Bacon's Rebellion

  • The Left’s Plan to Drive a Huge Shortage of K-12 Teachers

    Posted on

    by

    sherlockj

    Becky Pringle, NEA President

    by James C. Sherlock

    The left has designed Critical Race Theory (CRT) and Socio-Emotional Learning (SEL) in no small part to drive current K-12 teachers with traditional values out of the profession.

    Leftists hope to have set in motion a five-step process:

    1. It will be clear in a couple of years that the plan has worked. With Virginia already facing a teacher shortage, VDOE continues to push CRT, SEL and other progressive ideals such as the colossal overreach of a transgender child policy that converts appropriate accommodations into recruitment.
    2. Working conditions will continue to worsen for those:
      • who want to teach kids reading, writing, mathematics, science and the other academic disciplines without being forced into service in loco parentis to train social justice warriors in violation of their personal standards and those of most parents;
      • who wish to protect their personal values and dignity in their chosen profession.
    3. The state will be shocked — shocked —  that there are not nearly enough teachers to staff the schools.
    4. Virginia will continue its ongoing reductions in the qualifications for licensure. (Example:  For the Middle School Science Praxis test, the Educational Testing Service, after exhaustive research, recommended a cut score of 152 corresponding to a raw score of 61 out of 100. The Virginia Board of Education recently authorized a cut score of 147, corresponding to a raw score of 57 out of 100.)
    5. Nothing will stem the tide. President Biden will be asked to declare a national emergency and ask for a trillion dollars to increase the numbers of teachers without, this time, looking for root causes.

    This is an easy assessment of what the left wants, not the least because they admit it. Most radical progressives are not stupid, just wrong. Those five steps are exactly what they seek.

    (more…)

  • Pass the Hemlock, Please

    Posted on

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    James A. Bacon


    by Walter Smith

    The strangest thing happened the other day. I was asleep, but I swear it wasn’t a dream. I was in Charlottesville, wandering around the University of Virginia Law School! I walked into an auditorium where the law faculty was seated, with UVa President Jim Ryan and law school Dean Risa Goluboff in attendance. Before the professors could chase me out and file a No Trespass Warning, we were suddenly transported, Star Trek-like, to an amphitheater in Athens. Socrates stood before us.

    The following discourse took place in Classical Greek, and everyone understood it. Socrates took the floor and began conducting a — you guessed it — Socratic dialogue.

    “Is there any limit on a woman’s right to choose,” he asked.

    No, nodded the professors in freaky unanimity, the woman’s right to control what happened to her own body was sacrosanct. Pressing on, the great philosopher asked, “what if the baby were due in a month? What if the baby’s head, shoulders and torso had emerged?” Heads bobbed up and down. Yes, it was still the woman’s right to choose.

    It was astonishing how up to speed on current events the old man was. He then asked — I’m telling the truth! — “If a woman has the right to control her own body, could Athens require her to get a COVID shot?” (more…)

  • Even With a New Name, Community College Can Be Free

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    Dick Hall-Sizemore

    by Dick Hall-Sizemore

    Lost in the discussion of last year’s General Assembly actions and the current discussion of renaming community colleges is the restoration of funding for Governor Northam’s “Get Skilled, Get a Job, Give Back” (G3) program. This program will provide a free community college education for low-and middle-income students enrolled in “high demand” programs.

    To be eligible, a student’s family income must be equal to or lower than 400 percent of the federal poverty level. According to the Virginia Community College System, “As a rule of thumb, students could qualify for G3 support if they come from a family of four with a household income of $106,000 per year.” The student must also be enrolled in one of numerous, designated “high demand” programs and taking at least six credit hours per semester. (A list of the high demand programs can be found here.) (more…)

  • Virginia Next-to-Last in Motley Fool Ranking

    Posted on

    by

    Steve Haner

    Crescent Dunes solar project near Tonopah, NV. Photo:  Wikipedia

    by Steve Haner

    If you need another reason to break into peals of laughter over the recent CNBC “Top States for Business” ranking, consider this.

    In the story about the infrastructure rankings, while praising the state of Nevada, the illustration provided was the aerial shot of the Tonopah Solar Energy facility. The failed, now-in-bankruptcy (also here) Tonopah Solar Facility. Shades of Virginia’s clean energy future to come? But I digress.  (more…)

  • Flooding the Zone at VDOE

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    sherlockj

    Superintendent of Public Instruction James Lane

    by James C. Sherlock

    The Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) is absolutely relentless.

    Defenders in a zone defense in football are responsible for areas of the field, rather than following a specific receiver. Offenses often attack these defenses by flooding a zone — sending three receivers into an area covered by two defenders.  

