Tag: Florida

The Phoenix Declaration

Right about here most people are asking….HUH?

This is that group of a/holes from the Heritage Foundation on our education system….

Florida is the first state to embrace the manure from these ‘people’…..

Florida education leaders on Thursday approved a set of principles that would teach a conservative-backed vision of the United States. The State Board of Education, which also approved social-studies changes intended to highlight ideological evils of communism, signed off on Florida becoming the first state to adopt the Heritage Foundation’s “Phoenix Declaration: An American Vision for Education.”

The declaration is a statement of principles described as fostering “a love of country,” teaching children to “seek the good, true and beautiful” and aiming for students to “achieve their full, God-given potential.” Education Commissioner Anastasios Kamoutsas said the declaration establishes an “affiliation” with the Heritage Foundation and promotes what the board supports rather than what it opposes. “We often call out what is problematic in education, pushing an ideology over indoctrination, whether that’s the instruction of sexual orientation and gender identity in elementary schools or divisive concepts like critical race theory and DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) that treats people differently based on the way God created them,” Kamoutsas said. “Well, this talks about what we want to see. We want to see parents empowered. We want to see curriculum, transparency, we want to see academic excellence in all of our students.” The Washington, D.C.-based Heritage Foundation has a stated mission of building and promoting conservative public policies. Critics addressing the education board Thursday described the Heritage Foundation declaration as promoting indoctrination.

Read more at: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/education/article312907332.html

It is bad enough that these dicks have fucked up our political system and now they have a plan to do the same with the education of our children.

My favorite part of the whole debacle is there statement…..“We often call out what is problematic in education, pushing an ideology over indoctrination”

Now what is the difference between instruction and indoctrination?

How long before the other Red States embrace the crap these people are pushing?

It is true that the education system needs an overhaul but nothing these idiots are proposing will make it better…..if anything it will feed the bigotry and ignorance they say they want to eliminate.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

US Version Of ‘Devil’s Island’

We have a new ‘detention’ center about to open in Florida it is being called ‘Alligator Alcatraz’…..

President Donald Trump will visit a new immigration detention center in the Florida Everglades on Tuesday for what’s expected to be the site’s official opening, showcasing what critics are condemning as an inhumane makeshift prison camp and what supporters are embracing as a national model for aggressively ramping up detention and deportation efforts.

Florida officials have raced to erect the compound of heavy-duty tents, trailers and temporary buildings in a matter of days, as part of the state’s muscular efforts to help carry out Trump’s immigration crackdown.

Dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz” by state officials, the facility is located at an isolated airfield about 45 miles (72 kilometers) west of downtown Miami and is surrounded by swamps filled with mosquitoes, pythons and alligators.

To Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis and other state officials, locating the facility in the rugged and remote Florida Everglades is meant as a deterrent, and naming it after the notorious federal prison, an island fortress known for its brutal conditions, is meant to send a message. It’s another sign of how the Trump administration and its allies are relying on scare tactics to try to persuade people in the country illegally to leave voluntarily.

It is sounding like the US version of France’s Devil’s Island…..a prison in the middle of a jungle surrounded by disease and dangerous wildlife.

Donny’s press secretary summed it up like this….

“The facility is in the heart of the Everglades and will be informally known as ‘Alligator Alcatraz.’ There is only one road leading in, and there is the only way out is a one-way flight,” Leavitt told reporters on Monday.

“It is isolated and surrounded by dangerous wildlife in unforgiving terrain, the facility will have up to 5,000 beds to house, process and deport criminal illegal aliens. This is an efficient and low-cost way to help carry out the largest mass deportation campaign in American history,” she added.

Leavitt was later asked whether the “dangerous wildlife” is a “design feature” of the facility.

“When you have illegal murderers and rapists and heinous criminals in a detention facility surrounded by alligators, yes, I do think that’s a deterrent for them to try to escape,” she said.

The problem that load of manure is not everyone sent there will a murderer or a rapist….some will be family members that have been ripped away from their loved ones.

