Policy Archives - Page 1903 of 1926

Muslim Prison Inmates Demand “Islamically Permissible Food”

February 3, 2014/in Courts & Law, Must Read, National Security, News, Policy/by Dr. Richard M. Swier, LTC U.S. Army (Ret.)

Judicial Watch reports:

Should Americans pay the extra cost of providing Muslim prison inmates with special meals prepared according to Islamic law? The federal government does it and so do a few states, but not Florida and a U.S.-based terrorist front group is demanding a change.

It’s one of those only-in-America stories that tarnish the country’s image, not to mention diminish its dignity. The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), which pretends to be a Muslim civil rights group, is ordering Florida prison officials to offer Muslim inmates halal meals, which would cost taxpayers in the Sunshine State a lot more than the regular jailhouse cuisine.

Federal inmates already get the accommodation and so do convicted felons in some states, such as Pennsylvania and California, which spends an additional half a million dollars a year to purchase the halal meals for Muslim prisoners. Florida has resisted any religious meal accommodation so the Obama administration sued the state on behalf of Jewish convicts demanding Kosher meals, which cost four times as much.

“By refusing to offer Kosher meals the Florida Department of Corrections forces hundreds of its prisoners to violate their core religious beliefs on a daily basis, in violation of the Religious Land Use and Institutional Persons Act of 2000,” according the Department of Justice (DOJ) complaint. The Clinton-era law protects the religious exercise of persons confined to institutions and prohibits a state or local government from “substantially burdening” that right.

Not surprisingly, a Clinton-appointed federal judge agreed with the Obama administration and ordered Florida to “provide a certified Kosher diet to all prisoners with a sincere religious basis for keeping Kosher” no later than July 2014. In the order the judge, Patricia Seitz, mentions the “number and diversity” of organizations that urged the state to provide inmates with a Kosher diet “further demonstrates the strong public interest at stake in this litigation.” Among them are the usual suspects like the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other less known groups like the Hindu-American Foundation and the International Society for Krishna Consciousness.

CAIR celebrated the ruling and used it as an opportunity to call for “Islamically permissible” food to be served to all Muslim inmates in Florida. In a statement issued this month, the executive director of CAIR’s Florida headquarters says the Kosher ruling is “an important step in protecting the religious rights of incarcerated individuals” and that it’s only “fair and equitable” that if Jewish inmates get Kosher food, Muslim inmates should have access to halal meals. Florida officials needn’t worry about a thing because CAIR says in its press release that Muslim businesses are ready to provide “advice and services needed to provide halal meals to inmates.”

How convenient. Halal is an Arabic term for lawful under Islamic code. This means that pork is prohibited and all meat must come from animals that are ritually slaughtered. Allah must be pronounced during the kill and animals must be properly nourished, well rested and not stressed or excited prior to slaughter. A few years ago the Obama administration launched a special program to deliver halal meals to home-bound seniors in Detroit, a city known for its thriving Muslim population.

If Florida prison officials don’t start giving Muslim inmates halal meals, they should prepare for another DOJ lawsuit. CAIR, which has proven to be very influential in the Obama administration, will undoubtedly demand it. The group was founded in 1994 by three Middle Eastern extremists (Omar Ahmad, Nihad Awad and Rafeeq Jaber) and was a co-conspirator in a federal terror-finance case involving the Hamas front group Holy Land Foundation.

Why Common Core is Wrong For Our Kids – Period!

February 3, 2014/in Education, Featured, News, Policy, Politics/by Dr. Richard M. Swier, LTC U.S. Army (Ret.)

The document, “Common Core is Wrong For Our Kids. Period” from Florida Parents Against Common Core (FPACC) has just been released. The document explains why there is a growing mistrust with Common Core.

FPACC states, “Parents are not radicals, we are concerned… and we are basing our conclusions on the words from the proponents themselves, not from editorials. I urge you to read the entire document to understand why there is such a growing grassroots opposition to Common Core. Parents across America are just fed up.”

Watch this video titled, “Common Core For Public Officials”:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfcJuV4dC6g[/youtube]

Members of our group, Florida Parents Against Common Core have produced a detailed document outlining why Common Core and Race To The Top are wrong for our children and our parents. This document will help you understand the process by which we have come to have Common Core State Standards imposed on us, against our will and without the proper involvement of parents in discussing the validity of the premise and potential impacts. Additionally, it details how this process was never more than a wholesale transfer of sovereignty by our state legislators to the Federal Government in exchange for a $ 700 million dollar bribe.

The proponents, backed by a campaign of several hundred million dollars in the best public relations resources available, all stand to gain billions of dollars in benefits in the form of new business, the quashing of competitive forces and the in some instances, the advancement of personal political ambitions, all through a grand experiment constructed of an untested theory of education, the brainchild of a man who has never taught a day in his life.

Download: Common Core is Wrong For Our Kids.

Fifty-one Years Ago a Democrat read a list of 45 Communist Goals into the Congressional Record

February 3, 2014/in Featured, National Security, News, Policy/by Dr. Richard M. Swier, LTC U.S. Army (Ret.)

Rep. Albert Sydney Herlong, Jr., D-FL District 5

On Jan. 10, 1963, Democrat Congressman Albert S. Herlong Jr., representing Florida District 5, read a list of 45 Communist goals into the Congressional Record. The list was derived from researcher Cleon Skousen’s book “The Naked Communist.” These principles are well worth revisiting today in order to gain insights into the thinking and strategies of much of our progressive elite.

Communist Goals:

1. U.S. should accept coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.

2. U.S. should be willing to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.

4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war.

5. Extend long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.

6. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination.

7. Grant recognition of Red China and admission of Red China to the U.N.

8. Set up East and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev’s promise in 1955 to settle the Germany question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.

9. Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the U.S. has agreed to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.

10. Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.

11. Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand that it be set up as a one-world government with its own independent armed forces.

12. Resist any attempt to outlaw the Communist Party.

13. Do away with loyalty oaths.

14. Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. Patent Office.

15. Capture one or both of the political parties in the U.S.

16. Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions, by claiming their activities violate civil rights.

17. Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for Socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers associations. Put the party line in textbooks.

18. Gain control of all student newspapers.

19. Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations that are under Communist attack.

20. Infiltrate the press. Get control of book review assignments, editorial writing, policy-making positions.

21. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV & motion pictures.

22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all form of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to “eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings,” substituting shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms.

23. Control art critics and directors of art museums. ” Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art.”

24.Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them “censorship” and a violation of free speech and free press.

25. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio and TV.

26. Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity as “normal, natural and healthy.”

27. Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with “social” religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity, which does not need a “religious crutch.”

28. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the grounds that it violates the principle of “separation of church and state”

29. Discredit the American Constitution by calling it inadequate, old fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a worldwide basis.

30. Discredit the American founding fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the “common man.”

31. Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was only a minor part of “the big picture.” Give more emphasis to Russian history since the Communists took over.

32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture – education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.

33. Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the Communist apparatus.

34. Eliminate the House Committee on Un-American Activities.

35. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.

36. Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.

37. Infiltrate and gain control of big business.

38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand or treat.

39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose communist goals.

40. Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.

41. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents. Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents.

42. Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of the American tradition; that students and special interest groups should rise up and make a “united force” to solve economic, political or social problems.

43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.

44. Internationalize the Panama Canal.

45. Repeal the Connally Reservation so the U.S. cannot prevent the World Court from seizing jurisdiction over domestic problems. Give the World Court jurisdiction over domestic problems. Give the World Court jurisdiction over nations and individuals alike.

Chuck Morse, a radio talk show host at WROL in Boston, reported on this in 2003. Please listen to his radio report:

Black America: Stop The Insanity!

February 3, 2014/in Commentary, Policy, Politics/by Lloyd Marcus

Remember that spiky-haired blonde lady fitness guru all over TV years ago? Her famous line was “Stop the insanity!” As a common sense thinking black conservative, I offer the same clarion call to fellow black Americans, “Stop the insanity!” Why do you continue sleeping with the enemy; voting for liberal Democrats whose policies imply that you are inferior, stupid and culturally immoral?

When the NAACP and Democrats claim that requiring a photo ID disenfranchises blacks, such implies we are stupid. For the life of me I do not understand why millions of blacks are not highly insulted by this absurd claim. Do blacks fly? Do blacks drive cars? Do blacks cash checks?

When Democrats and liberals accept over 70% out-of-wedlock births and fatherless households as a cultural norm in the black community, I am offended. http://bit.ly/1fo1iLd And yet, I am called a sellout.

Liberal Democrats policies and programs have destroyed the black family and continue to devastate the black community. Meanwhile, blacks vote monolithic for Democrats and politically beat up anyone, black or white, who offers common sense solutions. For crying out loud, stop the insanity!

God forbid that a black person dare to think outside of the liberals’ we-be-simpleminded-blacks-in-need-of “gov-ment”-intervention-to-survive box. Blacks becoming successful the old fashion way, by earning it, does not cut it with Democrats and liberals. Liberal media and Democrats grab such uppity blacks by their afros and politically drag their black derrieres kicking and screaming back to the liberal Democrat plantation.

There, such blacks are strung up in the public square with their naked backs exposed; made an example for any other conservative leaning blacks contemplating their escape. Beaten, battered and broken black conservatives are flogged within an inch of their political life with countless articles and operative pundits calling them a stupid n*****, Uncle Tom and traitor to their race.

A prime example of a black overlord of the Democrat liberal plantation attempting to rein in a black escapee is North Carolina NAACP Chapter President Rev. William Barber. Black race-baiters typically use Black History Month and Martin Luther King Day to trash America for purposes of extortion.

In celebration of MLK Day, Rev. Barber called black conservative and Tea Party American Senator Tim Scott a puppet, saying, “A ventriloquist can always find a good dummy.”

Senator Scott is about applying common sense solutions to issues plaguing our country. Thus, once again, any black who does not view themselves as a victim of an eternally racist white America, entitled and in need of lowered standards and expectations is a dummy; a tool of white Republicans – a stupid self-loathing n*****. This is not an exaggeration.

I have been called these names and worse by Democrats and liberals for many years every time I suggest that blacks stop having babies out of wedlock, stop dropping out of school, stopping killing each other, stop blaming whitey and assume personal responsibility for their lives. Too me, this is true Black Empowerment.

I do not know what it is going to take for black America to see the light; to realize the betrayal of a majority of the modern civil rights coalition. If these so-called advocates truly gave a hoot about blacks, they would celebrate extraordinary black conservative achievers such as former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and businessman extraordinaire Herman Cain. These blacks should be held high for black youths to see what can be achieved in the greatest land of opportunity on the planet via education, hard work and right choices.

And yet, these blacks are despised by white liberals and black civil rights leaders. Why? In a nutshell these blacks nuke the Democrats and liberals entitlement and big government narrative.

So while black America believes white conservative Republicans are burning the midnight oil plotting ways to keep blacks down, Democrats and liberals are the ones keeping them enslaved.

With the liberal mainstream media in the Democrats’ back pocket as complicit liberal plantation gate keepers, I will continue praying for divine intervention while pounding on the plantation master’s door. Let my people go! My fellow black Americans, it truly is time to stop the insanity.

The Faces of Pedophilia in America: Woody Allen and Dylan Farrow

February 2, 2014/in Featured, News, Policy/by Dr. Richard M. Swier, LTC U.S. Army (Ret.)

What’s your favorite Woody Allen movie? Before you answer, you should know: when I was seven years old, Woody Allen took me by the hand and led me into a dim, closet-like attic on the second floor of our house. He told me to lay on my stomach and play with my brother’s electric train set. Then he sexually assaulted me. He talked to me while he did it, whispering that I was a good girl, that this was our secret, promising that we’d go to Paris and I’d be a star in his movies.

Dylan Farrow today.

This begins an Open Letter From Dylan Farrow, the adopted daughter of Woody Allen, in the New York Times.

There is an effort in America by B4U-ACT to normalize what Dylan Farrow and tens of thousands of children suffered thru – attacks by pedophiles and pederasts. This movement is not unlike the normalization of homosexual marriages and introduction of the homosexual lifestyle into public schools via the national anti-bullying campaign. The idea is to make deviant sexual behaviors permissible by calling these sexual acts a “civil right”.

