REPUBLICANS IN THEIR GAS AND OIL PARTY (GOP) ARE GASSY AND OILY

Randall Pettigrew, GOP District 51 (Lea County) representative, responded to my blog on Yvette Herrell.  He wrote, “lol. I do however agree with the 1st sentence of your last paragraph.”  Pettigrew’s comment not only represents himself, but also others old enough to have better manners and more regard for facts and truth.  But he finds the data about Herrell’s record and platform from government or campaign sources laughable.  No doubt, his GOP constituents also find facts and truth laughable.

 

Pettigrew’s response reflects the lack of decency and integrity which most GOP politicians, donors, and supporters now demonstrate without shame throughout the country.  When today’s Republican politicians were children and adolescents, the GOP talked incessantly, presumably to suggest, in contrast to the Democratic Party, their commitment to family values.  Now that these GOP politicians are adults, it is fair to ask about their family values and their families’ values.  Did their parents raise them to be disrespectful and dishonest, or did mom and dad just let their kids grow up that way?

 

Of course, Democratic politicians do not always tell the truth in campaigns, but they, their donors, and supporters still respect facts established by official records, scientific reports, expert testimony, and the like.  With few exceptions, such is not the case with Republican politicians.  They believe or cynically assert that Trump won an election stolen by Biden.  They either affirm that climate change is a hoax or deny that it is man-made.  They disregard medical facts contrary to their views about pandemics and abortions.  They scorn religious beliefs different from theirs, and the First Amendment, which protects them.  Their true faith is in guns and the Second Amendment only.

 

The difference in the value placed on facts—or, more generally, truth—between the two parties reflects itself in their approaches to legislation.  Disregarding facts or truth, Republican enact legislation which is malign in purpose, flawed in conception, coercive in implementation, or harmful in effects.  Mindlessness in GOP-dominated legislatures is matched by mindlessness among their ardent followers.  No one on the Democratic Left, only those on the Republican Right, dress in military garb; wear Nazi-like paraphernalia or Nordic horned helmets; open-carry military weapons; and threaten ordinary citizens and elected officials in public places and public meetings.  Such are the operational styles of the GOP patriotism of self-styled “real Americans.”

 

Consider the Republican bait-and-switch on abortion legislation.  Before conservative Catholic SCOTUS justices who lied about “settled law” in their confirmation hearings ignored stare decisis on the Court, Republicans opposing abortion argued that states should enact legislation appropriate in each.  Now, in a callous display of dishonesty, they are quietly pressing for federal legislation.  They have good reason to go silent, into hiding, so to speak.  For, in the current mid-term campaigns, Republicans, once so proud of their anti-abortion stances, one crueler than the next, are now busy deleting from their websites their attacks on abortion and abortion rights because many people have reacted in anger to the revocation of a Constitutional right.  Those doubting that the effects of newly enacted abortion restrictions are cruel, damaging, or deadly should ask why Catholic Republican Texas Governor Abbott Texas refuses to release information on abortion-related damage and deaths before the mid-term elections.  He knows that, if the figures were released, the state would turn from red to blue in a fetal heartbeat.  First Republican lies, then Republican cover-ups.

 

Likewise, the dishonest Republican agitation about immigration into border states.  The GOP lie is that illegal immigrants are invading border states; its advice: be afraid.  The facts are that 2,000,000 refugees have been turned back at the border in Biden’s administration and that 750,000 seeking asylum have legally entered the country and remain in it while they await asylum hearings.  They are in states which already have large populations of immigrants: California (125,000), New York (110,000), Florida (98,000), and Texas (75,000), with most of the rest in Maryland, Massachusetts, and New Jersey; five of seven are Democratic states.  Two border states, red Arizona and blue New Mexico, have small numbers of illegal immigrants, but most pass through to other states.

 

Florida demonstrates that the immigration issue is largely political, not critical.  No immigrants invade the state from across the Mexican border because it has no border with Mexico; most of its immigrants are Caribbean.  Presumed 2024 presidential candidate, GOP Governor DeSantis had to invent an immigration issue by importing legal, not illegal, immigrants to Florida before exporting them to Massachusetts.

