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On Wednesday, ALEC bleated out a statement, complaining that they're just a little non-profit organization whose sole purpose is to help businesses turn a bit of a profit, don't you know? And they're being victimized by those mean, nasty lefty types.

From their statement:

ALEC is an organization that supports pro-growth, pro-jobs policies and the vigorous exchange of ideas between the public and private sector to develop state based solutions. Today, we find ourselves the focus of a well-funded, expertly coordinated intimidation campaign.

Our members join ALEC because we connect state legislators with other state legislators and with job-creators in their states. They join because we support pro-business policies that promote innovation and spur local and national competitiveness. They’re ALEC members because they’re more interested in solutions than rhetoric.

For years, ALEC has partnered with legislators to research and develop better, more effective public policies – legislation that creates a more transparent, accountable government, policies that place a priority on free enterprise and consumer choice, and tax policies that are fair, simple and that spur the kind of competiveness that puts Americans back to work.

Somebody's going to have to explain to me how Stand Your Ground laws and Voter ID laws help create jobs. That's left me scratching my head. How is it that laws which blatantly discriminate against people of color and have absolutely nothing to do with jobs create jobs? And then there's abortion legislation. What does abortion legislation have to do with job creation?

As to their so-called free enterprise and consumer choice policies, let's look at one area where they're working hard to interfere: education. And let's bring the Gates Foundation back into focus on this one. The Gates Foundation has now declared they will not give any further grants to ALEC. Slow clap for the Gates Foundation.

I'm not particularly impressed because there are 17 months remaining on the grant they've already given ALEC for "education reform"; specifically, to:

Purpose: to educate and engage its membership on more efficient state budget approaches to drive greater student outcomes, as well as educate them on beneficial ways to recruit, retain, evaluate and compensate effective teaching based upon merit and achievement

Now let's look at what kinds of "state budget approaches" are currently driving student reforms that specifically point back to ALEC. There is the Virtual Public Schools Act, which would send public funds to private companies hosting virtual schools, like K12, Inc, which receives large contributions from the DeVos Foundation and the Walton Foundation, just to name a few. There is the Innovation Schools Act, which would come in the back door by first mandating modernization with an eye to implementation of online learning.

Of course, it's not lost on me that Bill Gates might have a tiny outside interest in seeing virtual schools take off, right? And not only Bill Gates. K12, Inc. is a member of ALEC and also an online school provider, one that's quite expensive, too. And K12 has a deep vested interest in having virtual schools become a deeply integrated part of students' education.

Here's what they've achieved so far. Virginia just passed a mandatory online education law, requiring that every student in Virginia's public schools take at least one course online. Requiring. Mandating. That's right, those conservatives are mandating one online course for every student who wants a diploma from Virginia schools. And as the Washington Post reports, K12 was Johnny-on-the-spot when it passed, waiting to pounce into the pool of money the Virginia legislature just set aside.

It isn't just Virginia. It's Florida, Tennessee, Mississippi, Georgia, Indiana and Arizona, too.

There's only one reason to mandate students take one online course, and that's to cut back on teachers in the classroom, weakening them further. It's one thing to make online learning available and another to use it as a bludgeon to union-bust and try and render teachers' roles irrelevant, which seems to clearly be the goal here.

As ALEC whines and twirls in a strange dance of damage control, remember that the Stand Your Ground law that triggered the corporate exodus from them is only the tip of the iceberg. They have done grave harm to many states and most people. Whether it's education, Voter ID, health care, guns, or taxes, ALEC is the author of far too much turnkey legislation with deep and barbarous cuts to those institutions we hold dear in this country, like schools, and hospitals, and public streets. They deserve no sympathy, nor quarter. They should be accountable for each and every evil they have wrought on states and people who live in them, and those who sponsor their efforts should be equally accountable, even those who claim to have noble motives, like the Gates Foundation.

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Privatization is all the rage these days in right-wing states, but Ohio's John Kasich may have just crossed a line he may want to reconsider.

