History will be made no matter who wins the presidency.

Harris, if elected, will be the first woman and the first person of South Asian descent to be elected president.

Trump, if elected, will be the first person elected president with a felony conviction (let alone, 34 of them).

The Ann Selzer poll reported in the Desmoines Register released last week that has Harris beating Trump by 3 percentage points in that state has really turned things on its ear. Not considered a swing state by any stretch of the imagination, the Iowa poll has sparked the notion that other traditionally conservative states might follow suit in a similar model. That this news hasn’t created a joyful “Whoop” among D’s is very probably a result of the PTSD that still afflicts Hillary’s 2016 voters. Myself included.

Former LA Dodger first baseman Steve Garvey will “strike out looking” as Adam “Shifty” Schiff effortlessly serves up fast balls and sliders in California’s Senate race. Texas Senator Cruz hopes to cruise to another victory, this time against former NFL linebacker and present US Congressman Colin Allred, who has chipped away at Cruz’s iHeartMedia-fed lead. If Allred has any chance at all to defeat “Cancun” Cruz, he will need a boost by Texas voters who align with the so-called “Iowa Effect.”

California could contribute the most congressional district flips per state (not fair because they have the most districts, but there it is). In CA-41, Will Rollins is neck and neck with 32-year veteran Ken Calvert (R) and is campaigning more aggressively than in the mid-term, where he lost by the least number of votes in decades. In CA CD-22, David Valadao (R) is duking it out with former State Assemblyman Rudy Salas in a toss-up that would elect a Hispanic to a Hispanic-dominated district that always sees victories by minority White Republican candidates because of low Hispanic turnout. Ditto for CA CD-13, another heavy ag area in the Central Valley, where John Duarte (R) is in a rematch with former Assemblyman Adam Gray, who lost to him by 564 votes in 2022.

Overall, I am expecting a Pro-Choice backlash that will upstage the flimsy one we saw in the midterm election in ’22. The horror stories circulating about women being denied care when their pregnancies “go south” (pun not intended) are being repeated, reviled and revisited. Years ago, I read Al Franken’s book “Lies, And The Lying Liars, Who Tell Them” from cover to cover. In a brief discussion of abortion rights, Franken predicted that if (and when) abortion rights are taken from American women, there will be righteous anger and backlash from both sides of the aisle as banning abortion is a political issue for less than a quarter of the electorate.

So now we’ll see…

The SEED School of Washington, D.C. was in the Washington Post yesterday, accused of inaccurate records and wholesale breezing past laws that are supposed to protect students with disabilities.

If the name of this unusual charter boarding school seems vaguely familiar, that may be because back in 2010, they were one of the charter schools lovingly lionized by the documentary hit piece, "Waiting for Superman."

"Waiting for Superman" was a big hit, popularizing the neo-liberal narrative that public schools were failing because public school teachers were lazy incompetents. Every damn newspaper in the country jumped on the narrative. Roger Ebert jumped on. Oprah jumped on. NPR wondered why it didn't get an Oscar (maybe, they posit, it was because one big emotional scene was made up). It helped sustain the celebrity brand of Michelle Rhee (the Kim Kardashian of education, famous despite having not accomplished anything). It was a slanted hatchet job that helped bolster the neoliberal case for Common Core and charter schools and test-centric education and heavy-handed "evaluation" of teachers.

And it boosted the profile of SEED, the DC charter whose secret sauce for student achievement is that it "takes them away from their home environments for five days a week and gives them a host of supporting services."

Except it turns out that maybe it doesn't do that after all. 

According to the WaPo piece, reported by Lauren Lumpkin, audits of the school suggest a variety of mistreatment of students with special needs.

SEED underreported the number of students it expelled last year. It couldn't produce records of services it was supposed to have provided for some students with disabilities (most likely explanation--those services were never provided). Federal law says that before you expel a student with an IEP, you have meetings to decide if the misbehavior is a feature of their disability, or if their misbehavior stems from requirements of the IEP that are not being provided. 

