Pitting the Republican Party of Texas

[foolsguinea]

1. Strict adherence to the original intent of the Declaration of Independence and U.S. and Texas Constitutions.
   Meaning what? Manifest Destiny? Past that, there wasn’t exactly a great unity of opinion among the framers.

2. The sanctity of human life, created in the image of God, which should be protected from fertilization to natural death.
   Seriously? We’re against the death penalty now?

3. Preserving American and Texas Sovereignty and Freedom.

4. Honoring all of those that serve and protect our freedom.

5. “The laws of nature and nature’s God” as our Founding Fathers believed.
   Vague vaguenesses.

6. Limiting government power to those items enumerated in the U.S. and Texas Constitutions.
   So, any new program, even from your own party, would require a constitutional amendment? Maybe two, so it can be in the federal constitution and the state one, I can’t tell. Madness.

7. Personal Accountability and Responsibility.
   OK, how about taking some responsibility for the state of your state? Or is this the line where you say, “personal responsibility,” to mean, “shirk social responsibility”?

8. Self-sufficient families, founded on the traditional marriage of a natural man and a natural woman.
   How are we defining “family” here? Household? Immediate family? Or can we count tribes and clans? How about we all be descendants of Adam and Eve’s traditional marriage and be one family?
   In any case, “self-sufficient,” is a loaded term. Do we just need to own our own businesses, or are we required to live off the land? And what’s the remedy for being a prole? Oh, wait, you think the proletariat are “self-sufficient” in their at-will employment. Yeah, go on, pull the other one.

9. A free enterprise society unencumbered by government interference or subsidies.
   Oh, you *want *to be poor.

10. Having an educated population, with parents having the freedom of choice for the education of their children.
    So we should be educated, but only if our parents say so. Got it.

11. Americans having the right to be safe in their homes, on their streets, and in their communities, and the unalienable right to defend themselves.
    Great! So you’ll help us disarm MS-13, the KKK, and* la M*, right? Safety on our streets means safety from drive-by shootings, yes?

[foolsguinea]

@Shakes

I read an article once (Sorry can’t remember where) about the similarities of Republican doctrines and the dontrines of extreme Muslims. After reading that article I wondered why republicans don’t hail extreme Muslims as the greatest thing ever.

Same reason early Christians denounced Marcion as a “son of hell.” Exclusivist religions hate those almost like them, whose made-up but supposedly deathly important theological claims are a little bit different.

[Little_Nemo]

I’m surprised nobody has already mentioned this one:

Voter Rights Act – We urge that the Voter Rights Act of 1965 codified and updated in 1973 be repealed and not reauthorized.

[foolsguinea]

Controversial Theories – We support objective teaching and equal treatment of all sides of scientific theories. We believe theories such as life origins and environmental change should be taught as challengeable scientific theories subject to change as new data is produced. Teachers and students should be able to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of these theories openly and without fear of retribution or discrimination of any kind.
Good! We agree then! Last year’s drought was a data point. Take some personal responsibility to fight climate change before you wipe out Texas agriculture.

Early Childhood Development – We believe that parents are best suited to train their children in their early development and oppose mandatory pre-school and Kindergarten. We urge Congress to repeal government-sponsored programs that deal with early childhood development.
“Parents are best suited”? Hahahaha no. I’m not for mandatory pre-school either, really, but I’ve known too many young parents to find this credible.

Federal Tax Reform – We recommend repeal of the Sixteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, with the goal of abolishing the I.R.S and replacing it with a national sales tax collected by the States. In the interim we urge the income tax be changed to a flatter, broader, lower tax with only minimal exemptions such as home mortgage interest deductions.
No exceptions, except the one our middle-income base would notice!

Capital Gains Tax – We favor abolishing the capital gains tax.
So, all capital gains would be counted as regular income, instead of only some? Good idea!
Or you mean to abolish all income taxes on capital gains, including on privately held businesses, real estate, and collectibles? Bad idea.
Or you don’t know what capital gains is? That’s it, isn’t it?

