Hansville sign
Some surprises aren’t good
It was surprising when I received a call from M.Kling asking me how I felt about the Hansville sign, since I did not live in Hansville and as a member of the Eglon community, I was not affected one way or the other.
I was surprised again when I noticed the sign being erected one day later, indicating the decision had already been made. A further surprise was the location, which is not in Hansville.
It seems the Eglon community sees no necessity for such a sign and I haven’t noticed one for Suquamish or Kingston either. I did not complain since I felt this matter was not worth it.
The greatest surprise was finding out that Kitsap taxpayer money was used for the sign. Now I feel the necessity to complain.
Hansville residents should do whatever they want to do (in Hansville) but they should pay for their actions themselves.
Don Sederholm
Eglon
Foreign policy
History has taught them nothing
Insanity is continuing a failed policy and expecting different results. Let’s kick our half century addiction to snake oil leadership. Neither Bush nor McCain learned obvious lessons from history about domino theory and foreign occupation. For example, Gandhi proclaimed and lived the truth that every nation prefers its own rule to that of even a benevolent occupier. Furthermore, our bogus foreign policy is based on discredited domino theory and irrational fear. When I was a young adult, our government both scared and fooled me when they told me we needed to enter a civil war in Vietnam to ensure our national security. We were told if we were not on the winning side of that war, all of SE Asia would fall like dominoes to the communists, eventually resulting in a world-wide communist evil empire. It didn’t happen.
Today John McCain continues to feed us an analogous, foolish domino theory to justify our continuing military involvement in what is essentially a civil war in Iraq. Islamic extremists continue to be miscast as the new evil empire intent on world conquest.
The truth is that very few Iraqis are terrorists. Most enemy casualties in the Iraq war have not been terrorists.
Bin Ladin, a Saudi terrorist, has stated that the real purpose of the 9/11 attack was to draw us into guerilla warfare that, in the long run, would bankrupt our economy. Our bankruptcy is happening.
The Bush-McCain domino theory is based on an exaggerated fear of boogie men and built on a foundation of sand.
It does, however, reveal the limited intelligence that led to both men’s poor grades in higher education. Although history disproved a domino theory in Vietnam, both Bush and McCain clearly missed that key lesson. Their bogus domino theory re-enforces the truth that those who don’t learn from history will let the same mistakes happen again.
Tom Driscoll
Poulsbo
NK Schools
Facts askew in Reader Sound-Off
The Reader Sound-Off editorial, “Schools aren’t underfunded” (June 21) argues that schools are essentially overfunded.
It cites credible data on steady increases in spending and staffing, concomitant decreases in student population, and flat academic performance — measured by the National Assessment of Educational Progress Test for American 17-year-olds.
This seems persuasive until its climactic hyperbole: “The last major technological development to transform classrooms was the invention of the chalkboard during Thomas Jefferson’s presidency.”
Hello. How about some relevant facts.
1. Even our grade school classrooms in Kitsap County are replete with networked computers, electronically-augmented whiteboards, and advanced projection systems. And student performance in the last decade is a well-documented upward arc.
2. Approximately half our teachers have master’s degrees or equivalent advanced training. Yet pay and benefits are less than any comparable profession — for instance less than corrections officers (guards and staff) in our booming prison industry.
3. Public school teachers deal daily with a much more complex class-roll of students than Jefferson could have imagined — falling into these basic cohorts:
“Gifted” — top 20 percent, with native intellect, generally involved-supportive families, who hardly need teaching — only guiding to discovery —therefore on the average, overfunded.
“Middlers” — next 60 percent, who need the style of teaching our system aims at — therefore on the average, properly funded.
“Laggers” — bottom 20 percent, who bear the burden either of weaker native intellect, of neglectful and outright destructive families, and who may come to school in dire need of breakfast, underwear, clean clothes, personal cleanliness, adequate health care, and most of all loving kindness — therefore on the average, grossly underfunded.
Teaching?
Foster-parenting is a better description of the teacher’s role — well before teaching can begin.
And among the teacher’s frustrating burdens is knowing that some laggers are diamonds in the rough, which if time and good luck permit, can be elevated to higher cohorts.
Funding on the average? Probably not enough — but the slightest attention to the real complexity of education negates grandiose arguments made so well on chalkboards.
Stephen A. Wald
Indianola
A different viewpoint
