A gay fifth grade teacher in Glendale‚ California‚ is suing the Glendale Unified School District after he was suspended then fired for condemning transgender ideology at a school board meeting in April. Ray Shelton‚ a 25-year veteran teacher‚ spoke at a Glendale Unified school board meeting amid concerns over the district’s promotion of LGBTQ+ curriculums to elementary students‚ including by an administrator stating that all children were naturally “socialist” and “queer‚” The Daily Signal reported. Parents also have alleged that the school district allows boys who claim to be transgender to share locker rooms with girls. Glendale‚ a city in the San Fernando Valley‚ is part of Los Angeles County. Its school system has 32 schools and 25‚000 students‚ according to the district’s website. Shelton‚ who taught at Mark Keppel Elementary School‚ was named the Glendale school district’s “Teacher of the Year” twice‚ and earlier this year won the PTA’s Golden Oak Award. He attended the April school board meeting wearing a T-shirt that said “Make Biology Great Again.” He told The Daily Signal that he was supposed to have been given three-to-five minutes to speak at the board meeting‚ though he was only given 60 seconds before he was cut off. Two plus two equals four. The world is not flat. Boys have penises; girls have vaginas. Gender is binary and cannot be changed. Biology is not bigotry. Heterosexuality is not hate. Gender confusion and gender delusion are deep psychological disorders.  No caring professional or loving parent would ever support the chemical poisoning or surgical mutilation of a child’s genitalia. Transgender ideology is anti-gay‚ it is anti-woman‚ and it is anti-human. It wants to take away women’s sports‚ women’s rights‚ women’s achievements. It is misogyny writ large. And I can also say this as a gay man‚ the gay people … At that point‚ Shelton’s microphone was muted and a board member informed him that his time was up. Shelton sat down amid applause from the audience. Glendale Unified prevented Shelton from returning to his classroom afterward. The next day‚ April 19‚ Shelton was visited in his classroom at 8 a.m. by Keppel Elementary Principal Kristine Tonoli and a Glendale district administrator. Shelton told The Daily Signal that he was given a letter informing him that he was being placed on paid leave pending investigation after “several complaints” were lodged against him. He was subsequently fired. But‚ the teacher said‚ all of the emailed complaints shown to him by the Glendale school district were made after he had been put on leave‚ not before‚ suggesting either that Glendale didn’t provide Shelton with earlier complaints or that Tonoli lied to him about why he was being suspended.  All of the emailed complaints provided to The Daily Signal originally were sent after the meeting‚ at 8 a.m. April 19‚ according to time stamps. After that classroom confrontation on April 19‚ Shelton was escorted to the edge of school property and told not to return unless accompanied by someone from the Glendale Unified human resources office. Since those events‚ Shelton has been attacked by liberal activist groups. Media Matters on June 13 called Shelton a “swastika-wielding teacher” in a misleading headline for an article slamming Fox News and Shelton for what it called a “hate-filled tirade.” Media Matters writer Jane Lee didn’t cite Shelton’s comments to the school board or what role the swastika played in the situation. Shelton’s “swastika‚” seen in a photo in the tweet‚ is an internet meme combining four Pride/Progress flags into a swastika‚ mocking the transgenderism and “diversity‚ equity and inclusion” movement as authoritarian‚ discriminatory and dangerous‚ he explained to The Daily Signal in a Tuesday interview. While Jordan Henry has been agitating and lobbying attacks against the district for 2+ years‚ his efforts were mostly contained. However‚ on 4/16 he appeared w a man who held a swastika in the school board meeting. That man was revealed to be local 5th grade teacher Ray Shelton. pic.twitter.com/gNbnsUbYkE— GUSD Parents for Public Schools (@GUSDforAll) June 12‚ 2023 Applying Nazi imagery to political opponents‚ such as by drawing a Hitler mustache on photos‚ has been a popular method of demonizing and discrediting the Left’s opponents for decades. But now‚ a law firm is suing on Shelton’s behalf for what it claims was retaliation against his First Amendment rights. The lawsuit states: As a result of Defendants’ retaliatory‚ unconstitutional actions against Mr. Shelton‚ he was never allowed to return to his classroom or watch his students graduate‚ something he looked forward to every year. Mr. Shelton suffered personally and professionally because of the damage inflicted on him by Defendants’ punitive actions. He filed this action to restore his name and to vindicate not only his rights‚ but the right of all Americans‚ to speak freely without being burdened by the oppressive yoke of government censorship. Asked what he hoped to gain through the lawsuit‚ Shelton said he hoped a legal victory  would help strengthen free speech precedents. “Once the principle [of free speech] is broken‚” he said‚ “people can be silenced through fear—then that’s the end of our civilization.” 2023-12-13-Shelton-ComplaintDownload Have an opinion about this article? To sound off‚ please email letters@DailySignal.com‚ and we’ll consider publishing your edited remarks in our regular “We Hear You” feature. Remember to include the URL or headline of the article plus your name and town and/or state. The post EXCLUSIVE: Award-Winning Gay Teacher Sues California School After Being Fired for Condemning Transgenderism appeared first on The Daily Signal.

