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School's Nation of Islam handout paints Founding Fathers as racists [W:293]

Private investors care more about the short term bottom line than they do for the long term ramifications that studies like the one we are discussing are providing. Which is hardly the fault of private citizens earning their buck, but again this whole line of discussion is pointless.
Unless you have some facts to support this claim it seems you have a clear misunderstanding of the private sector.

What the private sector is now doing, thanks to government largess and the power structure, is lobbying for government grants knowing they can get the taxpayer to take the risks, thus limiting their own exposure. If it becomes successful then they stand to make a bundle, with the most recent and famous government failure being Solyndra. You can bet that the executives and their friends didn't lose money.

These $3 million shrimp experiments go largely unnoticed and although $3 million sounds trivial we can be reasonably certain that someone besides scientists is making money from this and that there might well be political connections involved.

There are many private companies which do their own Research and Development and are hugely successful. Taxpayer money is not a requirement and never has been.
 
Unless you have some facts to support this claim it seems you have a clear misunderstanding of the private sector.

What the private sector is now doing, thanks to government largess and the power structure, is lobbying for government grants knowing they can get the taxpayer to take the risks, thus limiting their own exposure. If it becomes successful then they stand to make a bundle, with the most recent and famous government failure being Solyndra. You can bet that the executives and their friends didn't lose money.

These $3 million shrimp experiments go largely unnoticed and although $3 million sounds trivial we can be reasonably certain that someone besides scientists is making money from this and that there might well be political connections involved.

There are many private companies which do their own Research and Development and are hugely successful. Taxpayer money is not a requirement and never has been.

Private R&D groups do develop breakthroughs in science and technology but does that mean we shouldn't provide tax dollars for advancements that wouldn't directly impact a private companies bottom line like Shrimp anatomy?
 
Private R&D groups do develop breakthroughs in science and technology but does that mean we shouldn't provide tax dollars for advancements that wouldn't directly impact a private companies bottom line like Shrimp anatomy?
Yes. Eventually the system corrupts both government and the private sector.
 
Minorities cannot be racist against the majority, they've no systemic privilege to perpetuate.

Oh lordie... not this again. :lol:
 
What about the Africans that sold the Africans? They're racist, too?

If they believed Africans were inferior in any way then they were racist. There is no doubt they participated in a racist system.
 
All I've heard, is that The Founders were racists. No one has made any exceptions.

In general they were. As great as many of their ideas were, they were products of their times. All I've heard from the Right is how we should be revering these men as gods.
 
In general they were. As great as many of their ideas were, they were products of their times. All I've heard from the Right is how we should be revering these men as gods.
Revering them as Gods? Do you have a link, or is this just more leftist hyperbole?
 
Apdst doesn't know what he's discussing. He thinks if he keeps screaming "Omgz shrimp! 3 million!" people won't actually bother to find out the details:

Shrimp Treadmill - How Much it Cost Taxpayers

Yes, the shrimp treadmill research cost taxpayers more than $3 million over the course of a decade. That includes a $559,681 grant for research into "Impaired Metabolism and Performance in Crustaceans Exposed to Bacteria."

So in short, the study wasn't really about watching shrimp on a treadmill. Shrimp on a treadmill was actually part of a much larger study on the effects water quality has on shrimp. A study which had nothing to do with congress as it was part of the money already allocated to the NSF. A study which "cost" the average taxpayer less than 10 cents per year. A study which actually benefits coastal states like Louisiana. Better stop all scientific research people. It's part of wasteful spending. Wait.... Here is Governor Bobby Jindal depending on that same type of research to ensure Louisiana's shrimp industry doesn't go to ****:

The oil disaster, two years later: seafood, human health in jeopardy | Blog of New Orleans | Gambit - New Orleans News and Entertainment

A statement to Al Jazeera from Gov. Bobby Jindal's office reads, "Gulf seafood has consistently tested lower than the safety thresholds established by the FDA for the levels of oil and dispersant contamination that would pose a risk to human health. ... Louisiana seafood continues to go through extensive testing to ensure that seafood is safe for human consumption. More than 3,000 composite samples of seafood, sediment and water have been tested in Louisiana since the start of the spill."

I'm sure if the government stops spending money on research towards the food exported by states, we'll be better off though!
 
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Revering them as Gods? Do you have a link, or is this just more leftist hyperbole?

I don't think anyone, including the founding fathers, considered revering them as Gods..........more like great and courageous men who created the greatest government the world has ever seen......a beacon of light for the rest of the world. That's why most of the world would immigrate to the US if they could.
 
Revering them as Gods? Do you have a link, or is this just more leftist hyperbole?

I think you are smart enough to know hyperbole when you see it. The point is, many on the Right consider it borderline blasphemy to be critical of the Founders in any way.
 
I think you are smart enough to know hyperbole when you see it. The point is, many on the Right consider it borderline blasphemy to be critical of the Founders in any way.
No, i don't go along with the idea that they were Gods or 'borderline' blasphemy' to be critical of them.

But if we are to be critical shouldn't we be looking at their work and what they did for their country and the dangers they faced while doing it?

What's happened, in the celebrity environment of today, is to judge people quite apart from their world and accomplishments but, as others have pointed out, judged them by today's 'feelings'. Everyone is going to come up short using these measurements and the US, as well as any other country, will have no heroes to admire, to inspire those behind them.

