October 2, 2023 – Pat Abrami, the former six-term State Representative from Stratham has formally announced that he will be running as a Republican for State Senate in District 24, which includes Rye, Greenland, Stratham, Exeter, Hampton, North Hampton, and Hampton Falls.

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This occurred on Tuesday evening, September 26, before a completely full Wiggin Memorial Library conference room in Stratham. Pat reintroduced himself to the audience by discussing his life experiences that will bring his knowledge, people skills, problem-solving skills, and strong leadership abilities, to the Senate just as he did as a New Hampshire House Member for 12 years, all on the Ways and Means Committee, and serving as Vice Chair for three terms under long-time chairperson Norm Major.

He discussed his life’s successes, academically, athletically, and professionally as a principal/owner of a hospital operations consulting firm. Pat then laid out his position on just some of the issues currently facing New Hampshire, namely, maintaining our business-friendly environment; the importance of low taxes; the need for reasonable, but non-stifling regulation; the importance of parental rights with safeguards against abusive parents which already exist in statute for the most part; for continued support for a ban on abortion at 24 weeks (with a few exceptions), emphasizing the need for continued dialog between all sides of this issue; how the illegal immigration crisis is impacting NH; about energy costs and the need for a rational realistic energy policy; voter integrity that ensures everyone eligible to legally vote can do so and the need for our voting processes to be as fraud-proof as possible, and the biggest, but most silent issue facing New Hampshire, which is our six-billion-dollar pension liability.

Mr. Abrami relayed what Senate President Jeb Bradley told him at a meeting several months ago as he was contemplating a run that, if elected, he would hit the ground running as State Senator given all his years as an active and productive member of the House, who always conducted himself in a statesman-like manner.

 

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Minnesota, sometimes described as the paintbrush on America’s canvas, offers an artistic blend of culture, nature, and novelty. When one imagines the state, it’s easy to think of lakes and forests; however, The Gopher State’s appeal extends far beyond its serene landscapes.

Whether you’re obtaining a title loan in Minnesota or just cruising the scenic byways, you’ll find a treasure trove of hidden gems to explore.

The Maze of Museums

Step into a labyrinth of human invention, history, and art. Minnesota’s museums are not just rooms with exhibits but a fascinating journey into the dimensions of time, culture, and nature. Take the SPAM Museum for instance. It isn’t just a place that glorifies a canned meat; it’s a time capsule that reminds us of American innovation, marketing genius, and the stories behind household names.

Another off-the-beaten-path destination is the Museum of Russian Art, the only museum in North America dedicated to the preservation and presentation of Russian art and artifacts. Here, you get a unique chance to meander through the alleys of Russian history without ever boarding a plane.

Adventures in Amusement

Think of amusement parks as adult sandboxes where everyone, regardless of age, becomes a child. While Minnesota offers mainstream parks, it also offers Paul Bunyan Land—an ode to folklore and history. It’s where stories come alive, and old tales find a fresh breath, just like opening a book and watching the characters spring to life.

Hidden Histories and Estates

Beyond the skyscrapers and modern amenities, Minnesota is a custodian of histories whispered through its mansions and estates. Places like the James J. Hill House are not just buildings; they’re time machines. Walking through these estates is akin to reading pages from a novel, with each room narrating a different chapter, giving you an insight into the gilded age, aspirations, and artistry of times gone by.

Vineyards: The Nectar Trails

While Napa Valley gets much of the spotlight when it comes to American wines, Minnesota’s vineyards are like those indie songs—less discovered but incredibly soulful. Dive into vineyards like the Alexis Bailly Vineyard, where the vines aren’t just about producing grapes; they narrate a tale of perseverance, cold winters, and the dance between soil and seasons. It’s where the taste of wine becomes a narrative.

Distilleries: The Spirit of Minnesota

If vineyards are the gentle storytellers of Minnesota, distilleries are its vibrant raconteurs. Tattersall Distilling isn’t just about spirits; it’s about the spirit of place, people, and passion. When you sip a drink here, it’s not just alcohol but a concoction of history, innovation, and Minnesota’s distinctive touch.

A Shopper’s Canvas

If shopping were an art, Minnesota would be the Louvre. While it boasts the massive Mall of America, there’s also an underbelly of boutique shops that offer curations instead of collections. It’s a place where you don’t just shop but embark on a hunt, finding treasures that echo stories, craftsmanship, and the heartbeat of local artists.

Conclusion

Minnesota isn’t just a state; it’s a storytelling tapestry where every corner, from its museums to vineyards, tells a tale. Whether you’re passing through after getting that title loan or settling down for a vacation, allow the diverse narratives of The Gopher State to enrapture you. With every step, you uncover a new story, a fresh perspective, making your journey not just about sightseeing, but soul-seeing.

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Offshore wind developer Ørsted has delayed its New Jersey Ocean Wind 1 project to 2026. Previously, the company had announced construction of the project would begin in October 2023. The delay was attributed to supply chain issues, higher interest rates, and a failure so far to garner enough tax credits from the federal government. For now, they are not walking away from all their U.S. projects but will reconsider long-term plans by the end of this year. Ørsted’s stock price has fallen 30% in 5 days. This is just the latest bad news for offshore win.

Ocean Wind 1 had one of the highest guaranteed prices among the 18 projects currently in the approval queue. The actual wholesale price guarantees for Ocean Wind 1 start at $98.10/MWh, rising 2% a year to $145.77. Over twenty years revenue will average $126.47/MWh according to the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (BPU). Ørsted is seeking higher guarantees from the BPU and an increase in federal Investment Tax Credits from 30% to 40%. Recognizing the potential financial problems, New Jersey’s largest public utility, Public Service Electric & Gas Company sold its 25% share of the project to Ørsted in January.

The company said it is “reconfiguring” Ocean Wind II in New Jersey, and its Skipjack Wind project off the coasts of Maryland and Delaware because they do not currently meet its projected financial standards. The Maryland Public Service Commission guaranteed Skipjack Wind $146.42/MWh average over twenty years and also gets to keep revenue from sales to the regional grid. Apparently, the higher guarantee is still not enough to meet the company’s financial goals. Ørsted is working to renegotiate guaranteed prices on two other projects, Sunrise Wind and Revolution Wind, that would need a 30% increase just to meet the current Ocean Wind 1 guaranteed price.

Meanwhile, projects off New York are asking for an average 48% increase in guaranteed prices that could add $880 billion a year to electric rates, or almost $18 billion over twenty years (see table below).

 

In North Carolina, the latest long-term energy plan from Duke Energy drops offshore wind entirely in favor of nuclear, solar, and onshore wind. Furthermore, Duke has committed to only close any existing power plants once replacements are in operation, an idea that other states should follow. Two new offshore wind lease areas in the Gulf of Mexico failed to attract a bid. Vineyard Wind off Nantucket has begun construction but faces three unresolved lawsuits.

Wind turbine manufacturers are faring no better. Siemens Gamesa has announced almost $5 billion in 2023 losses from warranty repairs for turbines much smaller than those planned in the US. The company also faces price pressure. The stock price has dropped 30% since June.

This is not the time for Delaware to be considering offshore wind.

Clearly, the industry is in disarray, facing rising costs, durability, and legal issues. An 800 MW project similar in size and the current guaranteed price to Skipjack 2 may raise Delaware residential electric prices by $400 to $545/year and for businesses by the tens of thousands. A Monmouth University poll shows a major decrease in public support for offshore wind in New Jersey, falling from 84% to 54% with 40% opposed.

 

David T. Stevenson, Center for Energy & Environmental Policy, Caesar Rodney Institute. 

David T. Stevenson | Real Clear Wire

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Funding for Ukraine is causing a lot of political drama – did you notice how I did not use the word “war”?  Some politicians want additional funding for Ukraine, some do not, and there is a report suggesting we might want to rethink foreign aid.

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It seems there is an issue with corruption.

Ukraine is deeply corrupt.  Don’t take my word for it; that’s according to the White House.  It is so corrupt that unless President Zelensky cracks down on that corruption, future aid will likely be in jeopardy.  This comes from a leaked State Department assessment, as reported by Politico.

This comes on top of previous reports from both the State Department and Pentagon that tracking aid inside of Ukraine is difficult to impossible. They know some of our aid, from military gear and cash, has been outright stolen.

Our regime says they don’t have proper auditing teams on the ground.  And whose fault is that?  Yea, yea, they are trying to fix it.  For whatever good it will do, a team from the Pentagon landed in Ukraine over the weekend to start the auditing process… $74 billion dollars into it, and somebody just got the idea of auditing in the most corrupt country in that area of the world is a good idea.

Probably becasue that mess became part of our latest Act of shutdown theater when the bill passed to fund government operations stripped out funding for Ukraine.

Mr. Biden immediately started working the phones with international leaders.  He is assuring them that more US aid will be coming, and most Senators share Mr. Biden’s desire to give more cash to Ukraine.

Why does no one else ever think to lend them money?

Lindsey Graham said that funding for Ukraine should be tied to funding the US border.  The suggestion is that the two are of equal importance. But in the House of Representatives, officials are not as inclined to blow their lunch money on Ukraine.  There is a group of 10 to 20 Republicans who say not one more penny for Ukraine.

Beyond them, support is a bit more mixed.

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has said he doesn’t want to give Ukraine a blank check, but he is open to giving more.  That’s led to accusations he made a secret deal with the Democrats to draft a new bill this week offering billions more for Ukraine. McCarthy denies it, but Mr. Biden suggested there is a secret deal of sorts; comments made a lot of people angry, especially those 10 to 20 Republicans who oppose more money for Ukraine.  One of them has announced that he will try to remove Mr. McCarthy from the Speakership. A vote to do so could happen this week.

Polls out over the past two months show Americans think we’ve already given too much aid to Ukraine. A CNN poll showed 55% say no more aid; 45% say that, no, keep the spigot open and the dollars flowing. Democrats were more likely to support more war aid than Republicans.

