Lisabob

Wow. Whatever you may think about a person's political and/or religious leanings, illegal is illegal. The law is not written for convenience' sake. Merlyn raises a good point here. Is he right? I dunno for sure, I'm not a lawyer, don't play one on tv either. But it sure does seem like the easy answer would be for BSA to co-charter via explorer posts instead of crews. As for the other stuff (or does this only apply to the kids?): A Scout is Friendly. A Scout is a friend to all. He is a brother to other Scouts. He offers his friendship to people of all races and nations, and respects them even if their beliefs and customs are different from his own. A Scout is Courteous. A Scout is polite to everyone regardless of age or position. He knows that using good manners makes it easier for people to get along. A Scout is Kind. A Scout knows there is strength in being gentle. He treats others as he wants to be treated. Without good reason, he does not harm or kill any living thing.

Scoutmom, I'm sorry to hear about your experience. I often have thought that the other adults - not the kids - are the cause of most burnout in scouting, and I've been there myself. This year, I'm taking a very big step away from involvement because it had become a major source of irritation and stress in my life. THat's not what I signed up for, so I'm going back to being "just" a parent for a while. Maybe down the road a ways I'll come back as a volunteer but not right now. Just one thing I wanted to mention to you though - please keep in mind that the BSA is *not* a christian organization. It is not any particular religion, one need not be a Christian or even a member of any religion at all to join, to advance, to participate, etc. And anybody who tells you otherwise is either misinformed and spreading incorrect information, or is trying to pull the wool over your eyes.

vol, I was not attacking you. But I don't see how or why the birther stuff even rises to the level of constitutional discussion. They're not even on the same rational playing field as most Americans. Obama was born in Hawaii, overwhelming evidence to that effect has clearly been presented, end of that particular story. In my view, it is not worth pursuing further and so I won't. When you continue to pursue it, it makes it appear as though you wish to legitimize the birthers, despite your claim to the contrary. Regarding the representation question, it depends on how you understand representation to work. THere are legitimate debates about whether your elected official ought to mechanically reflect the will of the majority in his/her district (assuming it is possible to figure out what the majority actually wants, which is often a difficult task), or whether the official is bound to make what he or she believes are the best choices, sometimes even in spite of the majority preference. There are reasonable arguments in both directions. Then too, minority political viewpoints are a challenge. Obviously, it is more likely that an official will reflect the views of the majority who elected him or her, than of the minority who did not. None the less, even people who hold minority viewpoints have a representative - just not one with whom they agree. People in the minority can still contact their representative, tell them why they feel as they do, encourage them to vote a certain way, ask for help with government bureaucratic problems, etc. The point about representation is that, just because you don't agree with the choices an elected official makes, doesn't necessarily mean you have no representation. And incidentally, the British parliament actually offered the colonies seats at the table - representation. However, partly as a strategic move, colonial leaders turned down this offer. Can't cry "no taxation without representation!" (a catchy little slogan) when you actually get a representative, now can you. There were other, more pragmatic, reasons too, that have to do with the quality of representation (would've been difficult for the rep to know in a timely fashion what his colonial constituents thought, given the communications technology of the day). It is worth noting, though, that the rallying cry around which most of the current tea party folks are convening is a little more complicated than it appears on the face of things.

Absurdity abounds. Vol, you can be angry with your representative for not promoting your viewpoint, but the fact remains that you do have representation in the US Congress (unless, of course, you live in Washington, D.C., and then forget it). Regarding the birther argument, I don't see how you could come to the conclusion you reached, based on what Gern wrote. If we were discussing a situation where it was clear that the person running for president really might not have been eligible, that's one thing. But these birthers, they just won't settle for any sort of standard of evidence. They're off the deep end. Either they're crazy, or they're blinded by their other agenda(s), or maybe both. Even Obama's opponent, John McCain, disavowed their particular brand of idiocy. Trying to make what they are doing into a serious constitutional debate is like building a castle on a foundation of sand. Forget it.

vol, if there were credibility to the birthers' claims that would be one thing, but there is none and yet they continue. Why on earth are you attempting to equate their stance with defending the constitution? That's the thinnest of veils for other agendas, since no one (except the birthers and even you have said you think they're off base) is suggesting that the constitution should be, or has been, disregarded in this matter.

Yes I do pack, but I'd prefer not to identify exactly where I live on the web. Send me a pm if you want and we can discuss that way.