  • The compound at Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport in the Everglades, around 50 miles west of Miami, consists of tents, trailers and temporary buildings, the AP reports. “You don’t always have land so beautiful and so secure,” Trump said. “You have a lot of bodyguards and a lot of cops that are in the form of alligators. You don’t have to pay them so much.” He joked about teaching detainees to run in a zigzag manner to improve their chances by “about 1%” if they escape and have to run away from an alligator.
  • Critics of the project include Bacardi Jackson, executive director of the ACLU of Florida, the Miami Herald reports. In a statement Tuesday, Jackson said the branding of the facility “reflects an intent to portray people fleeing hardship and trying to build a better life for themselves and their families as threats, which is both unnecessary and abusive.”
  • The area is home to endangered species. Elise Pautler Bennett, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, described it as the “most sensitive” place in the state, the BBC reports. “Any other project that would have been proposed in the Everglades would have gone through an intense environmental approval process,” she said. “I’m convinced this one didn’t get that because it’s a political stunt.”

To me this is cruel and usual punishment and I find it sad that many Americans support this cruelty.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

DeSantis–Authoritarian Prick

Have you ever signed a petition that you thought might do some good?

I have on many occasions….but if you live in Florida law enforcement could be dispatched to your home and you could be interrogated about your signing.

You read that correctly….you could be brow beat for your signature.

Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration is sending law enforcement officers to homes to question Floridians who signed petitions to place an abortion amendment on the November ballot. The questioning appears to be part of an effort to inspect thousands of petitions concerning a measure to overturn the state’s six-week abortion ban, instead protecting abortion access until the point of viability, the Tampa Bay Times reports—despite the fact that the signatures have already been verified.

Florida’s secretary of state, who was appointed by DeSantis, has ordered elections supervisors in several counties to send at least 36,000 petition forms already found to have been signed by real people to the state government. Past fraud investigations have been centered on rejected petitions, but the state did not ask for those this time. One 16-year elections supervisor called the request unprecedented. It was DeSantis who signed the six-week legislation into law, and he’s organized opposition to the ballot measure. The amendment proposal reads, “No law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health,” per WTVT.

In another move, the state Agency for Health Care Administration has publicly opposed the ballot proposal, per the New York Times. Its website now says at the top: “Florida Is Protecting Life. Don’t let the fearmongers lie to you.” Organizers turned in petitions with more than 1 million signatures, 100,000 more than was required. Supporters of the amendment called the state investigation political interference.

A Lee County voter says he was left shaken by the visit of a plainclothes officer, who twice asked if he’d signed the petition. He said the officer brought a copy of his driver’s license and other documents. Another voter said she felt intimidated when an officer came to her home. “It didn’t surprise me that they were doing something like this to try to debunk these petitions to get it taken off of the ballot,” Becky Castellanos said.

We are not far away from the sound of jack boots on the pavement.

Do you want to be grilled because you signed a petition?

If not then think about who you vote for because this scenario is only a vote away from a national policy.

Jack boots are just an election a way.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Why Avoid Florida?

A good question for a spot that use to be the pinnacle of vacation spots.

But why not Florida?

I am glad you asked.

There are so many reason and let me count the ways.

First the mini dictator, DeSantis…..a red state that hates people…..brain eating amoeba….malaria….alligators…..sharks……15 foot pythons and anacondas…..and the biggest predator of them all….Disney….and now just more scary for the list.

Florida is contending with invasive species, spiking insurance rates, worrisome warming waters, political tensions, and now … leprosy? That’s according to the CDC, who on Monday issued a release spelling out how the infectious condition, also known as Hansen’s disease, has taken hold in the Sunshine State, especially the central portion, reports the Hill. Per the release, Florida was one of the top states that contributed to the 159 new cases in the United States in 2020, with Central Florida being hit especially hard: That portion accounted for 81% of the cases in Florida that year, and nearly 20% of the cases nationally.

The agency notes that its findings “contribute to rising evidence that leprosy has become endemic in the southeastern United States.” The CDC adds that “travel to Florida should be considered when conducting leprosy contact tracing in any state.” Leprosy, also known as Hansen’s disease, is caused by the Mycobacterium leprae bacteria, which affects the nerves, skin, eyes, and nasal lining. Symptoms typically include discolored skin patches (as well as thick, stiff, or dry skin); loss of eyebrows or eyelashes; ulcers on the soles of one’s feet; muscle weakness; and a loss of sensation, meaning, for instance, a patient may not feel if their skin is being burned.

Upward of 200,000 cases are reported annually worldwide, per the World Health Organization, which notes that the most cases have emerged in Brazil, India, and Indonesia. The agency says the number of reported cases in the southeastern part of the US has “more than doubled” over the past decade, and that multiple cases tracked in Florida “demonstrate no clear evidence of zoonotic exposure or traditionally known risk factors.”

Central Florida?  Is that not where Disney is housed?