Shouldn’t a conversation about corruption in Ukraine and our aid be a bipartisan concern?  Shouldn’t the conversation be had before we send $74 billion?  As the State Department says, it is real, it is important, and we should be talking about it.  That’s irrespective of whether we want more aid or not.

You voted for the senators and representatives who supported our actions up to this point.  What do they have to say about their actions with your money?

 

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Anyone old enough to remember the classic “Get Smart” TV series has to remember one particular gag often used by that bumbling secret agent, Maxwell Smart. Caught in another of his many precarious predicaments, he’d try to distract his adversaries by throwing out some incredible lie about his imminent rescue, closing the ruse by adding, “Would you believe it?”

When he realized it wasn’t working, he’d adjust the story slightly. “Would you believe…? The bit worked perfectly with Don Adams’ comic genius, and it popped up periodically throughout the series.

It seems that Democrats picked up a thing or two from Maxwell Smart. Just a few weeks ago, while honest news outlets were broadcasting endless scenes of mass migration and utter chaos on our southern border, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Alejandro Mayorkas, and White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre were confidently proclaiming that our border is secure. In fact, all the Democrats went along with that storyline.

But millions of new inhabitants are hard to hide, and when they started overflowing into sanctuary cities like New York and Chicago, Democrat mayors began to take notice. Eric Adams complained that the border crisis “will destroy New York City.” That’s when the Democrat lie began to unravel. The Biden administration needed to modify the story. Like the ever-resourceful Maxwell Smart, they quickly adjusted their narrative. “If you don’t believe the border is secure, would you believe Republicans caused the border chaos? No? How about this? “Republicans are making the chaos much worse by talking about it so much.” Or their latest claim: “Republicans are politicizing the border crisis.”

The essence of their argument goes something like this: “Rest assured that the border is secure, but if it’s not, don’t blame us.” Loyal Democrats might agree with that sort of blather, but rational Americans aren’t buying it.

Most Americans recognize it as a desperate and pathetic attempt by this administration to deflect responsibility for the disaster it created with the help of Democrat lawmakers. It’s not a new tactic. It’s how they deal with all their policy follies, whether the border fiasco, inflation, or the anarchy now spreading across our country.

While most of us like to think that facts are facts and the truth is the truth, politicians have developed a reputation for distorting both. They euphemistically call it spin. But, unchallenged by their allies in the news media, the lies coming from this administration have grown to epic proportion – so brazen, so outlandish that only committed Democrats continue to nod in agreement. They insult the intelligence of clear-thinking Americans.

Maybe it’s one reason Biden finds himself 10 points behind Trump in a recent Washington Post-ABC News poll.

As far as the border is concerned, CBP statistics tell the simple, unvarnished truth. Encounters at the border skyrocketed after Joe Biden took office. During the year 2020, they were at a manageable 405,036. In 2021, during Biden’s first year in office, they quadrupled to 1,662,167. According to some estimates, more than eight million foreign citizens have entered the country illegally since Biden took office. The good news for the administration is that Kamala Harris can finally end her quest for the root cause of illegal immigration. It all begins with Biden’s policies.

The voters entrusted Joe Biden to enforce American laws and protect its citizens. For whatever reason, he and his administration have shown utter contempt for the safety and security of American citizens by eviscerating our sovereignty and inviting into our homeland millions of unscreened, unidentified foreign citizens, mostly from third-world countries. While border towns have suffered for years under the crush, cities like New York are only now beginning to feel the impact.

Like characters in a situation comedy, Biden and his administration will say anything to get themselves out of a jam. But there’s nothing funny about their lies. They’re killing Americans and destroying the entire country – not just New York City.

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With a few weeks left and only one CAT3 US landfall in 2023, the Climate Cult must be beside itself: all the boiling hot ocean water and only one landfall. The news gets worse. Nothing is coming (anytime soon) to save their narrative.

Related: It Was Not the Wettest July in NH History Nor the Hottest

The only tropical storm in the Atlantic is Phillipe, and his track is estimated to head north from the Sargasso Sea, far too far from shore to be of any use and never achieving hurricane status.

 

 

You might wonder, why, Steve, do we care? Perhaps you don’t, but you have to remember the context. July was hot. Not the hottest, but it was … hot. The media pretended there was nothing like it on record, by which they mean records they’d admit exist. A lot of people swallowed the bait, and what goes with it? The rest of the narrative.

Super-heated oceans create massive super-storms that wreak havoc on coastal communities: sea swell, flooding, damage and destruction, dogs and cats living together. But that last thing is the only thing mankind has caused. Cats and dogs can live together absent the alleged chaos, just like Hot Julys and this year’s hurricane season.

July convinced NOAA to tweak its previous forecast.

In May, it predicted “a range of 12 to 17 total named storms (winds of 39 mph or higher). Of those, 5 to 9 could become hurricanes (winds of 74 mph or higher), including 1 to 4 major hurricanes (category 3, 4 or 5; with winds of 111 mph or higher). NOAA has a 70% confidence in these ranges.”

In early August, the prediction changed: “The outlook now includes a 70% chance of 14-21 named storms, of which 6-11 could become hurricanes, and 2-5 could become major hurricanes. The updated outlook also states that current conditions are likely to counterbalance the usually limiting atmospheric conditions associated with the ongoing El Niño event.”

As predictions go, they’ve done worse, but not much has come of getting close. Most of the storms were tropical and muddled about the middle of the Atlantic like Joe Biden looking for a hand to shake.

I wouldn’t call it embarrassing; Tropical Storm Phillipe is number 16, the fourth of his name, but when they predict 5-9 hurricanes, including 1-4 major ones, we expect them to be big and make landfall. The Cult gets giddy. Is this the year they get to use that bigger, more frequent storm narrative to socialize energy? Nope.

They must redirect their anger and frustration toward whatever sloppy excuses they can articulate. They certainly can’t say global warming makes more cyclones that just putter about the ocean never reaching land. Oh, and you’re still a denier! And their agenda is still getting rammed down our throats with CAT 5-level executive orders and bureaucratic rule-making.

They don’t need no stinkin’ storms, but it helps the optics.

 

 

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Around ~250 supporters turned out for Ian’s sentencing hearing between day 1 & 2 with some amount of overlap

Sadly many folks with an ulterior motive and those otherwise misinformed keep repeating the lies of the prosecution and mainstream media. I’m going to try and straighten out fact from fiction as the one person whose quite literally stood next to Ian Freeman and watched each and every little aspect since before the arrests in 2021 over the dastardly crime of not getting a permission slip to sell bitcoin. Let me start at the beginning though with some history lessons about the origins of the Shire Free Church and and the governments effort to squash the Free State Project as this case was never really about Ian selling Bitcoin or scammers as the prosecution would like you to believe.

Ian has been a key participant in the Free State Project and larger migration movement of libertarians to New Hampshire. The Free State Project aims to concentrate libertarians and like-minded individuals in New Hampshire for the purposes of securing liberty in our lifetime.

https://www.freedomdecrypted.com/public_html/other-content/ian-sentencing-video-freekeene/ian-sentencing-day-video-w-court-ruling-small4.mp4

Ian’s sentencing speech read aloud by Captain Kickass, pre-sentence protest, and reaction from supporters after conviction + special edition of Free Talk Live; If you’d like to support those supporting the Crypto6 consider purchasing the Crypto6 music created by our very own Captain Kickass : https://captainkickass.com/

 

 

In the early days of the Free State Project early movers were asked why they moved and 2/3rd of them responded with Ian Freeman, Free Talk Live, or something connected to Ian. If there was ever a super activist it was Ian Freeman. Ian has been a non-stop super activist since moving to New Hampshire over a decade ago. He co-founded a talk show called Free Talk Live that gives anybody and everybody the opportunity to speak about anything they like on a nationally syndicated radio show. This however is just one of many activities Ian is active in. From reporting on abusive state actors to filming boring hearings at the state house. From protests to running for office Ian has done, Ian has organized it, and Ian has even committed acts of civil disobedience in face of cage time to protest unjust laws harming peaceful people. Ian even co-founded a church in 2010 for all the philosophically principled libertarian activists moving to New Hampshire! The church, the Shire Free Church was never going to be an ordinary church with steeple however. It was and is an interfaith church where the only requirement to partake is that you are an advocate of peace.

We take this mission of advocacy very seriously. Everyone who moves to New Hampshire for the Free State Project has signed a statement of intent and advocates for peaceful solutions to solve problems rather than violence or threats thereof. Often although not always violence is done through or in the name of the state. Many don’t likely understand what a libertarian actually is and confuse political messages by people claiming to be libertarian while not being libertarian with actual libertarians. Actual libertarians believe in something called the non-aggression principle. In simple terms it’s the idea that violence should only ever be used as a last resort and in self defense. Personally I like to describe it being just shy of a pacifist philosophy. When someone advocates for war, I object. When someone advocates to solve a social problem through the legislature I object. In order for a law to be legitimate in my eyes a party with a valid claim must be the victim of violence. Outlawing guns does not involve a victim. A party with a gunshot wound probably involves a victim of violence. Outlawing the former does not follow libertarian philosophy. Outlawing the later outside self defense does. Taxing John at the point of a gun is violent and the laws illegitimate. Asking John to make a voluntary contribution to help someone in need on the other hand is perfectly acceptable and admirable.

This advocacy for peace and criticism of law enforcement and governance by the way of a gun has never sat well with the bureaucrats and government employees and it’s even resulted in a decade long grudge between a particular federal employee Phil Christiana and a particular free state project leader Ian Freeman. In fact Ian gave a talk on the background of FBI’s attack on free staters and the connection to FBI agent Phil Christiana at the Porcupine Freedom Festival in 2022.