I just want to add that I live in one of the areas where a ban was proposed. It ultimately failed, and I applaud the teacher, the school board, the students, and most of the community for standing up to the narrow-minded individuals who tried to enact the ban. However, one upshot of this was that at least a couple of folks from the group who supported the ban ran for, and won, seats on the school board. The area is pretty conservative, but I was very pleased to note how many people came out in opposition to banning books, especially books intended to be included in a high school advanced literature course.

Brent, I am concerned about a great many things, not all of which I intend to discuss with you. As we have had an ongoing discussion about the conduct of Mr. Wilson, I chose to comment on how you spun your post in this thread to relate to that topic.

Pack, that's interesting. Thanks for sharing the link. But I wonder if the reason you see few attempts to ban books in places like Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, etc., has more to do with the relatively smaller populations and fewer school districts in many western states and less to do with the degree of conservatism vs.liberalism out west? If it were based on ideology in the way that you suggest, then we would also expect to see more bans in place in northeastern (typically liberal) states, and few bans in place in southeastern (typically conservative) states, too. Yet the map in your link shows a great many bans in southeastern states.

Sigh. There is a large difference between arguing that the president "lied" in the way you just did, Brent, and having a fellow member of Congress shout at the president from the floor during a formal speech to a joint session of Congress. Respect for the office, civility, and expectations about leadership and role modeling make the latter unacceptable. The former, while perhaps inflammatory in some ways, is more acceptable. I don't see why many people refuse to see the difference in context. I would almost say that some people simply want to be stubborn, in the same way that little kids get into the "he started it!" sorts of arguments and then dig in their heels on that point, no matter what else may have happened.

According to their website there are only 13 AHG troops in my state, and none (or maybe 1, not sure) in my entire council. So it hasn't really come up. I suspect this is another example of a de facto local policy - in places where AHG has a stronger presence, they probably were already working out their relationship with scouting. I don't know if they have their own internet forum (bet they do though), but you might actually get more response to this question by approaching AHG troops to ask how this matter has impacted them, rather than how it has impacted most scouting groups.

Yeah, it doesn't appear to be the same old thing to me, either. Richard, I understand your point about knowing that things will arise as jambo approaches, but this just seems like the kind of thing that should have been ironed out before national released their new med form earlier this year. We'll deal with it, but it is just another hoop to jump through that could have been eliminated with a bit better planning at some level.

THat's a good idea scoutldr, I'll see if I can get them to do it.

We got told by my son's jambo troop leader that hte jambo forms are bar coded to the specific individual and that's why we cannot use the other BSA medical forms. He said in no uncertain terms, the BSA physical forms that came out last year will NOT be accepted. Sigh. THis means I get to pay for a whole new physical completely out of pocket, because my insurance pays for one every 12 months and he already had it over the summer. We have to submit the special jambo form well in advance of the event itself, so there's no waiting until our insurance clock resets in summer 2010 to do the new physical, either.

I have to agree with Beavah. And, if I were a school leader, I'd be extremely wary of having a bunch of kids come in to do such a program (even if well meaning). THere are all sorts of issues, ranging from efficient use of classroom time, to the school's responsibility for whatever is presented (will the school control the script?), to your scouts missing their own classes to do this program, to whether or not kids will take it seriously, to possible parental responses to such a program. If I were an elementary school principal I wouldn't want to touch this with a ten foot pole. These are not hurdles that are easily cleared by a well-meaning boy scout leader, in this day and age. I really appreciate your thoughtfulness and the fact that you want to be sure kids learn that bullying is bad. YOu have great intentions, that's clear. I just don't see this as an appropriate solution to the problem you have described (as Beavah says), nor do I see it as something that is highly likely to be an effective program that the schools will welcome.

Yeah and here's the rub, Ken. In most cases that money isn't viewed as "wasted" by the residents of that Senator's or Congress member's home state or district. You might think "hasn't NY gotten enough money for their roads already??!" But I can tell you , New Yorkers were thinking "isn't it great that Senator D'Amato knows how to help us keep our roads in good shape?" And now living in MI, I wish our Senators were half as attentive to that because our roads here are terrible. Evidently it is only "wasteful" if it is going to somebody else's constituents. As for Clinton, yes there were a lot of harsh things said about her transplant to NY. New Yorkers were not shy about saying some of those things, either. Bottom line is, they chose her anyway. That's their business. Following Vol's line of thought, why should somebody in, say, Kansas, care who New Yorkers choose as their representative? (And whatever your politics, she did work very hard for New York, and won a lot of them over. She was re-elected 6 years later with more than 60% of the vote, which is an unusually high margin of victory.)

