Crane's Corner

Sacramento City Councilwoman Angelique Ashby shares her views on the current state of the city and her run for the Senate seat being vacated by Senator Richard Pan.  Our discussion meanders thru her significance on Sacramento's City Council (and that she is!) as well as her views on a variety of topics including homelessness.  If you thought she was a pegged left liberal, think again.  This may be one person who not only gets things done but may be able to bring a little partisanship, common sense and action to many of our pressing issues.  As a small businesswoman herself, she also brings a sense of savvy when it comes to the needs of business owners and their relationships in the communities they serve.  If I was a betting man, I would say I just interviewed one of our soon to be State Senators.  Join us for this most interesting and helpful insight into one of Sacramento's most influential local leaders.  

Sometimes, I’ll just shake my head, other times I just burst out laughing at the very idea of de funding the police. Some cops are as bad as the people they arrest. Most in my opinion are hard working and fair. Deserving of our respect and admiration. If you’re a CPA, a utility worker, a car salesman, a teacher or an insurance broker, there’s a pretty good chance you’ll come home from work in one piece. Work in law enforcement and there are no guarantees. 

Yes, there have been some highly publicized cases of cops using excessive force, sometimes with deadly results, but read most of the cases and you’ll find the story began with illegal behavior, usually by a repeat offender who ignored a police warning, thought they were smarter than the cops or didn’t quite understand that when cops draw their weapons, they are prepared to use them, and they’re not taught to wound, they’re taught to immobilize the offender or in layman's terms, odds are they’ll stop what they’re doing on account of their dead.

You want to talk about reforms, more accountability, specialized training, I’m all ears. But defunding--cutting back..punishing law enforcement. No way. We need more cops---and not just the ones patrolling our neighborhoods and highways; we need on line cops, patrolling the information superhighway and can stay ahead of the hackers, who hit the little fish and the whales with impunity.

Not a day goes by that I don’t see some scams directed at me. There’s a FEDEX delivery, a gift card from my bank, a special settlement from the IRS or because of my impressive resume, a job waiting for me in a warehouse at a bustling third world sea port. The come-ons look real but they’re as real as a Rolex watch priced at 15 bucks on the street. It’s like a minefiel if I click on it, it will steal my identity or turn my IPhone into a can of Mountain Dew. Passwords? I have over a hundred of em because everyone asks for one. 8 letters or more, with some numbers and some  special signs. Then there's the always annoying picture game, to verify it’s really you. How many crosswalks? 

The other day my Ipad reminded me that I have old passwords and that one particular password was as hard to crack as Password 1-2-3. Funny, that particular pass word had the name of an ex-girlfriend, the nickname of  a 1969 Met, the number of my high school football jersey, and a symbol. Go ahead Siri, try to guess it. 

When your password is compromised, it’s either the result of  a data breach that sends thousands of names and passwords to the Dark Web which is to cyber-cons what Ohio State is to 300 pound lineman who run a 4 second 40 yard das, or it’s human behavior. The online offer looked real the caller could have been from a well known charity or in desperation you let a caller flatter you  through an application for a great job not thinking twice about giving out your social or drivers license number.

But America’s prisons are suddenly like M-I-T or Harvard for crooks. Armed with the knowledge that the feds wanted to get pandemic relief out to as many people as possible as fast as possible, they left the front/back and side door open when executing  the Cares Act.  CASH ALREADY ENROUTE TO SCAMMERS  Act. Cons who could find  a partner outside to steal mail, had a smooth scamming phone voice or just overwhelmed the bureaucrats got fake i-d’s,  applied for the benefits and waited for the cash loaded debit cards to arrive,In California, the scam run on the E-D-D could hit 30 billion. The Labor Department says the national toll may surpass 500 billion. That's the kind of money that can fund a war, house America’s poor or homeless or cover the cost of finish the story at... www.edcranescorner.com/blog-page/

Finally, in a matter of days or weeks, wherever you live in these 50 states, you can wash those face masks, pack 'em away for the next killer virus, burn them or donate them to the forthcoming Anthony Fauci “Do As I Say Not As I Do” Museum. Suddenly it seems the scourge of 2020 and part of 2021 will soon be just another dark chapter in history. Why, because people are getting vaccinated!   Sort of. 

