Banned/Censored in the USA

That poem is full of lies, half-truths and spurious logic.

...counting down the seconds until RMTex, andymoon or Woofer blames this on Ashcroft....

 

So are all of your posts here, yet you haven't been banned....

 

Ho, ho ho! I simply express opinions here, Sam. I rarely make personal attacks, Sam,something that is a bannable offense. You just made a personal attack. Many liberals attack me personally everday. Yet you, Sam, think *I'm* the one who should be banned? That's laughable Sam!

In other news: They found the STRADIVARIUS!!! You can rest easy now, Sam!!.

Stolen Stradivarius cello almost ended up as CD holder, police say
Wednesday, May 19, 2004 Posted: 1:16 AM EDT (0516 GMT)


LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- A nurse found a 320-year-old cello made by master craftsman Antonio Stradivari lying by a trash bin -- and almost had her boyfriend convert it into a CD holder, police said Tuesday.

The $3.5 million instrument was returned to the Los Angeles Philharmonic Association on Monday after sitting unrecognized for days in the home of Melanie Stevens, 29, who found it on her way to visit a patient.

Stevens discovered the cello about a mile from where it was stolen, still inside its silver-coated plastic case.

Detective Donald Hrycyk said Stevens asked her boyfriend, a cabinetmaker, to either repair the instrument or convert it into a unique CD holder. She said she didn't know its significance until she noticed a news report May 7.

"It's an incredible miracle that somebody actually found it and returned it. Can you imagine it going into a garbage truck?" said the philharmonic's associate principal cellist, Daniel Rothmuller, who played the instrument for more than 25 years.

Its return was a relief for philharmonic principal cellist Peter Stumpf, who accidentally left it outside his home. Nearby video surveillance cameras showed a bicyclist stole it April 25.

"It's been an enormous weight on me for the last three weeks," Stumpf said. "I'm just incredibly relieved that it's solved."

However, detectives are still looking for the thief and have not ruled out any suspects. They plan an investigation before deciding whether to give Stevens the $50,000 reward offered by an anonymous donor, Hrycyk said.

The prospect the prized instrument could have been turned into a CD holder "is so abominable. I get sick when I hear it," said Robert Cauer, a Los Angeles-based expert instrument restorer.

The 1684 cello was one of only about 60 made by Stradivari in his Cremona, Italy, workshop. The philharmonic association bought it about three decades ago.

The cello -- nicknamed the "General Kyd" for the man who brought it to England from Italy near the end of the 18th century -- is cracked on the front, back and upper rib, but there is no crack in the critical rear soundpost, Cauer said.

He said the cello should be ready to play by October.

 

I thought Kerry was out of high school

 

No, I'm not. I apologize for Sam trying to derail your thread with a personal attack.

I think that poem was pure garbage and meant to inflame. I'm personally happy they took corrective action.

 

This is absolutely sad. A high school student has the temerity to write their opinion and a teacher gets fired for it??? They have now banned poetry readings in class???

This country is getting more and more insane every day.

 

Apparently TJ and other Nazi-facist bums out there believe the first amendment applies to only themselves. I hope she and the teacher sue the school district for the hypocrites they are.

Hiding behind the flag just to push your own personal agenda is pretty f***ing lame.
And if you don't like what she says don't listen.The school district just screwed the pooch on this one, by trying to get rid of their problem, they just created more for themselves.

 

I've got a better idea, T_J. Please point out for the unenlightened among us exactly which lines of the poem are "lies, half-truths and spurious logic".

 

Whether the poem is true, half-true, good, bad, etc. isn't the issue. If making bad poetry was punishible their would be more prisons than schools. Suspending the student was actually a bigger attack on America and what it stands for than the student's poem was. There are people who don't seem to understand the struggle for our nation's independence, the documents governing our nation, and the principles this country was founded on, making decisions about how country is run.

Something is very wrong, and if we truly do love freedom, we need to stop that kind of maladjusted authority in it's tracks.

 

Very good points FB, why don't you read those TJ?

 

What do the people who would fire teachers over a poem like this, or those that support their actions, value about our country other than its capitalist economic system. Seriously.

 

Funny thing about No Child Left Behind.

Wasn't it based on Governor GWB's plan in Texas? Didn't they tout how great education reforms were working in Houston, only to find information was misreported to skew the results? This news coming out only after Rod Paige, formerly of Texas Board of Ed, was elevated to Sec of Ed?

Or am I mixing apples and oranges in education reform plans?

I wonder if No Child Left Behind has the same sort of misleading title as compassionate conservatism.

 

NM is weird about stuff like that, maybe just weird in general...

 

White House Is Trumpeting Programs It Tried to Cut
By ROBERT PEAR

Published: May 19, 2004

ASHINGTON, May 18 — Like many of its predecessors, the Bush White House has used the machinery of government to promote the re-election of the president by awarding federal grants to strategically important states. But in a twist this election season, many administration officials are taking credit for spreading largess through programs that President Bush tried to eliminate or to cut sharply.

For example, Justice Department officials recently announced that they were awarding $47 million to scores of local law enforcement agencies for the hiring of police officers. Mr. Bush had just proposed cutting the budget for the program, known as Community Oriented Policing Services, by 87 percent, to $97 million next year, from $756 million.
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The administration has been particularly energetic in publicizing health programs, even ones that had been scheduled for cuts or elimination.

Tommy G. Thompson, the secretary of health and human services, announced recently that the administration was awarding $11.7 million in grants to help 30 states plan and provide coverage for people without health insurance. Mr. Bush had proposed ending the program in each of the last three years.

