Three thumbs up for Star, Citizen Editorials

by David Safier In the past few days, the Star has written two strong, important editorials, one criticizing Horne’s wrongheaded ELL policies and another condemning immigrant bashing. Meanwhile, the Citizen went after Jan Brewer for the latest salvo in her unending crusade against election integrity. This kind of advocacy by our local papers deserves notice. … Read more

Arizona’s Newest Minority Group?

by David Safier We may be seeing the emergence of a new minority group in Arizona. At the risk of being called a bigot, let me say I hope to see this group’s numbers decrease in this state and across the nation. The group I’m talking about is homophobes. The event that triggered my hope … Read more

If U.S. Schools are so Bad . . .

by David Safier The Sunday NY Times has a lengthy article, For English Studies, Koreans Say Goodbye to Dad. Korean mothers are taking their young children to the U.S. and other English speaking countries to study while their husbands remain behind in Korea. The main reason they give is that they want their children to … Read more

The Cost of a Stealth Bomber

by David Safier (TASL) A short item in Friday’s Star: “The Air Force on Thursday said the first crash of a B-2 stealth bomber was caused by moisture in sensors and estimated the loss of the aircraft at $1.4 billion.” Sure, airplanes crash. Sure, we need our high tech bombers. But this little item took … Read more

The Horne Mutiny

by David Safier Looks like Ed Supe Tom Horne has a little ELL mutiny on his hands, first in Sahuarita and now in Tucson and Sunnyside. Sahuarita started the mutiny by stating it wouldn’t follow the state mandated English Immersion program that would segregate ELL students for four hours a day of intensive English instruction. … Read more