The National School Boards Association versus the non-compliant parents
Andrea Widburg (“Bookworm”) has written an article describing the new campaign of the DOJ at the behest of the National School Boards Association:
One of the recurring news stories over the last few months is that parents are speaking out at school board meetings to protest Critical Race Theory, masks, and transgender pressure in their public schools. The schools respond by trying to silence them and there have been a few minor scuffles that local police quickly settled. The National School Boards Association (“NSBA”) responded by demanding help from the FBI—and “moderate” U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland has agreed.
The ostensible reason the feds of the DOJ have been pressed into service is that somehow the local authorities aren’t able to enforce their own local laws, which already prohibit violence and death threats and the like, because of some sort of huge spike in threats that local police can’t handle. But is this the case?:
While the NSBA letter footnotes a number of news stories in support of its request, few of them document actual violence at school board meetings. There is this statement in a report on the famous Loudon County school board encounter: “A third person received a minor injury, officials said, without releasing details.” And in Mendon, Illinois, “school officials attempted to escort Felde out of the meeting when he struck one of them before leaving the school.” It doesn’t sound like a national wave of violence that is too severe for local authorities to handle.
This is most likely just the way for the federal camels to get their noses into the School Board tents, and one of the desired goals is to intimidate the opposition with the fear of being treated as the non-violent (vast majority) of January 6th protestors have been treated.
[NOTE: Here’s the letter the NSBA wrote to the Biden administration. This passage is of special interest, I think:
This propaganda continues despite the fact that critical race theory is not taught in public schools and remains a complex law school and graduate school subject well beyond the scope of a K-12 class.
I’ve heard that sort of argument before: of course we don’t actually teach CRT! That’s like saying they don’t teach genetics or physics or philosophy or economics or almost anything under the sun, which can also be graduate school subjects well beyond the scope of a K-12 class. But of course, those things are taught in rudimentary, more simplistic, and introductory forms. And the anti-racism initiatves (about “white privilege” and the like) are all based on CRT and derive from it, even though that don’t go into the theory of CRT in detail.]
demanding help from the FBI
Could somebody with more legal knowledge than I explain to me what business the FBI has with policing local school boards? It doesn’t seem like a Federal jurisdiction to me. Is there a specific law or precedent for bringing in the Feds when some local school administrator or teacher (presumably) receives a threat from some local parent? And how do the local police feel about being pushed aside since this is evidently some sort of Federal level crime?
This tyrannical abomination from the Department of (In)Justice, presided over by the aspiring commissar Garland (whose confirmation was voted for by nearly two dozen members of the feckless GOPe) should be the final and conclusive evidence for any rational person that this entire illegitimate and fraudulent administration has, in effect, declared war on any and all citizens (whether conservative or not) who dare to question any of its unconstitutional mandates or its pernicious and perhaps even suicidal policies. The oppression against which the colonists felt they were fully justified in their opposition some two and a half centuries ago was as nothing compared with today’s leftist assault on the few freedoms remaining in our moribund republic.
Andy McCarthy is shocked, I tell you, shocked that his oh so moderate buddy Merrick Garland would do something like this.
McCarthy has to be the most naive person in law and media.
Could this administration create a better way to awaken liberal parents to the democrats authoritarianism than to have the DOJ start arresting and prosecuting parents who protest against the demonization of their children?
There are far more virtue signaling liberals than hard core leftists and though they unwittingly enable them, liberals are not leftists. And the majority of liberals are not going to willingly sacrifice their children upon the left’s ideological altar.
Never interfere, when an enemy insists upon acting stupidly.
Nine months ago, McCarthy described Garland on Twitter as a “superb choice” to be AG. commenting that the DOJ would be “in good hands.” One wonders when he will decide to delete this unbelievably stupid opinion.
Nonapod,
Since when have tyrants needed legal validation?
je,
I read the other day the claim that Lindsey Graham has voted to confirm every Biden nominee.
Briefly checked into it and found this; “Senate aides tell us that because of Lindsey Graham—one man—the Biden administration is able to rush its nominees through the Senate confirmation process faster than any other president in memory,” said Carlson. “So the most radical president of our lifetime gets the most judges confirmed thanks to Lindsey Graham.” Tucker Carlson
Griffen,
Not naivete, simply an apologist. As je points out, that he hasn’t spoken out against Garland’s actions more strongly further brings into question his integrity.
