Common Core: Libyan owned Pearson at the core of TN Governor Bill Haslams Islamic policies in our state

Common Core: Libyan owned Pearson at the core of TN Governor Bill Haslams Islamic policies in our state

In the last few years we have seen a movement in our country to nationalize our educational system, to implement Common Core in all our schools. 

Inside the schools, the most drastic change has been an overwhelming  theme of driving acceptance of different religions in our schools, particularly the overwhelming influence of Islam and Sharia law! I was left with the overwhelming question as to why such a push toward acceptance of multiple religions, in light of the recent push by the left to eliminate “religious” influence from our schools the last 40 years or so.

I believe I have followed the money trail to Pearson Education and our own TN State Governor Bill Haslam, with many assorted tentacles intertwined to deliver Haslams brand of bad policy towards education reform. Together they are deliberately spearheading this drastic change in tandem by implementing pro-Islamic literature and a global policy agenda that supports acceptance and integration of Islam into our communities. 

In my research, I had to look no further than the middle east, to Lybia and the regime of the late Muammar Gadaffi, Bill Haslam, Pearson Education and assorted friends for a connection.

Lybia and their regime own 26 million shares of Pearson stock, a huge 4 percent share, valued at nearly one half billion dollars. 

The LIA, Lybian Investment Authority and five members of Gaddafi’s family own the stock. With a Pearson portfolio this huge it surely carries great influence on the content inside it’s books and on our elected leaders. (See links below)

In the middle east, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood have invested heavily in Pearson Education and K-12 learning vehicles. 

It has even been reported by Bill Korach, at http://www.thereportcard.org 
that Pearson owners are deeply involved in the Muslim Brotherhood and linked to CAIR.  “Muslim Brotherhood documents seized by the FBI and presented at the Holy Land Foundation Trial in Texas revealed a plan by the Muslim Brotherhood and their subsidiary organizations like CAIR to penetrate and indoctrinate American K-12 students.”

” Key Pearson textbook consultants on Islam, Susan Douglass and Shabbir Mansuri have both been connected to the Muslim Brotherhood and voiced strong support of Islamic Madrassah, Islamic schools where hate for Jews and Christians is a daily lesson. (At the very least) The Pearson Libyan connection and others who may own Pearson bear deeper scrutiny.”

As perhaps one of the strongest lobbying groups in the US, you can easily see how Pearson educational books content could be swayed to contain an Islamic bias and may well explain the strong Islamic literature contained within many of their books.

Pearson has reportedly “frozen” Gaddafi’s holdings and the only explanation given was to keep his regime from funding Jihad against the Lybian people during the 2011 uprising. No mention of freezing the assets because of it’s influence on our K-12 system or on our Common Core curriculum. It has been reported that Pearson has gone on to say that this controversy has not affected their business greatly in the Middle East.
http://www.sharecast.com/news/pearson-freezes-libyan-stake/4079462.htSherRiff 

It seems wherever there is Islamic influence, Middle East money or big oil influence, the money trail always seem to end up in Tennessee and to Tn Governor Bill Haslam. It just seems this way. If it makes money Haslam seems to have his hands near it and allows it to influence his decision making in our state of Tennessee.

It appears Haslam is up to his neck tie in special interest or middle east money. His obvious actions listed below shows him extremely involved, a willing vessel for acceptance or the luckiest man on earth possibly making hundreds of millions on his educational endeavors. Figure in his TN Secretary of Education nominee Kevin Huffman and you have the perfect cocktail to make money off his endeavors into education reform,ie, Common Core, testing materials, online education tools, elearning modules, textbooks and assorted computer software for it’s implementation. It’s a strong suspicion with many links and warrants heavier scrutiny, perhaps in another opinion piece.  

Enter TN Governor Bill Haslam! 

If participation and facilitation make you a guilty party to benefitting off Common Core implementation and all it’s tentacles, then actions and outright policy changes to benefit self makes you part of the problem and responsible for the recent influx of Islamic and Sharia influence in our state, and renders you guilty.

Timelines and pointed data do more to establish this connection and basically renders fact and conjuncture along an organized path for easier consumption, for this reason I am a fan. Critics find it very difficult to dispute facts with links in an organized fashion. This once again tells me that where the flak is heaviest I have a confirmed target!

Let’s just look at what we do know then follow up on my research, then we draw our own conclusions, hopefully piecing the big puzzle together. Remember, this data is based on my opinion first and then while looking for facts I attempt to substantiate and support my claims. Some link up, some don’t. Please consume the info, make your own mind up, and if you find it palatable, pass it along to your friends.

This grouping of assumptions and facts do not follow a specific “timeline” but are instead grouped according to topic with discussion. Enjoy the read.

1) One of the first actions of our Governor was to put out a policy to not allow Pearson or McGraw Hill books to be reviewed by the public and warning of any leaks of their content will be dealt with a stiff hand. The simple phrase that info cannot be reviewed or critiqued because of copyright restraints, sounds like he has a vested interest or the very least for some reason protecting the book companies, for whatever reason, scrutiny would be my guess and don’t try to get a book  of choice from your child’s school. My kids can’t even take their books home. What is the big secret? Bill Haslam declares no books on Common Core be reviewable, claiming copyrights laws protect us from looking at them!

Click to access TextbookCollectionSitePolicies.pdf

2) Who owns Pearson? At least 26 million shares belong to the Muammar Gadaffi family via the Lybian Investment Authority and his five family members who have put together a nice portfolio! Enough said there! But then I question, what could be Haslams involvement in the Middle East, ie; Lybia, Turkey, Iran and Saudi Arabia? See links below, I’m building on this here, be patient.
http://education-curriculum-reform-government-schools.org/w/2013/03/pearsons-libyan-ownership-and-islam-biased-textbooks/

Pearson is partially owned by Lybian government and the late Mohmar Ghadaffi!
http://www.pfspublishing.com/workshop/2011/03/pearson-shuts-down-libyan-shares-in-company.html

3) Who once owned stock in K-12 education, a key component of Common Core, a complimentary reform measures that makes Pearson and other book and software companies multiple-billionaires? Ok, the cat is out of the bag, Bill Haslam invested 10,000 dollars in this program, but “didn’t know it” or failed to recognize that his portfolio contained this investment. He supposedly dumped it from his name and ditched the stock as it was uncovered by a Democratic foe as he was running for Governor.  My intuition would lead me to believe he perhaps got rid of the stock but has it close to him somewhere in another co-owned business, non profit or someone else’s name. Even early on he realized that 10,000 dollars invested in this up and rising stock would reap him possibly millions upon millions. A shrewd businessman and politician he is, a wise man he may not be. He knew education reform was on the way.
Michael Milken, “Haslam Invested in K-12.”
http://www.wbir.com/story/news/local/2013/09/09/haslam-k12inc-investment/2785759/

4) PILOT Oil is deeply associated with Lybia and Iran. Before his election, the then Democrat Gubernatorial candidate McWherter brought many of these issues to the table for review that I have discussed this evening. It is not to far a stretch to assume that Haslam is influenced by big oil and the middle east. To tie these together much less prove or implicate and tie them to Haslam is a stretch, but it makes you wander when most of his decisions are made about education reform it somehow seems to be tied to the middle east or big oil, you begin to think, where is his alliance? What is he protecting with these repeated bad policies with a middle eastern flare to them? Where is his ability to benefit personally from his policy? He has paved a way for Sharia Compliance with other actions in TN, why not with Education Reform? Who is in his pocket and pulling his strings?  And why do most of his decisions seem to tied to that common theme.
http://m.commercialappeal.com/news/2010/sep/21/mcwherter-ties-haslam-business-to-iran/

5) Is there a Saudi, Iranian, Muslim Brotherhood, Middle East, Turkey, Big oil, Education
Reform connection of book companies such as Pearson textbooks  to Pilot oil or Bill Haslam? The verdict is outstanding but the trail is warm. Further research may reveal many more personal interest connections.

6) The mere fact that Informational textbooks are replacing great works of literature in TN sets one to think that big corporate America is driving education reform changes. The recent endorsement of the US Chamber of Commerce of Common Core and recent private meetings in Bradley County Tennessee with members of SCORE, Kevin Huffman at least shows intent and an attempt to keep info sharing on the down low!

