8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

1/20

DUCK DYNASTY 

>PSSPL 9VILY[ZVU VU [OL

Z[PUN VM -HP[O HUK 7\YWVZL

HIGHER ED

;OL ;VW -P]L >H`Z *VSSLNLZ

>HZ[L @V\Y 4VUL`

WORLD

4HWWPUN [OL 9PZL VM *OYPZ[PHU

7LYZLJ\[PVU (YV\UK [OL .SVIL

ENERGY 

0[»Z *SLHU 7V^LYM\S HUK 9LSPHISL

:V >O` +V >L -LHY 5\JSLHY 7V^LY&

=63 56 WWW.THEBLAZE.COM

;9

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

2/20

Protect your family in a crisis with

25-year shelf life survival food from

getfood22.com 

Dear friend,

There are some people out there who

think folks like you and me are a bit “odd”.

They think having a stockpile ready for a

disaster is something they can put off for

“someday” or “never”.

But those people are just hiding their

heads in the sand. They are dead wrong

-- and you are dead right.

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

3/20

3 4(@     THEBLAZE 

PROGRESSIVE TRACKER

Keeping an Eye on ‘Those Guys’VOL. 4; NO. 4MAY 2014

PUBLISHERGlenn Beck

CEOChristopher Balfe

PRESIDENT & CHIEFOPERATING OFFICER

Carolyn PolkePRESIDENT & CHIEFCONTENT OFFICER

Joel Cheatwood

PRESIDENT & CHIEFSTRATEGY OFFICER

Betsy Morgan

EDITOR IN CHIEFScott Baker

EXECUTIVE EDITORChris Field

ASSISTANT EDITORSharon Ambrose

CONTRIBUTING EDITORSessie Adams, T. Becket Adams,

Sara Carter, Oliver Darcy,illy Hallowell, Jason Howerton,Liz Klimas, Elizabeth Kreft,

d Lucas, Madeleine Morgenstern,Michael Opelka, Erica Ritz,

Sharona Schwartz, Jon Seidl,Buck Sexton, Dave Urbanski

LAYOUT & DESIGNAC Graphics

DIRECTOR OF STRATEGYAmber Hovey

TECH DEVELOPMENTnton Jacobsen, Hamid Younessi

PRESIDENT & CHIEFREVENUE OFFICER

Kraig Kitchin

VICE PRESIDENT OF SALESJeremy Price

SALES DIRECTORBrad Samuel

TIONAL ACCOUNT MANAGERSatherine Astalos, Cathy Deary,

Scott Kline, Stephanie Lia,llison Luchetti, Benjamin Pratt,

Linde Thurman

SALES ASSISTANTTerrie Huberman

ANAGER, CLIENT SERVICESLauren Glass

he Blaze ISSN 1930-7322

published monthly (combinedsues in Jan/Feb and July/ug) ten times a year for $34.95

Mercury Radio Arts, Inc., 1133venue of the Americas, 34thoor, New York, NY 10036. Peri-icals postage paid at New York,

Y, and additional mailing offices.

OSTMASTER: Send addresshanges to: The Blaze, POox 16586, N. Hollywood, CA615-6586.

2014 All rights reserved.hotocopying, reproduction quotation strictly prohib-

ed without written permissionom the publishers. Unsolicit- material cannot be acknowl-ged or returned.

 

Kooky, but more annoying than anything else

 

Suspicious

 

Mind-bogglingly insipid

 

Boarding the bus to Crazy Town

Red Alert!

Echoing the sentiments of Sen. Pryor, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi,D-Calif., declared on CNN’s “State of the Union” that Democrats definitely willbe running on ObamaCare in the 2014 midterm. “The members are proud ofwhat they’ve done, are happy to not run away from what we have done. We areproud of what we accomplished,” she said. “There may be a few [Democrats whodon’t like ObamaCare], and some of them weren’t there to vote for the bill, someof them were there and didn’t vote for the bill, but they’re the exception. Demo-crats embrace the Affordable Care Act. We are very proud of it.”

Famously thuggish Rep.Jim Moran, D-Va., isfeeling bad about hisand his colleagues’ mea-ger salary of $174,000—he wants members ofCongress to be able to“live decently in Wash-ington.” Moran told CQRoll Call : “The Ameri-

can people should knowthat the members ofCongress are under-paid. I understand thatit’s widely felt that theyunderperform, but thefact is that this is theboard of directors forthe largest economicentity in the world.”

Sen . Mark Pryor ,D-Ark., one of several

 vulnerable incumbentsin 2014, was asked on

Little Rock’s local NBCaffiliate if, knowingwhat he knows today,he still would have

 voted for ObamaCare.Pryor responded thathe would have, claim-ing that, when crafting“big,” “difficult” and“complicated” legisla-tion like this, “if youget 80 percent of thisright, you’ve really

done something—weprobably did get 80percent of it right.”

Democratic California state Sen. LelandYee, who represents über-progres-sive San Francisco, has been one ofthe most ardent anti-gun legisla-tors in America—so much sothat he’s bonded closely with thefamously anti-Second Amend-

ment former CNN primetimehost Piers Morgan. Lee was ar-rested in late March on arms-trafficking charges. (He alsofaces corruption charges, including that he took tens ofthousands of dollars in campaign contributions and cashin exchange for supporting contracts for clients andinfluencing legislation.) According to CBS News, Leeoffered to set up meetings between arms traffickersseeking automatic weapons and shoulder-fired missilesand Muslim separatists in the Philippines. The senatorgot pinched when a trafficker he was conspiring withturned out to be an undercover FBI agent.

GOP Sen. Thad Co-chran, Miss., is facing aserious primary chal-lenge this year from TeaParty candidate ChrisMcDaniel. When it wasreported that McDaniel

would be taking part inthe FreedomWorksFreePAC event in Ken-tucky where Glenn Beckand other small-govern-ment, anti-progressivepersonalities would beappearing, the Cochrancampaign attacked. Co-chran, a longtime D.C.insider, blasted his op-ponent for not focusingon Mississippi.

bigstockphoto

   C  o  v  e  r  p   h

  o   t  o  :   b   i  g  s   t  o  c   k  p   h  o   t  o

http://marketplace.theblaze.com/

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

4/20

4   THEBLAZE  4(@

FIREWIRE

ENERGY

Fracking Creates Job Boom; Solar Panels—Not So MuchRecent joblessness data reveals that the lowest un-employment can be found at a natural-gas boom-town while the highest is located in a solar-panelmanufacturing community.

Midland, Texas, has a 2.9 percent unemploymentrate, the lowest in the country, reports the Washing-ton Free Beacon. Located in West Texas, the town isalso one of the fastest-growing metro areas in thenation thanks to its robust fracking industry.

Conversely, Yuma, Ariz., has the highest unemploy-ment rate of any U.S. metro area at 26.1 percent. Yumais home of the Aqua Caliente solar plant, which is “thelargest photovoltaic solar generation facility in the

world.” e facility also received a $967 million loanguarantee from the Department of Energy in 2011.

“It represents the difference between an industrywhich exists of its own accord, by providing goods

and services that people actually want to buy, and anindustry that exists only by the grace of government,which acts to mandate demand and subsidize supply,”William Yeatman, an energy policy expert with theCompetitive Enterprise Institute, told the Beacon.

“It should be intuitive that job creation is morerobust around the industry that succeeds on themarket due to its own merit, vis-à-vis that whichcannot succeed without favorable politics,” he added.

SCIENCE

Giant Virus Frozen in Siberian Permafrost for 30,000 Years RevivedA virus, which experts say is pretty large by microbestandards, was frozen for 30,000 years in the Siberianpermafrost, but scientists were recently able to reviveit—and, yes, it’s still infectious.

Named Pithovirus sibericum by a team of Frenchscientists, the 1.5 micrometer-long virus is transmis-sible to unicellular protists, like amoebae.

“e revival of such an ancestral amoeba-in-

fecting virus used as a safe indicator of the possiblepresence of pathogenic DNA viruses, suggests thatthe thawing of permafrost either from globalwarming or industrial exploitation of circumpolarregions might not be exempt from future threatsto human or animal health,” the study’s abstract,published in the Proceedings of the National Acad-emy of Sciences, stated.

SURVEILLANCE

Court DenouncesFAA Ban on‘Paper Aircraft’Though the FederalAviation Administra-tion (FAA) is workingon guidance that willopen up the skies fordrone use, it has beenstrict on a ban against

the use of unmannedaerial vehicles for pri-

 vate and commercialpurposes. But now theNational TransportationSafety Board (NTSB) isbattling against thispolicy.

e NTSB court re-cently ruled that theFAA’s rules “lead to aconclusion that thosedefinitions include as

an aircraft all types ofdevices/contrivancesintended for, or usedfor, flight in the air. eextension of that con-clusion would then re-sult in the risible argu-ment that a flight in theair of a paper aircra ora toy balsa wood glidercould subject the ‘op-erator’ to the regulatoryprovisions of [the]

FAA.”The FAA is appeal-ing the judge’s decision.“The agency is con-cerned that this deci-sion could impact thesafe operation of thenational airspace systemand the safety of peopleand property on theground,” a FAA spokes-man told TheBlaze atthe time, declining to

comment further due topending litigation.