 

The new Republican qualification for office is not necessarily allegiance to Trump’s Big Lie, but necessarily allegiance to lies.  The result: a GOP of Gassy and Oily Politicians whose lies may win them elections and, once they are in office, will keep them there.  Only when policies based on ideology, ignorance, and indifference to facts and truth do actual damage will people realize their mistake—too late, too bad, tough luck.

 

For instance, the GOP is divided between those who claim to want to strengthen social security by privatizing it and those who claim to want to sunset or re-authorize it every 5 years.  Try planning your retirement under the threat of a declining stock or bond market, or with the periodic uncertainty of the end of social security.  The GOP is also divided between those who claim to want to strengthen Medicare by reducing coverage and ending programs, and those who claim to want to sunset or re-authorize it every 5 years.  Try to budget medical costs when you face exclusions or loss of coverage and. higher premiums and costs, or, every so often, these and spikes in health-care expenses.

 

Voters for Republicans and their gassy lies and oily promises will learn that they have been conned and can do nothing about it.  They will realize that the reforms based on—you guessed it—lies to prevent (the non-existent problem of) voter fraud restrict their voting.  They will realize that the GOP has exploited not only gas and oil, but also their juvenile fears of people said to have absolutely terrifying attributes—skin color; turbans and robes; strange foods; different religions or national origins; changed genders or alternative sexual orientations—who, nevertheless, somehow, never affect them at all.  Yet  they will continue to fear monsters under their beds who intend to devour them, feet-first, in the middle of the night.  Thank the Gas and Oil Party for your nightmares.

YVETTE HERRELL'S TWO CAMPAIGN PLATFORMS: STATED AND SECRET

I like campaign literature because I learn so much about candidates seeking my vote.  Yvette Herrell’s recent campaign flyer gave me many reasons why I could not respect myself if I voted for her to represent me.  She is not like me.  Is she like you?

 

Herrell brags: “No one has worked harder than Yvette Herrell to fight inflation, protect our military installations and national labs, and keep us safe from crime and open borders.”  Her legislative record of 24 proposed bills and resolutions has little or nothing to do with inflation, military installations or national labs, or crime and borders.  All have been introduced and referred to committees; none has received a committee vote; all will die in committee when this session of Congress ends.  Her hard work will have achieved nothing.

 

Herrell had no co-sponsors of three bills and one resolution.  Of the other 20 bills and resolutions, one of each had a total of five Democratic co-sponsors; most of the rest had a dozen or so Republican co-sponsors, mostly from the far-right.  Though she had few followers, she urges District 2 citizens to “vote for proven leadership.”

 

The bill and resolution were trivial: a name change and a testimonial.  H.R. 5829, Las Cruces Bataan Memorial Clinic Act, “designates the community-based outpatient clinic of the Department of Veterans Affairs in Las Cruces, New Mexico, as the Las Cruces Bataan Memorial Clinic.”  The two co-sponsors were New Mexico Democrats.  H. Res. 7783, Recognizing military spouses of the United States of America, “recognizes military spouses for their sacrifices and acknowledges their strength and perseverance through difficult and challenging times.”  For Herrell, sponsoring trivia is hard work.

 

Most of Herrell’s hard work was, no doubt, making speeches and casting votes related to her campaign flyer’s five points:

 

1.    Opposed Wasteful Spending That Fueled Rising Cost Of Living.  Why does she not oppose all wasteful spending, not just what she claims fueled rising costs of living?  Was that spending on bills to fund rebuilding infrastructure, upgrading US productivity in computer technology, improving tax collection on the rich and large corporations, reducing prescription drug costs, and improving health care?

 

2.    Secure the Border and Fix Our Broken Immigration System.  What bills to deal with immigration did she support?  Were they bills which would violate national laws and international treaties, and national laws, or be unaffordable (she backed Trump’s $25 billion wall)?  Does she support family separation?