Click to access PESF_G2_3-8_v4web.pdf

7) An Anti-Terrorism, Anti-Sharia, Anti-Jihad bill was introduced, SB 1028, that was spawned from the jihad attack on military personnel and other acts of “homegrown” terrorism acts in TN to include Haslams policies. Haslams actions have resulted in Legislators feeling strongly enough to enact laws to protect its citizens from Haslams bad policies and influence. 

Click to access FAQ%20anti-terrorism%20bill%2011.pdf

Click to access SB1028.pdf

8) PARRC Testing and Kevin Huffman, a Haslam appointee for Education Czar in TN, is shifting the load, favor and money to Pearson to conduct the tests, develop the tests and get them online with loads of software development to support it. This action leaves a lucrative money trail benefitting once again Pearson Education and vested parties, Haslam and Huffman. Can anyone say money,  investments and lobbying influence driving decisions?
http://lastcar.blogspot.com/2013/11/text-book-review.html?m=1

9) Bill Haslams Drive 55 initiative gives the TN GED testing contract to, you guessed it, Pearson Education, yet another obvious push to give Pearson more of our state tax dollars. Can you see the set up and the cronyism displayed in these actions?  The Islamic influence in our childrens schools and text books? He doesn’t seem to make a step without including a benefit package for known associates of K-12, Pearson, PARRC, or Common Core. It makes you think that he might even be in cahoots with Jeb Bush and Bill Gates?
http://businessclarksville.com/education/the-new-face-of-ged-testing-to-debut-in-2014/2013/10/29/58251

10) Jeb Bush and Bill Haslam partner to bring Education Reform to TN. What do you know? Coincidence? I don’t think so!! 

After stepping down as governor in 2007, Jeb Bush created the Foundation for Excellence in Education, which advocates for school choice and higher standards in public education, he announced after speaking to Tn Governor Bill Haslam.

Bush admitted that “it was helpful to have money behind the reforms,” “You’re asking people to eat broccoli—it’s always good to have some hot-cheese sauce. The money is like that hot-cheese sauce,” Bush said.

At the meeting Haslam asked “As Republicans, what do we think the government’s role is in higher standards?” Sinking feeling!!! “What is the Governments role in higher standards?” Did Bill Haslam really ask that?

Jeb Bush went on to correct Governor Haslam and again reiterate, although falsely, that this is not a government program but a state led, school board, teacher and superintendent led education reform plan- emphasis added for maximum impact!

 Mr Bush added, “I’m a conservative, but this is a national imperative. We have close to no standards.” No standards? What have we been doing for the last 50 years?Just a note of interest, with Common Core there are actually much fewer standards than are currently in place, by the way Mr Bush.

Note to self, Bush’s and Haslam’s partnership and education foundation receives funding from major Republican Party donors as well as the philanthropic foundations run by Bill Gates and Michael Bloomberg. 

“The event was hosted by the State Collaborative on Reforming Education (S.C.O.R.E.), a Nashville think tank founded by former U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist. Members of the Tennessee General Assembly were also in the audience, the source below reveals. The Bush-Haslam reform partnership came a few weeks into a legislative session where Tennessee lawmakers were expected to vote on controversial education bills, including a statewide authorizer for charter schools and a generous school voucher program. ” Another reform measure to take away our school board and parents voice. Bring on WGU.
http://m.wknofm.org/?utm_referrer=http%3A%2F%2Fatthechalkface.com%2F2013%2F08%2F23%2Fhaslam-bush-wgu-and-mcgraw-hill%2F#mobile/25392

10) Charter Schools: Haslam signs bill making charter schools more accessible, his idea of bringing new businesses and jobs to TN.
http://news.tn.gov/node/7341

Haslam threatens to take away money from schools in TN for not implementing charter schools! Remember, this man is vested somehow and he doesn’t make a decision without a check in his hand.
http://nashvillepublicradio.org/blog/2012/08/16/haslam-backs-off-threats-to-withhold-state-money-from-mnps/

Charter schools jump 12 fold and growing under Haslams reign.
http://timesfreepress.com/news/2013/nov/17/charter-schools-prompt-concerns-about-money/?news

11) School Vouchers: The timeline continues. Remember Jeb Bush came to town and suggested it and Haslam assumed the lead!  It’s that simple! Does Haslam have an original thought?
http://m.knoxnews.com/news/2013/jan/14/gov-haslam-to-push-for-limited-school-voucher/

12)  WGU, Western Governors University an online Diploma mill, another venture for Bill Haslam coming out of the meeting with Jeb Bush. McGraw Hill  gets the nod to provide the material. . .” a landmark agreement to establish a “pay-for-performance” model in which McGraw-Hill will receive variable compensation for those WGU students who use MHE technology and services for a particular course and pass.”

Through the partnership, McGraw-Hill Education will provide e-books and access to industry-leading adaptive learning tools including McGraw-Hill LearnSmart to Western Governors University’s (WGU) online courses.” 

Meanwhile back in Tennessee just a few weeks later after Bush met with Haslam to talk corporate education reform, Haslam once again was doing the “I’m vested and will do whatever you want dance” and produced the following informercial on YouTube to promote a sweetheart deal to hand over $5 million in public money to set up an office for WGU in Tennessee., with Bill Gates kicking in $750,000.  This public largesse for an out-of-state corporate diploma mill comes at a time when public universities and community colleges can’t pay the light bills or cut the grass.  Please watch (it’s short):
http://m.youtube.com/index?desktop_uri=%2F&gl=US#/watch?v=O0uqrWSecpM

Could there ever be a sweeter corporate welfare deal?  Move right into the State, with taxpayer support and become a state university overnight!
http://atthechalkface.com/2013/08/23/haslam-bush-wgu-and-mcgraw-hill/

13) Bill Haslam, the United Nations via the Gates Foundation awarded $90 million to Memphis City Schools almost a year ago to improve teacher quality. Teacher quality? Are you beginning to
see where teacher evaluations, pay for performance complete with hiring and firing decisions, loss of teaching licenses based on a child’s performance on tests was born? 

 In attendance at this meeting was the then newly elected Governor Bill Haslam, who quickly accepted Gates money for Tennessee schools, but it didn’t come without the favor for money given. Does Bill Haslam do anything he is not told while a check is being written? It doesn’t seem so!

And Bill Gates praised the state’s (Haslams)  willingness to try new things:

“This idea of measuring teachers is very important because a teacher wants to know what they could do better…”

Gates also said  he “wants data to drive teacher evaluations nationwide!”

And as the attention turned to Haslam as the new Governor, Bill Gates essentially tells Haslam what he will do, with a 90 million dollar bribe of course and Haslam does it!

Melinda Gates, Bill Gates spouse offered this challenge to our spongy Governor,

“For a governor-elect, it’s really ‘Continue the course,’ and there will be tweaks to make along the way; there are going to be some hard times ahead, as you try to make sure you get an effective teacher in every classroom. It’s going to take some political will to do that with the parents and the teachers, but I think he’s very committed and we’re excited to be here, and will continue to work with whatever administration is here working in Tennessee.”

The Governor wet and soiled himself in this instance and has in one fell swoop appeased the United Nations/UNESCO/Education Reformer. Gates continued,  “I’m excited by the momentum around education reform, and will maintain it going forward.” Notice, no questions asked, Bill Gates says do it this way, and it is done. No questions asked! Done!

Gates, a UN puppet ended the meeting with this; “Countries with educational systems outperforming the United States academically all have three things in common:
— Students spend more time in school.
— Schools in different areas share the same curricula, or “common core,” meaning a student moving cross-country can arrive in a classroom studying the same material as the old one.
— Teachers get lots of feedback about their strengths and weaknesses.
 (Lets pretend that we don’t know that most countries only report their top students against our median average of all students, let’s leave that fact out of the equation, Mr Gates. Bill Haslam the whip has been  snapped and another set of bad policies are well on their way to
changing the way TN educates it’s children.
http://nashvillepublicradio.org/blog/2010/11/04/bill-and-melinda-gates-visit-praise-tennessee-on-education-reform/

Here is a picture of Bill Haslam and Bill Gates with Phil Bredesen at the meeting.
http://www.forbes.com/pictures/fdmi45fmj/bill-gates-phil-bredesen-bill-haslam/

Bill Gates inks agreement with UNESCO, given to Haslam, to do exactly what the UN wants him to do. Remember, not to long ago the Governor refused to sign off on the anti-Agenda 21 bill from the legislature and senate. Agenda 21 specifically addresses education in it’s plan. Gates and Haslam seem to know that!
UNESCO Agreement with Gates.

