Which raises a question: are we getting to a point that one day soon we may see Washington enact a law or create a regulation and the rest of the country simply ignores it? What happens when the country tells Washington to go pound sand on something and refuses to support it? Will the center hold or does the country splinter into who know what?
Most of this backlash and pushback is against the un-Constitutional overreach of the Washington political class. Those in Washington have been pushing a variety of issues and actions that do not sit well with large parts of the country. These issues include, but are not limited to, gun control, Common Core education standards, Michelle Obama’s healthy eating/school lunch legislation, Federal government land grabs, NSA spying on innocent citizens, IRS harassment, etc.
For the next few days we will update where state and local governments and individual citizens are rebelling against this overreaching and increasingly repressive set of politicians. When reviewing these updates keep in mind the overall question: will the center hold once the rest of the country actually starts to ignore Washington dictates?
1) The Education Action Group website reported on December 23, 2014 that Arkansas is the latest state, on the growing list of states, that is considering a repeal of Common Core national standards.
The Arkansas News recently reported that state senator Gary Stubblefield is considering filing legislation to repeal Common Core. His reason for wanting to get out of the Common Core disaster is similar to what we have reported on in other states: “This one size fits all, I just don’t buy that, because there’s just too much difference in different school districts in different states. I just think there’s a better way to do it.”
The Arkansas News recently reported that state senator Gary Stubblefield is considering filing legislation to repeal Common Core. His reason for wanting to get out of the Common Core disaster is similar to what we have reported on in other states: “This one size fits all, I just don’t buy that, because there’s just too much difference in different school districts in different states. I just think there’s a better way to do it.”
He recently recounted what he is hearing from a lot of teachers: “They [teachers] think it’s a waste of time. They spend more time trying to learn how to give a test than they actually do teaching.”
Last month we reported on how the governor of Maine wanted to also get out of the Common Core strait jacket since he noticed how far kids in Massachusetts had fallen below their education attainment trend line after living through Common Core processes. Also, the state of Maryland has also seen a degradation in their kids’ learning progress under Common Core:
Seems like the senator from Arkansas has also seen the light for kids in his state.
2) The Conservative Tribune website did a nice summary job in their website article from December 12, 2014 which highlighted the progress and action states were involved with to push back on an overreaching Federal government and Washington political class:
- The article focused on two broad fronts that states are using to pushback, namely state nullification of Federal law and the pending Article V Convention of States effort.
- The article claims that around twelve states are directly defying the Federal government in the area of gun control and Second Amendment rights, usually be declaring that Federal gun control laws are null and void within their state borders.
- These states that are trying to nullify Federal gun control efforts range from north to south and from east to west across the country: Alaska, Arizona, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri, South Carolina, and Texas, among others.
- In some of these states it is now against the law for any state or Federal agent that attempts to enforce Federal gun control laws.
- At least four states are also working on nullifying Obama Care including Arizona, Georgia, Missouri, and South Carolina.
- This effort is above and beyond the decision by more than two thirds of the state to not build and operate Obama care website health care exchanges in their states.
- Nine states have already rejected Common Core standards and at least thirty states have different legislative efforts underway to address changes to their Common Core changes.
- Regarding the Convention of the States front, approximately half of all states have already submitted, or are in the process of submitting, an official application calling for the convention.
- Organizers from around the country have already held meetings to establish ground rules for a convention.
- Most supporters of a Convention of States are focusing on forcing Congress to balance an out of control Federal budget and instituting term limits for Washington politicians.
3) I recently came across a Townhall website article written by Kurt Schlichter entitled, “Nothing Succeeds Like Liberal Secession: Blue America Without Red America Would Be A Basket Case.” He writes a fictional story of how the country became so polarized that it eventually split into two separate countries.
Obviously fiction, since it runs out to the year 2019, but its theme is consistent with what we are talking about here. In his view, the center does not hold and the country divides along political lines because of many of the concepts we have talked about here. It is very well written and is a very interesting take on what could happen if the center does not hold.
I wanted to reprint the entire article in this blog, it is quite long and entailed, but never received reprint permission from Townhall. Thus, I am providing the link directly to the article on their website for your review and contemplation:
4) State and local government are pushing back on the Federal government not only on Common Core but on the new Federal government school lunch guidelines that were championed by Michelle Obama. As we have discussed many times in this blog, the new guidelines have resulted in many disasters in school districts across the country.
These disasters include kids not getting enough to eat, untasty food be thrown out by the ton, school budgets being hit with drastic cuts in revenue as kids and families refuse to pay for tasteless food as a result of the new guidelines, and learning and school athletic performance suffering because kids are no longer getting enough calories at lunch.
According to a recent article on the Education Action Group website, school districts across Wyoming are just the latest school districts turning their back on the Federal school lunch guidelines.
According to Jeremy Smith, business manager for Wyoming’s Sheridan County District One, his school has dropped out of the so-called National School Lunch Program: “because there were just too many complaints. Universally, it was, ‘We are starving. We are hungry. This isn’t enough food for us.’ But we couldn’t blame them, because I looked at that school lunch and said, ‘I wouldn’t eat it either.’”
His school district saw a 20% upward spike in cafeteria sales this school year after it dropped the Federal rules championed by First Lady Michelle Obama. The district raised prices to provide larger portions of food to their growing kids and focused on offering “locally sourced produce and beef.”
Dennis Decker, the school district‘s food service director, told NPR in an interview that, “A one-size-fits-all program doesn’t work everywhere. And I also think that food is a little too personal to make a law. You can tell someone they can’t speed, but I don’t [think] you can tell everybody what they have to eat every day.” Wow, another American who realizes that top down, bureaucratic dictates from Washington make little sense when they hit the real world.
The article goes on to report that seven Wyoming school district
have dropped out of the Federal school lunch program. And you know the program must be bad since they are forgoing Federal grant money to provide the low calorie, tasteless food.
That will do it for today. Pushing back on lunch standards and education standards, gun control, Obama Care and more. Will the center hold or do we end up two separate countries as Mr. Schlichter foresees? In the meantime, consider joining our effort to impose term limits on Washington politicians, the very people that are causing the center to shake and rattle, and maybe make it roll:
Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:
www.loathemygovernment.com
It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.
Please visit the following sites for freedom:
Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w
More rebelling tomorrow.
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