Sunday, July 08, 2012

What could go wrong? Oh, that.


School vouchers? Sounds good. Way to get our precious chirren out of the violent, godless public schools.

Teach 'em about God, who founded the United States. He did this with help from Jesus and apostles, who we know as the Founding Fathers. Their word is law, and we must always follow the l
aw.

Even when that includes giving money to them thar Muslims.

Muslims?

Errrrrrrr . . . ah didn't vote to give no state money to Muslims! They probably opening a truck-bomb academy! Ah voted to give state money to Christians only!

Says Louisiana Rep. Valarie Hodges to the Livingston Parish News (registration required):
Rep. Valarie Hodges, R-Watson, says she had no idea that Gov. Bobby Jindal’s overhaul of the state’s educational system might mean taxpayer support of Muslim schools.

“I actually support funding for teaching the fundamentals of America’s Founding Fathers’ religion, which is Christianity, in public schools or private schools,” the District 64 Representative said Monday.

“I liked the idea of giving parents the option of sending their children to a public school or a Christian school,” Hodges said.

Hodges mistakenly assumed that “religious” meant “Christian.”

HB976, now signed into law as Act 2, proposed, among other things, a voucher program allowing state educational funds to be used to send students to schools run by religious groups.


(snip)

Gov. Bobby Jindal’s staff pushed hard to get the educational bills approved in the early days of the session, which ended June 4.

Hodges, who represents District 64 on the northwest side of the parish, and another freshman lawmaker in the local delegation, Clay Schexnayder from Dist. 81 in the southwest, voted with the House majority in favor of HB976.

The school funding mechanism, however, did not come up for a vote until the end of the session. By then, a Muslim-based school had applied for support through the new voucher system.

During debate over the MFP (Minimum Foundation Program) funding formula, Hodges learned more about the consequences of the educational changes. She voted against the new MFP funding formula; Schexnayder voted for it.

“Unfortunately it will not be limited to the Founders’ religion,” Hodges said. “We need to insure that it does not open the door to fund radical Islam schools. There are a thousand Muslim schools that have sprung up recently. I do not support using public funds for teaching Islam anywhere here in Louisiana.”
THERE YOU have it. Valarie Hodges wants only to fund promulgation of the Founders' religion.

I'm sure that Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin would have appreciated Hodges' enthusiastic support of deism. . . .

And I'm sure George Washington wouldn't have minded gaining more adherents for his vague sense of pantheistic providence . . .

And I'm sure John Adams would have figured that Unitarianism could use all the help it can get --
particularly during football season -- but there's this little document many of these men got around to fashioning in the late 1780s that the representative from Watson seems not to be familiar with. . . .

But that's not important now. What's important is this:
You are who you elect.

God help the people of the 64th House District of Louisiana.

3 comments:

Sandy Brady said...

"You are who you elect." Um, yea. She represents Watson/Livingston Parish. It's safe to say, most of her constituents agree with her :/

Sandy Brady said...

Re "You are who you elect," since you are from Neb you probably are not lucky enough to be familiar with Livingston Parish, Louisiana...
As of the 2010 census, the racial makeup of the parish (we have parishes instead of counties) was 92% White, 5% Black, and was the long-time home of David Duke, former Grand Wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. Many citizens there still adhere to the beliefs of that organization. Most of Ms Hodges' constituents likely "are" her. :/

The Mighty Favog said...

Sandy,

Cher, I was born and raised in Baton Rouge. I have tons of relatives in Livingston Parish. And from 1970 until after my father's death in 2001, we had a camp on the Petit Amite River.

I practically grew up in Livingston Parish, and I am intimately familiar with it . . . at least the Livingston Parish of the 1960s, '70s and '80s.

I have no doubt that most of Valarie Hodges' constituents agree with her wholeheartedly. This story didn't surprise me at all; it just amused me. Which, after all, is why the parish exists -- for the amusement of the rest of us.

(Do you reckon she has a little girl she enters in all the kiddie beauty contests?)

BTW, you forgot Bill Wilkinson, head of the other Klan group in Denham. Not every place is "special" enough to have two gaggles of Kluxers. ;-)