Knowledge-Based Education – We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the student’s fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.
Oh sweet screaming Christ. OK, I think you meant to say that you oppose teaching OBE (I don’t know what that is) under another name. But to come out against critical thinking? In your platform? You’re explicitly promoting thoughtlessness, blind dogmatism, and prejudice to your own people!

Imbeciles.

[foolsguinea]

@Rhythmdvl

Tough competition between Texas and Iowa:

We favor teaching systematic intensive phonics in reading, the three R’s, hard work and individual responsibility.

(nice apostrophe there)

That is a perfectly appropriate apostrophe, and traditional when speaking of the 3 R’s.

[otternell]

@Rhythmdvl

<snip> It’s also why I think the Iowa platform would beat the pants off Texas in a stupidfest.

Yay Iowa - we are beating the pants off Texas!!! Oh wait . . . stupidfest huh? nevermind.

[foolsguinea]

Wow, the Iowa platform seems to have just taken most of what was thrown in by random cranks, with no idea of editing it down.

We support the establishment of a no-activities night on Wednesdays.
I guess they mean that public schools should not have activities on Wednesday evenings, when good evangelical kids have Wednesday night prayer meeting. Maybe. Pretty out there, but understandable from a really culturally provincial mindset.

We call for the reintroduction and ratification of the original 13th Amendment, not the 13th Amendment in today’s Constitution.
We call for the legal ratification of the 14th Amendment and the clarification of Section I as based upon the author’s intent (Senator Jacob Howard).
What the holy hell? This is new to me, too.
I found this about the Thirteenthers: http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2010/07/27/why-some-republicans-want-to-restore-the-13th-amendment.html
And as for the Fourteenth, I’m not clear why they’d support an early draft over what was actually ratified, but maybe they think it’s some kind of attempt to strike against immigrants or Mr Obama.

We call for reinstating, with proper safeguards, the death penalty for murderers, rapists, kidnappers, and drug dealers with a firm limit of 24 months for appeals and no intrusion of federal authorities.
Murderers, rapists, kidnappers–and drug dealers? When was that ever a capital crime? Even in 1980’s Hollywood fantasy, when Crockett and Tubbs were blowing drug runners away, it was more, “good (or sometimes flawed) cops working outside the law to take down the bad guys.”
Kidnapping is a misfit, too. A kidnapping that ends in death is felony murder, and can be prosecuted in that way. Making kidnapping a capital crime would threaten those who make citizen’s arrests, for crying out loud.

[BrainGlutton]

@foolsguinea

Knowledge-Based Education – We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the student’s fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.
Oh sweet screaming Christ. OK, I think you meant to say that you oppose teaching OBE (I don’t know what that is) under another name. But to come out against critical thinking? In your platform? You’re explicitly promoting thoughtlessness, blind dogmatism, and prejudice to your own people!

This is OBE.

Outcome-based education (OBE) is a recurring education reform model. It frames itself as a student-centered learning philosophy that focuses on empirically measuring student performance, which are called outcomes. OBE contrasts with traditional education, which primarily focuses on the resources that are available to the student, which are called inputs. While OBE implementations often incorporate a host of many progressive pedagogical models and ideas, such as reform mathematics, block scheduling, project-based learning and whole language reading, OBE in itself does not specify or require any particular style of teaching or learning. Instead, it requires that students demonstrate that they have learned the required skills and content. However in practice, OBE generally promotes curricula and assessment based on constructivist methods and discourages traditional education approaches based on direct instruction of facts and standard methods. Though it is claimed the focus is not on “inputs”, OBE generally is used to justify increased funding requirements, increased graduation and testing requirements, and additional preparation, homework, and continuing education time spent by students, parents and teachers in supporting learning.

Each independent education agency specifies its own outcomes and its own methods of measuring student achievement according to those outcomes. The results of these measurements can be used for different purposes. For example, one agency may use the information to determine how well the overall education system is performing, and another may use its assessments to determine whether an individual student has learned required material.

Outcome-based methods have been adopted for large numbers of students in several countries. In the United States, the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills started in 1991. In Australia, implementation of OBE in Western Australia was widely criticised by parents and teachers[1] and was mostly dropped in January 2007.[2] In South Africa, OBE was dropped in mid 2010.[3] On a smaller scale, some OBE practices, such as not passing a student who does not know the required material, have been used by individual teachers around the world for centuries.