 

3.    Protecting Our Military Bases and the Jobs The Create.  Did any military bases and jobs need to be protected?  Which bases?  Which jobs?

 

4.    Supporting Energy Jobs And the Education Funding The Industry Provides.  Does she mean continued support for and state dependency on fossil-fuel industries?  Is she opposed to alternative energy industries?  Does she think that climate change is a problem or a hoax?

 

5.    Fully Support Law Enforcement, Border Patrol & First Responders.  Does she ignore police misconduct, family separation, and racially different responses to people needing help?  Does she believe that criticism or reform are unsupportive?

 

Do not expect Herrell to work at all, much less hard, to answer these questions.  She has a lazy mind which coasts on conservative slogans.  She is also afraid to address tough issues which identify her differences from many District 2 residents.  She omits her:

 

Opposition to democratic processes.  She believes Trump’s lie that the election was stolen.  On Capitol Insurrection Day, 6 January 2021, she voted to reject certified elections results in Arizona and Pennsylvania; she signed objections to certified election results from Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, and Wisconsin.  She opposes election reforms to prevent more election riots and to establish trustworthy election processes nationwide.

 

Opposition to abortion rights.  She supports bills rejecting rape, incest, and women’s health or life as reasons for abortions.  She disregards the religious rights of those who do not share her narrow sectarian views.

 

Opposition to gun control.  She opposes any restriction on Second Amendment rights.  She supports unregulated ownership and possession of firearms of any kind, anywhere.

 

Opposition to amnesty or citizenship for illegal immigrants.  She does not care how long, productively, and peacefully they have lived in this country.  She does not care whether enforcing the law would separate families or evict citizens born in this country.

 

Opposition to unregulated public education and public libraries.  She wants federal or state governments to limit what schools can teach and what books people can read.  She opposes teaching on or reading about racial, gender, ethnic, and identity issues.

 

The principle underlying Herrell’s announced platform and her unstated positions: help the powerful, hurt the people.  She supports the latest Republican effort to fool the American people; the “Commitment to America” is dishonest in every clause.  Its first claim is to want what Biden has already achieved, as if he has achieved nothing.  Its last claim is to want to strengthen Social Security and Medicare, when it means to privatize the one and shrink the other.  In between first and last, smoke and mirrors.

 

Yvette Herrell’s opponent, Gabe Vasquez, who is Senator Martin Heinrich’s lapdog, has never impressed me; he appears hypocritical and opportunistic.  But he is unlikely to be worse.

OVERSEEING THE OVERSEERS: PROPOSING A LAS CRUCES CIVILIAN POLICE OVERSIGHT BOARD

One of these days, Peter Goodman will write and deliver another editorial about a Civilian Police Oversight Board (CPOB)—a name avoiding “civilian review board.”  His first editorial was about the need for a CPOB.  The next one will be about a proposal for approval either by a City Council vote or a voter referendum.

 

Some time ago, Goodman invited me to join others—I know only of Earl Nissen and Bobbie Green—in developing this proposal; I refused.  So far as I know, this group is developing its proposal in negotiations with the city’s muckety-mucks for an up-or-down vote with no citizen input.  If this Council approves the proposal, its words are written in water, for the next Council may not support it.  If a referendum approves it, it may survive from one Council to another, yet remain susceptible to a lack of support.  However the proposal is put to a vote, the fact remains that it is being developed by those with presumably little or no direct unpleasant experience with the LCPD, but a good deal of arrogance that they know best what everyone else needs.

 

Without knowledge of the proposal, I cannot consider its strengths or weaknesses.  However, my experience with the LCPD, City Attorney, City Manager, and City Council is that there is not, and likely never will be, enough integrity and determination to make a CPOB work.  I have dealt with everyone serving in these capacities and know that they are dishonest, weak, and inconsistent when it comes to policing and public safety.  In evaluating any forthcoming proposal, ask how the CPOB would deal with the Baca case.