Ohio, like other states, runs a liquor concession for anything harder than beer or wine. The profits from that concession go directly back to the state. It's one of the few bright spots in an otherwise miserably sad revenue stream, especially after Kasich's tax cut plans.

In accordance with his "laser-focused" jobs strategy which included killing a high-speed rail project among other things, Kasich has introduced legislation to create an agency for job creation called Jobs Ohio. Here's a January description of the plan:

Duffy said House Bill 1 is still being crafted and few specifics were available. The governor's office said Jobs Ohio will be run by a nine-member board, with the governor serving as chairman. Board members will be appointed to four-year terms by the governor and will be compensated for expenses only.

Board members will be bound by ethics guidelines similar to those regulating university trustees, Kasich said. The board will produce an annual report, hold four public meetings a year, and "they will be closed at times in executive session to discuss specific issues because you don't want to be negotiating out in the public," Kasich said.

The names and salaries of Jobs Ohio employees will be made public, Kasich said, assuring that transparency "is really important."

The House bill will appropriate $1 million to start-up Jobs Ohio, but Kasich said he will seek private funding for it.

"Part of it will be public, part of it will be private," Kasich said. "Ultimately, we hope to push it into the all for private."

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There are small evils and big ones. Focus on the Family is, in my view, a big one. Besides promoting child-beating as a method of keeping your little darlings in line, they are the most homophobic people on the planet. Dobson (even though he is no longer affiliated with them in an official capacity) made a point out of doing everything he could possibly do to make gays and lesbians look like Satan.

The newest FotF "concern" is that gay activist groups are "bullying" schoolchildren:

As kids head back to school, conservative Christian media ministry Focus on the Family perceives a bully on the playground: national gay-advocacy groups.

School officials allow these outside groups to introduce policies, curriculum and library books under the guise of diversity, safety or bullying-prevention initiatives, said Focus on the Family education expert Candi Cushman.

"We feel more and more that activists are being deceptive in using anti-bullying rhetoric to introduce their viewpoints, while the viewpoint of Christian students and parents are increasingly belittled," Cushman said.

Public schools increasingly convey that homosexuality is normal and should be accepted, Cushman said, while opposing viewpoints by conservative Christians are portrayed as bigotry.

In case you haven't seen what happens when children are taught that homosexuality isn't normal and shouldn't be accepted, let me introduce you to the story of Lawrence King.

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BLACK-BROWN TENSIONS IN LA

DAVEY D, FNV NEWSLETTER - For those of you reading this who live outside of Los Angeles you should note the that folks are on edge cause of increasing racial tension between blacks and Mexicans. Over the past month there have been a few brawls at local high schools which were widely reported on the news down here.

Now the tensions have been inflamed by a letter that has been circulating around the city claiming that in retaliation for some beef between black and latino gangs, 500 black kids wearing white t-shirts would be targeted and killed by Mexican gangs on Cinco de Mayo which is today. For the most part, the letter appears to be a hoax. Folks who work closely with the gangs down here have not heard of any craziness jumping off, but because the letter has been so widely circulated, it has led to some town hall meetings and increased police presence on all the high school campuses down here. A lot of parents are refusing to let their kids come to school...read on

Blessed are the sneaky bastards TBogg

Sometime back we referred to Mel Gibson's theological snuff film as Crouching Jesus, Hidden Agenda. Now reader Ed (no, not that Ed, the other one) provides us with a link where handy tips are provided for slipping Jesus through the eye of a needle cracks:

If you are worried that your local schools are teaching children that religion has no place in the study of biology, please consider donating biology-related books, posters, CDs, and DVDs with religious content to your school. These materials can be given to public libraries, too, and even directly to science teachers who can keep them in the classroom as convenient reference sources. Students benefit greatly from being exposed to alternatives to the theory of evolution, which is the bias of most textbooks used these days.

