A Topic for Discussion...Handicaps and Politics

When you stop for a moment and consider Franklin Delano Roosevelt you have to be amazed and filled with awe that a man who had suffered through such a tremendous physical tragedy as he did during the summer of 1921 was able to rise to the highest office in the land given prevailing opinions concerning the disabled at that time.

FDR contracted polio…or what was thought to be polio while on vacation and even though various cures never worked to restore his legs he also never accepted the fact his paralysis was permanent and constantly felt he was getting better.   Many state today his paralysis might have been from the effects of Guillain-Barre Syndrome and not Polio, but no matter the cause FDR was what our society deems as handicapped.

Yet, at the time of his death in 1945 and for years afterward very few Americans knew the full extent of FDR’s physical limitations.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt....one of three public photos showing him in his wheel chair

Once he entered the political fray again he was very careful not to allow the general public to see him in his wheel chair.    The picture I’ve shared here is only one of three that exist showing his chair.  He worked very hard at manufacturing a type of walk to appear as normal as possible.  Using iron braces on his legs he twisted his torso back and forth while using a cane for support.   FDR’s sons generally accompanied their farther on public appearances and walked by his side to support him.  His arrivals and departures from public events were orchestrated so that FDR was never seen getting in or out of his vehicle. 

By 1929, FDR was governor of New York….by 1932 he was running for President of the United States.

So, how was this done?   In a September, 1978 article in Reviews in American History dealing with  general opinions regarding the handicapped in years gone by P.K. Longmore advises handicapped people were kept at home, out of sight, and in back bedrooms by families who felt a mixture of embarrassment and shame in their presence.   It’s hard to fathom today, but it was true, and FDR knew this.  He didn’t want to appear weak or as H.G. Gallagher states in FDR’s Splendid Deception, “Those with disabilities were viewed as flawed in moral character as well as body.”

Knowing this FDR and his family as well as close supporters opted to hide his disability as much as possible, and the media allowed this.   It was a different time.   There was line drawn between someone’s personal life and their political one.   In fact, political cartoons actually showed FDR running, jumping, and even leaping, and many thought he actually could.

So, would it have been possible during the early half of the Twentieth Century for someone in a wheel chair to be elected to public office?    Obviously FDR thought it would be an issue for him.   It was a personal decision to obscure the fact as much as possible.  

But….paralyzed men were elected to public office during the 1920s including seats in our Congress.

Meet William D. Upshaw or “Earnest Willie” as folks in the Fifth Congressional District in Georgia knew him.    

William D. "Earnest Willie" Upshaw...

Yes, Congressman Upshaw is in a wheelchair.   At the age of 18 he fell on the crosspiece of a farm wagon and was paralyzed from the waist down until very late in his life.   I discovered Upshaw’s story while researching and writing about local history where I live.   You can read more about Upshaw’s entry into political life at my local history blog titled Every Now and Then here.

As I learned more about the Upshaw story I had to think about how interesting it would be to discuss with students how President Roosevelt  endured his handicap….how he decided to obscure his condition from the public while contrasting Congressman Upshaw who didn’t hide inability to walk at all….from anyone.   One of the most interesting facets to the story concerns both men as they both……yes, BOTH of them……ran for president in 1932.   Upshaw was a staunch Prohibitionist and was the candidate for the Prohibition Party.

The dynamic begs for examination, doesn’t it?    Two handicapped men running for president during an era when the disabled were shunned and kept out sight and many felt their morality was in question.  Upshaw chose to be out in the open…..while FDR didn’t. 

  

It should make for some interesting discussion in the classroom, don’t you think?

Bullets and Ballots

The song I’ve posted below isn’t as popular as Marvin Gaye’s hit “What’s Going On?”, but it is from the same album….the first of its kind for Motown…a concept album.





Gaye wrote the songs during a time of great depression when he isolated himself from the outside world.  This site explains....Through television news broadcasts, Gaye saw the racial, political, and social problems that were plaguing the world, manifestations from the explosion of political and social activism that took place during the late ‘60s. As he wallowed in his seclusion, Gaye read letters from his brother Frankie serving in the Vietnam War. They described the confusion and frustration he and other soldiers felt fighting in a war that had no just cause. Many black soldiers at the time felt doubly conflicted, drafted to fight and die for a country that refused to accept them because of the color of their skin. These observations, along with the loss of Tammi Terrell, motivated Gaye to question his role in the world and at Motown.

…The songs [from  the album] are told from the point of view of a black soldier returning home from fighting in a white man’s war. It is an unrecognizable America, filled with racial violence and uprisings, political strife and protests. The album is a question-inducing commentary about change, love, and hate.

