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Get in votes for ed board
Have you sent in your ballot for the Douglas County Board of Education election? This certainly has been less than a nonpartisan take on a nonpartisan election.
Some people are accusing the American Federation of Teachers of just looking out for the teachers. Well, teachers want a fair shake in this world, too, but they also have the district in mind.
If they aren’t treated well, they would go somewhere else, right? However, after having spent 26.5 years as a special education aide/para , I can say I have met very few teachers who put themselves in front of kids for seven and a half hours a day, five days a week, for about 36 weeks a year, for that pay.
They do it because they like kids and they love to see those eyes light up when the light bulb goes on. They are usually the front line of attack when the parents aren’t happy with the district.
So, yes, the union is going to back candidates that know from experience and support the district’s goals, not those that have nothing good to say about how the district is run.
The American Civil Liberties Union was the featured subject at the Oct. 20 Parker Dems meeting. After listening to the speaker, every one of us ought to be outraged how our civil rights have been completely trampled by the Patriot Act.
After giving a little history, Kathleen Hynes, a volunteer speaker with ACLU, started right in on the Bill of Rights and how the Patriot Act has negated so many of our civil freedoms. Hynes said the Patriot Act has allowed the government, essentially the FBI, to pry into a citizen’s private life, by searching medical records, library records, credit card records, organizations they belong to, e-mail, Internet, phone, and more.
This can be done without the citizen knowing or being suspected of wrong doing, and the citizen has nothing to say about it. The Writ of Habeous Corpus has been negated, and gag orders in place so the searchers can’t even tell you what they are doing or why.
Hynes went on with example after example how the Bill of Rights amendments have been neutralized.
We know that the Act was put in place to catch terrorists after 9/11, but it has been abused to the inth degree. Several sections of the act are being studied right now, and may be out of committee by the time you read this. There are several crucial pieces that will sunset Dec. 31, but the Obama administration doesn’t appear to plan to do that.
We who voted for Obama, assumed undoing what the Bush administration had done to our civil rights was one of his top priorities. So it was disappointing to hear from Hynes that this probably was not going to happen. Maybe health care and the economy are on the front burners, but losing our freedoms is the one that will burn us to a crisp.
You may not agree with all the things the ACLU does — for instance, when you hear about them standing up for the American Nazis — but the ACLU is protecting their right to freedom of speech, not what they believe in.
If you want to join in our letter writing campaign to our congress people, contact Jessica Frost at jnfrost@hotmail.com or contact the ACLU at www.aclu-co.org to get more information. America is about civil freedoms and we need to get them back.
Congress is the only body that can change the Patriot Act and it needs to be done now. So, get out that pen and paper.
Pat Nagorka is a 35-year resident of Douglas County and a longtime Democrat.
Some people are accusing the American Federation of Teachers of just looking out for the teachers. Well, teachers want a fair shake in this world, too, but they also have the district in mind.
If they aren’t treated well, they would go somewhere else, right? However, after having spent 26.5 years as a special education aide/para , I can say I have met very few teachers who put themselves in front of kids for seven and a half hours a day, five days a week, for about 36 weeks a year, for that pay.
They do it because they like kids and they love to see those eyes light up when the light bulb goes on. They are usually the front line of attack when the parents aren’t happy with the district.
So, yes, the union is going to back candidates that know from experience and support the district’s goals, not those that have nothing good to say about how the district is run.
The American Civil Liberties Union was the featured subject at the Oct. 20 Parker Dems meeting. After listening to the speaker, every one of us ought to be outraged how our civil rights have been completely trampled by the Patriot Act.
After giving a little history, Kathleen Hynes, a volunteer speaker with ACLU, started right in on the Bill of Rights and how the Patriot Act has negated so many of our civil freedoms. Hynes said the Patriot Act has allowed the government, essentially the FBI, to pry into a citizen’s private life, by searching medical records, library records, credit card records, organizations they belong to, e-mail, Internet, phone, and more.
This can be done without the citizen knowing or being suspected of wrong doing, and the citizen has nothing to say about it. The Writ of Habeous Corpus has been negated, and gag orders in place so the searchers can’t even tell you what they are doing or why.
Hynes went on with example after example how the Bill of Rights amendments have been neutralized.
We know that the Act was put in place to catch terrorists after 9/11, but it has been abused to the inth degree. Several sections of the act are being studied right now, and may be out of committee by the time you read this. There are several crucial pieces that will sunset Dec. 31, but the Obama administration doesn’t appear to plan to do that.
We who voted for Obama, assumed undoing what the Bush administration had done to our civil rights was one of his top priorities. So it was disappointing to hear from Hynes that this probably was not going to happen. Maybe health care and the economy are on the front burners, but losing our freedoms is the one that will burn us to a crisp.
You may not agree with all the things the ACLU does — for instance, when you hear about them standing up for the American Nazis — but the ACLU is protecting their right to freedom of speech, not what they believe in.
If you want to join in our letter writing campaign to our congress people, contact Jessica Frost at jnfrost@hotmail.com or contact the ACLU at www.aclu-co.org to get more information. America is about civil freedoms and we need to get them back.
Congress is the only body that can change the Patriot Act and it needs to be done now. So, get out that pen and paper.
Pat Nagorka is a 35-year resident of Douglas County and a longtime Democrat.
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