I rarely used to go to School Board meetings. Budget season, sure (being on the Budget Committee) but generally only when there was a contentious issue raising its head.
So much going on in regular life, I used to be one of those Conservatives that thought that family, friends, and career demanded much more of my time than “Government” at any level. I figured that people in Government were just doing their jobs but otherwise leaving the rest of us alone. Boy, what a shock when I finally realized that Government, at 3, 4, or even 5 “levels down” from my day-to-day life was whittling away at what I was schooled in as “The Proper Role of Government.”
I hold that it was the Left that was taking advantage of that sense and operating at those “levels down”.
For me, O’Neil’s quip became reality – and in a hurry.
I finally decided that no longer would people, elected or otherwise, make the decisions that I and my family had to live by (or be constrained by, truth be told) without my input. I refused to be a sheep just going with the flow for I learned that much of what was going on when I became politically aware back in mid ‘Naughts was not fitting in with our Founding Principles. GraniteGrok and my individual political activism.
And lately, “All Politics is Local” has come home to roost in School Boards who are probably the most condescending, overbearing, and self-isolating part of local politics. Between these Elected Representatives and “the Professionals” that have captured them, the full panoply of Leftist politics and indoctrination have risen (as if from the dead) up to “our level.” As our kids have been coming home from school with words that are anathema to their Parents and Grandparents who still believed that the WHAT and HOW of their times in school still existed.
Tip O’Neil had his saying, Doug’s and mine was “If it is happening here, it’s happening in your town, too.” And it is, all over NH.
That curtain has been rent to shreds. Overstepping and hubris have made it clear.
They’ve made it personal – they have made it clear that your children are really THEIRS with turning schools where academics are second place in teaching “dispositions” – teaching kids to learn their ideology instead of learning how to think for themselves. That’s not political??
They’ve made it personal and ALL about the politics. Sure, they say it isn’t and that school boards aren’t, the Administrators are as pure as the driven snow, and teachers merely have apples on their desks.
OK, back to what I started to write about. It IS about local politics and it has become political because School Boards, Administrators, and Teachers (at the prompting of their Unions) refuse to Follow the Law. Like this turd (reformatted, emphasis mine):
Loudoun County Superintendent Appears to Admit District Violated State Law by Not Reporting Sexual Assault
The superintendent of a Virginia school district on Friday appeared to admit the district violated state law in failing to properly report alleged sexual assaults, as a state official confirmed the matter is under review. Loudoun County Public Schools Superintendent Scott Ziegler made the admission during a brief appearance before reporters, where he read a prepared statement and took no questions. Ziegler said that the district made “errors in our state reporting regarding disciplinary incidents in schools,” adding that it “inadvertently omitted some information in the past.”
Yeah, “inadvertently omitted”; sorry, that doesn’t apply and as the Administrative Head of the District, HE was responsible for making sure that the report was done and in a process that Followed The Law. When Leftists are in the process of “taking over”, the Law seems to matter very little, processes in place to ensure openness and transparency are ignored.
How many of YOU have tried to get answers, at public School Board Meetings from your elected Representatives, only to be rebuffed with silence? How many of you, in reviewing School Board policies, ever wonder “Can they actually do this in NH?”. The more I read and then try to find the legal basis for those policies and the points in them, the less I trust these folks. Many of these come from the NH School Board Association lawyer mill – spitting out policies all the time. They pass them on to the Superintendents who just pass them on to the Boards who then put them into practice.
FEW, it seems, ever wonder to vet them from the stand of “Can we really do this? Does this even pass the smell test?”. A complete refusal to scope out what they are allowed to do. Just ignoring to Follow The Law. Gracious! What an example to show to their students – we don’t have to listen to no stinkin’ law!
“That is extremely concerning, and we are taking steps to make sure that process is improved. I will say that I have no reason to believe at this time that any missing reports were due to an intent to hide any information from the Virginia Department of Education,” he said, blaming an alleged “lack of oversight” that was in place before he was appointed in June, even though he served as interim superintendent starting Jan. 1.
Ziegler appeared to be responding to a report by The Daily Wire that the district failed to record multiple instances of alleged sexual assault even though it’s required to by state law.
Ziegler said during a school board meeting on June 22 that he was unaware of any record of assaults happening in the district’s restrooms, nearly a month after a girl was allegedly raped by a male in a bathroom at Stone Bridge High School.
He’s in CYA mode and justifiably so. Instead of reporting it, he made that young girl’s Dad to be the scapegoat – a “tail wagging the dog” in having his protestations “hide” his illegal actions (or inaction if you wish but still a conscious decision to NOT Follow the Law).
There’s much more at The Epoch Times for this story. It’s must miserable in seeing grown adults defending themselves instead of rushing to help this girl.
While I hope that this is an isolated incident in and of itself, the forcible sodomy of a young girl and then covering it up, violating the basic sense of Follow The Law is becoming more and more rampant. No, I’m not talking about crime here as far as those individuals DOING the crime but those in places of authority (and formerly, respect) making the decision to NOT Follow the Law or to turn their backs on the Law. Remember that “Space to Destroy” utterance by a Democrat Mayor?
With her city spiraling out of control, Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake has two problems: quelling the violence — and clarifying a controversial comment she made over the weekend before it erupted.
“I’ve made it very clear that I work with the police and instructed them to do everything they could to make sure that the protesters were able to exercise their right to free speech,” Rawlings-Blake said Saturday as Baltimore roiled following the funeral of Freddie Gray, the black man who died in police custody April 19.
“It’s a very delicate balancing act because while we try to make sure that they were protected from the cars and the other things that were going on, we also gave those who wished to destroy space to do that as well, and we work very hard to keep that balance and to put ourselves in the best position to de-escalate.”
Condoning those that decide to NOT Follow the Law is even worse. Sadly, we see this more and more all up and down the chain (is Biden “faithfully executing the Law” as he doesn’t enforce our southern border from illegal aliens, or declaring mandates for which he has no legal authority). But for most of us, the buck stops locally: School Boards, Selectmen / Aldermen, Mayors, the different Boards and Commissions in your town or city. Many DO Follow the Law – but I keep seeing more and more reports of those, once becoming elected representatives, feel they have become “Elected Royalty” in which laws are only tiny speed bumps to go over quickly or around.
The Law’s intents are being superseded by office holder/bureaucrat desires for Power – and Power ignores Law when inconvenient and deployed to cement such Power when possible.
So, what do you know about your School Board and are they Following the Law?