FAITH

Christian Persecution on the Rise WorldwideThe persecution of Christians “has increased over the last10 to 15 years,” said Ed Clancy, director of evangelizationand outreach at Aid to the Church in Need, in an inter-

 view with the Catholic News Agency, adding that “per-secution has many faces, unfortunately, and many places.”

Since there is no single threat to Christians across

the world, he said, but myriad forms of oppression, “itmight become more incumbent on the CatholicChurch, and Christians in general, to be aware of themany dangers that Christians face in the world. … Inother places (than the United States) they’re facingmany, many challenges.”

CUBA

BELARUS

MALI

TURKEY 

SYRIA

IRAQ  IRAN

TURKMENISTAN

UZBEKISTAN

AFGHANISTAN

CHINA

INDIA

PAKISTAN

MALDIVESSRI

LANKA

BURMA

LAOS

VIETNAM

NIGERIA

ZIMBABWE

BOSNIA-HERZE-

GOVINA

TANZANIA

SUDAN

EGYPT

ISRAEL

AND

PALESTINE

SAUDIARABIA

 YEMEN

ERITREA

NORTH

KOREA

INDONESIA

EXTREME

HIGH TO EXTREME

HIGH

MODERATE TO HIGH

MODERATE

bigstockphoto

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

5/20

5 4(@     THEBLAZE 

FIREWIRE

EDUCATION

Get Sensitive: College Lectures Staff on ‘Heterosexual and Gender Privilege’Staff at Western Washington University (WWU)are being trained to understand the advantages of“heterosexual privilege” and “gender privilege.”Campus Reform reports that performance reviewshave turned into “sensitivity trainings”

Put on by the dean of students, staff are expectedto sit through lessons on the topics of “gender priv-ilege,” “heterosexual privilege,” “nationality privi-lege” and “language privilege.”

 “e primary theme of the meetings makes

people considered privileged feel guilty and mi-norities feel self-pity,” a WWU staff member told

Campus Reform anonymously.Once mandatory, the meetings are now optional

aer some voiced opposition to the subject matter. Deanof students eodore Pratt said that, while “there’s alwaysgoing to be someone that may find some issue,” the over-all feedback his office has gotten has been positive.

“What we do is if there are areas of people that aremaybe marginalized or seem to fall between thecracks, or if you’re looking at veterans, people withdisability, maybe it’s women, gender issues, religious

issues, we want to make our staff sensitive,” Pratt toldCampus Reform.

ENVIRONMENT

Global Food Supply Triples, but Climate AlarmistsWarn of Global ‘Mass Destruction’

In the face of dire warnings from climate change doom-sayers regarding the world’s food supply, crop yields aredoubling and tripling. James. M. Taylor of the Heart-

land Institute reports that the world’s crops are doing just fine despite reports to the contrary. Scientific Amer-ican recently ran a story titled “Fortified by GlobalWarming, Deadly Fungus Poisons Corn Crops, CausesCancer.” Time claimed that “Climate Change CouldCause the Next Great Famine” and argued, “A new

study finds that, as the planetwarms, yields for important

staple crops like wheatcould decline sharply.”

  But this sim-ply isn’t true, accord-ing to Taylor’s re-

search. “Global corn,rice, and wheat pro-

duction have more than tripled since 1970. e Unit-ed States is experiencing a similar explosion in cropproduction, with corn and rice production more than

tripling since 1970,” he counters. “During the past fewyears, the United States has set crop production re-cords for alfalfa, cotton, beans, sugar beets, sweet po-tatoes, canola, corn, flaxseed, hops, rice, sorghum,soybeans, sugarcane, sunflowers, peanuts, and wheat,to name just a few.”

Even so, politicians are not giving up. Secretary ofState John Kerry recently announced that climatechange is a “top-tier diplomatic priority.” “Protecting ourenvironment and meeting the challenge of global cli-mate change is a critical mission for me as our country’stop diplomat,” Kerry wrote in his first Policy Guidance.

 In February, Kerry also suggested climate change

was “the world’s most fearsome weapon of massdestruction.”

SURVEILLANCE

Will Gov’t UseGrocery StoreDiscount CardsTo Spy on You?

A Canadian study rec-ommends that healthadvocates, such as gov-ernments and policymakers, use the datagleaned from populargrocery store customerdiscount cards to targetunhealthy communities.

“We’ve taken datawhich most grocery andconvenience stores gen-erate with digital scan-

ners to identify items atcheckout. Companiesuse these data and pro-duce information formarketing and otherpurposes,” said DavidBuckeridge, a publichealth physician and as-sociate professor at Mc-Gill University. “Wedeveloped a way to usethese data towards apositive public health

initiative: routine moni-toring of eating habitsover time in particularpockets of a city to re-

 veal which populationsconsume foods that cancontribute to negativehealth outcomes.”

The study said thatneighborhoods foundto have poor eatinghabits could be targetedby health agencies with

messaging that encour-aged healthier choices.

SOCIETY

Doomed: NASA Study Warns of ‘Impending Collapse’It’s the end of the world as we know it, or so warns areport sponsored by NASA’s Goddard Space FlightCenter.

e study, which has been accepted for publica-

tion in the peer-reviewed Elsevier journal, Eco-logical Economics, says that the industrialized na-tions of the world have, in their pursuit of energyresources, created an unsustainable model that’sdoomed to implode on itself creating a power vac-uum and chaos.

 “Technological change can raise the efficiencyof resource use, but it also tends to raise both percapita resource consumption and the scale of re-source extraction, so that, absent policy effects,

the increases in consumption oen compensatefor the increased efficiency of resource use,” thestudy reads.

So what’s the solution? Well, as summarized by

Dr. Nafeez Ahmed, executive director of the Institutefor Policy Research & Development, in the U.K.Guardian newspaper, the fix suggested by researcherswon’t be pleasant (and seems unlikely to succeed).

“e two key solutions are to reduce economicinequality so as to ensure fairer distribution of re-sources, and to dramatically reduce resource con-sumption by relying on less intensive renewableresources and reducing population growth,” Ahmedwrote.

bigstockphoto

bigstockphoto

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

6/20

6

HOLLYWOOD INSIDER

MPAA Wooing ConservativesIs Hollywood starting to shift rightward? It could be possible. The MotionPicture Association of America (MPAA) has been lobbying hard to makelaws tougher against online piracy and is starting to court Republicans inthe process. The MPAA has a new lobbying group that strongly favors Re-publican candidates. The Wall Street Journal  reports that Hollywood ishistorically known for supporting Democrats, “yet Republicans are morephilosophically inclined to side with the industry’s goals of copyright protec-tion, free trade and lower taxes.”

In a report about the MPAA, Melanie Sloan, executive director of the non-profit organization Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said,“While Hollywood’s money has typically gone to le-leaning politicians andcauses, the MPAA has been working hard to shore up its credentials with Re-

publicans through donations to conservative organizations and Republicanpoliticians.”

Rich Actress Who Could

Give More to Gov’t Is Apparently

Waiting To Be Forced

“Sorry RNC -rich people

SHOULD pay higher taxes

because they can afford

it. End. Of. Story. xo a

rich person”—Actress Kristen Bell on Twitter

Testing ofFaith andPurpose“I loved it. …There was atesting of theshow [lastyear] … Arewe just in thisfor the money,for the fame,or is theresomethingbigger?”

—”Duck Dynasty”

star Willie

Robertson in

an interview

this spring with

Breitbart News

on the dustup

surrounding

his father Phil’s

comments about

the gay lifestyle in

GQ last December

D.C.

Corruption:

You Can’t

Make It UpActress Robin Wright,who plays Claire Un-derwood on the hitNetflix production“House of Cards,” pro-claimed in a recentinterview with CapitolFile   magazine that“D.C. is more corruptthan Hollywood.”

One of the detailsthat caused her to ar-

rive at such a conclu-sion reportedly camefrom a “senior person”in the Obama adminis-tration who told herthat—like on the hitshow—reporters reallydo sleep with their D.C.sources.

That apparentlywasn’t all she learnedwhile discovering whatgoes on in Washing-

ton, while researchingher role as a powerfulpolitician’s wife. She

 just didn’t reveal ev-erything she was told.“D.C. is more corruptthan Hollywood. It re-ally is. It’s more sleazythan Hollywood …[considering] howmuch infidelity goeson,” Wright said.