The B4u-ACT website states:

B4U-ACT assembled a list of over 30 credentialed practitioners in Maryland who agreed to its Principles and Perspectives of Practice, and who were willing to provide caring and inviting services to clients who are sexually attracted to minors. Lay volunteers were sought who would be trained to operate a hotline for the purpose of referring minor-attracted individuals to these professionals.

Americans for Truth About Homosexuality (AFTAH) reported:

On Wednesday, August 17, [2011] child advocates Matt Barber, Vice President of Liberty Counsel Action, and Dr. Judith Reisman, a visiting law professor at Liberty University School of Law, attended a Baltimore, MD conference hosted by the pedophile group B4U-ACT. Around 50 individuals were in attendance including a number of admitted pedophiles – or “Minor-Attracted Persons” as they prefer to be identified (MAP “sexual orientation”) – as well as several supportive mental health professionals. World renowned “sexologist,” Dr. Fred Berlin of Johns Hopkins University gave the keynote address, saying: “I want to completely support the goal of B4U-ACT.”

Highlights of the conference:

Pedophiles are “unfairly stigmatized and demonized” by society.
There was concern about “vice-laden diagnostic criteria” and “cultural baggage of wrongfulness.”
“We are not required to interfere with or inhibit our child’s sexuality.”
“Children are not inherently unable to consent” to sex with an adult.

Americans Are Losing Their Freedom

February 2, 2014/in Commentary, News, Policy, Politics/by Alan Caruba

February 1st was National Freedom Day. It commemorates Lincoln’s signing of the House and Senate resolution that later became the 13th Amendment. Lincoln signed the Amendment outlawing slavery on February 1, 1865.

Short of another Civil War, Americans have reached a point verging on the loss of their Constitutional freedoms as ever before. The issue then was slavery, but Americans are rapidly moving toward having their Bill of Rights annulled by a President intent on ruling as a despot, making them slaves of a regime that rules as he wishes, ignoring the Constitution and Congress.

His actions have been supported by the Democratic members of Congress and because Republicans only control the House they have seen their legislative efforts to oppose the regime blocked, often by one man, Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader. The nation’s media with few exceptions have supported or ignored the President’s actions.

Why is this happening? A brief review of the means put forth in Saul Alinsky’s “Rules for Radicals”, written by a “community organizer”, outlines what Obama is doing as he seeks to turn America into a socialist state. It is a process that progressives/liberals have been pursuing since early in the last century.

Healthcare – Control health care and you control the people.
Poverty – Increase the poverty level as high as possible, poor people are easier to control and will not fight back if you are providing everything for them to live.
Debt – Increase the debt to an unsustainable level. That way you are able to increase taxes, and this will produce more poverty.
Gun Control – Remove the ability to defend themselves from the Government. That way you are able to create a police state.
Welfare – Take control of every aspect of their lives (Food, Housing, and Income).
Education – Take control of what people read and listen to – take control of what children learn in school.
Religion – Remove the belief in God from the Government and schools.
Class Warfare – Divide the people into the wealthy and the poor. This will cause more discontent and it will be easier to take (tax) the wealthy with the support of the poor.

We are close to having everything we write and say known to the regime. As Andrew Napolitano asks, “What if the government spies on all of us all the time and recognizes no limits to its spying? What if its appetite for acquiring personal knowledge about all Americans is insatiable? What if the government uses the microchips in our cellphones to follow us and listen to us as we move about?”

And what if Congress, as World Net Daily’s Bob Unruh has written, has empowered the President to “arrest, kidnap, detain without trial and hold indefinitely American citizens thought to ‘represent an enduring security threat to the United States.’” That’s what the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) does!

“Some of the nation’s most respected legal teams are asking the Supreme Court to take up a challenge to the indefinite-detention provisions” of the Act “charging that the law has created the framework for a police state.” That’s how far along we are toward the destruction of the U.S. Constitution.

“The 2014 NDAA was fast-tracked through the U.S. Senate, with no time for discussion or amendments, while most Americans were distracted by the scandal surrounding A&E’s troubles with ‘Duck Dynasty’ star Phil Robertson. Eighty-five of 100 senators voted in favor of the new version of the NDAA, which had already been quietly passed by the House of Representatives.”

Ostensibly a law to address terrorists, the NDAA is a blueprint for a nation in which its citizens have none of the rights spelled out in the Bill of Rights. All it will take is the declaration of martial law or a national emergency.

Sen. Ted Cruz, a leading opponent of Obamacare, writing in The Wall Street Journal, said, “Of all the troubling aspects of the Obama presidency, none is more dangerous than the President’s persistent pattern of lawlessness, his willingness to disregard the written law and instead enforce his own policies via executive fiat…the President’s taste for unilateral action to circumvent Congress should concern every citizen, regardless of party or ideology.”

Americans will soon have little recourse against a government intent on controlling every aspect of their lives, spying on them, and arresting them for criticizing it.

A May 16 march on Washington may cause the White House and the Congress to pause in its attacks on our freedom and liberty. One can only hope that millions participate.

Americans fought a war to end slavery. Will we have to fight to resist becoming slaves?

Another Environmental Lie Exposed: Bees are Thriving

February 2, 2014/in Environment, Must Read, News, Policy, Science/by Alan Caruba

I cannot say it strong enough. Do not believe the lies that environmental groups, particularly those that receive millions from liberal foundations and from members who never question the “science” they claim to justify massive scare campaigns.

One such organization is Friends of the Earth (FOE) and its latest claim is that bees are dying all over the world as the result of the use of pesticides in agriculture and by people protecting their gardens. It is a lie.

The attack on the use of pesticides began in 1962 with the publication of Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring” that claimed that their use posed a threat to human life. She said “Only within the moment of time represented by the present century has one species — man — acquired significant power to alter the nature of the world.”