    But at least there are 11 players on both sides of the ball.

    VDOE is trying to flood  defenders of traditional K-12 education, not with strategy, but with superior numbers of players.

    The enormous staff of VDOE, backed by state-funded University of Virginia and Virginia Commonwealth University ed school professors, attacks traditional roles of parents and teachers on so many fronts simultaneously that they are very hard to defend.

    I just read the VDOE Teacher Direct Newsletter published July 14, 2021. 

    Below are a few of the headlines along with some of the VDOE guidance for teachers.

    (more…)

  • Freedom From Union Dues Hangs on Warner

    Posted on

    by

    Steve Haner

    Washington Post photo of a cake delivered to Virginia Senator Mark Warner in May, encouraging his support for the pending PRO Act. So far he is not supporting it.

    By Vincent Vernuccio 

    First published by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy.

    A bill under active consideration in Congress would allow unions to get Virginia workers fired for not paying union fees. The Protecting the Right to Organize Act, among many other things would end right-to-work laws in Virginia and in 26 other states.

    According to a recent report by the Institute for the American Worker, 89,000 Virginia workers are unionized and currently protected if they change their minds by our state’s right-to-work law.  Those who have chosen not to join a union would be forced to pay union fees if the PRO Act passes. Those who are already members would lose the ability to choose to opt-out and stop paying union fees if they feel they are not getting good representation.

    Another 2,971,327 Virginians could be forced to pay union fees if unions organize their workplace and the PRO Act kills right-to-work.  (more…)

  • On the Renaming of Community Colleges

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    Dick Hall-Sizemore

    by Dick Hall-Sizemore

    A school task force has recommended that John Tyler Community College be renamed Brightpoint Community College.

    I can understand getting rid of the John Tyler name. He was a slaveholder and a member of the Confederate Congress. He also happened to be a former president of the United States, but only because William Henry Harrison died from pneumonia after a month in office. Tyler was not a founding father and his presidency was undistinguished.

    But Brightpoint? I’m sorry, but that is a stupid name. It sounds like one of those made-up names for banks. (more…)

  • Descano Promises More Sunlight for Criminal Justice Data

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    Democracy thrives in sunlight

    by James A. Bacon

    Steve Descano, Fairfax County Commonwealth Attorney, plans to begin publishing data on prosecutions as part of his campaign to root out alleged racial and socioeconomic disparities in the county’s criminal justice system, reports The Washington Post.

    Data to be published online will cover such metrics as race, charging, sentences, bail decisions, and plea offers.

    “You can’t fix what you don’t measure,” Descano said. “I’ve heard from a lot of members of our community they don’t know what goes on inside this building and they don’t feel comfortable that they are going to get a fair shake.”

    This is a positive development. Open publication of the data is far preferable to the attorney general’s office compiling the data internally and selectively citing statistics that support a predetermined narrative. Anyone who values open, honest government should approve. In fact, Fairfax County might be setting a precedent that other Virginia localities should emulate. (more…)

  • “Let Them Die”

    Posted on

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    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    The rhetoric is getting ugly out there, folks.

    In a counter-protest (against those protesting the enactment of admissions policies that discriminate against Asian-American students) at the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, Michelle Leete, an official with the Fairfax County NAACP and state and district PTAs, said the following: (more…)

  • Extirpation of Memory

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    by

    James A. Bacon


    by Donald Smith

    In deciding which Confederate iconography should remain visible at the Virginia Military Institute, the school’s Commemorations and Memorials Naming and Review sub-committee (CMNRC) identified four major items of commemoration to Stonewall Jackson at the Main Post. Most famously, there was the statue sculpted by VMI alumnus  and Battle of New Market veteran Moses Ezekiel, but Jackson’s name appears  on Memorial Hall, while his name is engraved on an arch at the Old Barracks, while a quote attributed to him is also displayed there.

    This past November the Board of Visitors (B0V) voted to remove the statue. In May it approved the removal of drastic alteration of the other three items.

    The criteria that drove these decisions appear in this document, “Finding Meaning in the Landscape and Criteria By Which To Assess It.“

    A comparison of key passages from that CMNRC document and the Board of Visitors’ decision raises many questions. (more…)

  • Fellow Democrats, We Can’t Fix Stupid

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    sherlockj

    by James C. Sherlock

    Fellow Democrats, we can’t fix stupid.

    News report:

    “Secretary of State Antony Blinken responded Tuesday to criticism by the United Nations’ human rights apparatus of “systemic racism” in the United States by announcing plans to issue a formal, standing invitation to dozens of U.N. rights experts to visit and investigate.”