Standing for Character in the Pages of CosmoIn an unusual move, Christian principles like chas-tity, character and respect were endorsed on thepages of Cosmopolitan magazine. The eldest daugh-ters of Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, who are fa-mous for having 19 children and sharing their lives

with the world on their reality TV show “19 Kidsand Counting,” were recently interviewed by thefeminist publication. The girls, Jana, Jill, Jessa andJinger promoted their beliefs of purity until mar-riage and encouraged young women to have moreself-respect.

Cosmopolitan delicately asked the girls questionslike, “Have you ever gotten any heat for being vir-gins?” and “So at what point do you hook up witha guy?”

“We’ve set our guidelines really high, and peoplewill not understand that,” Jessa explained. “ey’llbe like, ‘at’s weird. How are you going to show you

really love the guy if you’re not having sex with himbefore marriage?’ But that’s where we purpose, inthis stage of our relationship, to focus on building

strong communication, because anyone can just goout and have sex.”

She added, “In today’s day and time, it’s a little bitstrange to be in your early 20s and have not had sex,but it’s how our parents did it. It’s how our grandpar-

ents did it. We have a self-respect where we feel con-fident in who we are, even apart from having a sexu-al relationship.”

ey were also asked what advice they wouldgive to troubled young stars like Miley Cyrus andJustin Bieber.

“It’s important for whoever—whether it’s Miley,Justin, anyone in the spotlight—to understand theyhave a whole host of people looking up to them,”Jill said. “ey’re not just speaking for themselves.e heart of the matter is having good characterand setting an example. Let’s not focus on even theglam and sex but really encouraging good charac-

ter and taking a stand for purity and respect. Be-cause respect is last in our culture today and in popstars.”

THEBLAZE  4(@

bigstockphoto

bigstockphoto

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

7/20

7 4(@     THEBLAZE 

HOLLYWOOD INSIDER

Privileged Left-winger Doesn’t Like BeingCalled ‘Privileged’ by Left-wingersIs the Left turning on Lena Dunham? The star of HBO’s “Girls” and out-spoken feminist revealed in a podcast interview that she has been accusedof being a “privileged oppressor.” Dunham is well-known among con-

servatives for supporting President Obama’s re-election with a suggestivedouble entendre ad called “Your First Time.”

More recently, the Daily Caller reports that she is starting to feel theheat from young progressives. She recounted a memorable experiencewhile talking with comedian Marc Maron on his podcast.

Dunham was asked by the student newspaper at her alma materOlberlin College, “How does it feel to be a line item in so many people’sstories of privilege and oppression?” is question led Dunham tobelieve that she is viewed as a “privileged oppressor.”

She clarified that these questions are from people who see her “op-pressing others with the force of my privilege,” she clarified. She addedthat some feel that “Girls” is not “diverse enough” and fails to accu-rately represent a cross-section of New York. “What’s painful for me is

when the attacks become personal,” she said. “‘You are a privileged girl.You are a racist. You don’t understand real suffering.’ Like, that’s whenit starts to feel like it’s ringing in my head and like it’s too hard.”

No Opinions

Allowed in

Hollywood—

Just Anger

“They screamfor tolerance,they scream forfreedom ofspeech, but ifyou disagree atall with whatthey’re saying,then they canblacklist you.They have thepower to dothat. I meanHollywooddoesn’t owe meanything. I getit. I understandthat but, on thesame side, it’slike ‘OK, whycan’t I have anopinion? Whydoes that costme jobs?’ Imean there’s somuch anger …in Hollywood.It’s weird. Theirargumentsaren’t logical.They aren’tbased on fact. …They just havean anger.”

—Actor Kevin Sorbo 

on being an independent

in Hollywood during

an interview at

Beliefnet.com

NBC Sitcom To Do First Lady’s Nagging for HerThe first lady is taking her “Let’s Move” campaign toprime time. Michelle Obama is slated to appear in theseason finale of the NBC sitcom “Parks and Recre-ation.” According to the network, the show was “filmedin late February in Miami where [Mrs. Obama] cele-brated investments in healthier out-of-school pro-

grams as part of her ‘Let’s Move’ initiative dedicated tosolving the challenge of childhood obesity.”

Obama is not the first to politic on the comedy—other notables who have appeared on the show in-clude Vice President Biden, Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Barbara Boxer, D-Calif.

Maher Boosts Leno, Likens to IsraelJay Leno got an unexpected endorsement from Bill Maher who recently in-ducted Leno into the TV Hall of Fame. According to Deadline.com, Mahersaid at the event that Leno is a “fantastic stand-up.” He dubbed Leno’s 20-plus-year run of hosting “e Tonight Show” as a drive down a highway in “somegiant gleaming pristine luxury car with the competition far in the rearview

mirror—except one time when NBC,” driv-ing some beat-up clunker, “blindsided himand beat the sh*t out of his beautiful car.”

Maher said Leno is a victim of “some badpublicity over the years” and that he did notdeserve the reputation for stealing “ConanO’Brien’s dream,” Maher opined, calling it,“the most hysterical thought I’ve ever heard,in a business known for bullsh*t.”

“Jay reminds me a little of Israel. Heisn’t perfect, but he’s held to standard Idon’t think anybody in the world is ex-pected to live up to but him.” Maher con-tinued, calling Leno “the most Machiavel-lian and also the most morally uprightperson I know in show business. He will

hide in a closet but never needs a confes-sional booth.”

Comedian Claims:Pregnant MenWould WantAbortionsActor Ricky Gervais ispro-abortion and he’snot ashamed to say it.

On Twitter he said,“If right-wing Christian

men were the ones whogave birth, there wouldbe abortion kits in pub

 ve nd in g ma ch in es .”Among the backlashone person retortedand said that “a child’sbody belongs to thechild,” and that it is theparent’s job to protectthat child. Gervais’ re-sponse before quicklydeleting it? “You’re con-

fusing ‘child’ with‘bunch of cells.’”bigstockphoto

bigstockphoto

http://deadline.com/http://beliefnet.com/

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

8/20

8   THEBLAZE  4(@

COVER

BY SHARON AMBROSE

Standing at the podium, George S.Counts had his audience enrap-tured. The University of Chicagoprofessor argued that in order for

progressive education to be truly progres-sive it needed to “come to grips with life inall of its stark reality” and “fashion a com-pelling and challenging vision of humandestiny and become less frightened than itis today at the bogies of imposition andindoctrination.” He argued for a change inAmerica’s social order through the class-room curriculum.

When Counts concluded his speech, theroom was silent. en there was some qui-et chatter that grew into excited discussionand support among the participants. e

crowd had fully embraced his unflinchingphilosophy. His presentation was so well

received that most of the remaining plansof the 1932 Progressive Education Associa-tion meeting was suspended so that thedelegates could reflect on this bold direc-tion for progressive education. As Counts’fame grew, he was emboldened and pub-

lished papers saying that “there is the fal-lacy that man is born free” and “there is thefallacy that the child is good by nature.”

American progressives have long rec-ognized the power of the American edu-cational system—now they have made ahuge power grab with the establishment ofthe Common Core standards. rough aseries of closed-door meetings that createdtop-down policy changes, this new cur-riculum was quietly injected into Ameri-ca’s classrooms following PresidentObama’s 2009 stimulus bill. States were

awarded with $4.35 billion worth of “Raceto the Top” grants if they adopted certain

standards and requirements developed bythe U.S. Department of Education. Today,parents, teachers and grassroots organiza-tions throughout the country are shiningthe light on the dangers of Common Core.

But progressives from government and

Big Business are doubling down. U.S.Education Secretary Arne Duncan saidthat he found it “fascinating” that some ofthe opposition to Common Core hascome from “white suburban moms who—all of a sudden—their child isn’t as bril-liant as they thought they were.” Seventy-two CEOs hailing from corporations thatusually like to stay out of the political fray,including Harley-Davidson, GeneralMills and Xerox, placed a full-page ad inthe New York Times claiming that the cur-riculum will meet the “business commu-

nity’s expectations.” Which leads to thequestion: Why is Common Core so im-

C

VAL

Witness the progressive education scheme in action. America’s education system is

being fundamentally transformed. Instead of fostering a generation of thinkers, today’s

children are being indoctrinated with leftist philosophy while their privacy is beingcompromised by huge data-mining systems with private interests. If fully implemented,

Common Core will serve as progressives’ greatest weapon against American freedom.

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

9/20

9 4(@     THEBLAZE 

COVER

portant to progressives? Is Common Corereally about helping America’s kids suc-ceed, or is it more about keeping progres-sives in power?

The true value of Common Core be-comes apparent when considering whatprogressives from today and the past havesaid about their vision of the education

system and of the United States.

Language Arts Standards:eading Isn’t Funda ental

“Children who know how to think forthemselves spoil the harmony of the col-lective society which is coming whereeveryone is interdependent.”