The problem with her opinion is that humanity cannot alter nature, but can protect itself against the diseases and other problems. Humanity endures nature in the form of climate that currently is cooling much of the Earth. Were it not for science, we would not have put an end to polio and reduced other diseases such as malaria by killing the mosquitoes that spread it. We would not have learned how to create water purification systems that protect the residents of cities worldwide. We would not have learned how to increase crops that feed millions thanks to genetic modification.

Is humanity at risk? There are seven billion of us, more than any previous time on Earth.

Why do I defend pesticides? Because, since the 1980s, I have served pest control trade associations by providing communications programs, too often ignored by the mainstream press. In the 1980s I worked for a corporation that produced one of the most extraordinary pesticides invented; one that was applied with water! It so alarmed the Environmental Protection Agency, that it insisted that its multi-million dollar registration be repeated and that company decided to cease making it available in the U.S.

What do pesticides do? They protect us against trillions of insect and rodent pests that spread diseases while some represent millions in property damage—termites—every year. In June 2011, the EPA announced it intended to ban the sale of “the most toxic rat and mouse poisons, as well as most loose bait and pellet products” to residential customers. The only result of such a ban would be millions more rats and mice in their homes!

Rachel Carson’s book predicted the massive loss of bird species due to the use of pesticides. It was a bestseller and is still in print. She was wrong, but she triggered the beginning and growth of environmental groups that have used the same bad “science” to unleash all manner of fears on Americans and worldwide. Friends of the Earth is just one of them.

Recently I received a FOE email from Lisa Archer, its food and technology program director, in which she reported a Valentine’s Day project to stop Home Depot and Lowe’s stores from selling pesticides. The project is based on the totally false claim that all the bees are dying from the use of pesticides; in particular neonicotinoid pesticides that are widely used in agriculture.

The American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) disputes this while acknowledging that “In the last decade, a massive decline in bee populations was detected. It was given the name of “Bee Colony Collapse Disorder” and “while the problem seems to have abated somewhat after 2010, periodic declines continued, and fears of recurrent major extinctions persisted.” The fears have been fanned by environmental organizations, but the ACSH revealed new research by scientists affiliated with the Department of Agriculture here and in China, reviewed in “The Scientist” that “provides the first evidence that the bee problem in fact, stems from the tobacco ringspot virus (TRSV), not from pesticides.”

[youtube]http://youtu.be/ob_e8gn0nzM[/youtube]

Not from pesticides despite the FOE’s claim that “neonicotinoid pesticides are killing bees” noting that Europe is banning them. Europe is a hotbed of environmental fears and, ironically, is reversing its trend toward solar and wind energy after it has driven up the cost of electricity there and harmed its economic growth.

The ACSH reports that “the bees may pick up the virus from the pollen of plants that they feed upon, and that the virus may be spread to other bees by mites that feed on them. Once it has gained a foothold in a bee, the researchers determined that TRVS can replicate itself in the bee’s body.”

“This process of a virus moving from one species to another is call ‘host shifting’”.

Writing in 2012, Rich Kozlovich, a pest control expert, reported that “it is not true that there has been a mysterious worldwide collapse in honey bee populations. In fact managed bee hives (which contain the bees which do the vast majority of our pollinating) have increased by a remarkable 45 percent over the last five years.”

He also noted that “most staple foods—wheat, rice and corn—do not depend on animal pollination at all. They are wind-pollinated, or self-pollinating.”

These well-established facts mean nothing to FOE or other environmental organizations seeking to demonize pesticides. It means nothing to the EPA that has banned many extraordinarily effective pesticides from use to protect humans and property.

It is the advances of modern science that have protected and extended human life. Banning them just exposes Americans to a range of diseases, some of which kill. Until more Americans understand that the real threat is the EPA and the environmental groups spreading baseless fears, they will continue to be at risk.

Hamas-linked North American Islamic Trust received thousands in farm subsidies, never produced any crops

February 2, 2014/in Budget and Finance, Economy, Must Read, News, Policy/by Jihad Watch

“NAIT’s farm subsidies stopped in 2008 during the trial and were first received again in 2011.” That was right around the time that the Obama Administration scrubbed all mention of Islam and jihad from counterterror training materials, while collaboration with groups linked to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood was in full swing in numerous government agencies. So this is no surprise. It is consistent with established administration policy.

“Islamic group once tied to terror trial received thousands in farm subsidies, without growing crops,” by Emily Walker for FoxNews.com, February 1 (thanks to all who sent this in):

An Islamic organization once listed by the Justice Department as a co-conspirator in a high-profile terror case is among many groups that have received thousands in federal farm subsidies, without producing any crops.

The subsidies to the North American Islamic Trust are just a slice of the questionable payments that, as has been well documented, go to millionaires and non-farmers every year. But as Congress moves to rein in the program, these subsidies stand out considering the group’s involvement in the Holy Land Foundation case of 2008. During the trial, the group’s farm subsidies stopped, only to be reinstated after a federal judge cleared them.

Records show that since 1998, the North American Islamic Trust has received over $10,000 across 34 separate taxpayer-funded programs. NAIT’s two relatively small land plots are tax-zoned as “agricultural” — but they aren’t developed.

The group has been able to obtain farm subsidies legally without producing any crops because it is a nonprofit “charity group” landowner — so it received subsidies on top of being tax-exempt.

“Organizations with no history in agriculture are getting in on taxpayer-provided farm subsidies,” said Adam Andrzejewski, founder of the transparency database OpenTheBooks.com and former Republican candidate for governor of Illinois.

He said the NAIT’s subsidies are “probably legal,” adding: “The federal farm bill has become so large that it has nothing to do with ‘preserving the family farm’ or ‘creating a stable food supply’.”

The North American Islamic Trust’s history is complicated — as the offshoot of the Muslim Students Association and its financial arm, NAIT was founded in 1973 by Middle Eastern-born college students.The majority of NAIT’s founders were members of the Muslim Brotherhood, and the group continues to be backed by Saudi Arabia. NAIT uses Shariah-approved investing with its own company, Allied Asset Advisors, to buy and pool mosques and community centers. Former Allied Asset Advisor board member, Jamal Said, preached the most conservative forms of Islam and was specifically named as a co-conspirator in the terror-funding case.

