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Texas Republican leaders in the state senate unveiled their ambitious plan to enact the ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council) agenda for privatization of public education. With the help of Texans for Education Reform and a battalion of highly paid lobbyists, the Republicans will promote charters, school choice, and accountability measures to stigmatize public schools.
By Marcy Wheeler
David Petraeus Gets Hand-Slap for Leaking, Two Point Enhancement for Obstruction of Justice 
As a supine Congress sitting inside a scaffolded dome applauded Benjamin Netanyahu calling to reject a peace deal with Iran, DOJ quietly announced it had reached a plea deal with former CIA Director David Petraeus for leaking Top Secret/Secure Compartmented Information materials to his mistress, Paula Broadwell.
The Illusion of Democracy | NEWS JUNKIE POST
Netanyahu's speech to Congress was brilliantly deceitful because it played to the fantasies that Israeli propaganda and right wing militarists in the United States have been popularizing for the past thirty years.
Bad news for O'Reilly haters. Since the Fox News Channel's top-rated host is perhaps better known as a bullshitting blowhard than as a legitimate journalist, he'll easily ride out recent accusations that he may be a serial fabricator: accusations that include concocting stories during a disastrous stint as a CBS correspondent back in the 80's.
It's one thing to know and exercise your rights when a police officer pulls you over, but what rights do you have when a private cop--entrusted with all of the powers of a government cop but not held to the same legal standards--pulls you over and subjects you to a stop-and-frisk or, worse, causes you to "disappear" into a Gitmo-esque detention center not unlike the one employed by Chicago police at Homan Square?
Last night said it all; congress giving a thundering ovation to Benjamin Netanyahu, the PM of the US, ah Israel. It was as if a conquering hero returned & gloated in the presence of his adoring minions. Yet it was a glaring reminder how political theatre is what congress is all about. As for last night w/ Israeli elections 2 wks. away it was a nothing more than a stump speech hoping to play well w/ the Israeli electorate.
There is a widespread hatred for teachers--and teacher unions--in many parts of the country. The reasons are embraced within a culture of envy and jealousy.
By Paul Craig Roberts
Innocent Disabled Vietnam Veteran Set Up for Life Imprisonment by Corrupt Louisiana Cops and Prosecutors 
The disabled veteran is surprised that cops and prosecutors would lie and construct a false case. The innocent, but gullible, veteran who foolishly trusted the system was saved by a video of the actual encounter.
This is a poll to ascertain to what extent users of OpEdNews believe in God, are not sure there is a God, or do not believe in God.
Higgs boson, aka the "God particle," was allegedly confirmed to exist by CERN in 2013, but this complex idea -- an elementary particle that is key in explaining certain "mass" situations -- apparently was confirmed first by ... wait for it ... Homer Simpson?! Yes, the same Homer Simpson you know and love from "The Simpsons." In a 1998 episode of the long-running show, Homer draws an equation on the chalkboard that Dr. Simon Singh says "almost predicted the mass of the elementary particle," according to The Independent newspaper in Britain. The episode is titled, "The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace," and features Homer taking on a new persona as an inventor. "That equation predicts the mass of the Higgs boson" he said. "If you work it out, you get the mass of a Higgs boson that's only a bit larger than the nano-mass of a Higgs boson actually is. It's kind of amazing as Homer makes this...
In an unusually relaxed setting, Professor Noam Chomsky visits Google Cambridge to answer questions from Googlers. I personally found his response to a question towards the end, "What is the most interesting insight the science of Linguistics has revealed but that the public at large seems not to know about or appreciate?", one of the most stunning things I've ever heard.
This advertisement does a number of things in 15 seconds that U.S. television has not done before.
As Jon Stewart's time on the air nears its end, so does his patience for Fox News.
House Republicans have voted over 50 times to strip away Americans' health care.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu came to Washington this week to prepare the American people for war against Iran. He has no confidence in President Obama, and his objective is nothing less than to wreck the current negotiations and push America into a regime-changing war against Iran. Netanyahu's narrative is a fabric of lies and omissions.
