The media forms the image of kids and how they behave anywhere, including in school.

THE PARENTS AND THE TEACHERS SHOULD GO AFTER THE MEDIA IF THEY WANT TO EFFECT CHANGE IN THE BEHAVIOR OF THE KIDS IN SCHOOL OR ANYWHERE.

MAYBE 'THE FATHER KNOWS BEST' PROGRAMS WERE PRETTY GOOD AFTER ALL.

Gail: You are 100% right on this one. I second with 1000% concensus.

I want my child to be prepared for the future.Case in point:

Egypt's Internet Shut Off--But How? The Blackout Explained.

I am a teacher and my son is a teacher. I tried to talk him out of becoming a teacher due to what I have experienced in my own school district. No respect, not being treated as a professional, no support from parents or the district administrators. The cost of the education alone to stay a teacher thanks to Act 48 laws. I'm also tired of being blamed for all of society's problems most of which begin in the home.

It pains me to say I wouldn"t want my child to teach. I've taught for 30 years. I used to look forward to going to work, to motivate my children, and to instill values and a love of learning. As of late the trend has been to test these children throughout their school lives, ostensibly to use the data to improve instruction. Testing has become an end to itself. As early as Kindergarten children are assessed unceasingly. The schoolday has become a tedious routine of test prep for the children and record keeping for the teachers. No longer are children allowed to play, to explore, to experience and to to wonder. If and when this once noble profession becomes respected and revered, I could not reccommend it to anyone.
sincerely,
Lou

As a Public School Special Education teacher of children with mental and physical handicaps for the last 12 years I am very offended by a blanket comment made by a friend recently . It has been my experience that many of the children in our cities schools come to school already so damaged by their home environment that it is almost impossible to make a dent in the achievement gap or impact the social issues many of these children have. A school could have the best teachers in the world, the best materials, the best of facilities and many children would still not achieve Proficient scores on the PSSA. Many of our students arrive at school hungy, dirty, sick, tired and unprepared everyday. The school can not report any of these issues to DHS because unless there is physical abuse, or an endangerment issue, DHS REFUSES to step in! Parents of these children are not doing THEIR job! The school is now responsible not only to educate children in the academics but also in areas that traditionally should be done by the parent. The schools are also now responsible to feed every child 2 meals a day for FREE. If the child wishes to stay afterschool they also get dinner. I work with the most devoted staff a person could ask for. I have witnessed teachers not only provide excellent teaching but also school supplies, clothing, food, administer minor first aid, and money for trips. I've seen teachers hold children in their hearts and some have taken a few into their homes and lives as foster parents. Everyone seems very eager to say what schools are not doing right or responsibly. Please tell me just what the parents of Philadelphia are responsible for because from what I experience everyday it certainly isn't their children.

.

Why wouldn't someone want to grow up to be a teacher ... they work less than any other profession (180 days/year), after a couple of years, they cannot be fired (tenure), even if they are doing a terrible job of teaching our young people how to read and write. The young people we have out there coming into the world after graduation cannot put a proper sentence together, and don't know how to add, subtract, multiply or divide without a calculator. The rest of the world gets fired if not doing their job - and the rest of the world contributes at least a small share to their benefits. It's time they catch up with the rest of us.

Parents are the only people who can get anything done for their child with a school district. The district does not listen to teachers, EVER! Why would they! Most of us have masters degress or better and 10 or more years of experience. In Philadelphia children always come first, (until they cost too much!) That's usually the main reason they don't act on requests from teachers. Only a parent can make them do what's needed, what's right, even when there is a price.
I can understand a parents frustration when they seem to be getting lip service from the school! If the district had more parents who cared as much about their children as some of you do our schools would not be in the trouble they are in! Everyone in the field of education and social work knows that the behavior problems and achievement gap are due mostly to social issues. Unfortunately social issues are almost impossible to fix and cost a great deal of money to even try. It is much easier to blame the teacher, school or district in general. Even Bill Cosby was almost tarred and feathered when he took the stand that the biggest problem in education was how lax parents were becoming at being involved in their childs schooling and allowing certain behaivors to continue. Politicians are also very well aware that it is political suicide to demand parent accountability. It is much easier, and cheaper, to villianize the school system and teachers. This is why teachers get so upset when someone believes the propaganda against them that gets put out there, especially in a contract year, just to win approval from the tax payers! Every profession has individuals who don't do their jobs responsibly. Teaching is not exempt from this, however, it has taken a beating for the few individuals who don't measure up!