Click to access UNESCO-MS.pdf

14) Teacher Evaluations and pay. Bill gates said it, Haslam does it! Let’s rethink our teacher evaluations and tie their license to how well their students perform on tests and decrease their pay too!
http://news.tn.gov/node/8213

Haslam taps SCORE to do teacher evals! Cha Ching !
http://www.nooga.com/mobile/#149893/haslam-taps-score-to-review-new-teacher-evaluation-system/

15) Do I even need to post a link of what happens next, in true Haslam fashion, if it benefits him and you give him money, he’ll do it!

Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam today launched WGU Tennessee — http://tennessee.wgu.edu/ — an online, competency-based university aimed at expanding access to higher education for Tennesseans.

16) Haslam and K-12 investments led by Saudis? Again, the anthem repeated by Haslam. The following summary was provided by the link below ” It turns out that the system of federal subsidies to university programs of Middle East Studies (under Title VI of the Higher Education Act) has been serving as a kind of Trojan horse for Saudi influence over American K-12 education. Federally subsidized Middle East Studies centers are required to pursue public outreach. That entails designing lesson plans and seminars on the Middle East for America’s K-12 teachers. These university-distributed teaching aids slip into the K-12 curriculum without being subject to the normal public vetting processes. Meanwhile, the federal government, which both subsidizes and lends its stamp of approval to these special K-12 course materials on the Middle East, has effectively abandoned oversight of the program that purveys them (Title VI).
Enter the Saudis. By lavishly funding several organizations that design Saudi-friendly English-language K-12 curricula, all that remains is to convince the “outreach coordinators” at prestigious, federally subsidized universities to purvey these materials to America’s teachers. And wouldn’t you know it, outreach coordinators or teacher-trainers at a number of university Middle East Studies centers have themselves been trained by the very same Saudi-funded foundations that design K-12 course materials. These Saudi-friendly folks happily build their outreach efforts around Saudi-financed K-12 curricula.”
http://bwcentral.org/2013/11/prentice-hall-and-pearson-educations-libyan-ownership-and-islam-biased-textbooks/

17) Bill Haslam invests in K12. Yes he did and supposedly dumped his stock before running for office.
http://www.tennessean.com/article/20130909/NEWS0201/309090034/Gov-Haslam-invested-K12-education-company-one-time

18) For sake of time, I will only mention further radical groups that Haslam has embraced as a tool to change education results in our state of TN and they are SCORE, Teach for America, Students First and Achieve Inc ! It’s worthy to research these organizations because they are the catalyst to do the Governors dirty work!

In summary, you can easily see who is really driving education reform in TN and across the nation, big corporate money, special interests,  a seedy middle east influence, education reformers, self made millionaires, opportunists, big oil,  government controllers and they all have one thing in common and that is our Tn State Governor Bill Haslam. 

Other sources of information:

Pearson who are they?
http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/1850169

Pockets of rebellion: Many educators are calling for Huffman and Haslam to stop their assault and push toward education reform.
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/10/04/20759234-parents-teachers-join-pockets-of-rebellion-against-common-core?threadId=3830961&commentId=79453394#c79453394

http://www.networkforpubliceducation.org/news/tn-school-superintendents-ask-gov-haslam-to-rein-in-commissioner-huffman-the-tennessean/

Is Bill Haslam turning TN into Saudi Arabia?
http://www.zimbio.com/Mayor+Bill+Haslam/articles/oxAhrKLMukc/Governor+Haslam+tuning+Tennessee+Saudi+Arabia

http://education-curriculum-reform-government-schools.org/w/2013/03/pearsons-libyan-ownership-and-islam-biased-textbooks/

http://tn.gov/education/cte/Career_Clusters/Career_Clusters.shtml

An added bonus: Many other allegations about the Haslam dynasty.
http://www.tennessean.com/article/20130425/NEWS0201/304250057/Pilot-Flying-J-mess-could-hurt-Bill-Haslam-s-political-ambitions

Pearson Middle East
http://www.pearsonmiddleeastawe.com/

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2011/feb/28/libya-pearson-financial-times

Gadafis assets frozen
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/feb/27/gaddafi-family-assets-frozen-queen

Up to 80 million may lose healthcare coverage beginning January 14th, 2014

Up to 80 million may lose healthcare coverage beginning January 14th, 2014

Up to 80 million or roughly 55 percent of all Americans may lose their current healthcare coverage beginning January 14th, 2014.

You have heard this following statement dozens of times from president Obama, “If you like your plan you can keep it!”  As this lie was being spewed  reports are now surfacing, based on cost projections from 2009 that the president was aware of this deception even as he spoke of it and lied to millions who looked to him for reliable information.

There are approximately 157 million working insured in this country of that 16 million are receiving an individual insurance plan and are seeing some plan premiums increase by up to 150 percent and as little as 50 percent. The majority currently covered under an employer mandate which relies on corporations to share the cost burden while spreading the healthcare risk across a large base will see their healthcare plans cancelled in the coming weeks.

The Affordable Healthcare Act, or Obamacare was slated and understood from the beginning to be “free” healthcare or reduced priced healthcare and a great plan with many benefits, enough to take care of all your needs. The plan as we were told does not exist it rolls out and the many costly intricacies within are being revealed.

Instead of the picture perfect plan being painted in the beginning we now see it as it really is. The burden of cost is being shifted to the young people in recent months who are expected to be “healthy” and not a large consumer of a healthcare product to bare the greatest portion of this cost for the rest of us. This has been a huge surprise to this block of consumers, many of which voted for Obama looking for positive hope and change.

What Obama and his cronies didn’t expect or perhaps they did, that is debatable, is they didn’t expect the health registry  website to not work, young people to not buy this insurance opting to pay penalties instead of coverage, americans demanding answers and the insurance companies pulling out the way they are doing.

The private insurers pulling out in droves is  leaving the healthcare system and our economy in jeopardy and at an extreme risk of collapse or at the very least vulnerable and chaotic.

As many as 76 percent of small businesses, 55 percent of large businesses and 63 percent of all businesses are expected to cancel coverage come January 14th! 

This will leave many with the option to either buy mandated coverage from the government that is substandard, expensive and unwanted with many products that are not wanted or needed, keep and re-register with your current adjusted plan and pay inflated premiums or opt out all together and pay a fine at the end of the year saving 10s of thousands in premiums that are placing huge burdens on middle income families, quite frankly most families.

The NY Times this week, eluded to Obamacare as no more than a redistribution of wealth, a huge step toward Socialism. The shift of costs across the spectrum of households, insurance companies backing away from coverage, inflated premiums and expensive, expansive and sub par government coverage is driving all these factors and indeed spreading the wealth or cost burden across the spectrum affecting 10s of millions of Americans in their pocketbooks, tightening their family budgets. This is causing many to panic as they see their incomes diminish and net worth and expendable income whither away at a time when most will not survive with many more insults to their incomes.

Some are beginning to question if all this confusion is purposeful! Is all this burden and added debt a well thought out plan. If you believe the Cloward-Piven strategy, of which Obama is a student and was indoctrinated from an early age with, then you will fully understand that by overwhelming and bombarding the system, it will collapse leaving most totally dependent on the government for every need. This socialism perfected folks and it is no secret this may be the presidents intent and if so he is actively and cleverly making this a reality.

The debate is still out there and it’s seeing day light as the presidents obvious attempts to socialize our country is underway and being revealed.

There are many things that need to change. Private insurance costs are way too high, there is great fraud, waste and duplication inside our current system, that is a given and should be fixed. This does not call for another plan, it just needs to be changed with less a focus on profit for large insurance companies.

Americans losing their individual and work related insurance plans are being blamed on the basis that your current  insurance plans do not meet Obamacare guidelines. I’m not so sure this is the only reason but the private insurance plans could make easy tweaks to your plans to make them compliant to Obamacare guidelines. They could do this, but currently their is no incentive to do so. What I believe is really going on is the large insurance companies are now considering the costs and are figuring out that Obamacare and the decisions the president is making is cutting into their bottom lines, greed and wealth are now driving healthcare decisions and that’s where you the consumer are being left out in the cold.

What I don’t agree with and I have personally challenged the Constitutionality of Obamacare  as it relates to the individual mandate and the commerce clause is that the government and their mandated tax is not the answer to our current healthcare woes.

The events unfolding this morning till January 14th, 2014 give me great angst and uncertainty for the vast majority of Americans and makes me doubt we as a nation, a band of families, united in our pursuit of happiness and a quality of life unlike most of the world will survive this impingement on our budgets and our national form of healthcare.