The Vietnam War wasn’t the first war when soldiers came home to a changing landscape.  Many men and women returning from serving their country during World War II was met with changes as well….especially the solders from McMinn County, Tennessee
.

This site tells us….  In McMinn County, Tennessee, in the early 1940s, the question was not if you farmed, but where you farmed. Athens, the county seat, lay between Knoxville and Chattanooga along U.S. Highway 11, which wound its way through eastern Tennessee. This was the meeting place for farmers from all the surrounding communities. Traveling along narrow roads planted with signs urging them to “See Rock City” and “Get Right with God,” they would gather on Saturdays beneath the courthouse elms to discuss politics and crops. There were barely seven thousand people in Athens, and many of its streets were still unpaved. The two “big” cities some fifty miles away had not yet begun their inevitable expansion, and the farmers’ lives were simple and essentially unaffected by what they would have called the “modern world.” Many of them were without electricity. The land, their families, religion, politics, and the war dominated their talk and thoughts. They learned about God from the family Bible and in tiny chapels along yellow-dust roads. Their newspaper, the Daily Post-Athenian, told them something of politics and war, but since it chose to avoid intrigue or scandal, a story that smacked of both could be found only in the conversations of the folks who milled about the courthouse lawn on Saturdays.

During the Civil War, McMinn County favored the Union and it was strong Republican held community, but in the 1930s Tennessee began to fall under the control of Democratic bosses. To the west, in Shelby County, E.H. Crump, the Memphis mayor who had been ousted during his term for failing to enforce Prohibition, fathered what would become the state’s most powerful political machine. Crump eventually controlled most of Tennessee along with the governor’s office and a United States senator. In eastern Tennessee local and regional machines developed, which, lacking the sophistication and power of a Crump, relied on intimidation and violence to control their constituents.

In 1936 the system descended upon McMinn County in the person of one Paul Cantrell, the Democratic candidate for sheriff. Cantrell, who came from a family of money and influence in nearby Etowah, tied his campaign closely to the popularity of the Roosevelt administration and rode FDR’s coattails to victory over his Republican opponent.

As more and more of McMinn’s able-bodied men began to head off to war Cantrell was able to gain more power.  Cantrell was elected Sheriff in 1936, 1938, and 1940.  Then he decided to run for State Senate and was elected in 1942 and 1944.  His chief deputy, Pat Mansfield took Cantrell’s position as Sheriff.

Cantrell was able to get a bill passed through the state legislature redistricting the county from 23 voting precincts down to 12….basically eliminating any Republication opposition.  Voting machines were sold supposedly to save money, but basically it was done so that votes could be tampered with a little easier. 

There were continued charges of election fraud in the form of swapped ballot boxes and voter intimidation.  The Department of Justice investigated each election from 1940-44, but no action was taken. 
 

The sheriff’s department operated a fee system where they received a cut of the money for every person they booked, incarcerated and released.  Buses headed through the county would be pulled over….people were ticketed for drunkenness as a matter of habit….it didn’t matter if they were guilty or not.

The people felt they were powerless to fight Cantrell and his men. Cantrell had taken advantage of the fact that most of his opposition was away fighting the war.  McMinn citizens hoped once their soldiers returned home things would change.

Bill White, [a soldier] recalled coming home from overseas with mustering-out pay in his pocket: “There were several beer joints and honky-tonks around Athens; we were pretty wild; we started having trouble with the law enforcement at that time because they started making a habit of picking up GIs and fining them heavily for most anything—they were kind of making a racket out of it.

...At last the veterans chose to use the most basic right of the democracy for which they had gone to war: the right to vote. In the early months of 1946 they decided in secret meetings to field a slate of their own candidates for the August elections. In May they formed a nonpartisan political party.

Leading up to the election both sides made charges against the other and ultimately the powder keg erupted on Election Day.   Cantrell’s machine hired men from neighboring towns to “keep the peace”, but basically they were there to intimidate people as they walked around polling places with pistols and blackjacks.  As in past elections anyone who objected to anything were labeled as troublemakers.

Poll workers were attacked and one was thrown through a glass door. Before all was said and done 20 people would be hurt that day, 14 cars were overturned and burned, and the jail ended up being under siege for several hours by several townspeople/ex-soldiers. 

Just another Election Day, huh?

During the melee Cantrell and some of his men fled the town.   The next morning the twenty-five deputies attempting to hold the jail gave up and surrendered.   The story goes they were taken to the edge of town, stripped naked and told to keep walking.