In the Holy Land Foundation case of 2008, which prosecuted investors charged with sending money to Hamas, NAIT was named by U.S. federal prosecutors as a co-conspirator and an entity that is or was “a member of the Muslim Brotherhood” (the parent organization of Hamas).

The Holy Land Foundation’s five accused individuals were sentenced for funneling $12.4 million to the terror group, which controls the Gaza Strip and is dedicated to the destruction of Israel. NAIT never was formally charged in the case.

NAIT’s sheer size may have worked against it. An estimated one in five mosques in the United States is owned by NAIT; those properties are estimated to be worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Several of these mosques, though, have been places of worship for those convicted in terror activities.

But even before a verdict in the 2008 Holy Land Foundation case had been reached, NAIT appealed their co-conspirator status, saying that they had “suffered injuries” from a “public branding.”

In October of 2010, the Fifth Circuit Court overturned the group’s “co-conspirator” status after NAIT’s appeal and pressure from the ACLU. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals said “if NAIT could have been accurately characterized as a joint venture,” that “does not carry an inherently criminal connotation.”

NAIT’s farm subsidies stopped in 2008 during the trial and were first received again in 2011.

Every farm subsidy to the North American Islamic Trust has been received at the mailing address of the Islamic Center of Central Missouri Mosque, records show. The USDA lists the “farm location” as Boone County, Mo. But aerial searches of the “agricultural” properties owned by the North American Islamic Trust reveal that the plots are undeveloped, tree-dotted land combined to form just over 100 acres valued at about $59,000.

The North American Islamic Trust and the Islamic Center of Central Missouri did not reply to multiple requests for comment.

According to the USDA and OpentheBooks.com, about half of NAIT’s subsidies were “Direct Payments,” a program which costs taxpayers an annual $5 billion. By 2011, the North AmericaN Islamic Trust began obtaining subsidies under the auspice that it is a “church, charity, or non-profit organization.”…

FL Rep. Manny Diaz offers Trapped Students a Way Out of Failed Schools

February 2, 2014/in Education, Featured, News, Policy/by Trevor Colestock

Students in Florida that are trapped in failing and/or troubled schools may have new hope on the horizon.

The various misdeeds of the Miami-Dade School District, and the events that took place at Miami Norland Senior High School, in the aftermath of Adobegate makes the case for an upcoming House Bill concerning charter schools being sponsored by Rep. Manny Diaz.

An aspect of this bill, co-location, has unions up in arms about this legislation, but as a whistleblowing union steward who desires reform, I am for it and view co-location and competition as a viable remedy to reform the Miami-Dade School District, and other Florida school districts, for the better.

Simply put, co-location is the sharing of public school space by both charter and public schools, sometimes on the same school campus.

In Florida, charter schools are under the supervision of county school boards but privately managed. As schools and school districts are very unwilling to reform themselves in terms of clean ethical governance, co-location makes perfect sense and just may force schools like Miami Norland SHS and districts like Miami-Dade to clean up their act, especially in the areas of compliance with professional development procedures, teacher observation and evaluation improprieties, test cheating, and treatment of whistleblowers for the betterment of the students they purport to serve.

A well-run charter school on the same campus as a poorly run public school akin to Norland would force the Norland’s of the state to change their ways and shape up, or the school districts that supervise them to clean them up, or else risk losing their students to the charter school on site as parents would have a viable alternative to an inadequate public school option.

During the 2011-2012 school year, two vocational teachers at Miami Norland SHS, Mr. Emmanuel Fleurantin and Mrs. Brenda Muchnick, and most likely persons unknown, engaged in massive test cheating on two Adobe industrial arts certification exams, hence of Adobegate.

With the assistance of cheating, undertaken by Mr. Emmanuel Fleurantin and Mrs. Brenda Muchnick, Miami Norland’s school grade went from a “C” for the 2010-11 school year to an “A” for the 2011-12 school year.

As a result, total federal funds (SIG, RTTT) given out due to a grade influenced by cheating was $100,560; the total state funds per FSRP was between $130,000- $140,000; the total overall combined federal and state incentive funds were $230,560- $240,560.

Each teacher at Miami Norland Senior High School received $1730.41 from all three payouts.

This affair is detailed in the Miami-Dade OIG Final Report and the Department of Administrative Hearings brief, issued by the School Board Attorney on January 8, 2014, justifying Mr. Fleurantin’s termination.

During the following school year, 2012-2013, Miami Norland SHS led the state in FCAT invalidations due to cheating with 13 student exams being invalidated.

The response by school district administration has been outrageous and unjust: Mr. Fleurantin, a black union member, has been suspended pending termination while Mrs. Muchnick, a white non-union member, received a slap on the wrist for the same offense from the same cheating scandal and is back working at Norland.

When one reads the Miami-Dade OIG Final Report and the Department of Administrative Hearings brief, one can reasonably conclude that Mrs. Muchnick is equally culpable and a reasonable person would think her employment was up for termination as well.

For my efforts, I as the whistleblowing union steward suffered an attempted transfer and a bogus CRC complaint devoid of merit (dismissed later) in September and an actual involuntary transfer on October 24, 2013, followed by another on December 10, 2013.

To make matters worse, my award winning library program has been closed since my departure, in violation of state law, and the students have not had library media services since then.

A Norland employee told me a week ago that students have been complaining about being unable to access library books, and one acted up.

Too bad the faculty, which apparently seems to care about their bottom line and financial incentives gained from cheating more so than their students, does not speak up about this injustice and defend the students’ right to read.

Whether the Norland faculty is silent due to complicity or cowardice, to quote Barbara Bush, a reasonable person may conclude “they are a sorry bunch.”

Sadly, Norland SHS is under the leadership of a principal who has two prior ethics complaints successfully processed against him by the FLDOE. Mr. Lee is a principal who has threatened me twice with retaliation (documented in grievances) in May 2010 and February 2013; a principal who has fabricated my observation and been caught doing so in a meeting on April 4, 2012; and a principal who has undertaken various forms of adverse action, in concert with the other union stewards and District officials, against me since late August 2013 for my efforts in trying to clean up the school.