Griffin:
I went to the McCarthy article that I believe you are referencing, and I see neither shock nor naivete. Here’s the article. It’s an excoriation of Garland. McCarthy refers back to the way Garland used to be, but only to point out his hypocrisy and double-dealing. McCarthy also mentions this:
McCarthry doesn’t say that he himself believes Garland is a moderate. He’s offering a hypothetical for anyone who DID believe it, and he is expressing no shock at all at his behavior. He is saying Garland’s behavior is inevitable in the Biden administration.
Aggravating on several levels.
I start with the idea of a National School Boards Association. The purpose of a school board is to provide local control of schools. There is no justification for a national association of any kind.
It is appalling that any disagreement with Left Wing functionaries is now defined as harassment, or worse, and justifies law enforcement response. (I won’t mention the lack of response to the street violence that plagued the country over the past couple of years). Basic freedoms are not being eroded–they are being trampled.
Then, as previously noted, there is the rather frightening idea of the National police rushing into local jurisdictions on the flimsiest excuses.
I am beginning to suspect that there is an orchestrated effort by the Left to incite angry push back, if not outright violence, from ordinary citizens. That gives them a pretext to crush opposition.
Footnote: I think Garland’s performance as AG demonstrates that McConnell was prescient when he refused to take up his nomination to SCOTUS.
j e:
I think if you look at what I wrote here, McCarthy no longer thinks anything of the sort about Garland. He doesn’t explicitly reference his earlier opinion, which I think was based on his previous experience with Garland (described in McCarthy’s recent article this way):
He is saying that Garland has become radicalized and now is saying very very different things than he said then. I don’t doubt that that is true.
neo,
I was being sarcastic because as ‘j e’ above said McCarthy was full of praise for Garland when he was nominated just like his good friend Bob Mueller was such an honest straight shooter.
At some point this guy needs to get things at least a little right beforehand if he wants any credit for his criticism afterward.
Playing with fire here. Many parents are deeply appalled. It is one thing to virtue signal with a BLM sign in your yard. It is quite another to find your white student is being abused.
It is not surprising that home schooling is gaining in interest.
The Democratic party is positioning itself to being a rump party of shrill idealists unmoored from reality. Go for it Democrats!
Griffin:
I agree on that. McCarthy – at least initially – keeps being taken in by Lucy and the football. But I think it’s at least somewhat understandable because he has a lot of prior experience with the very same people being far more reasonable. At least now – as opposed to, say, with Comey – it doesn’t take him very long to get up to speed on their present incarnations.
Not all the protests are about CRT. Mask mandates play a very large part of the protests going on around here. We have school board elections coming up this Nov. I am urging my friends to be very “educated” on the various candidates.
… keeps being taken in by Lucy and the football.
Took the words right out of my fingertips. Good grief!
Does McCarthy not understand the developing double standards political and justice systems under Dems? Of course they don’t want to chill speech that promotes hatred of the U.S.A. as preached by the Blind Sheik (if that’s McCarthy’s reference). Hillary worshipped Saul Alinsky who studied under Frank Nitti.
Just don’t try to speak forcefully about defending the original intent of the US Constitution. That’s incitement to violent wrongthink.
So, would the parents be better off legally just challenging their School Board to a gunfight? Maybe in Chicago, anyway.
https://www.thenewneo.com/2021/10/05/gunfight-at-the-chicago-corral/
which gave me a very hard time — though it ultimately relented — when I proposed charging a notorious terrorist with soliciting acts of violence and seditious conspiracy…
McCarthy hasn’t figured out that it’s been who? whom? motivating those types all along.
From Nazis braying Jew privilege to neo-Nazis braying White privilege.
That said, Critical Racists’ Theory presumes diversity (i.e. color judgment). A sincerely held dogma by the Progressive Church, Corporation, Clinic under the Pro-Choice religion (i.e. behavioral protocol).
Throw another baby on the barbie. One step forward, two steps backward.
I would like to hear from someone who knows something about the activities & orientation of the Natl School Bd Ass’n. Their Board has a good many “red-state” members, and in my experience local School Boards are often at odds with their teachers’ unions. But the entire NSBA organization might be something of a fake, if they do not have broad buy-in from the hundreds (thousands?) of local school boards.
As an Armchair Accelerationist, I say Bring it On!
Normie has to be dragged kicking and screaming away from his grilling and shoved head-first through the what perceives to be a somewhat tarnished but still serviceable Norman Rockwell Looking Glass so that he can be made to see up close and personal what Leviathan is and what it’s fixing to do.
Sadly some Normies have to become ‘Examples’ now so that many more won’t be later.
Maybe it’s not even so much Norm Normie but Karen Normie… When she finds out that there’s a Federal Paramilitary response to her Karening the local Educrats, well who knows what her fury might wreak.
