Oh boy! Just heard Dennis Prager discussing this one on his radio show. Not even the heartland is safe from “progressive” idiocy. Here is how the story was presented in the Dallas Morning News:

‘In God We Trust’ goes missing

School plays it safe with yearbook cover photo

The freedom of religion at Liberty Elementary School has gone too far for some parents at the Colleyville school.

The cover of the Keller ISD school’s annual depicts the 2005 Liberty Nickel – complete with the face of Thomas Jefferson – but the words “In God We Trust” are missing.

Instead, the $16 yearbook contains a sticker with the credo and directions on how to apply it to the cover if the owner chooses.

Debbi Ackerman was one of the parents who questioned the missing phrase when her daughter brought the annual home from school.

“She said the teachers told them there was some people who didn’t believe in God, and that when they got home – don’t do it at school – but affix it when they got home,” Mrs. Ackerman said.

“We are just shocked and saddened that it’s come to this and it hit right in our back yard.”

The Keller school district’s policy is to remain neutral on religion.

A spokesman for the PTA, which produced the book, says it simply adhered to that rule.

“I have heard both sides of the argument, so we decided to not step on anybody’s toes and take it off,” PTA spokesman Tom Gardner said.

A spokesman for the district agreed.

“In this case, I think it was the principal making every effort to make sure that all faiths were respected,” Jason Meyer said.

I’m sure not the only one that thinks this is beyond silly. Doug Hagen writing in The American Daily says:

The Left is, despite their oft repeated claims of open-,mindedness, tolerance and inclusiveness, the most radically closed-minded and intolerant folks walking the earth. Anything they do not approve of, they seek to remove, period! No debate, no discussion, certainly no tolerance, just erase it and pretend it not only should not exist, but also in fact pretend it never did! An ostrich has nothing on these intellectual midgets.

It is the minority trumping the majority once again. The San Antonio News adds:

Keller ISD spokesman Jason Meyer said a parent’s group at the school approved the decision before the book was published. Liberty Principal Janet Travis wanted to avoid offending students of different religions, Meyer said.

“It’s not always easy to make everybody happy when we are making decisions,” Meyer said.

According to an ABC News poll, 83% of Americans say that they are Christians. Even if you were to discount that a bit, but then add back in the Jews and Muslims in America that also believe in God, I guess that statement “It’s not always easy to make everybody happy” actually means that they are only concerned about making those that think of themselves as Liberal or Progressive happy — screw the believers! The Fort Worth Star Telegram quotes one of the parents that has just finally had it!

Debi Ackerman of North Richland Hills said she is offended by the omission. It’s yet another example of a politically correct culture that is removing Christian references from all public places, she said.

“I think it’s really ridiculous,” said Ackerman, whose daughter Tawni, 10, took the book home Thursday afternoon. “Now it has come to this. … When is it going to end?”

She likened the situation to retailers that use “Happy Holidays” rather than “Merry Christmas” in their displays and advertising.

“First, we can’t say ‘Christmas’ trees. It’s ‘holiday’ trees. Then it’s ‘holiday’ decorations,” Ackerman said. “It just doesn’t make any sense to me.”

So, to the unprincipled Liberty Elementary principal, Janet Travis, the Colleyville school administrators, the ACLU and especially Tom Gardner, president of the Colleyville PTA, “Okie” presents to them the well-deserved Head Up the Ol’ Wazzoo Award, cause these folks haven’t seen the light of day for a looooong time! (db)

Technorati Tags: Liberty Elementary, Colleyville, Janet Travis, Tom Gardner, Keller school district, Debbi Ackerman

I didn’t think that I would get to award another of these so soon, but it just can’t be helped. The Los Angeles Times and it’s columnists Michael Hiltzik and Tim Rutten, along with another Patterico outed comment poster from the Times IP address all combine to be more than worthy.

First, this AM’s Regarding Media Calendar column by Rutten, which is also taken apart extremely well by Hugh Hewitt on his blog where Hugh refers to Tim as “Baghdad Bob Rutten”. Tim seems to take each Saturday as an opportunity to slam bloggers, especially center-right types, and praise the un-biased MSM, especially the LA Times. He seems to revel in stating that he himself has no leftist bias, but his own words constantly betray him on that.

A number of prominent commentators called for jailing three of the [Pulitzer] prize winners.

What’s interesting about these demands is that they didn’t come from people normally dismissed as part of the lacy fringes of the lunatic extreme but from analysts actively involved in the mainstream’s public conversation, albeit from the ideological right.