—John Dewey, 1899

The fundamental theme of CommonCore’s English language arts (ELA) stan-

dards is a focus on non-fiction “informa-tional texts.” e ELA standards were fash-ioned so that elementary students read nomore than 50 percent classic literature andhigh school students may read only 30percent classic literature. e other 70 per-cent is comprised of informational texts.Items on the Common Core-recommend-ed reading list include historical docu-ments, insulation installation manuals,presidential executive orders, environ-mental programming and even FederalReserve documents.

The curriculum advocates a “closereading” of a text in which students areasked to analyze what they’ve read strict-ly from the available text without a whiffof historical context. One Common Coremanual provides this explanation forteachers giving a lesson on the GettysburgAddress: “This close reading approachforces students to rely exclusively on thetext instead of privileging backgroundknowledge, and levels the playing field forall students as they seek to comprehendLincoln’s address.”

Color teachers doubtful.English teacher Jeremiah Chaffee post-ed his experience with the lesson plan atthe Washington Post . He felt that the lessonis “too scripted,” does not trust the studentsto “direct any of their own learning” and“presents a narrow and shallow view ofteaching and learning.”

“This gives students a text they havenever seen and asks them to read it with nopreliminary introduction. is mimics theconditions of a standardized test,” Chaffeewrote. “Asking questions about, for example,

the causes of the Civil War, are also forbid-den. Why? ese questions go ‘outside the

text,’ a cardinal sin in Common Core-land.”One Washington state English teacher

who asked to remain anonymous toldeBlaze, “When I read the new CommonCore reading requirements, I told our de-partment chair, ‘This is ridiculous—they’re cutting out the classics. And I’mnot doing it.’”

Close reading discourages studentsfrom including their own views and experi-ences. It also narrows the scope on majorhistorical events. Will the Constitution haveany impact without understanding theyears of oppression the colonists endured?Will Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have ADream Speech” be lost without a soundknowledge of racial segregation? Perhapsmore concerning is that this method teach-es students to accept the information thatthey are given without question. If studentsare told that they are reading a non-fiction

document from the EPA, how likely wouldthat same student question the validity ofman-made global warming? Being spoon-fed “non-fiction” government documentsmeans that a generation can grow up ac-cepting all government documents as truth.

Institutionalizing Bias

“Our major concern consequently shouldbe, not to keep the school from influenc-ing the child in a positive direction, butrather to make certain that every Pro-

gressive school will use whatever powerit may possess in opposing and checkingthe forces of social conservatism andreaction.”

—George S. Counts, 1932

The Common Core curriculum has thepotential to become the most effective re-cruiting tool for progressives. EducationAction Group News (EAG News) reportsof a newly published Common Core-aligned textbook that “encourages third-graders to learn about ‘rights and respon-

sibilities’ from a story covering the 1985SEIU-led janitors strike in Los Angeles.”“e Bluest Eye” by Pulitzer Prize-win-

ning author Toni Morrison is a CommonCore-approved book but has since beenbanned from several schools because of itsexplicit depiction of rape, incest, sexual

 violence and pedophilia.A Common Core-approved book for

first-graders by the National Catholic Educa-tional Association celebrated families headedby same-sex couples—“e Family Book”was yanked aer an outcry from parents.

The bias even seeps into CommonCore’s approved math instruction. For ex-

ample, a sixth-grade lesson plan created bythe National Council of Teachers of Math-ematics asks students if they think the 2000presidential election between George Bushand Al Gore was “fair.”

And a math lesson for third-gradersinstructs teachers to “start the lesson byengaging students in a discussion about the

presidents of the United States. You mightask: What factors influenced our last pres-idential race? Are there typical character-istics of a person running in any presiden-tial race? ere are many answers to thesequestions. If no students suggest party af-filiation and age at the time the personenters office, bring these characteristicsinto the discussion.” Not only do thesequestions appear distantly related to math,they are also politically charged.

Math Standards: Fuzzy at Best

“We want one class of persons to have aliberal education, and we want anotherclass of persons, a very much largerclass of necessity in every society, toforgo the privilege of a liberal educationand fit themselves to perform specificdifficult manual tasks.”

—Woodrow Wilson, 1909

“We have in the past taught algebra andgeometry to too many, not too few.”

—William Heard Kilpatrick, 1925

The mathematics Common Core stan-dards apply the constructivism philoso-phy—a technique that requires students to“construct” understanding of math prob-lems. Advocates claim this will help buildcritical-thinking skills. Traditional formsof math lessons, including the tried-and-true memorization of multiplication tables,are not required. In fact, eighth-graders inCalifornia are no longer required to takean algebra class as the state moves to alignitself with the new standards.

“e math standards focuses on inves-tigative math, which has been shown tobe a disaster,” Glyn Wright, executive di-rector of Eagle Forum, told Fox News.“With the new math standards in theCommon Core, there are no longer abso-lute truths. So three times four can nowequal 11 so long as a student can effec-tively explain how they reached that an-swer.” Wright’s comments weren’t someout-of-the-blue criticism of a myth aboutCommon Core but were in response towidely panned statements from an Illinois

school district official.During a Common Core town-hall

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

10/20

10   THEBLAZE  4(@

COVER

meeting last summer, Amanda August, acurriculum coordinator in a suburb ofChicago, explained to a group of parentsthat, though all students should come upwith the same correct answer regardlesshow they do the math problem, they’reless concerned with wrong answers. “Un-der the new Common Core, even if they

said three times four was 11,” said August,“if they were able to explain their reason-ing and explain how they came up withtheir answer, really in words and in oralexplanations and they showed it in a pic-ture, but they just got the final numberwrong, we’re more focusing on the howand the why.”

When one parent asked whether wronganswers would be corrected, August at-tempted to clarify. “Absolutely. Absolutely.We want our students to compute cor-rectly,” she said. “But the emphasis is really

moving more towards the explanation, andthe how, and the why, and can I really talkthrough the procedures that I wentthrough to get this answer—and not justknowing that it’s 12, but why is it 12? Howdo I know that?”

Confirming that the emphasis on mul-tiplication tables is out and time-consum-ing, multi-step processes are in (see “FuzzyMath” sidebar), August told parents, “eyare supposed to not only be able to comeup with the same answer no matter howthey do it but they’re going to have to show,

‘OK, I know three times four numericallyis 12, but I can show this in a picture, I canwrite a real world situation where I showthat if I put four apples into three bagsthat’s going to give me 12 total apples.’ Sothey’re going to have to be able to go backand forth between all those different mo-dalities and really show that.”

Stanford Prof. James Milgram, the onlymathematician on the Common CoreValidation Committee, rejected the finalmath standards. He called the curriculum“in large measure a political document”

during testimony he gave in May 2011where he advised Texas lawmakers againstimplementing the Common Core cur-riculum.

“I had considerable influence on themathematics standards in the document.However, as is oen the case, there was in-put from many other sources—includingstate Departments of Education—that hadto be incorporated into the standards,” hesaid during the testimony.

“A number of these sources were main-ly focused on things like making the stan-

dards as non-challenging as possible. Oth-ers were focused on making sure their

favorite topics were present and handled inthe way they liked,” he said.

Co on Core’s ProgressiveSugar Daddy

“Education is thus a most powerful ally ofhumanisim, and every American public

school is a school of humanism. What canthe theistic Sunday schools, meeting for anhour once a week, teaching only a fractionof the children, do to stem the tide of a five-day program of humanistic teaching?”

—C.F. Potter, 1930

Progressives do not want to stop at Com-mon Core. Consider what former IBM CEOand one of the big names behind the stan-dards, Louis Gerstner Jr., wrote in a Decem-ber 2008 op-ed for the Wall Street Journal .Gerstner contended that “nowhere is the

progress more worthy than the crisis in ourpublic education system.” He called for“more time in school each day, and a longerschool year.” More radically he said that theUnited States should “abolish all local schooldistricts, save 70 (50 states, 20 largest cities).Some states may choose to leave some of therest as community service organizations,but they would have no direct involvementin the critical task of establishing standards,electing teachers and developing curricula.”

at’s just the tip of the agenda for pro-gressives’ business allies.

e greatest single force behind Com-mon Core is the Bill and Melinda GatesFoundation. e Microso founder’s non-profit has donated at least $150 million tothe cause, money offered up to any stake-holder—unions, colleges and universities,state education departments, think tanksand chambers of commerce.

Gates insists that Common Core is amild and reasonable approach to bettereducation.

In a February op-ed inUSA Today , Gateswrote, “These are standards, just like the

ones schools have always had; they are nota curriculum. ey are a blueprint of whatstudents need to know, but they have noth-ing to say about how teachers teach thatinformation. It’s still up to local educators toselect the curriculum.”