The administration also announced recently that it was providing $11.6 million to the states so they could buy defibrillators to save the lives of heart attack victims. But Mr. Bush had proposed cutting the budget for such devices by 82 percent, to $2 million from $10.9 million.

Whether they involve programs Mr. Bush supported or not, the grant announcements illustrate how the administration blends politics and policy, blurring the distinction between official business and campaign-related activities.

In recent weeks, administration officials have fanned out around the country. Within a 48-hour period this month, Treasury Secretary John W. Snow was in Wisconsin and Illinois, doling out federal aid to poor neighborhoods. Anthony J. Principi, the secretary of veterans affairs, was in Las Vegas to announce plans for a new veterans hospital. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham was in South Carolina to announce a new national research laboratory. And a top transportation official was in Portland, Me., awarding a $13 million grant to the city's airport.

In some cases, overtly political appearances are piggybacked onto such trips. Earlier this month, Mr. Principi was in Florida announcing plans for another veterans hospital, in Orlando, with a side trip to Tampa to kick off a national coalition of veterans supporting the re-election of Mr. Bush.

A few days earlier, while traveling to Marco Island, Fla., on official business, Commerce Secretary Donald L. Evans stopped in Daytona Beach to attend a large prayer meeting, where he praised Mr. Bush as "a leader you can trust 100 percent of the time."

The combination of official business and politics is neither illegal nor unusual in an election year, though Bush administration officials were reluctant to provide details. In fact, the Bush administration is using techniques refined by President Bill Clinton. The difference is that in the Clinton years the White House was often trying to add and expand domestic programs, not cut them.

The government has byzantine rules for documenting mixed official and political travel. The goal is to ensure that the campaign or some other political group pays for parts of a trip that are purely political.

But as the General Accounting Office, an investigative arm of Congress, has said, "it is often impossible to neatly categorize travel as either purely business or purely political."

Ron Bonjean, a spokesman for Mr. Evans, said the Republican National Committee paid for the commerce secretary's stop in Daytona Beach on May 6. A local newspaper, The News-Journal, said the prayer meeting there "evolved into a rousing Republican political rally."

The contrast between politics and policy is particularly striking when the administration takes credit for spending money appropriated by Congress against the president's wishes.

In April, Secretary Thompson announced that the administration was awarding $3.1 million in grants to improve health care in rural areas of Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Iowa, New Mexico and New York. He did not mention that the administration was trying to cut the same rural health program by 72 percent, to $11.1 million next year, from $39.6 million.

Mr. Thompson likewise recently boasted that the administration was awarding $16 million to 11 universities to train blacks and Hispanic Americans as doctors, dentists and pharmacists. But at the same time, the administration was urging Congress to abolish the program, on the ground that "private and corporate entities" could pay for training.

Alberto R. Gonzales, the White House counsel, has sent a memorandum to Cabinet officers saying they must carefully allocate travel costs between the government and the campaign.
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"There is considerable room for discretion in determining whether an event giving rise to an expense is political or official," Mr. Gonzales wrote. Ultimately, he said, the decision depends on the facts of each case.

Interior Department lawyers said that Secretary Gale A. Norton had made eight entirely political trips and 17 trips combining official business with political activity, for which the government was reimbursed. The political sponsor typically pays a share of the costs, based on the amount of time spent on political activity, said Timothy S. Elliott, a lawyer at the department.

Last month, on a trip to Alaska, Ms. Norton attended two fund-raisers, in Juneau and Anchorage. "It's always beneficial to have members of the cabinet at these events," said Randy Ruedrich, chairman of the Republican Party of Alaska.

A trip to Minneapolis by Education Secretary Rod Paige shows a similar mix. John M. Gibbons, a spokesman for the secretary, said Mr. Paige went to a Republican fund-raiser there on Feb. 17, then visited schools the next day.

On March 13, Mr. Paige made a political trip to Orlando for a Republican dinner. He was back in Florida for a Bush-Cheney fund-raiser in Fort Lauderdale on March 26 and for the annual conference of the National School Boards Association, in Orlando, on March 28-29.

Likewise, Anthony T. Jewell, a spokesman for Mr. Thompson, said the health secretary attended a Republican fund-raiser on April 22 while visiting Detroit to promote organ donation.

The precedents for such activity run deep. Phillip M. Caplan, who was a special assistant to President Clinton, said the Clinton White House had a weekly conference call with chiefs of staff at Cabinet departments.

"We would tell officials, for example, that the president will be in Ohio on the 27th of this month, so you should scour the agency, and if you have something coming up in Ohio, let us know," Mr. Caplan recalled. "The announcement of grants was timed to coincide with the president's visit. The goal was to maximize the credit and visibility for the president."

Scott M. Stanzel, a spokesman for the Bush campaign, said: "The law sets forth clear guidelines as to how costs should be allocated. We adhere to the guidelines. We pay travel and other costs for government officials participating in political events."

 

How anyone can read the article rH posted and agree with the actions of the principal is beyond me.

This is going to court (ACLU leading the fight), he will lose his job, the teacher(s) will get reinstated with back pay, and everyone will hopefully learn something.

And to whoever the hell said it earlier, calling people "nazis" is ****ing r****ded, and shows every bit the level of ignorance you seem to decry.

 

Lines 1-80.

That poem just proves we need capital punishment, and it needs to be applied to high school "poets".

 

Are conservatives so insecure about the beliefs that they have to enforce them? It wouldn't even occur to me that a teacher should be fired or a student suspended for writing a poem with a rightwing slant. This is the definition of Politically Correct ridiculousness.

 

Yes. This is the same group here in the last couple of days that's hoped for a man's heart attack and has a signature rejoicing the death of four students 30+ years ago. And no conservative has said anything against them. Typical...