Trump tackles the anti-American anti-history anti-truth indoctrination in our schools
Well, well, well.
Yesterday Trump made quite an announcement:
On Thursday, President Donald Trump announced that he would sign an executive order to launch a “1776 Commission” for American patriotism in education, countering the Marxist critical race theory of The New York Times‘ “1619 Project.” In his remarks, Trump tied the deadly and destructive riots that broke out across America this summer to the noxious ideology of Marxist critical race theory and championed the virtues of America’s founding in opposition to the “twisted web of lies” undermining American patriotism.
“Our mission is to defend the legacy of America’s founding, the virtue of America’s heroes, and the nobility of the American character. We must clear away the twisted web of lies in our schools and classrooms, and teach our children the magnificent truth about our country,” Trump declared.
I don’t even have to use a search engine to figure out the left’s reaction. But my own reaction is twofold. My first reaction is that I am continually astounded at the number of things Trump manages to tackle, all at once, and impressed by his willingness to take controversial stands. My second reaction is “too bad he didn’t do this four years ago, because the hour is late and getting later.” Of course, four years ago the results of the ongoing leftist miseducation of America and its youth hadn’t reached the obvious fever pitch they have today, although leftist educators had nevertheless been doing their work of indoctrinating in leftist wokeness and the “anti-racist” form of racism for many years.
Had any president mentioned it before? I don’t think so. You certainly wouldn’t expect if from Obama. And I can’t imagine Bush saying a word about it, either. Prior to that the signs were more subtle, although they were present.
I finished law school about ten years before CLS (critical legal studies) gained ascendance, so as a student I escaped the changes that it wrought. However, I noted them later on (the 80s and 90s) and followed their development with alarm. CLS was one of the seminal movements behind the entire leftist post-modernist edifice we see today, having burst forth some time ago from its seeming but illusory confinement in the universities and law schools.
As Heinrich Heine wrote: “Thought precedes action, as lightning does thunder.” Indeed.
NOTE: That quote of Heine’s is taken from a larger quote that made my blood run cold when I first read it several years ago. Keep in mind as you read this that Heine wrote it in 1834, making the following prediction about the future of Germany and the world (yes, that’s eighteen-thirty-four, not nineteen-thirty-four) [emphasis mine]:
Christianity – and that is its greatest merit – has somewhat mitigated that brutal Germanic love of war, but it could not destroy it. Should that subduing talisman, the cross, be shattered, the frenzied madness of the ancient warriors, that insane Berserk rage of which Nordic bards have spoken and sung so often, will once more burst into flame. This talisman is fragile, and the day will come when it will collapse miserably. Then the ancient stony gods will rise from the forgotten debris and rub the dust of a thousand years from their eyes, and finally Thor with his giant hammer will jump up and smash the Gothic cathedrals…Do not smile at the visionary who anticipates the same revolution in the realm of the visible as has taken place in the spiritual. Thought precedes action as lightning precedes thunder. German thunder is of true Germanic character; it is not very nimble, but rumbles along ponderously. Yet, it will come and when you hear a crashing such as never before has been heard in the world’s history, then you know that the German thunderbolt has fallen at last. At that uproar the eagles of the air will drop dead, and lions in the remotest deserts of Africa will hide in their royal dens. A play will be performed in Germany which will make the French Revolution look like an innocent idyll.
Manchester, in his preface and suffix to “The Arms of Krupp” says about the same thing, in terms of the aryan crouching in the bushes with his spear.
And some people think the Versailles Treaty caused WW II.
Quite a quote.
People love Heine, but I just haven’t come across his writings before.
Written before the revolution(s) of 1848, post-Napoleon, pre-Marx, pre-Bismarck and the unification of Germany. A unified Germany, what a pox on Europe that turned out to be?