Have a serious talk with the school administrators. If they're not on board, if they pay it lip service and are half-hearted about it, it won't matter what you do because it won't work. And the kids pick that up very quickly.

Eamonn says: I have heard horror stories of some Councils using Dining Halls and having the participants sit on wooden benches!! Man! That would hurt!! (Holding my hand up) Quite a bit of our course was delivered in that venue. Not entirely pleasant. I enjoyed weekend #2 a lot more than weekend #1. After the formal course was over, I only ever saw a couple of people from my patrol. None of us actively participated in each other's tickets. But 6 years later, I am still in regular contact with 2 of them. I just served as a character reference for one, who was 19 at the time of our course and is now finishing college and trying to land a full time job. I can honestly say I know him pretty well as a result of spending 2 wood badge weekends with him.

That's an interesting point too. In a purist sort of way I agree with vol. Given the current system, I appreciate Beavah's response. Evidently Wilson ran a web ad using his recent behavior as a tool to attempt to fundraise from his base (and presumably, from sympathizers nation-wide). But he does have an opponent, Rob Miller. According to this article, his opponent's backers have raised almost $800,000 in the last few days as a direct result of Wilson's behavior. http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/09/11/actblue-raises-over-750000-for-joe-wilsons-opponent/ Edited: Brent, you beat me to it buddy. (This message has been edited by lisabob)(This message has been edited by lisabob)

Ha, Ken, I've only lived in MI for about a decade. Kind of limits my opportunities to have voted for or against him. But there is an argument to be made that longevity matters. When I lived in NY we had a guy, Al D'Amato, who was a Senator forever (well it seemed that way). When elections rolled around he would make the case that he was an effective representative for the state because of his tenure. He knew how to get things done, he had influential committee assignments, people owed him favors, etc., and he used this to NY's benefit (in his view at least). In fact one of his nicknames was "Senator Pothole" because he was good at getting federal highway funding to fix NY's roads. He always said voters would be better served by keeping him, rather than by sending some new guy or gal who didn't know the ropes. Now when it gets to the point where they're drooling on themselves and can't remember their names, yeah I think they should resign. But longevity in office, by itself, isn't necessarily an automatic strike against them.

"We are The People. We have elected these officials and allowed this kind of behavior. It is our fault for not setting higher expectations. Republicans and Democrats both are only giving us what we have asked for. Why are we now surprised when something like this happens? Either get off your butt and do something about it or shut up, sit down and be a sheep. " That's a point I can agree with, Ken. But what makes you assume that at least some of us are *not* attempting to "do something about it?"

What Baden says is certainly true, in terms of what I have heard from scouting pros. But then... sometimes there is incredible and unreasonable pressure being placed on DEs (especially on young & inexperienced DEs) to start up X number of new units by a certain date. I know one new DE who was informed that she would either start 8 units in her first year (in an area where cub scouting was pretty well saturated already), or she'd be fired. THe result of such unreasonable pressure on new scouting pros is sometimes that they do short-sighted things. I am not trying to excuse your DE, Nissan. She sounds as though she was acting in a way that would make any volunteer upset. But she may be under tremendous pressure to produce ridiculous results, or else. Talk to her about it. If your CO is not active, then the CM or CC could be a good connection to the DE. Be kind, but let her know how you'd have preferred things to go, and what you are willing to do to help scouting grow in your area. (Incidentally, I agree with John that the COR or IH should be more active, and it is also part of a DE's job to ensure a CO understands the role they are supposed to play. But I wouldn't want an inexpert and obviously somewhat ham handed DE coming to meet with *my* CO - who knows what might be said and to what effect - so I would hold off on that for a while.)

Yeah I know, BDP, but that's just what his troop does. Of all the things to be concerned about, that one's low on the list for me, and the SPL and ASPL always have a bit of fun with it.

Hey since we're talking about this, I have a question. Our SPL & ASPL came up with a novel patrol name for themselves. Haven't been able to find a patch to match it. And they only need 2 patches. Any ideas how to do this without paying a ton of money for excess patches?

vol, you may have heard that Lyndon Johnson predicted the end of Democratic electoral success in the south for the next 50 years when he signed the 1964 Civil Rights Act. He appears to have been right. I don't know that it was the "liberal" nature of the party that drove people away in the 50s and 60s, unless of course, you want to categorize racial equality as just another one of those crazy "liberal" ideas.