Shocking attack
Although the opinion piece in question was a paid advertisement and not the work of the Journal staff or its syndicates ("Did you just waste $200,000 on a Wake Forest education?"), I must profess shock at the scurrilous attack in the May 21 Journal on a Winston-Salem cleric I personally respect and admire: Imam Khalid Griggs.
The advertisement, paid for by "Alumni for a Shariah-Free Wake Forest, Don Woodsmall, et.al.," protests Wake Forest's appointment of Imam Griggs as an assistant chaplain. In brief, the ad describes Griggs, in the most extreme terms conceivable, as a fanatical jihadist who advocates the Shariah rule of law. In doing so, it resorts to distortions, oversimplifications and outright falsehoods.
Those acquainted with Griggs know him to be an equanimous advocate of fairness, justice and inclusiveness. The methods he deployed in his persistent efforts over the years to free the wrongfully convicted Darryl Hunt speak not of some radical firebrand but of a man of patience, principle and quiet but insistent determination who treats all with respect and dignity.
America (and institutions such as Wake Forest University) is changing — racially, socially and religiously. For millennia, we have debased humanity through our hatred, intolerance, exclusion and persecution of those who look, behave and believe differently than ourselves. Isn't it time we began practicing acceptance and respect — for the sake of all of us?
DAVID FYTEN
Winston-Salem
Governor's reaction
What a classless governor we have.
Gov. Bev Perdue recently showed why North Carolina desperately needs a new governor. Belittling the state of Mississippi because she didn't get her way with the marriage amendment vote was a childish act on her part ("Perdue slams marriage vote," May 12).
Regardless of one's sentiments on the issue, the matter was handled in an orderly fashion by way of our democratic voting process. It'll be interesting to see how she reacts when her proposed tax increase for her beloved education pet project is defeated by the state House and Senate.
HAYDEN KIRBY-SMITH
Kernersville
Boundless love
I wonder if the image of segregated water fountains still causes some shame to stir in people. Did those cause black people to feel like second-class citizens to white people? Even if the fountains were identical, it sent a message to blacks that said, "I'm better than you and you need to keep your distance."
We're still doing that today in North Carolina. This time we're saying the same thing to our gay and lesbian citizens. "They're just not as godly as us church folk because we married the opposite sex and produced children." Good for you.
It's just so sad to keep God in the pages of a book when he is so much larger than any of us can imagine. His love is boundless and I believe he celebrates any kind of genuine love (no, I'm not talking about love for a pet or a car).
Love between same-sex people is as genuine as any straight couple. If people got their minds out of the gutter long enough to stop picturing the sex act, they would see that.
SALLY WALTON
King
Treat educators with respect
Given who senior policy adviser for education Erica Shrader's boss is, her plea in her guest column ("Put politics aside and put our students first," May 11) to "put politics aside" and for "robust public debate" is laughable. Did not state Sen. Phil Berger and other Republicans vote to end payroll deduction of dues for members of the North Carolina Association of Educators as a political punishment? Was it not Republican leaders who refused to even discuss with Gov. Bev Perdue the merits of raising the sales tax to make up for education cuts?
Certainly North Carolina's education system needs reform. But creating a program modeled after Teach for America is not going to do it. That program has a lower retention rate and effectiveness than that of traditionally trained educators. SB 795's provisions to put teachers on an annual contract and increase our workload without increasing our pay will only make the teaching profession more unappealing to the best and brightest college graduates. Once the economy improves, will we again see school systems struggle to fill positions with quality educators?
If the legislature is serious about education reform, it will get serious about treating teachers and public education with the respect they deserve.
DAN MONROE
EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN TEACHER
WINSTON-SALEM/FORSYTH COUNTY SCHOOLS
Dan, I agree with you that teachers don't make enough money. But let's face it. Teaching is not a particularly tough job. Plus, we've got a lot of loser teachers out there that drag down the rest of you.
ReplyDeleteWe've thrown more and more money at education over the last fifty years, and the test scores have remained relatively stable. Have you seen John Stossel expose on education? I would like to see the teacher to student ratio reduced, however.