These have the fancy name of "manifestation determination" which just means the school needs to ask-- is the student acting out because that's what her special situation makes her do, or because the Individualized Education Program that's supposed to help deal with that special situation is not being actually done. For absurd example-- is the student repeatedly late to her class on the second floor because she's in a wheelchair? Does her IEP call for elevator transport to the second floor, and there's no elevator in the building? Then maybe don't suspend her for chronic lateness. 

Founded in 1998, SEED enrolls about 250 students, which seems to preclude any sort of "just lost the details in the crowd" defense. But as Lumpkin reports, questions arose.

But after receiving complaints about discipline, understaffing and compliance with federal law, the city’s charter oversight agency started an audit of the school in July. One complaint claimed school officials had manipulated attendance data and were not recording suspensions.

The audit’s findings sparked scathing commentary from charter board members and questions about SEED D.C.’s practices.

“I’m the parent of a special-needs child, and I’ve got to tell you, reading what was happening in these pages, it’s like a parent’s worst nightmare,” charter board member Nick Rodriguez told SEED D.C. leaders. “I sincerely hope that you will take that seriously as you think about what needs to happen going forward.”

Lumpkin reports that this is not their first round of problems. A 2023 audit found a high number of expulsions and suspensions compared to other charters-- five times higher. A cynical person might conclude that SEED addressed the problem by just not reporting the full numbers. Inaccurate data, missed deadlines, skipping legal requirements--that's a multi-year pattern for the school.

The school is now on a "notice of concern," a step on the road to losing its charter and being closed down (or I suppose they could just switch over to a private voucher-accepting school).

The whole sad story of the many students who have been ill-served by SEED is one more reminder that there are no miracles in education, and no miracle schools, either. 

Knock knock
Who’s there?
Annie.
Annie who?
Annie one not voted yet?

While we are waiting to find out what the voters hath wrought in this latest election, I invite you to partake in this list of one- and two-liner jokes of the political kind. If you’ve heard any of these before, tough. I haven’t.

What’s the problem with political jokes?
They get elected president.

In what state was George Washington born?
Naked and crying, just like the rest of us.

Stop repeat offenders. Don’t re-elect them!

How can you tell the difference between a president and an actor?
One leads the land, while the other lands the lead.

How are presidents like diapers?
They need to be changed regularly and for the same reason.

America is a country which produces citizens who will cross the ocean to fight for democracy but won’t cross the street to vote.

What is the fastest way to get Trump to change a light bulb?
Tell him Obama installed it.

What do you call a lawyer with an IQ of 100?
Your Honor.
What do you call a lawyer with an IQ of 50?
Senator.

The NSA: a government organization that actually listens to you!

I don’t approve of political jokes… I’ve seen too many of them get elected.

There’s a term for a president like Donald Trump, probably not a second, though.

How did Trump respond when he was asked how to deal with Hurricane Helene?
“Pay her the same as Stormy Daniels!”

What’s the difference between a platypus and George Washington?
One has a bill on his face, the other has his face on a bill.

What did George Washington say to his men before crossing the Delaware?
Get in the boat!

Which rock group has four men who don’t sing?
Mount Rushmore

“Because it would be hilarious,” is probably not a good reason to elect someone to be President.

I remember when Halloween was the scariest night of the year. Now, it’s Election Night.

How many congressmen does it take to fix a flat tire? None. They’re all afraid of inflation.

Why did Ted Cruz go to culinary school? To could learn how to cook the books.

We need to show compassion for the mentally ill without letting them run for President.

Why can’t Congress ever be vegan?
Because all the turkeys playing chicken in a beef over pork is pretty fishy.

If Con is the opposite of Pro, then is Congress the opposite of Progress?

The consensus in this election is that 100% of Americans think 50% of Americans have lost their minds.

For This Guy To Say He Wants To Protect Women Just Sounds Nutty

Donald Trump has brought back his comments that he would “protect” women “whether the women like it or not” as a closing note for his campaign.

