Following Nikki-speak

I believe it is true that if you nod your head, and speak without hesitation, people will believe or accept what you are saying.

Take Nikki Haley's performance in the second gubernatorial debate.  I felt my head nodding right along with her as she said that her plan to save failing schools would be to have faith-based communities be actively involved in poor school districts and "in the poverty areas".

In fact, she said, it won't cost the taxpayers a dime.

Here's where my head stopped nodding.  Huh?  Did she just say what I thought she said?

When I ran it by a black co-worker, she got it much faster than I had the night before.

Nikki Haley's plan for failing schools and poor communities is to allow the churches to have at it; that is, allow them to be responsible for moving these people forward instead of the government.  So, basically, the churches are going to help the poorest areas and the worst schools, so that Nikki won't have to increase taxes.

So... isn't that what we've been doing???  And isn't that why the poor communities are still poor, and the failing schools are still failing?


Don't let Nikki Haley's double-talk work in this debate.  Talk to your friends, family, and community about this inherently racist proposal.

Kingmaker, or, Little Opie Grows Up

It's always fun to see what the media makes of our own good ole' boy Jim Demint.  It's fun to see him slugging it out with Sarah Palin to see who can be the Tea Party hero of the moment.

It's also enjoyable to hear the mutterings about Jim Demint on Capitol Hill.
 
And it's probably a good thing he doesn't have to worry about actually campaigning for himself, against someone who could actually confront him with some of his stupidity-based positions.

Like for example, "Uh, Jim, what exactly do you mean by 'Freedom'?  Because right after you talk about 'Freedom' you mention how the government should make sure gays can't get married and women can't make private choices about their own bodies.  You also don't seem to think everyone should have the 'Freedom' to go to the same quality schools, or receive the same quality of health care.  You don't even seem too concerned about whether people should have a roof over their heads.  You DO care about people having religion -- YOUR religion.

"So basically, Jim, what you're saying is that we all should have the 'Freedom' to be poor if we're poor, and have whatever religion we want as long as we follow the dictates of YOUR religion, right?  And we need to stop government spending, except for enforcing all those rules that come under the heading of 'Jim Demint's morality'?  Which, as I remember from your Senate campaign six years ago, remember, that was when you actually campaigned, had some pretty anti-American ideas about 'Freedom'."

Sadly, we won't get to hear Jim Demint debate anyone knowledgeable this year.  For our money, he has taken his show on the road, but for my money, I would say he hasn't taken it far enough.