@JamesS:
You’re right on the money there. You can bet your bottom dollar that the National School Board Association is subverted. Of course it is.
Executive Director and CEO:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Maria_Chávez
Read it and weep.
But does anyone seriously expect anything else when an organization Goes to Babylon on the Potomac?
One of my daughters worked for the state School Board Association for a while. In theory, it’s an organization which helps school boards with resources. In practice, it was fairly left-wing even fifteen years ago here in NC. The NSBA, then, is that group that provides resources and information to all fifty state SBAs. The fact that it’s strongly left-wing doesn’t surprise me. Many good ideas end up being leftist pressure groups over time. Plus, most of the state and national organizations are tight with the education schools, where conservative thought is anathema.
As Christopher Rufo tweets, “They went from ‘critical race theory doesn’t exist’ to ‘unleash the FBI against its enemies’ in less than 90 days.”
Via the Instapundit. https://twitter.com/realchrisrufo/status/1445427755194073094?s=20
Does a single person that reads this blog actually believe there is any such “epidemic” of death threats against school board members ? I virtually guarantee these are the equivalent of many racist hoaxes over the years, if they exist at all.
Running to the FFBI / DOJ to complain about the “domestic terrorism” of parents confronting the school board doesn’t actually require there be any real death threats whatsoever.
@ Kate > “Many good ideas end up being leftist pressure groups over time.”
Michels’ Iron Law of Oligarchy (“In any organization the permanent officials will gradually obtain such influence that its day-to-day program will increasingly reflect their interests rather than its own stated philosophy”) allied to O’Sullivan’s First Law of Organizations (“All organizations that are not actually right-wing will over time become left-wing”) is pretty much the story of the Gramscian March through the Institutions.
What we are seeing here is also an outstanding example of Conquest’s First Law: “Everybody is reactionary about what he knows best.”
https://web.archive.org/web/20100715191034/https://old.nationalreview.com/flashback/flashback-jos062603.asp
and
and not to be overlooked, in reference to the actions of the GOP, and some conservative pundits who we sometimes excoriate in our Salon:
Deep in the weeds, we find that Jerry Pournelle restated and expanded the law as given by Michels, thereby creating the Iron Law of Bureaucracy which has gained currency through the SF community.
https://americandigest.org/pournelles-iron-law-bureaucracy/
Conquest is often credited with O’Sullivan’s First Law, but he has two legitimate laws of his own, as quoted above. Cf. Steve Sailer:
https://vdare.com/posts/how-and-why-is-conquest-s-second-law-true
Which references this post by Tyler Cowen:
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2021/06/how-and-why-is-conquests-second-law-true.html#comment-160282750
Most of Steve’s text is copied from (or to) his comments at Tyler’s post, in a very interesting discussion for those inclined to perusing the Philosophy of Ideology.
“It is not surprising that home schooling is gaining in interest.” Garrett D Crawford
If the democrats steal enough ‘elections’ to retain their majorites, it’s a virtual certainty that they will move to ‘cancel’ home schooling.
Does anyone here imagine for even a moment that the Left will countenance interference in their indoctrination of the young?
@GB:
All grist to the mill. Will recruit more of the right kind of people to the ranks of dissidents.
“I’ve heard that sort of argument before: of course we don’t actually teach CRT!” (from the post)
That’s one that really angers me. *(*&^%** liars. I’ve heard this from academics based on some fairly nit-picky distinctions that are definitely without a difference at the secondary school level. As always, the left wins the terminology game.
Zaphod said:
>You’re right on the money there. You can bet your bottom dollar that the National School Board Association is subverted. Of course it is.
Executive Director and CEO:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Maria_Chávez
The link doesn’t mention NASB. NASB’s website says Chip Slaven is their interim Executive Director and CEO. https://nsba.org/Executive-Staff
Also it’s plural, Boards.
This is not about School Boards per se; it’s about the Transformation of America.
Lipson is talking here about the two massive bills being tossed around in Congress, but the conclusion applies across the board.
Or Boards.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2021/10/05/its_not_the_top-line_number_–_its_the_bottom-line_goal_146509.html
They have to do something now that the January 6 Rally is over.
https://twitter.com/TheAmishDude/status/1445247022253199361
@Wesson:
Copied and pasted directly out of Wikipedia. Last edit May 23. Chavez may have been replaced since then.