These donations are completely legal, and provide a very good way to provide balance in the school without formally challenging the agenda of the mainstream curriculum.

[...]

"These donations can also be tax deductible, but are best made anonymously so that a connection is not easily made to the religious affiliations of the donor. Purchases made at Amazon.com can be sent directly to the school's librarian." (my emphasis)

Oh. And if you want to have some fun, there's a contest to rename Intelligent Design. Why? Here's why:

As you know, lately we have enjoyed increasing success in getting religious explanations of life reintroduced into public school curricula, and we believe our strategy of "repackaging" every 10 years has been a critical contributor to this success. In particular, it has allowed our members to appear more "fair and balanced" at school board meetings.

Because appearing to be "fair and balanced" is much more important than actually being "fair and balanced".

Today was the first day of the Texas State Board of Education meeting to approve the modified curriculum standards for Social Studies. (See backstory here and here). Over 200 people have stepped up to testify before the final vote begins. Texas Freedom Network's live blog of the meeting has some interesting tidbits to share.

From LiveBlog 1:

• Former Bush education secretary Rod Paige urges a delay on the vote.

  9:27 – Paige: “We have allowed ideology to drive and define the standards of our curriculum in Texas. It has swung from liberal to conservative.” (We’re waiting for evidence that the Republican-dominated board and then-Gov. Bush’s education commissioner in 1998 adopted “liberal” curriculum standards.) The swing has been too broad, Paige says.

• Texas State Representatives Dan Flynn and Wayne Christian say "Take a vote."
  

  Flynn and Christian are still at the podium answering various questions from board members. They both continue to call on the board to adopt the standards on Friday and “respect the process.” Their argument is that the process so far has been just fine and that the board should finish its work on schedule. But the process hasn’t been fine. The board has essentially jettisoned the work of educators and scholars who spent a year carefully crafting the new standards. The question is whether standards should be based on the work of educators and academic experts or handful of politicians on the state board.

From LiveBlog #2:

• Accusations fly about "religious cleansing" in public schools.

  11:23 – Kelly Shackelford, head of the Liberty Institute/Free Market Foundation, the Texas affiliate of the far-right Focus on the Family, is up. Shackelford argues that the words “separation of church and state” aren’t in the Constitution. Neither, we might say, is “fair trial,” “separation of powers” “checks and balances” and other basic constitutional principles. Shackelford thinks “separation of church” is being used to “abuse” the freedom of students. He wants students to contrast the intent of the Founders (or what he believes was the intent of the Founders) who wrote the Constitution with the phrase “separation of church and state.”

  11:32 – Board member David Bradley calls separation of church and state a “myth.” He notes that the Ten Commandments adorn federal buildings like the Supreme Court.

  11:34 – Shackelford: There are people who want to engage in a “religious cleansing” in this country. He argues that students are being punished for expressing their faith in public schools.

  I ask myself, what do these claims have to do with teaching Social Studies in public schools?

• Promoting American "exceptionalism"
  

  Moore is arguing about the importance of promoting “American exceptionalism.” He claims that university professors earlier this year were testifying before the board in favor of socialism as the preferred “form of government” for America.

  Does it get any more paranoid than this?

Moving on to LiveBlog #3...

An interesting exchange between a University of Texas professor and Cynthia Dunbar, one of the most conservative members of the board:

5:08 – Prof. Julio Noboa, a social studies professor at the University of Texas at El Paso who served on the high school U.S. history curriculum writing team, is up. He’s very critical of the many changes board members made to the standards his team proposed. In fact, the American history standards have been among the most heavily revised by the board among all social studies classes. Prof. Noboa calls many of the changes a “whitewash” of problems and challenges in American history.

5:30 – Board member Cynthia Dunbar is challenging Prof. Noboa’s contention that the United States is a democracy. America has vastly expanded voting rights, making it far more democratic than in the nation’s early decades, Prof. Noboa says. He notes that Dunbar’s contention that the United States is a republic is too narrow — a republic is simply a nation without a hereditary monarchy and doesn’t truly describe what the United States is today.