Republican Senators Marco Rubio and Mike Lee proposed a tax reform plan which they said would help drive long-term growth by reducing the top corporate rate and simplifying rates for other taxpayers. Writing in the Wall Street Journal, the two conservative lawmakers said their plan would lower the maximum tax rate for companies to 25 percent from 35 percent. Individuals and families would pay a rate of either 15 percent or 35 percent, rather than the current tiered system with seven rates going as high as nearly 40 percent. Rubio, a possible 2016 presidential contender, and Lee are scheduled to hold a news conference to formally unveil the plan. The senators said their proposal would end the "double taxation" that companies face on both capital gains and dividends. It also would call for companies with operations in other countries to be taxed only in the country where income is earned.
Noam Chomsky delivered this lecture at University of Massachusetts on September 27th, 2012. Among other things, it provides an excellent primer to his other works, as well as a very clear and succinct oral history of world since World War II, and the United States' role in it.
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu showed off his extraordinary control of the U.S. Congress as he bathed in waves of applause while denouncing President Obama's proposed deal with Iran and urging America to sign up for the Israeli-Saudi regional war on Iran and its Shiite allies, reports Robert Parry.
Netanyahu's speech to Congress has been covered as a spectacle orchestrated by the conservative GOP-Likud alliance to undercut President Barack Obama's effort to reach a deal with Iran limiting that government's nuclear program. But this stunt did highlight a significant aspect of the the ongoing debate over Iran -- Netanyahu's position is extreme and unworkable: Iran should yield completely, or there will be war.
The brainwashing of the populace by the mainstream media machine has been effective beyond Murdoch's wildest imagination. Sometime in the last few decades, journalists abandoned their stance as independent seekers of the truth and merely spewed whatever propaganda best suited to advancing their advertisers' interests.
Israel's military and security leaders have made clear that they do not agree with Bibi's insistence that Iran is well along to developing its very own nukes. On this issue, Bibi stands largely alone in his paranoia. Those members of Congress who attended the Tuesday speech cheered a foreign leader who is in Washington to lobby them to defy their own president.
By Steven Jonas
I Hate to Break This to You, Judge Moore, but God Did Not Actually Write the US Constitution 
Nullification and the South. Bound together at birth and determined to keep on truckin' (Judge Moore).
In a statement after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's speech to Congress, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) today renewed his support for diplomatic efforts by the United States and other world powers to negotiate an agreement to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.
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These past 7 years years of turmoil have been heralded by the Heavens. Why is it so hard to believe that we are connected to the meaning that the Heavens unfold for us? The Heavens are telling us of the continuing story of the unfolding of the 60's promise. Isn't that what's happening here on Earth? Of course we're meeting resistance. The old never dies without a fight--it's called the sunset effect.
The speech has been made. It was well-received by those hearing it. But progressives must listen and then propose alternatives in keeping with our views and values, while recognizing legitimate security concerns of all the valid participants in the region. Here is one such set of proposals.
The for-profit college industry is less about teaching anybody anything than it is about creating debt -- debt that then be very profitably sold off in tranches -- and even aggregated into derivatives -- to banksters and wealthy investers. In no other country in the developed world are financiers and scam artists entrusted with managing the education commons.
With democratic values such as free speech, the rule of law, privacy, press freedom and civil liberties now 'old school' -- all increasingly displaced by secrecy, surveillance, and subversion of the erstwhile Republic's operating manual the US Constitution -- the future looks bleak for The Homeland. In this article Australian Greg Maybury ponders if America on the road to the Rubicon may have already crossed a bridge too far.