It is very interesting that Trump should be making this push now, with this order coupled with the one about stopping “anti-racism” “training” in the departmental organs the other day. I suppose, Neo, that you’re correct about it being a somewhat delayed reaction (hopefully not too late) made possible by the self-revelation of the CRT activists – I like to think it is a movement of God to cause them to reveal themselves prematurely, but we’ll see – I’m not a prophet. But I hope it’s not just a sort of maneuver to shore up his base. I tend to think it isn’t, but if he should end up losing the election, then these efforts to dial back the madness will necessarily go up in smoke.
Of course, since we are dealing with a German writer, I, as is my wont, went and sniffed out the original citation. That essay ends with a cautionary moral (my translation impromptu):
I wonder if it would be well for those of Trump’s people who will be running this new educational effort to coordinate with the already existing 1776 Unites project, for example.
Meanwhile, at Princeton, the truly egregious Eisgruber seems to be hoist with his own petard. By threatening an investigation, Betsy DeVos is calling the bluff of this spineless administrator whose only function seems to be caving to radical demands and engaging in mindless virtue-signaling.
neo states, “Of course, four years ago the results of the ongoing leftist miseducation of America and its youth hadn’t reached the obvious fever pitch they have today, although leftist educators had nevertheless been doing their work of indoctrinating in leftist wokeness and the “anti-racist” form of racism for many years.
The latest; “BLM Takes Over California Schools”
Pledge to BLM or fail!
https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/09/fitzgderald-video-blm-takes-over-california-sean-fitzgerald/
Yes, in the near future, to graduate from a California public high school… pledging to the left will be required to secure a high school diploma.
Yes, Alinsky them and hold them to their own ‘standards’. If systematic racism is the norm, then every College and University is in violation of multiple Constitutional provisions.
So too with every media outlet and major corporation.
So too with every major professional team sport. Equal opportunity means that only 13.4% of a team can be black. 13.4% of coaches can be black. Let them have what they wish for, “good and hard”.
Diversity refers to individuals or it’s class-based bigotry, an insidious, progressive condition. The one exception is the male and female sexes equal in rights and complementary in Nature.
Philip Sells:
Thanks for the translation.
Heine moved to France in 1831 at around 34 years of age and lived there till his death at 56. So when he wrote that, he actually lived in France and had lived there for many years. He was indeed German and wrote in German (as far as I know), but he spoke French fluently. He had left Germany because of censorship and anti-Semitism.
This is interesting:
That’s obviously not a literal translation, because of the rhyme.
“I wonder if it would be well for those of Trump’s people who will be running this new educational effort to coordinate with the already existing 1776 Unites project, for example.” – Philip
My first thought, reading the announcement last night, was, “Trump must have been talking to the 1776 Unites people.”
He has made a lot of allies in the black religious establishment, as well as with the historically black universities.
(IF we can keep Betsy DeVos 4 more years, we might chip away at the Gramscian Education Complex!)
I don’t think the pollsters are tapping into the full anti-BLM, anti-Antifa community.
Regarding the timing, it’s a tricky political art. You can’t introduce a program that nobody yet thinks is needed, which is why things have to get really bad sometimes before you can get enough people pushing the bandwagon to turn it around. Case in point: Churchill in the lead-up to WWII.
I think President Trump is very good at seeing where the new crowds are going and jumping out in front of them, especially when he is already marching that direction.
In re the passing of Justice Ginsburg: that just upped the ante for the election!
We know Trump’s proposed pool of replacements; Biden (or Harris) will now have to come up with a Democrat slate.
“I like to think it is a movement of God to cause them to reveal themselves prematurely” – Philip
Erm, well, Trump saying he’s going to sign an executive order about something he’s seen in the news, I’m not sure it means much.
The people who have to carry out that order are not elected and can’t be fired, and are the ones bringing things like the 1619 project into the schools and the workplace in the first place…
BTW, put this in the folder marked”with friends like these….”
https://pjmedia.com/columns/rick-moran/2020/09/18/trumps-misguided-effort-to-give-kids-a-patriotic-education-n941754
In the abstract, his point is that kids need a balanced presentation of American history – the bad and the good.