From the live blogs, it appears that the number of public comments is definitely slowing things down a bit. According to TFN, about 10% of the people who appeared to testify have been heard. However, a good number of people made their voices heard during the lunch break today, when public education supporters held a "Don't White-Out our History" rally in front of the Texas Education Administration building.

I'll bring more as it rolls in....

Download | play Download | play (h/t Heather)

I try very hard to be tolerant of others' beliefs. I don't pretend to have all the answers and I certainly don't want to begrudge others answers that work for them. However, I draw the line at the whole false equivalence of the Intelligent Design/Evolution argument. In fact, even though I recognize it goes against the Constitution, I'm not sure that shouldn't be a test for elected office: If you feel that the idea of Intelligent Design (which can not be proven in any kind of scientific way) should be taught alongside with evolution (which is as much a theory as gravity is), then you do not belong in a position where you can make that decision.

Which makes Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal all that more frightening for being on the short list for the Republican Veepstakes. On Face the Nation, Jindal tells guest host Chip Reid that even though we should teach our kids at the highest levels of science, it's wrong to "withhold" from them the concept of Intelligent Design.

As a parent, when my kids go to schools, when they go to public schools, I want them to be presented with the best thinking. I want them to be able to make decisions for themselves. I want them to see the best data. I personally think that the life, human life and the world we live in wasn't created accidentally. I do think that there's a creator. I'm a Christian. I do think that God played a role in creating not only earth, but mankind. Now, the way that he did it, I'd certainly want my kids to be exposed to the very best science. I don't want them to be--I don't want any facts or theories or explanations to be withheld from them because of political correctness. The way we're going to have smart, intelligent kids is exposing them to the very best science and let them not only decide, but also let them contribute to that body of knowledge.

Really? Should we also let students "decide" on whether the theory of gravity makes more sense to them than the notion of a benevolent God moving us around on puppet strings? Does that contribute to the body of scientific knowledge?

Transcripts below the fold:

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We love The General. Frank Schaeffer at Huffpo, h/t Mike:

Every Sunday thousands of right wing white preachers (following in my father's footsteps) rail against America's sins from tens of thousands of pulpits. They tell us that America is complicit in the "murder of the unborn," has become "Sodom" by coddling gays, and that our public schools are sinful places full of evolutionists and sex educators hell-bent on corrupting children. They say, as my dad often did, that we are, "under the judgment of God." They call America evil and warn of immanent destruction. By comparison Obama's minister's shouted "controversial" comments were mild.

...Was any conservative political leader associated with Dad running for cover? Far from it. Dad was a frequent guest of the Kemps, had lunch with the Fords, stayed in the White House as their guest, he met with Reagan, [and]...became a hero to the evangelical community and a leading political instigator.

Read more...

Michigan Messenger has the latest information.

And according to MM, weather conditions are not conducive to high turn-out. Many parts of the state were blanketed in 3 to 5 inches of sloppy, wet snow overnight, with schools being closed in some areas.

UPDATE: This site, Pick Your President has been measuring online votes in key states: California, Colorado, Michigan, Ohio, Washington and Wisconsin. Call me skeptical, but it looks like there may be some gaming of the polls by a few ardent supporters.

Of course there's a New Hampshire Primary Open Thread here, but for the main open thread let's watch an issue-oriented video that will bring us down gently from Planet Primary. Actors Jack Klugman and James Whitmore have recorded these spots in support of separation of church and state. These religious freedom ads will run this week in South Carolina (heh), and the accompanying website has ten sample questions for voters to ask candidates, such as "Do you think public schools should sponsor school prayer or, as a parent, should this choice be left to me?" and, "Do you think my pharmacist should be allowed to deny me doctor-based prescribed medications based on his or her religious beliefs?" You can watch the other ads here.

Generic Open Thread below, and again, the New Hampshire Primary open thread is here.