We see people of great personal accomplishment who, like MLK or JFK, are charged with being womanizers. Perhaps Jonas Salk was quick tempered, Dwight Eisenhower persistently late for appointments, and so on, I don't know or care. But let's spend more time on the deeds they've done, the accomplishments they've made. If students want to learn more of the minutiae of these people lives as they progress through their education they can easily do so. Magazines like Confidential or People seem to have encouraged a generation to bring people down to their own level rather than inspire them to greater things. A country with no heroes is a sad place to live.

The Communists would use this propaganda (and many Leftists still buy into it) and now Islamists will do the same. We should be sophisticated enough to understand this old game and not allow it to happen.
 
if we are to be critical shouldn't we be looking at their work and what they did for their country and the dangers they faced while doing it?

We already do that in history class. And we go above and beyond reverence with holidays like President's Day.

What's happened, in the celebrity environment of today, is to judge people quite apart from their world and accomplishments but, as others have pointed out, judged them by today's 'feelings'.Everyone is going to come up short using these measurements and the US, as well as any other country, will have no heroes to admire, to inspire those behind them.

You can be inspired by someone while acknowledging their faults. George Washington was a great leader, thinker, and showed humility by declining a third term in office. At the same time, he owned slaves. Yes, it should be discussed within the context of the times, but do you really think that kind of fact should be ignored?

But let's spend more time on the deeds they've done, the accomplishments they've made.

We already do.

A country with no heroes is a sad place to live.

And a country where its leaders can do no wrong can be a dangerous one.



The Communists would use this propaganda

The Communists (particularly in North Korea) use propaganda to make their leaders out to be perfect human beings if not gods. People like Navy Pride want to put the Founding Fathers on a pedestal that is not far off from what those dictatorships do.
 
We already do that in history class. And we go above and beyond reverence with holidays like President's Day.
Which was formerly Washington's Birthday. That mediocre Presidents should share the same holiday as the first US President suggests changes are happening in American schools and the people who contributed so much to its founding are being trivialized..
You can be inspired by someone while acknowledging their faults.
Yes, but the faults, like gossip, can be exaggerated to the point where they become more important than the greatness which was achieved, as though they should have shared billing.
George Washington was a great leader, thinker, and showed humility by declining a third term in office. At the same time, he owned slaves. Yes, it should be discussed within the context of the times, but do you really think that kind of fact should be ignored?
What is being taught about George Washington and his attitude to his slaves? Did he treat them kindly? Did he rescue them from worse slave owners? How deeply does the subject get into the slave trade and how it effected the American people of the day? Unless an important topic like this is discussed at much greater length I don't see the point in mentioning the subject at all, if the subject is George Washington and his importance to American history.
And a country where its leaders can do no wrong can be a dangerous one.
And George Washington did lose occasionally, and it should be mentioned. I have not suggested that any leader can 'do no wrong', and I would not encourage that idea. But is it necessary to mention MLK was a womanizer, or a suspected Communist? Why not study people like Washington, King, Kennedy or Lincoln in the context of their historical importance?
The Communists (particularly in North Korea) use propaganda to make their leaders out to be perfect human beings if not gods. People like Navy Pride want to put the Founding Fathers on a pedestal that is not far off from what those dictatorships do.
What the communists did, and did well, was to denigrate all Americans and their history through unlimited propaganda, and it worked. It's a little disappointing to see Americans themselves continuing along the same path.
 
Which was formerly Washington's Birthday. That mediocre Presidents should share the same holiday as the first US President suggests changes are happening in American schools and the people who contributed so much to its founding are being trivialized..

That's absurd. The change was to also honor Lincoln, whose birthday was Feb. 12.
 
It was combining Washington and Lincoln into one holiday. Yeesh.

So it is a generic President's Day to honor Washington and Lincoln, neither of whom are mentioned? Great stuff!

You bought that, huh?
 
So it is a generic President's Day to honor Washington and Lincoln, neither of whom are mentioned? Great stuff!

You bought that, huh?

Yeah, the REAL reason was to take the focus off the founders. Part of the great progressive plot to create another day of sales at Walmart.

The idea that Washington's Birthday became President's Day as some sort of nefarious attempt at historical revisionism is laughably preposterous.
 
Yeah, the REAL reason was to take the focus off the founders. Part of the great progressive plot to create another day of sales at Walmart.

The idea that Washington's Birthday became President's Day as some sort of nefarious attempt at historical revisionism is laughably preposterous.
Except that's exactly what happened. Your idea that it was to honor Lincoln only means that you will believe whatever you're told.
 
Except that's exactly what happened. Your idea that it was to honor Lincoln only means that you will believe whatever you're told.

But YOU know the REAL reason, amirite? Do you have any evidence to support your cockamamie theory?
 
Under a far left administration this is what is happening in our country.


School's Nation of Islam handout paints Founding Fathers as racists | Fox News



By Todd Starnes
Published October 27, 2014FoxNews.com


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660-Nation-of-Islam-handout.jpg
(Courtesy Sommer Bauer)


The mother of an eight-year-old wants to know why a Tennessee school teacher gave her child a handout from the Nation of Islam that portrayed the presidents on Mount Rushmore as being racists.

Well, you know, if the shoe fits.

By today's standards - yes - they were racist. They just didn't care back then which is why slavery and other practices were permitted to continue for so long.

But to try to claim they were NOT is absurd.
 
That's already been explained to you.

Yeah, and it was ridiculous. You honestly think Washington's Birthday was changed to President's Day to diminish the historical relevance of the Founding Fathers. That is beyond stupid.
 
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