While the first issues between agent Phil Christiana and free staters began prior to Ian Freeman joining the Free State Project it was Ian Freeman that really ticked off Phil Christiana. Phil Christiana appears to see Ian as his enemy having led not 1, not 2, but 3 FBI investigations into taking Ian out. The first that I’m aware of occurred in 2012 with the arrest of Free Talk Live co-host Rich Paul. At the time Ian Freeman had taken the initiative to create an activist center and apparently Phil Christiana really hated this. The feds setup an undercover sting operation in an effort to rope in Rich Paul (he changed his name for political reasons to ‘Nobody’, and is the same co-host arrested in the Crypto6 case) with the intent of using Rich to get at Ian Freeman. Rich was brought to the local Keene police station and waiting inside was an FBI agent. That FBI agent told Rich that he had two choices. He could face prosecution or go wear a wire into the Keene activist center. Long story short- Rich refused, took it to trial, risked 100+ years in a cage, and ended up losing at least legally speaking. Despite the max he could have gotten he spent one year in a cage for this.

 

 

In 2016 the FBI once again were up to no good. An agent made a false swearifcation two weeks after a co-founder co-host of Free Talk Live criticized the FBI for distributing child pornography. It was not only disturbing, but hypocritical as the FBI regularly explains the ban on child pornography distribution as being to protect the children. By that logic the FBI was literally harming the children it was claiming to protect. This criticism came about a year after the FBI raided actual pedophiles or at least to the extent that they were telling the truth as the raids were based on tainted warrants. In any event the false affidavit that led to a raid was intended to take out Ian Freeman and Free Talk Live by way of slander through the media. Despite this 2016 raid on Free Talk Live’s studio and hit on Ian’s reputation Phil Christiana failed to take out either Ian Freeman or Free Talk Live. About 7 of 200 radio stations stopped airing Free Talk Live in response to the raid. Despite no arrests and no evidence the feds smeared Ian’s name all over the newspapers. Ian and others who had electronics stolen from the studio have been forced to sue the FBI to get their equipment returned. It’s only been in the last year or so that the FBI has had to give up and return the equipment as no crime was ever committed. They have however tried to drag the return of Ian’s devices out in furtherance of their goals of taking Ian out by way of leaving a question mark in peoples minds as to the extremely disturbing insinuation. While Ian may think optimistically about the judge in his Crypto6 case I don’t. During the sentencing hearing for Crypto6 co-defendant Renee Spinella Judge Joseph Laplante directed the prosecution to pursue fraudulent charges against Ian for despicable crimes that even the prosecution responded had been investigated and had no merit.

The Shire Free Churches Vending Machines Warned Users About Potential Scammers And The Various Ways They May Get Tricked Into Buying Bitcoin

In 2016 they raided over non-existent despicable content that didn’t exist based on a fraudulent affidavit. According to the prosecutor immediately following the March 2021 Crypto6 arrests she stated that the Crypto6 investigation began in March of 2016. If you can do the math this was immediately following the failed attempt at taking Ian out via a raid over content that alluded to crimes that never occurred. In 2021 after a 5-year investigation the FBI raided again this time over the bastardly crime of selling Bitcoin. The prosecution may now be claiming it was about scammers or money laundering. However that isn’t how it started, and during sentencing the prosecution admitted as much. The feds didn’t have a case. They didn’t know of any victims relating to Ian Freeman or the Shire Free Church. After spending millions of dollars on round the clock surveillance of Free Talk Live’s studio, tailing co-hosts vehicles for months on end, and infiltrating the libertarian porcupine freedom festival what did they know? They knew Ian was on the board of the Shire Free Church, that Ian and the church were selling Bitcoin for charity. This was never a secret. The vending machines had been well advertised in the newspapers and on popular online sites tracking where users can find a Bitcoin vending machine. The vending machines even warned unattended purchasers about the risks of online scammers and to never send Bitcoin to someone they did not know. This is no different than what retailers do for pre-paid card products.

 

2017 Photo Of The Shire Free Churches First Vending Machine Available For General Public Access Getting Some Publicity In The Local Paper

 

Ian even warned everyone including customers that transacted off of LocalBitcoin including via his Telegram profile of scammers

Ian even warned users in his social media profiles that he would NEVER ask anyone to send him crypto of any kind. A common scamming tactic is to impersonate other users in an effort to trick friends into sending crypto.

Ian didn’t sell crypto for profit, the Shire Free Church sold it for charity AND because Ian firmly believes whether you do or not that spreading crypto undermines government induced violence. Ian and the rest of us are advocating for a peaceful voluntary society in the courts, in the state house, and on the radio. It sounds kinda crazy if you don’t have an understanding of currency and the history of money or the context in which this preaching occurs. And remember this is merely one outreach effort of the church. Before dollars existed notes were issued to people who physically deposited their gold with banks. The promissory notes could then be handed in and the bank would give you your gold. In time people began trading those promissory notes directly for goods and services rather than exchanging actual gold. The United States created a currency and that currency was a standardization of the promissory notes that had previously been issued by private banks. This made it even more convenient as now you didn’t have to trade your TD bank promissory notes for a Bank Of America promissory note when you traveled outside the reach of TD Banks. After World War II the United States even convinced- or bullied may be a more appropriate term here the rest of the world to adopt the US dollar as the world reserve currency. This is all currencies were tied to the US dollar and the US dollar could then be exchanged for gold held by the United States. Now everyone was dependent on the dollar to buy and sell things between foreign countries. In 1971 the US ended this convertibility.

Bitcoin was started as a means of escaping banks and supporting violent governments, not as a tool for investors, even if admittedly it’s been the best investment in all of human history thus far

No longer could you get your gold out. Some countries did try to forcefully repatriate their countries gold reserves. Long story short the United States eliminated the ability to get your gold out of their vaults, the thing that actually has value. You might now be wondering why did they do that? Well, the United States was at war and by eliminating this convertibility the could print dollars and tax or steal from anyone who held US dollars. This funded the wars occurring at the time and the United States remains on this system today. In recent years (depending on what system you use to do the calculation) US dollar holders lost as much as 18% of their dollars value, or in other terms gold had they merely been safekeeping it for you. If you disagree with funding violence spreading Bitcoin or crypto more generally is one way to minimize your participation in government committed atrocities. You may have seen the drop Bitcoin, not bombs stickers, and this is at the heart of why principled libertarians became interested in Bitcoin before “investors” got on board.

Now I’m sure people are yelling, but the The Shire Free Church was fake! Because that is what the perpetrators of the real fraud have said. They have said it was setup disingenuously to attract scammers too. Well, I hate to break it to you, but the Shire Free Church dates back to 2010. 6 years before the first vending machines were installed in publicly accessible places or Bitcoin sold online. The Church was not that different than a TV ministry that preaches its values, but in this case had real people in the physical and local world community in New Hampshire too. A government informant was even married by the Shire Free Church’s minister Mark Edge at the Porcupine Freedom Festival in 2018. Many others have also been married by the Shire Free Church. The humorous thing here is Melanie Neighbors both claimed on the stand that the church was fake while then being questioned about why she would have had a fake church marry her. She had no good response to that.

 

 

Shire Free Church Minister Mark Edge Officiates The Marriage Of Fed Informant Melanie Neighbours. Take particular note of the religious clothing the minister is wearing. It says bitcoin, not bombs which is a reference to the immorality of using US dollars. US dollars are what we call fiat currency, or my preference is dirty fiat. It means government money of which has no backing. This is you can’t redeem your dollar for a certain amount of gold and the US government prints more and more dollars to fund war efforts. The printing of these dollars results in inflation and the loss of dollar holders purchasing power. Members of the Shire Free Church and particularly those most devoted resist the use of dollars whether it be through use of Bitcoin other cryptocurrencies or Goldbacks (Goldbacks are a currency containing actual gold).

The Shire Free Church was founded by group of people and has over the past 13 years had many different outreach projects. It’s not just a front to sell Bitcoin. The church was funded initially by donations by different people. The donation of a single person that was not Ian included a 100 BTC Casascius Bar. It’s hard to even calculate what that is worth today as so few are left unredeemed and the value isn’t just in the 100 Bitcoin. However, that alone over the last 13 years meant the church had enough reserves to last it at least 40 years assuming that the value kept going up or the church otherwise invested it. Yes, churches, and non-profits have investments, and they also have employees. Ian however did not receive a salary and what most people don’t know is he long ago took a vow of poverty. His minimal existence is sustained by the church. He has one bedroom in one of the churches two properties. He drives a church vehicle that is also used for other church activities. This is a vehicle that was purchased used for what I believe was less than $10,000 at the time. That’s it! This is the guy that people are vehemently attacking based on lies that he profited from the sale of Bitcoin. He never had a need. He donated two properties to the church in 2010, before taking a vow of poverty. The one property is today over-valued at under $300,000 and the other is a mixed use property with a small convenience store on it and a house that is harder to estimate, but maybe also in the $200-300,000 range. The property has not had a successful enterprise on it in at least a few decades, but the church has given several small businesses and minority entrepreneurs over the decade an opportunity to get into the game and at least try to make something of it. According to the experts that testified Ian may not owe any taxes, and the IRS’s website says neither churches nor ministers must file a return. The gist of it is a minister of a church is only required to file if they have a job working at Mc Donalds on the side. The essentials can be covered by the church. Ian devoted his life to his ministry. While he does not currently hold a paying job he has had employment in the past working at K-mart and was previously employed in the radio business. In fact after Ian’s 2021 arrest he was given a prestigious freedom of speech award by talk radio’s premiere industry publication. He has also previously received other awards including one for being the most outspoken advocate for freedom by the Free State Project.