CNN Covers the Harvard President Plagiarism Story

Sometimes the artist you love is the one who disappoints you the most. Continue reading…

From 'Abbey Road' and 'Icky Thump' to 'Goodbye' and 'Everything Must Go.' Continue reading…

"California must stand on the right side of history. The Colorado decision can be the basis for a similar decision here in our state," writes Lieutenant Governor Eleni Kounalakis.

The driverless car is here! Finally. Google has harnessed artificial intelligence to create a self-driving car it calls Waymo‚ standing for “Way Forward in Mobility.” Regulators in San Francisco and Phoenix legalized Waymo cars because the robo-cars drive better than people do. They’ve already driven millions of miles on public roads without any fatalities. Not one. No injuries either. Waymo achieves that with sensors attached to the top and sides of the cars. The sensors constantly shoot out lasers that bounce back‚ telling the car precisely where other objects are. The magic of the driverless vehicle is the artificial intelligence behind the sensors. That allows the cars to operate like a human nervous system. Sensors and radar are the eyes and ears. The brain is algorithms trained by billions of simulated trips. The more the robo-cars drive‚ the more they learn‚ and the smarter and safer they get. The big automotive safety problem is people‚ not robo-cars. It’s people who kill nearly 43‚000 Americans every year. Drunk drivers kill 13‚000 people. Six thousand of us die because we fall asleep while driving.Waymo cars have accidents‚ too‚ but almost all happen because of human error: a human driver hits the Waymo. Another robo-car‚ Cruise‚ owned by GM‚ is almost as safe‚ but Cruise cars have gotten into bigger accidents. California regulators then said they pose an “unreasonable risk to public safety‚” and suspended their permit to drive. But California limited the ban to Cruise cars’ autonomous mode‚ meaning Cruise can still operate so long as they have a human in the front seat‚ as backup. I’m surprised that the regulators have been so reasonable. Often‚ after accidents‚ bureaucrats simply ban new ideas. California regulators have exercised unusual restraint. Five hundred Waymo cars still operate freely in large sections of San Francisco and Phoenix. They are wise to allow this because self-driving cars increase safety. Still‚ there will be problems. First responders in San Francisco told my executive producer‚ Maxim Lott‚ “[Waymo cars] freeze in front of us. It’s a 15- to 30-minute fix waiting for a technician. That’s time we don’t have when a building is on fire.” Driverless car companies say they’re making adjustments to let first responders move the cars in an emergency “We’ve heard that‚ too‚” the fire chief told Lott. “It hasn’t happened.” The media hype other risks. Quoting a magazine headline‚ Lott asks Alex Roy‚ former executive at Argo AI‚ “What if a hacker gets into Waymo and hacks 1‚000 robo-taxis‚ ordering them off the road?” “These what-ifs don’t make much sense‚” replies Roy. “For every technology that’s ever arrived‚ there was a ‘what if.’ The ‘what ifs’ played out. … Solutions arrived and everybody moved on.” Still‚ many Americans object to robo-cars. Unions complain that they will take away taxi driver jobs‚ delivery jobs‚ and especially truck-driving jobs. They are right‚ but in the long run‚ that will actually be good for most workers. I’ll make that argument in a future column. Meanwhile‚ some anti-car activists in San Francisco are vandalizing robo-cars. But most people who try them like them. “It’s one of the few things you can do today that makes you feel like people must have felt 100 years ago‚” says Roy. “First time they saw a light bulb‚ first time they saw a plane.” Fully driverless cars are here‚ and they’re a very good thing. More places should allow them. The bigger threat‚ as usual‚ is overregulation. Delaying self-driving cars would cost thousands of American lives. COPYRIGHT 2023 BY JFS PRODUCTIONS INC. The Daily Signal publishes a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Heritage Foundation.  Have an opinion about this article? To sound off‚ please email letters@DailySignal.com‚ and we’ll consider publishing your edited remarks in our regular “We Hear You” feature. Remember to include the URL or headline of the article plus your name and town and/or state. The post Enjoy the Ride appeared first on The Daily Signal.

