[CS-FSLUG] PD: Anti-homeschooling bigots strike again

[Tim Young]

(he, He) I found this article particularly humorous.  I was homeschooled all my
life, and have no problems with what the Muskegon folks have put together. 
They had the grace to say that it was a group of wacko homeschoolers, the same
way that one might say Islamic extremists.  There may be homeschooler
extremists group for all I know.

Now, if they pass out anti-homeschooler propaganda during the exercise, then I
think something should be done about it.  My reading on the matter?  That they
wanted to stage a fictitious situation and so created a fictitious enemy.  If
people want to take insult because something hits a little close to home, that
is their problem.  Unless the writer of the article actually is a wacko
homeschooler extremist, then he has the right to be insulted.  

Just a funny side story.  I have some friends from South America somewhere who
told me of something that happened there during their school years.  The
military wanted to do a similar thing, they wanted to get some practice
storming a compound.  So, totally unexpectedly, they took over a missionary
headquarters, herded everyone into one area, checked how long it took them to
do it, then released everyone.  Seriously, they just did it for practice, and
the missionaries had no previous inkling it was going to happen.

	- Tim

Fred Miller wrote:
> 
> http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=40569
> 
> Anti-homeschooling bigots strike again
> 
>  Posted: September 22, 2004  1:00 a.m. Eastern
>  © 2004 Creators Syndicate, Inc.
> 
> The public school establishment hates homeschoolers. They've smeared the
> movement as a conspiracy of conservative Christian zealots. They've scoffed
> at homeschooled kids as social pariahs. They've painted homeschooling parents
> as uneducated and negligent.
> 
> And now, under the guise of preparing students for a violent terrorist attack,
> educators in one public school district are casting homeschoolers in the role
> of bomb-detonating militants.
> 
> The story about a mock terrorism drill involving a local school district in
> the Muskegon Chronicle starts out innocently enough:
> 
>    Local school district transportation directors instigated the exercise
> because they wanted to test their abilities to respond to emergencies, said
> Tom Spoelman, transportation consultant for the Muskegon Area Intermediate
> School District. They eventually hooked up with Muskegon County Emergency
> Services, and planning for the event has been under way for about a year,
> Spoelman said.
> 
>    The exercise will test not only school transportation directors, but also
> the Muskegon County Emergency Operations Plan, which involves many agencies
> throughout the county.
> 
>    About 60 middle and high school students from Reeths-Puffer and Whitehall
> public schools will be part of the exercise, according to Kristin Tank,
> public information coordinator for the MAISD. Local law enforcement agencies,
> fire departments, human service agencies, transportation services and medical
> services will participate.
> 
>    Students from Muskegon Community College and Reeths-Puffer will assist in
> applying makeup to add to the reality of the gruesome scene. Between 200 and
> 300 people will observe the exercise, including school bus drivers, school
> administrators, emergency personnel and evaluators from agencies across the
> state who will provide feedback.
> 
> What's jaw-droppingly unbelievable is the next paragraph describing the
> attackers in the simulation:
> 
>    The exercise will simulate an attack by a fictitious radical group called
> Wackos Against Schools and Education who believe everyone should be
> homeschooled. Under the scenario, a bomb is placed on the bus and is
> detonated while the bus is traveling on Durham, causing the bus to land on
> its side and fill with smoke.
> 
> This is not a joke. A taxpayer-funded drill is using public school students to
> enforce anti-homeschooling bigotry under the guise of preparing for
> terrorism. Terrorism by whom? By Islamic jihadists who hijack planes and
> incinerate kids headed to Disneyworld. Islamic terrorists who take hundreds
> of children hostage in Beslan, force them to drink their own urine and shoot
> babies in the back. Islamic terrorists who groom toddlers as suicide bombers.
> 
> Our enemies are Islamic extremist murderers. Except if you happen to attend
> the Muskegon County, Mich., schools, where the menacing faces of terrorism
> belong to parents who make untold sacrifices to give their children the best
> education they know how by schooling them in the loving environment of their
> own homes.
> 
> I recall the Islamist-sympathizing admonition included in the National
> Education Association's touchy-feely, post-Sept. 11 curriculum: "Do not
> suggest that any group is responsible" for the terrorist attacks, one tip for
> parents and teachers urged. Unless, it should be amended, you can work an
> anti-homeschooling hate angle into the lesson.
> 
> When President Bush's education secretary, Rod Paige, likened the NEA in jest
> to a "terrorist organization," teachers' union officials and the media became
> completely unhinged. How dare he make such an odious comparison, they gasped.
> How dare he make light of the real terrorists, they fumed.
> 
> "I can tell you what my first response was: Scary. That's really frightening,"
> said Diana Garchow, a special-education teacher at Highland Elementary School
> in Bakersfield, Calif., to the Associated Press after Paige's remarks. "It's
> scary that you can't voice an opinion in this country without being called a
> terrorist ... I don't care if it was a joke or what it was, that was a
> totally inappropriate comment."
> 
> Paige was forced to apologize to teachers. What about the Muskegon County,
> Mich., school system? Will its public education militants apologize to
> homeschoolers for taking an intolerant swipe at their beliefs? Or will this
> politicized "Wackos Against Schools and Education" terror drill be coming to
> a classroom near you?
> 
> Michelle Malkin's column is syndicated by Creators Syndicate and appears in
> about 100 newspapers nationwide. Her book, "Invasion: How America Still
> Welcomes Terrorists, Criminals and Other Foreign Menaces to Our Shores," is a
> national best seller and now available at ShopNetDaily. All copies of the
> book sold at ShopNetDaily are personally autographed.
> 
> --
> "Running Windows on a Pentium is like getting a Porsche but only being
> able to drive it in reverse with the handbrake on."
> 
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