 

The Two Church Owned Properties

 

Do you think having a privacy policy makes you someone who caters to scammers? I’d hope not. Your bank has one of these. Do you really think a money laundering business would advertise that they require ID? Of course not. Would an individual that the prosecutors are claiming to be, and at least to this degree are right a genius really have used Telegram, but than not deleted their conversations with victims? Would they have run Linux and then not made the disk read-only despite having created educational videos on Tails? Tails is an operating system designed to provide anonymity to users for those unaware. Ian didn’t create “secret chats” as Telegram calls them to securely communicate using end-to-end encryption with anyone the government is disingenuously calling a victim. In fact, the government attempted to imply that Telegram was used to hide a crime when no efforts were taken to do so. While Telegram by default has encryption it’s not end-to-end and no more secure than the platform utilized primarily to sell Bitcoin. What was the reason? I didn’t ask, but it’s obvious to anyone whose ever sold anything on eBay. Platforms like these charge fees. By taking a purchase off a platform you save on the fees. This usually works fine so long as you have a history with a buyer. These are the instances where Ian took some sales off of localbitcoin where the church normally sold Bitcoin.

Another lie that has been repeated and perpetrated by false prosecutorial claims was that Ian charged “exorbitant fees” to exchange proceeds from fraudsters’ romance and other scams into Bitcoin, which was really the church, and those fees they claimed he charged for Bitcoin were 10-21%. This is wrong. It’s an outright lie and manipulation. The church may have charged as much as 21% at some point to a first time customer under some circumstance. However all the victims in this case paid 10%, not 21%. These are competitive rates for online peer to peer platforms within the time frame  alleged and for the methods of payments used (which each have different costs associated with them). For selling crypto the church actually charged as little as 5% and its vending machines typically had the lowest rates for purchasing Bitcoin anywhere. The first time I purchased Bitcoin from the churches vending machine I paid an 8% fee. This is as low as I believe the vending machines themselves ever got. The prosecutor claimed that these fees were evidence that that Ian catered to scammers. It’s not the case given that they were in line with the industry norms. The church didn’t operate a Bitcoin exchange as the government claims. The church operated 1-4 vending machines with a new vending machine coming online about once a year. The church also sold Bitcoin on localbitcoin, but the fees varied and were determined by the market and costs associated with different methods. Vending machine rates differ but are typically (yes, FINCEN registered) around 8-20% and there was only one example of another vending machine operator charging 8% that I’ve ever encountered. Bitcoin exchanges are a high volume operation and have different costs associated with them. This is why they can offer 1-2% fees, but this can also be misleading as often exchanges lie to you. They don’t sell you Bitcoin. They sell you IOUs for Bitcoin. In other words if you send IOUs from one user to another on the same exchange it doesn’t cost anything more because you aren’t actually sending Bitcoin. But if you withdraw your IOUS and exchange them for actual Bitcoin to a wallet you control off the exchange or for a fiat currency these exchanges will charge another percentage fee on top of this 1-2% advertised rate.

Other disturbing aspects about the case is the basis for which the prosecutor considered a transaction to be suspicious. The prosecutor asked how Ian could possibly have overlooked the fact one guy was black. The government says that Ian should have filed a report on it (even though he couldn’t as the church wasn’t a money transmitter under the law). People who are over 60 are also suspicious apparently as well people from other countries or maybe it’s just countries that are predominantly not of Caucasian or of European dissent. It frankly wasn’t clear how far this guys bigotry extended. Meanwhile Ian regularly helped business owners and others at no charge as well as folks on the older side with their crypto questions. A number of business owners testified to this. One lady regular came and comes to our Keene Decentralized Currency Meetups. She was the oldest person to testify at 79 years old during the trial. Many other businesses were setup to accept crypto by Ian- and not once did he ask for money. Ian didn’t do cryptocurrency activism for profit. He did it for religious reasons. He believes in peace and anything to that end he supports. Speaking of which Ian wasn’t selling just Bitcoin as a fundraiser for the church. The church also sold goldbacks which are a form of ‘real money’. What that means is that the currency isn’t backed by gold. It is gold. To Ian it’s not about making money. He was already wealthy prior to founding the church and rather than retire like some people in our community he took a vow of poverty and disposed of his assets. He now works focuses full time on various outreach efforts to that end.

Let’s talk about some of these other outreach efforts for a moment that have nothing to do with Bitcoin. The government admits that most Bitcoin sold went back into buying Bitcoin. They never claimed it went to fund luxury cars, mansions, or his personal benefit. They may have said it was his personal gain, but no evidence of this existed that they could point to. No, not at all, but I can tell you where the money went that didn’t return to the pool to purchase more Bitcoin. It went to charitable causes in Keene and to people around the world.

The church funded the construction of a mosque for a persecuted religious minority in Keene. The space was donated by the church and about 20 muslim families one of which was from India even testified to that end. He did not know much about the Shire Free Church other than that the church had funded the construction of the mosque and that his family partook in the mosques services, but none-the-less, the church was focused on its mission of spreading peace and helping people in need. The government then had the gall to insult the man asking if the mosque was just another front for Bitcoin. The man responded that he didn’t know anything about Bitcoin although acknowledged his Indian Curry Restaurant accepted Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies even though he didn’t know much about it and needed a lot of help with it. Something else which he said was that Ian was always extremely helpful with Bitcoin and promoting his business. When he was asked if Ian charged for this he said no. He also said he was extremely appreciative of Ian and all that Ian had done to drive traffic to his struggling restaurant. This was also said by a number of other witnesses that were brought in to counter the governments slander.

Another instance of the churches outreach efforts included funding for an orphanage in Uganda. What is truly disingenuous and nefarious is the feds denial of a mans visa who could otherwise have come to the United States to testify on Ian’s behalf about orphanage he helped build with the Shire Free Churches funding and support. This was one of the larger financial contributions to charitable causes that the church made and its members helped raise additional funds for.

Some Of The People Involved In The Uganda Orphanage The Shire Free Church Made Possible

The church has also attempted to acquire and donate property to a local homeless shelter. What almost no one else is aware of besides me, Ian, and maybe couple of others is that the FBI interfered in the effort to acquire and donate a portion of a property to the homeless shelter. The property consisted of two attached buildings and one of them would have been donated to the shelter had the shelter not backed away in fear of the consequences as the result of government meddling. It was not the church or Ian that were fake, or at fault for under-performing if you were to somehow try and argue that, but the government’s own intimidation of charitable organizations that the church was attempting to work with.

The church also helped many people in the community who were of lower income with below market rate rents. Some of these families had members with drug addiction issues and other mental health problems. Other members of the church would routinely volunteer to drive some of these individuals around. One family lacked a car. Neither mom nor dad could drive and were dependent on the church and its members for rides to and from grocery stores and even getting to and from work. On numerous occasions I personally drove one mother who had been separated for the sake of the kids to and from work while she was attempting to beat a terrible drug addiction. Both sides had mental health issues, but at least dad was employed and able to take care of the kids with some amount of outside assistance. Dad eventually was able to get on some form of government assistance and is now running his own business and licensed.

Before the building was converted to a mosque other church members assisted in cleaning it out. This volunteer work was grueling. The house had previously been used by a family who had fled the state. Their drug addictions were severe and despite having garbage pickup service paid for by a good samaritan they would never put the garbage outside for pickup. Instead of using the service they started using the basement as a dumping ground for their trash. This resulted in a house full of bed bugs, rodents, and physical deterioration of the property. It took a slew of volunteers to help clean it out. If only I wouldn’t embarrass one of the volunteers who did the dirtiest of the deeds I’d include a picture here of him that I have stripping down to his undies and being scrubbed down outside the home (no worries, it’s not weird, it is someone very close to me). It was that disgusting. It’s unclear if those bedbugs were ever fully eliminated. It’s been at least a good handful of years and despite this there was a bedbug infestation that was recently discovered by new tenants. Keep in mind the church immediately took appropriate action to remediate the situation once it was brought to attention.

During the sentencing hearing at least one of the media outlets seemed to describe supporters as disturbing as if we were giving a scammer a “standing ovation when he entered the room”. In reality we were supporting an innocent man fighting against thugs who were defrauding the public and using violence against a man who went above and beyond to stop scams and educate people about safe and proper use of Bitcoin. Not just as an investment, but as a means of transacting business. Bitcoin is not just a means of spreading peace, but while we may have peaceful objectives it’s actually a means of helping people escape an actually nefarious system. Bitcoin was created in response to the 2008 financial collapse when the banks took peoples homes after knowingly issuing subprime loans that borrowers would not be able to pay back when interest rates rose. Bitcoin enables users to be their own bank. One need not procure the services of highly regulated and immoral financial institutions to conduct transactions at a distance. These financial institutions have been ordered by bureaucrats with regulatory authority to ban classes of people from protesters to workers in the legal sex trade. From Justin Trudeau ordering bank account seizures during the truckers protest in Canada to US bureaucrats cutting off access to unauthorized entrants to essential banking services. Sometimes these acts just push up the cost of sending money back home, but at other times it’s it’s a complete financial nightmare for people who haven’t even been in a completely legal industry for 20 years. Protecting vulnerable people is a lofty goal, but it’s not morally acceptable to lock people up, use violence against, and lie about individuals did under the guise of fighting crime. It’s not morally OK to exploit and use people as scapegoats to send a message either.

At the end of the day Ian was convicted of something he did not do. Fortunately all of the significant charges including money laundering were tossed for lack of evidence before sentencing or dropped prior to the trial. The jury didn’t have evidence upon which to come to a verdict of guilty as the evidence presented actually proved his innocence. He turned down the undercover IRS agents ask to buy Bitcoin and would not sell to him once he knew the agent was pretending to be a drug dealer. Ultimately 20 of the 27 trumped up charges were dropped or otherwise tossed. What remains must now be appealed post-sentencing.