    “It is in this context that the United States intends to issue a formal, standing invitation to all U.N. experts who report and advise on thematic human rights issues.”

    “As a first step, Blinken said, the administration has invited two of the experts, the “special rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism” and the “special rapporteur on minority issues,” to pay an official visit.”

    (more…)

  • Richmond Public Schools Show No Progress on Staff COVID Vaccinations

    Posted on

    by

    sherlockj

    by James C. Sherlock

    Last updated Just 15 at 4:16 PM

    I have long taken a personal interest in the City of Richmond Public Schools (RPS). Its students have a right under the Virginia constitution to a quality education that they are systematically denied. RPS has utterly failed to educate the children under its care. The proof is in the Virginia Department of Education’s School Quality Report.

    The Board of Education dutifully reports that fact every year to the Governor and the General Assembly — another constitutional requirement. Neither takes effective action.

    Now most of RPS school personnel have failed to get vaccinated. School starts next month.

    Action is warranted. None appears in the offing. (more…)

  • Eating the Bait

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon


    by Joe Fitzgerald

    Eating The Bait is the improbable story of Harrisonburg’s Golf Course, and how it came to be, told in a decidedly non-linear fashion by a non-objective observer. The whole sick, sad, silly, sorry, sordid story of the destructive, polarizing, maddeningly frustrating and ultimately hilarious battle over whether a city in the Shenandoah Valley — where little happens, nor should it — should build a golf course. Caution: the story is carefully doctored by a key player to make it more exciting and occasionally uses 4-, 11-, 12, and 7-letter words to express frustration and drama.

    In April 1999 the City of Harrisonburg decided to build a golf course. “City” is capitalized here because the phrase refers to the government of the city, in all its majesty and error. The course was touted as raising the quality of life in the city, increasing city revenues, and helping make Harrisonburg a first-class city.

    The only real catch, as the City Council voted 5-0 to launch the project and the city staff began making plans and spending money, was that the city didn’t want a golf course. And by “city”, non-capitalized, I mean the people who lived in the city, paid the taxes and owned the government that the council and staff only held in trust. Two polls and an election bore out the fact that a landslide of city voters and an overwhelming majority of its citizenry did not want the golf course.

    The City didn’t care. The City knew better. And the city still bears the scars. (more…)

  • Vaccinations: Parents Matter

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    by Kerry Dougherty

    Does the left want to replace parents with the state?

    Increasingly, the answer seems to be a hard YES.

    Here’s one example of government officials actively driving a wedge between parents and children:

    Last November, the far-left District of Columbia City Council passed the “Minor Consent For Vaccinations Amendment Act of 2020. “ This parent-shunning measure took effect on March 19, 2021.

    In essence, this law allows a child 11 or older to be vaccinated against any disease without the consent — or knowledge, apparently — of their parents.

    Chilling.

    Yes, I know. Many of you think it’s imperative that young people become vaccinated quickly against COVID-19. But what sort of bizarre collectivist mentality would suggest that parents not be involved in the decision to inject their children with a drug being distributed on an emergency basis and without full FDA approval? (more…)

  • What Goes Up Stays Up

    Posted on

    by

    Dick Hall-Sizemore

    By Dick Hall-Sizemore

    One of the explanations for the increase in the cost of new housing recently has been the surge in the costs of raw materials. Builders have been forced to pass those increased costs on to buyers.

    Indeed, prices of materials, such as lumber, did increase significantly this last year, reaching a high during the spring. However, with supply chains opening up after the pandemic has eased, those lumber prices have decreased by about two-thirds. According to the theory, then, builders would be passing those savings on to buyers in the from of lower prices.

    But, that does not seem to be the case. According to a Wall Street Journal article (yes, I know it will surprise some of you that I subscribe to the WSJ), builders are opting to keep prices where they are, thereby increasing their profit margins. (more…)

Now Available

Book cover of 'Dust Mites: A Second American Revolution' by James A. Bacon, featuring astronauts planting a flag with a blue and white emblem on a lunar landscape, with Earth visible in the background.
For sale on Amazon.com

The year: 2075. The American colonies on the Moon are getting restless under Washington’s tyrannical rule….

This second edition of “Dust Mites” has a snazzy new cover, includes helpful lunar maps, and is 5,000 words tighter than the original. The sequel, “Trogs,” is scheduled for publication this summer.

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Bacon’s Rebellion is Virginia’s leading politically non-aligned portal for news, opinions and analysis about state, regional and local public policy. Read more about us here.

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