Opinion

QUESTION: We have choices in other areas of life. Why not in schools?
RESPONSE: Choice and rights are not the same thing; they are distinct categories with different properties and should not be conflated.

Nearly a year and a half into his presidency, Donald Trump continues to hold his base and maintain an approval rating of around 40% – close to the same percentage he polled at just after his inauguration. Let’s try to figure out why.

Can anything be said that doesn’t warrant an empaneled jury of twitting twats to determine the fate of an individual?  It is evident that branding, marketing and selling can only be done in a context of controlled hypocrisy.  Companies long happy to use celebrities as fronts for promoting products and the image of a television network have become obsessed with the idea of sensitivity.

On the day of the Parkland massacre, Valentine’s Day, I made a decision, one long in the making since my days as a Philosophy student and instructor nearly fifty years ago.

Within many areas of contemporary life there is a growing momentum for fundamental change. Inequality and injustice are being resolutely challenged and environments in which Right Relationships can evolve are being consistently and powerfully demanded. The establishing of right relationships is a principle hallmark of the unique times we are living in, it sits alongside those other perennial values of goodness: justice, freedom and sharing, qualities that have been held deep within the hearts of humanity for eons though consistently denied and not expressed.

Gordon Gekko, the fictitious corporate raider so memorably personified by Michael Douglas in Wall Street, lectured an assemblage of investors and flaccid board members with this eye-opening burst of insight:

EU president and Polish politician Donald Tusk says the U.S. acts with “capricious assertiveness.” With friends like this who needs enemies?” he asked the other day, adding, “If you need a helping hand you will find one at the end of your arm.”
EU vice-president Federica Mogherini met with European and Iranian representatives after the U.S. decision to leave the Iran nuclear agreement. She committed Europe to the following:

One of the essential features of European colonialism were the boundaries drawn between Europeans and so-called Western civilization and everyone else. Even during the European enlightenment, the accepted philosophical justifications for human inequality in Western liberal thought meant that women, the colonized, the enslaved and non-property holders occupied different rungs on the ladder of humanity and were excluded from demanding same inherent rights as the White, male bourgeoisie.

Poverty is the greatest cause of death and illness globally; it strangles the lives of billions of people, denying the expression of innate potential, condemning men, women and children to live stunted uncreative lives of interminable suffering and drudgery.

The White House is more and more looking like a house of cards. After 16 months the staff is demoralized, in disarray and divided, some prone to leak embarrassing news to the press. (Trump in January banned personal cell phones in the West Wing, indicating that he mistrusts everyone around him.) While Trump is reported to dislike firing people (in real life as opposed to his reality show The Apprentice), over 12 top officials have left so far, among them the secretary of state, who called him a moron.