Some points to note about how the judge and audience are being misled. One victims letter that was read to the court included that a scammer directed her to wire money to the church and sent $300,000 “wiping out her life’s savings”. This isn’t correct. She may have been ripped off for $300,000, but the church didn’t see that money. The scammers would direct their victims to purchase various amounts of Bitcoin from different sellers. The church did receive some repeat business, but ultimately these amounts were a small percentage of the funds lost. Ian would utilize commercial phone books to lookup and call buyers in an effort to avoid calling someone merely pretending to be the buyer. Through this method he was able to confirm that the buyers of Bitcoin from the church understood that they were buying Bitcoin and were not being scammed. The problem ultimately was that scammers aren’t all dumb. Some are actually very intelligent and were successful at convincing their victims to lie about their purchases. At one point Ian even asked a women if she had ever met her husband. This was not because he suspected her of being a victim necessarily, but merely because he was trying to catch any potential scammer off guard. While offensive in nature he carefully asked the question blaming the law as to why he was asking it, still to some offense. To make a long story short she lied and said she had. If she had said she had never met her husband Ian may have been able to have persuaded her not to buy Bitcoin for a lover she had never met in person. Remember that it was not just the church that victims would buy bitcoin from, so even had he refused to sell to her she would not have been left unvictimized short of Ian having been able to convince her of the mistake she was making.

One of the most interesting parts of the sentencing was that a supposed victim read a letter for the audience that stated she had bought her bitcoin at a vending machine in the state of Florida. The Shire Free Church never operated a vending machine outside the state of New Hampshire. This was not testimony, but it demonstrates that these women were being coached and providing unreliable testimony. These so-called victims were convinced by the prosecution that Ian was somehow involved in their victimization despite it being the farthest thing from the truth. “if only Ian had registered” was the logic, despite that not making an iota of a difference given the churches know your customer regime was stronger than that of any bank these victims used to wire funds to the church in the first place.

There was one other disturbing thing I overheard from a conversation between a Sentinel reporter and a government employee. The government employee was OK’ing the writers story. Whether this was suggestive that he was working hand in hand or otherwise seeking approval it didn’t appear to be honest journalism. The media for the most part failed to get the whole story or fairly report the story although I believe the reporting for the Sentinel on this sentencing story despite this incident was not as terrible as I’ve seen it on other articles they’ve  written about the Crypto6. At least some effort appeared to be made to give the resemblance of fair reporting whether or not it actually was.

The government brought in a lot of sob stories about elderly women being victims. In reality it wasn’t all women, and they weren’t all elderly. About 20% of the victims were young and no older than the judge, prosecutors, and lawyers, and some were men. The victims were that of third party perpetrators and the government admitted during the trial that Ian did NOT scam anyone or know of the scammers at the time these victims were being scammed. They attempted to frame it as if he knew the people buying Bitcoin were victims of scammers by carefully cutting audio from episodes of Free Talk Live where the scams were discussed post-discovery. Prior to discovery Ian did not know any of these victims at trial were being victimized by a third party scammer. These so-called victims had lied to the banks which were used to wire the money to the church. The banks didn’t have any effective KYC- procedures either that worked 100% of the time. A credit union lady testified they don’t have to cut off individual transactions even. Know your customer procedures were followed by Ian religiously. Know your customer procedures are not created by the government, but rather by the financial institutions licensed to transmit money or otherwise those operating banks. KYC is not required unless you are moving money on behalf of another from one location to another or from one person to another. The church never transmitted anything. The church sold Bitcoin and only sold Bitcoin from it’s own wallet raising money for charity. No financial gain occurred as it relates to Ian Freeman.

Ultimately the lawyers who advised the church prior to the 2021 arrest were correct on the requirements and whether the church had to register with the regulatory agency FINCEN. The lawyers that advised the church had a deep understanding of what Bitcoin was. The judge on the other hand couldn’t fathom what Bitcoin was. In his decision he actually revealed that he thought the blockchain was a real life breathing human being. The church in practice only ever sold its own Bitcoin though and did not move money on behalf of others like walmart does or a bank does or an actual exchange does. The church didn’t need to register as a money transmitter for this and other reasons, but the ignorance of the judge resulted in a conviction on the money transmitter charge anyway. The other aspect of why the church wasn’t required to register came down to the fact the church wasn’t doing it for profit. A person selling Bitcoin without a profit or markup for instance or a church doing it for charity isn’t included in the law. I believe that the defense preserved the issue for appeal so it could get overturned on appeal. Unfortunately it’s more than likely Ian will serve out his sentence prior to the appeal meaning that while he may get found not guilty of all the charges later he’ll still have served his sentence.

For now the remaining convictions that will need to be appealed include the follow: Operation of an unlicensed money transmitting business, conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and attempts to evade or defeat tax in the years 2016 through 2019.

For that Ian has been sentenced to 8 years for what amounted to a paperwork violation. The good news is this is more than half of the minimum sentence for the charges he’s been convicted of. In practical terms the estimate for his release with “good time” under a new law is 4 ½ to 5 years. And sadly yes he has not been allowed to remain free on appeal as the judge had previously stated was likely. This is probably because he threw out the money laundering charge prior to sentence and it was the lack of evidence for the knowledge component of the money laundering statute that the judge thought would be successful on appeal. So, the good news is he’ll be back. The bad news is it probably won’t be before his appeal is concluded or his sentence is completed. Judge Laplante also sentenced Ian to two years of supervised release, ordered him to pay a court fine of $40,000, and ordered forfeiture and restitution to be decided at a future hearing. Stay tuned to Free Keene for continuation of this story and others. And remember, Ian may be held up for a bit, but the Free State Project, Free Talk Live, and the church live on. We should be ecstatic as our community is thriving with record numbers of new movers every year, more and more government violence in New Hampshire being eliminated,  and those advocating violence being done away with in favor of peaceful liberty minded individuals. For that I am very thankful! So lets keep up the good work.

 

A Locally Organized Bitcoin Pizza Day Photo Celebrating The Day That Bitcoin Was First Used A Currency, NOT Just Some Investment Vehicle Or Scammer Tool

With the passing of Senator Dianne Feinstein last week, the responsibility of replacing the late Senator falls on Governor Gavin Newsom of California. Newsom’s nominee will serve until a Senator is elected in 2024 and sworn in in January 2025.

Newsom had made two stipulations when it became apparent that Senator Feinstein was failing and would not survive the remainder of her term. Newsom committed to naming a Black Woman and would insist the nominee not run for the Senate seat in 2024. He has made good on one but may change his tune on the other.

On Sunday night, Newsom named Laphonza Butler to fill the role. Butler is not a household name and is unfamiliar to most, not just outside California but inside, too. Laphonza Butler is what you get when the person making the appointment paints themselves into a corner with specific promises.

Butler is not new to politics as a campaign organizer and operative who has never held a public office. She may not be qualified to be a Senator, but she did check off the two essential boxes. She is Black and a woman who comes to the table with a bonus box checked. Laphonza Butler is a Black Woman who happens to be a Lesbian. She is a trifecta for Governor Gavin Newsom. She is not the best person available for the Senate, but she checks boxes, which is more critical in this Woke World of Politics.

Nobody enters the political world quickly; something is always in their closet. In Butler’s case, she had a huge flaw that had to be rectified Sunday night before the announcement. Laphonza Butler was not a legal resident of California but of Maryland. Butler cannot serve as a Senator of a state she does not live in. So, Butler and Newsom miraculously found a Town Clerk working on a weekend and registered the appointee as a California voter on Sunday night. When will someone throw the Red Challenge Flag and call foul on this process?

From the first stipulation by Newsom, where but in politics can you narrow the search for an employee to a specific Race or Gender? To do so in a private business environment would land you a civil rights or equal opportunity employment violation. Not for the President with his Vice President pick and his Supreme Court nominee, and now we see it is perfectly legal for a Democrat Governor. Is it legal, or is it a case of nobody having the guts to challenge these selections?

Anyone must prove residence to register to vote in a new city or state. There is no way that she could produce the documents to show that she lived in California and not in Maryland, as was detailed in her biography on the website of Emily’s List, where she is the organization’s president. Emily’s List is a political action group focusing on abortion rights.

Aside from the technicalities, Butler’s real issue is whether she checks boxes or is she qualified to be a United States Senator. Nothing in her resume indicates her ability to perform the job, but she will probably be in D.C. for 15 months and will only need to vote, however, she is directed by Chuck Schumer. That she can probably handle. She just needs to watch John Fetterman and do as he does.

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America has a free speech problem. Not so much the idea. A majority of those recently polled by Real Clear Politics think “First Amendment protections for freedom of speech is a good thing.” But they don’t all agree on what free speech is or means.

That lack of understanding has led to unhealthy opinions about the First Amendment.

A few cherry-picked bullets from RCP.

 

• Nearly one-third of Democratic voters (34%) say Americans have “too much freedom.” This compared to 14.6% of Republicans. Republicans were most likely to say Americans have too little freedom (46%), while only 22% of Democrats feel that way. Independents were in the middle in both categories.
• …
• Fully three-fourths of Democrats believe government has a responsibility to limit “hateful” social media posts, while Republicans are more split, with 50% believing the government has a responsibility to restrict hateful posts. (Independents, once again, are in the middle.)
• Democrats are significantly more likely than Republicans to favor stifling the free speech rights of political extremists. Also, Republicans don’t vary by the group: Only about half of GOP voters favor censorship — whether asked about the Ku Klux Klan, Nazis, or the Communist Party.

 

As alluded to in the opening, “Overall, 9 in 10 voters in the U.S. think First Amendment protections for freedom of speech is a good thing, while only 9% think it is a bad thing,” said pollster Spencer Kimball, who directed the RCP survey. “This is agreed upon across the demographics, like party affiliation, age, and race.”

Good in principle but not in practice.

We know what Free Speech means. The government cannot infringe on public speech; allowing that camel’s nose under the tent ends with the camel in the tent and no room for anything but what it decides. We’ve seen how that works in real life, from COVID to Vaccines to masks to closing churches to so-called disinformation ministers (official or self-reclaimed) to shuttering businesses or jailing protesters because they are registered with the wrong political party. And that’s in America.

We’ve seen worse outside our borders and as close as Canada. It’s not pretty.

But the media, including social, have created reasonable doubt in the minds of many. Instead of Free Speech, we need free speech*.

Some conditions have always applied., but the new-age version knows not the evil it embraces. If you ask the government to regulate something, especially speech, it will not stop at whatever boundary line you’ve concocted in your imagination. Once invited across the threshold, it still sucks your rights dry; any bureaucracy tasked with policing words and ideas will do that and won’t stop. You won’t be able to stop it.