He doubled down in March when hetold the American Enterprise Institute, “Tobe clear, it’s not [a] curriculum, it’s not atextbook, it’s not a way of teaching.” Later inthe interview he appeared baffled that Com-mon Core has “somehow gotten to be con-troversial.”

ough Gates likes to act incredulous atthe controversy surrounding Common

Core, critics point to his own admissionthat standards are designed to create a cur-riculum. At the 2009 National Conferenceof State Legislators (NCSL), he pronounced,“When the tests are aligned to the commonstandards, the curriculum will line up aswell—and that will unleash powerful mar-ket forces in the service of better teaching.”

More recently, James Pellegrino, amember of the technical advisory boardfor the Smarter Balanced Assessment Con-sortium (SBAC) and the Partnership forAssessment of Readiness for College andCareer (PARCC), the consortia chargedwith developing assessments aligned to theCommon Core State Standards, backed upthis claim. He told Education Week inMarch, “We in the assessment communityhave got to get much closer to the world ofcurriculum and instruction.”

Just to get a grasp on Gates’ progressive

bona fides, consider the unflinching en-dorsement of “death panels” the billionaireoffered at the July 2010 Aspen Ideas Festi-

 val in Colorado: “at’s a trade-off societyis making because of very, very high med-ical costs and a lack of willingness to say,is spending a million dollars on the lastthree months of life for that patient—would it be better not to lay off those 10teachers and to make that trade-off inmedical cost? But that’s called the deathpanel, and you’re not supposed to havethat conversation.”

Gates, who placed ahead of the Pope inthe 2010 USA Today /Gallup Poll as the fihmost admired man in the world, has arguedagainst the free market. He claimed in 2010that while capitalism does some amazingthings it has “systemic problems in that theneeds of the poorest will not be prioritizedthe way they would if you put a more hu-man-values-driven system in. … Govern-ment comes in for the things the marketdoesn’t work well on.”

He also believes that children in develop-ing countries ought to be constantly moni-

tored and held accountable for vaccines viatracking technology. “If you could registerevery birth on the cell phone, get fingerprints, get a location, then you could take thesystems where you go around and make surethe immunizations happen,” he said at the2010 mHealth Summit in Washington, D.C.

Co on Core Database Syste sAre Big Business

“Certainly the high school must preparestudents for life. Whether, in addition, it

shall constitute itself a Public Employ-ment Bureau, finding positions for stu-

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

11/20

11 4(@     THEBLAZE 

COVER

dents, keeping in touch with their ca-

reers, and assisting in their advancement,

is a matter yet to be determined.”—Scott Nearing, 1915

Gates-style monitoring of the health ofAmerica’s kids would be a seamless pro-gression with databases now made legaland mandatory thanks to the policiesattached to Common Core.

The National Education Data Modeldefines the types of data with which statesmay populate their databases and has iden-tified hundreds of attributes characterizingstudents, including, “health care plan,” “in-

surance coverage,” “family income range,”“religious affiliation” and “voting status.”Many other attributes including eye colorand blood type once available for inclusionwere nixed aer public outcry. Under thelaw, states are mandated to store this infor-mation and are allowed to start collectingthis data when a child is in preschool andcan follow him into his working adult life.

States did not have to search long tofind such a database, because Gates hadone ready to take on the task. Launched inFebruary 2013, inBloom touts itself as a

technological tool for teachers to “easilytailor education to the needs, skill level,

and learning pace of each individual stu-dent.” e Gates organization gave $100

million to fund this massive databank de-signed to amass the confidential informa-tion of American school children.

is database is the result of a Big Busi-ness collaboration. e inBloom tool is con-tracted with Wireless Generation, a NewYork-based educational analytics and as-sessment firm that was purchased by RupertMurdoch’s News Corp for $390 million in2010. Jeffrey Bezos’ Amazon will host thecloud that will store the student data.

New York City education advocate Le-onie Haimson reports that inBloom has

come under attack from New York Cityparents furious that their children’s person-al information will be gathered by a privatecompany and stored on a vulnerable datacloud. “If this information leaks out or isimproperly used, it could stigmatize a childand damage his or her prospects for life. estate and the city are setting themselves upfor multimillion-dollar class-action suits ifand when these data breaches occur,” shewrote in the New York Post .

In fact, the Gates Foundation has beenfunding a number of new monitoring and

data-collecting technologies, which hasprivacy advocates on high alert. A bioen-

gineer from the University of Californiaat San Diego (UCSD) received a $100,000

grant from the Gates’ Foundation to de- velop a tattoo-like device that can moni-tor the vital signs of pregnant women indeveloping countries. According to re-ports from UCSD, “The device couldtransmit signals to a mobile phone andupload them to the cloud so that a doctorelsewhere can review them.”

e foundation has also given $1.4 mil-lion worth of grants to select researchers tostart testing a biometric bracelet. Whenworn by students, it can measure vital sig-nals to determine how students are re-

sponding to classroom lessons. Debbie Rob-inson, a spokeswoman for the GatesFoundation, told Reuters that “we needuniversal, valid, reliable and practical in-struments” such as the biosensors. ough,almost admitting that there are fears overthe potential risks of such technology, sheadded, “It’s hard for one to say what peoplemay, at some point, decide to do with this.”

Gates and other tech giants such as Appleand Google are anticipating huge profits fromCommon Core. e Silicon Valley Business

 Journalreports that the education/technology

sector is expected to more than double in sizeto $13.4 billion by 2017. at growth is driven

Co n CorWhat is it?e Common Core State Standards is

the establishment of consistent K-12education standards across the country.Forty-five states and the District of Co-lumbia have adopted Common Core.e states that have rejected it are Texas,Virginia, Alaska and Nebraska. Min-nesota has adopted the English languagearts (ELA) standards but not the math-ematics standards.

How Was It Implemented?e curriculum was buried in PresidentObama’s 2009 stimulus package. Cash-starved states were offered $4.35 billionthrough the Department of Education’s“Race to the Top” grant program if theyadopted Common Core. Even if a state didnot win a grant, it was still required toalign with Common Core, which debunksthe myth that the effort was “state-led” asthe program’s proponents like to claim.

When do the standardsgo into effect?

While the timelines for implementationamong the states varies, the two majorstate consortia that developed assess-ments aligned with Common Core—thePartnership for Assessment of Readinessfor College and Careers (PARCC) and theSmarter Balance Assessment Consortium(SBAC)—will be ready for full implemen-tation for the 2014-15 school year.

What sub ects are impacted?Currently English language arts (ELA)and mathematics are the only subjectscovered in Common Core. ere is, how-ever, a special section under the ELA stan-dards that addresses the use of fiction andnonfiction in science, social studies andother technical subjects. e National Sci-ence Teachers Association has alreadyapproved of the Next Generation ScienceStandards (NGSS), which, according tothe NGSS website, is working “toward the

integration of the NGSS and CommonCore in the classroom.” ere are also ef-forts to create standards that align withCommon Core in the subjects of worldlanguages and the arts.

Does it affect home-schoolersor private school students?Yes. While Common Core officially isrequired only for public schools, thereare big implications for private andhome-school students. Standardizedtests that colleges rely on to determinestudent acceptance are aligning with theCommon Core curriculum. Also, theinformation of privately educated stu-dents is expected to be collected by thestatewide longitudinal databases that arerequired under Common Core. At theNational Conference on Student Assess-ment in 2011, officials from Oklahomadescribed the challenge of meeting thedata requirements of federal and stateeducation policies and explained thatthey are motivated to “include studentgroups not now included (e.g., home-schooled) in the data system.”

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

12/20

12   THEBLAZE  4(@

COVER

12

by the digital learning and testing mandatesof Common Core. Gates revealed at the 2009NCSL, “For the first time, there will be a largeuniform base of customers eager to buy prod-ucts that can help every kid learn and everyteacher get better.”

With the uniformity that CommonCore creates among the states, Gates knows

that companies like Microso will be ableto deliver the only product available to themasses for education purposes, either viastandardized tests, textbooks or digitallearning tools.

Curriculum writer and author RobertD. Shepherd contends that inBloom alonewill reap massive revenues for Gates. “erewere 55,235,000 K-12 public school stu-dents in the U.S. in 2010. At $5.00 apiece forinBloom, that would amount to$276,175,000 a year,” he postulated on thewebsite of education watchdog Andrea

Garbor. “And if inBloom had a large exist-ing database, it would become a monopolyprovider. Switching from it would be nextto impossible.”

The End Ga e

“A dying laissez-faire must be completelydestroyed and all of us, including the‘owners,’ must be subjected to a largedegree of social control. The major func-tion of the school is the social orientationof the individual. It must seek to give him

understanding of the transition to a newsocial order.”—Willard Givens, 1935 

A fully implemented Common Core hashuge ramifications for America. Its agen-da-driven lessons will discourage diversethought and opinion. Its data-mining pro-gram has the potential to virtually elimi-nate the notion of civilian privacy. And itwill empower Big Business progressiveswho will profit from it all.

