by systemic racism that we built a system of education admissions on a foundation of systemic racism. We somehow think racially gerrymandering schools is a solution. We ignore John Roberts’ dictum,”The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.” Why are we so hell-bent on self-harm as to sacrifice our education system on layers of false progressive assumptions? The first false assumption is access to learning equals learning. A student has to be prepared intellectually to succeed, or he fails, or the institution is forced to dumb down to accommodate him. Progressive education thought demands people publicly disavow what we all know to be true, that some students are smarter and work harder than other students. We are absolutely not all alike. Imagine if colleges chose who would play on their football teams based not on athletic skill but racial quotas? Who knew schooling was only skin deep, and the football team more intellectually honest than the philosophy department? The next false assumption is the magic number: X percent of the population is black so X percent of the student body should be black. If it is not, the thinking goes, de facto some form of systemic racism must be at play. This typically focuses on the admissions process (to include testing, like the SAT) and thus the answer is to scrap every part of the admissions process that seems to rub against that X percent. You don’t have to show question 27 on the SAT is itself “racist,” only that the SAT results won’t get X percent of black kids into Harvard and must ipso facto be racist. So, let more black kids into Harvard by eliminating the SAT and that will result in more black doctors and lawyers and a more just society. Problem solved. Well, sort of. There still is that issue of the fact getting admitted to Harvard is not the same as graduating from Harvard; a student still has to understand the classes and put in the hard work of studying, that important form of delayed gratification. And Harvard only has so much space so to let in more black kids means saying no to others. In most progressive instances, that means telling “Asians” to go away (the term “Asian” itself is yet another false and disrespectful assumption, that somehow Chinese, Thais, Japanese, Koreans, Filipinos, Laotians, Indians, Bangladeshis, et al., are lumpable into one omnibus racial garbage can.) What you’re left with is the certainty that more exclusion by race is the answer to the alleged problem of exclusion by race. After some 40 years of seeing something that egregiously dumb as a good idea, the issue is now coming again before the courts for a reality check, starting in Fairfax County, Virginia. Someone in the process may decide it’s time to ask why we regularly end up with “cosmetically diverse” institutions, rather than anything real that leads to broad social progress. A group calling themselves the Coalition for T.J. sued the school system to reverse the admission process changes, which they allege were meant to diminish the number of Asian students. That qualifies as discrimination based on race, outlawed under the 14th Amendment, they claim. In January, a U.S. District judge turned down the Coalition’s request for a jury trial and will instead issue a ruling later this year. Both sides will then be able to appeal, suggesting the issue will overlap another admissions season. A second suit is also in play. A bill before the Virginia legislature would also affect T.J., seeking to remove race as an admission criteria. The move to eliminate racism in admissions processes in Virginia is mirrored at the national level. The Supreme Court agreed to decide whether race-based admissions programs at Harvard and the University of North Carolina are lawful. The case against Harvard accuses the school of discriminating against Asian students by using subjective criteria such as likability, courage, and kindness, a nasty echo of the 1930s when it was thought Jews lacked the “character” to be Harvard men. In the North Carolina case, the argument is simply that the university discriminated against white and Asian applicants by giving preference to P.O. other C. Don’t expect a decision before next year. Once upon a time, Americans decided race should not be a factor in education, doing away with segregated schools and ending separate but equal. Somewhere we lost our way, to the point where we are leveling down, and twisty definitions of things like “experience points” have brought race directly into education again. Only this time we convinced ourselves that discriminating against whites and Asians was perfectly okay. That thinking is under fresh attack in the courts, and well it should be. The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race. You don’t have to go to Harvard, or T.J., to figure that out. This whole left-religion about the concept of "equity", aka, equality of outcomes, has led us down this twisted path.

https://campusreform.org/article?id=18978 Binghamton student Sean Harrigan questioned whether "progressive stacking" would penalize students' participation grades if they never got a chance to speak because of how they were born. “How am I supposed to get full participation when the professor won’t call on me even though I had my hand up the longest?” Harrigan asked. Michael Lawrence told Campus Reform that he has "experienced classes that partake in similar rules." "Progressive stacking," according to Lawrence, teaches "students to victimize people and see them as less than many of their peers.” Emme Young, another Binghamton student, called the policy "embarrassing." “It’s pretty embarrassing that I pay tuition to a school that has a class with that syllabus,” Young said. Campus Reform also obtained a screenshot of a group conversation between members of the university's College Republicans chapter discussing the participation policy. “Can anyone tell me how this is legal,” one student asked. “Well that’s sociology for ya," another student replied. Campus Reform reached out to Binghamton University for comment. Ryan Yarosh, senior director of media and public relations, said that Candela was "counseled" by the university due to the syllabus' failure to comply with the 2021-2022 Faculty-Staff Handbook. Good. I hope this inane "progressive stacking" was removed by the Ms. Candela, at the request of the university. Most liberal college these days must be hell on earth.

