What’s news today?
Let’s go to Egypt first.
From Naharnat.com
“Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi assumed sweeping powers on Thursday, putting him on a collision course with the judiciary and raising questions about the country’s democratic future.
The move, just a day after Morsi took diplomatic centerstage in brokering a ceasefire between Israel and Gaza’s Islamist Hamas rulers, earned him the same derisive monicker of “new pharaoh” leveled at veteran strongman Hosni Mubarak before his ouster in a popular uprising last year.”
“The constitutional declarations, decisions and laws issued by the president are final and not subject to appeal.”
The move is a blow to the pro-democracy movement that toppled Mubarak last year, and raises concerns that Islamists will be further ensconced in power.”
More here from Yahoo
“Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi triggered controversy on Thursday by issuing a decree likely to lead to retrials of Hosni Mubarak and his aides but which was compared to the ousted leader’s autocratic ways.
As well as ordering retrials for Mubarak-era officials responsible for violence during the uprising against his rule, the decree shielded from legal challenge an Islamist-dominated assembly writing Egypt’s new constitution.
It gave the same protection to the upper house of parliament, dominated by Islamists allied to Mursi, and assigned the president new powers that allowed him to sack the Mubarak-era prosecutor general and appoint a new one.”
Well, when you back radicals, don’t be surprised when you get some radical moves like this.
From Al-Monitor.com
“Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood’s official website said yesterday [Nov. 19] that the Egyptian presidency is considering replacing Prime Minister Hisham Kandil with Khairat al-Shater, the deputy leader of the group.”
“It should be noted that Shater, among others, was excluded by the Presidential Elections Committee in Egypt from participating in the elections. The first round of voting took place between 13 candidates last May, whereas the second round took place between current President Mohammed Morsi and the former prime minister, Ahmed Shafiq, last June.
A security source confirmed that Mounir Thabet, the brother-in-law of Egypt’s former president Hosni Mubarak was arrested yesterday morning.”
See what I mean?
UPDATE——————-
From France24
“Protesters torched Muslim Brotherhood offices on Friday, state media said, as supporters and opponents of President Mohamed Morsi staged rival rallies across Egypt a day after he assumed sweeping powers.
The offices of the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), the Muslim Brotherhood’s political arm, were set ablaze in the canal cities of Ismailiya and Port Said, state television said.
An FJP official told AFP the party’s office was also stormed in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria, where clashes broke out between rival demonstrators.”
And also the JPost
“Morsi’s decree exempting all his decisions from legal challenge until a new parliament was elected caused fury amongst his opponents on Friday who accused him of being the new Hosni Mubarak and hijacking the revolution.
Morsi’s aides said the decree was to speed up a protracted transition that has been hindered by legal obstacles but Morsi’s rivals were quick to condemn him as a new autocratic pharaoh who wanted to impose his Islamist vision on Egypt.
“Morsi a ‘temporary’ dictator,” was the headline in the independent daily Al-Masry Al-Youm and hundreds of protesters in Tahrir Square, the heart of the 2011 anti-Mubarak uprising, demanded Morsi quit, accusing him of launching a “coup”.”
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This, also from the MidEast, is just sad.
From France24
“Denied the right to travel without consent from their male guardians and banned from driving, women in Saudi Arabia are now monitored by an electronic system that tracks any cross-border movements.
Since last week, Saudi women’s male guardians began receiving text messages on their phones informing them when women under their custody leave the country, even if they are travelling together.”
“”The authorities are using technology to monitor women,” said columnist Badriya al-Bishr, who criticised the “state of slavery under which women are held” in the ultra-conservative kingdom.”
GRINCH ALERT!
From ConnecticutCBSLocal
“For some, the idea of Christmas coming early is anything but welcome.
Local shop owner Sarah Hamilton-Parker, tired after years tolling bells sounded by Salvation Army workers for hours on end during the holiday season, took matters into her own hands by reaching out to local authorities to complain about the noise.”
“After asking the Salvation Army directly for peace and quiet – and attempting to drown out the noise with everything from ear plugs and bell-like music in her shop – Hamilton-Parker finally reached out to the local authorities to see if the bell-ringing falls under the jurisdiction of the city’s noise ordinance.”
Thankfully police shot her idea down.
