And So The Revolution Begins...pass the margaritas...

Greetings from Maryland,

Well, it sure looks like you are working to create a revolution in the Santa Barbara school system. Your energy and passion for that is clear and powerful.



The revolution others of us are seeking to launch (see the attached articles, one of which was also published as Duffy, F. M. (2010). Prologue to revolution. Journal of Educational Alternatives, 4(2), 27-37.) is one that will replace the industrial age paradigm of teaching and learning that has groups of students sitting in front of one teacher who controls the learning process; where students are expected to learn a fixed amount of curricular content in a fixed amount of time; and where students are forced to move forward in the learning process even if they have not mastered what needs to be learned.



We want to replace that old paradigm with the student-centered, personalized learning paradigm that assesses each student’s needs, interests, and abilities, and then uses that information to design a personalized learning experience for each child that also complements and supports important learning objectives for all children.



The old paradigm does and always will leave children behind. But if children receive a customized, personalized learning experience that gives them the time to master what they need to learn, how in the world could any child be left behind.



There are many people working on personalizing the education experience and they have been for a very long time. But we have not been able to breakthrough the resistance to change (see the 20 Laws of Transformation in the 2nd attachment). But I believe we are moving quickly toward a tipping point as seen in the growing number of examples of personalized learning models that are emerging; for example, please take a few minutes to view this video clip at the TED.com website. It's by Sugata Mitra and titled "The child-driven education."



The link is:
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/sugata_mitra_the_child_driven_education.html.



Finally, I am not advocating any particular model of personalized learning. Rather, my contribution to the revolution is a field-tested methodology and set of change tools that can be used to bring to whole-system scale any model of personalized learning. That methodology is called The School System Transformation Protocol SM. The SST Protocol was designed in collaboration with Charles Reigeluth of Indiana University.



I will include your name and a link to your website in the “directory of revolutionaries” that I am compiling.



Cordially,

Frank Duffy



Francis M. Duffy, Ph.D.

The F. M. Duffy Group
www.thefmduffygroup.com
duffy@thefmduffygroup.com
http://thefmduffygroup.blogspot.com/
301-854-9800

Co-Director
FutureMinds: Transforming American School Systems
http://www.futureminds.us/
http://systemic4change.wordpress.com/

R& L Education’s Leading Systemic School Improvement Series
http://www.rowmaneducation.com/bookseries/LSI.


Defendant Kate Smith STATEMENT OF CASE.docx
31K View Download

www.k8longstory.blogspot.com

Dear Professor Duffy,

GODOT tells me you're in search of revolutions; Santa Barbara is the Perfect Storm of Injustice.

Please come to Santa Barbara and assist The Whistleblowers in exposing the Education-Politico-Industrial Complex. Money is not the problem; management is.

After we expell the EducRat$ and BureaucRat$, creating the "Schools of Our Dreams" is no problem---we have model schools for the nation.

Sincerely,

k8longstory4sbschooltalk.com


Duncan Waite, Ph.D.
Professor, Educational and Community Leadership
Editor, The International Journal of Leadership in Education (IJLE)
Director, The International Center for Educational Leadership and Social Change
328 ASBS
Texas State University
601 University Dr.
San Marcos, Texas 78666 USA
phone: 512.245.2304
Web site: http://www.txstate.edu/clas/Educational-Leadership/Program-Faculty/Duncan-Waite-Ph-D.html


Announcing IJLE's 10th Annual Emerging Scholars Manuscript Competition.
(Please feel free to copy the pdf and/or share the link with colleagues):
http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/pdf/competitions/tedl.pdf
________________________________________
From: Francis M. Duffy, Ph.D. [fmduffy@earthlink.net]
Sent: Monday, July 11, 2011 5:26 PM
To: fmduffy@earthlink.net
Subject: Will you help?

Dear friends and colleagues,

In the last edition of The F. M. Duffy Reports which you all received I shared with you my personal vision for transforming our education system and the more than 14,000 school districts that are part of that system. That vision, as many of you know, is built on a foundation created by many other researchers, education philosophers, and advocates—past and present.