 Outside of Gibraltar, where 100 percent of the population has been immunized, few countries have an immunization rate of better than 60 percent and those numbers include people who’ve gotten 1 shot and those who’ve gotten 2. So the numbers are a little suspect, because those who’ve only gotten one jab, may not get the second, which makes them COVID possible in a couple of months or even weeks. Just the other day, ex FDA Commissioner Dr. Scott Gotlieb offered the opinion that those fully vaccinated will need a booster shot in the fall.

 All of which tells me a couple of things. We are nowhere near being fully vaccinated, but after 16 months of being bullied by politicians who ordered businesses, schools, churches, ball parks, barber shops, restaurants, bars and even Disneyland closed.

Suddenly, Happy Days are here again.

Really? I’m guessing most kids under 12 and maybe 30 to 40 percent of the US adult population has not been vaccinated. Thats over 100 million people. 100 million people who won’t be protected by masks or 6 foot separation or any of the other life or death protocols that made us all nuts for the last year and change.  How can we leave so many unprotected?

 Because they don’t need protection. They never really did. COVID 19 was a nasty virus that killed millions. But for the most part it killed people with underlying serious health issues. Heart Disease. Respiratory Disease. Cancer. Diabetes.

 Unfortunately, most who died didn’t have a chance and those with the  comorbidities got the vaccine first, and perhaps just in time. Pardon my cynicism but the great Pandemic of 2020 was part health crisis but mostly it has been a shameful power grab, by mostly liberal politicians who got a chance to shove money at people who will keep voting for them, and now think they will be viewed as the great emancipator by restoring freedoms they shouldn’t have taken away in the first place. We’ve been over-sanitized, traumatized and conned into losing businesses and relationships, recreation and fellowship over a pandemic that was academic. If you weren’t terribly old or terribly sick, you’d certainly survive it and might not get it.

 Most intelligent Americans have figured this out, but our so-called leaders are still on the power trip. Noticeably California Governor Gavin Newsom. He’s lifting the mask mandate but refusing to relinquish the so-called State of Emergency which lets him control California and 140 million residents like a crackpot dictator in a Banana Republic. Forget the recall circus that he’s likely to survive, Newsom should be impeached and then exiled. There must be some Banana Republic looking for a power hungry idiot to handle the people  who haven’t yet packed up for Biden Bucks in Estados Unidos.

I’ve been a baseball fan since my little league days, and at the big league level, the game has changed and not for the better. Though they are better nourished and probably in better shape than the players I followed back when LBJ pitched for the Washington Senators, well at least on opening day, today's players are comparative wimps. The New York Mets, my team, lead the national league east in games won and players injured. 13 of the 25 players have gone on the injured list. Back in the day, anything short of an amputation, might keep you out of action for a couple of days. These guys need weeks to heal up. 

They earn for the most part millions, and that's part of the problem. Owners coddle the rich jocks to protect their investment, so, even the best pitchers rarely pitch deep into the game and very rarely toss a complete game. Each year the 30 teams play almost 5000 combined games. Since 2007 there haven’t been 100 complete games tossed in a single season.

 Back in the 60’s and 70’s the best pitchers usually went the distance, or close to it. Guys like Bob Gibson who died last year at age 84. Gibson pitched from 1959 till 1975.  It was an era when fans and baseball people followed statistics but were not immersed in analytics as they are today. Calculators only covered the basics, computers were the size of refrigerators and only understood by nasa nerds not sportswriters or GM’s.

But pore over Gibson's career numbers and count how many times you say wow.

He was at once a product of his environment and of the times both of which might have ruined a lesser man. He grew up in a gritty housing project in Omaha.  He was bitten on the ear by a rat. Undernourished to the point that he suffered rickets and even as a major leaguer, the prime of his career was the decade of the 60’s and prejudice and racism were a constant. Maybe that’s what made Gibby so angry,an emotion, which along with a 96 mile an hour fastball made Gibson so intimidating and so good.

The stories are legion. Traded from the white sox, Tommy Agee a new Met, faced Gibson in a spring game. Gibson drilled him yelling “welcome to the national league”. The pitch sent Agee to the hospital then into an  0 for 34 slump to start the season and his worst career year.

 Gibson’s best friend was ex Philly and former National League President Bill White. In a 1964 game, White’s pal warned him not to crowd the plate, White ignored him, and was greeted with a fast ball on his elbow, and a friendly “ I warned you, you sob.”.Those guys had company. The Cardinal head hunter hit 100 other batters. Tim McCarver, Gibby’s long time catcher tells of a mound visit, a short one, ended with Gibson shouting.”What the blank are you out here for...the only thing you know about pitching is you can’t hit”.