As a parent of a Miami Norland SHS student, why would you leave your child to languish in what a fair-minded person may conclude are the clutches and the bad influences of Mrs. Muchnick, Mr. Lee, and a faculty that apparently could care less for your child when you can give them a better environment and educational opportunities on the same school grounds under the bill sponsored by Rep. Diaz?

Rep. Diaz’s bill preserves the concept of neighborhood schools and gives the parents and students of Florida trapped in similar situations throughout the state a way out.

If these events have transpired at Miami Norland SHS, and they have, you can believe that they have transpired (or are transpiring) at other schools throughout Florida.

Districts like Miami-Dade and schools like Norland SHS feel entitled to public funds and in their arrogance rails against those who expose test cheating, which leads to better school grades and enhanced funding, and other frauds while the state simply passes the buck and declines to take action.

Rep. Diaz’s bill would curtail the “business as usual” environment as parents would have the means to place their child in a better educational, and ethical, environment.

Unions and public education advocates have decried the fact that Rep. Diaz is in charge of this bill, but it is phony outrage as they have plenty of advocates in the Legislature that have significantly influenced educational bills over the past few years: Sen. Bill Montford, who is the CEO of the Florida Association of District School Superintendents and former superintendent of Leon County Public Schools; Sen. Don Gaetz and Nancy Detert, former public school superintendents; as well as teachers in both chambers, namely Sen. Dwight Bullard, a Miami-Dade teacher and a UTD member.

Critics decry Rep. Diaz’s involvement as a conflict of interest.

So he is a legislator with a passion for education reform that embraces charter schools; how is that different from Sen. Montford’s or Sen. Bullard’s passion for public education and the bills that they propose and support?

As with traditional public education, charter schools are deserving of advocates as well in the Legislature. The purpose of representation is to serve all the interests of everyone in the state encompassing all races and ethnicities.

The legislation proposed by Rep. Diaz will receive, as with any legislation, intense scrutiny in the appropriate House committee as well as the House floor as well as the appropriate Senate committee and Senate floor when it arrives there.

What really scares unions and traditional public education advocates, as well as school districts and the Norland’s of the state, is that they cannot continue on the same path collecting taxpayer dollars as they go with little oversight and with no accountability as it is on the horizon.

Immigration Plan: Trust Obama?

February 1, 2014/in Immigration, Must Read, News, Policy, Politics/by Dr. Richard M. Swier, LTC U.S. Army (Ret.)

House Republicans say they are ready to move forward with an immigration reform plan—and it sounds remarkably like amnesty for illegal immigrants.

While avoiding key phrases like “path to citizenship,” the ideas put forth by congressional leaders this week would give legal status to people who are here illegally. It would just have more steps, including a probationary period, a work permit—and the government upholding a lopsided part of the bargain.

The plan assumes that border security would be ramped up and immigration laws would be strictly enforced in America. Representative Paul Ryan (R-WI) said Members of Congress are prepared to make this deal. The Wall Street Journal reported:

Mr. Ryan said it would make sure that the Obama administration went ahead with the enforcement provisions. “We want to make sure that we write a law that he can’t avoid,” Mr. Ryan said.

Unfortunately, the President seems to be doing quite well avoiding laws he doesn’t like. On immigration, he has already selectively enforced laws, and he went around Congress to implement major portions of the DREAM Act—which had failed in Congress more than 30 times—by executive fiat.

“Policymakers have no real reason to trust the President to uphold any new immigration laws,” Heritage Vice President Derrick Morgan wrote yesterday.

The President and Congress did not pass comprehensive immigration reform during his first two years in office when liberals controlled both Houses of Congress. He now wants conservatives to join him in this unpopular policy, apparently asking them to trust that he will enforce the law in return.

The lure of a rebounding U.S. economy, the promise of eventual amnesty, and the lax enforcement of immigration laws are strong temptations. That’s why amnesty doesn’t work to control illegal immigration; in fact, it just encourages more people to risk sneaking in.

Amnesty is unfair to all Americans who are living in this country legally—whether they were born here or immigrated legally. Millions more are waiting their turn for their opportunity to become Americans, and it’s simply wrong to allow lawbreakers to jump the line.

Why is this a hot topic on Capitol Hill right now? Americans aren’t demanding changes to immigration laws. Heritage’s Morgan reports:

Only 3 percent of the American people think immigration is a top priority. Most have a healthy skepticism of promises to control the border: only 5 percent think it is very likely that a new immigration law will actually seal the border.

It’s true that the immigration system is broken. That’s why Heritage has set out its own recommendations for reforms that would welcome immigrants, protect U.S. citizens, get people into jobs, and secure the border.

Read the Morning Bell and more en español every day at Heritage Libertad.

EDITORS NOTE: This column is by Amy Payne. Read more of her columns by clicking here.

GOP Walks into U-shape Ambush RE: Immigration

February 1, 2014/in Immigration, Must Read, News, Policy, Politics/by Allen West

Recently we reported that the House GOP, especially Speaker Boehner, was looking at a means to advance the idea of “comprehensive” immigration reform.

President Obama threw down a gauntlet during his State of the Union address, (which very few watched, by the way). The House GOP is currently at a retreat conference in Baltimore (some might say their at a retreat both literally and figuratively) and they may well be crafting a strategy at this session.

Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol writes in his blog,

The Wall Street Journal reports that some House Republican leaders are looking to give illegal immigrants legal status right away, with the chance for a green card—and citizenship—down the line….First, illegal immigrants would be offered a “probationary” status, allowing them to work while the government tightened border security and interior enforcement. Officials have explained that this would allow people to work legally while they wait for permanent legal status. (Officials have explained that this group could revert to illegal status if enforcement benchmarks are not met.)

Mr. Kristol (and I) challenge that parenthetical statement. Kristol says,

Is it plausible, and would it even be fair, to force legalized working immigrants to “revert” to illegal status just because some bureaucrats haven’t met certain arbitrary benchmarks? The forced “reversion” would never happen, and it shouldn’t.