National School Boards Association
Founded 1940
Headquarters Alexandria, VA, Anna Maria Chávez, Executive Director & CEO
Location
United States
Website http://www.nsba.org
As for Slaven:
Slaven has deep government relations experience having served as director of federal policy and intergovernmental affairs for Governor Robert E. Wise, Jr. of West Virginia, and district director for former U.S. Representative Wise. Slaven also served as Counsel to the President and Senior Advocacy Advisor at the Alliance for Excellent Education (All4Ed). A proud product of public education, Slaven received his undergraduate and law degrees from West Virginia University. He is licensed to practice law in the District of Columbia and State of West Virginia.
Democratic Party Apparatchik.
But yes. BoardS. You win.
Leave you to google Alliance for Excellent Education. Suffice to say also Democratic Party Astroturf Org.
Not quite 74 million, but it’s a start.
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/gwendolynsims/2021/10/05/epic-427000-parents-respond-to-national-school-board-association-labeling-them-domestic-terrorists-n1521936
Kevin Downey doesn’t answer his own question, but he adds the School Board Stasi to the growing list of FBI partisan ops.
https://pjmedia.com/columns/kevindowneyjr/2021/10/05/why-is-the-fbi-working-for-the-democrats-n1521928?utm_source=piano&utm_medium=onsite&utm_campaign=-1
The DOJ is practicing for their raids on school PTA meetings.
https://justthenews.com/government/courts-law/fbi-raids-nypd-officers-union-headquarters-and-residence-president
Perhaps it’s just a coincidence, but I’ve seen this graphic a couple of times lately.
https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F03152c46-c574-4c2f-8e28-bd810572b408_1069x1017.png
Look at the red circle at the very bottom.
Maybe time to revisit this September post by Professor Jacobson.
https://legalinsurrection.com/2021/09/why-parental-pushback-against-critical-race-theory-scares-democrats/
My appearance on Chicago’s Morning Answer: “this is an issue that scares [Democrats] terribly because it cuts across racial groups. It cuts across ethnic groups. And it’s very personal to parents. And that’s why they’re hitting so hard on it.”
His newest article:
https://legalinsurrection.com/2021/10/our-new-database-critical-race-theory-infiltrating-americas-25-most-elite-private-k-12-schools/
And one of the things about Turtle Mitch we can actually agree about.
https://legalinsurrection.com/2021/10/thank-you-mitch-mcconnell-for-keeping-merrick-garland-off-the-supreme-court/
We’ll see how long that lasts. Our conservative justices have to live through 1 to 3 more years of Democrats in the slight ascendance.
Comments at LI opine that McConnell ended up doing the right thing with Garland in re SCOTUS, but probably for the wrong reasons, and he wasn’t helpful in any nominations other than the courts. Whatever.
Of note for this topic:
“This entire family has swamp connections
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/blog/2021/10/05/ag-merrick-garlands-daughter-married-to-co-founder-of-company-selling-critical-race-theory-resource-material-to-school-districts/
Mrs Garland advises on election security issues, maybe that is why he [is] so hands off.”
Headlines at Not the Bee often say more than complete articles on other sites.
https://notthebee.com/article/the-fbi-is-now-going-after-parents-who-criticize-critical-race-theory-because-theres-obviously-no-other-riots-plots-or-criminals-more-dangerous-than-loving-parents-who-dont-like-marxism
“So keep speaking up. Keep railing on your woke school boards that see you as a threat to their agenda. Pull your children out of schools if they won’t listen.
If it comes to it, let the world see the FBI of the United States of America hauling away loving mothers and fathers in droves.”
BTW….
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/fbi-counterterrorism-official-admits-agency-doesnt-track-antifa-violence
But knowing “Biden” and “his” plots and plans, this should come as NO surprise.
(Actually, though…it IS a surprise!! I always thought that the FBI tracked antifa but just didn’t do anything about that patriotic non-organization—same as BLM. Instructions from “on high”, you know….)
And so, the GANGSTER government continues apace. (Looks like we’ll have to redefine “G Man”…)
I think Merrick Garland may once have been a moderate with a decent respect for law and the Constitutional guarantees for free speech. But clearly that is no longer the case. What changed? My theory is, he was so damaged by the failed nomination process that he can no longer do his job. To be that close to his long-desired goal; to be left dangling month after month, abused by the other camp and neglected by his own —why, it must have been hell. It broke him. And now all of us must pay the price as he prostitutes himself and his office in mad pursuit of imaginary insurrections.
Just a theory.
Owen, yer far too kind.
The man has sold himself to the Devil he believes—TRULY believes—is the Angel that will save America and usher in a new—MESSIANIC (that’s right)—era.