A defeat of Common Core is essential

in the fight for liberty in America. Andthere is no better time than now to invali-date George Counts’ assessment of Amer-ica when he said:

“Already we live in an economy which, inits function, is fundamentally cooperative.ere merely remains the task of reconstruct-ing our economic forms and of reformulatingour social ideals so that they may be in har-mony with the underlying facts of life. eman who would live unto himself alone isnow a public enemy; the day of individualismin the economic sphere is gone.”

Americans must choose: individuals orthe collective?

y Mate Common Core math standards serve to make simple mathematics more compli-cated. Here’s one example of the types of “new math” many parents and teachers havebeen criticizing:

Add 26 + 17 by breaking apart nu bers to ake a ten.

Use a nu ber that adds with the 6 in 26 to ake a 10.Since 6 + 4 = 10, use 4.

  Think: 17 = 4 + 13

  Add 26 + 4 = 30

  Add 30 + 13 = 43.

  So, 26 + 17 = 43.

Parents in Atlanta, Ga., received a note from elementary school officials who attemptedto clarify the Common Core math philosophy. In it, moms and dads are told that theirtraditional methods of doing math is part of the “old language” and that this new system

will create a “deeper understanding” of math for students. Education watch group Truthin American Education obtained the full letter—hereeBlaze has compiled some of thehighlights:

OLD LANGUAGE NEW LANGUAGE

word proble ath situation

carry the one regroup ten ones as a ten

borrow take a ten and regroup it as ten ones

*add increase

*subtract decrease

* ore than/fewer than co pare

How do you know?  evidence

*Please note that we do still use “add/subtract, ore than/less than,” but we interchange it with the

new language you see listed beside each of these words to create a deeper understanding.

The old way to solve

an addition proble :

The new way to solve

an addition ath situation:

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

13/20

TOGETHER,

WE CAN DO MORE  SO GOVERNMENT DOES LESS.

 WWW.MERCURYONE.ORG

http://www.mercuryone.org/http://www.mercuryone.org/

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

14/20

OUR  F A V ORI TE

14   THEBLAZE  4(@

FEATURE

14

T

ed Turner ruined my childhood.In 1990, Turner created a Sat-

urday morning cartoon that mademe afraid that everything I didhurt Mother Earth. That show, “CaptainPlanet and the Planeteers,” was pure eco-propaganda. The general storyline was a6-year-old Al Gore’s dream. Five kids aresummoned by “Gaia” (voiced by WhoopiGoldberg for the first three years) to fightagainst big corporations and their devastat-ing Earth-killing activities. When the battleis too much for the kids to take, they canpool their powers (Earth, Wind, Fire, Water,Heart) together and summon “Captain

Planet” who, of course, saves the world fromthe brink of utter environmental disaster.Captain Planet’s most menacing nem-

esis was a character named “DukeNukem”—a mutated giant glowing blockof yellow yuck. e toxic terror’s goal wasto turn Earth into one big radioactive zone,and he introduced himself as the “Radia-tion king, at your service. e ignorantscall me a mutant, I prefer to think of myselfas the future of mankind!”

A nuclear-power-themed eco-villain thefuture of mankind? In the early ’90s, that

 just seemed ridiculous. Everyone knewDuke Nukem was a bad guy and, therefore,

by association, so was nuclear power.I had nightmares of Duke setting off nu-

clear reactors in my bedroom, mutating myteddy bears into gruesome fluffy piles of goo.But Duke Nukem was hardly the first char-acter to embody the fear of nuclear power.

A year before “Captain Planet and thePlaneteers” promoted childhood eco-ter-rorism, “e Simpsons” introduced us toCharles Montgomery Burns, Homer Simp-son’s excellently evil boss and owner of theSpringfield Nuclear Power plant.

In the early ’80s, DC comics introduceda cunning adversary for Superman called“Neutron.” A former security guard at a

nuclear power plant, Neutron had the mis-fortune of being caught in a meltdown,turning his body into nuclear energy con-tained in a special suit. When battling Su-perman, Neutron could also call for helpfrom members of the supervillain NuclearLegion: Professor Radium, Geiger, Nuclear,Mister Nitro and Reactron.

In 1962, “Dr. No” permanently etchedtwo distinct images in our culture forever:Ursula Andress’ white bikini and hiddenisland nuclear power facilities used forworld domination.

Welove

 tohate

 nuclear power.We perceive nuclear energy as some-

thing to be feared, something uncontrol-lable, something evil that must be combat-

t ed w i t h ou r mos t mora l (a n dmake-believe) do-gooders. at percep-tion is so embedded in our culture that ittrumps all fact about the energy source.

When people think of nuclear power,disastrous images are conjured up—therotting Ferris wheel near Chernobyl, JaneFonda protesting ree Mile Island, andlittle Japanese children trying to enjoy lifewith medical masks on.

Most people do not think sunshine,rainbows and lollipops when they thinknuclear power.

What’s the Truth? For an episode of “e Wonderful Worldof Stu” on eBlaze TV, we went out andproved just how terrifying people thinknuclear power is. When asked how manyAmericans have died as a result of nuclearmeltdowns at power plants, people an-swered from 17 to an incredible 100,000.e real answer? Zero.

Of course the average person is going tothink this way when organizations likeGreenpeace characterize nuclear power in

the most cartoonishly evil way possible.When you’re bombarded with images of

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

15/20

15 4(@     THEBLAZE 

FEATURE

activists in gas masks carrying signs declar-ing, “Nuclear is going to blow up the plan-et!” you’re not going to feel warm and fuzzy

about the energy source.e truth about nuclear power has long

been overshadowed by outlandish and falserepresentation. Totally uninterested in thefacts, Greenpeace even managed to com-pletely dismiss one of its founders, PatrickMoore, when he began sharing truth aboutnuclear power instead of fearmongering.

Jane Fonda didn’t have her facts straightwhen she was protesting ree Mile Islandfollowing its 1979 partial meltdown (heranti-nuclear propaganda film “e ChinaSyndrome” had been fully embraced by the

Le earlier that year). Neither did PatrickMoore at the time, but he later came to theconclusion that ree Mile Island was infact a success story. “e concrete contain-ment structure did just what it was designedto do—prevent radiation from escaping intothe environment,” Moore wrote in an April16, 2006, op-ed for the Washington Post. “And although the reactor itself was crip-pled, there was no injury or death amongnuclear workers or nearby residents.”

Despite what their former founder says,the world will never see Greenpeace activ-

ists outside ree Mile Island—which isstill in operation and powering 800,000homes from its undamaged reactor today,by the way—with posters that say “reeMile Island Is A Success Story!” and “LongLive ree Mile Island!”

What about Chernobyl? What hap-pened April 26, 1986, was no doubt terri-ble. But it was an accident waiting to hap-pen: The Soviet reactor simply had nocontainment vessel.

Greenpeace tells the story of Chernobyllike it’s an NC-17 horror film. In 2006, the

organization released its own report, “eChernobyl Catastrophe: Consequences on

Human Health,” on the fatalities caused bythe meltdown at Chernobyl, and their find-ings seemed catastrophic. ey predicted

“approximately 270,000 cancers and 93,000fatal cancer cases caused by Chernobyl.”The report also concluded that an addi-tional 60,000 people have died in Russiabecause of the Chernobyl accident and thatanother 140,000 deaths could occur inUkraine and Belarus.

at’s an incredible number comparedto the World Health Organization’s officialestimate that up to 4,000 people could  dieeventually of radiation exposure fromChernobyl.

What is the total fatality number?

Around 50 deaths have been directly at-tributed to radiation from the disaster.Granted, that’s 50 deaths and 4,000 pos-

sible deaths too many, but the carnage isnot what Greenpeace purports it to be.

It’s interesting that the WHO labels“mental health” as the “largest publichealth problem created by the accident”alongside death and disease. WHO par-tially attributes this to a lack of accurateinformation—manifesting as “negativeself-assessments of health, belief in a short-ened life expectancy, lack of initiative and

dependency on assistance from the state.”e truth is that Chernobyl serves an-other sad instance where perception of nu-clear power trumps fact. It’s widely consid-ered the worst nuclear disaster of all time—apretty amazing title considering the plantcontinued to operate until 2000 and still, tothis day, employs 3,800 people. What thosepeople do since the remaining reactors aredecommissioned is unclear, but since dam-aged nuclear fuel remains on site, the planthas to be staffed and people are happy for the

 jobs. Six million people still call the area

around Chernobyl home, and it is not thewasteland the world perceives it to be.

Oh, and the ominous iconic Ferriswheel? Rotting from old age and neglect—not radiation.