I never said the IHSAA would go away. But they may have competition in the field of managing high school sports and sponsoring post season tournaments. Is that such a bad thing? Glad to see you are taking the managerial lead in this exciting endeavor, SenatorFan. My role as a GID idea man has born fruit again.

https://mises.org/wire/canada-nice-no-longer-trudeaus-totalitarian-response-trucker-protests

Economically disadvantaged rate = Free/Reduced Lunch rate. Probably also includes those on free/reduced textbooks as well. That percentage used to be labeled as such on the Indiana DOE website, but "economically disadvantaged" is the new PC term.

Per Indiana DOE information shouldn't "4A" Frankfort be on your list: https://inview.doe.in.gov/schools/1011700997/population Enrollment: 899 Economically disadvantaged rate: 68%

That won't be me. Membership in the IHSAA is completely voluntary the last time I checked. But because it has a monopoly on the running of high school sports in this state many believe it is some kind of government organization.

It was both. One can congratulate a successful boondoggle, can they not?

The trip was mostly likely paid for by rich Clinton County farmers, and maybe some fundraising by the cheerleaders themselves. To my knowledge no taxpayer funds were spent on the boondoggle. Do you have different information?

Congratulations to the Clinton Central Cheerleaders: https://clintoncountydailynews.com/clinton-central-cheerleaders-place-14th-in-the-nation-in-orlando-florida/#:~:text=Clinton Central Cheerleaders Place 14th In The Nation In Orlando%2C Florida,-February 13%2C 2022&text=In November the Clinton Central,are held in Orlando%2C Florida.

What is your opinion of Modern Monetary Theory, @DanteEstonia? All you do lately is add "Kill me now" emojis to posts. Not very productive IMHO.

Indiana bill banning transgender girls from playing girls sports passes key vote https://www.indystar.com/story/news/education/2022/02/16/indiana-legislature-transgender-school-sports-ban-house-bill-1041-vote/6814374001/ I have not read the text of the bill, but wonder how the state government can enforce such a ban for private and parochial schools? Sounds like a constitutional fight ready to happen.

https://www.indystar.com/story/opinion/2022/02/15/southern-indiana-usi-moves-division-1-join-march-madness/6778004001/ Big, big mistake for USI.

https://mises.org/wire/new-anti-economics So under a full MMT policy why would we need taxes, if the government can just print money out of thin air to to pay for whatever it wants?

Meh, the refs just had a pocketed make-up call against the Bengals after they missed that blatant offensive PI by Tee Higgins at the beginning of the third quarter. They just waited until their NFL masters told them take it out of their pocket at the most opportune time. And they did.