Candidates will run on it, but they’ll never manage to do more than get elected. And we are only a few Supreme Court justices away from what little protection we have, as capricious as that can be. Quite often, these unelected, robed hooligans are what stand between us and sanctioned, lawful censorship. A regime that expands its speech and thought policing far and wide such that it will inevitably trample on those who believe it a good idea to regulate some speech.

We do regulate some speech, libel, slander, and genuine threats of harm, but the government bungles these often. Why anyone would see fit to allow them to manage more astounds me, but they do, and it is a growing trend we need to reverse soon. The root of which is public education. We need to teach children why speech must be free, even when we don’t like it, or they might grow up in a nation without it.

Speech is free or not, and asking the State to manage the middle ground will only result in there being no ground left upon which to stand and voice your opinion, especially if it contradicts that of those with power.

 

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As promised in Monday Memes, I have an overflow. My meme cup runneth over.  And yes there will be a Friday edition too.

Let the mayhem, mockery, and ridicule resume:

 

*** Warning, a few possibly off-color ones, in case tender eyes are about ***

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Having some hiccups with meme collection.  I think I’ve figured out the problem but small collection this post.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

Pick of the Post:

 

 

I just had one kid at the doctor’s office.  They offered the flu shot.

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Palate cleansers:

 

—

—

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Come back on Friday for more.  Same meme time.  Same meme channel.

 

 

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Kevin McCarthy is out as speaker, and people are, as they should, picking sides. Ray Cardello thinks Matt Gaetz is a petulant child without a plan. Ed Mosca is happy to see Republicans of the principle remove him for failing to do his job.

Republicans in at least one Facebook group where I lurk think dethroning McCarthy was a bad idea—party division. We are shooting ourselves in the foot. Question: if everyone agrees that Washington, DC, is broken, how do we think fixing it might look?

Did it look like the brief tenure of Speaker McCarthy?

While McCarthy was speaker, Joe, and the Democrats didn’t seem to have too much trouble advancing their agenda at a time when Kevin’s job – his only job – was to leverage significant concessions or bring Congress to a screeching halt. I don’t recall hearing any tires chirp.

Let’s turn that around. As the House ponders his replacement, can they be a disruptor? Someone who walks against the flow of politics as usual. A guy or gal who says no to open borders and uses the power of the body and the majority to cut purse strings to get the Executive Branch under control. Or will it be someone who must also agree to look the other way? A leader who, instead of returning the budget process to clean appropriations or bust, has to agree to support continuing resolutions and pork-filled omnibus bills to get Republican votes. Someone who agrees that 33 trillion isn’t too much debt, we can afford some more.

Kevin McCarthy might be a great guy and a passable member of Congress, but it took fifteen attempts before he managed enough votes to get the gavel. And only after multiple concessions to the freedom wing of the Caucus and the very thing that got him “fired” from the gig. One of those concessions was a rule allowing any member to call a vote to vacate. That’s not exactly a guy with a mandate. Any Republican pretending anything else has a poor memory.

Here’s another unpleasant truth. In the wake of his departure as speaker, only Republicans can fail to elect one of their own to the post. Democrats will reject anyone who is not an R, which is meaningless unless Republicans screw it up. Is the departure of McCarthy as Speaker an expression of distaste at the removal from leadership of a milquetoast insider, or are we afraid our Republicans will do worse?

I have a few years of experience as an observer of politics, including the ones where Kevin McCarthy was Speaker of the US House. He was no great find. He’s much closer to the Inside the Beltway party than flyover country Republicans, but he could have been more like the latter.

Twelve appropriations bills. All he needed to do was bring the budget process back into line by forcing votes on each of the individual appropriations bills, clean and neat. Democrats would have been the ones shutting down the government, and we’d be able to put a name to the department, its largesse, and who was affected. He opted for a continuing resolution which, like the omnibus bills of the past decade-plus, have helped drive waste, fraud, abuse, and deficits (plus interest) into the pockets of our grandchildren.

I’m not saying I didn’t like the guy. Given the choices at the time, he appeared to have potential, but as often happens, he hid his Georgetown flu or got a more severe case along the way. He’s not the first or the last, and such is our problem. Too few members of Congress keep the principles they claim to get elected when they get to DC – it is a rare, perhaps even precious, trait, and we need more of it.

And I get why you might think Matt Gaetz was a petulant child, but he did something of which most Republicans are incapable. He got Democrats to vote for change Republicans can believe in if Republicans can stop bitching about displacing a budding DC insider from leadership long enough to replace him with someone with a bit more backbone.

Republicans control the US House, but what exactly have they done with that? If you are unsure, compare McCarthy’s US House to any Democrat majority, no matter how slim. They act like they can’t lose and refuse to accept no for an answer. They use their power to advance as much of their agenda as they can and to block every other, regardless of which branch of government.

Was McCarthy finally moving in that direction? I saw no evidence of it. And I’m not saying the Republican majority will manage to do better, just that someone had to rip off the bandaid, or we’d keep doing worse. America is worse off under McCarthy as Speaker. Much worse.

Are you sure you want to defend that?

 

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About a month ago, I wrote a story about Slate Valley School Board member Curtis Hier’s battle with both the school officials he was elected to oversee and his fellow board members, who don’t seem to appreciate Hier’s desire to get to the bottom of some serious problems in the system that are negatively impacting students.

The main issue at the heart of Hier’s concerns (although there are several) is the physical and psychological abuse of students by faculty – primarily kids with special needs – and the alleged cover-up of these abuses.

From a news perspective, this would appear to be low-hanging fruit for the front pages of local and statewide reporting outlets. It has sympathetic victims our reporters usually like to cover (equity for special needs students), dramatic conflict between a whistleblower and an entrenched bureaucracy, and it explores a scandalous issue that is also a subject of statewide concern – the use of “restraint and seclusion” in our public schools.

This problem is so glaring and widespread that the state legislature introduced a bill in 2023 (H.409) banning the violent practices entirely and that Education Committee members promise will be a focal point of lawmaking in 2024. Since Hier brought attention to the issue, multiple local citizens with ties to the school have come forward with stories corroborating and/or expanding on Hier’s allegations.

Hier has filed a Freedom of Information (FOIA) request for redacted records regarding restraint and seclusion incidents. This was met with a threat to release Hier’s personal file from his days as a teacher. Hier started Slate Valley Transparency Legal Fund. There have been calls from the board for Hier to step down, and calls from the community for the superintendent, Brooke Olsen-Farrell, to step down….

So where is the Vermont press corps?

Looking back through the archives of our major statewide news outlets, there is no coverage of this story. Even coverage by the Rutland Herald, the paper of record for the Slate Valley District, has been anemic. (Just two rather vague articles, and largely disinterested in getting to the bottom of Hier’s accusations.) It’s not because Hier hasn’t reached out to them; he has. Is it because they just don’t cover specific local school board issues? This excuse would seem to apply to Seven Days and VPR (although VPR did have one recent story on the Green Mountain School Board’s allegedly racist “Chieftains” mascot controversy). WCAX covers Burlington and adjacent school board stories, but that’s about it, so they can plausibly say it’s just not in their wheelhouse.

However, VT Digger and WPTZ do love themselves a good local school board controversy from anywhere in the state! So long as, one must now assume, it fits a certain narrative. School boards battling over racist mascots is a favorite topic for these outlets, for sure. School board conflicts over transgender policies: check! But public school employees systemically abusing vulnerable students and administrators covering it up… apparently not so much.

VT Digger routinely covers stories about local school board controversies involving members, school staff, and/or concerned parents. Just within the timeframe that the Hier events have been active, Digger dug into such headlines as, Community members urge Middlebury school district to improve its response to racism (September 27, 2023), “Alburgh School Board moves to distance itself from Grand Isle Supervisory Union (August 30, 2023), Facing no-confidence vote, South Burlington school board chair steps down (August 17, 2023), Parents say a Strafford art teacher lost her job under cloudy circumstances. They want her back. (August 16, 2023), South Burlington school board will hold vote on chair’s ouster (August 11, 2023), How did an anti-trans activist book an event at a Vergennes public school? (June 16, 2023), Brattleboro Union High School retires ‘Colonel’ moniker, replaces with ‘Bear’ mascot (June 14, 2023), At Peoples Academy, allegations of ‘systemic’ racist bullying (June 12, 2023), Orange Southwest reaches settlement in locker room lawsuit (June 2, 2023).

On September 8th Digger ran, “Independent investigation finds multiple abuse allegations at Kurn Hattin ‘supported by evidence,’” so they apparently don’t have an aversion to discussing the abuse of special needs students. But Kurn Hattin is a therapeutic independent school, not a public school, and herein, I suspect, lies the rub!

Vermont’s Left-wing media routinely puts its thumb on the scale to advance the woke agenda of the public school monopoly and its political interests. Right now, those interests include absorbing birth to five-year-old childcare into the public school system (at massive taxpayer expense) and shutting down Vermont’s independent schools and the tuitioning system that supports them so as to corral those kids and that money for themselves as well. And they feel the need to do this now while the Democrats’ supermajority, which is totally in bed with the teachers’ union, is in place and can override Governor Scott’s vetoes.

Obviously, a broad, public conversation focused on violence and psychological trauma being inflicted upon young children by public school officials and gotten away with due to lack of transparency, and competent oversight isn’t one that recommends placing toddlers into that environment to be either witnesses to or victims of these practices.

As for the independent school/tuitioning issue, the main argument that public school lobbyists have put forward to justify shutting down tuitioning is that independent schools don’t serve students with special needs, whereas public schools must and do. And public schools are transparent and accountable, whereas independent schools aren’t. Neither accusation is true about independent schools. But what Hier is trying to expose provides evidence for the exact opposite case: that public schools aren’t transparent and accountable, they aren’t actually serving special needs kids, and, in fact, beyond mere neglect, may be actively causing them serious harm.