.

50 years of political social engineering has taken its toll. The social fabric is in tatters.

Caspian, MikeG, MikeQ. fred: Here's a positive.

PROMETHIUS SCORES!!!
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/us_community_radio

John that is the first good news I heard in a very long time.

Great Find.

At least Obama did something positive for average Americans being a Republican in liberal clothes.

Yeah I'd want my kid to be a teacher. Great job security and benefits. And what other public profession is so involved in politics and policy making?
Heck, some public school gym teachers in my area make in excess of $175,000 a year.

The National Education Association membership(NEA) comprises 47% of delegates at the Democrat national conventions.

Here's one for the "gun freaks".

Got problems? Buy a gun, 5 days later... NO MORE PROBLEMS! Hmmmmmmmmm!

Wow, what a remedy. YA THINK???
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1351678/They-saw-coming-Mother-shot-teenage-children-twice-head-mouthy.html

HOW ABOUT THINKING TWICE NOW ABOUT THE LUNACY SOME OF YOU PROPOSED JUST A FEW SHORT DAYS AGO?

Does this work for you? Don't even begin to call this tragedy an abomination. This is what happens in the real world. Regardless of the advertised psycho talk by gun manufacturers, ammunitions pedlders and the NRA the "stereotype" typical good normal everyday people DO NOT COMMIT CRIMES AND HAVING GUNS STRAPPED OR READILY ACCESSIBLE- PREVENTS CRIME does not pass any single acid test whatsoever.
SEE: SUICIDES, ACCIDENTAL MISFIRES, MOMENTARY LAPSES OF REASON, FITS OF ANGER, TEMPORARY INSANITY, ROAD RAGE.
THOSE PRONE TO VIOLENT RESPONSES AND HAIR TRIGGER MOOD SWINGS, JEALOUSY, AND VENGEFUL PERSONALITIES, ORDINARY DEPRESSION, PHARMECEUTAL PRESCRIPTION DRUG INDUCED PARANOIAS & DEPRESSIONS...
THE FEMALE HORMONAL IMBALANCES- WITH ALL OF THEIR LEGAL DEFENSES- POST-PARTUM DEPRESSIONS, PMS, CHANGE OF LIFE.

Wow, what a remedy. YA THINK???
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1351678/They-saw-coming-Mother-shot-teenage-children-twice-head-mouthy.html

HOW ABOUT THINKING TWICE NOW ABOUT THE UTTER LUNACY THAT YOU'VE PROPOSED?

Headline: Mother Shoots Children For Being Too Mouthy
No time left for dead childrens mother to consider buyers remorse.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/us_community_radio

"At least Obama did something positive for average Americans being a Republican in liberal clothes." casp

Yet, isn't it strange how ever since the Republicans won the majority in the mid-terms, more is getting done? The Democrats insisted there would be gridlock but instead we are seeing compromise.

I believe the reason for this is that had the Democrats still held the majority they would have focused their attention on the "fairness doctrine" instead and would have faced strong opposition.

This community radio is a good compromise to have access to alternative views and still have freedom of choice. Therefore, we have widespread agreement, allowing Obama to pass it, without any problems.

"Headline: Mother Shoots Children For Being Too Mouthy
No time left for dead childrens mother to consider buyers remorse." - John

John, had this been a bar room brawl and after one too many drinks a heated argument ensued, resulting in weapons drawn and people getting shot at. Then I would agree, that having a weapon could be the blame for lives lost.

However, when somebody flips like this mother obviously did, ANYTHING can become a weapon, including the vehicle she was driving in. After she shot her son she went how and shot her daughter. She was intending to kill, whether she had a gun or not.

John:
I'll just start off by saying that I am not a gun owner and dont intend on becoming one. However, I do have knives in my kitchen and use them daily.

The point is that for every gunshot victim there are more than 50 times as many stabbings.

Where is the public outcry? There isnt one. Do you know why? Because like me, just about everyone owns knives. And the vast, vast majority are responsible with them.

The knife itself isnt dangerous. It becomes dangerous in the hands of a child or someone bent on using it as a weapon.