The targets of their outrage are three journalists who rendered extraordinary public service this year. New York Times reporters James Risen and Eric Lichtblau won a share of the national reporting prize for exposing President Bush’s approval of warrantless domestic wiretaps by the National Security Agency. Dana Priest of the Washington Post was awarded the prize in beat reporting for stories documenting the CIA’s operation of clandestine foreign prisons where terrorists — and those suspected of terrorism — are tortured. [emph mine]

You have to be way left of center to consider that leaking classified information to the press, and the MSM not only releasing, but promoting said classified info to be an “extraordinary public service”, instead of an egregious affront to our national security! But Rutten continues:

In this case, what you have is the latest extension of the right wing’s mantra-like criticism of the American news media. Like the constant hum of traffic, it now seems an unavoidable part of our contemporary life. It’s interesting to recall that it began as a perfectly reasonable — indeed, beneficial — discussion of unexamined bias in newspaper and broadcast journalism and of news outlets’ institutional lethargy when it came to correcting errors. As it turns out, though, addressing those things isn’t what the critics have in mind. They don’t want an unbiased news media, they want a press that reflects their bias.

Actually Tim, “discussion of unexamined bias in newspaper and broadcast journalism and of news outlets’ institutional lethargy” is exactly what we have in mind, and what the MSM seems determined never to do. Why? Because like you, the majority of those that make up the MSM cannot, or will not, avail themselves to become aware of the true nature of their bias. Which is what would lead Hugh Hewitt to make this comment about Michael Hiltzik and his “sock-puppets” that were outed by Patterico this week.

My recommendation: The paper should admit that their journalists are just polemicists who carry their opinions with them into battles they care deeply about. They are as biased as the day is long and getting longer. They aren’t objective, and never have been. They should admit that Hiltzik gave as good as he got, and that this whole Code of Ethics blarney forced him into absurd deceptions because his editors wouldn’t let him swing for the fences.

Let Hiltzik be Hiltzik, and come clean about the paper and its deep commitment to the left and the left’s agenda. It is ex-editor John Carroll who is the embarrassment for spreading that piffle about pseudo-journalists versus the Times. Michael Hiltzik may be the most honest guy at the Times.

Patterico also hammers on Rutten’s column today with Rutten: Hiltzik Critics Can’t Stand the Truth, and then brings to light another very odd occurrence, actually occurrences, of pseudonymous comments to more of his blog posts by someone from an LA Times IP address — someone calling her/himself, Masha.

All of which is much more than enough to earn Rutten, Hiltzik, the Times et all, the not-so-coveted “Head Up The Ol’ Wazzoo Award”! Patterico is an investigative machine! I can’t wait to see what happens next. (db)

   Goes to San Francisco State University’s Donald M. LoweFirst winner of this ol’ Okie’s Head Up the ol’ Wazzoo Award” is San Francisco State University’s Donald M. Lowe, whose letter to the editor was printed in this AM’s Los Angeles Times.

Re “Messianic Fervor Grows Among Iran’s Shiites,” April 15

The article on Iranian messianism suggests that some Westerners are worried Iranians may be irrational. So, are Bush’s messianism and his desire to nuke Iran more rational? I am more worried about Bush’s rationalism than about Iran’s threat.

DONALD M. LOWE

Professor Emeritus of History
San Francisco State University [emph mine]

Just so you know how he really feels, the good prof. has co-written
Against Preemptive War with Tani Barlow, Professor of History and Women’s Studies at the University of Washington, Yukiko Hanawa, instructor in East Asian Studies at New York University & Thomas LaMarre, Associate Professor of East Asian Studies at McGill University. From the book’s description on the Duke University Press website:

In the war on Iraq, the Bush administration has advanced a strategy of preemption—striking in advance of any realized threat. Creating its own reality of war and presenting the destabilization of a supposed threat as a measure of success, preemption allows victories to be declared in advance and justifies violent and unilateral strikes on peoples, on liberties, on perception, and on truth. (…)
(…)
In the introduction, the editors criticize the American press for being, with few exceptions, easily if not willingly deceived by the Bush administration’s propaganda regarding weapons of mass destruction. One contributor redefines fascism as a situation in which contradictions are evident but blatantly ignored, one which creates a false sense of cohesion between events. Another argues that U.S. military bases around the world are now maintained not for military defense and quick mobilization but to create a culture of American militarism[.](…) [emph mine]

Not that it would make any difference to these folk to note that the Clinton administration, and most of the leaders of the Democratic Party, including 2004 Presidential candidate John Kerry, not to mention the rest of the West all thought that Sadaam had WMDs. Shoot, even Sadaam thought that he had WMDs!

But, of course — Bush lied and soldiers died. Same ol’ yadda, yadda from the Left. Remember what I keep harping on here at Okie — You pay good money to send your kids to college and University. Better make sure you’re gettin’ your money’s worth! (db)

Technorati Tags: Los Angeles Times Letters, Donald M. Lowe, San Francisco State University, Against Preemptive War, Duke University Press