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/justin-trudeau-safety-totalitarian-live-not-by-lies/ Safety! Of course. Keep this in mind when you see how the young are being taught that an “unsafe space” is intolerable. Whatever you think about the Truckers’ protest, this is going to be the reason that and the means by which a future American regime will use to punish its enemies — especially once we go to a cashless society. From Live Not By Lies: Now the Canadian state is learning from the Chinese … and the American state will learn from the Canadians. This is why I wrote Live Not By Lies — to wake up Americans who are, or are likely to be, dissidents from the emerging soft totalitarian regime, and show us ways to prepare. Read the signs of the times! I agree with Mr. Dreher, an ominous sign of things to come here in the U.S.A.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2022/02/the-new-yorker-flawed-hit-job-on-amy-coney-barrett/ I can only imagine the outrage had this paragraph been written about another female Supreme Court trailblazer like Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Surely it would have been decried forcefully. “Not fair!,” the critics would scream. “You can’t define this woman by merely her physical attributes! She is as hard-working, as qualified, as achieving as her male peers — and you would never speak of their attire or the frequency of their exercise.” In this instance, I find myself in fervent agreement with the critics. Yet Talbot’s efforts to discredit Justice Barrett reflect the deep-rooted so-called systemic misogyny of which conservatives are so often unfairly accused. Talbot refuses, time and time again, to give a woman of incredible intellectual caliber — who has received perhaps the highest honor of the legal profession — any credit of her own. Instead, she relentlessly attempts to tie Justice Barrett to — and define her by — her involvement with the Federalist Society, her formation under Justice Scalia, and her time at Notre Dame, which Talbot identifies as “the nation’s elite conservative law school” (emphasis in original). Setting aside the question of whether there is anything inherently wrong about Justice Barrett’s association with these mentors and institutions, I am struck by Talbot’s deeply antifeminist disregard for Justice Barrett’s ability to form her own ideas. Our culture claims to celebrate women’s rights and rightly objects to the exclusion of women from fields that men have historically dominated. Talbot, purportedly endorsing these same feminist values, fails to apply these standards, and instead attempts to discredit Amy Coney Barrett’s every achievement. The irony, evidently, is lost on her. President Biden’s nominee to the Supreme Court — who he has promised will be a black woman — will be a hero to the mainstream media, in no small part because she will, if confirmed, join a small band of women who can claim that achievement. She will be presented as a self-made woman, possessing a unique voice to offer the nation’s highest court. I presume that this portrayal will be, in many ways, true. But if that female judge dares to think the wrong thing? Will she receive scrutiny of the kind Talbot has published? I predict the media will say nothing at all if they have nothing nice to say. Yet Justice Barrett is maligned simply because that same media have decided that she is the wrong kind of woman. Women ought to make their voices heard in the public square, we are told, unless they have a conviction that is considered undesirable — say, on the sanctity of human life. “All are entitled to their own opinion and complete autonomy,” progressive elites tell us, “unless you’re pro-life, which no woman should be. If you are, you are necessarily a puppet of male interests and a traitor to your sex.” In 2017, Senator Dianne Feinstein shared her concern that “the dogma lives loudly” within Amy Coney Barrett. She also said to Justice Barrett, then a judicial nominee: “You are controversial because many of us that have lived lives as women really recognize the value of finally being able to control our reproductive systems, and Roe entered into that, obviously.” Behind Feinstein’s comment lurked the old-guard police of feminist orthodoxy. Feinstein’s “many of us” was to be perceived as “all of us.” Every woman who has really lived a woman’s life, Feinstein insinuated, should recognize the “value of finally being able to control our reproductive systems.” Yet as Erika Bachiochi of the Ethics and Public Policy Center remarked poignantly in the midst of Justice Barrett’s nomination to the Supreme Court: In some ways, Talbot cannot help but answer the question she dares not ask. She speaks of the incredible love and generosity that the Barretts have for their children, including two adopted from Haiti and one with special needs — a generosity motivated in no small part by their deep faith. Inadvertently, Talbot highlights the unique — and thoroughly “progressive” — balance that Justice Barrett and her husband Jesse have found in order to allow their family to thrive. Even in this piece, Justice Barrett is a living sign of contradiction over and against pro-abortion narratives about women’s flourishing. Talbot’s interviews are testimonies to Justice Barrett’s maternal heroism and constant friendship — not because she “does it all” but because, as her husband movingly says: “You can’t outwork Amy. I’ve also learned that you can’t outfriend Amy.” You cannot outwork Amy Coney Barrett. She is a once-in-a-generation legal mind whose scholarship, intellect, and kindness has blessed hundreds of law students for decades. She will certainly shape — and in my opinion, bless — the Court for decades to come. Why, then, does Talbot continue to insinuate that her humility must not be sincere? Why does she go to such lengths to construct a case for Justice Barrett somehow being both consumed by a secret ambition and merely a puppet of powerful conservative men? You cannot outfriend Amy Coney Barrett. Colleagues and neighbors testify to Justice Barrett’s generosity and contentment with her life in South Bend: “She carefully considered opportunities as they arose, but never angled for them. . . . Ambition played no role in her nomination or acceptance of it. She’s not a political actor,” Justice Barrett’s colleague of 20 years (and my mother) comments. Yet Talbot insists that she knows better: Again, ironies abound. Talbot assumes that a woman like Justice Barrett couldn’t possibly have been at peace with her vocation as a wife, mother, and professor — that she must have been scheming for more. But who is she to tell Justice Barrett what kind of woman she is, or ought to be? I do not claim to speak for our newest justice’s jurisprudence, nor do I know how she will vote in Dobbs. A legal scholar might take up the questions of originalism and “common-good constitutionalism” that Talbot raises in her article. I have written previously, though, about my relationship with Justice Barrett as a family friend and neighbor. For as long as I can remember, she has been a mentor and maternal figure in my life, the mother of one of my best friends, and my mother’s best friend. It is because of that relationship that I wrote this piece, and it is with that familiarity that I say only this: Amy Coney Barrett is strong enough to withstand the swamp, faithful enough to place vocation above careerist aspirations, and courageous enough to offer the world a different — truer — kind of feminine genius. Just yet another liberal hit piece against an accomplished conservative, what else is new? But I wonder if the GID's own @Bobrefcan speak to the Notre Dame Law School as being the “the nation’s elite conservative law school”.

*yawn*

You just bitch and moan about the lacking of parking on an internet message board.

Add Frankfort, Hamilton Heights and probably 90% of all the other high schools in this state to your list. What exactly is your point, that you refuse to walk a couple of blocks to see a high school basketball game because neither of the schools are "relevant" to that high school sport?

So "passion" is making lewd comments against a school you may not even be playing at the time. Sounds more like insanity to me. *Sigh*, not this delusion again. Once again a Boilermaker fan's inferiority complex regarding the Hoosiers comes to the fore.

Walking is good for the body and soul. Try it sometime.