Tag Archives: Socialism

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Public school teacher threatens student with arrest for criticizing Obama

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From Breitbart. (Note the Youtube video is about 9 minutes long, so I don’t recommend sitting through the whole thing)

Excerpt:

A YouTube video uploaded on Monday afternoon apparently shows a schoolteacher from the Rowan-Salisbury school district in North Carolina informing a student that failing to be respectful of President Obama is a criminal offense. Breitbart News has uncovered that the student is a high school junior, and that the teacher is apparently one Tanya Dixon-Neely.

The video shows a classroom discussion about the Washington Post hit piece about Mitt Romney bullying a kid some five decades ago. One student says, “Didn’t Obama bully someone though?” The teacher says: “Not to my knowledge.” The student then cites the fact that Obama, in Dreams from My Father, admits to shoving a little girl. “Stop, no, because there is no comparison,” screams the teacher. Romney is “running for president. Obama is the president.”

The student responds that both are “just men.”

The teacher yells — literally yells — that Obama is “due the respect that every other president is due … Listen,” she continues, “let me tell you something, you will not disrespect the president of the United States in this classroom.” She yells over the student repeatedly, and yells at him that it’s disrespect for him to even debate about Romney and Obama.

The student says that he can say what he wants.

“Not about him, you won’t,” says the teacher.

The teacher then tells the student – wrongly – that it is a criminal offense to say bad things about a president. “Do you realize that people were arrested for saying things bad about Bush? Do you realize you are not supposed to slander the president?”

The student says that it would violate First Amendment rights to jail someone for such sentiments. “You would have to say some pretty f’d up crap about him to be arrested,” says the student. “They cannot take away your right to have your opinion … They can’t take that away unless you threaten the president.”

Clearly, the student should be teaching the class, and the teacher should be reading the Constitution more often.

This is why taxpayers need to support school choice. There are some teachers in public schools, especially in the STEM areas, who are qualified. But there are others who are not. Education degrees are universally regarded as very easy, and very useless. We really should not be forced to fund a public school system that does not work for parents and children. Abolishing the federal Department of Education would be an excellent first step to improving the quality of education in state-run schools. We need to get the politics out of the classroom and focus on basic useful skills and career training.

UPDATE: This post has some more of the transcript, for those who can’t see the video.

News

Greeks withdraw $894 million from Greek banks in one day

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I found this article from MSNBC on The Other McCain.

Excerpt:

Political leaders in Athens were due to discuss an emergency government Wednesday to deal with a possible run on banks as it emerged Greeks withdrew almost $900 million in a single day, fearing their country could crash out of the euro currency by the end of the week.

An interim government would take the country through to new elections on June 17, triggered by the collapse on Tuesday of talks to form a coalition between winners of the inconclusive May 6 election.

Greeks are withdrawing euros from banks, apparently afraid of the prospect of rapid devaluation if the country leaves the European single currency and returns to the drachma.

President Karolos Papoulias warned of “great fear that could develop into a panic,” the minutes of Papoulias’ negotiations with political leaders showed, according to Reuters.

[…]Several banking sources told Reuters similar amounts had also been withdrawn on Tuesday. Nevertheless, there was no sign of panic or queues at bank branches in Athens on Wednesday. Bankers dismissed suggestions that a bank run was looming. A senior executive at a large Greek bank told Reuters: “There is no bank run, no queues or panic. The situation is better than I expected. The amount of deposit withdrawals the president mentioned referred to three days, not one.”

[…]Greeks have already been withdrawing their savings from banks at a sharp clip – nearly a third of bank deposits were withdrawn between January 2010 and March 2012, reducing total Greek household and business deposits to 165 billion euros.

What I find really striking about stories like this is that Greece just had an election. 75% of them want to stay in the European Union and keep the Euro as a currency. But that can only happen if they accept that they are spending too much and they are not producing anything. They have to cut spending, lower taxes and deregulate so that there is economic growth. So what did they do? They voted against austerity. They think that by refusing to meet the conditions of the people who can bail them out, that they will get a bailout. It’s just insane. Like whipping a thirsty camel with the expectation that whipping can somehow satiate its thirst and cause it to get up and keep moving.

News

Moody’s downgrades credit rating of 26 Italian banks, Spain is next

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European Debt to GDP and Credit Rating
European Debt to GDP and Credit Rating

From Yahoo News.

Excerpt:

Moody’s Investors Service has downgraded the ratings on 26 Italian banks as they struggled with the effect of government austerity measures.

The rating agency said Monday that the banks are suffering because Italy is back in recession and government austerity measures are cutting demand for loans.

The banks are struggling with more loan losses, limited access to funding and weaker profits.

Moody’s noted that support of the European Central Bank lowered the default risk of many banks.

Its outlook for all 26 banks is negative.

From the Wall Street Journal.

Excerpt:

The ratings for Italian banks are now among the lowest within advanced European countries, reflecting these banks’ susceptibility to the adverse operating environments in Italy and Europe, Moody’s said in a statement. Two of the country’s largest institutions, UniCredit SpA (UCG.MI, UNCFF) and Intesa Sanpaolo SpA (ISP.MI, ISNPY), were included.

Moody’s move came hours after the firm raised an alarm on Spain, arguing the country’s banks remain vulnerable even after Madrid moved to increase the banks’ cushions against potential losses from real-estate loans.

[…]Italy, saddled with EUR1.9 trillion ($2.44 trillion) debt, has signed onto the EU’s fiscal compact that sets strict limits on the country’s deficit levels. In recent weeks, Mr. Monti has begun pressing Germany to give Italy more fiscal slack to stimulate its economy and create jobs. Mr. Monti has recently proposed that the EU create special exemptions to the budget rules when countries target their public spending on projects like broadband investments and infrastructure.

Moody’s downgrades come after the ratings firm in February placed various ratings of 114 financial institutions in 16 European countries on review for possible downgrade, highlighting the region’s banks’ vulnerability to the euro-zone sovereign debt crisis.

Moody’s is expected to follow the downgrade of Italian banks by cutting the ratings of Spanish banks. By the end of June, more than 100 European banks, as well as Wall Street giants like Bank of America Corp. (BAC) and Citigroup Inc. (C), are likely to have ratings that are at least one notch lower.

[…]Moody’s also alluded to J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.’s (JPM) recent disclosures of more than $2 billion in trading losses as a reminder of potential problems lurking at some European banks.

“Recent events highlight the risks for creditors from potential weaknesses in governance, controls and risk management, especially at some smaller, privately-held banks,” Moody’s said in its news release.

Moody’s says it will conclude its reviews by the end of June. In coming weeks, major U.S. financial institutions, Bank of America Corp., Citigroup Inc., Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are likely to face downgrades.

Banks in Austria and Sweden are expected to see downgrades after Spain.

Italy’s debt is $2.44 trillion, ours is nearly $16 trillion.