In the last edition of my Reports I asked you what you will do to help transform America’s school systems. Paradigm change is challenging. We need all the help we can get to make this happen. I will be making a specific request for your help at the end of this note.

Fortunately, there is a growing number of innovators who are advocates for creating and sustaining paradigmatic change in school systems. Charles Reigeluth of Indiana University and I have been advocating for this shift for almost a quarter of a century. For 16 years I have published and distributed The F. M. Duffy Reports to more than 400 recipients (all of you), including school superintendents, state superintendents of schools, professors, principals, teachers, state and federal politicians with an interest in education reform, directors of education agencies, journal editors, and graduate students. I have published 9 books on how to create and sustain whole-system change. Charles has also published a lot on this topic.

I can remember when I first started making presentations about systemic change in the late 1980s I could see people’s eyes glaze over. They don’t glaze over any more because there is a growing recognition of the need to transform the education system and there are many people who are now advocating for that transformation. People get it, and as a result there is a growing interest in transformational change that is found in examples like these:


1. The Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) created the FutureMinds: Transforming American School Systems initiative several years ago (www.futureminds.us). FutureMinds provides the field with a field-tested transformational change methodology and set of tools that can bring to scale any model of personalized learning. That process is called the School System Transformation ProtocolSM.

2. AECT also has a Division for Systemic Change with members who all share an interest in how to create and sustain whole-system transformational change. Many of these members conducted field-based research on transformational change. The division has a website at http://systemic4change.wordpress.com/.

3. Rowman & Littlefield Education created a series of books that focus on various aspects of systemic change (http://www.rowmaneducation.com/bookseries/LSI).

4. Barbara McCombs directs the Human Motivation, Learning and Development Center at the University of Denver. McCombs’ current research is directed at new leadership models for redesigning outdated views of schooling and learning.

5. Clayton Christensen and Michael Horn, co-authors of “Disrupting Class” were interviewed by Joan Richardson (Executive Editor) in a Kappan article titled “Disrupting How and Where We Learn: An Interview with Clayton Christensen and Michael Horn.” (Available at http://www.kappanmagazine.org/content/92/4/32.abstract)

6. Eutopia published an article titled “Disrupting Class: Student-Centric Education Is the Future—How radical innovation will change the way we teach and kids learn” by Clayton M. Christensen and Michael B. Horn (available at http://www.edutopia.org/student-centric-education-technology).

7. Richard Elmore from Harvard University and several of his colleagues recently created a new interdisciplinary education leadership program to prepare superintendents to lead systemic change (http://www.gse.harvard.edu/news-impact/2009/09/harvard-university-to-offer-groundbreaking-doctoral-program-for-education-leaders/).

8. The Software and Information Industry Association, in collaboration with ASCD and the Council of Chief State School Officers (the association for state superintendents) co-sponsored a national symposium titled “Innovate to Educate: System [Re]Design for Personalized Learning.” A report from the 2010 symposium is found at (http://siia.net/pli/presentations/PerLearnPaper.pdf). Participants included two members of the FutureMinds advisory board (Gene Carter of ASCD and Chris Dede of Harvard University).
I know there are others working to create the paradigm shift that is so desperately needed in our education system, including some of you who receive my Reports. I apologize to those whom I did not mention. I am also sure there are people working in support of a paradigm shift of whom I am unaware. So, I am writing to ask for your help. I would like to compile a “directory” of “revolutionaries” who are doing something to transform our education system. I will compile all the names and affiliations that are sent to me and share the document with all of you. If you have examples of schools or school systems that have actually transformed to provide children with a personalized learning experience I would like to know that, too. I will also include those examples in the document that I will compile.

Will you help? I hope so.

Frank


//////////////////////////
Francis M. Duffy, Ph.D.

