I have been pretty status quo since was a very young man.
And I have to reiterate what my topic says..." What did they ever do to you?"
I have been a registered Republican since 1976 when I voted in my very first election, a Presidential Election I voted for Gerald R. Ford....and have voted GOP since then.
And while I have kept some fairly standard Republican issues....
Strong 2nd Amendment...I still have a problem with most abortions, but in the case of rape, incest, health, I am more lenient than many of those in the GOP and in recent years I have been questioning some of my fellow Republicans, we seem to care more about a kid before they are born, than afterwards.
I have changed in the last few years concerning my views on gay-marriage. Sorry folks, life is short, people are just trying to be happy. Let them marry.
I have also had a change in my views on drugs...it might be time to legalize a number of them. The drug war has been going on for 60+ years and it has hasn't worked.
I know some of your political views are in line with your Biblical views, but you know, many of you " pick and choose" what you want to "go after" God forbid you actually see what Jesus said about money....or loving your neighbor...or what God says about things such gluttony. Or divorce, churches were all up in people's business about divorce until Reagan was elected. Heck Reagan had divorced Jane Wyman and married Nancy Davis, after Nancy was 5 months pregnant...but Ron Reagan was "our boy" and afterward, the view on divorce changed.
But this attack and I can't think of calling it anything else, started about 7-8 years ago, this attack started on teachers. They were saying," teachers only work part-time, we all are union members ( not in Texas, no collective bargaining) we're all Democrats( I know plenty of Texas Republican teachers), we all suck at our jobs, yadda yadda".and of course this attack was lead by Fox News.
This of course was the reason why we needed all these state tests, we need to let public sector take over and make money off your kids, etc..."because public school teachers suck...."
The 2017 Session the Texas Legislature is pushing vouchers for people to attend private and church schools and in many cases these private/religious schools won't be held to the same standards of the public school. This money will be taken away from public schools.
They( the private/church) can take whatever kid they want. If you child is autistic or has Asperger's or is dyslectic, or is a special needs child, the private school, church school can reject them...they can even establish who they hire as teachers, non-certified, no college degree, shoot, they could even hire a person with a 9th grade education to teach.
The biggest concern I have is for these religious schools.
There is a step back in our churches. Science is now evil. There are churches now, and I am serious that are pushing the literal Biblical interpretations...including
The earth is only 6,000 years old. Either there were no dinosaurs, that dinosaur fossils, bones were put here by Satan to trick us into believing the earth is older than 6,000 years old, or that in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve were riding around on the dinosaurs, sort of like we ride horses today.
Sorry, but some of these people and you may think this isn't true they take it literally flat. And they use about 50+ verses to back up their beliefhttp://www.testingtheglobe.com/bible.html.
These will be Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Atheists, Satanist ( and trust me, watch, these will be started, my money is on Austin for the last two)
In the last 6 months, I was asked by a man in the community to stop his "church school" and see " how well they were doing."
So, I did. 20-25 kids in what amounted to a 1 room school. The "teachers" had no college degrees, and used basically home school programs.
There is nothing wrong with home schooling programs. As many of you know we home-schooled our child for a could of years in his 7-8th grade years. Now, we used a pretty serious academic program, based on classical training, had philosophy and Classics as part of the program, but that is just us, it came out of the UK.
The church's program might have worked, but there was so much of the curriculum either skipped over or ignored or just not taught well and I looked at the kids in high school and the level they were at was maybe 4th-6th grade. Maybe. Two were about the graduate.( I just smiled and left)
They would be eligible for the state's vouchers.
Perhaps the thing that disturbs me the most is not the vouchers in major cities, but what would happen to rural public schools. How much money would be lost because XYZ Church deciding to set up a school in their back "education" room and the money being taken away from the Buna ISD or Evadale ISD or any or 700+ other rural Texas school districts.
And what about the people who set up private schools trying to "make a dollar" out of education? How many of these schools will set up as LLC's, and once the tuition money is paid, the file bankruptcy?
Folks, public schools are under the gun here, maybe you say " well, we don't need to have them, or maybe people should be responsible for the own kid's education..." Just think...how well would that work for a percentage of the population? We'd insure generations of illiterates.
Buna ISD patron, be concerned, very concerned. You had teachers laid off year due to students leaving the district. You have a massive bond you just passed and you just voted on this summer a change in how funding is distributed. Say what you want, you're on the hook for making this all work.
Buna patrons, you need to worry. Teachers you need to worry.
I have been a good Republican my entire life, I spent my career teaching kids in public schools, and this is what the state legislature thinks about us.
Say what you want, but most communities revolve the local public school. It is how people assimilate in many cases.
I know I often blast the mess out of Buna ISD, and to be honest, while Buna actually is a pretty darn good district, there are people within it not doing there best, and to be honest, I wonder if they just can't, or if they want to just do enough to " get by..." And the kids know who these teachers are...and you do too...( Private schools and church schools have the same problem. Part of it is finding people to do the job....Part of it is just like public schools, politics. And many of you in business know there's politics going on where work...)
But, I digress.
This may upset some of you, but I may need to look at how I vote in the future....teachers, you do too...
Times are changing, and teachers, public schools are in the cross-hairs. And to be honest, I do not know what we've done so wrong...