A HIGH SCHOOL PRINCIPAL sets the rules

We need a few thousand more principals like this.

When you listen to the young people," F-this, F-that", and nary anyone will step
up and correct them- even with wife and kids in tow! ...you have to wonder about our education system. 

FINALLY - - Someone in the teaching profession had the courage to set the standards so badly needed. 

New high school principal  Dennis Prager of Colorado,

This is the guy that should be running for President in 2016
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A Speech By Dennis Prager
Every American High School Principal Should Give.

" To the students and faculty of our high school: I am your new principal, and honored to be so. There is no greater calling than to teach young people. I would like to apprise you of some important changes coming to our school. I am making these changes because I am convinced that most of the ideas that have dominated public education in America have worked against you, against your teachers and against our country. 

First ,this school will no longer honor race or ethnicity. I could not care less if your racial makeup is black, brown, red, yellow or white. I could not care less if your origins are African, Latin American, Asian or European, or if your ancestors arrived here on the Mayflower or on slave ships. The only identity I care about, the only one this school will recognize, is your individual identity -- your character, your scholarship, your humanity. And the only national identity this school will care about is American. This is an American public school, and American public schools were created to make better Americans. If you wish to affirm an ethnic, racial or religious identity through school, you will have to go elsewhere. We will end all ethnicity, race and non-American nationality-based celebrations. They undermine the motto of America , one of its three central values -- E pluribus unum, "from many, one." And this school will be guided by America 's values. This includes all after-school clubs. I will not authorize clubs that divide students based on any identities. This includes race, language, religion, sexual orientation or whatever else may become in vogue in a society divided by political correctness. Your clubs will be based on interests and passions, not blood, ethnic, racial or other physically defined ties. Those clubs just cultivate narcissism -- an unhealthy preoccupation with the self -- while the purpose of education is to get you to think beyond yourself. So we will have clubs that transport you to the wonders and glories of art, music, astronomy, languages you do not already speak, carpentry and more. If the only extracurricular activities you can imagine being interested in are those based on ethnic, racial or sexual identity, that means that little outside of yourself really interests you.
Second , I am uninterested in whether English is your native language. My only interest in terms of language is that leave this school speaking and writing English as fluently as possible. The English language has united America 's citizens for over 200 years, and it will unite us at this school. It is one of the indispensable reasons this country of immigrants has always come to be one country. And if you leave this school without excellent English language skills, I would be remiss in my duty to ensure that you will be prepared to successfully compete in the American job market. We will learn other languages here -- it is deplorable that most Americans only speak English -- but if you want classes taught in your native language rather than in English, this is not your school.
Third , because I regard learning as a sacred endeavor , everything in this school will reflect learning's elevated status. This means, among other things, that you and your teachers will dress accordingly. Many people in our society dress more formally for Hollywood events than for church or school. These people have their priorities backward. Therefore, there will be a formal dress code at this school. 
Fourth , no obscene language will be tolerated anywhere on this school's property -- whether in class, in the hallways or at athletic events. If you can't speak without using the f -word, you can't speak. By obscene language I mean the words banned by the Federal Communications Commission, plus epithets such as "Nigger," even when used by one black student to address another black, or "bitch," even when addressed by a girl to a girlfriend. It is my intent that by the time you leave this school, you will be among the few your age to instinctively distinguish between the elevated and the degraded, the holy and the obscene.
Fifth , we will end all self-esteem programs. In this school, self-esteem will be attained in only one way -- the way people attained it until decided otherwise a generation ago -- by earning it. One immediate consequence is that there will be one valedictorian, not eight.
Sixth , and last, I am reorienting the school toward academics and away from politics and propaganda. No more time will be devoted to scaring you about smoking and caffeine, or terrifying you about sexual harassment or global warming. No more semesters will be devoted to condom wearing and teaching you to regard sexual relations as only or primarily a health issue... There will be no more attempts to convince you that you are a victim because you are not white, or not male, or not heterosexual or not Christian. We will have failed if any one of you graduates this school and does not consider him or herself inordinately fortunate -- to be alive and to be an American. Now, please stand and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of our country. As many of you do not know the words, your teachers will hand them out to you. 

Astronomers find a galaxy cluster 5 billion light years in diameter

Artist's illustration of a bright gamma-ray burst. (Photo: NASA/Swift/Mary Pat Hrybyk-Keith and John Jones)

Astronomers discover humongous structure one-ninth the size of the observable universe

The mysterious structure's existence could contradict current models of the universe.

By: Bryan Nelson
August 6, 2015,

The sheer size of our universe is just about unfathomable, so you can imagine the surprise that researchers must have experienced when they recently discovered a structure within our universe that measured 5 billion light years across. That's more than one-ninth the size of the entire observable universe, and by far the largest structure ever discovered.In fact, this mysterious structure is so colossal that it could shatter our current understanding of the cosmos."If we are right, this structure contradicts the current models of the universe," said Lajos Balazs, lead author on the paper, in a press release by the Royal Astronomical Society. "It was a huge surprise to find something this big – and we still don't quite understand how it came to exist at all."Just what is this massive structure? It's not a single, physical object, but rather a cluster of nine massive galaxies bound together gravitationally, much like how our Milky Way is part of a cluster of galaxies. It was discovered after researchers identified a ring of nine gamma ray bursts (GRBs) that appeared to be at very similar distances from us, each around 7 billion light years away.GRBs are the brightest electromagnetic events known to occur in the universe, caused by a supernova. Their detection typically indicates the presence of a galaxy, so all of the GRBs in this ring are believed to each come from a different galaxy. But their close proximity to one another suggests that these galaxies must be linked together. There is only a 1 in 20,000 probability of the GRBs being in this distribution by chance.A mega-cluster of this size shouldn't be possible, at least not if you think in terms of our current theories. Those theories predict that the universe ought to be relatively uniform on the largest scales, meaning that the sizes of structures shouldn't vary by much. In fact, the theoretical limit to structure size has been calculated at around 1.2 billion light years across.If the Hungarian-American team's calculations are correct, then this giant new structure-- which measures in at over 5 billion light years across — would blow that classic model out of the water. In fact, either the researchers' calculations are wrong on this, or scientists will need to radically revise their theories on the evolution of the cosmos.Needless to say, this GRB cluster discovery has the potential to cause a sweeping paradigm shift in astronomy. At the very least, it reminds us just how small our view of the universe really is.Read more:
http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/space/stories/astronomers-discover-humongous-structure-one-ninth-size-observable-universe#ixzz3i3Bw6oQg