Miraculously there had been no deaths. But on August 2 a page-one headline in The New York Times wrongly trumpeted the news: TENNESSEE SHERIFF is SLAIN IN PRIMARY DAY VIOLENCE. All day long reporters with cameras and notebooks poured into town to photograph, question, analyze, and write. And every newcomer passed the sign on Highway 11:  WELCOME TO ATHENS “The Friendly City”.

The “victory” of the veterans that night in August, 1946 appeared, at first, to have settled nothing. The national press was almost unanimous in condemning the action of the GIs. In an editorial perhaps best reflecting the ambivalence of a startled nation, The New York Times concluded: “Corruption, when and where it exists, demands reform, and even in the most corrupt and boss-ridden communities, there are peaceful means by which reform can be achieved. But there is no substitute, in a democracy, for orderly process.” The syndicated columnist Robert C. Ruark commented: “There is very little difference, essentially, between a vigilante and a member of a lynch mob, and if we are seeking an answer to crooked politics, the one that the Athens boys just propounded sure ain’t it.” Commonwealth cautiously compared the battle to the American Revolution, then went on to say that “nothing could be more dangerous both for our liberties and our welfare than the making of the McMinn County Revolution into a habit.”

On August 4 Pat Mansfield telegraphed his resignation as sheriff of McMinn County to Governor McCord and requested that Knox Henry fill his unexpired term, which would end on September 1. Henry was appointed immediately, and the next day State Rep. George Woods returned to the county under GI protection to convene the election commission and certify the election. A cheer rang out in the courthouse when Woods rose as the canvass ended and announced that Knox Henry was elected sheriff by a vote of 2,175 to 1,270. After their victory, GIs with machine guns waited for a Cantrell counterattack.

It never happened…….The Cantrell Machine in McMinn County had been quashed.

Henry Knox, the sheriff elected after the election 'war'

I guess my main point in bringing all this up is to say that it’s easy to think whatever issues our country is going through is something new….. wars, violence, racism, media spin, politics so polarized that nothing is done, conspiracy theories, conspiracy truths, talking heads spinning half-truths, being so busy thinking ahead to YOUR next point that you don’t HEAR the person across from you, and politicians so willing to hang on to the power of their office they are willing to make the so called solutions so convoluted that more chaos is created than solved.

Unfortunately, we haven’t learned from history, and our problems aren’t anything new…..we just have more outlets to throw the muck around instantly.

America is unrecognizable to me……

Just how polarized do things have to be before they get better?

What’s happening?

More Campaign Ads

Back in February during the height of the Presidential Primary process I created an article with several campaign ads and discussed a method to engage students in a method of comparing and contrasting ads.

Within the last few days both of the ads I present here today have appeared in my email box via friends. Both ads were created by private inviduals and both are powerful messages in their own right concerning Iraq.

The first message is pro McCain….make sure you stay with the video until the very end. The message was created by the young man seen in the video.



This ad favors Obama and was created by a group of San Diego State students as an assignment. As with the first ad stay with it until the end.....make sure you view the series of Iraq images.



I’ve recreated here from the original post in February the process I use with students to compare and contrast ads. In the next several days we will be bombarded with tons of quips, barps, mini-messages, and all-holds-barred commercials touting one candidate over another. Perhaps we all need to go through the same process my students have done in order to keep it real and not let these messages cloud the issues.

Here’s the process:

First using Ease History we begin by looking at campaign ads from the past. As we watch them we categorize the ads into the following categories----biographical, issue-oriented, values-laden, and negative. These terms come from a lesson plan at the website found here.

Once we have looked at several examples for each category I divide the class into groups. Each student receives a work sheet with the following questions (taken from this page):

Name:
Date:
Group Members:
Candidate in Ad:

1. How would you categorize your ad? (biographical, issue-oriented, value-laden, or negative)

2. Describe the language and tone of the ad? Is the narrator a male, female, or the candidate? Does the ad specify an action for the viewer (i.e. to elect the candidate, to visit the candidate’s website, to vote against the opponent)? How do language and tone shape the overall message?

3. How do words, images, color, music, camera angles, lighting, people, and symbols contribute to the message of the ad? Do you think they are effective?

4. Did this ad influence you? Did you learn from it? How did it appeal to you? How would you change it to make it more effective?During our look at past campaign ads I also provide opportunities for students to answer the questions they will encounter during the group portion of the activity so that once they are are on their own they are familiar with the direction I’m trying to take them.

This activity meets several of Georgia’s standards for Language Arts as well as Social Studies.So, now it’s time for me to hold your feet to the fire. It’s your turn…Which one appeals to you, if you dare. :)

Related Content: Comparing and Contrasting Campaign Ads

The Disease of Washington D.C.