When it comes to Florida I’ll take vanilla.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Florida Does It Again

We could write volumes on the lunacy coming out of Florida under the watchful eye of DeSantis….and now they have gone that proverbial one step further….this time in education.

I am a proponent of teaching history as it is….that means no whitewashing the embarrassing bits….teach it like it is.

We know that these Reds States, like my own, are hell bent on turning back the pages of history and throwing white paint (no pun intended) on the whole institution of slavery and Florida is one of the first to put a ‘happy face’ on the ordeal.

Florida education officials have changed state standards, in keeping with Gov. Ron DeSantis’ policies, to mandate teaching public school students that some Black people benefited from being enslaved because they learned useful skills. The state Board of Education immediately defended the policy, unanimously approved Wednesday, by saying lessons will still include the “darkest” parts of the nation’s past, Politico reports. “It’s the good, the bad and the ugly in American history,” Education Commissioner Manny Diaz Jr. said. State officials denied that students will be taught that “slavery was beneficial”; the policy calls for instruction in “how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.”

The 216-page social studies policy requires attributing racial violence partly to Black people, saying, “Instruction includes acts of violence perpetrated against and by African Americans but is not limited to 1906 Atlanta Race Riot, 1919 Washington, D.C. Race Riot, 1920 Ocoee Massacre, 1921 Tulsa Massacre and the 1923 Rosewood Massacre.” The statewide teachers union called the policy “a big step backward,” per NBC News. “How can our students ever be equipped for the future if they don’t have a full, honest picture of where we’ve come from?” said Andrew Spar, president of the Florida Education Association.

This is a lie!

We can pretend all we want but this is just pure manure spread to make the whole institution appear to be something positive….ranks up there with slaves got room and board….

Anyone with half a brain will see through this….but sadly children may not and will then go along thinking that slavery was ‘not all that ‘bad’ after all.

How long before other Red States start teaching this lie and adding to the whitewash?

Thoughts?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Send In The Calvary

Florida’s mini dictator, DeSantis, has been waging war in his state…war on bathrooms, education, rights, voters, Disney and now he is exporting his ‘jack boots’ to the border.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis says he’s sending a formidable force, including planes, boats, drones, and more than 1,100 personnel, to help “defend” the border with Mexico. The Republican, who is expected to announce a White House bid within weeks, said the deployment will include 800 members of the Florida National Guard, 200 agents from the state Department of Law Enforcement, 101 state highway patrol troopers, and 20 agents from other state agencies, NBC reports. DeSantis sent around 100 law enforcement officers to the border in a similar move in 2021.

DeSantis said the personnel are being sent to the border for 30 days but extensions are possible. He cited the end of COVID-era Title 42 restrictions at the border, though the change last week was not immediately followed by the expected surge in migrants. “While Biden ignores the crisis he created, Florida stands ready to help Texas respond to this crisis,” he said, per the Hill. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said Tuesday that he had asked governors to help the state with its “unprecedented border security efforts.” He said DeSantis and Idaho Gov. Brad Little had already offered resources.

“Given the crisis at the border, we decided to send in the cavalry,” said Taryn Fenske, the governor’s communications director. Some of the governor’s critics called the move a “political stunt,” the Miami Herald reports. “What an irresponsible waste of critical state resources by DeSantis for his own performative national politics,” tweeted former GOP Rep. David Jolly.

The problem they are trying to ‘solve’ may be a moot point….for after the crush of immigrants to the border with the end of 42 the amount of immigrants has fallen by 50%.

Here is a thought maybe Texas should spend more time with the border policies and less time fighting individual rights and education and all the other diversions.

But the GOP needs immigrants for it is a rallying point for all the hatred and  is doing nothing to move Texas into the 21st century.

Any thoughts on DeSantis’ new move on exporting his ‘troops’?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

DeSantis War On Education

The mini dictator of Florida has been attacking education at every turn….and his newest attack goes a bit far….well most of the attacks go too far in my opinion….

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis continued his campaign on Monday against what he views as “woke” ideology in the education system. The governor and presumptive 2024 presidential candidate signed into law a measure that prohibits the state’s public colleges and universities from spending money on what are known as DEI initiatives, or diversity, equity, and inclusion, reports the Washington Post. “DEI is better viewed as standing for discrimination, exclusion, and indoctrination,” said DeSantis Monday at New College of Florida in Sarasota.