Here’s another via Breibart
“Arkansas Atheists are upset that a local elementary school plans to send second graders on a field trip to see a stage production of “A Charlie Brown Christmas” at a church.
Anne Orsi, Vice President of the Arkansas Society of Freethinkers, an atheist organization, told KARK said a parent complained to the group about the event because the play had “religious content” and was being performed at a church.
“We’re not saying anything bad about Charlie Brown,” Orsi said. “The problem is that it’s got religious content and it’s being performed in a religious venue and that doesn’t just blur the line between church and state, it over steps it entirely.””
Grinch’s are bad enough. The (not as rare as they used to be) Whining Grinch is even worse.
Small businesses are unhappy with ObamaCare? This is the first they’ve heard about it.
More from HotAir
And here’s yet another reason to dislike ObamaCare, as if you needed another.
From Breitbart
“Taxpayers — through Obamacare — are funding Planned Parenthood to allow the organization to expand its sexual education and “risk reduction” program for ninth graders in places like southeastern Virginia.
Critics say the program does more to glorify and encourage sex than educate about its risks, even though Planned Parenthood has insisted the program teaches that “abstinence is the best and safest choice.”
Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Virginia has received money from a $75 million pool set aside as part of Obamacare to teach the “Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP).”
And that’s just Virginia PP’s cut. I’m sure plenty of other state PP’s are getting some too. Looks like another one of those “gifts” that helped buy the election that Romney mentioned.
Wandering Views 
The news from Egypt may be good news. I welcome most actions that stifle democracy in the Arab world. We live in interesting times. In Eastern Europe, much of Asia and parts of Latin America the move toward democratic government is going relatively well. In the Arab world and most of Africa the people are clearly not ready to govern themselves.
Then there is the US which increasingly reminds me of the Weimar Republic or perhaps Italy after WWII.
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As a mother, I WANT TO BE THE ONE TO EDUCATE MY CHILD ABOUT SEX. Not the government and not planned parenthood.
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People have sex? Who knew?
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the ascendent of the muslim brotherhood is unfortunate but not surprising. They are far better organized and have a better ground game then the kids who occupied the square and were responsible for the end of mubarak. However, they are over reaching here and will probably have to pull back on the power grab if they wish to maintain a stable regime.
Kim, you would think most parent would share your opinion but surprisingly every year most tell me “better you than me” as I begin the growth and development portion of the health curriculum. Most surprisingly, this attitude is also found among the muslim parents.
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HRW, Egypt is not Iowa. Egyptians (and other Arabs) respect strength above all else, sort of like Germans in 1933.
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Agreed but I think the kids who helped overthrow Mubarak have been embolden enough not to tolerate an other authoritarian regime. I think the brotherhood will soon realize it needs to step back or there will be some blowback. Apparently the media is already pushing back so i have some hope.
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“However, they are over reaching here and will probably have to pull back on the power grab if they wish to maintain a stable regime.”
I doubt that is their goal. They just want power. Radical Islam is not well-known for logic and reason.
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“People have sex? Who knew?”
But not us. Everyone knows conservative Christians are against it. 🙂
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HRW, Are the “kids” the same ones who raped the reporter who was covering them in the square?
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HRW’s “health” course that gets into sexuality is a good example of weak and misguided academic curricula. Well educated students don’t need to be taught health and sexuality, subjects that are easy enough to learn well on one’s own and are better taught by family, church, and the general culture. At all levels of education schools should rigorously teach language, the liberal arts, science, and mathematics.
Public school teachers often adhere to secularist values and ideology that are the subtext of the subjects they teach. There is a growing salutary view that parents should have the option with public financial support of pluralistic religious schools that would adhere to rigorous academic standards in context of serious moral and ethical values. European schools often have a variety of Christian and Jewish academies.
No serious Christian parents want their children taught “health” by secular ideologues that despite their smarmy rhetoric don’t value rigorous subject matter and serious moral values.
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I might add that serious academic schools focusing on English, history, modern and classical languages, sciences, and mathematics simply don’t have adequate time to teach such subjects as “health.”
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Well educated students don’t need to be taught health and sexuality, subjects that are easy enough to learn well on one’s own and are better taught by family, church, and the general culture.
Good point until the last two words. The “general culture” includes the pop culture. I don’t want Lady Gaga or Hollywood liberals teaching anyone about the birds and the bees.