The F. M. Duffy Group
www.thefmduffygroup.com
duffy@thefmduffygroup.com
http://thefmduffygroup.blogspot.com/
301-854-9800

Co-Director
FutureMinds: Transforming American School Systems
http://www.futureminds.us/
http://systemic4change.wordpress.com/

R& L Education’s Leading Systemic School Improvement Series
http://www.rowmaneducation.com/bookseries/LSI.

k8longstory: Kate Smith's Appeal Brief: Statement of Case

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KhCU5jYkZj_KRjyJJhx0p_LORxsOcHOeNGpi1L41D9g/edit?hl=en_US

Kate Smith's Appeal Brief: Statement of Case

STATEMENT OF CASE

Defendant Kate Smith, (hereafter “Kate”) did not endear herself to high-ranking government administrators and elected officials, to whom she spoke frequently and critically at public meetings of the Santa Barbara Board of Supervisors (BOS), SB City Council, Santa Barbara School District (SBSD) Board of Education and SB County Mental Health Commission.

In August, 2008, Kate filed papers for her third campaign for the SBSD Board of Education; her candidate’s statement “named names” and vowed to expose school and government corruption in a “hard-hitting,” “pull no punches” way:

There is deep-seated and wide-spread school and government corruption in Santa Barbara County. An Education-Political-Industrial Complex (EPIC) has established an unholy alliance between EducRat$, BureaucRat$, and tax-payer-paid lawyers who collude, conspire, and cover-up wrong-doing while they feed at the public-funding trough.

COE Superintendent Bill Cirone and His Cronies have lost sight of the Educational Mission. There are systemic and systematic violations of state and federal laws, abuse of power and process, rampant retaliation against whistleblowers, and malfeasance.

The School to Prison Pipeline (googleable) incarcerates our low-socio-economic-sector youth instead of educating them, causing irreparable damage to the children, family, and our society.

Democratic education is “engaged, relevant, and socially-conscious curriculum in a cooperative and supportive atmosphere, with an embrace of diversity, an accommodation of different learning styles, and a fair distribution of funds.” Visit www.sbschooltalk.com

“The schools of our dreams” are child-centered, teacher-directed, and parent-involved ; Open Alternative School and Cesar Chavez Charter are model school paradigms for our nation.

I am a credentialed teacher and non-profit administrator affiliated with the International Center for Educational Leadership and Social Change.org.

Two weeks before the election, (October 21, 2008), Kate was summarily disqualified from the ballot by the Voter Registrar, Joe Holland, and Billie Alvarez, Elections Manager, because although Kate’s address (3400 Gibraltar Road, Santa Barbara, 93105) is ten minutes away from SBSD schools, an ancient boundary line map places her in the Santa Ynez School District, an hour-and-a-half from her home.

The mistake on the map was discovered in 1998, when Kate submitted her first candidacy for school board. Kate was placed on the ballot because a school administrator wrote to Billie Alvarez on official stationery that “Kate’s residence is in the SBSD.” COE Superintendent Bill Cirone requested that she be disqualified with a promise to then-Voter Registrar Ken Peitit that the map would be corrected. The SB News-Press announced Kate’s candidacy on Augsust 12, 1998, and then published her disqualification the next day.

Civil lawsuits, compliance complaints, and a landmark and epic due process ensued (CT 132-136). Kate prevailed in what the Department of Justice (Office of Civil Rights) deemed “the most expensive, most complex, and most pathetic Special Education Administrative Hearing in the history of the United States.”

The California State Registrar of Voters (Debra Bowen) advised Kate to appeal the 2008 disqualification to the SB Board of Supervisors, which was dicey, since three supervisors were supported in their political careers by contributions from “Bill Cirone and His Cronies. “

On October 28, 2011, one week before the election, Kate submitted her complaint and explained her Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) disorders in an email to the Clerk of the BOS, Michael Allen. During a recess, BOS Chair Salud Carbajal and CEO Michael Brown conspired to deny Kate access to the public podium for remote testimony public comments and ordered her ejected from the county administration building, in violation of the Brown Act and ADA.

The 2008 disqualification was officially noticed in every newspaper, on television, radio, and online, by mail to every registered voter and at each polling place, and cost the tax-payer over $50,000.

The election took place on November 4, 2008; despite the disqualification, Kate received 17,500 votes. Kate filed a lawsuit against Joe Holland, Voter Registrar and Billie Alvarez, Elections Manager, and prevailed in Judge Denise de Bellefeuille’s court. It was a Pyrrhic victory; Kate won, but the disqualification cost her her good name, her husband's support, her father’s blessing and her community’s positive regard.