What about Japan’s Fukushima? It hasbeen three years since the Fukushima di-saster, and no one has died as a result ofradiation exposure. According to the Unit-ed Nations Scientific Committee on theEffect of Atomic Radiation, “Radiationexposure following the nuclear accident atFukushima-Daiichi did not cause any im-mediate health effects. It is unlikely to beable to attribute any health effects in thefuture among the general public and the

 vast majority of workers.”But that declaration won’t stop Green-

peace from printing posters with nuclearskulls on them saying “Save the children ofFukushima!”

Reports of a rise in the number of Japa-nese children being stricken with thyroidcancer in the areas around Fukushima hasmade headlines worldwide. But a piece forNational Geographic reveals the Japanesegovernment has stated that the increasednumber cases are not a direct result of ra-diation released during the meltdown—it’ssimply a result of testing a bigger pool ofchildren.

Trashing the OnlyViable ‘Green’ PowerWhy such anti-Fukushima hate fromGreenpeace then? Because they don’t wantto admit that they have been vilifying the

 very energy source that can accommodateour growing energy needs in a completelyrenewable and green way.

Nuclear power is the most viable greenenergy source available to us at the mo-ment. According to the EPA’s “Clean En-ergy” site, “nuclear power plants do not

emit carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, ornitrogen oxides.”

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

16/20

16   THEBLAZE  4(@

FEATURE

If Greenpeace truly cared about actualdeaths that can be linked directly to energyproduction, they would be more con-

cerned about the 5,000 coal-mining deathsthat occur worldwide each year instead ofthe zero deaths caused by nuclear radiationaccidents in the United States. Nuclearpower could help bring those fatal coal sta-tistics around the world down.

Most Americans would likely be sur-prised to learn there are currently 65 com-mercially operating nuclear power plantswith 104 nuclear reactors in America ac-counting for 20 percent of U.S. electricitysince 1990.

Solar, geothermal and wind power just

aren’t growing at a pace to be a realisticcompetitor to coal. Wind accounted for 4.1percent, geothermal 0.4 percent and solarpower a paltry 0.2 percent of total electric-ity generation in the United States in 2013.None of these came close to coal’s 39.1 per-cent share of U.S. electricity.

Even France is getting it right: Thecountry has embraced nuclear power withopen arms out of necessity. And it worksfor them. Nuclear accounts for 75 percentof the country’s electricity generation.

e French don’t vilify nuclear power

the way greens do in America. at’s be-cause the French actually worked hard to

promote positive feelings about the tech-nology with advertising campaigns andsoliciting tours of their nuclear plants—

which millions of French people havetaken them up on.ey like nuclear because it’s easily re-

cycled and the waste is very small. Picturethis: e waste from a French family of fourusing nuclear power fueled electricity for 20years is a glass cylinder the size of a cigarettelighter. C’est une nouvelle incroyable! 

If France isn’t afraid of nuclear power,America shouldn’t be either.

Disney’s Three Wishesere was a time in America when one of

the most prolific, lasting and wholesomecontributors to American culture and me-dia sought to paint nuclear power in amuch less fearful light.

at person was none other than WaltDisney.

In 1956, Disney released a tandembook and television special called “TheWalt Disney Story of Our Friend theAtom.” In the foreword, Disney boldlystates, “The atom is our future. Atomicscience began as a positive, creativethought. It has created modern science

with its many benefits for mankind. In thissense, our book tries to make it clear to

you that we can indeed look upon theatom as our friend.”

Quite a gutsy move to reimagine nucle-

ar power as our friend only a decade aerHiroshima and Nagasaki. But Disney wasa pioneer who didn’t let stereotypes weighhim down.

Disney used the story of “e Fisher-man and the Genie” to illustrate how wecould harness nuclear energy for good.Nuclear power is the proverbial genie inthe bottle. We have found this extraordi-nary energy source. It’s up to us how we useit. Like the story, Disney offers up threewishes for the “atomic genie.”

Disney’s first wish is for renewable pow-

er: “e coal and oil resources of our plan-et are dwindling, yet we need more andmore power. e atomic Genie offers us analmost endless source of energy.”

With power under control, Disney’ssecond wish is for food and health: “eatomic Genie offers us a source of benefi-cial rays. ese are magic told of researchwhich can, above all, help us to producemore food for the world and to promotethe health of mankind.”

And the third and most important wishis for peace: “e atomic genie holds in his

hands the powers of both creation and de-struction. The world has reason to fear

Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration

 N  at  u  r  a l 

 G  a s

 2 7 . 5%

 H yd  r  o  e  l e  c t  r  ic  

 6.7 %

 P  e t  r  o  l e  u  m  0 .7 %

 G  e  o t  h  er  m a l 0 . 4%

 O t  h  e  r  G  a s e  s 0 . 3%

 S o  l a r   0 .2 %

 B  i  o  m a s s 1 .5%

 W  in  d   4.1 %

 N  u  c  l e  a r 

1 9 . 5 %

 C  o  a l

 39 .1 %

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

17/20

17 4(@     THEBLAZE 

FEATURE

those powers of destruction. ey couldyet destroy civilization and much of hu-mankind. So our last wish should simplybe for the atomic genie to remain foreverour friend!”

Disney’s three wishes for nuclear powershow us what hope there once was inAmerica for the energy source. He made

nuclear power sound exciting, but he alsomade it clear that, like the powerful genie,its powers need to be harnessed responsi-bly. He was adamant that nuclear powerwas characterized as our “friend.” A far cryfrom the villainous “Dr. No” and DukeNukem characterizations.

Walt Disney so believed in the futureof nuclear power that he outlined in“Our Friend the Atom” plans to “build aHall of Science in the Tomorrowlandsection of Disneyland where we willamong other things put up an exhibit of

atomic energy.”is idea actually culminated in an ex-

hibit at the 1964 World’s Fair in New York.e exhibit was called Progressland (a titlesurely Glenn Beck would hate). GeneralElectric and Disney teamed up to producethe exhibit, which featured “the first public

demonstration of atomic fusion.” It was theclimax of the Progressland visit. GeneralElectric described the demonstration infull detail:

“Everyone looks intently at the largequartz tube atop the fusion equipment atthe bottom of the centerwell. e count-down ends. ere is a sudden brilliant burst

of light … and a crash of discharging high voltage that echoes and re-echoes throughthe centerwell. You have just seen one of thefirst public demonstrations of fusion—theenergy source that may someday supply allthe electricity we’ll ever need.”

Could the Disney corporation put onan exhibit glorifying the benefits of nucle-ar power today without riots and protestsfrom activists? Could Disney produce atelevision series on atomic energy andwrite a 162-page book about the subjecttoday?

Disney’s hope for nuclear power and hisimage of the atom as “our friend” has beenlost to misinformation and a deeply heldperception that nuclear power is inher-ently bad. But we must remember thatDisney was fighting an uphill battle, too,when he introduced nuclear power to the

world as a positive force. In “Our Friendthe Atom” he wrote: “So far, the atom is asuperb villain. Its power of destruction isforemost in our minds. But the same pow-er can be put to use for creation, for thewelfare of all mankind. What will eventu-ally be done with the atom? It is up to us togive the story a happy ending. If we use

atomic energy wisely, we can make a heroout of a villain.”

If anything, nuclear power is already ahero, albeit the antihero. Few people cur-rently expect nuclear to be our key to en-ergy independence and our solution forrenewable energy. But just like the 104 re-actors providing life-giving electricity tofamilies every day in the United States,nuclear power will grow quietly beneaththe yowls of the critics who will one daysing its praises.

Duke Nukem may have been right all

along: “e ignorants call me a mutant, Iprefer to think of myself as the future ofmankind!”

Future of mankind, indeed.

NATASHA PASCETTA IS A PRODUCER FOR

THEBLAZE TV.

Supplies are running low — call Goldline today to receive

my exclusive Mind Your Business steel medal.

Working exclusively with Goldline, I designed this medal to represent our innate

and constitutional right to freedom of thought and conscience. I want you to receive

this steel medal, absolutely free. Call Goldline today and ask a personal Account

Executive* to send this medal while supplies last. Plus, if you make a qualifying

purchase of Goldline’s exclusive bullion coins, you will receive a free .999 fine

silver version as well — honoring your country and diversifying your investment

portfolio, all at the same time.

These special medals are only available from Goldline,but supplies are limited so call today: 800-710-7140*No purchase necessary for steel medal. Limit one steel medal per household.

LAST CHANCE TO GET

MY ONE-OF-A-KIND MEDAL.

Not actual size

https://www.goldline.com/d/index.php?id=1157&utm_source=theblaze&utm_medium=printad&utm_campaign=BLAZE

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

18/20

18   THEBLAZE  4(@

WORTH 1,000 WORDS

What Our Education Bucks Have Bought UsU.S. spending on public schooling has soared over the last 40-plus years, and the educationbureaucracy has ballooned. In fact, according to the Cato Institute, the total cost of a public schoolK-12 education for a single student on the day of his graduation, in inflation-adjusted dollars, hasincreased from $56,903 in 1970 to $164,426 in 2010. What has been the return on our “invest-ment”? Weak enrollment and not-so-great achievement.