What kind of country do you want to live in?

And what kind of country do you want to pass on to your children?!

the mindset of "war": the "military option" is no longer an option

diplomacy or war

The "mindset of war" is characterized by a preference for military action over diplomacy
"Leaders did not inform their people of the cost of war"

full text and video  of Obama's speach at American University on the topic of Iran deal:

http://wapo.st/1IHwBh4

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2015/08/05/text-obama-gives-a-speech-about-the-iran-nuclear-deal/

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/08/obama-and-the-iran-deal/400535/

http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-08-05/obama-reruns-specter-of-iraq-invasion-to-make-case-for-iran-deal

Obama rode to the White House in 2008 on his early, vocal and mostly lonely opposition to the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003. More than a decade later, he says the fight over the Iran deal is with the same group of neoconservative politicians and commentators who beat the drum for war over diplomacy to meet what turned out to be a non-existent threat in Iraq.
Listening to them again on Iran, he argued in a speech Wednesday in Washington, would be another historic mistake.
"More than a decade later we still live with the consequences of the invasion of Iraq," Obama said at American University, the same venue where in 1963 President John F. Kennedy called for a recalibration in the Cold War with the Soviet Union. "I raise this history because now more than ever we need clear-thinking in our foreign policy."Obama and his aides have invoked some of the most prominent proponents of going to war in Iraq: former Vice President Dick Cheney to former UN Ambassador John Bolton and Bill Kristol, founder of The Weekly Standard.Kristol, for one, is unapologetic either for his support for the Iraq invasion or his opposition to the deal with Iran.

Failing the Test

"Obama's free to re-litigate Iraq," Kristol said Wednesday before the president spoke. "But he's losing the argument over Iran.""Obama said Iran couldn't be permitted a nuclear weapons infrastructure," Kristol said in an e-mail. "Obama condemned Iranian terrorism. Obama denounced Iran for killing Americans in Iraq. Obama signed the sanctions legislation. Obama said he had Israel's back. The deal fails all these tests."Another backer of the 2003 Iraq invasion, Arizona Republican Senator John McCain, dismissed Obama's arguments in a statement Wednesday opening his Armed Services Committee hearing on the Iran agreement.The administration, he said, "suggests that any criticism of this deal is tantamount to a call to war. Such scare tactics are to be expected from this administration, but they have no place in a debate of this magnitude."Obama said in his address today that his critics were repeatedly wrong in assessing threats from Iraq and Iran. Rejecting the Iran deal would unravel economic sanctions that forced the Islamic Republic to negotiate, accelerate its nuclear program and hurt U.S. credibility in the world, he said.

Easy Choice

"I've had to make a lot of tough calls as president, but whether or not this deal is good for American security is not one of those calls," he said. "It's not even close."In anticipation of a vote in the Republican-led Congress to disapprove the accord next month, Obama and his allies are girding against a well-funded campaign to influence lawmakers by groups including the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. They also face adamant opposition by the Israeli government.The agreement announced last month in Vienna between Iran, the U.S. and five other world powers eases sanctions in return for verifiable limits on the Islamic Republic's nuclear program.Obama has vowed to veto a resolution of disapproval if Congress passes one at the end of a 60-day review period that ends in mid-September.He is counting on Democrats to prevent the Republican-led opposition from overriding his veto. He'd need at least 44 House Democrats and 13 Senate Democrats to stand with him.

'Selling a Fantasy'

In his speech, Obama said a rejection of the agreement by Congress would leave the U.S. standing alone and Iran in a stronger position."Those who say we can just walk away from this deal and maintain sanctions are selling a fantasy," he said.AIPAC on Wednesday distributed a memo citing polls that suggest Americans are increasingly skeptical of the deal.Just over half of Americans believe the Iraq war was a mistake, according to a Gallup poll conducted in June. Polls on the Iran deal have shown varying levels of support, depending on how the question is framed.A CBS News poll released Tuesday found that almost half of Americans don't know enough about the deal to form an opinion. Among those with an opinion, opponents outnumber supporters 33 percent to 20 percent.

Consequential Choice

The Iran agreement "is historically consequential for the national security of the United States," Hardin Lang, a former diplomat and researcher at the Center for American Progress, a Washington group which backs the agreement, said in a telephone interview. "I spent a couple of years in Iraq, and I think people need to understand the gravity of the choice before us."Obama explicitly drew a parallel with Kennedy's 1963 address, which urged Americans to support a nuclear test-ban treaty with the Soviets despite deep suspicion and animosity." We do not want a war," Kennedy said. "This generation of Americans has already had enough - - more than enough - - of war and hate and oppression."Obama said the standoff with the Soviet Union was much more dangerous than what the world faces today. Kennedy, he said, rejected the idea of "security with perpetual war footing" for "a practical and attainable peace."The Iran agreement "builds on this tradition of strong, principled policy diplomacy," Obama said.