 

On 16 April 2022, called to a home by family members reporting a woman with a mental problem threatening to use knives, the responding Police Officer Jared Cosper shot and killed Sra. Amelia Baca in less than a minute.  Police Chief Miguel Dominguez’s immediate reflexive response was to generate a deceptive PR audio-visual presentation released about a week later.  It was doctored to make the victim look threatening when, in fact, she was not and the LCPD officer was obscene, angry, and aggressive—five times shouting, “put the fucking knives down”—before shooting and killing a non-English-speaking, elderly, confused woman likely suffering from dementia.

 

The next response was to convene a joint task force of local police agencies—LCPD, DASO, NMSP, and NMSUPD—to investigate and report to the Third District Attorney, Gerald Byers.  The composition of this task force is an example of conflict of interest, a concept which no one in these agencies understands or respects.  The LCPD actively participated in both the investigation into and its report about one of its officers.  So gross was the conflict of interest that the meeting to review the report on 13 June was led by LCPD Detective Kenny Davis and in the presence of his superior Dominguez.

 

When the task force report went to the Byers, he dithered for weeks, then decided to kick the case upstairs to NM Attorney General Hector Balderas for his decision whether to bring charges against Cosper.  Balderas, who is departing office at the end of his term, is almost surely not going to bring charges, a police officer and murderer will be back on the street, and the local law enforcement and legal community can duck responsibility.  Meanwhile, the delay enables everyone to get the politics right, let football and the fall elections distract the public, then make a late Friday afternoon announcement.

 

Five months and counting.  Meanwhile, those investigative reporters at the Las Cruces Sun-News, have done little reporting of this case.  After its headline stories, it did publish the complete footage of the LCPD film after I sent it to them when I got it from my IPRA request.  If they have done any more investigating, no one knows about it.  Apparently, they have not interviewed officers on the task force or the District Attorney, have not asked why the case of a local murder has been moved from the city to the state, and have not asked the obvious questions: (1) why did the LCPD not determine the facts and either charge Cosper or explain the reasons for not charging him; and (2) why did Byers not make the same determination?  The silence of the Sun-News suggests that it is willing to get its headlines, then do its civic duty—that is, serve the powers-that-be, by supporting these agencies in their desire to minimize a police murder.

 

Entirely silent on the Baca killing are all elected state officials from this area.  Neither my Representative Angelica Rubio nor my Senator Jeff Steinborn has spoken up about this killing.  Their silence signals their continuing indifference to police criminal conduct and, not so by the way, to Hispanic victims.

 

Those who have read my two dozen or so blogs on the dishonesty and corruption of the LCPD, City Attorney, City Manager, and City Council about five trivial phony charges of code violation know that misconduct, dishonesty, and corruption begin with a police officer but go up to the Attorney General, and include officials at all levels in between.

 

The lesson for Las Cruces’s police reformers is that the law enforcement and legal community is all-embracing from street to state.  It will not reform itself; it will not let self-appointed do-gooders initiate workable and endurable reforms.  At best, they will get a façade of reform.  Meanwhile, LCPD officers will continue to harass, humiliate, abuse, harm, or kill Las Cruces citizens with impunity.  Is everyone happy with LCPD’s hiring teenagers and giving them guns with which to play police?  Is everyone happy with LCPD training when we know how well it worked after Cosper got over 70 hours of training in de-escalation?  LCPD officers know no better, they are trained to do no better, and they will not tolerate anyone changing policies and practices to better provide for public safety.  With or without a Civilian Police Oversight Board, they will continue doing their duty as they have always done it.  And, in the more ominous impending political climate, the LCPD police will be well prepared to play their part in suppressing political action not to their liking.  Provocateurs will have privilege over protesters.

MARK RONCHETTI'S EFFORT TO ABORT HIS PREGNANCY PROBLEM

In a previous blog, I invited Mark Ronchetti to address two questions about abortion: one about “shared values,” the other about freedom of religion.  As I expected, he did not respond to my personal invitation.  I knew that he would not respond because he could not respond.  I recognized him then as being too ideological, too ignorant, and too indifferent—all overlapping attributes—to answer to a citizen asking tough questions.  Are we all lining up to vote for a man who refuses to answer questions about his views?