He also banned courses that, in the law’s language, “distort significant historical events,” teach “identity politics,” or are “based on theories that systemic racism, sexism, oppression, or privilege are inherent in the institutions of the United States and were created to maintain social, political, or economic inequities,” per the Orlando Sentinel. Under the legislation, Florida colleges will have to review courses and majors offered to students and ditch ones that cover what DeSantis deems “niche” areas such as critical race theory. “Florida is getting out of that game,” DeSantis said. “If you want to do things like gender ideology, go to Berkeley—go to some of these other places.” Some opposing views rounded up in coverage:

  • “The government has no role in banning or censoring subject matter in higher education,” says Andrew Gothard, head of United Faculty Florida, which represents faculty members across the state.
  • “It’s basically state-mandated censorship, which has no place in a democracy,” says Irene Mulvey, president of the American Association of University Professors.
  • “Indoctrination drives the DeSantis agenda not because he is worried educators are indoctrinating students, but because they aren’t indoctrinating them with HIS ideology,” says Democratic state Sen. Shevrin Jones.

Florida is not alone in this war on education…..almost every Red State has some form of attacks….all of which are a march toward authoritarianism.

There are no commanding visions of public education at work in the United States. These are dark times for education, teachers, librarians, Black youth, trans people, young people and the empowering principles of academic freedom, critical thinking, civic courage, and a shared notion of citizenship. Since the 1950s, and especially since the 1980s with the election of Ronald Reagan as President, there has been an intense struggle both to privatize public schooling and to corporatize higher education.[1] In its updated and expanded version, the current far right extremists in the Republican Party are waging a naked attack “on the very existence of public education.”[2] In the first half of the 20th century, the established conservative common sense operated off the assumption that the central purpose of education was to prepare students at different levels for their station in the workplace or in the larger global corporate order. A growing far right version of the conservative movement increasingly argued that the idea of schooling as a public and common good was anathema. Schools were now disparaged as government schools or even worse, “socialist training camps.”[3]According to these assassins of public education, schools had become a byproduct of a government that used them to enforce a poisonous notion citizenship defined through the values of equity, freedom, justice, and equality.[4]

Public Education as a Domestic Machinery of Indoctrination and Disposability in the Age of Fascist Politics

These attacks are doing nothing to make this a better country.

If anything it is dumbing down our children which makes for more pliable adults….so far it is working like a clock.

We need to be vigilant or we will lose everything we have worked for in the past.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

How To Crap On The ‘Happiest Place On Earth’

I see that immature little petty dictator in Florida has extended his feud with Disney.

He is trying to pull out all stops to make Disney’s time in Florida as miserable as he can.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, apparently hell-bent on showing Mickey Mouse who’s boss, announced new measures Monday in his ongoing feud with Walt Disney World. The Republican governor said new legislation would block the company’s attempt to circumvent control by a DeSantis-installed board. DeSantis said he also plans to give the state greater oversight of the park’s rides and possibly build on land next to the park, NBC reports. “People have said maybe create a state park, try to do more amusement parks, someone said another state prison, who knows?” the governor said. “The possibilities are endless.”

DeSantis—who often slams Disney as a “woke” corporation—said a bill next week would restore power to his appointees in Disney’s tax district, the New York Times reports. Last month, it emerged that the outgoing Disney-controlled board had stripped the new board of most of its powers. “They talked about a development agreement that would render everything we did null and void,” DeSantis said Monday. “Well, that’s not going to work. That’s not going to fly.” The AP reports that another bill proposed by DeSantis would end an exemption to state inspection of rides at Disney, but not other theme parks in the state. Critics noted that the inspectors Disney currently uses likely have greater expertise in the kinds of rides involved than state inspectors do.

With DeSantis expected to announce a 2024 White House bid, Donald Trump has been stepping up his attacks on the governor, NBC reports. In a Truth Social post Saturday, the former president referred to the surprise Disney move—and to the governor’s failure to visit flood-hit Broward County. “First Ron DeSanctimonious got outplayed, outsmarted, and embarrassed by Mickey Mouse and Disney, and now, while Fort Lauderdale is facing the worst flooding in 100 years, DeSanctus is on tour with his ‘shadow’ campaign for president, instead of taking care of the people of Florida,” Trump wrote.

What part of this mash up doing the best for Floridians?

This just illustrates how infantile the GOP has become.  PERIOD!

This is what my friend John wrote on his log today.

https://limingslynkz8.blog/2023/04/17/disatanist-is-after-disney-again/

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–09Mar23

Most of us bloggers keep an eye on our region so that we may comment on the developments that effect our country.