I still remember that fateful day in spring 2005. I was a junior at Liberty University desperately seeking to land a summer internship as part of my graduation requirements. I naively believed that being a religion major would make it easy for me to find a local church to extend an internship to me. It proved to be rather difficult—until my Google search landed on The Father’s House‚ a nondenominational church in Norcross‚ Georgia. I had no previous affiliation with the church‚ but my desire to graduate outweighed my fear of rejection. I picked up the phone and called. What happened next would positively change my life forever. On the other end of the call was the Rev. Dean Nelson. I explained my situation‚ and he graciously entertained my request. Little did I know that he was looking for an intern that summer while I was looking for an internship. After numerous conversations and a visit to the church during spring break‚ he offered me the opportunity to intern for him.  This began a relationship that lasted until Dean died Saturday of stomach cancer at age 55. As an obituary in The Christian Post notes‚ at the time of Dean’s death he was chairman of both the Frederick Douglass Foundation and the Douglass Leadership Institute‚ as well as vice president of government relations for Human Coalition‚ a network of pro-life pregnancy centers. His is a loss that profoundly affects me. I have lost a father‚ mentor‚ and friend. I owe a great debt of gratitude to Dean Nelson. Growing up in a single-parent home without a dad‚ I never knew how a godly husband and father served his family. That is‚ until Dean allowed me to live with his family—free of charge—for over two years. He showed the love‚ discipline‚ and servanthood I always longed for‚ and he and his wife Julia are why my wife and I homeschool our kids today. >;>;>; Related: Frederick Douglass Statue Toppling Is About ‘Creating Chaos’ Dean and Julia provided premarital counseling for Cathy and me; Dean officiated at our wedding. More importantly‚ Dean Nelson has been a constant in my life. He was always there to provide wisdom and loving encouragement. Like many other young black Christians in the nation’s capital‚ I owe my success to Dean. Not only that‚ but his contributions to the pro-life movement among black Americans are legendary. When I think of Dean‚ I think of his humility. He always—and I mean always—used his platform so that others could succeed‚ even to his detriment sometimes. He was ambitious but not selfish; his love for God’s kingdom drove him. He was faithful with everything that God entrusted to him. Although his time on this side of Heaven is over‚ his impact and legacy will live on in everyone who longs to see righteousness and justice prevail in our culture. Jesus said‚ “The meek shall inherit the earth.” Nelson undoubtedly will be in that number. I will miss him ferociously‚ and these words don’t do his life justice. The 55 years of his life were a resounding testimony to God’s goodness and faithfulness. I know Dean Nelson has received the reward of his faith and the declaration from our Lord that we all long to hear‚ as recorded in Matt. 25:21 (ESV): “Well done‚ good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.”   The Daily Signal publishes a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Heritage Foundation. Have an opinion about this article? To sound off‚ please email letters@DailySignal.com and we’ll consider publishing your edited remarks in our regular “We Hear You” feature. Remember to include the URL or headline of the article plus your name and town and/or state. The post Well Done‚ Dean Nelson appeared first on The Daily Signal.

FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—More and more Army soldiers are reenlisting after being discharged for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine‚ according to information shared exclusively with The Daily Signal. The increase comes after Congress repealed the Pentagon’s vaccine mandate and conservative lawmakers applied pressure to Defense Department leaders to be more welcoming of 8‚400 service members who were “fired” for their refusal to get the COVID-19 shot. As of October‚ only 19 soldiers had returned to the Army. That number grew to 57 this month. Even though the number tripled over the past two months‚ it represents just 3% of the 1‚903 soldiers who were kicked out of the Army under its vaccine mandate. “I’m glad that we were able to remove the COVID-19 vaccine mandate last Congress‚ but there is more work to do‚” said Sen. Ted Cruz‚ R-Texas‚ who in January introduced what he calls the AMERICANS Act to ensure service members would be welcomed back if they chose to reenlist. >;>;>; BIDEN’S COVID-19 VAX MANDATES SPAWN LINGERING BAD RESULTS In February‚ Army Secretary Christine Wormuth announced the Army’s plans for complying with Congress’ repeal of the vaccine mandate. Since then‚ however‚ the Army has struggled to reenlist soldiers who were forced to leave when they didn’t get the shot. The vaccine-related dismissals‚ combined with recruiting woes‚ have led to staffing concerns in the military. Three branches—the Army‚ Air Force‚ and Navy—missed their recruiting targets for 2023. The Army recruited 55‚000 but its goal was 65‚000‚ so it fell short by 10‚000 active-duty soldiers. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin implemented the military’s COVID-19 vaccine requirement in August 2021 (read his memo below). It prompted backlash not only from within the military itself but also from members of Congress. While some service members rejected the vaccine because of their sincerely held religious beliefs‚ others worried about the vaccine’s safety and how it was developed and quickly approved. The Heritage Foundation’s National Independent Panel on Military Service and Readiness‚ chaired by Rep. Mike Waltz‚ R-Fla.‚ issued a report in March citing the COVID-19 vaccine mandate as an impediment to recruitment and retention. (The Daily Signal is Heritage’s news outlet.) As a result of changing conditions on the ground‚ the COVID-19 vaccine mandate became more detrimental than beneficial to military readiness. Every servicemember separated from service or formally restricted from operations is also not deployable‚ which reduces overall readiness. The cumulative effect of the vaccine mandate has equated to entire divisions no longer available for deployment. The panel faulted military leaders for not reconsidering the vaccine mandate as conditions changed and for letting politics contribute to their decisions. This led to “a diminished amount of trust between leaders and subordinates.” That’s one of the reasons Cruz introduced the AMERICANS Act—to ensure service members would be welcomed back if they chose to reenlist. Rep. Dan Bishop‚ R-N.C.‚ introduced a companion bill in the House. >;>;>; DEFENSE DEPARTMENT ‘DRASTICALLY SHIFTED OFF COURSE‚’ REP. MIKE WALTZ SAYS “The COVID vaccine mandate is gone‚ and our military is undermanned at a critical time‚” Cruz said in a written statement to The Daily Signal. “We should be welcoming unvaccinated servicemen and women who want to come back into our armed forces with open arms.” Cruz’s legislation‚ which has 20 cosponsors in the Senate‚ would credit service members for their involuntary separation in retirement pay‚ restore their rank‚ compensate them for lost pay and benefits due to their demotion‚ adjust their “general” discharge to “honorable‚” along with other measures. (Read the full text of the bill.) “This shouldn’t be controversial‚” Cruz said. “The military is struggling with recruitment‚ yet it kicked out over 8‚400 service members over Biden’s vaccine mandate. We must right this wrong. I will continue to fight until we deliver justice for wrongfully dismissed service members.” >;>;>; WITHIN RANKS‚ TRUST IN MILITARY DECLINES AMID POLITICIZATION OF NATIONAL DEFENSE Of the 57 soldiers who returned to the Army‚ 53 are on active duty and four with the Army Reserve. “Our military continues to feel the effects of the Biden administration’s reckless‚ misguided‚ and now-prohibited vaccine mandates‚” Cruz told The Daily Signal. “The AMERICANS Act would correct the wrongs done to unvaccinated service members who were discharged for exercising their conscience.” MEMORANDUM-FOR-MANDATORY-CORONAVIRUS-DISEASE-2019-VACCINATION-OF-DEPARTMENT-OF-DEFENSE-SERVICE-MEMBERSDownload The post Soldiers Slowly Return to Army After Discharges Over COVID Vaccine Mandate appeared first on The Daily Signal.

FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—A Missouri school district is providing elementary-school teachers with coloring pages‚ asking children as young as kindergartners to choose their pronouns and draw the corresponding hair and clothing.  Webster Groves School District Director of Diversity‚ Equity and Inclusion Shane Williamson emailed administrators a resource list of “Gender Identity and Expression Activities” in October 2022 in honor of LGBT History Awareness Month‚ according to public documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and shared with The Daily Signal. “I believe it would be good to start our own resource sheet that provides ideas and activities that can help affirm and support our elementary students around the topic of gender identity and expression‚” Williamson said in the email. Williamson started the list and allowed others to add more activity resources. She did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment.  The list includes two “Playing with Pronouns” coloring pages from the Gender Wheel website for kindergarten through fifth grade and links to Welcoming Schools resources on gender-expansive classrooms and Advocates for Youth’s K-12 sexuality curriculum. The “My Personal Style” coloring page asks children to draw themselves in the “style that feels the most like you.” The page features a gender-neutral child in the middle surrounded by both boy and girl options for clothing‚ hairstyles and jewelry. A line for children as young as age 5 to fill in their preferred pronouns is found below the picture.  The other “Playing the Pronouns” coloring page includes a maze with a child of uncertain sex at one end and a text bubble saying‚ “Help Dylan find their baseball hat” at the other end‚ with “their” in lieu of either “his” or “her.” “The Gender Wheel reminds us that we must see gender and bodies in a nonlinear continuum‚ and not in isolation‚” according to the Gender Wheel website‚ which makes the claim that gender stereotypes have no basis in nature.  Jay Greene‚ a senior education fellow at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Education Policy‚ told The Daily Signal the coloring pages used by the St. Louis-area school district is inappropriate for young children. (The Daily Signal is the news outlet of The Heritage Foundation.) “Asking kindergartners in a Missouri public school to reimagine their gender identity and list their pronouns is simply not age-appropriate and almost certainly inconsistent with the priorities of families in that community‚” Greene said. “Even if we think certain topics can lead to productive discussions‚ not all topics are appropriate for all ages of children.”  The Welcoming Schools lesson plans‚ which the Webster Groves resource list designates as age appropriate for kindergarten through eighth grade‚ aim at “creating classrooms and schools that are free of gender stereotypes and gender norms that limit all children‚” according to its website.  The “Lesson Plans to Create Gender Expansive Classrooms and Support Transgender and Nonbinary Students‚” produced by the far-left Human Rights Campaign‚ include LGBTQ children’s book downloads‚ such as “I Am Jazz‚” the story of transgender-identifying biological male Jazz Jennings; “Julian Is a Mermaid‚” the story of a boy who wants to dress like a female mermaid; “Jacob’s New Dress‚” about a boy who wears a dress to school; and “They‚ She‚ He‚ Easy as ABC‚” a child’s guide to “inclusive pronouns.”  “A key focus of our program is to provide comprehensive resources for educators to teach about transgender and nonbinary people and to affirm all students’ identities across the gender spectrum‚” the Welcoming Schools website says.  Other book recommendations for children kindergarten age and older include “Born Ready: The True Story of a Boy Named Penelope”; “They‚ She‚ He‚ Me‚ Free to Be!”; and “Introducing Teddy: A Gentle Story About Friendship and Gender.”  A winter-related lesson available for download about a “Gender Snowperson” for third through fifth grades asks children to draw their gender identity‚ sexual orientation‚ gender expression‚ and so-called sex assigned at birth.  Children learn about nonbinary butterflies in another lesson designated as appropriate for kindergarten to second grade classrooms.  “Introducing students to animals that are nonbinary‚ as opposed to the ‘female and male’ gender binary‚ helps them to understand that there are many genders and that nature displays great diversity‚” the lesson plan says. Martin Bennet‚ secretary and treasurer of the St. Louis County Family Association‚ which submitted the FOIA request‚ said the Webster Groves lessons are indicative of what’s happening in public schools in Missouri and elsewhere.  “The inappropriate lessons that are occurring in public education‚ along with the continual slide in academic performance‚ is why the Missouri Legislature and Gov. [Mike] Parson must make school choice a reality for parents in Missouri‚” Bennet told The Daily Signal. K-12 lesson plans from Advocates for Youth feature elementary lessons on “Thinking Outside the (Gender) Box‚” different kinds of families‚ gender roles‚ and understanding that “there are some body parts that mostly just girls have and some parts that mostly just boys have.” A lesson on pregnancy lists abortion as a pregnancy option. Teachers are to show the students a video on options‚ then say‚ “Let’s take a closer look at these three options and identify what a person should consider with each option. For example‚ with the option of abortion‚ a person should consider if abortion is available in their local area or would require them to travel.” Optional homework outlined in the lesson plan undermines crisis pregnancy centers‚ more commonly referred to as pregnancy resource centers or pregnancy help centers. “Research the phrase Crisis Pregnancy Center‚ which are centers that aim to block a pregnant person’s access to a safe abortion‚” the lesson plan says. “Identify three key facts about crisis pregnancy centers that set them apart from health care centers.”  Advocates for Youth’s use of “pregnant person” implies that pregnancy is not exclusive to women.  Abortion is defined as “when a pregnant person decides to end the pregnancy by accessing a safe medical procedure or medication to remove the pregnancy from the person’s uterus.” Webster Groves School District did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment.  Have an opinion about this article? To sound off‚ please email letters@DailySignal.com‚ and we’ll consider publishing your edited remarks in our regular “We Hear You” feature. Remember to include the URL or headline of the article plus your name and town and/or state. The post EXCLUSIVE: Missouri School District Offers Coloring Pages on Preferred Pronouns‚ Gender Expression to Kindergartners appeared first on The Daily Signal.

New York Jumps on the Reparations Bandwagon