Way back in June, 2007 I visited Mississippi and toured the home of James A. Quitman of “Halls of Montezuma” fame. Pictures from Quitman’s home, Monmouth, can be seen here while you can learn more about Quitman’s service to his county here. While I don’t agree with many of Quitman’s views I found it tragic that his service to his country ended earlier than it should. In my post I wrote:

Quitman’s work came to an end tragically after attending a dinner for James Buchanan. Poison was suspected after several men fell ill. Quitman lingered for sometime, but eventually died from what some state was National Hotel Disease. What’s that? Ah, another story for another time.

Perhaps now that both political parties have had their convention and running mates have been secured it is time to tell the story and revisit the climate of Washington D.C. in the past and in the present…..

In her book titled Reveille in Washington 1860-1865, Margaret Leech sets the stage on the eve of Buchanan’s inauguration which was held on March 4, 1857. She states:

….the city of Washington was a southern town, without the picturesqueness, but with the indolence, the disorder and the want of sanitation…Fish and oyster peddlers cried their wares and tooted their horns on the corners. Flocks of geese waddled on [Pennsylvania] Avenue, and hogs, of every size and color, roamed at large, making their muddy wallows on Capitol Hill…People emptied their slops and refuse in the gutters, and threw dead domestic animals in the canal. Most of the population still depended on the questionable water supply afforded by the wells and by the springs in the hills behind the city. Privies, in the absence of adequate sewage disposal, were plentiful in yards and dirty alleys....

Andrew Dickson White, a U.S. Diplomat, author, educator, and co-founder of Cornell University wrote in 1896 of our nation’s capitol:

The general impression made upon me at Washington was discouraging. It drove out from my mind the last lingering desire to take any part in politics. The whole life there was repulsive to me, and when I reflected that a stay of a few years in that forlorn, decaying, reeking city was the goal of political ambition, the whole thing seemed to me utterly worthless.

I visited Washington D.C. in May of this year, and while I did not find the physical city of Washington in the dire straights Leech relates, the aura of the town reeked of the sticky mud found at the spot which serves as middle ground for the give and take of a tug-of-war. It was so thick in the air you could cut the tension with a knife.

I can certainly agreee with Mr. White.

Why in the hell would anyone want to get into the political pool?

But, before I go down that road of why we should volunteer to run for political office I want to visit the National Hotel part of the story…….

The National Hotel sat at the corner of Pennsylvania Avenue and 6th Street. It was one of the city’s largest hotels. During the 1830s and 1840s, the hotel was known as Gadsby’s. For some reason by the 1850s it was the meet and greet place popular with Southerners who flocked to Washington to take place in the slavery debate during the 1850s…perhaps they served a mean bowl of grits…….I’m not sure.

Think back over the last two weeks and how the presidential nominees arrived at the convention hall a bit early to be on hand following the acceptance speech of their vice presidential nominees. When James Buchanan was nominated by the Democrats for the 1856 election he wasn’t even in the county……this actually made him attractive in that he had not sullied his hands with the struggle during the Kansas-Nebraska debate. Buchanan was in England when he was nominated on the 17th ballot. He didn’t want to run, but accepted the nomination as his cross to bear.

Buchanan won the election over the first Republican candidate for president, John C. Fremont. Though Buchanan was not born a Southerner he was as historian Kenneth Stamp (America in 1857: A Nation on the Brink) relates….a consummate “doughface”….meaning he was northern man with southern principles.

The nation was taking sides and doing so rapidly. Viewing Buchanan’s actions today and through our 21st Century eyes it can be said he simply didn’t get the political realities of the time. When he discussed the problem of slavery he returned time and time again to the Constitution (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing), but the North wouldn’t hear of any Constitutional arguments that favored the South, and he could not grasp the fact that sectionalism had taken hold and altered exisiting political parties. The Democrats had split in two….the Whig Party was no more….and the Republicans were still testing their legs.

While the Democrats argued that they had been poisoned by abolitionists a more sane reason for the outbreak has to do with the unsanitary conditions at the National Hotel and in the city of Washington itself. Many sources states the winter that year was particularly frigid and the hotel plumbing had frozen leading to a backup of sewage that overflowed and contaminated the hotel’s kitchen. Another theory suggested rats had drowned in the hotel’s cooking water.

President Buchanan held that secession was illegal, but if a war was fought over secession it would be illegal as well. Therefore…..he did nothing and his non-action is remembered as the worst single failure by a United States President.

At the pre-inauguration event held at the National Hotel many men had gathered to have dinner and make speeches with President-elect Buchanan. Many of those in attendance were Southerners. Afterwards a virulent strain of Dysentery broke out among many of the attendees including Buchanan.