MikeG: Didn't the gun make the task a whole lot easier? Could she have killed her son in a physical grapple that would have ensued if the weapon were a knife and not a gun? If not a gun... Couldn't he have jumped out of the car Wouldn't others have been alerted- and intervened if the attack were more prolonged and no gun were present?.

Don't the flashing of guns prevent people from entering into more interventions when troubles arise in the real world? Would you reach for a gun pitting yourself into the middle of every situation where violence was occuring against one that was already drawn?
Most "mothers" would have lessened their anger and determination to kill their offspring- during a melee, or other blood letting fracas when screams, pleas for mercy, blood, and even a promise to be better would have ensued during a more prolonged altercation- with any other weapon than a gun.
The swiftness and instanteneous deadliness of a point blank entry, as well as the neatness of a bullet puncture allows the shooter to maintain that unreal detachment other methods deny.

I believe this woman to be both as totally a methodical coward, as the killer in the supermarket killings. Both denied their own illnesses and bought an instrument of perceived power in their weakest moment to avenge their unhappiness. In both cases, guns made them deadly. More deadly, then they ever could have been- if they were limited to any other weapon of choice.
.
I see the events happening as such. Deranged Mom at the height of emotional rollercoaster buys the gun w/ intent to commit suicide. She is conflicted with the dilemma that most suicides face what to do about the children. While at the apex of this confusion, the son mouths off on the way to soccer practice. Mom flips out grabs gun and fires. Oooops! Oooh, ooh No time to reconsider alternatives, now.
Mondlessly, goes home and quickly with adrenelin still racing- makes sure that her daughter the other factors that led her to the breaking point, is sent along the same path quietly and quickly. By this time, the brain catches up with the fury of moment, and the full impact hits her, before she can go further . Gee, wait a minute... SUICIDE??? Hey, this is serious, permanent. This is not for me. What, did I do? Stunned paralysis and remorse ensues. NO SUICIDE! JUST WEEPING AND PARALYSIS.

The passage of time, however short and brief it may appear allows rational thinking to overtake the fury of the moment.
OTHERWISE, SHE WOULD HAVE TAKEN THAT THIRD LIFE HER OWN IN THE SAME FLUID MOVEMENTS JUST AS SHE HAD PLANNED. Time, tick, tick, tick, allowed the brain to catch up with adrenelin, and pass it. Whoaaaaaa! Stop! Said the inner voice. The next pull of the trigger is FINAL!

Anyway, Mike is really doesn't matter does it. What matters is that with any single one of the situations mental or hormonal characteristics present which were layed out for you in the previous post- that person with those abnormalities raging and gun in hand becomes monumentally more deadly and dangerous to society at large doesn't it?

PS: How would she have gotten the vehicle which you suggest that she could have killed her son with, back into the house and upstairs without making enough noise that would have alerted her daughter of the impending danger?
In most cases, the vehicle would have been immobilized...
Most accidents regardless of the severity of the impact are not deadly. So even with the premise of her having both children in a moving vehicle they would have had much more going in their favor[bracing for impact, opening the door and getting out... etc] than the point blank no warning headshots they received.

fred: Go back to the supermarket killer for a moment. You can't put a 30 blade clip on a knife. heh, heh- lol

John, Those are some excellent counterpoints that you raise! Good job!

I still think if this unstable woman did not have that gun, she more then likely would have found another way to kill. Perhaps a more covert, less obvious way, with the potential of taking even more lives with one attempt. However, you've forced me to look at this from a different angle, that I did not consider. If I was face to face with a lunatic and in front of her or him, was a knife, a hammer, an automobile or a gun. The gun would be the last thing, I would want him to go for, because the gun would seem to be the most deadliest. When placed in the wrong hands, of course.

"50 years of political social engineering has taken its toll. The social fabric is in tatters."

Thirty years, the thirty years of conservative ascendancy. Before that it was fine following FDR and Truman.

"the gun would seem to be the most deadliest. When placed in the wrong hands, of course."

No one's hands are the wrong hands until they are.

exactly. Now on to Rwanda where during the genocide 850,000-1,000,000 were killed with machetes- all within a 100 day time period.

Where is the outcry about the 'evil' machete?

Anybody see the Daily Mail story today about the mother who was so pissed at her significant other for cheating, that she lit her house on fire and burnt two of her children to death.