Kate met with County Counsel Dennis Marshall and Steve Underwood in an hour-long audio-taped meeting to discuss her allegations of wrong-doing against “Bill Cirone and His Cronies,” which includes several supervisors, elected officials, and appointed government administrators and to explain her rare and life-threatening disorder and Americans with Disabilities Act protections (December 8, 2008).

Kate's complaints fell on “deaf ears and she was given "the run around." Referrals to persons with authority went in circles; promises to meet were never kept; appeals for accommodations of American with Disabilities Act (ADA) and California Public Records Act requests were ignored. Every interaction---even polite requests for complaint forms---was met with denials, dismissals, contempt, and misinformation. (CT 117-144. Maureen Graves, Esq./ Karolyn Renard/Motion to Dismiss)

When there is no due process, there is no democracy. Kate filed a sequentially-designed series of Small Claims Court cases to plead for justice and find vindication. When Kate submitted documents at a BOS meeting to Michael Brown (SB County CEO) she was “swatted away” by the CEO who was annoyed by this “gadfly.” (April 21, 2009)

Kate filed a lawsuit against CEO Michael Brown alleging assault and battery and served subpoenas duces tecum to supervisors and high-ranking government employees on “live” camera from the public podium. All efforts to serve subpoenas were met by a phalanx of opposing forces to quash, avoid, ignore, dismiss and even wrongfully deny her right to serve them.

Kate continued to publicly accuse the government of corruption, including malfeasance, fraud, conflict of interest, dereliction of duty, abuse of power and process. She accused several supervisors on camera of covering-up wrong doing and castigated CEO Michael Brown, who was embroiled in three high-profile civil lawsuits against him while, at the same time, he was undergoing a job performance evaluation that would lead to his resignation.

After months of adversarial interactions at the public comments podium, Kate pulled papers to run as a write-in candidate against 1st District Supervisor Wolf, and announced that her doctoral dissertation, “God’s AIE!,” was a video-documentation of her performances at the podium.

It was then that five employees filed declarations seeking Temporary Restraining Orders Against Workplace Violence (March 29, 2010). The employees’ names and faces were unknown to Kate, but their positions were suspiciously strategic: Araceli Velasco, receptionist for the Board of Supervisors and Chair Wolf; Eric Friedman, Supervisor Carbajal’s clerk; Stephanie Fodor, CEO Michael Brown’s secretary; Ethan Duffy, County Counsel’s lunch-time receptionist; and Lael Wageneck, video technician for Community Access Television.

By filing for the much more serious Workplace Violence injunction rather than filing as individuals seeking relief from Harassment, these five “gatekeepers” were huddled under the protection of their employer, Plaintiff Santa Barbara County Government, and were thereby provided the free legal services of SB County Counsel, County Office of Education (“Bill Cirone and His Cronies”--- Griffith and Thornburgh’s Craig Price) and the SB District Attorney.

A trial ensued and three-year restraining orders were issued August 2, 2010 (CT 246-248) prohibiting Kate access to the ENTIRE COUNTY ADMINISTRATION BUILDING, 105 E. Anapamu Street, Santa Barbara, CA, among other restrictions.

This is a stunning blow to a woman who frequently and fervently exercises her First Amendment Rights to “Speak Truth to Power.” Kate passionately plays “the role she has created and occupied of vocal, perpetual critic, and occasional school board candidate in Santa Barbara.” (CT 132) “She is not a danger to anyone, unless it is possible to TALK a person to death, in which case, we’re all in trouble.” “I am not a threat to their lives; I’m a very real threat to their livelihoods.”

“Truth comes as a conqueror only to those who have lost the art of welcoming it as a friend.” --- Rabindranath Tagore

America is on The Edge...

June 21, 2011 at 12:41:13
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Heed the Warning Signs; America is Edging Ever Closer to a Societal Implosion






Become a Fan

SAVE AS FAVORITEVIEW FAVORITES By michael payne (about the author)

Become a Fan (27 fans) -- Page 1 of 2 page(s) opednews.com


Warning by printablesigns.net


Many millions of Americans are currently experiencing intense, unrelenting stress and feelings of despair and futility as they try to cope with a myriad of personal problems largely brought on by this nation's economic crisis. They are not unlike the millions of people in the Middle East that find themselves caught up in protests and violent civil disobedience; in fact they have one thing very much in common with them.

