Chaplains Don't Belong in Public Schools

On Friday, September 1, one of the new laws taking effect in Texas, SB 763, authorizes public school districts to hire chaplains using funds allocated to improve school safety and security. There are several problems with this, no requirement for training in child psychology or development, no prohibition on proselytizing, and it is clearly unconstitutional.

Conservative Christian proponents of the bill claim without evidence the bringing religion into public schools will somehow reduce violence, drug use, and suicide in schools. I went to Catholic schools for 12 years with nuns and brothers as teachers and I can tell you from personal experience there was no lack of violence or drug use in Catholic schools. House Democrats offered amendments that would have required chaplains to have similar accreditation as chaplains who work in prisons or the U.S. military, to bar proselytizing or attempts to convert students from one religion to another; to require chaplains to receive consent from the parents of school children; and to make schools provide chaplains from any faith or denomination requested by students. All of those amendments failed.

In legislative hearings, the bills proponents like Rocky Malloy, assured lawmakers that chaplains were not interested in proselytizing. Malloy, a self-described former drug-smuggling pirate saved by divine intervention, founded and runs Mission Generation, the  group’s website says “Mission Generation has 20 years of experience bringing Jesus to the classrooms of public schools.”

The Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty opposed the bill and has organized efforts to urge school boards to keep chaplains out of public schools. In a letter to school boards signed by over 100 certified chaplains they state “As trained chaplains, we are not qualified for the duties envisioned by SB 763. We cooperate with mental health counselors – we do not compete with them. Further, professions which help children with sensitive matters, such as therapists and police investigators, typically require special training on how to interview and treat juveniles. Few chaplains have this expertise.”

I don’t know about you but when my daughter was in public school I’d have been quite upset if some Protestant or Evangelical chaplain had been proselytizing to her in the guise of counseling.

SB 763 is part of a broad push by conservative Christians to insert religion in public life claiming that separation of church and state is a false doctrine. Mind you these are the same folks who claim that if it isn’t specifically stated in the constitution that it isn’t constitutional when arguing that the Department of Commerce or Department of Education shouldn’t exist. Anyone who reads the constitution will see that there are only two mentions of religion. The first is in Article VI which says in part “The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.” The second is in the First Amendment stating “Congress make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting its free exercise.”

You have an opportunity to put a stop to this in your community. Find out when the school board meets and plan to attend at least long enough to participate in the citizens to be heard segment which is usually in the early part of the meeting. Tell them you want the board’s official policy to be that chaplains are not hired or accepted as volunteers.

Published in the Seguin Gazette - August 30, 2023

Injustice Clarence Thomas

Congressional Republicans like Monica de la Cruz and Speaker Kevin McCarthy are talking about impeaching President Biden as a way to deflect attention from all the indictments and very real corruption of the real estate con man who lost the popular vote twice and is once again the leading candidate for the Republican nomination. They’ve also now got their work cut out diverting the public’s eyes from the lengthening list of ethical and legal violations of several Republican members of the Supreme Court most especially Justices Clarence Thomas.

Research and reporting by ProPublica the nonprofit Pulitzer Prize-winning newsroom that investigates abuses of power has provided an ever lengthening list of corrupt behavior by Thomas.

During his 32 years on the Supreme Court, Clarence Thomas has enjoyed a lifestyle most Americans can only imagine which has been provided by a list ultra-wealthy corporate magnates and executives who have taken him on lavish vacations aboard their yachts, invited him to premium suites at sporting events and sent their private jets to pick him up. On more than one occasion, a 737 was sent just for him. The list of luxury is both longer and from a larger group than has been previously understood or reported. The broad range of leisure activities have been paid for by wealthy conservative benefactors who share the ideology that drives Thomas' judicial philosophy but didn’t have any connection to him until he gained his seat on the nation’s highest court.

Pro-Publica reports “At least 38 destination vacations, including a previously unreported voyage on a yacht around the Bahamas; 26 private jet flights, plus an additional eight by helicopter; a dozen VIP passes to professional and college sporting events, typically perched in the skybox; two stays at luxury resorts in Florida and Jamaica; and one standing invitation to an uber-exclusive golf club overlooking the Atlantic coast.”

