Trump’s reelection

[parkerbink]

The comments are so freaking funny.

[parkerbink]

oh, it's getting better.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44864739

if he flip-flops any harder we're gonna have to start worrying about spine injuries.

I know. My favorite is he forgets that it took 27 hours to come up with that bullshit & that he sided with Vlad 17 times before & after that.

Also, they wrote him a script (that he read like a hostage) That did not include there could have been many others or no collusion.

How stupid does he think we are?

[decay]

Trump's performance today has most Republicans dumbfounded.

oh, it's getting better.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44864739

if he flip-flops any harder we're gonna have to start worrying about spine injuries.

[parkerbink]

The missing middle of the Trump-Putin meeting
The summit offered up a graphic reaffirmation of what was already known

https://www.economist.com/democracy-in-america/2018/07/17/the-missing-middle-of-the-trump-putin-meeting

THE story of the meeting between President Donald Trump and President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki has a beginning and an end, but no middle.

It began with a statement from the American president. The lowly state of Russo-American relations, he tweeted, was not the fault of the Russian government for seizing Crimea, shooting down a passenger airliner, interfering in America’s presidential election or using a banned nerve agent to kill citizens of a close ally on its own soil. No, it was the fault “of US foolishness and stupidity and now, the Rigged Witch Hunt”.


It ended with a joint press conference that John McCain, a Republican senator, described as, “one of the most disgraceful performances by an American president in memory.”

In the middle was a void, in which the two presidents met with nobody else in the room but their interpreters. For those who watch Mr Trump daily and have observed his habit of being confrontational with other people when at a safe distance and then seeking to please them when face-to-face, this encounter seemed freighted with risk. Would he give away Crimea by mistake? Would he commit to some Russian-led military initiative in Syria? In fact this part seems to have gone relatively well. Both presidents reported that they talked about nuclear weapons, including the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) which covers short- and medium-range nuclear missiles. The chances of them signing an extension to the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) are perhaps greater now than they were before the meeting. That is not nothing.

In fact it is hard to pinpoint a decisive change in American foreign policy that came out of the Helsinki meeting. What it offered instead was a reaffirmation of things that America already knew about its president. Mr Trump thinks that the world benefits when America and Russia have close relations, and that “the United States has been foolish” on this point. He takes the judgment of America’s intelligence services that Russia intervened in the 2016 election campaign to be a personal insult, an accusation that he needed outside help to beat Hillary Clinton. He will readily believe the word of a former KGB agent over the views of the CIA or FBI on this point. Americans who question this are liable to be described by their president as enemies of the people. The probe run by Robert Mueller is “a disaster for our country”. It was jarring to see Mr Trump say these things standing on a podium next to Mr Putin, but they are all things he has said before, countless times. This is not a performance. He really means it.

One part, near the end of the press conference, is worth quoting at length to give an unmediated sample of the president’s thinking:

REPORTER, Associated Press: President Trump, you first. Just now, President Putin denied having anything to do with the election interference in 2016. Every U.S. intelligence agency has concluded that Russia did. My first question for you, sir, is: who do you believe? My second question is: would you now, with the whole world watching, tell President Putin, would you denounce what happened in 2016 and would you want him to never do it again?

PRESIDENT TRUMP: So let me just say that we have two thoughts. You have groups that are wondering why the FBI never took the server. Why haven’t they taken the server? Why was the FBI told to leave the office of the Democratic National Committee? 

I’ve been wondering that. I’ve been asking that for months and months and I’ve been tweeting it out and calling it out on social media. Where is the server? I want to know where is the server and what is the server saying? 

With that being said, all I can do is ask the question. 

My people came to me, Dan Coats [director of national intelligence], came to me and some others they said they think it’s Russia. I have President Putin. He just said it’s not Russia.

 I will say this: I don’t see any reason why it would be. But I really do want to see the server but I have, I have confidence in both parties.

 I really believe that this will probably go on for a while but I don’t think it can go on without finding out what happened to the server. What happened to the servers of the Pakistani gentleman that worked on the DNC? 

Where are those servers? They’re missing. Where are they? What happened to Hillary Clinton’s e-mails? 33,000 e-mails gone, just gone. I think in Russia they wouldn’t be gone so easily. 

I think it’s a disgrace that we can’t get Hillary Clinton’s 33,000 e-mails.

 I have great confidence in my intelligence people but I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today and what he did is an incredible offer. 

He offered to have the people working on the case come and work with their investigators, with respect to the 12 people [GRU officers indicted by the Department of Justice]. I think that’s an incredible offer. OK? Thank you.

For readers who are rubbing their eyes at this point, it is important not to lose sight of a few things that will endure once this summit is over. Mr Mueller’s probe has gathered so much detail about the activities of the GRU that its future activities would seem to be compromised. Russia’s economy is weak, and American sanctions will not be lifted by the Senate anytime soon. Some of America’s institutions are not doing their job. But some of them quietly are.

[kickinindian]

[parkerbink]

Trump's performance today has most Republicans dumbfounded.

[decay]

your being meen

all right, fine. serious answer: about 2/3 of the employees at that company were former teachers, or school administrators. my job was to apply enterprise-level technology solutions to the problems they'd encountered on the job, and make sure they were scalable to the level where we *could* handle hundreds of districts.

that was a much better use of my time and skill set than making sure mr/ms X's printer, wifi, or ipad is working.