OBE was a popular term in the United States during the 1980s and early 1990s. It is also called mastery education, performance-based education, and other names.

<snip>

Criticism

Criticism of OBE falls into a few major groups:

• Opposition to standardized testing
• Criticism of inappropriate outcomes
• Lack of evidence that OBE works
• Extra burden on instructors and educational institutions
• Dislike of something that is not OBE
  Opposition to testing

Critics claim that existing tests do not adequately measure student mastery of the stated objectives.[citation needed]

Some parents also object to the use of standardized tests (all students take the same test under the same conditions) because they think it unfair for schools to require the same level of work or to use the achievement tests for impoverished or disadvantaged students as they do for more advantaged students.[citation needed]

The OBE philosophy insists that assessment models be carefully matched to the stated objectives. High-stakes tests are not required in an OBE system; norm-referenced tests are prohibited. Portfolios, daily assessments, teacher opinions, and other methods of assessment are perfectly compatible with OBE models. Furthermore, the OBE approach does not permit special, lower standards for students who have been badly served by public education in the past.
Inappropriate outcomes

Many people oppose OBE reforms because they dislike the proposed outcomes. They may think that the standards are too easy, too hard, or wrongly conceived. Finally, some so-called OBE critics oppose non-OBE reforms that were presented as a part of a wide-ranging reform “package”, rather than opposing OBE itself.

Standards can be set too low: Most fear that the focus on achievement by all students will result in “dumbing down” the definition of academic competence to a level that is achievable by even the weakest students. Critics are unhappy with having all students meet a minimum standard, instead of most students meeting a somewhat higher standard.

Some critics also question whether even such low goals are realistic or attainable, and whether success can only be framed in terms of high test scores and high incomes. The emphasis on higher reading standards and algebra for all appears to devalue vocational training and the achievement of those who do not get high test scores, but who are likely to become competent blue-collar workers.

Standards can be set too high: Others object that the standards are too high. OBE models do not approve of social promotion, so non-disabled students who perform significantly below the stated standard may be held back or required to take additional instruction. Especially when the standards are relatively new, and the schools are just beginning to adjust to the new standards, a majority of students struggle with at least some of the requirements. Parents are understandably unhappy to learn that their children have not acquired the necessary skills, and occasionally respond by demanding that the standards be lowered until their children are declared to be passing.

Sometimes this demand that the standards be lowered is justified, because standards can be found developmentally inappropriate for all but the brightest students. The State of Washington found that some fourth grade WASL math problems were much more difficult than what is typically expected of nine-year-old students. A 2008 draft mathematics standard proposed that Kindergartners multiply to 30 by skip counting (also known as counting by twos: 2, 4, 6, 8…),[15] and that second graders solve simple algebra story problems.[16]

Committees often set standards without considering how many students are currently achieving at that level. For example, in the 1998 North Carolina Writing Assessment, less than 1 percent of fourth graders received the highest possible score for writing content.[17] While a majority of students passed easily, parents were upset that so few were rated as being best.

Dislike of specific outcomes: Finally, many complaints are directed against the nature of certain standards. For example, a politician might propose that standards be included for education about sex or creationism. Opponents say that many educational agencies have adopted outcomes which focus too much on attitudes (e.g., “Students will enjoy physical education class”) rather than academic content.[18] Similarly, the “Who Controls Our Children” campaign in Pennsylvania claimed that an OBE reform effort was part of a federal program that was “stressing values over academic content, and holding students accountable for goals that are so vague and fuzzy they can’t be assessed at all.”[19] The Western Australian outcomes were criticised for being too vague.[20]

Controversial standards are opposed because of their content, not simply because they are standards. OBE models always leave the choice of the exact standards to the educational authority, so that families can influence the choice of standards according to their community’s preferences.
Lack of evidence that OBE actually works

OBE is a loosely bound collection of ideas, with little uniformity in the way it is implemented from case to case. This makes it difficult to test OBE’s effectiveness in a way that applies universally. The vagueness of OBE’s conception of a “measurable outcome” is a particular challenge, both in implementing an OBE regime and in testing its effectiveness. In fact, there is little published evidence that OBE actually works.
Extra burden on instructors and educational institutions