Sources: Cato Institute; U.S. Department of Education; and NAEP testing

Mandatory Spending

     N    o .

    o     f    m    a    j    o    r    r   u     l    e    s    i    s    s   u    e     d

2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013

Bush   Obama

A White House in Love With Red TapeFor five years, President Obama has been exploiting regulation to implement his far-left progressiveagenda. “Red Tape Rising: Five Years of Regulatory Expansion,” a report from The Heritage Foundation,reveals that the Government Accountability Office’s data shows that the administration has issued 157new major rules, costing Americans about $73 billion annually—more than double the number ofmajor rules (62) and triple the cost of regulation ($22 billion) implemented during the first five years ofthe George W. Bush administration. And the White House isn’t slowing down: Federal agencies have

another 125 major rules they planning to work on this year.

Good Luck Fixing the Debt Without Serious ReformFor years now, conservatives have been pointing out that, in order to get spending under control andreduce the debt/deficits, we must reform entitlements and address military spending. Two-thirds of allfederal expenditures last year were on mandatory spending, while Defense took up nearly one-fifth.

Share of Federal Spending in 2013

200

180

160

140

120

100

80

60

40

20

0

-20

    P   e   r   c   e   n    t     (    %     )

1970 1976 1982 1988 1994 2000 2006 2012

Total costEmployees

Enrollment

Reading scores

Math scores

Science scores

Sources: Office of Management and Budget; The Heritage Foundation

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%66%

Net interest 6%Welfare programs andother entitlements 16%

Medicare, Medicaid, andother health programs 22%

Social Security 22%

Everything Else

34%

All other spending 12%

Defense 18%

Internationalaffairs 1%

Education andtraining 3%

Sources: Government Accountability Office; “Red Tape Rising,” The Heritage Foundation

0

10

20

30

40

50

37

18

24

10

26

47

33

25  26

2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014

% Respect him % Do not respect him

67  56

52   51   51   53

20  39   41

  44   43   41

Can’t Get No RespectA new Gallup poll shows that, for the first time, amajority of Americans believe foreign leadersdon’t respect President Obama. The souredattitude comes not from Republicans—they’vealways doubted his international clout—but fromindependents and Democrats.

% Respect % Do nothim respect him

  Democrats

  2013 80 14

  2014 69 28

  Change (pct. pts.) -11 +14

  Independents

  2013 49 45

  2014 34 57

  Change (pct. pts.) -15 +12

  Republicans

  2013 21 74

  2014 19 77  Change (pct. pts.) -2 +3

Not only are Americans negative about thepresident’s respectability among world leaders,they’re also dissatisfied with our position in theworld. HotAir.com’s Allahpundit points out:“Americans’ satisfaction with the country’s place inthe world goes south under Bush as the Iraq Wardrags on—but it never recovers. Compare thenumbers in 2007, at the height of sectarianviolence in Iraq, to the numbers today. Identical.Nothing Obama’s done, including total withdrawalfrom Iraq, has moved the needle much.”

Source: Gallup

’01 ’02 ’03 ’04 ’05 ’06 ’07 ’08 ’09 ’10 ’11 ’12 ’13 ’14

% Satisfied % Dissatisfied

33

65

67  71

67

4248

43

37   30   32  35 35 36

  4037

3027

  30

47

5156

5154

6168   66 63   63 64

58  61

Do you think leaders of other countriesrespect President Obama?

Are you satisfied with the position ofthe U.S. in the world today?

http://hotair.com/

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

19/20

For example, what are the results experienced at every multi-nation

activity? Do people behave according to the natural  Law of Right

 Action  identified by Richard Wetherill decades ago, calling for

people to be rational and honest? No, they do not!

The fact that although for several years, the information of the Law

of Right Action has been made available to hundreds of thousands

here and abroad, irrational, dishonest behavior still prevails.

It seems that most people’s attitudes and actions still reflect their

choice of whatever irrational, dishonest action they think will serve

their purposes.

Could it be that our unusual weather conditions are being used by

the creator to draw attention to the public’s unchanged attitudes and

actions, lest they receive the kind of wrong results described over and

over again in the Old Testament?

 Let this be the generation of those who recognize the error of

their ways and quickly resolve to do that which is “naturally law-

 ful and right” and also to delight in the ancient promise that such

 persons will “surely live and shall not die.” 

Visit alphapub.com for more information or for a free mailing

write to The Alpha Publishing House, PO Box 255, Royersford,

PA 19468.

This public-service message is from a self-financed, nonprofit group of former students of Mr. Wetherill.

Ancient scriptural writings abound,

describing the

downfall of thosecivilizations that

had failed to

obey the creator’s

behavioral laws.“Just found your site. I

was quite impressed and

look forward to hours of

enjoyment and learning.

Thanks.” - Frank 

“I have finished reading

the book How To Solve

Problems. So simple, yet

so profound and powerful.

Thank you.” - Alex

Visit alphapub.com to read Natural-law Essays and eBooks FREE 

http://alphapub.com/http://alphapub.com/http://www.alphapub.com/

8/18/2019 TheBlaze_2014_5_May

20/20

#5:Dorms that put

spas to shame

n 2012, the Fiscal Times listedhe 10 most lavish dorms at pub-

c colleges. Here are some high-ghts of what these taxpayer-upported schools are offering8-year-olds:

Georgia State, University Com-mons: This “gated communityomplex” offers “fully furnishedrivate rooms wired with high-peed Ethernet, a high-speedoice link, and cable TV”—andll this for underclassmen.

Purdue University, First StreetTowers: is $52 million com-

lex offers “single air-condi-ioned rooms with private baths,”lus plenty of student lounges

with “47-inch flat-screen TVs,ustom-designed entertainmententers, and ceramic-tiled kitch-nettes.”

University of Cincinnati, Cam-us Recreation Center Housing: 

is dorm comes complete witha 40-foot climbing wall, a fitnessenter with more than 200 ma-hines, an Olympic-sized lap pool

. a suspended indoor track, andsix-court gym,” plus “a conve-i t d di i h ll

C  o l  l  e   g e s 8

Top

5 Ways

Q   Q

BY JOHN ZMIRAK

Will your kids work their way through college? Not likely.

e average college graduate owes more than $27,000—and one out of 10 owes more than $40,000. Tuitions have risen almost25 percent faster than inflation in just the past five years. Now a year of college can cost more than a luxury car. No kidding: Forbes 

eports that expenses at Sarah Lawrence run $62,636 annually, which is more than the price of a new C-class Mercedes.What are colleges doing with all that money? e Intercollegiate Review took a look. is lively campus magazine is published by the Inter-

ollegiate Studies Institute (isi.org), a network of conservative intellectuals, which also produces the acclaimed guide Choosing the Right College.Here are the five most egregious wastes of college cash that ISI found:

#4: Sex change operationsJoining some 37 other fashionable schools, Duke University announcedin May 2013 that it would be raising student fees to cover the cost of“gender-reassignment” surgery, a controversial and irreversible proce-dure. A school official boasted to the Duke Chronicle that Duke has “oneof the most, if not the most, transgender-inclusive plans in the country.”

#3: Ideological boondoggles In Los Angeles, the taxpayer-funded community college system wast-ed more than $10 million trying to take itself off the energy grid. egoal was nice, green energy generated from solar, wind and geother-mal sources. But as the Los Angeles Times reported, these pricey proj-ects never powered a single campus building—and the wind turbinescouldn’t even power a 60-watt light bulb.

#2: Overpaid executivese median pay for presidents of public colleges was $441,392 in2011-12, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education. Four presi-dents earned more than $1 million. e top earner was Penn State’sGraham Spanier, who collected $2.9 million the year he was fired forbungling the Jerry Sandusky/Joe Paterno child-sex-abuse scandal.

#1:Too many useless

administrators

and staffers

ink tuition dollars are goingtoward good classroom in-struction? ink again. As theWashington Monthly  reported,since 1970, the number of col-lege professors and students hasincreased by about 50 per-cent—but the number of ad-ministrators has shot up 85percent, and the number ofadministrative staffers has ris-en 240 percent. The result isthat classes are taught by starv-ing adjuncts, while campuses

crawl with “diversity enforce-ment officers.” e Universityof North Carolina at Wilming-ton recently increased fundingfor its five diversity-multicul-tural offices—and then mergedtwo science departments tosave money.

Spending all this money isn’t improving outcomes. e Society for Human Resource Management polledemployers and found: “Almost one-half of organizations (49 percent) believed that 2013 college graduates

are lacking the knowledge and basic skill of writing in English (grammar and spelling). Eighteen percentbelieved they are lacking in math skills, and 13 percent believed they are lacking in English speaking skills.”

Waste Your Money

http://www.collegeguide.org/http://home.isi.org/