Hopefully Americans will wake up to
this reality, and they are, and starting to realize these purposeful cancellations of your health plans are purposeful,  intentional, and very well planned and will demand change at mid term elections in 2014 and make the needed changes to create the needed changes.

A parting shot at this healthcare debacle and I’ll close this debate. Personally, I have about 35 years of healthcare experience, have seen many changes, witnessed loads of duplication and perhaps fraud, worked at many levels inside the provider beast and I have never been asked what could be done to fix the problems with healthcare nor do I knowingly know of anyone that has ever been asked to solve our healthcare issues or at least ask my opinion of how it may be made better. This scenario really perplexes me and if any of my readers read this that could influence the healthcare debate may learn from this omission.

Sources of info:

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/11/26/evidence-shows-obama-administration-predicted-tens-millions-would-lose-plans/

http://m.weeklystandard.com/blogs/millions-americans-are-losing-their-health-plans-because-obamacare_764602.html

Neighbors complain and shush “Star Spangled Banner” ceremony at Naval Base in New Jersey

Neighbors complain and shush “Star Spangled Banner” ceremony at Naval Base in New Jersey

11/26/13

Near Naval Weapons Station-Earles waterside base in Middletown New Jersey, neighbors are repeatedly calling police to complain that a “Morning Colors” ceremony be hushed and the volume turned down.

The ceremony which consists of an approximate 30 minute ceremony that plays the star spangled banner while raising the flag are being asked   to turn the noise down because it is too loud and disturbing their sleep. 

After the ceremony is commenced and the command given to “carry on,” the base returns to it’s duty, protecting those same neighbors from an undetermined enemy.

“One neighbor complained “just because the Navy has to wake up, we shouldn’t all have to wake to reveille”

A mother in the neighborhood surrounding the naval base defended the music and displays of color saying “every morning when my daughter hears it, she stops what she is doing and sings along to it, it’s so cute and patriotic!”

Veterans in the area say that “many have died for that flag and it deserves the respect given, it’s in memory of those who have died defending this country.”

The display and loud speaker system is there to also warn the area, other soldiers near the base and yes those complaining neighbors of impending inclement weather or God forbid an encroaching enemy or threat. 

Many in the neighborhood are now saying they miss the morning ceremony, missing that feeling of patriotism every morning and are asking many “complainers” to move if they don’t like it and the volume turned back up!  “This is America and if we wanna live free in America, then we let the Star Spangled Banner play,” one neighbor stated.

This neighborhood near the base is a  microcosm of a bigger picture going on in America. The constant and consistent attacks on all things patriotic, christian or related to our children is in full force and are fundamentally changing the face of our country, one complaint at a time.

While the people are inconvenienced by a patriotic song in our country, on a military base, a  more severe change is heading our way.

For now, the Naval Base in New Jersey has offered to turn down the volume, meanwhile the neighbors can lay in their beds undisturbed and inconvenienced! 

Sleep well folks! 

It’s another of many sad days in our country, Im afraid many more are ahead.

Sources of info: Please support those news outlet still putting the truth out daily!

http://www.centralohio.com/usatoday/article/3634599

http://www.nj.com/monmouth/index.ssf/2013/11/neighbors_complain_nj_military_base_plays_the_star-spangled_banner_too_loud.html

‘Dont dare call the health law redistribution’

‘Dont dare call the health law redistribution’

New York Times
By John Harwood
11/23/13

BCN NOTE: This apple didn’t fall far from the tree! My lil cousin John Harwood tells it like it is. He, like me has recognized this as a redistribution of wealth for a while now. Obama is predicting everyone can win and we all get to pay for it. Not! We have been sold a package that has many questions. This law, this tax is redistributing wealth from rich to poor, men to women, poor to less than poor. Pay attention folks! We are being forced to sign up for things we do not want! 

This redistribution of wealth is and will affect you on a daily basis. You are feeling the pinch, you are paying for the change you desired. Please read the article below by the New York Times and John Harwood!

“A commitment to economic justice necessarily implies a commitment to the redistribution of economic resources, so that the poor and the dispossessed are more fully included in the economic system,” Ms. Blank, a noted poverty researcher, wrote in 1992. With advisers wary of airing those views in a nomination fight, Mr. Obama passed over Ms. Blank, then a top Commerce Department official and now the chancellor of the University of Wisconsin. Instead he chose Alan Krueger, a Princeton economist.

“Redistribution is a loaded word that conjures up all sorts of unfairness in people’s minds,” said William M. Daley, who was Mr. Obama’s chief of staff at the time. Republicans wield it “as a hammer” against Democrats, he said, adding, “It’s a word that, in the political world, you just don’t use.”

These days the word is particularly toxic at the White House, where it has been hidden away to make the Affordable Care Act more palatable to the public and less a target for Republicans, who have long accused Democrats of seeking “socialized medicine.” But the redistribution of wealth has always been a central feature of the law and lies at the heart of the insurance market disruptions driving political attacks this fall.

“Americans want a fair and fixed insurance market,” said Jonathan Gruber, a health economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who advised Mr. Obama’s team as it designed the law. “You cannot have that without some redistribution away from a small number of people.”

Mr. Obama’s advisers set out to pass the law in 2009 fully aware that fears among middle-class voters sank President Bill Clinton’s health initiative 16 years earlier. So they designed the legislation to minimize the number of people likely to be hurt.

Instead of a sweeping change to a government-run “single-payer” system favored by Democratic liberals, members of the administration sought to preserve the existing system of employer-provided health insurance while covering the uninsured through the expansion of Medicaid and changes to the individual insurance market.

They also added benefits available to any family, such as the ability of children up to age 26 to remain on their parents’ health plans.

But throughout the process, they knew that some level of redistributing wealth — creating losers as well as winners — was inescapable.

They were nonetheless acutely aware of how explosive the word could be. When Mr. Obama ran for president in 2008, Republicans tried to wound him by accusing him of waging “class warfare” to achieve wealth redistribution. That fall, the Republican presidential nominee, Senator John McCain, derided Mr. Obama as the “redistributor in chief” as he seized on Mr. Obama’s comments to an Ohio man later known as “Joe the Plumber” that he wanted to “spread the wealth around.”

Mr. Obama survived that episode and other instances when Republicans deployed old recordings of him using the word “redistribution” as evidence that he was a closet socialist. But Mr. Obama had learned a lesson.

After he took office, he cast his goal of rolling back President George W. Bush’s tax cuts for higher earners not as economic redistribution, but as the restoration of top-end rates from the Clinton years.

The Affordable Care Act was a similar semantic sidestep. The law targeted high earners, too, by raising their Medicare taxes enough to reduce their after-tax incomes by nearly 2 percent, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. That revenue helped finance coverage for those currently without insurance, who tend to have lower incomes and who in many cases will receive government subsidies to make their premiums cheaper.

And yet for those nervous about potential changes, the president promised stability. “If you like your current insurance, you will keep your current insurance,” Mr. Obama said the day he signed the legislation in March 2010, a promise he made repeatedly as the Oct. 1 opening day of the online health insurance marketplaces approached.

Hiding in plain sight behind that pledge — visible to health policy experts but not the general public — was the redistribution required to extend health coverage to those who had been either locked out or priced out of the market.

Now some of that redistribution has come clearly into view.

The law, for example, banned rate discrimination against women, which insurance companies called “gender rating” to account for their higher health costs. But that raised the relative burden borne by men. The law also limited how much more insurers can charge older Americans, who use more health care over all. But that raised the relative burden on younger people.

And the law required insurers to offer coverage to Americans with pre-existing conditions, which eased costs for less healthy people but raised prices for others who had been charged lower rates because of their good health.

“The A.C.A. is very much about redistribution, whether or not its advocates acknowledge that this is the case,” wrote Reihan Salam on the website of the conservative National Review.

Having obscured much of that vulnerability before, Mr. Obama has responded to recent political heat by apologizing — and expanding the scope of his discredited “you can keep it” promise.

Mr. Gruber of M.I.T. called redistribution a convenient tool for Republican opponents who would fight the law anyway.

In the end, America’s political culture may have made it unrealistic to expect a smooth public reception for the law, no matter how cleverly the White House modulated Mr. Obama’s language or shaped his policy to minimize the number of losers.

“The reality is, any big thing you take on, any big change, is hard to accomplish,” said David Axelrod, the president’s longtime strategist. In America, he said, “we’ve created a sense that everyone can expect to win — nobody has to sacrifice.”