And that is that humans, no matter the nation or the culture, living under these kinds of extremely stressful conditions of despair and hopelessness, will eventually reach a breaking point when they have had all that they can take and they just can't take anymore; and then they react. Americans haven't reached that point, at least not yet. But conditions are continuing to deteriorate and many signs now indicate that a societal implosion is looming on America's horizon.

What we're talking about is an inward collapse of this society and its institutions. What exact form this collapse would take, how severe and far reaching it might be, and what it might do to this nation and its people is difficult to predict. But it's not the least bit farfetched to think that, at some point in the not too distant future, the American people will reach that breaking point and there will be a violent societal reaction.

Let's consider when that might happen and what would trigger such a reaction:

When millions of Americans completely give up on any possibility of finding a decent job in an atmosphere where there is no job creation by either the government or the business sector; when corporations continue to eliminate jobs in the U.S. and outsource them to China, India, and other nations and our government does nothing to reverse it.


When millions more Americans lose their homes to foreclosure and then, to their dismay, find that they cannot afford to rent. When personal bankruptcies due to home foreclosures and monumental health care costs overwhelm millions of Americans, leaving many of them destitute.

When America's financial institutions continue to hoard money and refuse to make loans to small businesses and individuals and, at the same time, devise new ways to increase service charges, ATM fees, and assess an array of penalties involving overdrawn accounts or minimum checking balances.

When the number of homeless people in America and those on food stamps double or even triple. When church charities and food pantries are overwhelmed by those trying but failing to make ends meet.

When the U.S. dollar continues to rapidly decline in value and rampant inflation makes it extremely difficult to feed and clothe a family.

When our states that cannot solve their massive deficit problems lay off even larger numbers of police and firefighters; when these states decimate our education systems by laying off more and more teachers; when they eliminate many social services to the poor, the elderly, the disabled and the mentally ill.

When the cost of gasoline skyrockets and most people can no longer afford long commutes to their jobs or when trying to find a job. When the costs of home heating and electricity become unbearable.

When those many millions of Americans under great stress, who are just trying to survive, see corporate profits rise while their incomes go down, CEO's getting massive bonuses and the wealthiest of Americans finding ways to get more tax breaks and stashing their savings in tax exempt shelters.

When people see the taxes they pay being foolishly and recklessly wasted on needless wars that accomplish nothing except to strengthen the vice grip of the military-security complex over this country.

When the millions of Americans who live in extreme poverty in this nation's cities can find no work of any kind, when their neighborhoods are overrun with violent crime by roaming gangs of young kids that include their own.

When those millions of Americans throw up their hands and say that "enough is enough" and "I can't take it any more," and decide that they will do whatever is necessary to survive, no matter what the consequences..

continue to read on OpEdNews.com

CRUZITO CRUZ 4 SB CITY COUNCIL

>From: Crvzito Herrera Crvz
>Sent: Mar 27, 2011 10:47 AM
>To: kate , Larry Mendoza
>Subject: De: Re: Political Cronyism and Hypocracy:...

Good Morning Kate and Larry:

i have bad news to bear, the system has me in thier legal web.

Thursday nite coming home from East Lost Angeles. Three Blocks Away from
home i got stopped and arrested for a DUI. They understood i was a medical patient and disregard my medical recommendation and really wanted to pick-a-fight more that anything, however, calm and collective throughout the entire arrest.

THEY forced blood from me against my will and on the threats of violence,
possibly tasing me to the force blood out of me, no way on hell was i going to get electrocuted with alot of voltage which is cruel and usual
punsihement when i am supposedly innocent until proven guilty. Here goes the legal wrangling.

Spent Thursday and most of Friday afternoon in County Jail.

Here goes the melodrama and the adherence to constitutional principles and one's personal right to not have evasive and most sacred of one's essennce's is thier life water blood. Not fair, but now they have picked a fight with me.


Time will tell. Pray for me.

