Miscellaneous

It's been a week or so since I've posted, and have a few unconnected topics to comment upon.

1) Mary Starrett. Her apology to Kelly Clark was backhanded at best. In the text of her apology she basically called him a sexist and accused him of being part of a "mob." Kelly, always gracious, unconditionally accepted her apology. But that doesn't change the fact that she used it to take another swipe at him.

2) Murray Hill Little League at the World Series. I am a big fan of youth baseball. My son went through the Lake Oswego Little League, then the Junior Baseball of Oregon program, and now plays at LO High. Murray Hill0 is L.O.'s arch-rival in the District 4 All-Star tournament.

Most every year, it seems, the 15 or 16 team District 4 tournament comes down to a Murray Hill vs. Lake Oswego final. Most every year Murray Hill wins, and then goes on to win the state tournament, which qualifies them for the regional tournament in San Bernadino.

This year for the first time Murray Hill won the regional to get to the World Series.

Hard as it is to root for your arch-rival, I hope they win the whole thing. They have played great, won by coming back with their backs against the wall - much like the OSU Beavers did in the college world series.

Wouldn't it be something to have both the college and Little League world series champs be right here from Oregon?

Oregon - the new baseball capital of the world!

3) I think it is important to understand the depth of the hatred our terrorist enemies hold for America. The Muslim religious extremists who want death to America are not a fringe group in the middle east. It is more and more a mainstream attitude, fed by their popular culture and their societal institutions such as the schools.

Take a look at this video which shows Nazi-like youth indoctrination camps and tens of thousands of Hezbollah followers chanting "death to America." Then look at this video in which two beautiful, poised and articulate Palestinian 12 year olds explain to a questioner why they love the idea of "Shahada."

This is a clash of civilizations. We have to understand that this isn't just a few radical extemist muslim terrorists who are pissed off at America because we support Israel. Rather, we are at war with a culture that views us as evil and wants to eradicate us. That is a much tougher - and longer - war to win.

4) Judge's decision on the NSA wiretapping. Read Dave Reinhard's column about it in the Oregonian today. The fact that the judge would "forget" to mention a FISA court opinion that spoke directly to this kind of surveillance says it all.

5) School stuff: Clackamas Superintendent Ron Naso is going to get an additional $25,000 "stipend" because he has taken up the slack for the duties of the assistant superintendent who left last year. Apparently he didn't ask for the money, but the district board gave it to him anyway. Kudos to Board member Lee Remmick, who was the only no vote.

This is just outrageous. Naso is near retirement, and that little $25K bump in his salary is going to show up forever in his PERS benefits calculation. Taxpayers get screwed again.

Kudos to Sherwood School District, which has decided to increase its own academic achievement targets because the state's assessments are too easy, especially at the elementary levels. They are discarding the state's "meets standard/exceeds standard" measure because they know the level of test score the state deems sufficient to meet standard is way too low. So they say they want at least 95% of their kids to be at or above the 55th percentile in test score.

This is a REAL learning goal, and one that cannot be faked by low "passing" scores. Good for them.