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Testing, Testing, Testing. - School Leadership 2.0; Diane Ravitch /David A. Gamberg; Superintendent
David Gamberg is the superintendent of two neighboring districts on the North Fork of Long Island, Southold and Greenport shows how bizarre it is to evaluate educators based on the test scores of students they never taught. This is sometimes called "shared attribution. He makes the point by using an analogy. Suppose all doctors in the community were judged by the weight loss of every community member? We will assess eye doctors, podiatrists, and pediatricians based on the results of data gleaned from a community's ability to lose a specific amount of weight by a specific date on the calendar. You happen to be a pediatrician who has just begun your practice, and as such you work in a relatively poor community. Within the first few years of practice your license is revoked due to "poor performance." You never get to a point in your career where you might consider opening a practice in a more affluent community. This one size fits all standard would ensure that doctors suffer the personal and professional consequences of the poor performance of the patients within this area. THIS is what the NCLB testing 'reform' has done.
The increasingly frequent and severe droughts that have punished California over the past two decades--including the current record-breaking one--are primarily the result of human-caused climate change and will likely grow even worse, scientists at Stanford University warn.
A Stunning Graphic on the Failure of Test-Based Accountability; by Diane Ravitch
Linda Darling-Hammond of Stanford University posted this graphic on Twitter. It shows the flat lines and declines of U.S. scores on the international PISA test from 2000-2012. Just think of the waste of billions of dollars for testing under both No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top. Think of the children cheated of a real education. Think about the fact that Arne Duncan says that high-stakes testing is non-negotiable in any new Elementary and Secondary Education Act. Is it not the definition of insanity to do the same thing over and over for a dozen years without success and to expect better results if you do it for another 7-10 years?
The Obamacare Challenge We Need? Improved, Expanded Medicare for All
As a primary care pediatrician who sees children of low-income families in Washington, D.C., I am reminded every day of the vulnerability of our children's health to the ill-informed whims of our lawmakers and courts. Those children will be on my mind as I gather with others outside the Supreme Court today. Just yesterday, I saw my 16-year-old patient Mary, who suffers from Down's syndrome and congenital heart disease, both conditions with lifelong disabilities. I have known Mary for the last 13 years.
President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that the murder of Kremlin critic Boris Nemtsov was a shameful tragedy that carried a political subtext. The Kremlin has denied any involvement, saying that the killing was a "provocation" designed to discredit Putin and strengthen his opponents, but Nemtsov's friends say the Kremlin is to blame for fomenting an atmosphere of hatred toward its opponents. "The most serious attention should be paid to high-profile crimes, including the ones with a political subtext. Russia should be devoid at last of the kind of shame and tragedies that we have recently endured and seen," he said in a speech during a meeting with officials from the Interior Ministry.
A lawsuit challenging the Affordable Care Act received a serious hearing at the Supreme Court Wednesday as lawyers from both sides faced tough questioning from justices, making it difficult to predict how the court will rule and whether millions of people will have to relinquish their health insurance. The stakes in this case are enormous -- and, in some ways, unprecedented. As many as 9.6 million people could lose their health insurance if the disputed subsidies were invalidated, according to the Rand Corp. An Urban Institute analysis concluded that these individuals are predominately working, white and Southern. The states that defaulted to federally run health insurance exchanges tend to be governed by Republicans.
The Justice Department has cleared a Ferguson, Mo., police officer of civil rights violations in the shooting of Michael Brown, a black teenager whose death set off racially charged and sometimes violent protests last year. The decision, which was announced on Wednesday, ends a lengthy investigation into the shooting last August, in which Officer Darren Wilson shot and killed Mr. Brown in the street. Many witnesses said Mr. Brown had his hands up in surrender when he died, leading to nationwide protest chants of "Hands up, don't shoot." The Justice Department said forensic evidence and other witnesses backed up the account of Officer Wilson, who said Mr. Brown fought with him, reached for his gun, then charged at him. He told investigators that he feared for his life. "There is no evidence upon which prosecutors can rely to disprove Wilson's stated subjective belief that he feared for his safety," the report said.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday seemed bitterly divided during heated arguments over the fate of President Obama's health care law. As expected, the court's four liberal members voiced strong support for the administration's position. But the administration must almost certainly capture the vote of either Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. or Justice Anthony M. Kennedy to prevail. The chief justice said almost nothing. Justice Kennedy asked questions suggesting that he was uncomfortable with the administration's reading of the statute. But he added that the challengers' reading posed problems, too. "Your argument raises a serious constitutional question," he told their lawyer.