Critics sometimes oppose OBE because of the burden it imposes on instructors and educational institutions more broadly, a burden that they regard as unjustified by any evidence showing that OBE actually improves learning outcomes. Rather than issuing a single letter or number to summarize an entire term’s achievements, an OBE system may require that the teacher track and report dozens of separate outcomes. It takes longer to report that a student can add, subtract, multiply, divide, solve story problems, and draw graphs than to report “passed mathematics class,” but the burden imposed by OBE does not owe primarily to the reporting of more data. The burden is spread across the entire educational institution, in the form of (1) a new layer of assessment placed atop the old familiar one, (2) a new bureaucracy responsible for the institution-wide collection and presentation of data, and (3) the altering and curtailing of classroom instruction to make room for more intrusive testing. In view of the paucity of evidence showing that OBE actually works, many regard this extra burden as an unjustified drain on pedagogical resources.[21]
Dislike of something that is not OBE

Many criticisms of OBE are actually criticisms of other things that are introduced with an OBE system. Many people oppose OBE reforms because the OBE reforms are packaged with other reforms.

OBE reform is often packaged as part of a comprehensive school reform model which promotes constructivism, inquiry-based science, tax reform, teacher training, and more. Other educational reforms, including changes to the school calendar, the age of students that attend school in a certain building, or the way tax revenues are divided, may all be inappropriately labeled “OBE” reforms simply because they were proposed on the same day as an OBE program.

School to work may also be a component of these multi-faceted reform programs. School-to-work programs require students to spend time in an internship or other form of career training or experience.

[Darth_Panda]

I believe life begins at erection. Protect my penis!

[Little_Nemo]

@foolsguinea

We call for the reintroduction and ratification of the original 13th Amendment, not the 13th Amendment in today’s Constitution.

It’s hard to say what direction they’re going for here. The 13th Amendment outlawed slavery. And they want to repeal that? Even for Texas, that seems a little extreme.

[Clothahump]

@Little_Nemo

It’s hard to say what direction they’re going for here. The 13th Amendment outlawed slavery. And they want to repeal that? Even for Texas, that seems a little extreme.

Nobody wants to repeal it. Why they want this Amendment in, I don’t really know. It’s the one about accepting foreign gifts or offices.

“If any citizen of the United States shall accept, claim, receive, or retain, any title of nobility or honor, or shall, without the consent of Congress, accept and retain any present, pension, office or emolument of any kind whatever, from any emperor, king, prince, or foreign power, such person shall cease to be a citizen of the United States, and shall be incapable of holding any office of trust or profit under them, or either of them.”

[BigAppleBucky]

@Shakes

I read an article once (Sorry can’t remember where) about the similarities of Republican doctrines and the dontrines of extreme Muslims. After reading that article I wondered why republicans don’t hail extreme Muslims as the greatest thing ever.

I have a cousin in Kentucky who is one of those compulsive e-mail forwarders. Last year he sent me something on the evils of Sharia Law and since he was a fundamentalist Christian and extremely right wing politically, I told him he should like rather than fear Sharia Law. I even pointed out many of the similarities.

Of course, I was being a bit tongue in cheek, but he never saw the humor at all and got his nose out of joint.

Maybe Muslims need to market Sharia by another name in the deep south. Call it God’s Law, or something.

[Reyemile]

@Clothahump

Nobody wants to repeal it. Why they want this Amendment in, I don’t really know. It’s the one about accepting foreign gifts or offices.

“If any citizen of the United States shall accept, claim, receive, or retain, any title of nobility or honor, or shall, without the consent of Congress, accept and retain any present, pension, office or emolument of any kind whatever, from any emperor, king, prince, or foreign power, such person shall cease to be a citizen of the United States, and shall be incapable of holding any office of trust or profit under them, or either of them.”

It SOUNDS like they want to repeal it. But then again, given their stance on education, it doesn’t surprise me at all that they didn’t proofread.