At the same time, Mr. Axelrod argued that widening income inequality has, to some Americans at least, changed the meaning of redistribution. “The whole redistribution argument has shifted in the country because there’s a sense that a lot of redistribution has been to the top and not the bottom,” Mr. Axelrod said.

Still, the word is hardly a favorite of the president these days. The last time Mr. Obama used it in public, according to Federal News Service transcripts, was 18 months ago during his re-election campaign in Elyria, Ohio.

“Understand this is not a redistribution argument,” the president told his audience then. “This is not about taking from rich people to give to poor people. This is about us together making investments in our country so everybody’s got a fair shot.”

Other articles by John Harwood!
http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/h/john_harwood/index.html

TN US Senator Bob Corker OK’s Obama’s Fed Chair nominee despite reservations

TN US Senator Bob Corker OK’s Obama’s Fed Chair nominee despite reservations

11/25/2013

http://nashvillepost.com/blogs/postpolitics/2013/11/20/corker_to_back_yellen

U.S. Senator Bob Corker, R-Tenn., a member of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, recently announced he will support Dr. Janet Yellen’s nomination to chair the Federal Reserve.

Whether its voting with Obama and the Democrats 63 percent of the time, a round of golf with the president or supporting Obamas nomination for Fed Chair, the Dems and Obama can count on Tennessee Senator Bob Corker to reach across the aisle and secure a crucial vote or nomination for supposedly the opposite side of the aisle.

This latest scoff by Corker comes as no surprise to many of his constituency in Tennessee.
 
Although having major reservations about her abilities to lead the fed, Corker threw his support behind her at the behest of Obama anyway.

About the nomination Corker said this, “I would prefer to see someone who held a more modest view regarding the limits of monetary policy on our economy, and I have been clear about that.” 

“After she was nominated, I met with Janet Yellen on the topic of monetary policy, listened intently to her responses during the hearing, and met with her again this week to discuss financial regulation.”
 
“As a result of these conversations, I do believe she will bring a more transparent approach to Fed decisions and guDidance.”
 
He went on to say and this should concern all as to his ability to discern subject matter along party lines,“I am concerned that she lacks experience in systemic financial regulation, and I hope she will work hard to overcome this deficit and not just rely on others on the Fed board for this expertise. In a similar vein, as an academic, she is isolated from market dynamics, so I hope she will develop a cadre of practitioners who have the savvy that she lacks in order to help advise her in the event of another crisis.”
 
“In the end, I do believe she has the qualifications necessary to be the Fed chairman and plan to support her nomination.”

Essentially what he just said was he does not think she has the experience needed to do it, hopes she learns great on the job skills and  surrounds her self with a fine group of mentors. 

Bob Corker, this is no way to lead. We are in one of the most crucial financial times of our country. Our finances are in ruins and he is going to stretch out his hand to an inferior nominee just to appease the Commander in Chief, in exchange for a possible nod for a key position somewhere in Obamas cabinet in the  near future.

Bob Corker said he ” doubts she can handle the subject of systemic risk!” This is no skill set that Corker should ignore or turn his head just to support the prez.

As I understand it, systemic risk refers to the risk or probability of breakdowns in an entire system, as opposed to breakdowns in individual parts or components, and is evidenced by comovements (correlation) among most or all the parts. (Kaufman and Scott 2003, 371)

Did you get that definition? “Systemic risk refers to the risk or probability of breakdowns in an entire system.

Seems it’s time for Corker to jump down off Obamas lap and run with his party or at the very least vote with his own findings and conclusions.

We can no longer afford to ignore the truth for DC Politics. It’s high time we elect a statesman that can run a state like he should and get his self interests out of DC and away from the liberal elite.

Understanding systemic risk!
http://www.frbatlanta.org/cenfis/pubscf/vn_reg_systemic_risk_1209.cfm

Thanks to the Nashville Post for their recorded comments from Corker.
http://nashvillepost.com/blogs/postpolitics/2013/11/20/corker_to_back_yellen

Media giant Zimbio and blogger features Bradley County News story about Gov. Bill Haslam

Media giant Zimbio and blogger features Bradley County News story about Gov. Bill Haslam

11/20/13

I am flattered! 

I think! 

Many news outlets, individuals, RINOS and liberals attack my blog daily and this is one of those days.

I am ok with this seriously. The author of the blog in question, Rod Williams from a Disgruntled Republican has offered up a critique of a recent blog post from the Bradley County News.

In the first sentence, it is obvious he is not pro anything conservative or even a hint of tea party-ish! 

He levels that Republicans  should distance themselves from “nut jobs” like those on the “fringe” or extreme right of the party. My response to that and I quote Julia Roberts from the most excellent film Pretty Woman, “Big, huge mistake!” With this huge voting block isolated and thrown away no Republican or Independent can win without that percentage of voters. None or at least very few!

In the opening sentence and two or three times after “wacko-nut job” is my new blogging title, like I’ve not heard that before.  

Mr Rob Williams, via a Zimbio platform, and I’m assuming this, but I’m afraid he doesn’t like me addressing the many actions of our very left leaning Governor and his seemingly compliant nature with Sharia Law and it’s implementation.

It’s like somehow if you attack and attempt to discredit those shedding the truth it will somehow not be true!

In the article he published and I can assure you it’s a good read despite the title of the lead in story is
misspelled (God forbid, I call the kettle black, it’s easy to do) and the blog is missing the details of the timeline, the facts about Haslams actions in Tennessee, just a few minor details, it’s still worth reading.

But dont fret! Through the very interactive blogosphere, and my kids still make fun of my computer skills, or lack thereof, I can repost anything from my prior posts like a pro.

This blogger was so caught up in pointing out the reasons he didn’t like the blog that he left the details out, the truth, the proof, the timeline! Remember, he called me a “wacko nut job!”

There is a reason that the Tennessee Eagle Forum Facebook page and Tennessee Federation of Republican Women Facebook page and National sites such as Creeping Sharia and Pamela Geller picked up this blog and posted! It’s because it contains truth, is factual and definitely shows that at the very least TN Governor Bill Haslam is paving the road so Sharia Law can creep into our communities, essentially making Tennessee another Saudia Arabia. Look below at what was left out of the blog by Mr Williams. 

He states he was remiss to bring this to light for fear of it drawing attention to this subject and I quote, “I am not sure I should repost this because by calling attention to it is to promote it. On the other hand, I want those who may not know how the nut-jobs are attacking our governor and how they are spreading irrational fear to see an example of what is being spread” .Duh, this is the desired result! Shine a light on it Mr Williams, at least on my blog that is my intent, good or bad press gets my readers from 164 countries, 150,000 readers deep the info they desire! Post and repost! Please! 

Most of my readers are likeminded and share my views, even disgruntled Republicans who are fed up with the way they are running things in the state of TN!

The timeline was conveniently left out of his blog, but I have delicately, like a surgeon, I may add, posted it below!

Read and weep if you desire:

2009- Haslam was formerly a member of the Mayors Against Illegal Guns Coalition with Mayor Bloomberg (NY) but resigned early in 2009 and became a member of the National Rifle Association just in time to run for office of Governor.

March 2009- Thousands of Somali refugees from United Nations refugees arrive in Shelbyville. Quickly growing to 63,000 under Bill Haslams reign with nearly a billion dollar taxpayer tag.

November 2, 2010- Republican Bill Haslam has been elected Tennessee’s 49th governor, overcoming his rival’s claims that he was a “billionaire oil man” and has his own controversial statements on gun rights.

2011 Legislative session – anti-terrorism bill introduced based on the Carlos Bledsoe case (Memphis man who shot and killed Pvt. Andrew Long at the Little Rock Army recruiting center.)

May 2011- Tenn: DOJ submits teachers, principals, police to Muslim “sensitivity” training

June, 2011 – picture emerges confirming that the Muslim Rapid Response Team (which morphed into the TN American Muslim Advisory Council) had been working behind the scenes during the legislative session with TN DHS James Cotter.  This was the group that had formed to lobby against the anti-terrorism bill.

June 5, 2011- Tenn: Fed and state agencies refuse to identify Muslim group in taxpayer funded terrorism conference

August 2011- Al Qaeda’s Recruitment Cartoon & Knoxville News Sentinel’s Comics Target Children

October 2011- Hutton Hotel in Nashville submits to sharia, cancels speech on “preserving freedom”

November 7, 2011 – Commissioner Bill Gibbons (TN Department of Safety and Homeland Security), sends congratulatory letter to the AMAC members for organizing along with the Governor- approved partnership with TN DHS.