Since I live in the Gulf South I keep an eye on the US mini dictator, the governor of Florida DeSantis (I had better be careful or he may send the Floridian thought police after me)…..

DeSantis recently went to California to make a speech at the Reagan Library to promote his new book…..

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) on Sunday blasted “leftist politicians” and touted his state’s “massive gains” in a speech in California amid speculation that he’ll jump into the 2024 presidential race. 

“We’ve witnessed a great American exodus from states governed by leftist politicians imposing leftist ideologies and delivering poor results. And you can see massive gains in states like Florida, who are governing according to the tried and true principles that President Reagan held dear,” DeSantis said in remarks at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Southern California with the Orange County GOP, as reported by The Washington Post. 

The governor said he was there “to share the Florida Blueprint to preserve and protect freedom” as he promotes his new book, “The Courage to Be Free: Florida’s Blueprint for America’s Revival.”

(thehill.com)

One more Floridian cock-up…..

“To Protect And Preserve Freedom”….except for women, gays, education, books and dogs….whose freedom is he trying to preserve?

There is so much more….

DeSantis has appointed a person to the Disney Oversight Board…..and he believes that tap water is turning our boys gay…..you read that right!

One of Ron DeSantis’ appointees to a special district that will oversee Walt Disney World once amplified a conspiracy theory that tap water could be turning people gay, according to a report from CNN.

Ron Peri, the CEO of The Gathering, a Christian ministry, also disparaged homosexuality, calling it “shameful,” according to CNN.

…

In a video of a January 2022 Zoom discussion, Peri claimed, without evidence, that higher levels of estrogen in the water from birth control pills led to lower levels of testosterone in men.

“So why are there homosexuals today? There are any number of reasons, you know, that are given. Some would say the increase in estrogen in our societies,” he said, according to the CNN report. He also linked homosexuality to disease.

Peri also said, according to the KFile report, “There are a lot of unhealthy effects of a homosexual lifestyle. There are diseases, but it goes beyond that.”

(thedeadline.com)

Oh to be in Florida…..NOT!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–07Mar23

My friend Dr. Rex (https://hrexach.wordpress.com/ ) has turned me unto this situation in Florida by the mini dictator DeSantis….he has crapped on individual choice, and books and education and now he is coming for the first amendment in Florida.

Any blogger mentioning Florida’s governor or a state legislator would be required to register with the state under newly proposed legislation experts say would surely violate the First Amendment. Senate Bill 1316 states any person who writes “an article, a story, or a series of stories” about “the Governor, the Lieutenant Governor, a Cabinet officer, or any member of the Legislature,” and is paid for their services must register with the Florida Office of Legislative Services or the Commission on Ethics within five days of publication. Authors would also need to submit monthly reports describing what posts mention officials, with links; the compensation received; and the individual or entity behind the payment—or face daily fines of $25 up to a maximum of $2,500 per report, per WFLA.

“If a blogger posts to a blog about an elected state officer and receives, or will receive, compensation for that post, the blogger must register,” reads the bill, per NBC News. It also requires that “bloggers file notices of failure to file a timely report the same way that lobbyists file their disclosures and reports on assessed fines,” per WFLA. The legislation, to take effect immediately upon approval, excludes newspapers or similar publications. It defines a blog as “a website or webpage that hosts any blogger and is frequently updated with opinion, commentary, or business content”—which may or may not apply to YouTube video bloggers. The bill is authored by Jason Brodeur, a Republican state senator who’s “been the subject of frequent criticism in the media,” per Florida Politics.

“Paid bloggers are lobbyists who write instead of talk. They both are professional electioneers,” Brodeur tells Florida Politics. “If lobbyists have to register and report, why shouldn’t paid bloggers?” Yet “it’s hard to imagine a proposal that would be more violative of the First Amendment,” Ron Kuby, a First Amendment lawyer, tells NBC. Brodeur has authored other bills experts say would be unconstitutional if passed. One would prevent journalists from shielding the identity of anonymous sources if sued and automatically presume information from such sources to be false, the Orlando Sentinel reports. It “empowers the rich and powerful to basically go after people who say things they don’t like,” Bobby Block of the Florida First Amendment Foundation tells the outlet.

All he needs now is to start wear some sort of uniform and his ‘style’ will be made.

If he is successful this may go to the Supreme Court…..and we know how those political hacks work….don’t we?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”