Once the outbreak was realized the Southerners cried that a plot was afoot managed by the Republicans and their abolitionist friends to wipe out Democrats. Many of the stricken guests remained sick for months and even years. Several died. President Buchanan spent the first six weeks of his presidency in bed. Some of those who died were Mississippi Congressman, John Quitman (I referred to at the beginning of this post), Pennsylvania Congressman, John Gallagher Montgomery, and New Hampshire Senator John Parker Hale.

So, how does all of this relate to today’s Washington? As I stated before the hygiene of Washington is much better today, but the political climate?

It oozes of sickness on both sides of the aisle. I’m tired of the discussions, I’m tired of the finger-pointing, and I’m tired of the “got-chas”. I want my government to protect this nation, I want my government to stay out of my life as much as possible, I want campaign reform including getting a handle on the the various folks who lobby for a living, I want to keep more of my money meaning less pork, and I’m tried of attempting to solve every problem in American society by creating a governmental program.

While it will be nice to finally reach that finish line of voting day in November I fear the tug-of-war will not be over until the common man….you, me, and that guy over there standing on the corner rises up and tells those entrenched in our nation’s capitol to go home....but why would we want to do that? That would mean we would get involved, we would take responsibility, we would then have ownership of the problem.

Perhaps that is what this country needs.

The picture presented at the beginning of this post was taken during Buchanan's inauguration and is considered to be the first photograph of a presidential swearing-in.

Education Stance...Education Dance

First and foremost I’m a taxpayer, so how my tax dollar is used to provide our nation’s children the best possible public education is important to me. Next, I’m a parent. I want the best education I can get for my child. Finally, I’m an educator. Decisions made at the Federal and State level effects my job and my students.

While there are many issues being discussed between the presidential candidates, education is one the more important issues for me. The thing that gets me hot under the collar the most is the dance that is played out during each and every election cycle be it a presidential election, an election involving lawmakers, or my local school board.

It seems like they will promise you the Moon for your vote, doesn’t it?

I thought I’d take a few minutes to investigate what Barack Obama and John McCain are saying about the issue of education.

What are they promising us?

From an ESchool News article published this week, Jeanne Century, director of science research at the University of Chicago's Center for Elementary Mathematics and Science Education, said Illinois Sen. Obama would push for school systems to bring broadband internet access into all K-12 schools. Obama would oppose any system that tied "teacher bonuses to student scores," Century said, but would back programs that rewarded educators for becoming highly qualified educators.

Century [also] said Obama would support more class time for social studies, art, physical education, and science—four areas that have been greatly reduced or eliminated at K-12 schools since NCLB was enacted in 2002. The law requires every school in the country to be 100-percent proficient in math and reading by the 2013-14 academic year—a goal some educators say is unlikely, if not impossible.

Over at BarackObama.com you can find information stating Obama believes that we must equip poor and struggling districts, both rural and urban, with the support and resources they need to provide disadvantaged students with an opportunity to reach their full potential. Too often, our leaders present this issue as an either - or debate, divided between giving our schools more funding, or demanding more accountability. Obama believes that we have to do both, and has offered innovative ideas to break through the political stalemate in Washington.

Obama’s plan for education provides critical support for young children and their parents in a plan titled “Zero to Five”. The plan will be promoted by Early Learning Challenge Grants to help all states move toward voluntary, universal pre-school. Early Head Start would quadruple under an Obama administration, and he promises affordable and high-quality child care to ease the burden on working families.

Obama’s biggest problem with No Child Left Behind was the funding mess it caused, and he promises reforms that will fully fund the requirements of the law. He’s against the current “teach the test” culture found in many school systems, and promises to improve the assessments. NCLB’s accountability system would also be reformed under an Obama administration so that we are supporting schools that need improvement, rather than punishing them.

Obama calls for more qualified teachers who are proficient in math and science. He wants to provide funding for school districts to come up with intervention strategies to address the drop-out crisis, fund more afterschool programs, and summer learning opportunities. Let’s not forget College Outreach Programs, more support for English Language Learners, the creation of Teacher Service Scholarships and all schools of education must be accredited. The website also mentions Teacher Residency Programs, teacher mentoring programs, and incentives to provide more common planning time for teachers. He wants new and innovative ways to increase teacher pay that are developed with teachers, not imposed on them.

Over at the NEA's blog, EdNotes, Cynthia Kopkowski confirms what is said in the EschoolNews article regarding teacher pay. Kopkowski advises when asked about merit pay, Century said Obama is "against traditional merit pay that ties individual teacher pay to student outcome." He wants to collaborate with teacher organizations and school districts to come up with alternatives, such as paying teachers for being leaders or mentors, or attaining additional education that displays deeper knowledge of their subject area.