November 2011- Regarding comment that all Muslims should be purged from the US military. Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam (R) told The Nashville Scene, “I don’t think I would agree with Rick on that.” But when pressed to denounce Womick’s comments, as Muslim community groups have been urging, Haslam came up short, saying “I don’t know that’s my role. I would just say that on that issue I don’t agree with Rick.” 

December 2011:  When asked whether Governor Haslam had appointed a Muslim advisory board, Tennessee GOP Chairman Chris DeVaney responded that he had ”checked into this and apparently there is no truth to it.  It must be some kind of rumor.“

December 2011 – AMAC partners with the TN DHS to do first law enforcement training.

December 2011- Sumner County School system-Tennessee mom finds Islam in kid’s textbook, Sharia compliance discussed. 

2012 legislative session – Commissioner Gibbons, testifies in support of an administration bill permitting the TN DHS to enter into partnership agreements with private non-profit organizations like the AMAC.

February 2012 – AMAC partners again with TN DHS for law enforcement training; TN DHS refuses to disclose any information about the AMAC.

March 2012- Judge allows defendants in underage sex trafficking ring Muslim prayer breaks during trial. Muslim immigrants involved.

March 2012 – In reference to SB 2237/HB 2375 which would exclude Tennessee state government from partnering/entering into contracts with organizations like AMAC, Attorney General Cooper issues an opinion stating “…it is the opinion of this Office that the proposed amendment which would add an exclusion providing that no partnership or contractual agreement shall be entered into with any religious or political organizations, or any affiliate organizations, is constitutionally defensible.” 

April 2012-Segregated swimming for Muslim “sisters” creeps into Nashville ( at the city’s taxpayer-funded South Knoxville Community Center.) & Virginia (Tysons Corner, Virginia)

April 2012-Judge in Tenn. mosque trial says expert witnesses on jihad cannot testify

April 2012- Bill Gibbons, Tennessee State Commissioner of the Department of Safety and Homeland Security (DSHS), establishing a partnership with a religious NGO, the American Muslim Advisory Council (AMAC) which has ties to local Muslim Brotherhood leaders via the American Center for Outreach (ACO). ACO is a Tennessee-based, non-partisan organisation that was established to inform, educate and empower Muslims to become engaged in society by providing the assistance and guidance the community needs.

May 2012- Governor vetoes bill that would have protected Christian student organizations at Vanderbilt and state universities.

May 2012- Nashville: 3 convicted, 6 acquitted in Somali sex trafficking case. Sex trafficking is quickly becoming a major problem in TN after Somali refugees transferred to Nashville, TN.

May 2012 – Governor approves appointment of Shariah Compliant Finance specialist Samar Ali as Economic and Community Development (ECD) International Director with known ties to Muslim Brotherhood and International Arab Bank.

May 2012 – AMAC trains TN Dept of Children’s Services.

May 2012- Refused to sign the Agenda 21 resolution passed by the state legislature (note that all Republicans voting in both the House and Senate voted yes).

July 20, 2012 – Full-page ad in The Tennessean of the Resolution opposing Governor Haslam’s administration partnership with the AMAC and the hiring of Shariah Compliant Finance Specialist, Samar Ali

July 2012- Williamson County Republican Party, the Stewart County Republican Party, the Carroll County Republican Party have submitted a resolution stating “The Governor of the Great State of Tennessee and his administration have demonstrated a consistent lack of conservative values. Mainly over his hiring of Sharia Compliance expert Samar Ali.

July 2012- GOP state Senate candidate Woody Degan of Shelby County charged the Haslam administration was “making our Economic Development Department Sharia compliant,” in part by hiring Ali as international director earlier this year.

July 2012- “Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam has elevated and/or afford [sic] preferential political status to Sharia adherents in Tennessee, thereby aiding and abetting the advancement of an ideology and doctrine which is wholly incompatible with the Constitution of the United States and the Tennessee Constitution,” the Williamson (County Republican Party)  resolution, dated 7/10/12

July 2012- Kevin Kookogey, chairman of the Williamson County Republicans: “To date, the Haslam Administration has displayed an unfortunate ignorance to the threat of Shariah,”  “They seem willing to accept the claims and defense of the Muslim Brotherhood at face value, refusing to even consider that, perhaps, those bent on destroying Western Civilization might just be infiltrating our institutions.

August 2012- Nihad Awad, Executive Director of CAIR travels to Murfreesboro to celebrate opening of mosque.

August 15, 2012 – Deputy Governor Claude Ramsey issues a letter defending Commissioner Gibbons’ partnership with the AMAC and the Haslam administration’s appointment of Shariah Compliant Finance specialist, Samar 

August 24, 2012 – After listening to Islamic Networks Group (ING) founder speak on the subject of “Women and Shariah”, ACO intern Jihan Abdulla tells The Tennessean that as Muslim woman she feels like she has more rights than American women

August 2012 – Islamic Networks Group (ING) provides AMAC-sponsored training for their Islamic Speakers Bureau

September 2012 – James Cotter, the TNDHS Regional Advisor who met with the MRRT in June 2011 and who claims that approval for the AMAC went to the Governor, is promoted to the position of State Training Advisor

September 2012 – AMAC co-chairs Daoud Abudiab and Zulfat Suara join the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC) Board of Directors

February 2013- Libraries all across the state of Tennessee recieve National Endowment for the Humanities grants, which is financing the “Muslim Journeys” books/videos series to be placed in Tn libraries. The books are “intended to address both the need and desire of the American public for trustworthy and accessible resources about Muslim beliefs and practices and the cultural heritage associated with Islamic civilizations”

May 2013- Al-Jazeera plans to open a news bureau in Nashville.The Tennessean reports the news organization that bought Al Gore’s Current TV for $500 million earlier this year has said it will begin broadcasting Al-Jazeera America sometime late this summer. Vanderbilt religious studies lecturer Abdulkadir Gure said Nashville probably was chosen because it is geographically, politically and demographically central.

June 2013- Sends DOJ and FBI to prepare Manchester residents for acceptance of Sharia into their communities and to warn of negative posts about Islam on social websites you may face fines and imprisonment. Haslams office denies any knowledge of diversity event in Manchester TN.

The journey you just took should be more than enough to convince you that Governor Haslam has someone in his pocket. The “bank” so to speak should be obvious and should be enough to make you ask him some questions. Let’s assume he is not listening. While his head is turned let’s elect someone that cares about Tennesseeans!

I am assuming Mr Williams left the timeline out of his blog because it contained the truth and by including the timeline on Governor Haslams actions would perhaps somehow implicate the Governor with his a actions through association as I have.

The moral of this story! Speak the truth, support the facts and inform the masses regardless of the opposition.

Remember, “Where the flak is heaviest, it confirms the target!”

Sources of info:

Please tune in to “a disgruntled republican” blog site
on Zimbio, it’s chocked full of other interesting stories! Share the love, there is plenty to go around!

http://m.zimbio.com/go/01ylFUZV0q8/http://www.adisgruntledrepublican.com/2013/07/is-governor-haslam-tuning-tennessee.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FwYHZ+%28A+Disgruntled+Republican%29

http://www.zimbio.com/Mayor+Bill+Haslam/articles/oxAhrKLMukc/Governor+Haslam+tuning+Tennessee+Saudi+Arabia

Author of the above story:
http://www.zimbio.com/member/Rodwilliams

Common Core: Arne Duncan speaks to “white moms” opposing reform, “your child, not as bright as you thought they were”

Common Core: Arne Duncan speaks to “white  moms” opposing reform, “your child, not as bright as you thought they were”

On Friday, November 15th, 2013, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, in a meeting with state education chiefs and Superintendents spoke regarding opposition to the Common Core State Standards. 

Speaking to parents, “white moms” upset with test results and weaknesses within the educational system Duncan had this to say:

“I  find it fascinating that opponents include “white suburban moms” who — all of a sudden discovered that their child isn’t as bright as they thought they were, and their school isn’t quite as good as they thought they were.”

Duncan apologized on Monday afternoon for the remark.

According to CNN, Duncan said: “My wording, my phrasing, was a little clumsy and I apologize for that.”

Soccer moms, those “white moms”, dads, parents, teachers and basically anyone concerned about how Common Core will affect their children have been completely dismissed by Duncan and with one comment has shown his insensitivity for parents concerned or opposed to Common Core.