(“Human Rights” or “Equity” or “anti-rascim” or “anti-fascism” or what have you being just the latest GOD that Garland, all things being equal, ought SURELY understand that he NOT “have before him”…. Alas, these GODS are extremely seductive; as is power; as is making your political opponents suffer (after all, the ends—MESSIANIC ends—justify the means. IOW, Garland’s just another sick little puppy with “Messiah”-wedded-to-“Power” issues…)
It’s becoming a severe problem….
Pursuant to the proposition that any organization not explicitly right-leaning will inevitably drift left, this happened to my former religious affiliation, the Episcopal Church, among many others. And Barry Meislin points out the quasi-religious nature of the new messianic leftism. So I looked up Merrick Garland’s religious identification, out of curiosity. He is Jewish, raised in Judaism by his Jewish mother, and was married in a Reform Jewish ceremony. Like my former church, the Reform movement appears to have largely substituted leftism for Torah. Like my former church, there are still undoubtedly believers amongst them, but when we substitute some human-defined god for the One God, trouble follows. Far better to follow an atheist or agnostic rational way of thinking than to convert to a utopian creed.
Kate @ 10:02: “… when we substitute some human-defined god for the One God, trouble follows.” Amen to that.
For these Marxists, their god is power. Full stop. There is no ideology, no controlling vision that guides or shapes their course. Just “whatever works” to gain and keep control. Setting Oceana at war against Eastasia to mobilize, distract and suppress the populace? Correct: but only every single time.
Lookee here:
They’re actually SLANDERING this man of impeccable MESSIANIC credentials with a claim of CONFLICT OF INTEREST.
With a claim of potential IMPROPRIETY.
Don’t they know that thy’re talking about the ATTORNEY GENERAL of the USA?
Have they no shame?
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/conflict-interest-ag-garlands-family-getting-rich-selling-critical-race-theory-materials
Well, conflict of interest, or a reflection of the family’s sincerely held beliefs, depending on whether or not one agrees with them.
Seen on Twitter:
“Advice to parents: Just chase school board members into bathroom stalls while filming them with your phones and the DOJ won’t bat an eye.”
https://twitter.com/NoahPollak/status/1445542862079234050
DiSantis steps up to counter the “Biden” Department of Injustice and defend its parents:
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/florida-gov-desantis-promises-defend-parents-school-board-meetings-against-doj
Just as Texas steps up to counter the “Biden” Department of Illegal Immigration and to defend the border of his state:
https://www.borderwall.texas.gov/
(Get the pattern?)
Sorry Owen, no. His behavior is perfectly in line with the attitude you’ve been encountering on campus for a generation. Free speech is for peers and protesting parents are not peers. Andrew McCarthy’s tale of him rattling on about free speech for Muslim revanchists is another example of what Mr. Sailer calls ‘leapfrogging loyalties’ and the tendency of people like Garland to manufacture patron-client relationships with hostile exotics. The Muslim revanchists have free speech rights because they’ve been given them by PLU. PLU did not give such rights to ordinary parents or to evangelicals.
An actual advocate of free speech is Jonathan Turley, a man whose general run of viewpoints is quite familiar and conventional. Have a gander at his comment boxes to get a sense of how attentive street-level Democrats react to that. Comments commonly begin with a denunciation JT for being a ‘Fox shill’.
My theory is, he was so damaged by the failed nomination process that he can no longer do his job. To be that close to his long-desired goal; to be left dangling month after month, abused by the other camp and neglected by his own —why, it must have been hell. It broke him
Nothing was done to him. He was nominated, the Senate majority leader says no vote will be scheduled and the chairman of the Senate judiciary committee says no hearings will be held. He was otherwise left alone. That’s ‘hell’? Nothing of the wringer through which Robert Bork, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Brett Kavanaugh were put (not to mention people adjacent to Kavanaugh). They continued to be functional adults.
Art Deco:
Another big free speech advocate is Glenn Greenwald.
Glenn Greenwald is a true journalist. A courageous talent.
By the way, Owen, during Bill Frist’s tenure as Senate majority leader, the Democrats then in the minority were permitted to take advantage of filibusters to prevent confirmation votes on Court of Appeals nominees. See Miguel Estrada, whose nomination was in limbo for 28 months.
Zaphod wrote:
>Copied and pasted directly out of Wikipedia. Last edit May 23. Chavez may have been replaced since then.
Odd. I just checked again. She’s not there, but someone added her May 11 and someone else deleted her May 19 (last edit). Maybe someone is messing with your Web, my Web, or both.