March 2015

With only several weeks of school left in this term it’s now important to do this testing and ascertain how students have progressed in their studies. “Common Core Standards, drafted by experts and teachers across the country, are clear, consistent guidelines for what every student should know in all the subjects from kindergarten through 12th grade.  Common Core focuses on developing the critical thinking, problem-solving, and analytical skills students will need to be successful” in this ever-increasingly mobile and demanding world.  Students are entering colleges and businesses that expect more than ever before.  Students who move from state to state, or even internationally, need to be prepared for what’s expected of them at every level of education.  Forty-three states have adopted Common Core Standards.  “Common Core Standards are the best opportunity in a generation to put American students on a path to personal and professional success.”  And we need to get behind our students and teachers and do all we can to assist them.

Must not be that important to her followers because Hillary is trouncing the 2016 Republican “hopeful wannabes”, but I’m sure you Faux Noise viewers won’t hear about the latest opinion poll numbers.  The issue is all Repub-hype, the newest strategy of the Benghazi investigators, who couldn’t find anything more relevant to throw at her.  Hillary responded by turning over 55,000 emails stemming from her duties as the U.S. chief diplomat.  Supposedly there was no outright ban at the State Dept. on using a personal email address to conduct official government business, and Hillary has stated that she used a personal email acct for convenience, reasoning that all her communications to state staff went to the .gov server that would  automatically go into storage.  According to a new CNN/ORC poll Rand Paul comes closest at 43% saying they’d back him and Hillary is at 54%.  The Democratic primaries don’t begin for another eleven months, and the general election is still some 20 months away.  Hillary will be the clear front-runner so expect a lot more mud-slinging.

Missouri has a long history of mistreating blacks.  Deep changes need to occur in Missouri law, in our psyches, and in police departments throughout our nation.  Better training for officers and brass, more diversity in hiring, and more accountability are crucial.  The Justice Dept. found overt profiling in Ferguson, Mo. and flat-out bigotry. From excessive fines, warrants, harassment and exploitation of blacks to questionable use of deadly force, we can see that racism dies hard!   Government sanctioned or sponsored prejudice and hate implemented to influence neighbor against neighbor led to millions of Jews being cast from their homes, robbed of their wealth and possessions, and ultimately murdered in public group displays or sent off to camps to be exterminated.  What within makes us able to be so callous in our attitudes and treatment of others?  There was the Jewish Holocaust and the Native American Indian Holocaust.  There’s also been a “Black Holocaust”!  Since slave days millions of  blacks have been tortured and murdered, many behind the scenes; many are being unjustly imprisoned still, and even now, sometimes unarmed, they can be shot down in our streets, their deaths justified by officers who are sworn to serve and protect our citizenry.  “We must be the change we would see in the world”, said Ghandi.  I say, It’s high time!  Let’s change it up!  Jesus admonished us to “Love one another!”  He also asked us to “Love your neighbor as yourself!”

I like the idea; to give an incentive to developers to build new housing is a win-win–win for the developers, the city and for the new home-buyers coming to the Galesburg area, which is in need of more high-end housing, especially if the purpose is to increase property tax revenue and attract bigger business owners and employers.   I’d also like to see an incentive program to help other buyers renovate existing homes and buildings — to improve and beautify the neighborhoods, ultimately bringing in more tax monies, and reducing the number of abandoned buildings in and around our Burg.