God Is Not Dead

Posted on 18/04/2014 by Grumpa Joe

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It is Good Friday morning and I awoke to a headline reading “atheist war on Easter.” I didn’t read it. I celebrated an unholy atheist holiday on April first, better known as April Fools Day. What the headline reminded me of is a post I had in mind to write last week but never did. I went to see a wonderful movie “God Is Not Dead.” All my life I have fought to learn new arguments to prove that God does exist. The one thread that remains in my mind is how it all got started. Not even the greatest mind of our time known as Stephen Hawking can out reason that one. Stuff just doesn’t happen out of nothing unless there is a Supreme Entity to seed it.

http://godsnotdeadthemovie.com

I recommend this movie for everyone, even atheists, especially atheists. At first, I didn’t think a movie about the philosophical argument about God could be entertaining and I delayed going. Yet, a voice inside me said “go.” I was glad because the story is intriguing and one sub-plots is comical. I won’t try to explain the story because it would give too much away, but it occurs inside a modern university and shows them feeding our kids bullshit by liberal, arrogant, know-it-all-professors with tenure. In my opinion tenure is an outdated idea in any school. Why do these people hide behind work rules that protect them from being canned. We have First Amendment rights to speak as we chose. Teachers don’t need tenure to protect them further.

The movie is not about tenure, it is about a professor who forces his ideas on students with a threat of a failing grade if they refuse to buy his theme of “God is  Dead.” In doing so, he denies his students from using their God-given brains from using their free will to accept or deny an idea.

What surprised me at the end of the film was a rolling list of lawsuits filed to protect First Amendment rights against the bully tactics of schools and teachers. The number is staggering.

Peg and I have seen many really great films this season, and we commend Hollywood for producing so many good stories with great actors and even better effects, but “God is not Dead” is the best film we have seen. I give it five stars, and recommend everyone see it.

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Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic

Posted on 10/03/2010 by Grumpa Joe

     Free education in the USA is a joke. There is nothing free about it. We pay dearly in taxes. The education opportunity given to our children is a golden gift. They waste the gift from grades 1-12 daily. Our kids just do not get it. They are too young to get it on their own. The problem is with parents who fail to take their parental responsibility seriously.

     My own parents did not have the same opportunity that they gave me. Their formal education was at a fourth grade level. Both Mom and Dad left their homes in a foreign country to migrate to America as teenagers.  The experience of coming to a new land on your own at age sixteen is unimaginable. Yet, there were thousands of European kids coming to America for a better life. When they arrived, they did not find a friendly country. People called them greenhorns and hunkies. They stuck with others of their own nationality in order to survive.  After they settled into a community, they attended school for two reasons: first to learn the language, second to become citizens.

     What I am getting to is that they understood the value of education, and insisted that we get a good one.  My own philosophy is the same. My children’s philosophy is the same as mine. Our kids will not squander the golden gift. I made sure the kids went to good schools.  We insisted they show us their assignments, and reviewed their homework. We talked to their teachers and gave them our permission to discipline our kids when they were out of line. Every teacher they had was a caring person who was serious about his work and my kids. I am satisfied that my kids took advantage of the gift.

     What makes me upset today, is the low graduation rate and the number of kids who get out of school, and do not know how to read. I hear politicians campaigning on the promise to spend more money on education. I see Chicago schools that are a hundred years old, and in need of serious repair. I see school busses lined up to deliver kids to school. I see kids getting free breakfast and lunch. I see teachers afraid to enter a classroom because of discipline problems. I see parents who do not give a hoot about their kid’s education. I see gangs substituting for parents and family in a kid’s life.

     All of the above only makes me mad as hell. What makes me furious is when I hear about teachers who are no longer interested or capable of teaching, and the administration cannot fire them because of their tenure. Between tenure and the teachers unions, I see my tax dollars flushed down the toilet.  I recently learned that it costs $219,000.00 to fire a bad teacher in the Chicago system. As a result, the bad teachers remain in force. They ignore our kids, and waste our dollars. When they retire, they get great pensions. Our kids are screwed.

     My point is that we have to make the teacher unions give a little in order to improve the school system. Certainly, more money is not the answer.

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