The failure of the elite left swept up
in their own personal bubble of self righteousness have once again failed to listen to the populace that speaks against their so called weak reform measures.

Duncan is talking to concerned parents, who happen to be white, injecting race unnecessarily into a bitter fight over common core, deliberately talking down to parents as if to shame them into shutting up? Where is his shame?

Duncan fails to recognize that these “white moms,” these suburban moms, are mothers that care deeply about their children and what they are exposed to on a daily basis. Did he directly infer that “black moms” or other minorities don’t care about the education of their children? 

The disconnect of the education elite to not be sensitive to parents and teachers concerns is mind boggling to me. 

It seems in a perfect world the steam roller approach to education reform would not be necessary to apply. It seems a collective approach encompassing all would be the preferred, less controversial approach to reform.

One could argue that this block of mothers are driving the successes we have today and why are you trying to shame them into submission? 

To somehow minimize this concern and underhand a mothers efforts to assure her child receives a top notch education is beyond conceptual thought.

This recent “verbal blunder” by Duncan shows a willful intent to nationalize our educational system and concerned parents are not gonna stop him. 

It is evident that they will leave no one standing that dares to stand in their way of it’s implementation, fully revealing it’s purpose.

Duncan by his actions and speech confirms that the US Department of Education is not concerned with parents concerns about common core, its going forward regardless, instead focusing only on the standards and raising test scores, not well intended opposition.

We have seen this locally also where many “private meetings” are being held without parent input or allowed attendance. Parents! You are not a necessary ingredient in this recipe of reform!

Duncan revealed  his true feelings when he said “their child isn’t as bright as they thought they were, and their school isn’t quite as good as they thought they were.” 

This seems to echo Michelle Rhees type reform measures passed down to Tennessee Education Czar, her ex husband, Huffman and his little lap dog TN Governor Bill Haslam, where the impetus is that teachers and parents are why education in the US is so bad.

The top down bashing by the Secretary of Education speaks volumes of his agenda. 

There is a bigger picture and we got a glimpse of it Friday and it is bigger than you and I. 

We are in the way and the education plow is going to get you out of the way so their agenda can be fulfilled, regardless of how you think. 

My immediate questions are this and I would like for you to ponder these thoughts.  How are education reformist going to explain Common Core failures to a group of angry moms that tried to tell them it wouldn’t work in the first place?” How can raising standards assure academic success? Doesn’t  it take a village to educate a child? Doesnt it take an engaged white mom, or any mom or dad to raise the level of their childs education by being deeply involved in their education?  I would love to be a fly on the wall when that day arrives as poor results trickle in and parents realize that indeed, our kids are not as smart as we thought they were.

White moms and dads, everyone regardless of race, everywhere, stay engaged. Continue to attend school board meetings and demand your voice be heard on this issue. Write blogs, contact your elected officials and post info on social websites and make more people aware. This is our only defense. Get more active, stay active.

For Duncan to make such an insensitive racial comment shows me we are over the target, where the flak is heaviest and we are being heard!

We are where we need to be!

Sources of info:

CNN reports on “White Mom” comment.
http://www.cnn.com/2013/11/18/politics/duncan-comment-controversy/index.html

(Video) Fox News Megan Kelley reports on Duncan white mom comment.

Politico reports on “white mom” comment.
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=9F5C9690-85F5-4951-897F-8C7215D66382

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan apologizes for “White Mom” comment.
http://www.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/us/2013/11/19/dnt-marsh-arne-duncan-white-moms-remarks.cnn.html

Chamber conducts “private” meeting about Common Core, parents forced to stand outside and protest

Chamber conducts “private” meeting about Common Core, parents forced to stand outside and protest

11/19/2013

A protest is planned this Friday as once again a closed meeting is being conducted inside a taxpayer funded (yes the COC is partially funded with taxpayer revenue) venue about Common Core away from the general public.

If this does not convince you that something sinister is happening you will never be convinced of it. This is the second time in as many weeks that “private” meetings are being held and the public is not being invited about Common Core.

It is obvious that this is a deliberate attempt to slide an agenda into place without parent or school board influence or input. Corporatism and Nationalism of our schools are one of the biggest mistakes that can be made that affects our children.

The subversive and covert actions by these sinister organizations with a hidden agenda is surely enough to convince you that something is up and you are not supposed to know about it.

Here is a support letter from the Chamber of Commerce as it relates to Common Core. 

Corporate America and Big expansive Government is now running the show and the direction of our schools. School board influence is dwindling and parents can no longer direct decision making. This is a very sad statement.

Click to access StatementK12USChamberofCommerce.pdf

A message from Karen Bracken of Tennessee Against Common Core, tnacc.net .

Friends,
 
On Friday, November 22, 2013 the Cleveland/Bradley County Chamber of Commerce will be conducting a closed meeting for members only about Common Core with representatives from SCORE.  We plan to conduct an anti-Common Core rally outside the meeting.
 
We are speaking with Channel 12 and Times Free Press to cover the rally.  SO PLEASE grab your neighbors and join us on Friday, at 8:30am.   We suggest parking by Starbucks.  We will all gather there and then walk to the area where we will conduct our rally (the Chamber office is located in the same shopping center as Starbucks).   LETS SEND A HUGE LOUD message to the Chamber and to SCORE.
 
The Cleveland Starbucks is located at 653 West Inman St., Cleveland, TN.   Throw a coat on the kids and bring them with you.
 
Please share this information with neighbors, friends and relatives in the Bradley County area that might be interested in supporting our efforts.  Thanks.
 
Karen Bracken
http://www.tnacc.net
http://www.americadontforget.com
215-692-2147

Common Core: Math standards developers refuse to sign off, schools implement unapproved standards

Common Core: Math standards developers refuse to sign off, schools implement unapproved standards

“Mathematics Professor R. James Milgram of Stanford University, the only mathematician on the Validation Committee, refused to sign off on the (Common Core) math standards, because they would put many students two years behind those of many high-achieving countries.”

For example, “Algebra 1 would be taught in 9th grade, not 8th grade for many students, making calculus inaccessible to them in high school. The quality of the standards is low and not internationally benchmarked.”

Dr. James Milgram, Professor of Math at Stanford University, emeritus, had such serious reservations about the fuzzy math of Common Core (Obama’s educational movement) that Milgram refused to sign off on the standards’ adequacy– as an official member of the Common Core Validation Committee.* states Rachel Alexander with RWN.

What are we doing in Tennessee and across the nation to our children?

A push to make our kids mediocre? Are we satisfied to only reach our least potential? 

Sure, small community colleges are great and have served my family well but where is the push for higher learning? Where is the thought process that if we set the bar high enough someone might succeed?

We are steadily educating worker bees, slaves and serfs for the workforce at the behest of corporate America while making little globalists and corporate pons to do as they are told.

Is this federal top down indoctrination a part of a bigger plan? Mindless Drones? Is that the best we achieve?

The quest for greatness is not there any more and I don’t completely understand.

Common Core Math Standards not being signed off on or approved is a big deal and we push it forward anyway placing it in our schools and say it’s the best we got? We hand it to our kids? A sub-par education? Unchecked? For a few hundred million?

Meanwhile, we have a corporate globalist out of touch Governor spanning the state making money on his education ventures, wheeling and dealing wherever the opportunity presents. 

He is misleading the state and touting that the Common Core Math standards are responsible for raised math scores from last year. 

The CC standards are not really even fully implemented yet in TN. Where is the clarity in this debacle by our elected representatives? The media?

If we go the way of New York and Kentucky mimicking their test results we may be in for a surprise or two when our real Common Core scores come in! 

But at what expense?

Our children and their education?

Sources of information:

http://www.rightwingnews.com/education/common-core-whats-hidden-behind-the-language/

Dr Milgram and Stotsky refuse to sign off on Math and English standards.
http://whatiscommoncore.wordpress.com/tag/refused-to-sign-off-on-the-standards/

Pioneer Institute: Math Standards
http://www.bipps.org/pioneer-institute-college-and-career-ready-national-math-standards-prepare-students-for-only-non-selective-colleges/

White paper: Milgram and Stotsky on Zimba and math standards.
http://pioneerinstitute.org/?wpdmdl=381

Hospitals forced to not see non-emergent patients under Obamacare beginning January 2014

Hospitals forced to not see non-emergent patients under Obamacare beginning January 2014

Hospitals and Emergency Centers are being forced to stop rendering healthcare to non-emergent patients beginning January 1, 2014  under the Affordable Healthcare, Obamacare guidelines.