Sadly, what happens Dan, is that schools turn into baby sitting institutions, and not places of learning. Many students also have little in the way of learned self-discipline because they are not properly trained at home.
I don't mind seeing you make a buck or two more Dan. But let's not be delusional. The quality of education and the test scores are not going to go up.
One of the reason people resent more taxes for education is that we thought the lottery was going to take care of the lack of funds. But, corrupt governors, like Bev. Perdue, are taking that money and using it to fund other things.
So taxpayers are sick of more and taxes for education.
North Carolina used to be on the cutting edge of governance in the nation. Now, it's one of the most corrupt. We need to get rid of the corrupt Democrats, and get more sane Republicans in, in order to correct the problem.
Bucky, for some reason I don't think you have any children. How have you formed these opinions of yours regarding lazy teachers? My husband leaves home for school at 6:30 am and returns around 6 pm. Most of his colleagues work similarly long hours as I believe Stab has stated that Mrs. Stab does likewise. If it is such a cushy job, then why the long hours?
DeleteWordly, I mainly wrote about the education letter because I'm getting tired of the gay rights whiners and the topic in general.
DeleteWordly, I will have to say that I saw a bull-buck woman yesterday. How does the female population cope with men that dress as women entering female bathrooms? I was somewhat appalled by the bull-buck that I saw. Mini skirt with bulges everywhere-some in the wrong places for a woman. Wowwie! Don't they frighten women when they come into women's bathrooms?
As always, more stupidity from the layer below pond scum.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteWordly, Bucky, aka Lindsey Graham, aka Knuckleheaded Democrat, was a teacher who quit his job and his students because he didn't like some new regulations.
DeleteBucky, I would be more afraid of a skinny little dude with a gun strapped to his buttocks in a local park.
DeleteSpeaking of bathrooms and cushy teaching jobs, did I mention that my husband can’t leave to use one most hours of the school day as the children cannot be left unsupervised. (I don’t get to urinate at one of my jobs either, but I also make 3 times what he does when I work, so I tolerate discomfort). He also gets 22 minutes to eat lunch at 10:30 a.m. at school which is not free time since he still has to supervise the children.
Bucky, you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.
DeleteThese Bull-Bucks are obviously a growing problem. If you think men are the only ones that have to worry about these types of 'people', think again.
DeleteThanks to the Obama Justice Department one university is being forced into allowing a Bull-Bucks into their female bathrooms.
Braly is the identified Bull-Brady in question:
_______
Someone saw me using the women’s public restrooms and complained,” said Braly. “[O]ne problem to this is there are not unisex bathrooms in every building. Especially the two main buildings where most of my classes are, so I have to go to a completely different building to use the restroom.” The university had offered to turn more gender-specific bathrooms into gender-neutral bathrooms. Braly filed the complaint anyway.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/05/24/Obama-DOJ-transgender-bathroom
As always, more stupidity.
Delete"Most all young people are liberals. After all, 80% of all college professors are. So it makes perfect sense. Then they have to go work. Then the loser Democrats come along and want to start taking all of their money through taxes, and the fresh faced liberal young people get old and tired real quick. And the Republicans' views on things start to make sense."
ReplyDeleteBucky May 23, 2012 1:35 PM
We must learn to love such pronouncements of ignorance because they will be with us to the very end of time…which if current trends continue, may not be that far off.
Interest in the causes of political orientation extends back to Socrates and his assumption that evil results from ignorance. He had nothing other than his own observations to back that up.
But since Socrates' time, thousands of scientific studies have been conducted regarding political orientation. Virtually all have confirmed Socrates original assumption: native intelligence and education have a profound effect on political orientation. Lack of either intelligence or education or both almost invariably leads to the tower of babble.
More recent studies conducted since the end of World War II have shown that the "common knowledge" stated above, as all such "common knowledge" is, is nothing more than the "common thinking" of the lower order. We have never had a generation in which most young people could be classified as "liberals" or "conservatives". Every generation at any age is dominated by "moderates".
