Parents Left With no Options as 15,000 Texas Kids test Positive for COVID-19

August 27, 2021 By: Jet Harris Category: 2024 Election, Abbott, Coronavirus, Sumbitches

A concerned parent from Bethany Elementary School in Plano ISD in Plano, Texas forwarded me the PTA newsletter that went out to parents today, as the school grapples with numerous outbreaks of COVID-19. Anna Hulse, the PTA President at Bethany Elementary gathered the following information that proves the impossible circumstances faced by parents, like me, who feel we have no safe education options for our children in Texas public schools.

Chris Hill, the Collin County Judge, is full-on trolling the parents in Collin County with Facebook posts asking parents “WTF is wrong with you?” and “Freedom is more important than education,” when parents challenge him and his interpretation of the law. Well, that freedom has consequences. As of today, 14,000 public school students have tested positive in the state. 15% of all Texans with COVID last week were public school students and staff.

Willam Joy is a reporter for DFW News station WFAA Channel 8

The following Newsletter outlines exactly how few options Texas parents have:

 

 

Dear PTA Families –

As you are aware, COVID positive cases are climbing at Bethany Elementary.  While the PISD Dashboard (link) is frozen at 13 student and 3 staff as of Sunday, our positive case count is at a minimum of 22 known positives, including both students and staff. Bethany Elementary’s 2019-20 TEA official population was 338. Some easy math tells you that 6% of our student population is COVID positive at 11 days into the school year. Several of these cases are concentrated in specific classes.

Page 18 of the PISD Return to School Plan 2021-2022 (link) has levels stating the following:

I messaged with Mr. Bird, Collin County Judge Chris Hill and the Elementary Executive Team for PISD about this. In addition, I invited PISD’s Director for District Health Services, Staci Antelo, to our PTA Board meeting Thursday morning to further discuss what options Bethany Elementary, PISD, and CCHSC have to control the positive case count at Bethany. Staci Antelo, BSN, RN, NCSN, was very gracious to give us almost an hour of her day to answer our questions and discuss our concerns. I am grateful to her for taking this time to speak with the Executive Board.

Here is a summary of the issues:

  • TEA has mandated that ISDs do not contact trace – the county will.
  • Collin County Health Services Center (CCHSC) is short staffed and is not doing contact tracing themselves. They forward cases to the state and Texas Health Trace will do the contact tracing.
  • For PISD, an antigen (rapid) OR a PCR positive test result equals a positive COVID case. For the county and state, only PCR counts as a positive case and is reported. The others are ‘probable’ cases.
  • Collin County Judge Chris Hill has stated that CCHSC does not have the authority to close schools for disease spread in the case of COVID.
  • TEA has told school districts that they cannot close classrooms/facilities due to COVID. Also, they cannot mandate quarantining in cases of close contact. If a school district does close due to COVID, they will not receive a temporary attendance waiver like they might for a flu outbreak. Any missed days must be made up. For an individual school, this would mean they continue after the school district is closed. For PISD, we would add those days to the end of the school year.
  • To truly break transmission, facilities need to close for a minimum of 14 days. However, this will not prevent community spread.
  • If a school district advocates for anything other than in person learning, they face the real possibility of losing funding. Because of Bethany’s positive case count, PISD started “strongly encouraging” students in close contact of several positive cases in a class to choose the remote conferencing option. While this is available and sanctioned, PISD is taking a risk with this wording. PISD is doing it because it is the right thing to do.
  • Bethany Elementary currently has the highest positive case percentage in PISD. Unfortunately, other PISD schools positive case percentages are climbing as well.
  • Advocating to our elected officials in the Texas Legislature, County Leadership and our TEA commissioner is the best way to let them know how their policies are affecting our school community. Hearing from constituent parents has a larger effect than hearing from Superintendents, school administrators and teachers. Our local elected officials are:

In the last 2 days, I have personally been in communication with PISD Superintendent Sara Bonser, PISD’s Director for District Health Services Staci Antelo and extensively with our Principal Bryan Bird. Each of these people are dedicated and doing the ultimate best that they can for all PISD students and staff. They hear and feel our frustrations. They want what is best for our students both for their health and their education. This situation is not ideal, and they are doing the best they can within the guidelines, mandates, and executive orders they have been given by state and county government.