There’s much, much more outlined over at Obama’s site. So much more it boggles the mind, and make me wonder…..how could we possibly pay for all of it?

A November USA Today article advises Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama [has] laid out a plan to spend $18 billion on early childhood education, dropout prevention and teacher incentives. His plan also touches on a hot-button pay issue on which he differs with education unions.To pay for his education program, Obama would eliminate tax-deductibility of CEO pay by corporations and delay NASA's program to return to the moon and then journey to Mars."We're not going to have the engineers and the scientists to continue space exploration if we don't have kids who are able to read, write and compute," Obama said.

The same ESchoolNews.org article I referred to above also mentions John McCain’s views on education. Lisa Graham Keegan, a former lawmaker and superintendent of public instruction in Sen. McCain's home state of Arizona, said that while school leaders struggle with shrinking operating budgets and teacher shortages, technology could supplement educators' daily lessons. She added that qualified teachers could never be replaced by advanced classroom technology. We could potentially have a perfect storm of success here," said Graham Keegan, who has worked with McCain since his 2000 presidential bid. "You can enhance what a teacher does with technology." Has not yet released his stance on classroom technology Century said school officials should encourage students at all grade levels to use the web to research and supplement reading assignments and daily homework "These are skills about problem solving," she said.

Regarding pay for educators McCain supports a pay-for-performance inventive model per Graham Keegan, but feels paying teachers extra according to data from test results would be the only reliable method to reward educators who stood out among their peers. Graham Keegan continues by stating McCain's education stances would "violate existing policies and will offend certain groups," adding that he was skeptical of teacher unions' "one-size-fits-all" contracts that provided little flexibility for school districts.

Over at the NEA's blog, EdNotes, Cynthia Kopkowski states Keegan Graham advised McCain favors an "innovative compensation system" that rewards teachers "for classroom excellence." But she would not specify if that meant student test scores. Stakeholders would have to define what classroom excellence meant, she said.

From JohnMcCain.com, McCain states that Public education should be defined as one in which our public support for a child's education follows that child into the school the parent chooses. The school is charged with the responsibility of educating the child, and must have the resources and management authority to deliver on that responsibility. They must also report to the parents and the public on their progress. The deplorable status of preparation for our children, particularly in comparison with the rest of the industrialized world, does not allow us the luxury of eliminating options in our educational repertoire. John McCain will fight for the ability of all students to have access to all schools of demonstrated excellence, including their own homes.

With regards to standards, McCain believes that we can longer accept low standards for some students and high standards for others. John McCain believes our schools can and should compete to be the most innovative, flexible and student-centered - not safe havens for the uninspired and unaccountable. He believes we should let them compete for the most effective, character-building teachers, hire them, and reward them.If a school will not change, the students should be able to change schools. John McCain believes parents should be empowered with school choice to send their children to the school that can best educate them just as many members of Congress do with their own children. He finds it beyond hypocritical that many of those who would refuse to allow public school parents to choose their child's school would never agree to force their own children into a school that did not work or was unsafe. They can make another choice. John McCain believes that is a fundamental and essential right we should honor for all parents.

John McCain will place parents and children at the center of the education process, empowering parents by greatly expanding the ability of parents to choose among schools for their children. He believes all federal financial support must be predicated on providing parents the ability to move their children, and the dollars associated with them, from failing schools. Plainly stated…McCain supports vouchers.

At OntheIssues.org John McCain states he is not in favor of nationally imposed standards or federal funding strings. Rather than have Federal mandates McCain would rather see state and local education authorities in charge of developing and enforcing high academic standards. By linking Federal education dollars to testing McCain argues we are in fact penalizing students and causing states to spend more money on federally imposed bureaucratic requirements – money that would be better spent in the classroom. McCain would like to see education funding money sent directly to the classroom rather than having it siphoned off by the Feds and state agencies.

No matter the outcome of the election each candidate will receive some of their “wants” for education, but not all of them. No matter the outcome of the election changes are in the wind...changes that will necessitate planning, rolling out, buying in, and don't forget the complaining and naysayers. No matter the outcome of the election classroom educators and students will be caught in the middle.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again……as long as education remains a political football, we tax payers, we parents, we educators will continue to be victims of the “stance dance," and quite frankly my toes have already been stepped on enough.

13 Unusual Names From U.S. Elections

I often encourage students to conduct further historical research during Language Arts. I allow students to research things they would like to know more about. This knowledge not only sharpens research and writing skills, but we extend Social Student content to topics I might not ever reach in the classroom.