 Ok, times have changed but it’s a rare night when your Kershaw’s, Scherzers and De Groms pitch past the seventh. Gibson threw 255 complete games and was the original Mr. October for the A’s, Gibson in three fall classics won 7 games. In ’68 he was the Cy Young and NL MVP winner, winning 22 games and  tossing 13 shutouts with a dazzling 1.12 era. And he could hit, slamming 26 homers. And he could field, winning 9 Gold Gloves.

 Maybe the most amazing stat in his final season when a knee injury led to a 4-3 record and retirement, Bob Gibson made a career best salary, $175,000.

I suppose the cost would be prohibitive, but I’ve come to the conclusion that the United States would be better served by ringing in the borders, not with any kind of fencing but a large padded wall...the kind they have in hospital psych wards and Mental Institutions,  because as a nation we are going nuts. Yes, the Pandemic was a game changer. Thanks to politicians and Dr. Flip Flop--er Fauci, we shut down the economy and the schools, made everyone put on a mask and pretty much wrote off 2020, and as I write this in June of 2021, no one seems to be really sure it was all necessary--because to everyone’s amazement, a Covid 19 kill shot arrived within months--not years..and pretty much cancelled the argument that shut downs worked or were a waste of time, money and sanity. America managed to run Donald Trump out of office..though he’s looking for ballots like OJ’s looking for his wife’s real killer. California prison inmates, dumb enough to get nailed for their crimes, were smart enough to scam the E-D-D out of at least 10 billion and maybe three times that, with the PPP, Pandemic prisoner profiteering.

And suddenly all the protocols and sacrifice and rules go away, per His Majesty King Gavin the Nuisance..as of June 15th.

 Back to normal? What is that? The other day on CNBC, the question was posed, “Should we have sex with robots”?

OK, some of you may think you already are, but seriously, there is now a line of robots, built in New Jersey, designed expressly to mimic many varieties of sexual behavior. These dolls, with artificial intelligence not only mimic most common sex acts, they talk and blink and some say provide decent conversation. My first thought is this sexy robot trend is not going to be good for the champagne, oyster or floral industries, not to mention the people who make pain relievers. Robots can’t derail the Love Express by copping to a headache and I suppose if your metallic lover smokes after sex, it’s best to check the wiring. They cost thousands but are really hooking some people, pardon the pun, but they’re said to be so life like, they may put human sex workers out of work. Houston nixed plans for a robot brothel, saying it could bust up families and finances. But they’re popping up in Europe.

Experts say this idea of getting lucky on demand suggests something we already knew.  People don’t talk any more, they just text or share whatever inane thoughts they may have on social media. Then there’s the British guy who owns a doll named April, and tells the Sun, it’s a full time job. They get physical four times a week, go out to dinner twice a week, then there’s hours devoted to keeping April dressed with hair and make up as well.  And that guy is still married. Nothing like a plastic pet to take care of.

Mental Health experts are divided as to whether sex robots are a good thing, but it appears they are here to stay. Some guys are even ordering bots that look like the ex wife or girlfriend. Different strokes for different folks, but until the virtual companions learn to cook, open the wine and order tons of stuff from Amazon, I’m staying with the human option, with all the money I save, I can buy some courtside tickets for the Kings Playoff games or take King Gavin to the French Laundry, He’s no robot, but he’s got that Artificial Intelligence going for him.

 Ever ask yourself this question. In  a country of 330 million people, why do we settle for such mediocrity in the people we elect to lead us?

Joe Biden, is not now nor ever will be anything special. Oh yes, he’ll go down in history like the 40 some men who preceded him as Leader of The Free World, but he’s no Reagan, Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt or Harry Truman. Maybe he slides in between Millard Fillmore and Warren Harding. Biden’s skill, if you want to call it that, is his ability to hang around. He got noticed in the early 70’s as a good looking guy with a lot of bad luck. His wife and young daughter were killed in a car accident. Biden didn’t do much in the senate, and became known as Senator Credit Card for his cozy relationship with the plastic honchos, who made his home state their home state, due to Delaware's favorable banking laws. Teddy Kennedy got in the way of his presidential aspirations in the early 80’s, Bill Clinton kept him off the ticket in the 90’s and in 1988, he killed any chance for the White House by lying---about almost everything. Now the media has been skewered for playing nice to Joe but that wasn’t the case in ‘88..