So, says our press, nothing to see here. Move along.

The Curtis Hier story exposes two stories behind the story. 1) The public school system is not performing as it should, especially for our most vulnerable students. And 2) Our reporters and editors at our most widely read/viewed news outlets are more concerned with protecting a politically powerful special interest than they are about informing the public about serious issues taking place in the most expensive sector of state spending – Pre-K-12 education. Our ignorance is their bliss.

 

Rob Roper is a freelance writer with 20 years of experience in Vermont politics, including three years of service as chair of the Vermont Republican Party and nine years as President of the Ethan Allen Institute, Vermont’s free-market think tank. He is also a regular contributor to VermontGrok.

 

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Thomas Sowell is Brilliant, but that quality is not new to the man. In today’s clip, we jump into the way back machine to watch a younger Dr. Sowell lay out the inconvenient truths about how blacks are being kept down in America.

This clip is only a minute long but worth the wait, as Sowell delivers the kill shot at the end of the clip. A truth from decades ago that he has revisited many times that is as or more true today.

Modern welfare programs keep blacks in America down.

 

Dependence was seen as the key to holding the slaves down. It’s ironic that same principle comes up in the welfare state a hundred years later.
pic.twitter.com/FsTsnaigaG

— Thomas Sowell Quotes (@ThomasSowell) October 3, 2023

 

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Thank you, Matt Gaetz, for exposing Kevin McCathy’s House-GOP as controlled opposition. Not a single impeachment … the military-industrial complex’s War in Ukraine continues to get funded … the DOJ’s war against Donald Trump continues to get funded … and we end up with a “continuing resolution” because, as Gaetz exposed, that’s where McCarthy wanted to end up. Gaetz was one of eight Republicans who said that enough was enough and refused to go along to get along. Nancy Mace was another:

Today I voted for the Motion to Vacate and remove the Speaker.

This isn’t about left vs right.

This isn’t about ideology.

This is about trust and keeping your word.

This is about making Congress do it’s job.
(1/7)

— Rep. Nancy Mace (@RepNancyMace) October 3, 2023

No budget, no separate spending bills until it was too late, a CR which takes spending power out of the hands of the people and puts all the power into the hands of a select few. There has also been no action on many issues we care about and were promised.
(3/7)

— Rep. Nancy Mace (@RepNancyMace) October 3, 2023

I came here to take difficult votes and do the right thing, regardless of the pressure and regardless of the threats (bc there’s been plenty of both). Today I’m voting against 95 percent of my party in the hopes of fixing how Congress operates.
(5/7)

— Rep. Nancy Mace (@RepNancyMace) October 3, 2023

I’ll work with anyone willing to do that and look forward to voting for a Speaker who shares this vision for changing Congress and getting us back on a path to delivering results for the people.#IndpendentVoice

(7/7)

— Rep. Nancy Mace (@RepNancyMace) October 3, 2023

Doesn’t sound all that “petulant” to me. Actually, sounds rather principled.

 

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Greenland, NH – Conservative CEO and U.S. Army Reserves veteran Hollie Noveletsky announced that she is running for Congress in New Hampshire’s First Congressional District against Congressman Chris Pappas.

Army Reserves Veteran, Nurse Practitioner, and CEO Willing To Work On Solutions To Help New Hampshire

“When I look at Washington, I see a city run by Joe Biden and Chris Pappas, who bask in inaction and empty promises, while middle-class families in New Hampshire are stuck with inflation, higher energy costs, the rising cost of healthcare, and chaos at our southern border,” said Hollie Noveletsky, the CEO of Novel Iron Works.

“For me, the choice was clear: I could either complain and do nothing or use my experiences as a veteran, a nurse, and CEO to offer conservative, America First solutions that will help New Hampshire. Washington has enough career politicians; we need a veteran and CEO willing to work on economic solutions that will help our families and fix the illegal immigration crisis, and that’s why I’m running for Congress.”

Please Submit Group communications or Press Releases to editor@granitegrok.com.
Submission is not a guarantee of publication – Publication is not an endorsement.

Noveletsky is the CEO of Novel Iron Works, which has created nearly 100 jobs across New Hampshire. She served in the U.S. Army Reserves for ten years as a nurse practitioner. Additionally, she volunteered in Sierra Leone, working with victims of the Blood Diamond Wars, in amputee camps, and victims of the sex trade, and assisted victims of Hurricane Sandy, Hurricane Katrina, the Oklahoma tornadoes, and the Maine ice storms.

 

 

Reminder: Content about candidates or by candidates is not an endorsement by GraniteGrok.com or its authors.

 

 

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Great job, Matt Gaetz. You threw a temper tantrum and have no plan for your next move. When everything favors the GOP, you pulled the fire alarm and made it personal.

We have a President wearing Depends in the White House, a totally inept Vice President that nobody wants, a GOP front-runner who will spend more time in court than the campaign trail for the next year, and Matt Gaetz decided it was a good idea to throw a grenade into the GOP led House.

Kevin McCarthy had a no-win situation when he became Speaker of the House in a tumultuous battle in January. He performed above expectations for most with a slim five-vote majority but not well enough for Matt Gaetz. Gaetz has had McCarthy in his sights since McCarthy first held the Gavel, and today, he got his wish and got McCarthy expelled from the Speaker’s office. The third person in line for the Oval Office is out because a young punk from Florida flexed his muscles and got his wish.

Excellent work, Matt, but being young and stupid, you forgot to think the process through. Who is your successor? Who now holds the Gavel in Matt Gaetz’s House of Representatives? Don’t ask Matt. He does not have a clue, but the crap show we will witness over the next few weeks to find a new Speaker is all on Matt. Did I say, great job, Matt? I think so.

Matt Gaetz has a very short memory. He forgets he was almost outed from the House on charges of sexual improprieties. The GOP stuck with Matt when tossing him aside would have been easy. His way of thanking his fellow Republican Congressmen is to throw their party into major disarray. When the Republicans should be uniting and concentrating on defeating the Democrats in 2024, we are beating each other, and the Democrats are laughing at us.

Kevin McCarthy has been kicked to the curb. He worked tirelessly to keep a GOP House divided into five fractions. His job was compared to a Mafia Don, keeping the five families aligned. It was not the Republicans against the Democrats. It was the five caucuses fighting for relevance and McCarthy pulling the strings to try and keep it all together. Nobody could have succeeded under those conditions. McCarthy did his best, but in the end, one of the families prevailed, and Kevin was dead on the side of the road.

The Speaker selects his successor as one of his first acts in office. The list is kept secret and only revealed in the case of a situation like today. When McCarthy made his selections, he chose GOP Rep. Patrick McHenry, a top McCarthy ally, to serve as interim Speaker. The House will now need to elect a new speaker. According to sources, the House GOP will have a conference meeting Tuesday night, although the election is not expected to happen on Tuesday.

It isn’t easy to be objective today. I am angry, frustrated, and disillusioned as I have never been. My hope, as this country is spiraling down the drain, was that the GOP could get their act together, win this election in 2024, and turn the lousy decisions of Joe Biden around. I do not feel too good about any of that tonight.

 

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A State Rep. who is supposed to represent Milford recently made some political noise by switching political affiliation from Democrat to Undeclared. But this State Rep … according to her X (Twitter) does NOT consider America “her country,” DESPITE being a citizen.

Rather, she considers El Salvador “her country:”

 

 

Do her constituents know that Rep. Perez does NOT consider them her countrymen? More importantly, do her constituents know how hard-left Perez is, that she’s a Communist? Maybe all we hear about New Hampshire having the most informed, engaged voters is just another BIG LIE. OR maybe a majority of voters in New Hampshire … at least in Milford, want Communism?

 

 

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And throw in ANYONE that believes in “open borders” as well?

What is being done is what we already saw in Britain: “We don’t like the current electorate (because we keep losing), so let’s import a new one.” The Labour Party did exactly that and soon started winning more.

Now that the Democrat/Marxist/One Worlders minions running the Biden Administration (what, you REALLY believe that Biden is in charge?  Hahahahahaha!) have flung open the doors and decimated our borders, this is exactly what is happening – Seen at Powerline.

Without the mass deportation of tens of millions, including their children, covering over a decade of illegal entry since DACA, the US population and electorate is going to be defined by recent arrival illegal aliens in your lifetime. pic.twitter.com/Lord75zeCY

— ib (@Indian_Bronson) September 27, 2023

Our nation is being changed right in front of us.

Now, I have no problem with immigration. When we have the CORRECT philosophy behind it (people who WANT to embrace our founding ideas, who want to work hard, who desire to assimilate while still bringing the best parts of their culture to share with us), it works. But that’s not what is happening. With the Marxism of “multiculturalism” that denies OUR uniquely American culture and wishes to stamp it out, what will happen with these millions of illegal alien invaders (mostly young men of military age and bringing crime as well as diseases we had previously stamped out like TB, leprosy just to name two) and nothing comparable to Traditional American mores into our heartland?

More importantly, of all those babies, WHOSE culture will they embrace? Historically, newcomers wanted to be Americans. With multiculturalism, they keep their native culture, and with the Left denigrating our own, WHY would they even begin to become Americans?

Remember that I used to write about the Cloward-Priven Socialist political stunt that almost bankrupted New York City? That was the scheme created by husband and wife sociologists who hated our way of life and especially hated capitalism, whose premise was to use the current laws against “The Establishment” by overwhelming the welfare system by insisting that NYC strictly follow those laws and spend what they demand. It was Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals (RULE 4: “Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules) writ large.

They almost succeeded.

Now, seeing those results, the minions that control Biden AND hate America have rolled this out nationally.  It’s goal is simple and we already see its results: the southern border states ARE overwhelmed and running out of resources – they are having to be dependent of the Federal Government.

My, my – the Feds created the problem with the aim of getting rid of the vestiges of the important principle of Federalism. How convenient!