I’m constantly amazed how so much legislation is written in double-speak to appease and assuage some concerns while enabling the true goals to be met. “Comprehensive” legislation equals lots of pages of legislation with caveats buried deep inside and no one reads but everyone votes for.

Even Pat Buchanan warns about the prudence of this legislative shift in a National Review article where he says

An imminent Republican debate over immigration will play into the hands of the Democratic party. With the widespread unpopularity of Obamacare, Republicans should instead focus on the embattled health-care law ahead of the 2014 midterm election. By pivoting to the issue of immigration, Republicans are walking right into the trap.

Buchanan surmises that the “Chamber of Commerce and the big-business folks want the immigration deal solved.”

And therein lies the u-shaped ambush awaiting the House GOP and Speaker Boehner if they fall on this grenade. First of all, at a time when Americans are suffering from high levels of unemployment, they should not be adding illegals into the job market until we can rectify the situation for Americans.

The Democrats will certainly blame the Republicans for exacerbating the jobless situation for Americans and castigate the GOP as the party of big business and corporations who want cheap labor.

Second, why would Speaker Boehner do anything that feeds more members into the liberal progressive welfare nanny-state? Who does the Speaker believe these new legal-status individuals will support? Ya think we have voter fraud issues now?

Lastly, why would the GOP want to discourage its base, which enabled them to have a House majority in 2010?

This issue combined with the insidious government education initiative “common core” will result in many conservatives basically saying, “you’re on your own” and this will add fire to the direction and policy of the Republican Party.

My advice to Republicans? You cannot win by being a lesser version of the liberals. If you cannot articulate a clear delineation based upon a policy agenda that promotes the advancement of the individual American, you will lose.

Focus on healthcare solutions, policies that get Americans back to work, get behind our veterans and their concerns, and present a vision for our national security — and communicate that as a unified body.

Even Harry Reid wised up and is denying President Obama fast track trade authority and the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Make the connection with the American people, because right now, President Obama and the progressive socialists have lost credibility with Americans.

What do you think, should the House GOP cave in and advance some type of comprehensive resolution to illegal immigration? I think I know the answer…

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared on AllenBWest.com.

Boehner and the Republican Scarlet Letter: “A” is for Amnesty

TAKE ACTION: Politicians Attacking Florida’s Voter-Approved Term Limits Law

February 1, 2014/in Must Read, News, Policy, Politics/by Philip Blumel

This month, Representative Keith Perry (R-Gainesville) introduced a bill to lengthen his own term limits from a maximum of eight years in one seat all the way up to twelve.

This is a direct attack on we the people of Florida, who passed those term limits with 77 percent of the vote and support them by an even greater margin today, according to polls.

By trying to overrule the peoples’ vote on term limits, Perry is focusing on keeping his own seat, rather than finding solutions to the problems Florida faces.

We say that if eight years are good enough for the President of the United States, then they’re good enough for the gang in Tallahassee.

Here’s how you can help us defend term limits in Florida:

Call Rep. Perry at 850-717-5021 to tell him you support the current term limits and don’t want his bad bill becoming a bad law.
Contact your House member and State Senator to tell them to oppose this proposal.
Write a letter to the editor of the Gainesville Sun or your local newspaper opposing Rep. Perry’s plan to weaken term limits

If the President Wants to Minimize GHG Emissions, He’ll Approve the Keystone Pipeline

February 1, 2014/in Economy, Environment, Featured, News, Policy, Politics/by Sean Hackbarth

The State Department released its final report on the environmental impacts of the Keystone XL pipeline. It not only pulls the rug out from a key argument of pipeline opponents, but it puts the president in an awkward position.

[youtube]http://youtu.be/d-Gn6UpmK-A[/youtube]

First, the report undercuts pipeline opponents’ claims that stopping the construction of Keystone XL would block development of oil sands crude development in Canada:

[A]pproval or denial of any one crude oil transport project, including the proposed Project, is unlikely to significantly impact the rate of extraction in the oil sands or the continued demand for heavy crude oil at refineries in the United States based on expected oil prices, oil-sands supply costs, transport costs, and supply-demand scenarios.

The report states that oil transport by rail is “already occurring in substantial volumes,” and “rail will likely be able to accommodate new production if new pipelines are delayed or not constructed.”

In short, blocking Keystone XL will not stop oil sands crude development in Canada.

Second, the report debunks arguments that a pipeline is the most environmentally dangerous of all scenarios. It looked at alternative scenarios if Keystone XL wasn’t approved—i.e. “No Action/maintaining the status quo–and compared their environmental impacts to the proposed pipeline.

The alternative scenarios all have higher greenhouse gas emissions associated with them than Keystone XL. From the report: “The total annual GHG emissions (direct and indirect) attributed to the No Action scenarios range from 28 to 42 percent greater than for the proposed.”

Impacts of Keystone XL alternatives [table]

If the president is as concerned with minimizing greenhouse gas emissions as he says he is, then he should give the pipeline the go-ahead.

Along with its environmental analysis, the report reaffirms the economic benefits from construction of the pipeline that were stated in the draft EIS:

42,100 new jobs.
$2 billion in earnings.
$3.4 billion added to U.S. GDP.

Tom Donohue, President and CEO of the U.S. Chamber commented on the release of the report:

The State Department has once again found nothing in its environmental analysis that would prevent the Keystone XL pipeline from moving forward. It’s time for the administration to stop playing politics with a project that will create good-paying American jobs, improve our energy security, and strengthen relations with our closest ally, Canada.

Five years of delays, distractions, and foot-dragging is long enough. It’s time to do what’s right for America, our economy and workers, and our relationship with our special neighbor to the north—approve the Keystone XL pipeline.

Now, we’re in the National Interest Determination stage, where eight other federal agencies and the public can weigh in on whether approving the pipeline is in the nation’s national interest.

Based on all that we know now about the jobs that will be created, the economic impacts, and its minimal effects on the environment, it’s clear that approving the Keystone XL pipeline is in America’s best interests.

Rubio Continues Pulling Back On His Immigration Reform Position

February 1, 2014/in Featured, Immigration, News, Policy/by Javier Manjarres

One of the authors of the controversial Senate immigration reform bill, Florida Senator Marco Rubio, spoke to the Shark Tank and other reporters at the Capitol about the upcoming House immigration reform debate, where he believed that a set of principles that would be widely supported will probably come out of the House of Representatives.