He plagiarized speeches..listen to Biden and British pol Neil Kinnock…

 AUDIO: BIDEN-KINNOCK

He apologized. Then got caught cribbing from Kinnock again:

That should have been enough. But Joe Biden--channeling his inner Joe Isuzu...boasted about his academic record:

AUDIO-BIDEN AND REPORTERS

The media caught him. He didn’t have 3 degrees just one---Law School,,close to the bottom of the class---76th in a class of 85 but then the media and the rest of the country forgot that Joe Biden was no George Washington..

If you can’t trust him with a political speech or his academic record, why are we trusting him with our tax dollars and the nuclear codes…

The answer---voters are lazy, and in 2020 even those well informed would rather go  four years without an iPhone and a Prius then vote for Donald Trump.

So far, Biden’s screwed up the southern border, relinquished our first time energy independence and is printing money to pacify poor voters who’ll return the favor with democrat votes..

Covid’s on the run, but inflation’s on deck...the deficit is at record levels and China and Russia are laughing. The truth hurts Joe. But how would you know..

The year was 1987. I was on a 9 day 10 city road trip covering the first visit to the U-S by the wonderful Pope John Paul for CBS News.

 All sorts of interesting things happened on that trip. I was blessed by the Pope many times as he celebrated mass in Miami, New Orleans, San Francisco and 7 other cities. On a pre-dawn assignment to meet The Pope in Monterey, I met the then Mayor of Carmel Ca, Clint Eastwood, who smiled when I suggested his next film could be Dirty Harry meets The Pope, a Miami thunderstorm drenched our equipment and caused me to miss the charter flight to New Orleans. I watched a Jesuit priest hired as a Papal Sermon Consultant do his best to shatter the TWA record for the number of inflight Bloody Mary's consumed in 2 hours. But the most interesting thing about that assignment was seeing my first cellular phone. It was about the size of a loaf of bread, had battery life measured in minutes, and was the latest equipment for TV producers to reach the NY News desk right from the airplane. Amazing.

Now, of course, cell phones are not bulky and rare. They are tiny and ubiquitous, and we’re told they are addictive to the point of being dangerous.

It may never prove as deadly as tobacco or as physically addictive as crack cocaine, but make no mistake about it, play with your iphone, android or tablet long enough and you will  most certainly incur a nasty social disease, one that even an i-condom might not prevent.  I’m talking about digital device disease. Somewhere in the 80’s tired of lugging quarters and sneaking into telephone booths some overseas researchers came up with a couple of good ideas. The basic idea was a cellular telephone that allowed one to have a brief conversation, untethered by wires or the need to keep dropping coins into a box or reciting a long credit card number. 

Soon some other researchers, these folks up in canada, did the cell phone one better. They made it smaller allowing it to fit in the palm of your hand.  And they added a few must have features like a calendar and text messaging and before long, all masters of the business universe needed these palm pilots.  Which gave way to the blackberry, the iphone and the android. The prices became more affordable.  The amazing technology more common and soon everyone, even the homeless are wired.  And not just for a chance to make or receive a call. Our phones have become our addictive little boxes. We don’t snort or guzzle or smoke them but they are just as addicting. Go anywhere; an airport, a meeting room, a restaurant and look around the room. 

The joy of good conversation and the exhilaration that comes from a fine exchange of ideas are hard to find as almost all of us have become addicts looking for the next information fix from google, news nugget from twitter, selfie from someone who claims to be somewhere cool or important and are convinced you care. These devices are driving us to distraction and away from human interaction. There's an app for everything, all kinds of entertainment, games, music, helpful advice. Something for everyone and thousands more waiting to be discovered and like a drunk drying out, a lost, stolen or broken device brings on the d-t’s. Digital torture. The phones and tablets have for many replaced the still and video cameras. My wife and son won’t go around the block, unless the trip is mapped out by Siri or google, so no one asks for directions any more and I can’t tell you the last time I saw road map in a gas station.

I don’t know how we break our habit. Not sure if there’s rehab after the last reboot, but recently driving through the plains of Wyoming, miles from the nearest town I saw something beautiful. A real, old time phone booth. I snapped a selfie with it. Then I asked Siri to tell me exactly where I was. Some habits die hard.

Anyone on the north side of 40, please raise your hand.

Thank you. Now for those of you on the glide path to middle age, here’s a question. Have your views on important matters changed as you got older?

It’s nothing to be ashamed of. For most, age brings maturity and life experiences and critical thinking, all of which change our viewpoint.