 

Recently, Ronchetti, to push his ideology, has confirmed his ignorance or indifference with a call for a referendum on abortion.  The referendum would presumably specify an end to all abortions after 15 weeks and allow exception for pregnancies resulting from rape or incest—my goodness, there seems to be a lot of both and very few prosecutions for either—or threatening the health or life of the girl or woman.

 

Ronchetti, like so many men and a few women, either does not know or does not care about the medical facts which expose his radical contradiction.  Most health-and life-threatening conditions during pregnancy do not become evident until after 15 weeks.  If those conditions become evident after this date and thus threaten the health or life of the woman, then what?  Hey, Mark, answer this one for all the women whom you would put at risk even if they want to become pregnant.  Must a desire to become a mother come with a MANdated requirement to gamble with damage or death?

 

Ronchetti’s nonsense raises the most serious question about his competence to serve as the highest elected official in the state.  Abortion has been a matter of national debate for longer than he is old.  He has had the same access to information about abortion as I have had.  Yet he seems clueless about the issues—medical, legal, religious, humane—involved.  Is this kind of callous ideology and willful idiocy what New Mexicans want in a governor?

 

Of course, Ronchetti is a politician running for office against an incumbent in a state inclined to vote for statewide candidates of the other party.  So we should expect some recklessness in such Republican candidates.  He urges a referendum on abortion to wash his hands of his stated position which dirties them, to abort his pregnancy problem.  He urges a referendum to appear ever so democratic and, at the same time, to rouse his base and even win some votes on the other side.  But the effect would be an increase in mutual hostilities of New Mexicans and then a vote on an issue which many voters do not understand any better than Ronchetti does.  If New Mexico needs to address the issue of abortion, it should be addressed in the usual way: by electing legislators who can debate the issue with more information and less passion than most people can.  Moreover, if he is elected governor, he can still take administrative steps or fight for legislation to achieve what the voters, either by voting down his referendum or electing legislators opposed to its provision, indicated that they did not want.

 

 

The issue of abortion cannot be separated from other issues: immigration and various gender-oriented rights, like contraception, same-sex relationships and marriage, and inter-racial marriage.  The common element in these issues is the Republicans belief that people exercising these rights are people morally inferior to straight white Christians, with preference to males; entitled to fewer rights as citizens; and deserving of abuse.

 

Ronchetti is only one member of a party which believes that bodies and people are different things.  Republicans have shown their cruelty toward those whom they disrespect (women seeking abortions) or despise (people of color, LGBTQs, religious minorities), with inhumane policies and practices.  (The old racist belief was that Blacks did not have souls.)

 

For example, to oppose immigration, Trump, with the support of the GOP and the efforts of the Border Patrol (BP), separated young Hispanic children from their parents.  The point of the separation was to abuse family members, young and old, by separating them.  A politicized BP did not even pretend to care whether they could be reunited.  So it ensured the perpetuation of this cruelty by not keeping records; half a decade later, hundreds of children and parents have still not been re-united.

 

Trump is not an outlier.  Republicans are continuing to treat the bodies of those whom they disrespect or despise without regard for the persons thus abused to serve their political purposes.  Such cruelty to bodies and abuse of people are the policy of the Republican Party.  The GOP now implements this policy by shipping the bodies of the disrespected and despised about as if they were, not people, but so many farm animals.  Governors Abbott and DeSantis, both with presidential ambitions (can you believe it?), are the latest elected Republican official to abuse and use minorities.  In accordance with GOP policy, they ship Hispanics here and there, by bus and plane.  Can cattle cars to camps be far behind?

 

The GOP policy extends to women who seek an abortion.  GOP intends legislation to deny girls and women capable of bearing children control over their bodies.  The GOP expects females to breed like animals, with the only choice in the matter given by men.