Sure, it’s both offensive to women who think, work and vote, and a weird choice of a closing persuasion since he also takes pride in wiping out abortion rights, but mostly it is an absolute head-scratcher. What is he talking about?

In repeating the point at rallies, Trump takes pains to say his own staff has advised against repeating such a statement, which he has done.

But for a guy who has been adjudged by a court to have defamed and sexually assaulted E. Jean Carroll, who has been convicted on charges that revolved around a hush payment for a sexual affair, who has had to defend against dozens of allegations of sexual groping, including this week, and who believes that women undergoing abortions should be punished, Plus, Trump still owns his video appearance from 2016 in which he proudly declares that as a star he can grab any woman sexually.

For this guy to say he wants to protect women just sounds nutty.

But worse: Protect women from what? And how? And how does he square it with his own presidential record of growing maternal mortality, difficulties in obtaining health care, opposition to equal pay and childcare tax credits and a long list of other issues that touch women directly?

A Record of Non-Protection

Trump didn’t protect a woman patient in Texas this week who died of sepsis after a miscarriage requiring an abortion. Doctors feared prosecution and declined treatment. It is a story being repeated in Republican-led state after Republican-led state.

Maternal mortality is about twice as high as the next sizable, industrialized country –a trend that grew on his watch. Trump and Speaker Mike Johnson are promising to eliminate the Affordable Care Act, and Trump is committed to eliminating health, ecological, and safety rules as over-regulation. Where’s the protection?

Logically, of course, it is all noise in a tight race in which he backhandedly recognizes that Harris is a woman, and that abortion politics are driving women to favor Harris disproportionately.

Naturally, Trump has attacked Harris as “low-IQ,” “stupid,” over ethnicity, His campaign has suggested she used sexual favors to advance her political career, and billboards put up by Elon Musk on Trump’s behalf had to be removed for suggesting a sex act by Harris and calling her a slur for women. As a woman, even as an opponent, is she due any personal protection?

Trump said he wanted to see former Rep. Liz Cheney facing a firing squad because she has attacked his candidacy. Sound like a protective attitude?

On Fox, Trump-supporting commentators like Jess Waters are warning wives not to disobey Trump-voting households. Ads for the Kamala Harris campaign beseech Republican women to do just that — to vote for their own interests over their husbands’ political leanings. The Trump staff has been busy trying to argue that what Trump means is a world safer with border closures and less crime and a restoration of better household income that only he can bring about.

The Politics

In the end, the pitch to “protect” women is just Trump politics, since he feels a need to address the polling leans to Harris among women,  but it is both ugly and strange.

Trump already faces criticism even from within Republican ranks for presenting himself as “overly masculine” and for underperforming among female voters in recent polling. He has taken credit for the end of Roe v. Wade, saying he was able to “kill” it, and sent it to states, where he takes no position on Draconian terms being set.

He has surrounded himself with speakers like Elon Musk and Tucker Carlson who talk openly about a dwindling masculinity in the American spirit, and Trump spent 12 minutes talking about golfer Arnold Palmer’s penis size at a rally in the last two weeks. His running mate, JD Vance, talks repeatedly about a country overly dependent on “childless cat ladies” as leaders.

It’s plain weird.

Trump has placed Harris, who clearly carries the political edge on the abortion rights issue, on a moral high place from which she can promise to represent everyone, regardless of politics. It was easy for her to undercut Trump’s hypocritical remarks.

“Donald Trump thinks he should get to make decisions about what you do with your body. Whether you like it or not,” Harris wrote on X.

If Trump’s remarks underscore that women need “protection,” it requires that a manly Trump as president who can promise “women will be happy, healthy, confident and free! You will no longer be thinking about abortion, because it is now where it always had to be, with the states,” as he posted on his Truth Social. “Because I am your protector. I want to be your protector. As president, I have to be your protector,” he said.

This “protecter” talk is a reason all by itself to vote against Trump.

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The post What is ‘Protector’ Trump Talking About? appeared first on DCReport.org.

Well, then let’s have a short review before the Final which will be True/False and Multiple Choice.