Because of my messages this week, PISD has been assigned a different epidemiologist at CCHSC who is much more responsive to our staff. Respectful, passionate, professional advocacy can affect change.

If you have questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to reach out to me, Mr. Bird, or Mrs. Miller.

Stay healthy, Be safe,

Anna Hulse

Bethany Elementary PTA President


 

Y’all, Texas politicians are playing politics with our children’s lives in a way that I’ve really never seen in my lifetime. I’ve contacted so many officials and everyone keeps passing the buck all the way up to Governor Abbott, who won’t make any changes no matter how many Texas students fall ill, in order to have a better chance in the next primary against Allen West and Don Huffines.

“What the Hell is Wrong With You?” – Collin County Judge Tells Worried Parent of School Children

August 12, 2021 By: Jet Harris Category: Coronavirus, Gleeful Cruelty and Dickishness, Healthcare, Local Stuff

Yesterday, a parent responded to his refusal to mandate masks in schools despite the CDC recommendation that all schools must do so to protect the health of children against the delta variant. His response to his constituent on his official Facebook page starts with “WTH is wrong with you?”

 

Chris Hill also campaigned maskless in November, shaking the hands of many of his constituents. He later discovered he had COVID during this time, and then deleted all of the photos of himself campaigning without a mask.

Elections have consequences, Collin County. Specifically, tent hospitals, refrigerated body trucks, children on ventilators, and 870 fatalities.

 

Gaetz and Trump: It all Makes Sense Now

April 03, 2021 By: Jet Harris Category: Sumbitches, Trump, Trumpists

It’s all so clear, now, ain’t it?

Matt Gaetz has been the loyalist of the Trump loyalists. No matter how low Trump went, Gaetz stood there with a grin on his face and a shovel in his hand to help dig a deeper hole. It all makes sense now that we know the latest accusations about Gaetz and his inability to keep it in his pants.

Here is what they have in common:

Daddy’s money

Don Gaetz made his fortune by convincing the government to allow Medicare and Medicaid to cover hospice services – that his non-profit provided. Once the government started covering these hospice services, he switched the company to for-profit and built the largest hospice company in the country. He made millions using government health care. He then used those millions to buy his son a seat in Congress, which the son is now using to rail against government-run health care. Now he’s using those millions on getting his son a lawyer.

We all know, of course, how Donald Trump’s daddy made his money. Real estate, including government-subsidized housing, like this building in Brooklyn that still nets the Trumps $5 million a year.

Being a Giant Windbag on Twitter

The night before Michael Cohen testified before Congress, Gaetz sent this tweet, meant to intimidate a federal witness:

“Hey @MichaelCohen212 – Do your wife & father-in-law know about your girlfriends? Maybe tonight would be a good time for that chat. I wonder if she’ll remain faithful when you’re in prison. She’s about to learn a lot…,”

There are about a million other examples of Gaetz being a horses ass on Twitter for you to read if you’re a masochist, and I certainly don’t need to prove that Trump is a giant windbag.

Multiple Accusations of Sexual Impropriety

This Wikipedia page lists 26 credible accusations against Trump, most of which you’re already aware, no doubt.

The best proof on this Earth of a devil is that Donald Trump gets away with literally everything he does with no repercussions ever, and the only way that this is possible is that he sold his soul to El Diablo.

Of course, it is this week that the Gaetzgate scandal began to unfold. In my estimation, he just finally pissed off the wrong person. Mr. or Mrs. pissed off leaked the investigation that had been secret from the media for half a year. For six months, the Justice Department has been investigating whether Gaetz flew a 17-year-old child across state lines and paid her for statutory rape. Within hours of the story breaking, GOP Congressmen and women lined up to give the media anonymous accounts of Gaetz sharing naked photos of women on the floor of the U. S. House of Representatives.