Shortly after noon last Sunday raw video appeared on Facebook within minutes after multiple Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officers shot and killed an unarmed man on the sidewalk outside the Union Rescue Mission on Skid Row, where many of the City's homeless live in makeshift tents on the street. Within hours, the video had been shared on thousands of Facebook pages and racked up millions of views. While the original Facebook post has been taken down, the video can be seen in its entirety on YouTube.
U.S. Park Police are investigating a report of shots fired near the National Security Agency's headquarters Tuesday evening. A spokesperson for the police said the NSA is investigating damage to one of its buildings that appeared to be from gunshots.
DEA warns stoned rabbits in Utah!!!
Now, regarding rabbits. Some wild animals apparently do develop a taste for bud (and, yes, best to keep it away from your pets). But I don't know that the occasional high rabbit constitutes grounds for keeping marijuana prohibition in place, any more than drunk squirrels are an argument for outlawing alcohol. And let's not even get started on the nationwide epidemic of catnip abuse. There was a time, not too long ago, when drug warriors terrified a nation with images of "the devil's weed" and "reefer madness." Now, it seems that enforcers of marijuana law conjuring up a stoned bunny?
The Path to Freedom From Corruption Goes Through New York State -- And Your State; by Zephyr Teachout
The system is rigged and broken. A small number of people have far too much political power in America. There is a clear way out, and it starts in the states. In the past, quick anti-corruption reform has started in the states.Like the trailblazers who dug the path of the Erie Canal right through New York State nearly two centuries ago, it's going to take a lot of bushwhacking, and a lot of imagination, but it can transform the system and free up the entire country. Until the late 19th century, ballots were mostly public, leading to systematic bribery of voters. Secret ballots were the result of state-by-state reform movements in the 1880s and 1890s. Our current problem isn't bribery of voters, but legal bribery of candidates. Power flows from elections, and right now most elections rely exclusively on private funding by some of the wealthiest people in world history. That means most candidates -- and therefore, leaders -- have no choice but to become sycophants to their interests. The corruption in our elections corrupts all of our politics. The path is there, but I won't pretend it's easy.
The House passed a bill Tuesday afternoon to fund the Department of Homeland Security for the rest of the fiscal year, sending it to President Obama for his expected signature. The measure will not target Obama's executive actions on immigration, giving Democrats what they have long demanded and potentially enraging conservatives bent on fighting the president on immigration. The vote was 257-167, with some Republicans joining all Democrats who voted to pass the bill, which had already cleared the Senate.The vote marked a big win for Democrats, who have long demanded that Congress pass a "clean" bill to fund DHS free of any immigration riders. For weeks, Boehner and his top deputies have refused to take up such a bill, as conservatives have demanded using the DHS debate to take on Obama's directives, which include action to prevent the deportations of millions of undocumented immigrants.
FairTest: Weekly Report on Resistance to High-Stakes Testing; Diane Ravitch
As Congress continues to take steps to protect the status quo of high-stakes testing, resistance to this misguided approach to education continues to build. When the public is not heard by its elected officials, the public finds ways to be heard. It was public demonstrations that built the civil rights movement; it was public demonstrations that built the anti-war movement in the 1970s. Keep your eye on what the public is doing. The politicians don't hear or see until the noise is deafening and the sights cannot be hidden by blindfolds. Bob Schaeffer of FairTest writes: Across the U.S. the testing resistance and reform movement is rapidly expanding as annual standardized exam begin in many schools. This week's stories from more than half the 50 states clearly show the significant impact that parents, students, teachers, administrators and community leaders are having on policy makers in the fight against testing misuse and overuse. Here are the Fair-Test links that will show you exactly what is on-going in this nation!