None of the men who have provided the luxury travel - oil baron Paul Novelly, billionaire H. Wayne Huizenga, former Berkshire Hathaway executive David Sokol, and Texas real estate tycoon Harlan Crow - appear to have met Thomas prior to him taking a seat on the Supreme Court. Crow is the only one whose name appears in Thomas’ financial disclosures, where justices are required by law to publicly report most gifts. The total value of the undisclosed trips they’ve given Thomas since he was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1991, is difficult to measure. But it’s likely in the millions. All indications are that Thomas violated the law when he chose not to disclose flights, yacht cruises and expensive sports tickets, according to ethics experts.

Maybe more important is that even if reported the breadth of free vacation travel is well outside of judicial norms according to seven current and former federal judges appointed by both parties and other experts. Jeremy Fogel, a former federal judge who served for years on the judicial committee that reviews judges’ financial disclosures said “In my career I don’t remember ever seeing this degree of largesse given to anybody, I think it’s unprecedented.”

Since Chief Justice John Robert’s can’t be bothered to take action of Thomas’ ethics and Republican Speaker Kevin McCarthy isn’t about to impeach Thomas we’ll have to wait for Democrats to return to majority in the House. Sadly even that is unlikely to actually accomplish much as it takes 60 Senators to convict and its doubtful Democrats will gain such a majority in 2024.

Published in the Seguin Gazette - August 16, 2023

Bidenomics and You

You might think that the more than 13 million jobs created under President Biden are just recovering the jobs lost in the pandemic, but even if you exclude the 10 million jobs that got us back to pre-pandemic level, job growth since then has been about twice as fast as pre-pandemic job growth under Trump.

Something often overlooked is the incredibly low unemployment rate during this recovery for veterans. Nationally veteran unemployment hit a record low of 2.2%, and has been under 3.5% for 19 straight months, the longest such stretch on record. Workers without a high school diploma and workers with a high school degree who did not attend college are also seeing extremely low unemployment rates. Adjusted for age, a larger share of our population, 16 or older, was working at a job last month than anytime in the last 45 years, or probably ever. Unemployment in 24 states is at or below 3%, a new record. Texas is not among them, we're at just over 4%.

Private business investment in facilities and equipment accelerated, contributing 1 percentage point to second quarter growth. Private construction of facilities alone, such as factories, contributed about 0.4 percentage point, this category’s largest growth contribution since 1981.

The recovery under President Biden has been significantly stronger than Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected when he first took office. In 2023, the CBO says there will be more than 3 million more individuals employed than they projected when Biden took office. The latest data shows we’re on track to have the first, second, and third best years for new business applications on record, all under President Biden.

It’s not just government agencies making these claims, Morgan Stanley has revised its economic projections upward. Here’s why, infrastructure spending is surging and manufacturing is booming. Both of those forces, manufacturing and infrastructure, are the key parts of President Biden’s economic agenda, which the media is beginning to call Bidenomics.

There’s been a shift in economic arguments that have gone on for many years to one that says investing directly in American workers and American families, via the expanded Child Tax Credit, was the right thing to do in bad economic times. Then in 2021 and 2022, as we moved from relief to recovery, the administration pushed Build Back Better which was not just a slogan, but an actual idea premised on a better way to manage the economy, the Biden team made an affirmative decision to invest in America directly, including over a trillion dollars in infrastructure. And even more cutting-edge was their decision to build safer, stronger supply chains: bringing jobs back home through laws that would build everything from semiconductors to wind and solar to cars and batteries, mostly here at home.

This is Keynesian economics all over again; that’s the Depression era policy that President Roosevelt used to start the country on the road to recovery.

The experience of the past 2.5 yrs shows that we have the tools to avoid painful spells of unemployment and to keep workers empowered with a strong job market. President Biden has been focused on using these tools, and American workers and the American economy have reaped the benefits.

In short Biden’s and the Democrats he leads have been incredibly good for workers in this country and all indications are it will only get better while he’s in office.