Modern studies show that as moderate people age, there is a slight movement to the right in fiscal areas, which is natural as people acquire property which they desire to keep. But the same studies show that the same people tend to move a bit left on social issues, whether they be the right of women to vote, the right of minorities to exist in a world free of ethnic bias or the right of any people to enjoy the fruits of modern democracy.
That is seen as the accumulation of wisdom and tolerance, which can only occur in an atmosphere of intelligence and education. Of course, there will always be those who, lacking both intelligence and education, will always lag behind, stuck forever in the world of bigotry and ignorance.
I feel sorry for them, because they will die choked with rage, not at the failure of society, but at the failure of their own "intellect", not to mention heart and soul.
Bucky is just here playing mind games with himself and others. He admitted that to me several weeks ago right here on this forum. Sometimes I play, but mostly I pay no attention.
ReplyDeletehe uses a familiar sociological trick of repetitive in-your-face keyword phrases in an attempt to illicit a cortico-limbic response to personally challenging emotional stimuli.
DeleteIt's a technique used by detectives in interrogation. Continually harass, harangue, cajole, the suspect, with key words and phrases until he/she gives an angered response.
DeleteMaybe his mommy didn't pay enough attention to him as a kid.
ReplyDeleteGood afternoon folks!
ReplyDeleteLTE 1: I was rather surprised myself that the Journal ran that ad. Imam Griggs has taken a few controversial stands on some issues over the years, but he has been an upstanding member of this community for many years and long before anyone here had ever heard of al-Qaida or Shariah Law. Meeting the needs of muslim students as well as providing a source of information regarding Islam should be a vital component of any university.
LTE 2:"...the matter was handled in an orderly fashion by way of our democratic voting process." - which is the major problem. This type of vote by the general public was never intended by the founders. They would have been appalled that the determination of the ability of < 10% of the population to marry the person they loved was put to a vote by the entire general public.
LTE 3: And like the Jim Crow laws of the past, the barriers for gays will also come down.
LTE 4: Must admit I also had a John McEnroe moment ("you cannot be serious!") when I read that column after what the state legislatures did to education. Ending public education and having every child attend either a private school, a charter school or be home-schooled simply isn't feasible. I wonder if the state legislatures have any idea how serious education is for our future. Young people can no longer drop out in the 10th grade or graduate from HS one day, then get a job the next in a textile or tobacco mill. Those days are gone forever. This is the 21st century, not the 19th. Driving teachers away will result in the governors of other states using NC as the country's armpit mark of comparison.
LTE #1 – I don’t know Don Woodsmall and don’t want to. He is a billboard salesman who lives in Charlottesville and who has been harassing President Hatch and members of the WF board of trustees and even the staff of the Old Gold & Black with a 50 page document containing insane allegations about Khalid Griggs. I have known Imam Griggs for a long time. Most Christian churches would be lucky to have a man of such quality associated with them.
ReplyDeleteThe most dangerous religious leaders in our area are all Baptists, such as the ones associated with Calvary Baptist church and Berean Baptist church and that nutcase up in Maiden.
LTE #2 - It is pretty difficult to belittle Mississippi, the most backward state in the Union. It's interesting that over half the Republicans in Mississippi believe that President Obama was born in Kenya when most of them don't even know their own daddy's name.
LTE #3 – The gay haters are not Christians, know nothing of god or jesus and long ago replaced love with hate…a sad bunch of losers indeed.
LTE #4 – “Teaching is not a particularly tough job.” Got to love that mindless response to a well stated essay.
The person who wrote the response is an ignorant lowlife bigot who used to be a teacher who quit when the going got tough. Teaching probably isn’t particularly tough for quitters like him.
But at the higher level, where teachers strive to be the best, there is no more difficult job.
Sometimes I wish that there really was a god, or more accurately, that there really was a lake of fire, so that people like Buck boy would actually get their just reward.
In contrast, California is suppose to be the most 'progressive' state in the union, and that state is 16 billion in debt. They are discussing major cuts in all kinds of programs, the middle class is fleeing the state, the judicial system is in chaos. Their politicians are the laughing stock of America.Illegal immigrants run rampant throughout the entire state clogging up social programs.