Carol Burris on Governor Cuomo's Baloney; by Diane Ravitch & Caol Burris
Carol Burris has been an outspoken critic of Governor Andrew Cuomo's baseless attacks on New York state's educators. He is outraged that the current evaluation system rated 99% of the state's teachers effective or highly effective. What he forgets, Burris reminds us, is that this is not an antiquated system: the current method of evaluation was created by".Governor Andrew Cuomo! "Cuomo remains obsessed with teacher measurement and firing. Unhappy with the outcome of evaluations, he called them "baloney." He forgets that when the Boars Head delivery arrived in Albany, he was driving the truck. The evaluation system he now mocks is the very one he insisted be put in place. REAS THE TRUTH ABOUT TESTING MANIA...
Police officers in Ferguson, Mo., have routinely violated the constitutional rights of the city's black residents, the Justice Department has concluded in a scathing report that accuses the officers of using excessive force and making unjustified traffic stops for years. The Justice Department, which opened its investigation after a white Ferguson police officer shot and killed a black teenager last summer, says the discrimination was fueled in part by racial stereotypes held by city officials. Investigators say the officials made racist jokes about blacks on their city email accounts. Ferguson officials now face the choice of either negotiating a settlement with the Justice Department or potentially being sued by it on charges of violating the Constitution.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said she was "near tears" during Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's address to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday. In his speech, Netanyahu warned the U.S. about accepting a nuclear deal with Iran, saying it "will not prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons - it will all but guarantee that Iran will get those nuclear weapons - lots of them." "This deal won't be a farewell to arms, it will be a farewell to arms control ... a countdown to a potential nuclear nightmare," Netanyahu said. Pelosi said she was "saddened by the insult to the intelligence of the United States." She was noticeably displeased with Netanyahu's remarks during his speech.
According to the State Department, Hillary Clinton's use of a personalized email address during her time as secretary of state was no secret. "The State Department has long had access to a wide array of Secretary Clinton's records -- including emails between her and Department officials with state.gov accounts," State Department Deputy Spokesperon Marie Harf said. Some observers have cast the story as a "scandal" for Clinton, who is widely expected to run for president in 2016. Clinton has already faced accusations she is insufficiently transparent, and the email story has already been tied to that narrative. However, Clinton's team pointed to former State Department officials who defended her use of a personal email address and dismissed potential concerns.
Lawyers for David H. Petraeus have reached an agreement with federal prosecutors for the retired general and former CIA director to plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge for mishandling classified materials, a deal that brings an end to a lengthy investigation that kept him largely out of public view for more than two years. The deal, if approved by a judge, will spare Petraeus a prison sentence and allow him to avoid a trial that probably would have revealed details of his relationship with his former mistress and biographer, who had been provided the highly sensitive documents. As part of the agreement, Petraeus admitted improperly retaining a number of bound notebooks that contained classified information and giving them to Paula Broadwell. The documents also indicate that Petraeus initially lied to FBI investigators during an interview at CIA headquarters, telling them that he had never provided Broadwell with classified information.
Politico Reports: Democrats Fight to Keep NCLB Testing in Place; by Diane Ravitch
This is one of the strangest political alignments ever: George W. Bush put annual testing into federal law, a practice unknown in the high-performing nations of the world. And Democrats--including President Obama, Secretary Duncan, and Washington State Senator Patti Murray--are fighting to keep George W. Bush's policy in place. . Now, in accordance with NCLB, every public school in the state of Washington is a "failing" school, having not reached the goal of 100% proficiency on state tests of math and reading. But Senator Murray blithely defends the obnoxious annual testing policy that has so infuriated educators in her home state. Read the latest from Politico .com here ,too... GET THE TRUTH ABOUT THIS TESTING CONTROVERSY
For weeks, Boehner and the far right wing of his party have been united in their plan hold national security funding hostage unless they could deport 11 million people, including parents and children. Now that it is clear Boehner has little control over the far right, he finally appear ready to do the right thing for our national security and our economy by bringing a clean DHS bill to the floor. This chapter of Republican infighting may finally be over -- as one House Republican critical of his party, Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) said, "Sanity is prevailing." This is a break from the previous two months, when Boehner included a repeal of the President's immigration executive actions to the DHS budget bill that Republicans passed in the House.
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