In service
cruzito cruz

----- Original Message -----
From: "kate"
To: "karolyn"
Cc: "Karin Huffer (Legal Abuse Syndrome)" ; "Duncan
Waite" ; "John Jensen" ; "Teresa
>Hernandez" ; "Dr. Karen"
>; "joan" ; "Joe Allen"
>; "Cruzito Cruz"
>; "Larry Mendoza" ; "David
>Marshall" ; "David Gilbertson"
>; "Shoshana Stokes"
>Sent: Sunday, March 27, 2011 7:29 AM
>Subject: Political Cronyism and Hypocracy: Washington Post's Ezra Klein
>
>
WE NEED TO WRITE UP A SIMLAR ARTICLE ON SB COE "BILL CIRONE AND HIS
CRONIES"---The "RETIREMENT" of CASTON, SARVIS, McClish et al; the accolades and cover-up of criminals; the funding of croney consultants and the obscene benefit packages....


The Sad, Hypocritical Retirement of Evan Bayh

by Ezra Klein

Washington Post blog, March 15, 2011

Evan Bayh wasn’t a particularly distinguished senator. You’ll not find much major legislation with his name on it, or a particularly coherent philosophy laced through his votes. He was a popular Democrat in a red state, and most of his efforts seemed to be devoted to keeping it that way. In practice,that meant talking a lot about the deficit, taking occasional potshots as liberals and avoiding any overly courageous legislative stands. “An ordinary politician,” I wrote when he retired.

But he was a very interesting near-retiree. When he decided not to seek
reelection in 2010, he published a precise and devastating broadside againstthe institution in which he and his father had served. Instead of merely condemning the bitter partisanship of the place, he proposed to close the loopholes that had enabled polarization to metastasize in paralysis.


“Filibusters should require 35 senators to … make a commitment to
continually debate an issue in reality, not just in theory,” he wrote. And “the number of votes needed to overcome a filibuster should be reduced to 55 from 60.” Strong stuff. He then went after money in politics, calling for“legislation to enhance disclosure requirements, require corporate donors to appear in the political ads they finance and prohibit government contractors or bailout beneficiaries from spending money on political campaigns,” not to mention “public matching funds for smaller contributions. Bayh had no record of leadership on any of these topics. But, in part for that reason, it was particularly potent to hear him speaking out on them.

An acknowledged moderate who’d taken on these crusades wouldn’t have just
been a good senator. He’d have been a great one. This new incarnation of
Evan Bayh, I wrote, should stay in the Senate, where he could do some good.


But he didn’t want to stay in the Senate, he told me in subsequent
interviews. He waxed rhapsodic over his time teaching at Indiana University’s Graduate School of Business. “It was real, it was tangible, and it was making a difference every day,” he said. He wanted that feeling again. He wanted to come home at night, he told me, and say, “Dear, do you know what we got done today? I’ve got this really bright kid in my class, and do you know what he asked me, and here’s what I told him, and I think I saw a litle epiphany moment go off in his mind.” For a United States senator to explain his retirement by saying, “I want to be engaged in an honorable line of work,” was the single most persuasive and devastating critique I’d ever seen of the Senate as an institution.

But Bayh did not return to Indiana to teach. He did not, as he said he was thinking of doing, join a foundation. Rather, he went to the massive law firm McGuire Woods. And who does McGuire Woods work for? “Principal clients served from our Washington office include national energy companies, foreign countries, international manufacturing companies, trade associations and local and national businesses,” reads the company’s Web site. He followed that up by signing on as a senior adviser to Apollo Management Group, a giant public-equity firm. And, finally, this week, he joined Fox News as a contributor. It’s as if he’s systematically ticking off every poison he identified in the body politic and rushing to dump more of it into the water supply.

The “corrosive system of campaign financing” that Bayh considered such a
threat? He’s being paid by both McGuire Woods and Apollo Global Management to act as a corroding agent on their behalf. The “strident partisanship” and “unyielding ideology” he complained was ruining the Senate? At Fox News, he’ll be right there on set while it gets cooked up. His warning that “what is required from members of Congress and the public alike is a new spirit of devotion to the national welfare beyond party or self-interest” sounds, in retrospect, like a joke. Evan Bayh doing performance art as Evan Bayh.