Those of us blessed with children, learn how precious they are, and even while respecting another individuals rights, many of us find the idea of abortion, killing the most vulnerable of our human race, horrible. Now I’m not going to debate just when life begins, but if that little person has a heart beat, that little person is alive, and any procedure which stops that heart beat is and has been since 1973, government sanctioned murder.

Since the Black Lives Matter movement took root in recent years, it’s leaders operating on a very restricted viewpoint, have angrily chastised any one, especially white people who respond “all lives matter”. Sorry to mess with your marketing slogan, but you should be ashamed for trying to cancel or denigrate those with opposing views, but the truth is to most right minded people--all lives do matter.

Except in places like Texas. Full disclosure. I love that state, it’s been my second home for about 40 years, ever since the Crane family moved to Houston about the time I started my career in Houston. Texans are proud and fun loving and don’t view bidness opportunities as a chance for the government to rip you off while your spirit and dreams are snuffed by red tape and nonsensical laws. In fact that view is so prevailing, the Texas State Legislature only goes into session once every two years, making it impossible to compete with their tree killing do-gooders in Sacramento, who regularly turn out more than 700 rules or laws or prohibitions that limit our freedom, pick our pockets and prompt us  to start calling realtors in Idaho, Tennessee and a number of non communist run foreign outposts.

That's not to say the good old boys and girls who get together in Austin every other year get it right. Last week Governor Greg Abbott signed two pieces of paper that couldn’t have been more different, and if you hold that all lives matter, more counterintuitive. One bill pretty much puts the Texas abortion bidness out of bidness, banning any abortion after a baby's heart beat is detected. That's generally at about six weeks, and experts tells us so early in a pregnancy a number of women don’t even know they’re pregnant, Figure it will keep Austin’s attorneys and Judges busy for a while, but until and if it’s struck down, it will save the lives of a lot of little Lonestar Lives,

But the very same day, Governor Abbott signed the death warrant which allowed the state to lethally inject Quinten Jones, who was ordered to die for killing his 83 year old Aunt some 20 years ago,

Now there was a time, when I was younger that I supported Capital Punishment. They didn’t let their victims live--so they deserved to get the same punishment as their victims, and once dispatched, they would never kill again. But one day, the light went on, Either life is sacred or it’s not. Who gave a bunch of jailers and legislators the right to play God? Then as is often the case, humans with the I-Q of a kitchen sponge ride the needle without the IQ to know right from wrong. But really closing the deal for me, the opinion that spending life in a tiny cell, while wearing a jumpsuit, eating bologna sandwiches and wondering when your hygiene challenged cellmate will decide to recreate his wedding night, is worse than a few drug laced moments of transit to the next world.

Now I’ll bet most of those Good Ole Guys and Gals are old enough to have pondered life itself...but never zeroed in on the hypocrisy of saving babies and killing grown men and women.  The only real life savers in Austin are sold in rolls at the candy store.

Perusing the messages from Facebook one weekend, I stumbled on something that mesmerized me. It was a long letter of explanation from a former colleague of mine I’ll call Dan. We’ll omit what the transgender crowd calls dead naming.. to protect his privacy--although that certainly doesn’t seem to be a real concern. Dan was a good reporter. Not flashy, but good.  He was bald, kind of short actually for a TV type--pretty nondescript. Dave always seemed hungrier than most--willing to do some extra duty on radio or overnight on network TV. 
Along the way he got his law degree, which helped him as a journalist and is helping him now. Dan stopped reporting a couple of years ago when he was let go by CBS in New York, probably on account of he was a good journalist who could tell a story live or on tape but brought down more dough than the Barbi and Ken's rolling in from Lost Nation Iowa or Frankfort Indiana. And sorry it’s a shallow business--no middle aged woman seeing Dan on the tube would mistake their living room for a male strip joint and feel the need to whip a few singles out of their handbag and hurl them at the TV, He wrote that after the initial period of anger and self examination, he began to really practice law, and because of his time on the tube, he had some name recognition, which served as built in advertising and marketing for the new attorney. 
That wasn’t the only change. Dan told his Facebook friends about having his name legally changed. I wondered why. His last name had good recognition, it wasn’t hard to spell and was pleasant enough. Dan’s last name is one of those 5 letter WASP specials, As the letter went on, it was clear that this former journalist had as they say buried the lead. It wasn’t his last name that changed, it was his first. Dan is now Kristen, with a brown wig and extensive makeup replacing the shining dome and the light touch of powder tv guys use to cut the glare of the lights. Oh yeah serious heels.Also gone, the pleasant baritone that media guys use to tell you that flooded highway is serious. Kristen’s new pipes..a cross between Hillary Clinton and Tiny Tim.

