Our schools are in trouble . . . but a racist doughboy has an idea!

            There’s no denying that our schools are in trouble. While our federal government sees fit to spend ludicrous sums of tax dollars bombing other countries, and our state and federal governments spend an equally absurd total imprisoning their own civilians here at home, our state governments have slashed and re-slashed their budgets for public schools. This resulted in crowded classrooms, less-than-model lunch menus, fewer buses, fewer supplies, and fewer teachers. In fact, right here in Orlando, eight more public schools are shutting their doors forever. One of those schools was designed for students with disabilities.

Not that long ago, I thought I had landed a fulltime job as an English teacher. I had all the credentials needed (degree-wise, at least), and I had finished a lengthy set of internships. In the end, though, those same schools from which I expected job offers couldn’t manage to hang onto the teachers they already had.

To fight this ongoing, economic crisis, everyone from the county-level-on-up has had to think “outside the box.” One currently approved option is to sell ad space on school buses. While I can think of several ads that would send positive messages to the children riding those buses, I can’t help but picture colorful ads for candy bars, sugary cereals, and moronic television shows.

However, one doughboy has another plan.

Presidential hopeful, Newt Gingrich wants to save the school systems by “hiring” its students to perform the tasks that the said system would otherwise pay lunch ladies (I mean, lunch people) and janitors to perform. While I fear for the cafeteria workers and janitors who would consequently face unemployment, I have to admit, this doesn’t strike me as the worst idea Newt ever belched from his angry, self-important fat folds. In my martial arts and Parkour classes, everyone stays after class to help put the gym back together and put away equipment. This builds a sense of unity. It also helps children understand responsibility. As always, though, there’s an expensive catch to Newt’s thinking.
            You see, Newt doesn’t want all children to stay after school and help clean or take turns serving food at the lunch line. He wants only the disadvantaged kids to perform these tasks. Newt’s found many creative ways to verbally dance around this plan, but it always boils down to the same thing. The poor kids will do the extra work, during school hours, while their wealthier (or at least “less poor”) classmates stay in class and learn. It’s a disgusting and dangerous notion.

I can only imagine how difficult it must prove, going to school wearing hand-me-down clothing and carrying around a tattered Goodwill backpack. I can only imagine the embarrassment that must accompany not even having the money for a “reduced price” meal during the lunch break. Now, on top of that, we’re going to ask these disadvantaged kids to mop up after their superior classmates? I think not.

Try to follow Newt’s logic here. 1) We want our children to receive a proper education so that they can perform, in their adulthood, tasks that will better themselves, our country, and our world. This seems an honorable enough goal. However, the trouble is: 2) Our schools are horribly underfunded (We might easily find the necessary funding if we would stop invading Middle Eastern countries. Newt, by the way, vibrates with enthusiasm for instigating a war with Iran—which could also spell a war with Syria). So Newt’s solution is to: 3) Save the schools money by taking students out of the classroom. That’s a little like selling your car for gas money, or like this: 1) My cat is hungry, but 2) I haven’t any cat food with which to feed him, so I: 3) Chop said cat into tiny, minced pieces, can those pieces, and call it cat food. Problem solved.

With African-Americans sharing a burdensome percentage of our nations “disadvantaged,” you can imagine where Newt’s plan will place their children—behind a mop or lunch line. Of course, this isn’t the first time Newt’s bigotry has reared its ugly head. As you may recall, Newt recently suggested that African-Americans should stop receiving food stamps and start earning paychecks. When moderator, Juan Williams challenged Newt at the Republican’s debate in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina to see the offensiveness of his remark, Newt unapologetically refused, and received applause for not doing so.

I could point out that most recipients of food stamps are white, but I suppose that anyone could counter that point by mentioning that African-Americans only represent about thirteen percent of our nation’s population. However, I could further counter (and only slightly redirect my argument) by pointing out that the vast majority of recipients of food stamps in this country do earn a paycheck—a paycheck with which they otherwise could not feed their families.

Part of me assumes that Newt made this remark—one of Newt’s Newtest—only to remind voters that President Obama is, in Newt’s own words, “The greatest food-stamp President in history.” I find it interesting that a republican president helped create an international economy so fucked that the number of American citizens requiring food stamps skyrocketed—but then the Republican Party held it against Obama when he tried to place a Band-Aid over their mess. If Obama hadn’t done so, I’m certain that House Republicans and their presidential hopefuls would jump at the opportunity to say something to the tune of, “President Obama stood by and did nothing as record numbers of Americans went without food.” (Record numbers since the Great Depression, of course).

<sigh> The Bible-thumping Republicans don’t like it much when President Obama feeds the hungry. They don’t like it much when he heals the sick (socialism!). These Bible-thumpers would have called Jesus Christ a commie bastard and booed Him so loud He would never have gotten another word out edgewise. Just saying. . . .