[Little_Nemo]

@Clothahump

Nobody wants to repeal it. Why they want this Amendment in, I don’t really know. It’s the one about accepting foreign gifts or offices.

It’s hard to say. When they write “We call for the reintroduction and ratification of the original 13th Amendment, not the 13th Amendment in today’s Constitution.” it sounds like they want the Titles of Nobility Amendment to replace the Involuntary Servitude Amendment. What else does “not the 13th Amendment in today’s Constitution” mean? If I said “I want to go on vacation to Hawaii, not Las Vegas” you wouldn’t think I meant I wanted to go on vacation to Hawaii in addition to Las Vegas.

If their actual intent is to have a Titles of Nobility Amendment enacted and leave the Involuntary Servitude Amendment alone, why not simply say “We call for the reintroduction and ratification of the Title of Nobility Amendment of 1810”?

As for the reason, it’s apparently mostly directed at lawyers. Some people feel that the use of “esquire” by lawyers is a “title of nobility or honour”. What exactly anti-lawyer people feel would be accomplished by eliminating the word esquire eludes me.

[Little_Nemo]

And apparently it doesn’t need to be re-introduced. The original proposal just said it would go into effect when a three-quarters majority of states ratified it. No deadline was given. Twelve states had ratified it between 1810 and 1812 but then it just sort of faded away. Five states voted against it. But the other thirty-three states have apparently never voted on this amendment (including Texas and Iowa so who are they to be pointing fingers?). The amendment currently needs a total of thirty-eight votes so if twenty-six more states ratified it, it would be enacted.

[BrainGlutton]

@BrainGlutton

They mean the Titles of Nobility Amendment. Sometimes contards invoke it to say lawyers, who use the title of “Esquire,” should be ineligible for public office. There is even a meme that this amendment really was ratified but that news was somehow “suppressed” or the amendment was “unlawfully removed”.

At least, I think that’s what the Iowa GOP is talking about. There was another almost-13th-Amendment.

The Corwin Amendment is a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution passed by the 36th Congress, 2nd Session, on March 2, 1861, in the form of House (Joint) Resolution No. 80. It would forbid subsequent attempts to amend the Constitution to empower the Congress to “abolish or interfere” with the “domestic institutions” of the states, including “persons held to labor or service” (a reference to slavery).

Ohio Republican Representative Thomas Corwin offered the amendment in an attempt to forestall the secession of Southern states. Corwin’s resolution emerged as the House of Representatives’s version of an earlier, identical proposal in the Senate offered by New York Republican Senator William H. Seward. However, the newly formed Confederate States of America was committed to independence and so it ignored the Corwin Amendment.

This proposed amendment is still pending before the state legislatures for ratification, because Congress submitted it to the state legislatures without a deadline. Since the Thirteenth Amendment abolishing slavery was adopted in 1865, the Corwin Amendment lost whatever momentum it had.

Or maybe not . . .

[BrainGlutton]

@foolsguinea

Same reason early Christians denounced Marcion as a “son of hell.” Exclusivist religions hate those almost like them, whose made-up but supposedly deathly important theological claims are a little bit different.

Well, come on! Cut 'em some slack! That was no common heresy, we’re talking about a religion from Mars here!

[BrainGlutton]

@BigAppleBucky

I have a cousin in Kentucky who is one of those compulsive e-mail forwarders. Last year he sent me something on the evils of Sharia Law and since he was a fundamentalist Christian and extremely right wing politically, I told him he should like rather than fear Sharia Law. I even pointed out many of the similarities.

Of course, I was being a bit tongue in cheek, but he never saw the humor at all and got his nose out of joint.

Good. Keep doing it.

[Boyo_Jim]

@Little_Nemo

…If their actual intent is to have a Titles of Nobility Amendment enacted and leave the Involuntary Servitude Amendment alone, why not simply say “We call for the reintroduction and ratification of the Title of Nobility Amendment of 1810”?..

Because they are not the brightest bulbs on the string?

FYI, the 13th Amendment thing is part of the Iowa Republican Party Platform, which IMO, impossible as it seems to believe, is is even crazier than the Texas one. YMMV.

