What a Difference a Letter Makes Word of the Day: precatory

Though it differs from predatory by a single letter, this less common adjective has a meaning all its own and quite removed from its look-alike: "expressing entreaty," or, less grandiosely, begging. Its Latin ancestor, precari, also gives us "pray."

Some Parents Oppose Obama Speech to Students – NYTimes.com

HOUSTON — President Obama’s plan to deliver a speech to public school students on Tuesday has set off a revolt among conservative parents, who have accused the president of trying to indoctrinate their children with socialist ideas and are asking school officials to excuse the children from listening.

The uproar over the speech, in which Mr. Obama intends to urge students to work hard and stay in school, has been particularly acute in Texas, where several major school districts, under pressure from parents, have laid plans to let children opt out of lending the president an ear.

Some parents said they were concerned because the speech had not been screened for political content. Nor, they said, had it been reviewed by the State Board of Education and local school boards, which, under state law, must approve the curriculum.

“The thing that concerned me most about it was it seemed like a direct channel from the president of the United States into the classroom, to my child,” said Brett Curtiss, an engineer from Pearland, Tex., who said he would keep his three children home.

“I don’t want our schools turned over to some socialist movement.”

The White House has said the speech will emphasize the importance of education and hard work in school, both to the individual and to the nation. The message is not partisan, nor compulsory, officials said.

“This isn’t a policy speech,” said Sandra Abrevaya, a spokeswoman for the Department of Education. “It’s designed to encourage kids to stay in school. The choice on whether to show the speech to students is entirely in the hands of each school. This is absolutely voluntary.”

Mr. Obama’s speech was announced weeks ago, but the furor among conservatives reached a fever pitch Wednesday morning as right-wing Web sites and talk show hosts began inveighing against it.

Mark Steyn, a Canadian author and political commentator, speaking on the Rush Limbaugh show on Wednesday, accused Mr. Obama of trying to create a cult of personality, comparing him to Saddam Hussein and Kim Jong-il, the North Korean leader.

The Republican Party chairman in Florida, Jim Greer, said he “was appalled that taxpayer dollars are being used to spread President Obama’s socialist ideology.”

And Chris Stigall, a Kansas City talk show host, said, “I wouldn’t let my next-door neighbor talk to my kid alone; I’m sure as hell not letting Barack Obama talk to him alone.”

Previous presidents have visited public schools to speak directly to students, although few of those events have been broadcast live. Mr. Obama’s address at noon, Eastern time, at a high school in Virginia, will be streamed live on the White House Web site.

The first President George Bush, a Republican, made a similar nationally broadcast speech from a Washington high school in 1991, urging students to study hard, avoid drugs and to ignore peers “who think it’s not cool to be smart.” Democrats in Congress accused him of using taxpayer money — $27,000 to produce the broadcast — for “paid political advertising.”

This week, school officials were hearing from parents about the issue not only in Texas, but in other parts of the country as well — California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, South Carolina and Utah.

Herb Garrett, executive director of the Georgia School Superintendents Association, said many of his members felt that the controversy had put them in an awkward situation, vulnerable to attacks from conservative talk-show hosts if they open up instructional time for Mr. Obama’s speech, and open to accusations that they have disrespected the president if they do not.

“It’s one of those no-wins,” Mr. Garrett said.

In Texas, calls and e-mail messages flooded into the offices of many local school officials. “I didn’t get a positive call all day,” said Susan Dacus, a spokeswoman for the Wylie Independent School District outside Dallas.

School officials in Wylie decided to record the speech, review it and then let individual teachers show it, offering students the opportunity to avoid listening if they wished.

In Houston, teachers have been asked to tell parents if they intend to show the speech and the schools will provide an alternative class for those whose parents object, a spokesman for the district, Lee Vela, said.

Some Houston parents, however, said telling children they should not hear out the president of the United States, even if their parents dislike his policies, sends the wrong message — that one should not listen to someone with whom you disagree.

“It’s difficult for me to understand how listening to the president, the commander in chief, the chief citizen of this country, is damaging to the youth of today,” said Phyllis Griffin Epps, an analyst for the city who has two children in public school.

(I might watch a bit on tv, but letting my kids see it….well…it IS an obscenity, after all)

Can You Say “Obama”?

All About Me Word of the Day: autolatry

Now here’s a form of worship that won’t require you to dress up or even leave the house: autolatry is self-worship. Few regard it as a Good Thing, but probably slightly more than few practice it from time to time. The -latry bit turns up in numerous other "forms of worship" words and is ultimately from Greek for "pay."

You NEED to know this, and keep close watch…or we’re SCREWED!!

This Arizona conservative bears watching…he is providing us with very important information.

http://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&view=bsp&ver=1qygpcgurkovy : http://azconserv1.wordpress.com/

This stuff is VERY frightening, and we must be aware and take action BEFORE all of our liberties are legislated right out from under us.

FIGHT BACK NOW!

duh!

Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity and I’m not sure about the former.

Albert Einstein

Slicked Back Word of the Day: oleaginous

Slicked Back Word of the Day: oleaginous

If smarmy wears out its welcome you can slide in this high-sounding synonym, derived from the Greek for "olive tree." Less frequently, oleaginous is used in technical contexts to characterize fatty and greasy things, where its comrades-in-arms are saccharinous (characterizing starchy things) and albuminous (characterizing proteins).