Of course, I do teach a full blown unit every year on formal research and writing where we develop a topic, research, take notes, and then develop those notes into a three to four page report with a reference list to boot. For this unit I have always used U.S. Presidents for our topic became I’m very familiar with the books and I’m pretty knowledgeable about each administration.

I make several databases available to students for their research including this one that uses a pull down menu to access voting information for each election. The site not only lists the winners but lists all of those than ran. Sometimes I use this database as a center-type activity for students to research and answer a question or make an observation. One question I’ve used is to ask students to look at the information for the 1800 election and compare the information to the 1804 election. Students should see for the first time in 1804 a separate race was established for the office of Vice-President due to the passage of the Twelth Amendment. Up to that time the second runner-up automatically assumed the office of Vice President.

Another observation I’ve asked students to make in the past involved strange or unusual names of men who have run for the two highest offices in our nation by choosing 10 elections and reviewing the names listed. I remind students that the names should not be those that we hear every day.

Here are the top 13 results:

1. De Witt Clinton---Election of 1812 (P)

2. Elbridge Gerry---Election of 1812 (VP)

3. Theodore Frelinghuysen---Election of 1844 (VP)

4. Hannibal Hamlin----Election of 1860 (VP) He actually won

5. Shuyler Colfax---Election of 1868 (VP)

6. B. Gratz Brown---Election of 1872 (VP)

7. Absolom West---Election of 1884 (VP)

8. Alson Streeter---Election of 1888 (P)

9. Ignatius Donnelly---Election of 1900 (VP)

10. Valentine Remmel---Election of 1900 (VP)

11. Silas Swallow---Election of 1904 (P)

12. Thomas Tibbles---Election of 1904 (P)

13. Estes Kefauver---Election of 1956 (VP)

and one of my favorite unusual names even though he resigned in disgrace was Spiro Agnew who ran for VP in 1968 and 1972 winning both times.

Which name do you think sounds the most unusual?

The image with this post is from the 1880 Republican National Convention in Chicago courtesy of the Library of Congress.
Catch other 13s here.

The Angry White Man....An Interesting Species

Many thanks to the two loved ones who forwarded this column from the Aspen Times by Gary Hubbell (February 9th edition).

I wonder……are angry white men the forgotten faction in the American political process that the media and certain pundits are forgetting when they create their sound-bites and politcal forecasts?

Read Mr. Hubbell's column below, and let me know what you think?

There is a great amount of interest in this year’s presidential elections, as everybody seems to recognize that our next president has to be a lot better than George Bush. The Democrats are riding high with two groundbreaking candidates — a woman and an African-American — while the conservative Republicans are in a quandary about their party’s nod to a quasi-liberal maverick, John McCain.

Each candidate is carefully pandering to a smorgasbord of special-interest groups, ranging from gay, lesbian and transgender people to children of illegal immigrants to working mothers to evangelical Christians.

There is one group no one has recognized, and it is the group that will decide the election: the Angry White Man. The Angry White Man comes from all economic backgrounds, from dirt-poor to filthy rich. He represents all geographic areas in America, from urban sophisticate to rural redneck, deep South to mountain West, left Coast to Eastern Seaboard.

His common traits are that he isn’t looking for anything from anyone — just the promise to be able to make his own way on a level playing field. In many cases, he is an independent businessman and employs several people. He pays more than his share of taxes and works hard.The victimhood syndrome buzzwords — “disenfranchised,” “marginalized” and “voiceless” — don’t resonate with him. “Press ‘one’ for English” is a curse-word to him. He’s used to picking up the tab, whether it’s the company Christmas party, three sets of braces, three college educations or a beautiful wedding.

He believes the Constitution is to be interpreted literally, not as a “living document” open to the whims and vagaries of a panel of judges who have never worked an honest day in their lives.

The Angry White Man owns firearms, and he’s willing to pick up a gun to defend his home and his country. He is willing to lay down his life to defend the freedom and safety of others, and the thought of killing someone who needs killing really doesn’t bother him.

The Angry White Man is not a metrosexual, a homosexual or a victim. Nobody like him drowned in Hurricane Katrina — he got his people together and got the hell out, then went back in to rescue those too helpless and stupid to help themselves, often as a police officer, a National Guard soldier or a volunteer firefighter.

His last name and religion don’t matter. His background might be Italian, English, Polish, German, Slavic, Irish, or Russian, and he might have Cherokee, Mexican, or Puerto Rican mixed in, but he considers himself a white American.