[mrsleeve]

"expierance"

see, this is why i worked hard at that job. i'd like my country to be full of people who can spell.

Yeah I know I cant spell, not a strong suit of mine never has been, uber bad dyslexia has been hard on me with spelling, but not on the reading side .. but your going to grab a phone post typo to bitch about....

The straw grasping is strong with this one.

[mbonder]

your being meen

teehee

[mbonder]

Wife and I are very involved with our youngin education. Hell I built the park benches surrounding the school yard. So many "parents" these days view school nothing more than daily baby sitters.

I based the reply on real world experience. Been raising 4 children for the last 20yrs, had my "baby" in 2006. I will be damned if they follow the typical "family model" of the common (core haha) household. Next generation to carry my name will be functioning members of society. Not some jackass watching television or playing video games until they are 30.

I don't think I made my point clear enough here, but what you've written above spells it out in real world terms. When I said the areas that "spend more" on education tend to have higher achievement, I meant it in two different ways, the first, and more obvious, financial spending. This is fairly evident to nearly everyone in the argument, without money, the school infrastructure isn't maintained and eventually crumbles. Without money there are no books and computers and whiteboards with markers with which to teach the students.

The caveat here and I'm separating this sentence on purpose, is that eventually you reach a saturation point where no matter the amount of money spent, you will not have higher achievement.

The reason for that is the reason why I quoted Firebird, the second type of "spending" is done by the parents not in a financial way, but is done with their time and effort. Parents that take the time to teach their children on their own, to reiterate what a teacher is doing in the classroom, that ensure homework gets done on time, that instruments are being played at home, that soccer is being practiced in the yard (insert sport here), those are the parents of the kids that will have higher achievement. Sleeve mentioned this point and I wholeheartedly agree, too many parents think that the responsibility is on the teachers and the schools to be the SOLE educators of their children. Drop them off, pick them up, complain when it doesn't happen like that. The finger is often pointed in the wrong direction.

I support charter schools and the like because I often feel that acceptance into a charter school often includes more involvement from the parents, which will lead to more achievement for the students. Unfortunately, because it is a public/private hybrid, there are some charters that end up being run by people that aren't working for anyone but themselves (Parker mentioned this). That's the danger of making it more corporate-like, but there are some real success stories here as well and so I will continue to support the good with the bad.

No Child Left Behind, Common Core, whatever else they come up with in the future is only an attempt to equalize the education, but the reality is that equalization starts at home, not in the schools. I am all for federal money going to ALL schools in an equal fashion to provide the possibilities of enrichment education to everyone. I don't really have a problem with the Department of Education, however, I think the theory that they can somehow legislate equality into education is a flawed one and will never succeed. They can, however, help to spread good ideas, better practices for all teachers as suggestions rather than mandates, as well as spread federal funding around to help all, so I don't really advocate for the department's dissolution.

I've made a habit of long responses on this one...

[2mAn]

"expierance"

see, this is why i worked hard at that job. i'd like my country to be full of people who can spell.

your being meen

[decay]

Ok so you were debugging the cloud based teaching and accounting resources in common use for a number of districts from your office across town, or from a lawn chair with internet connection on a beach in Thailand for all we know.... I am sure it's more involved than that but how much time were you in classrooms?? I would have taken your expierance in the realm of modern education more seriously if you had been hooking up comms in classrooms, where you could at least have seen it 1st hand.

"expierance"

see, this is why i worked hard at that job. i'd like my country to be full of people who can spell.

[mrsleeve]

uh, nope, i ran 24/7 saas ops on a platform that served hundreds of districts. a little different than showing up at the teacher’s desk and plugging in ethernet and usb. you basically just said the guy working at the gas station and the guy managing the refinery are doing the same job.

but i like how you accuse me of being the IT equivalent of a ditch-digger in the next breath after you claim i was making that statement about you (protip: i wasn’t).

Ok so you were debugging the cloud based teaching and accounting resources in common use for a number of districts from your office across town, or from a lawn chair with internet connection on a beach in Thailand for all we know.... I am sure it's more involved than that but how much time were you in classrooms?? I would have taken your expierance in the realm of modern education more seriously if you had been hooking up comms in classrooms, where you could at least have seen it 1st hand.

Love you too pookie. :)

[decay]

LOL! Some of us wish they had yellow brick roads. We pave the way with hard work, dedication, ethics and pure fucking drive.


My daughter had NOTHING handed to her, yet has 2 majors, and a minor in 2.5 yrs of FSU, zero debt, and doing her internship in Madrid while maintaining a 4.0 GPA since the 6th grade. Have 3 more coming up after her to boot.



No silver spoons here buddy.

EDIT: My mom raised us boys on a waitress salary and in the 80's that pure sucked. $2/hr plus tips. lol. A gallon of milk and 2 packs of ciggs was about $3. Back then she could send us to the store with a "sick note" haha. Society as a whole is a bunch of pansy asses who cry about nothing and get nothing in return. Meanwhile, I am opening shop at 5am :p

let me clarify that i was not making a statement about you, your family, or anyone else in this conversation.

and yeah, self-bootstrapped over here too.

[parkerbink]

My Wife works for the AZ. Department of Ed. creating the Azela ESL tests. She used to work at a good charter. However, there are horrible charters (here) where the "dean" has embezzled the $$$$ and others where they cheat the system.

I suppose it's like anywhere else there are good and bad things.