Visit the following URL to look up the word of the day in the Visual Thesaurus:

http://www.visualthesaurus.com?word=oleaginous

Quotes

http://quotes4all.net/quotes.html?quote_color=000000&quote_background=FFFFFF&quote_align=center&quote_font=arial&quote_fontsize=10&quote_fontstyle=plain&image=left&author_color=0000FF&author_align=center&author_font=arial&author_fontsize=10&author_fontstyle=plain&lang=en&country=us&.lang=en&.country=us&synd=ig&mid=95&ifpctok=-8862195034896102190&exp_split_js=1&exp_track_js=1&exp_preload_js=1&exp_ids=17259,300070,300377&parent=http://www.google.com&libs=7GiCFv4OBq0/lib/liberror_tracker.js,rXyJEuLpVIE/lib/libcore.js&view=home&is_signedin=1 : Oh! do not attack me with your watch. A watch is always too fast or too slow. I cannot be dictated to by a watch.

Jane Austen

A German’s View on Islam

Subject: A German’s View on Islam
This is by far the best explanation of the Muslim terrorist situation I have ever read. His references to past history are accurate and clear. Not long, easy to understand, and well worth the read. The author of this email is purported to be Dr. Emanuel Tanay, a well known and well respected psychiatrist.
I could find no affirmation nor denial of the validity of the letter in Snopes.com.

A German’s View on Islam
A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism. "Very few people were true Nazis," he said, "but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories."
We are told again and again by "experts" and "talking heads" that Islam is the religion of peace, and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectra of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.
The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honor-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers.
The hard quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the "silent majority," is cowed and extraneous.
Communist Russia was comprised of Russians who just wanted to live in peace, yet the Russian Communists were responsible for the murder of about 20 million people. The peaceful majority was irrelevant.
China ’s huge population was peaceful as well, but Chinese Communists managed to kill a staggering 70 million people.
The average Japanese individual prior to World War II was not a warmongering sadist. Yet, Japan murdered and slaughtered its way across South East Asia in an orgy of killing that included the systematic murder of 12 million Chinese civilians; most killed by sword, shovel, and bayonet.
And, who can forget Rwanda , which collapsed into butchery. Could it not be said that the majority of Rwandans were "peace loving"?
History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points: Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence. Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don’t speak up, because like my friend from Germany , they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.
Peace-lovinGermans,Japanese,Chinese,Russians, Rwandans, Serbs, Afghans, Iraqis, Palestinians, Somalis, Nigerians, Algerians, and many others have died because the peaceful majority did not speak up until it was too late.
As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts; the fanatics who threaten our way of life.
Lastly, anyone who doubts that the issue is serious and just deletes this email without sending it on, is contributing to the passivity that allows the problems to expand. So, extend yourself a bit and send this on and on and on! Let us hope that thousands, world wide, read this and think about it, and send it on – before it’s too late.
Emanuel Tanay, M.D.
2980 Provincial St. Ann Arbor , MI 48104
734-997-0256

–
Love flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.

Semenya wins 800 meters (as a man, or a woman??)

BERLIN — South Africa’s track and field federation has been asked to conduct a gender test on an 800-meter runner amid concerns she does not meet the requirements to compete as a woman.

Caster Semenya, 18, won the 800 meters at the world championships with a stunningly dominating run.

Semenya took the lead halfway through the race Wednesday and won in a world-leading 1 minute, 55.45 seconds, beating defending champion Janeth Jepkosgei of Kenya by a massive 2.45 seconds. Jennifer Meadows of Britain took bronze.

The world track and field federation requested the gender test about three weeks ago, after Semenya burst onto the scene by improving her personal bests in the 800 and 1,500 by huge margins.

[+] Enlarge Thomas Lohnes/AFP/Getty ImagesSouth Africa’s Caster Semenya caught the IAAF’s attention by greatly improving her personal bests in the 800 and 1,500.

IAAF spokesman Nick Davies said the "extremely complex, difficult" test has been started but that the results were not expected for weeks.

Semenya qualified for Wednesday’s final with a top time of 1 minute, 58.64 seconds. She posted the world’s best time this year of 1:56.72 three weeks ago at the African junior championships in Bambous, Mauritius.

Davies stressed that "it’s a medical issue, not an issue of cheating."

The verification requires a physical medical evaluation, and includes reports from a gynecologist, endocrinologist, psychologist, an internal medicine specialist and an expert on gender.

"So we’re talking about reports that are very long, very time consuming," Davies said.

South Africa team manager Phiwe Mlangeni-Tsholetsane would not confirm that Semenya was having a gender test, but said "there was no cheating on our part."

"We entered Caster as a woman and we want to keep it that way," Mlangeni-Tsholetsane said. "Our conscience is clear in terms of Caster. We have no reservations at all about that."

It was not clear what would happen if Semenya were to medal in Wednesday’s final and the test results determined she does not meet the requirements to compete.

"I can’t say that if ‘X’ happens in the future that we will, for example, retroactively strip results. It’s legally very complex," Davies said.

"If there’s a problem and it turns out that there’s been a fraud … that someone has changed sex, then obviously it would be much easier to strip results," Davies added. "However, if it’s a natural thing and the athlete has always thought she’s a woman or been a woman, it’s not exactly cheating."

He said a decision in such instances is "done on a case by case basis."

"It’s something that would have to be considered by the legal experts at that time," Davies said.

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

Robert A. Heinlein Quotes

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/r/robertahe100989.html : An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life.
Robert A. Heinlein