Which is true, although I don’t think he made sufficient allowance for starting with the Good while they are young, and introducing the Bad when they are old enough to actually understand the complexities of life and history.
However, when the house is burning down, you don’t argue about how the it should have been built, you just get the hoses running.
Geofrey made a comment elsewhere that is relevant.
https://www.thenewneo.com/2020/09/17/remember-the-protestors-who-harrassed-patrons-sitting-outdoors-at-a-restaurant/#comment-2515487
I hope we can re-establish 1776 without the War, if possible.
It will never be done without some kind of fighting, legal and political.
One story shows why Trump’s initiative is so important.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/leahbarkoukis/2020/09/18/blm-indoctrination-enters-4th-grade-classroom-n2576455
Trump is like pulling all the wishes from Ymar’s wish bag.
So funny.
The same reason people hate on Trump is the same reason people hate on Ymar. Except people don’t have the excuse of a fake news excuse when it comes to Ymar.
What you see is what you get.
In Fairfax, Virginia, the teachers don’t want the parents to look at what they are teaching the students with distant learning. People can now see the leftist propaganda being taught to their children and they are making angry calls to the local talk radio station.
There are teachers who are pro-Revo. Note the number of teachers arrested in the Antifa/BLM riots. How much are they pushing Revo in their classrooms? I am reminded of a conversation I had with a magnet school student some 2 decades ago. Being a magnet school student, he was bright, but also very contentious. He said that he wanted to become a high school teacher so that he could “educate” students to become lefties.
He got a math degree, continued his contentious political ways, and ended up teaching English in Latin America for about a decade. He came back home and recently began a new career as a high school math teacher. His decade of teaching English will probably help his teaching math. His politics haven’t apparently changed, as one can find online a comment where he supported Evo Morales’s attempt at vote fraud in Bolivia. I would not be surprised to find out he is pushing politics as much as he can in his classes. Bring on the Revo! After all, it worked so well in Latin America. 🙂
I suspect that his contentiousness is rooted in not having a functional father. His father did get a degree, got A’s in some challenging courses, and did have a job for several years. His bipolar father later became addicted to various substances and spent his life in and out of treatment facilities, the street, and prison. For decades he hasn’t held a job for more than a couple of days. His son the math teacher (for now) blames government for not assisting his father sufficiently. At least the son isn’t addicted to any drugs.
You can’t be systemically racist and have more than one third black mayors in the largest 100 cities.
@ Gringo: “Note the number of teachers arrested in the Antifa/BLM riots. ”
Interesting (well, sorta). I’m not too surprised. I also heard a number were counselors as well. Good grief. Anyone have the link?
GRA
@ Gringo: “Note the number of teachers arrested in the Antifa/BLM riots. ” Interesting (well, sorta). I’m not too surprised. I also heard a number were counselors as well. Good grief. Anyone have the link?
Boston Globe: Five Arrested ast Providence Protest Against Police.Those arrested including local educators….
Jul 26, 2020 Lauren Matthias, 30, of South Kingstown, a teacher at the Paul Cuffee School, a charter school in Providence, was charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest.
13 ‘Antifa Teachers’ Arrested in Portland: Viral Mugshots Explained
Only one could be confirmed to have worked in education, but there was not an indication that they worked in public schools.
There was a posting claiming that 13 arrested in Portland were teachers. Snopes called it “unproven.” I have found a list of 300+ arrested in Portland riots, but no job data.
https://dailycaller.com/2017/09/01/public-school-teachers-behind-violent-antifa-group/
Ray on September 19, 2020 at 10:34 am said:
In Fairfax, Virginia, the teachers don’t want the parents to look at what they are teaching the students with distant learning. People can now see the leftist propaganda being taught to their children and they are making angry calls to the local talk radio station.
* * *
But will the parents remember this once kids are back in
jailschool without their supervision?