Startling news from the wonderful world of education! It turns out that more classrooms are using the incredible variety of news sources and viewpoints available on the internet than are using the local newspaper. No wonder there, rather than students dragging around whatever biases are inhererent to the local news outlet, a savvy teacher can demonstrate issues like bias by contrasting worldwide coverage. CNN, NY Times, LA Times, Chicago Tribune, Washington Post, and a dozen English language publications from foreign nations are just a click away. Google news can give you 50 different spins on one story in half a second. (Oh yeah, and it saves paper.)
News flash: some parents feel seeming pure is more important than being alive. Apparently, potentially saving your daughters’ lives is controvertial. There is a vaccine that prevents most cervical cancer. But because the virus it prevents can be transmitted through the dreaded sex, some parents think it’s unneccessary. Because goodness knows Good Girls are never raped, and never ever have unfaithful husbands.
Don’t get me started. Here’s an item called Who Would Jesus Deport. Short version, “Waah! Let’s be nice to immigrants! Under these rules Mary and Joseph would be deported!” Reality break: Jesus said to render unto Caesar that which was Caesars, by which he meant to follow the laws where you are; furthermore since Mary and Joseph were travelling under a royal commandment to present themselves for tax assessment, no they wouldn’t have been deported. If you’re going to quote the Bible, at least get it right!
Can’t find what you’re looking for? Maybe you need a new search engine. Here’s a hundred of them to try.
“Mah House! I’m the decider!” The President is tightening his grip, and asserting that a host of agencies answers to him. Sounds to me like a showdown is inevitable.
Two items on food and eating. First, what many of you already know, it’s darn hard to eat a quality diet of healthy foods on a budget. As a follow up, Healthy eating and the federal school lunch program. The take away quote in a sea of important details, “Currently, 78 percent of schools in America do not meet USDA nutritional guidelines.” So an important thing to remember about the 39% of children who are in low income families, which includes 18% of children who are in poor families, is that 78% of them can’t even get a USDA approved quality meal in the school student lunch program. Oh, and if you are one of those people who has a hard time making the food budget work out, you might try some of the tips from the Hillbilly Housewife.
And finally…
Maybe if we stop treating everybody like a potential terrorist there will be more tourism. Really? D’ya think? The travel industry says travel to the United States is down because there’s not enough officials at border posts, the officials that are there “bark” at travelers, and travelers simply feel unwelcome. This results in an estimated loss to the United States economy of “$94 billion in economic gains, some 200,000 newly created jobs, and $16 billion in tax revenue.” That is to say absolutely nothing of international opinion of America and Americans. Federal officials reply: “If, God forbid, there’s another terrorist attack … travel to our country would come to a standstill. And then, I believe, they would find themselves in a much worse position.” It is unknown if the official actually added the words “oooga booga!” or “look out!”
Would we as a nation rather be the sum of our hopes, or the sum of our fears?
The Hillbilly Housewife thing looks cool. She talks about a vegetarian Kibee; my lebanese gramma used to make it out of lamb… but times theyare a changin and i guess i may give it a try.
The sum of a bunch of dolts… those kinds of noble axioms have largely been lost, nee? and a wreckless and breathless rush for anything that suggests “security”
prevails. (kinda feels like a clammy cupped palm on my “parts” rather security.)
Apropos: The cervical cancer vaccine. More than rape and infidelity. Can a good girl marry a guy that didn’t save himself for marriage? Can a good girl get drunk at a party and make a mistake? No I guess not, Jesus protects against any and all misjudgments and I would suppose those that oppose the vaccine would presume that the wages of sin are death. So There.
Mind you attitudes will change when someone like one of the Bush twins develops cervical cancer and has to have a hysterectomy at age 22. Enjoy the part that is chemotherapy and narrowly escape death. Then perhaps some of the right wing will come around and decide that maybe this vaccine is a good idea.
ModDoctor:
Although you list some excellent examples, I was specifically trying to use examples that were absolutely clearly *not* the Good Girl’s fault.
By way of follow up, the ultra conversative Governor of Texas has ordered that all schoolgirls of a certain age have the vaccine. He sees it as a public health issue that would otherwise cost a whole lot of money to treat. If Molly Ivins were still with us, she might have argued it was the smartest thing he’d ever done (RIP, Molly).