 

Ronchetti should be asked about GOP beliefs and practices on this range of social issues.  He should be asked to demonstrate how these GOP policies and practices reflect his respect for life.   He should be asked to name his family values.  He should be asked whether he thinks that the United States and its several states are bound by national and international laws and treaties.  He should be asked whether he believes that, if elected governor, he would have the right to use state power to meddle in or control peoples’ lives.

 

You will get no more answer to your questions than I did to mine.  Silence now is Ronchetti’s shield against accountability later.

DOG AND CAT LOVERS GO TO HEAVEN

Without being the slightest bit suicidal or even morbid, I spend odd moments thinking about my death.  The line in The Who’s “My Generation” “hope I die before I get old” led me to hope that I would die before I turned 70.  Damn: I am 82, in excellent health, with no prescriptions or props.  So far, so good, most people would say.  My doctors’ predictions that I have another decade or so to go makes their life sentence seem like a death sentence.  I do not want being old to spoil my love of life, for, to my way of thinking, being old means being no longer able to love life while living it.  My rule for my pets—their last day should not be a bad one—I hope will apply to me.

 

I am a Jew who is agnostic about the existence of God but certain that life is not a dress rehearsal.  Thinking about death is an inverse way of thinking about life.  What I cannot value dead is what I value living: family and friends; good books, music, and movies; scholarship and teaching; birdwatching, hiking, camping, racquetball, and kayaking; and crossword puzzles.  For me, death means that, for the eternity after my death, there will be no me to value any of these things, and it will not matter to the “no-me” if any of them value me.

 

The one exception is something which I allow myself: a very limited faith that I can value my dogs and cats here and can continue to do so there.  In the short pre-death period remaining to me, I reflect on the message printed on a piece of wood sold at a tacky roadside market: “If There Are No Dogs in Heaven, then, when I Die, I Want to Go where They Go.”  My faith goes farther.  I believe that only those who love dogs and cats go to heaven; everyone else goes nowhere.  I believe that I shall join my many dogs and cats who have pre-deceased me and who assemble in a larger pack to welcome each new arrival when the time comes.  So whenever I have to put one of my family down, my last words are advice to seek one well-suited to them of those who have gone before.  At my age, I wish myself long life only out of a desire to outlive all the cats and dogs of my last pack so that none feels left behind.  That will be the time for me to join them all.

 

But I must admit that my faith has the necessary element of doubt which makes faith necessary.  It resembles the doubt at the end of the story of Greyfriars Bobby, a Skye Terrier, who spends every night for 14 years on his master John Grey’s grave.  Shortly before his death, he looks up to an overcast evening sky and thinks, “I have abided long and lonely.  How long have I still to abide?  And, then, will I be going to Old Jock?”

 

I trust that Elizabeth has joined her corgis.  The Queen is dead; long live the King!

 

My book On the Same Team: Dog Owners Coaching Their Best Friends is available on Kindle.

CAN A LIFESTYLE PROPOSAL IMPROVE PUBLIC EDUCATION IN LAS CRUCES?

In a recent column, “Kids want to grow, learn; are we planting seeds of knowledge?” (Sun-News, 28 Aug), Peter Goodman commends the educational approach of the famous or infamous Summerhill School.  Its once radical, child-centered approach let students follow their impulses in an educational environment.  A quick search of the internet reveals many discussions about the school’s lifestyle and sex scandals, but few about the education which its students acquired, however they acquired it, except to note that, in its 100 or so years, the school has had a few distinguished graduates.  The column promotes this approach to education without assessing its consequences.

 

Summerhill School is not a model for Las Cruces schools.  The column assumes that one size fits all, that its approach can operate effectively in different schools and that their differences make no difference.  It ignores socio-economic and cultural differences between one English private school for mostly middle-class white students from families with good educations and many New Mexico public schools for largely lower-class minority students from families with poor educations.  It ignores the huge role which parental expectations play in educational attainment.  In my day, in Shaker Heights, OH, rich, white, college-educated parents expected their children to study hard (dropping out, inconceivable), go to college, and have business or professional careers.  Everyone graduated, and 96% went to college, at least a quarter of them to the very best in the country.  In Las Cruces, most parents are neither rich nor white, and few themselves have a college education.  Yet teachers blame them for not supporting their children’s education; whether parents deserve this blame, their children manage only mediocre results in statewide proficiency tests in basic subjects.  Today, 72.4% of graduates go to mostly undistinguished colleges.  The indifference of this column to such differences reflects white privilege.