Kristen informed us that she’s proud of her transgender status and apparently is going all the way.

Now it takes a lot to shock me, so shock is the wrong word, surprise is a better one. Surprised because as Dan, I saw no visible signs there was a woman in my colleague just dying to come out. He never was Dick Butkus, but there was nothing effeminate about Dan. He was just kind of average. Next trip to NY I sat down with the lady who used to be a gentleman. He’d wanted to be a girl since he was 8, played college hockey and thought he would get fired after getting into a habit of going to bars catering to crossdressers, Only when he saw the boss of TV station WNBC wearing a nice dress and sensible shoes, he knew was in the clear.

And since you are dying to know, he is attracted to women just like he always was, separated from his wife but getting on fine with his two boys. Dan was recently elected to a political job in the suburban NY town where he lives and is also a trustee of the Broadcasters Union, one of the people who manages our pension fund. I was also delighted to hear that he’s dead set against minors going pink or blue, and is shamed by parents who want to rush Johnny over to Sweden if he wears Mom’s pumps for a few days.

I give Dan points for courage to convert to Kristen, but personally I don’t get it. I never once entertained the notion of being an Edwina or a Layla or any other name that Dame.

Once upon a time, a mid-life crisis meant a new Harley or a sports car or maybe a brief affair. Now, for a small but growing segment of adults, it’s not a vehicle they want, it’s a vehicle for change. I don’t quite get it; but I respect it.  Dave took about 50 years to evolve into Kristen. MORE... you can find the entire script at www.edcranescorner.com/blog-page/

It sits in my office, but can fit in my shirt pocket. These days, I read it more than a new bride checks a cookbook or a new car buyer checks the owner's manual. What is it? 

 It’s not that I don’t know what's in that little 3 by 5 booklet, it’s that I’m incredulous that so many people either don’t know or simply ignore that booklet, that small copy of The U-S Constitution.

Whether you read 33 small booklet pages or a few large ones….or see the original parchment online, you will be amazed by the simple yet comprehensive nature of our legal backbone.

Let’s start with the first amendment which is pretty basic. We are free to speak our mind and practice our religion. First paragraph of the first amendment. Not really open to debate. And yet, these days, free speech comes at a price. In this cancel culture, having the wrong opinion can get you fired. And when you are fired for not one but two things that are protected by our constitution, things that generations of Americans died for, it is just inexplicable. But it happened to Joe Kennedy. Several years ago, Joe Kennedy, an ex-marine who risked his life to protect the constitution and the freedoms it guarantees was fired from his job as the Football Coach at Bremerton High in Bremerton Washington.  Now a 3-7 record after a 2-8 previous debacle  might have cost another coach his job, but that was not the deciding factor here. Joe Kennedy. was fired for exercising his constitutional right to pray, and did so with his players and opposing players after every game. Not every player participated but those who did welcomed the chance, one of them called the post-game gatherings on the 50 yard line “magical.”

In a classic example of political correctness run amok here’s what the district wrote in first suspending Coach Joe Kennedy...and later firing him. 

The post-game midfield prayer quote:

“poses as a genuine risk that the District will be liable for violating the federal and state constitutional rights of students or others.”

Say what? Allowing a citizen to exercise his constitutionally protected right while allowing others to freely join him could violate the constitutional rights of others.?

Mmm..no. That's as wrong as wrong can be. And if school officials believe that horse dropping of a paragraph, imagine what kind of history and civics they’re teaching the kids. 

Fast forward to 2021, after lower courts sided with the school district, attorneys for Joe Kennedy appealed, and a federal judge ruled in favor of the school district. It was Joe Kennedy’s last chance to get his job back. The Constitution is always open to interpretation, but the Bill of Rights is plain and simple. The view here is that the school and the courts violated Joe Kennedy’s rights in an asinine quest to protect the rights of young atheists, who probably don’t know the difference between the First Amendment and a First Down.

By the way, my little copy of the constitution was given to me by Senator Barbara Boxer, so I will give her the benefit of the doubt as to her left leaning colleagues around the country. Read it. Then read it again.

Remember it’s not a cafeteria menu, but with respect to the Bill Of Rights, one restaurant axiom is appropriate.

No Substitutions please!