[BrainGlutton]

@Little_Nemo

As for the reason, it’s apparently mostly directed at lawyers. Some people feel that the use of “esquire” by lawyers is a “title of nobility or honour”. What exactly anti-lawyer people feel would be accomplished by eliminating the word esquire eludes me.

Apparently, it would invalidate our whole legal system. Or something.

The orginal intent was something like this:

There is speculation that the Congress proposed the amendment in response to the 1803 marriage of Napoleon Bonaparte’s younger brother, Jerome, and Betsy Patterson of Baltimore, Maryland, who gave birth to a boy for whom she wanted aristocratic recognition from France.[1] The child, named Jérôme Napoleon Bonaparte, was not born in the United States, but in Great Britain on July 7, 1805—nevertheless, he would have held U.S. citizenship through his mother. Another theory is that his mother actually desired a title of nobility for herself and, indeed, she is referred to as the “Duchess of Baltimore” in many texts written about the amendment. The marriage had been annulled in 1805—well before the amendment’s proposal by the 11th Congress. Nonetheless, Representative Nathaniel Macon of North Carolina is recorded to have said, when voting on the amendment, that “he considered the vote on this question as deciding whether or not we were to have members of the Legion of Honor in this country.”[7]

However:

The assertion that TONA was validly ratified has never been upheld by any court in the United States. In the few instances in which courts have been confronted with the assertion that TONA was indeed ratified, judges have brushed those claims aside. In Campion v. Towns, No.CV-04-1516PHX-ROS, *2 n.1 (D. Ariz. 2005), a tax protester raised TONA as one of his defenses to a charge of tax evasion.[12] The court replied that it would “correct any misunderstanding Plaintiff has concerning the text of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution”:

In his Complaint, Plaintiff includes a certified copy of the Thirteenth Amendment from the Colorado State Archives which was published in 1861. As included in that compilation, the Thirteenth Amendment would strip an individual of United States citizenship if they accept any title of nobility or honor. However, this is not the Thirteenth Amendment. The correct Thirteenth Amendment prohibits slavery. Although some people claim that state publication of the erroneous Thirteenth Amendment makes it valid, Article V of the Constitution does not so provide.

In another case, Sibley v. Culliver, 243 F. Supp. 2d 1278, 1283 (M.D. Ala. 2003), aff’d 377 F.3d 1196 (11th Cir. 2004), a federal appellate court found that the defendant’s invocation of TONA worked to his detriment. The court took note of documents produced by the defendant, a convicted murderer who submitted documents in support of his appeal claiming that TONA rendered his conviction invalid:

These documents allege in great detail a complex conspiracy by an illegal monopoly, the American Bar Association, which resulted in a take-over of the judicial systems of this country, both federal and state, by the ABA and its related entities, including the Alabama State Bar Association and Alabama’s Unified Court System. It is then alleged that the ABA-controlled system is illegal and in violation of what is referred to as the “missing Thirteenth Amendment,” to the United States Constitution, which stated that any person who accepts a title of nobility forfeits his United States citizenship and which Amendment was ratified but subsequently hidden or excised from the law. Since lawyers and judges accept the titles “Esquire”/“The Honorable,” it is argued, they are not citizens and the entire judicial system is illegal. Furthermore, these documents contend that the charge of conviction in this case, capital murder of a police officer acting in the line of duty, is unconstitutional because it bestows upon police officers special rights or a special designation of the worth of life in contravention of the “missing Thirteenth Amendment.” The documents then explain that these are reasons that Sibley and his wife refused appointed counsel on appeal and refused to pursue matters any further in the court system and that only Congress can give them relief.

The Sibley court dismissed the appeal, concluding in part that the defendant was simply not seeking relief through the courts.

FTR, the American Bar Association is not a monopoly of any kind, legal or illegal. You have to be a member of a state Bar to practice law in that state – active Bar membership is identical with licensing (if you’re licensed in another state, you can move to be permitted to appear in a case pro hac vice, but that motion, if granted, only applies to that particular case). The ABA is just a club, or, if you prefer, a professional association, but membership in it has nothing to do with licensing. I’m not an ABA member and I don’t know any lawyer who is.