Rubio’s ears were ringing as earlier in the day, Speaker John Boehner told reporters during a press conference at RNC headquarters, that a set of immigration principles would be discussed at the upcoming Republican congressional retreat. Rubio stated that the American people lacked confidence in the Obama administration, which is pushing blanket legalization in the immigration reform debate, to enforce any and all immigration enforcement measures.

Rubio was pummeled by grassroots activists for his change of position on immigration reform, when he co sponsored the Senate immigration bill, but now seems to be backing away from his own bill.

It’s still an Issue that needs to be solve, I think the better way to solve it at this point, given the lack of confidence people have in the federal government, is to do it in a way that will gain people’s confidence, and that is why I think a sequential approach is the better approach- it was originally what I had advocated for, it’s not the direction the Senate headed, but in essence, it sounds like that’s the direction everyone wants to head now.

Rubio added that if there was another debate on this issue, he would engage and “give ideas about how to move forward.”

My observation on it now is, that this is not a process today that’s conducive to some big piece of legislation, lack of confidence people have in the federal government has only eroded in the past 12 months, I think it will continue to erode.

And then he added:

The observation that I have made, which I made a couple months ago, and now everyone is agreeing with, is that this is an issue that needs to be handled sequentially, given the mood and sentiment around here and the lack of trust people have. That’s the only observation I couple months ago is that some central piece of legislation, one big piece of legislation just isn’t going to pass.

When questioned if his bill was “one big bill,” Rubio responded:

That was the direction the senate went, but if you back and read what I wrote in the WSJ last year, up to the time that debate began , I argued that a better approach , there is a difference between what you do and how you do it, those are two separate issues, and from a procedural standpoint my argument was, that if we could begin to do this in a way that was sequence so that people can gain confidence and momentum behind the idea I thought that that was a more realistic approach.

Rubio then reiterated that “the Senate decided” to go in the “big piece”of legislation direction.

Now the Senate decided to do it in one big piece of legislation, I didn’t think that was the best approach, But I chose to get involved with it because I wanted to influence, and hopefully make something positive happen. By nature, if I see a problem, I try to solve it.

EDITORS NOTE: This column and photo originally appeared on The Shark Tank.

Oklahomans are All In on School Choice

February 1, 2014/in Education, Must Read, News, Policy/by Friedman Foundation

A majority of Oklahomans favor an education savings account system, with the largest margin of support and most positive intensity coming from younger voters ages 18-34, according to a Friedman Foundation poll released this week. An ambitious school choice proposal is on the table in Oklahoma. Last week, state legislators introduced a bill to create an education savings account system (ESA) for low- and middle-income students. (See a short video of the press conference and an explanation of how ESAs work.)

The proposal is bigger than Arizona’s ESA program, a pioneering policy that has provided crucial lessons for implementation in other states. (see here, here, and here for research on ESAs) Similarly, our release this week of the “Oklahoma K-12 & School Choice Survey” provides states interested in ESAs a new perspective on how voters react to this innovative plan.

Oklahomans are much more likely to support ESAs than oppose them. The margin in favor of ESAs is very large (+22 points). A solid majority of respondents (56 percent) support an “education savings account system”; just one-third (34 percent) oppose ESAs.

All demographic groups showed a propensity toward supporting ESAs. No group registered a larger proportion of negative responses than positive responses. Young voters (ages 18 to 34), Republicans, and school parents exhibited the biggest margins of support and represent the groups most likely to be on board today.

The positive intensity for ESAs is highest among young voters (ages 18 to 34), school parents, and Republicans. There is mild negative intensity among older voters and Democrats.

Oklahomans prefer universal access to ESAs rather than limited eligibility based on financial need. Nearly six out of 10 voters (58 percent) said they agree with the statement that “ESAs should be available to all families, regardless of incomes and special needs.” Approximately 37 percent “strongly agree” with that statement. One-third (32 percent) disagree with that statement, and 19 percent “strongly disagree.”

For most voters, an ESA proposal would not be a make or break issue. A majority (58 percent) said it would not make her/him more or less likely to vote for a political candidate who supports ESAs. However, if a voter has an opinion on this issue, he or she is more likely to vote for the pro-ESA candidate (19 percent more likely vs. 14 percent less likely).

Oklahomans send different signals about how to fund preschool, a topic receiving considerable attention lately by policy wonks and public officials.

On the first of two questions, a plurality of voters (29 percent) indicated they would like to see an increase of funding public preschool providers directly. However, about 26 percent of respondents said they would equally favor that or a proposal establishing an ESA system for four-year-old children. An additional 17 percent would prefer structural reform – the ESA system – over simple funding increases.

The follow-up question asked to what extent respondents would favor or oppose a pilot ESA program for Oklahoma’s four-year-olds. Considering this proposal on its own merits, more than half of respondents (55 percent) said they would favor such a limited ESA program, compared to 32 percent saying they would oppose the preschool ESA system.

The window looks as if it’s wide open for Oklahoma’s education reformers to change the funding mechanism for K-12 education (via ESAs).

First, certain questions in our poll pick up voters’ desires for changing the status quo and having more access to private schools.

56 percent believe Oklahoma’s K-12 education system is on the “wrong track”; 65 percent of school parents gave this response.
58 percent rated the state’s public school system “fair” or “poor”; 63 percent of school parents gave this response.
Voters are much more likely to grade local private schools A or B (74 percent) compared to giving those grades to local public schools (45 percent).
When asked for a preferred school type, nearly equal proportions of voters would choose a regular public school (39 percent) or a private school (37 percent). The disconnect is stark when juxtaposing those responses against Oklahoma’s actual enrollment patterns (94 percent public school and 4 percent private school).

Second, Oklahomans are more likely to favor – rather than oppose – education reforms such as school vouchers, tax-credit scholarships, and charter schools. Collectively, these responses provide a hospitable climate for an ESA proposal.

Click “Oklahoma K-12 & School Choice Survey” to read the full report.