 

The column cites an implausible instance for persuasive purpose.  It reports that the Summerhill’s founder “had one kid who spent all his time in the woods.  At 16, he decided he wanted to take the examination required for further schooling.  He learned what he needed to learn in six months.”  The instance is not only implausible, but also unrealistic; it implies that students can learn what they need to know in very little time.  Otherwise, why cite it?  The column seems to be serious, but it cannot be taken seriously.

 

The column omits information or even reference to the American attempt at student-centered education in the 60s and 70s.  The Open Classroom was the attempt and a failure.  It succeeded only in warping or discounting much traditional education, both curriculum and instruction, which has since contributed to the decline of education in America.

 

The column also presents no information as evidence for its claim that “Kids arrive excited, energetic, cheerful and curious, then many leave sullen and resentful.”  I guess—I do not make unsupported assertions on this point—that some number of students have their curiosity suppressed before they arrive at kindergarten (and that early childhood education will not encourage it).  In any event, I would like to have an explanation of this claimed change in feelings, not just the insinuation that it results from some stultifying approach to education.

 

The column claims that curiosity prompts students to learn naturally and eagerly, at random, without the structure and guidance of conventional approaches to education.  For a while, it does, at birth, in infancy, and into childhood.  But it is not free from the influence of its cultural and socio-economic environments, which circumscribe it.  It is well known that enriched environments stimulate and support curiosity, depleted ones dampen and weaken it.  So a laissez-faire approach which allows students, whatever their background, to follow their curiosity within their environment denies them opportunities for curiosity outside it.  This laissez-faire approach further disadvantages the already disadvantaged; in diverse student bodies, it reflects white privilege.  At some point, earlier and more for disadvantaged students especially, curiosity requires sustenance by supplements, structure, and guidance outward from instinct—in a word, education.  Here, the etymology of the word is instructive; it derives from Latin “educare,” or “to lead out” of oneself.  The column unwittingly urges the contrary, a sort of educational narcissism with its distortions and deprivations.

 

The core belief of this column in a child-centered approach to education is neither original nor appropriate.  It goes back at least as far as Rousseau’s Emile and is as anti-intellectual as the succeeding Romantic Movement was.  Its approach to learning is not an appropriate one for a world-oriented education for work, play, and personal growth.

 

This column or other recent columns on public education mean well but seem unenlightened by education in education, classroom experience, or expertise from civic involvement in public education.  Public education in New Mexico has many problems, all deserving of criticism and all easy to criticize, but nothing commends solutions ill-adapted to students in their cultural or socio-economic environments.

 

Everyone has gone to school, has an opinion about education, and has a right to that opinion.  But, without more knowledge than one’s narrow experience, one is unlikely to have a right or even a cogent opinion.  Columnists have opinions and a right to them, but they best serve their readers if they base their opinions less on lifestyle fancies, wishful thinking, conventional wisdom, or ideological agendas, and more on broader perspectives, extensive information, and careful analysis.

 

 

UPDATES:

1. Mark Ronchetti has not (yet) answered the two questions which I posed to him about his views on abortion.  A candidate for public office who believes in democracy owes it to the public to explain and, if necessary, defend his views.  His silence signals contempt for the electorate.

2. Justin Garcia has not reported on the Baca “investigation” since Third Judicial District DA Gerald Byers ducked the decision about prosecution by transferring the case to the NM Attorney General Hector Balderas, soon to leave office.  His reporting did not include any explanation for Byers’s decision.  My theory: the case was too hot to handle after the disclosure of investigative bias by the joint task force of enforcement agencies; the LCPD ran the panel on the final report, which has not been released.  This time, I have left it to Garcia to make an IPRA request.