"No one's hands are the wrong hands until they are." MQ

This is true but the Conservative brain is capable of understanding that very few responsible gun owners become the wrong hands. So we should use a scalpel not an axe to CUT gun ownership out from those who pose a threat. Say, wasn't it a Democrat brain that said something like that? Mike Q, I told you that political brain stuff is nonsense.

MikeG: ...the Conservative mindset capable of "understanding"? Whaaaaat???
The consertvative mindset upholds what is good for themselves- period. Damn, everone else and the repurcussions to everyone elses's lives and lifestyles.

Mike, I want you to begin to take note and tally the increasing brutality, and stress related insanitys exhibited within the recent murders being committed across our nation by good ole conservative values "former" middle class Americans.
"Idle minds and hands are providing indeed to be the workshops of the devil"

WHERE ARE THE JOBS, CONSERVATIVES? WHY IS YOUR METHODOLGY ALWAYS TO EXTRACT CUTS IN EDUCATION, ESSENTIAL SERVICES AND PROTECTIONS- THEN TELLING THE REST ALREADY ON THE BRINK TO GO OUT AND BUY GUNS?


DON'T YOU KNOW THAT DESPERATE PEOPLE WILL TAKE DESPERATE MEASURES?
We are a long way away from those small manageable numbers my friend. Read the papers. Believe me, unless jobs are created and fast you will continue to see more and more jaw dropping carnage.

"WHERE ARE THE JOBS, CONSERVATIVES? WHY IS YOUR METHODOLGY ALWAYS TO EXTRACT CUTS IN EDUCATION, ESSENTIAL SERVICES AND PROTECTIONS- THEN TELLING THE REST ALREADY ON THE BRINK TO GO OUT AND BUY GUNS?" -John

John, I thought we were almost on the same accord with this gun thing. Then you start with these broad characterizations about Conservatives. Blaming them for wanting people to buy guns to hurt themselves? That sounds freaked out and over the top to me. Whats the Liberal solution, a police state? A society run like an airport where no one is allowed to carry any sharp objects? We must all install metal detectors outside our homes with loud sirens to alert the neighborhood that someone left their house with something metal on their person. Oh no, I took the metal keys by mistake!

Exaggerations make a point but there are decent Conservatives and decent Liberals, as well as bad ones too. The focus should be to weed out the corruption, the evil and the abuser but I am not with you that Conservatives are bad, nor do I feel Liberals are bad, only that certain individuals are bad.

Plaxico Burress picked a club in the wrong borough to dance around with an illegal gun. Prosecutors in Manhattan have the highest conviction rate among the city's five boroughs against people collared in second-degree gun possession cases. About 22% of Manhattan defendants get convicted on that charge, according to a News analysis of state Division of Criminal Justice data from 2003 to 2007. The conviction rate hovered around 10% in three other boroughs: 9% in Staten Island, 10% in the Bronx and 12% in Queens. Brooklyn had the lowest conviction rate at 7%.
Citywide, 11.4% of the 9,729 defendants charged with second-degree gun possession were actually convicted of that charge, which carries a mandatory 3-1/2 year sentence. "To take a gun into a crowded nightclub where people drink and push each other around because of the density of people there," Mayor Bloomberg said in a radio address Friday. "There's a reason for this law and it is to convince you to not do this and to make the price heavy to stop it."...
Despite Bloomberg's call for Burress to get the maximum, the team distraction should be encouraged by statistics showing most people charged with second-degree gun possession don't get convicted of that crime. In all five boroughs, most have the charges knocked down to less serious crimes or see them dismissed.

Good job. Useful and helpful info here. Thanks

"Where is the outcry about the 'evil' machete?"

Atomic bombs killed a few hundred thousand people, too, but there are other uses for this technology, power production, medicine. Knives have a gazillion practical peaceful uses. Guns, maybe not so much. That's what makes them maybe not so essential that they just have to be in every American's home. Just saying.

"I told you that political brain stuff is nonsense."

And yet conservatives and liberals each shake their heads at the other and say How the heck can you think like that? Whether it's environment, experiences, or whatever, that shapes WHAT we think, this shaping also seems to affect HOW we think. Don't take my word for it, there's enough in the literature showing how different parts of the brain "light up" in different people thinking about the same thing, showing different ways of processing. And so on, blah, blah.

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