Exactly which of these new positions would Bayh say is against his
self-interest, or in promotion of the general welfare?

I should say, for the record, that I got in touch with McGuire Woods to give Bayh an opportunity to comment, or offer an alternative interpretation of his career decisions. I didn’t hear from them, but I got a call back from a PR person at Fox News. “I’m going to decline the interview for Mr. Bayh,” the flack said. And I guess I’m not surprised:

It’s one thing to take the positions Bayh took without much of a record on them. It’s a whole other to try to sustain them when his paychecks are being signed by people who profit from the very forces he lamented.

In our last interview, Bayh complained of the poor opinion the public had of him and his colleagues. “They look at us like we’re worse than used-car salesmen.” Yes. They do. And this is why.

This entry was posted on Saturday, March 26th, 2011 at 4:25 pm and is filed under Articles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS


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“The Sad, Hypocritical Retirement of Evan Bayh: Ezra Klein”
Prof. Duane Whittier Says:
>
>March 26th, 2011 at 6:28 pm
>A most insightful article here. Well worth reading. Thank you for bringing >it to our attention.
>
>sharon kerley Says:
>
>March 27th, 2011 at 2:56 am
>It is so sad when we really find out that we are not the country we thought we were. Who does really run our country, it becomes more and more evident that there are people behind the scene who run the show. The book that really showed the truth was Confessions of an economic hit man.
I had always thought that we were the best, we sent food, missionaries,
clothes etc. Then I find out that what we really were doing is gettin other countries tied up with interrest payments which went or goes to European Bankers. Do we even have an honest upright person to be our next president????The Haiti situation, and also the New Orleans situation only gives u s a glimpse of the magnitude of it all. There is a lot more.

>k8longstory Says: Your comment is awaiting moderation.
>
>March 27th, 2011 at 8:17 am


“Truth Will Out, Justice Prevails, and Love Conquers All in an Eternal
Conflict against Humorless Arrogance, Illusory Prestige, Brute Force and
Primeval Stupidity.” Santa Barbara is the Perfect Storm of Injustice; “WE,the People” are calling for PRACTICAL WISDOM, COMPASSIONATE COMMUNITY and RESTORATIVE JUSTICE—and we’re demanding a Federal Grand Jury to EXPOSE corruption, incarcerate the Education-Politico-Industrial Complex (EPIC)—Good Ol’ Boys SBCOE Bill Cirone and His Cronies. It is up to US to RESTORE JUSTICE and DEMOCRACY to our schools and communities.; social change is messy but inevitable….


« Secret Fears of the Super-Rich: Graeme Wood in the Atlantic (Part Two)TheWar on Elizabeth Warren: Krugman’s Powerful Indictment

Old Pepperass and Constant Change

<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>

Your Inspirational Quote
Sunday July 03, 2011

<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>~<>

Hi Kate,

Did you know...

... that today is the Old Peppersass Birthday? On July 3,
1869, Old Peppersass, the world's first mountain climbing cog
railway, reached the top of Mount Washington. Old Peppersass
was the original Little Engine That Could. ;-)

~~~

Today's Inspirational Quote:

"Become a student of change. It is the only thing that will
remain constant."

-- Anthony J. D'Angelo

~~~

Communication, Collaboration, Cooperation, Coordination...

New type of commander may avoid Katrina-like chaos

In this Jan. 25, 2011 photo, NORAD/Northcom commander Admiral James Winnefeld responds to questions during an interview at his office at Peterson Air Force Base, Colo. Under Winnefeld, the the Defense Department began grooming a new type of commander to coordinate the military response to domestic disasters, hoping to save lives by avoiding some of the chaos that plagued the hurricane Katrina rescue effort. Winnefeld, who is also commander of the North American Aerospace Defense Command, called the dual-status program "one of my proudest accomplishments since I've been here." (AP Photo - Ed Andrieski)

DAN ELLIOTT
From Associated Press

July 03, 2011

PETERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Colo. (AP) — The Defense Department is grooming a new type of commander to coordinate the military response to domestic disasters, hoping to save lives by avoiding some of the chaos that plagued the Hurricane Katrina rescue effort.