He’s a man’s man, the kind of guy who likes to play poker, watch football, hunt white-tailed deer, call turkeys, play golf, spend a few bucks at a strip club once in a blue moon, change his own oil and build things. He coaches baseball, soccer and football teams and doesn’t ask for a penny. He’s the kind of guy who can put an addition on his house with a couple of friends, drill an oil well, weld a new bumper for his truck, design a factory and publish books. He can fill a train with 100,000 tons of coal and get it to the power plant on time so that you keep the lights on and never know what it took to flip that light switch.

Women either love him or hate him, but they know he’s a man, not a dishrag. If they’re looking for someone to walk all over, they’ve got the wrong guy. He stands up straight, opens doors for women and says “Yes, sir” and “No, ma’am.”

He might be a Republican and he might be a Democrat; he might be a Libertarian or a Green. He knows that his wife is more emotional than rational, and he guides the family in a rational manner.

He’s not a racist, but he is annoyed and disappointed when people of certain backgrounds exhibit behavior that typifies the worst stereotypes of their race. He’s willing to give everybody a fair chance if they work hard, play by the rules and learn English.

Most important, the Angry White Man is pissed off. When his job site becomes flooded with illegal workers who don’t pay taxes and his wages drop like a stone, he gets righteously angry. When his job gets shipped overseas, and he has to speak to some incomprehensible idiot in India for tech support, he simmers. When Al Sharpton comes on TV, leading some rally for reparations for slavery or some such nonsense, he bites his tongue and he remembers. When a child gets charged with carrying a concealed weapon for mistakenly bringing a penknife to school, he takes note of who the local idiots are in education and law enforcement.
He also votes, and the Angry White Man loathes Hillary Clinton. Her voice reminds him of a shovel scraping a rock. He recoils at the mere sight of her on television. Her very image disgusts him, and he cannot fathom why anyone would want her as their leader. It’s not that she is a woman. It’s that she is who she is. It’s the liberal victim groups she panders to, the “poor me” attitude that she represents, her inability to give a straight answer to an honest question, his tax dollars that she wants to give to people who refuse to do anything for themselves.

There are many millions of Angry White Men. Four million Angry White Men are members of the National Rifle Association, and all of them will vote against Hillary Clinton, just as the great majority of them voted for George Bush.He hopes that she will be the Democratic nominee for president in 2008, and he will make sure that she gets beaten like a drum.

Hubbell leaves no stone unturned, huh?

The problem is….it doesn’t look like Hillary will be the nominee. What’s a white guy to do, Mr. Hubbell?

The column and all 700 plus comments can be located here.

Blah, Blah, Blog also linked to the post and there's come interesting comments there as well.

Comparing and Contrasting Campaign Ads

The Super Bowl of election primaries is tomorrow. Tuesday will be D-Day in Georgia as well as many other states. What better way to remind the adults in my student’s lives to get out and vote than by providing an opportunity for students to compare and contrast campaign ads! More often than not the exercise ends up being a parent-child discussion on the way to ball practice, on the way home from daycare, or the subject of dinner conversation.

First using Ease History we begin by looking at campaign ads from the past. As we watch them we categorize the ads into the following categories----biographical, issue-oriented, values-laden, and negative. These terms come from a lesson plan at the website found here.

Once we have looked at several examples for each category I divide the class into groups. Each student receives a work sheet with the following questions (taken from this page):

Name:
Date:
Group Members:
Candidate in Ad:

1. How would you categorize your ad? (biographical, issue-oriented, value-laden, or negative)

2. Describe the language and tone of the ad? Is the narrator a male, female, or the candidate? Does the ad specify an action for the viewer (i.e. to elect the candidate, to visit the candidate’s website, to vote against the opponent)? How do language and tone shape the overall message?

3. How do words, images, color, music, camera angles, lighting, people, and symbols contribute to the message of the ad? Do you think they are effective?

4. Did this ad influence you? Did you learn from it? How did it appeal to you? How would you change it to make it more effective?

During our look at past campaign ads I also provide opportunities for students to answer the questions they will encounter during the group portion of the activity so that once they are are on their own they are familiar with the direction I’m trying to take them.

This activity meets several of Georgia’s standards for Language Arts as well as Social Studies.

Here are ads for each of the candidates that are still viable. I only took ads that were uploaded to You Tube by the candidate’s campaign. I tried to choose ones that have aired on television.

Now it’s your turn….Choose an ad or view them all and tell me which one(s) appeal to you, if you dare. :) I haven’t decided yet which candidate I will be voting for. Perhaps your response will influence my vote.


Mike Huckabee


John McCain


Mitt Romney


Barack Obama


Hillary Clinton