However, the Red States did the right thing by sending the invading horde to the “sanctuary” cities and States. Martha’s Vineyard was the first virtue-signaling bastion to fail badly. I now find it highly amusing that NYC is now having to spend billions to take care of Biden’s illegals – once again, getting Cloward-Piven’d.

Will this be one ignition source for the turnaround for America?

After all, just with this decision by Biden’s minions, with no lawful deliberation or action by Congress, this is a dictator’s decision.  How long will we let this go on?

 

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California Governor Gavin Newsom, tasked with filling the US Senate seat vacated by Dianne Feinstein after her passing, has snubbed his state’s massive illegal immigrant population. He did choose a “non-resident,” just not one from California.

I can only assume that he could not find an English speaking black lesbian among the horde of California’s undocumented “workers” who can’t find work as if unemployment is a job Americans won’t do.

 

Newsom appointed Laphonza Butler, whose only qualifications appear to be working on Kamala Harris’ failed 2020 presidential campaign while being a “black lesbian.” Naturally, the California governor is touting the latter. …

 

FEC filings from EMILY’s List record Laphonza Butler’s residence as Silver Springs, Maryland as recently as 31 days ago. https://t.co/FjZkJ9Ugf0 pic.twitter.com/2FzA8MVqfU

— Rob Pyers (@rpyers) October 2, 2023

 

They’ve cleaned all that residency business up almost overnight, so no worries. Laphonza Butler, who is likely still registered to vote and has been paying taxes in (and from) Maryland, was doing so by mistake. Nothing about her history there is relevant to the appointment, and any thought or word to the contrary is white heterosexual fragility expressed as racism and bigotry.

Besides, does it matter which donkey they plug into that seat? None of them will vote for Californians; they will vote for the Inside the Beltway Party.

And who doesn’t want to see someone who fundraised for Kamala for president in action? As stupid and unqualified as Harris continues to be, the person who raised money to get her elected to the Oval Office has got to be worse.

Did the same donors help get a quick close on a property in California, which we all know does not define residency. Homeowners in states all over the place vote in New Hampshire every election cycle. They feel like they live here long enough to vote and then leave. Laphonza Butler can feel like she lives in California and cast votes as if she cares a wit about the people she has been chosen to represent.

C’mon, man, she’s a black lesbian. The US Senate needed one of those, and now it has one. And she’s not over seventy!

Of course, we don’t have any illegal “migrants” in the US Senate either. Not yet. But there’s still time.

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The following is an open letter to Frank Edelblut, Commissioner of Education, and Drew Cline, Chairman of the Board of Education, regarding a document that is making the rounds offering the public a chance to comment on proposed changes to the Ed Rules that govern public schools in New Hampshire.

Dear Commissioner Edelblut and Chairman Cline,

I’ve been reading — or trying to read — the 139-page document that is currently out for public review, which identifies proposed changes to the rules promulgated by the state Department of Education.

I believe that the goal of the document is to improve the performance of students in public schools.  However, the form, structure, and content of the document more or less guarantee that this goal will not be met. 

The first major problem with the document is its length:  It’s 139 pages.  There is a well-known technique in civil lawsuits for foiling the normal discovery process by providing so many documents that the ones that will be useful to the opposing side will probably never be found.  That seems to be what’s happening here.  There are so many changes — and so many rules that might be changed — that there’s no way to know which ones are important and which ones are trivial without plowing through the whole thing, which almost no one will have the time, motivation, or stamina to do.

The second major problem with the document is its level of detail. It is common knowledge among software engineers that every time you try to fix a bug in a system, you end up creating at least two more.  The same is true in statutes and regulations.  The solution isn’t to keep patching things but to go back to the original design, the architecture, so that fewer bugs can arise in the first place. The solution is to reduce the need for particular complications by reducing overall complexity.

In the case of public schools, the underlying source of complexity is that the system is time-based instead of results-based. In any other industry, the goal would be to get students to the finish line as quickly as possible for as little money as possible.  (Of course, this would require knowing where the finish line is, something that requires a shared agreement among students, parents, schools, and taxpayers about where it is. As far as I’ve been able to tell, no such agreement exists, and no steps have been taken toward reaching one.)

But in the industry of education — or more precisely, the industry of schooling — kids are kept in school for an arbitrary number of years, whether they want to be there or not, and whether they need to be there or not. Once they are there, it becomes necessary to find something for them to do, some way to fill their time and some way to keep them pacified. 

If this were to change — if there were a clear and adequate definition of an adequate education that focused on the desired end state rather than on particular paths to reach it — then many of the problems that the document seeks to address would simply not exist, and the document itself could be reduced to perhaps five to ten pages, and written in clear English rather than in legalese. 

Note that in technical fields, a ‘standard’ says what needs to happen, not how it needs to happen.  If you’re supposed to produce USB cables, there are some behaviors that the cables have to exhibit and some tests that they have to pass in order to meet the standard.  How you set up your factory, what manufacturing processes you use to make the cables, and how long you take to make them are your business. 

Imagine a USB standard that says:  The people making your cables have to spend a certain number of hours in training, and your factory has to run for a certain number of hours per day, a certain number of days per year.   And we’ll certify whatever you produce as a USB cable.

That’s the kind of standard we have now for graduating from the public school system, as embodied by documents like this one.

A reasonable standard for graduation would say:  This is what we mean by an adequately educated student.  Here are the tests he can pass, the skills he can demonstrate, and the kinds of problems he can solve. 

A reasonable standard would be precise.  It wouldn’t include pseudo-competencies like ‘Use digital tools to develop cognitive proficiency in literacy, numeracy, problem-solving, decision making, and spatial/visual literacy.’ 

A reasonable standard would be consistent.  If a certain kind of thinking or problem-solving ability is necessary, it would be spelled out, and every student would need to be able to demonstrate it in order to graduate.

If every graduate needs to be able to do things like ‘appreciate art,’ or ‘use technology,’ or whatever, then have tests that let students demonstrate those things and make everyone pass those tests. 

To the extent that the state has a job here — and the written state constitution, as opposed to the oral one, suggests that it does not — that job is to say what product is acceptable, not what process must be followed to produce it.  Micro-management guarantees macro-failure, which is what we have now.  Focusing on process creates the situation that allows (and, to some extent, even encourages) administrators and teachers to ignore (and in some cases, undermine) the product. 

I suspect that both of you are familiar with the book The Goal by Eliyahu Goldratt, but if you aren’t, I would ask you to read it since it perfectly captures the situation in which our public school system finds itself and suggests a way to deal with that situation.  Briefly, Goldratt points out that when running any kind of enterprise, every possible action that might be taken needs to be evaluated, not in terms of what invented internal benchmarks it might meet, but in terms of the primary goal of the enterprise.  In the case of a business, that goal is to make money. In the case of a public school system, that goal is to produce educated citizens.

Finally, unlike a manufacturing standard, an educational standard needs to be centered on two fundamental concepts:  priority and autonomy.

By priority, I just mean that some things are more fundamental than others and must be dealt with first. If you’re in a course on American history, but your reading skills are below proficiency, then you should be working on reading instead of listening to someone explain history to you.  If you’re not rock solid on your arithmetic skills, you certainly shouldn’t be taking algebra… but you also shouldn’t be taking courses in, say, fashion merchandising.

By independence, I just mean that the single most important thing that you should be learning is how to direct your own learning, how to become your own teacher so that you can learn whatever you want to later on. Nothing else even approaches this in importance.

Any educational standard that isn’t just a wish list must require students to develop foundational skills first and then require them to leverage those skills to learn to teach themselves. By the time a student is ready to graduate, his teachers should be acting mostly in an advisory role.

To put that a different way: No matter how much a student knows at a given moment if he’s still depending on his teachers to learn new material, then he’s not ready to graduate.

The third major problem with the document is, in fact, its complete lack of any priority among its requirements. It’s like a building code that goes into detail about how to choose the finishes on bathroom fixtures while ignoring how to tell if the foundation is solid. 

Two egregious and illustrative examples of this are requiring schools to ‘teach financial literacy’ and ‘teach digital literacy.’  It’s worth asking how these affect the teaching of actual literacy. 

First, when you require that schools ‘teach x,’ you’re implicitly saying that it’s okay if the kids can’t read about x on their own because you’ll provide a teacher to do that reading for them and provide oral explanations.   

Education professionals call this meeting students where they are, but psychologists would call it enabling illiteracy.  If you ever find yourself wondering how, in a district like Newport, 90 percent of kids can graduate while only about 10 percent of them can read, this is how.

Second, there is an old saying that if you chase two rabbits, you won’t catch either of them. By requiring so much content to be taught while not actually requiring any of it to be learned — and by establishing no priorities — you’re providing school administrators and teachers with a built-in excuse to ignore fundamentals in favor of incidentals.  If ‘learning about the Holocaust’ and ‘developing an awareness of and involvement with the natural world’ are on the same level of importance as learning to read, you can guess how that’s going to work out. 

If you really have an opportunity to overhaul the Ed Rules, I implore you: Please use that opportunity to create rules that (1) focus on product rather than process, (2) are results-based rather than time-based, (3) prioritize goals, (4) recognize that producing autonomous learners is the goal of the enterprise, and (5) eliminate everything that can’t be tied directly to the achievement of that goal.

In closing, I would ask that when creating those rules, you consider two crucial questions that almost never get serious consideration in discussions about education: First, if a kid wants to learn something, who can stop him? (And how much money do we need to spend to support that?)  Second, if a kid doesn’t want to learn something, who can make him? (And how much money do we waste by trying?)   

I would also ask that you consider these questions in the context of the world of 2023, where high-quality, low-cost pedagogy is literally falling from the sky, 24 hours a day, seven days a week — a world where a student in a school classroom has access to fewer resources, of lower quality, and vastly higher cost, than the ones available to him everywhere else. 

Thank you for your consideration,

Ian Underwood
Croydon, NH

This letter was originally published at Bare Minimum Books.

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