The officers, called dual-status commanders, would be able to lead both active-duty and National Guard troops — a power that requires special training and authority because of legal restrictions on the use of the armed forces on U.S. soil.

No one commander had that authority in the aftermath of Katrina, and military and civilian experts say the lack of coordination contributed to the nightmarish delays, duplications and gaps in the huge rescue effort.

"It was just like a solid wall was between the two entities," said Georgia National Guard Col. Michael Scholes, who was part of the Katrina response.

Top Defense Department officials believe dual-status commanders are the key to reducing at least some of those failures.

"We're going to be able to conduct disaster response operations on a large scale much more efficiently and effectively than we have in the past," said Paul Stockton, assistant secretary of defense for homeland defense.

Dual-status commanders will provide a "unity of effort that is going to save lives on a large scale," Stockton said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in August 2005, killing more than 1,600 people and causing more than $40 billion in property damage.

An unprecedented 70,000 military personnel poured into the region to help, but active-duty and Guard troops often didn't know what the other was doing, according to William Banks, a professor at the Syracuse University law school who studied the response.

Banks likened the confusion to the Keystone Kops of slapstick movies, with too many troops bumping heads at some assignments while other tasks went undone.

The evacuation of New Orleans' Superdome was delayed by 24 hours because of a lack of coordination among the Louisiana National Guard, active-duty troops and state and federal officials, Banks wrote in a 2006 critique published in the Mississippi College Law Review.

By contrast, Scholes said, active-duty and Guard troops worked together seamlessly during the 2004 G8 Summit on Sea Island, Ga., where a dual-status commander oversaw the military presence. Scholes was part of that effort as well.

The dual-status concept is simple but the execution is not. The active-duty military is limited in what it can do at home. The National Guard in each state is in charge of helping civilian authorities during emergencies.

Active-duty and National Guard troops also have distinctly different chains of command. The president is the commander-in-chief of active-duty troops, while the Guard reports through a state chain of command leading to the governor.

A dual-status commander would straddle that divide. With the approval of both state and federal officials, he or she would get temporary authority to command both types of troops and report up both chains of command.

The U.S. Northern Command, with headquarters at Peterson Air Force Base, Colo., began training dual-status commanders last year. Northern Command was created after the 2001 terrorist attacks to defend the U.S. homeland and help civilian authorities handle domestic crises like Katrina

The goal is to have at least one officer in each of the 50 states and in four U.S. territories qualified and ready to be a dual-status commander on a moment's notice, said Adm. James Winnefeld, commander of Northern Command.

"So if you have a sudden emergency, earthquake, hurricane, you name it, we want to be able to have a National Guard officer able to command federal forces," Winnefeld said in interview earlier this year.

Dual-status commanders have been used in disaster drills and at planned events, including the 2004 summit in Georgia, but Northern Command officials say they haven't yet been tested in a real crisis.

Bridging the gap between active-duty and National Guard troops is tricky because of questions about who should be in charge, Winnefeld said.

"There's always been, I would say, a gentlemanly disagreement between the states and the federal government, at least for the last decade probably, on who would actually have the responsibility for commanding federal forces responding to a disaster in a state," he said.

Winnefeld believes in nearly every case the National Guard should be in charge.

"We believe that the right person 99 percent of the time to command the entire military response inside a state is a National Guard officer who is from that state, is appointed by the governor and understands that state and has been trained by the federal side to understand the federal side of this kind of response better than almost any federal officer would," Winnefeld said.

Winnefeld, who is also commander of the North American Aerospace Defense Command, called the dual-status program "one of my proudest accomplishments since I've been here." He will be leaving the two commands to become vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff pending Senate confirmation later this summer.

Governors like the dual-status commander concept, said Heather Hogsett, director of homeland security and public safety for the National Governor's Association.

"Governors have embraced the dual status commander concept as a way to preserve their existing authorities within their states ... The National Guard commander reports to the governor, (so) you are preserving that chain of command," she said.

Syracuse's Banks, in an interview with the AP, said disaster victims also prefer the Guard take the lead.

"If you ask them who they'd like to have protecting them and enforcing the laws in the event of a crisis, they'd rather have their neighbors....than somebody from thousands of miles away," he said.

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