The DSH or Disproportionate Sharing Hospitals will start seeing a large decrease in reimbursement rates to hospitals currently treating indigent, non insurance bearing patients.This action will force hospitals to seek alternatives to delivering “free” or “uncompensated” care just to survive.

Hospitals across America are starting to either opt to not see uninsured patients in an emergent setting, demand payment up front, link payment to a bank account (as reported by BCN in previous blogs) in order to survive.

DSH Reductions will force Emergency rooms, hospitals and providers to resort to third world tactics to survive in a post Obamacare reimbursement world.

Shadac reports; “A national total of Medicaid DSH money is allotted across the states each year, with a 2011 total of $11.3 billion (closer to 20 billion in 2013). ”

“The ACA (Obamacare) reduces the annual Medicaid DSH total by $500 million in 2014; $600 million in 2015; $600 million in 2016; $1.8 billion in 2017; $5 billion in 2018; $5.6 billion in 2019; and $4 billion in 2020.”  

“In implementing these reductions, the statute requires HHS (Health and Human Services) to develop a “DSH Health Reform methodology” that imposes the largest percentage reduction on states with the lowest percent of uninsured or on states that currently do NOT target their DSH payments to hospitals with high volumes of Medicaid patients or high levels of uncompensated care.”

Uncompensated care, decreased allotments to hospital and providers will tip the scale to the patient placing the burden of payment upon them. Those who wish to remain uninsured and reporting to a hospital with a non emergent condition will begin to be turned away. There is no other viable scenario at this juncture.

If you work in or are associated with providing care in an Emergent Center you know that a great percentage of what presents to the Emergency Room, the entry point of any hospital, is either non emergent or uninsured. This population, presently and in the past, was pretty much taken care of by the DSH allotment now being taken away by the Affordable Healthcare Act or Obamacare. 

This action will leave millions vulnerable and seeking a setting where healthcare is delivered by a cash only scenario with very little regulation, a black market approach if you will. The underground provider or nurse with the ability to diagnose and treat on the spot for cash, bypassing the whole system. Think it will not happen?It’s already happening.

The Patient Affordable Care Act was intended to catch those patients or provide the net that was previously cast by hospitals under the Disproportionate Sharing Hospital plan. That safety net is now being removed and many are not going to like the outcome. The  net now has a wide hole in it and patients will be falling through rapidly.

Obamacare was ideally supposed to be the safety net pulling in some 40  million plus uninsured, give them “free or a terrific deal” on an insurance policy that would fix all their healthcare needs, off setting the total cost of healthcare, leaving “all” to share the load, so to speak.

What the “healthcare system” and the patient population system failed to see coming was the disastrous roll out of Obamacare and the many unexpected costs and high premiums associated with it and the amount of people running from it!

With premiums as high as several thousands of dollars a month for a family plan, three to five hundred  for a single young adult you can easily see why those this bill was intended to help will only hurt.

The recent ACA website rollout with it’s whopping 6 patients enrolled and ballooning premiums has left many seeking healthcare seeing a bad case of sticker shock as hospitals and providers look for survival measure to mediate the losses, to balance their budgets.

The proportional shift of most of the cost to young people is forcing millions to reevaluate the “need” to purchase healthcare instead opting to pay the relatively small fine at the end of the year. This leaves many with the inability to seek non emergent healthcare.

A dilemma has surfaced with no quick fix in site and only surmounting issues. 

Millions of Americans and financially strapped families choosing to not participate in Obamacare are facing yet another hurdle. 

Higher premiums, cancelled policies, opting to not purchase government insurance has left many in a quandry with few options leaving many financially strapped individuals to choose between purchasing a bad government forced  insurance, not seek medical treatment or ultimately choosing to say the heck with it all, Im putting food on the table for my family. The latter is the dignified approach and probably the preferred alternative.

This shifts most of the cost now to the employer, small businesses, the middle class and the everyday citizen……you, John and Jane taxpayer.

Higher taxes, up to 20 new taxes in all, higher premiums, increased shared costs with fewer participants  leaves hospitals with no other viable choice but to cease treating patients ie; the uninsured, the immigrant and the non emergent.

EMTALA, a regulation that forces hospitals and providers to care for patients regardless of their ability to
pay will be challenged under new Obamacare guidelines. 

The challenge will now be if you want healthcare in my hospital, you must purchase the insurance that your government is forcing upon you or we cannot see you!

Obamacare or the Affordable Care Act has created a major “boondoggle” of sorts.

It has offered unaffordable, unreliable care, a poor payment structure, reduced reimbursements for hospitals, higher premiums while forcing you to participate and not doing so will result in higher taxes and fines for you not doing so. 

Obamacare has forgotten to close or mend the hole in the safety net. That proverbial hole being hospitals have now trumped the administration using their own rules closing the door to healthcare by opting out of your health care if you don’t buy the mandated government insurance. 

What does a patient do? What does a hospital or provider do?

Well, simply put, patients will continue out of neccesity to not purchase this high premium government insurance forcing hospitals and providers to shut their doors till you purchase the insurance for your non emergent needs?

Will the government now say to the hospitals you must treat these patients regardless of their ability to pay per EMTALA regulations or force you to buy the insurance that the hospitals are now both saying you must buy to dart the door of our emergency room?

 Nothing would surprise me but a simple statement like that would not support the governments plan of forced or mandated healthcare for everyone, this rendering EMTALA non-existent.

Obamacare has contributed to this boondoggle by introducing the Individual Shared Responsibility plan and has placed upon you yet another way to make you pay for your healthcare.

Introducing the Individual Shared Responsibility plan under the  Affordable Care Act directly from the ACA healthcare exchange site.

Beginning January 2014, the Individual Shared Responsibility provision calls for each individual to either have minimum essential coverage (whatever that is) for each month, qualify for an exemption, or make a payment when filing his or her federal income tax return. 

On Aug. 27, 2013, the Department of the Treasury and the IRS issued final regulations on the Individual Shared Responsibility provision, Notice 2013-42….

The open enrollment period to purchase health insurance coverage for 2014 through the Health Insurance Marketplace runs from Oct. 1, 2013, through March 31, 2014.

The American Emergency Physician Association has prepared a statement regarding reimbursement under the ACA or Obamacare and I summarize. (See link below for full statement)

The ACA forces doctors, hospitals and providers to treat every pt under EMTALA while reimbursement rates go down. 

The ACA forces non good faith reimbursement scenarios where the hospital is forced to take care of patients with shrinking reimbursement from the government while private insurers reap the benefit of taking advantage of a low loss scenario having the distinct advantage of bypassing the benefit of a high cost uninsured patient population.

This has left hospitals, mainly Emergency Centers to force payment up front or stop treating non emergent patients.

Recently information was passed to Bradley County News from a social media website that depicts the following,

The Appalachian Regional Healthcare system in Kentucky has made the unprecedented move to opt out of treating non-emergent patients. 

A flyer or memo has  recently been sent out to patients and posted in their ERs which states, “Attention patients: Consistent with the Affordable Care Act, we will no longer be able to see  non emergent patients without healthcare coverage beginning January 2014!” The saga begins!

Can you see what is happening here? 

The government is saying you must purchase insurance, the hospitals must provide care  regardless of ability to pay under EMTALA, decreasing reimbursement to those providing care and now the hospitals are taking the desperate steps to say NO, we can no longer see you unless you purchase mandated insurance by the Federal government.  

The end scenario: 

Patients will be unable to enter the ER for non emergent care. They will be unable to pay for a Doctors office visit. This will leave millions without a portal of entry and forced to stand outside hospital doors begging for care and access or seek alternative, perhaps underground behind the scenes treatment inside a newly developed black market.

This is reminiscent of third world country healthcare, then again this end product is intentional isn’t it?

 It is about control of the populace?

Right?

Sources of info:

Disproportionate hospital share is going down!

Click to access PatientProtectionsandAffordableCareAct_PPACA_Position_Statement.pdf

http://www.shadac.org/blog/aca-data-note-hospitals-medicaid-expansion-and-disproportionate-share-hospital-dsh-payments

DSH Hospital Allotments through 2011. TN included.

Click to access DSH%20summary.pdf

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/27/nyregion/affordable-care-act-reduces-a-fund-for-the-uninsured.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Click to access 2013-21157.pdf

Click to access media.352.pdf