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Thanks, Peter. I meant to say a general culture in a well ordered society with strong religion, something that our culture woefully lacks.
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Sails, as I stated in a previous thread, your proposal serves a niche market (mainly the governing elites) but would not serve as a curriculum for a universal public education system. A public education needs to serve the needs of the whole. The origins of modern public education rests on its need to serve society — the Prussian military and the English market economy, in particular. From this origins, public education continues to be about society as much as it is about the individual. At its most explicit, we have corporations telling the the Ministry/Dept. of Education what they want taught .. ie work place skills. In a more subtle manner, public education serves the needs of society providing active informed citizens who want to make a positive contribution to their community.
The health curriculum serves the business community by providing workers already educated in health and safety, inter-personal relationships, etc. And it serves the greater community in much the same way including preventive public health care (example STD prevention). As much as one would think health and sexuality can be “learned well on one’s own”, I’m continually surprised by how little middle school students know in that regard. If they were to learn on their own (trial and error??), society may well end up cleaning their mistakes.
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HRW, With changes in the world economy, we need to structure our education for the elite, or we will continue to become more uncompetitive. Those incapable of handling the elite education should go to trade school. Trade school should end at age 16 and its graduates should become apprentices.
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One size fits all education yields the lowest common denominator.
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In general I agree. Most European school system start preliminary “streaming” at about 12 years of age and then stream even more at 15-16. At that point, students are directed to gymnasium (ie humanities/social science pre-university) science/engineering pre-univeristy, managerial/business, high trades (tool and die, electrical, etc), manual trades (carpentry, masonry) and service. Sails is advocating a gymnasium style programme but that only serves 10 to 20% of the population.
Having an education system only for 10-20 % will not help in the world economy. Having a diverse universal public education system is the way to go.
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kbells — and therein lies the problem for North America. Popular ideology supports a universal system where everyone starts equally and combined with parents who don’t always face reality means North Americans sort their kids out far too late and are often saddled with a lower common denominator. Equality of opportunity should not be confused with equality of results — something parents confuse (as some did today in parent teacher interviews.
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Here’s an idea; school choice.
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I agree with HRW that No Child Left Behind is built on a false premise. KBells is right about choice. If the schools were then allowed to set their own entrance standards, many more would then get the type of education which Sails advocates and which our sharpest kids desperately need.
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I live in a school district where students pick their high school subject only to availability and sometimes parents absorbing the transportation costs. High schools actively compete for students and some offer specialty programming. However, academic results are no different and there is still a university or bust mentality. At the elementary level, parents occasionally register their kids in out of catchment schools with no penalty or consequence. In the end, school choice doesn’t improve outcomes and does nothing other than allow parents to be more involved and sometimes over strategizing their child’s education career.
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School choice doesn’t result in higher academic standards rather the creation of pet programmes which appeal to parents. My daughter’s high school has a strings program, home construction, international baccalaureate (Sail would like that), and french immersion (my daughter’s program). Other high schools have a sports academy, performing arts, junior hockey program, self-paced program, etc. Its a boutique approach.
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HRW, In major cities in the US, school choice may be the only way for poorer parents to get their kids out of horrible schools.
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Ricky- and those of us in rural areas are stuck with either the local school or a long drive to a good school. Perhaps it’s time a gain for the one-room school house for the elementary levels.
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HRW, your view that firrst-rate school education is for the “elites” is pure leftist flapdooodle.
Our competitors in countries including Finland and Singapore far outclass us with first-rate common school education at far less expense. These countries on the essentials of subject education and do not get involved with such superfluities as “health” and other fills such as guidance counsellors and elementary school libraries filled mostly with trash literature.
Conrad Black who has a Tocquevillean understanding of America writes that America has declined to about the middle of major modern countries. In an NRO article, America’s Slide from Greatness, he suggests the following as the possible main reasons for America’s decline:
Far too large a proportion of the country’s human capital has been squandered in a failed state education system, a gigantic and corrupt and oppressive criminal-justice and custodial system, and a system of public health and medical care that seriously disadvantages the lower economic third of the population and is more than twice as expensive per capita as systems of other countries that, on balance, provide as good a service. Too much has been spent in duplicative or hypertrophic national defense, including wars from which the country did not gain anything and that it need not have fought, or fought at such high cost, in people and in resources.
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