ReplyDeleteIn short, California is one big mess. It's a beautiful state though. Too bad the 'progressives' ruined it.
For those seeking incorrect information, there is no better source than Buck boy.
DeleteThe California debt is not $16 billion...it is, as of last week, approximately $140 billion.
The rest of Buck boy's post is similarly bereft of truth.
Actually, we were both wrong. California's 'deficit' is 16 billion, its debt is close to 359 billion.
DeleteI always enjoy a smart aleck that corrects someone then makes a mistake himself. Why doesn't it surprise me that this happen with NW.
http://www.usdebtclock.org/state-debt-clocks/state-of-california-debt-clock.html
California's deficit is currently unknown because the budget is still being negotiated.
DeleteThe debt clock is a joke. It reflects a sort of guesstimate of many different and unrelated numbers which have little to do with anything.
The current official state debt, as calculated in the traditional manner for purposes of comparison with other state debts, is about $140 billion.
The clock apparently incorporates the cumulative municipal debt of all of California's cities, which has nothing to do with the state debt.
On the other hand, if you include such matters as state pensions and other retirement benefits and other debt not usually included in such calculations, one could say that California is in the hole for around $650 billion.
My point is that one dumbo grabs a number that he doesn't understand...doesn't even know the difference between deficit vs debt...and throws it out on this forum as a "fact"...which it is not, and that that is a habitual act of that selfsame dumbo...the all time champion of lies and BS.
This arises from simple-minded "thinking" from simple-minded fools.
Either way you cut it, we were both wrong. I know you'll never admit it, because you're a weasel, and a good for nothing liberal.
Delete"What a classless governor we have."
ReplyDeleteHayden Kirby Smith
____________
ditto that! Remember when all the 'progressives' said if we only had a woman in charge, things would be better? Pathetic!
I meant to post this some time ago but forgot. Sorry for the delay...now you only have two days to prepare...the end is Sunday, probably sometime during the running of the Indy 500. Until then, have a nice life.
ReplyDelete2008 - God's Final Witness
The year 2008 marked the last of God’s warnings to mankind and the beginning in a countdown of the final three and one-half years of man’s self-rule that will end by May 27, 2012.
On December 14, 2008, the First Trumpet of the Seventh Seal of the Book of Revelation sounded, which announced the beginning collapse of the economy of the United States and great destruction that will follow. The next three trumpets will result in the total collapse of the United States, and once the Fifth Trumpet sounds the world will be thrust into WW III.
The Seven Trumpets of the Seventh Seal, as well as the Seven Thunders of the Book of Revelation (which the apostle John saw but was restricted from recording) are revealed in this book.
Many of the prophecies of the Seven Thunders are being fulfilled and will continue to increase in strength and frequency throughout this final three and one-half years of man's self-rule on earth.
The prophecies revealed in this book explain the demise of the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Great Britain, and much of western Europe, which will be followed by man's final world war. This last war will be the result of clashing religions and the governments they sway. Billions will die! The destruction of this time will far exceed the very worst times of all human history.
As these events unfold, the world will increasingly become aware of the authenticity of the words in this book and realize that Ronald Weinland has been sent by God as His end-time prophet.
This book is primarily directed to the people of the three major religions of the world (Islam, Judaism and Christianity), whose roots are in the God of Abraham. Ronald Weinland has been sent to all three.
See you here on Monday.
DeleteDrat, I wasted my money paying bills and working instead of consuming Stellas
DeleteJesus may come back tomorrow, but I'm not going to quit paying my health insurance.
DeleteWordly may be right, so grab a few more Stellas, Stab. I just had a few beers with Jesus at the Silver Moon Saloon on Trade Street in the Arts District.
DeleteHe said that he had nothing on his agenda until Monday, when he is scheduled to go camping at Big Creek up in the Smoky Mountains National Park. He was reluctant to give any details, but when I offered to pay for all the beers, he spilled the beans.
WW III will begin when Scott Sexton whips out his big gun and shoots another camper who has been criticizing one of Scott's columns. The war will quickly spread to South Carolina. After that, it's Katy bar the door.