He is accused of having a sex contest when he was in the Florida state legislature involving . . . Harry Potter. Lawmakers got points for sleeping with married women, sorority girls, and virgins. The ultimate prize of this contest was one specific woman who they nicknamed “The Snitch” – as in Quiddich, whoever got her to sleep with them won the game outright.
Alright, alright, the Daily Mail reported the last bit there but it’s too damn juicy not to talk about at the beauty salon.

They each have a Creepy Predator Wingmen

Trump’s long documented and often photographed friendship with Jeffrey Epstein allowed him free and full access to many of these women who later accused him of sexual assault. Epstein died in prison after being indicted for running a sex-trafficking ring wherein he abused dozens of underage girls, flying them on his private plane to his private island where they could be abused without the fear of authorities coming to the aid of the children.

Gaetz’s Epstein is named Joel Greenberg. Joel Greenberg is under indictment for a whole host of unbelievably nasty crimes, from posing as a student and writing a letter that he hoped would disgrace his political rival, to using Florida state government offices to print Fake IDs for the underage girls he was sleeping with so he could fly them across state lines. That sounds familiar.

There sure is an awful lot of smoke around these folks.

Alright, jury, I’ve presented my case. Gaetz is Trump’s biggest defender because they’re the same guy. Given every advantage in life, able to purchase anything they’d ever want from women to political office, they openly flaunt their crimes and laugh at the dummies around them that play by the rules and don’t have nearly as many followers on social media as they do. They’re both full of horse shit. We can only hope that the Feds take down Gaetz before he becomes the next President Trump.

UPDATE 2: Buckle Up, Kids, You Ain’t Going to Like this Ride

November 03, 2017 By: El Jefe Category: Hillary

UPDATED FOR COMMENTS ABOUT BERNIE NOT BEING A DEMOCRAT:

Note: My usual warning…If you are a strong Hillary supporter, and believe her political loss in 2016 was purely the result of misogynist pigs denying her her birthright, please, please, please DON’T read this.  You will hate it, guaranteed.  However, if you want a little inconvenient truth, buckle up.  This one is a bumpy ride, but there is something to learn here…

Remember how all you Hillary supporters dismissed everyone who criticized her during the 2016 election?  Remember the way you unfriended people like me on social media and labeled us misogynist pigs who were being too hard on her?  Remember insulting Bernie supporters and libeling him at every opportunity?  Well, I do, and I have something to say about that and more.

Yesterday, Donna Brazile, who is a really good person, above board, honest, and a loyal Democrat published an excerpt from her new book, Hacks: The Inside Story of the Break-ins and Breakdowns that Put Donald Trump in the White House.  The excerpt described what she discovered when she took over the DNC after Debbie Wasserman Schultz was ousted during the Democratic Convention in the summer of 2016.  Her revelations about the state of the DNC is nothing short of shocking, but even worse, virtually all of the fears anti-Hillary folks had about how the nomination process was run were well founded. Hillary and her operatives HAD taken over the DNC and then proceeded to destroy every reform that had been implemented by Howard Dean and President Obama.

After Brazile took over the party, she first discovered that it had been deep in debt since the 2012 election and had been starved for cash since.  Worse, in September, she found the smoking gun.  She unearthed a document known as the Joint Fund-Raising Agreement between the DNC, the Hillary Victory Fund, and Hillary for America.  The document, negotiated between Robby Mook, Hillary’s campaign manager and the DNC,  handed FULL CONTROL of the DNC over to Hillary’s campaign office in August of 2015.  You read that correctly.  Hillary took full control of the DNC FIVE MONTHS before the primaries even started.  The DNC could do nothing without Hillary’s approval, including fund raising, staff hiring decisions, even press releases.

And file this under It Gets Even Worse; the money laundering charge that was asserted by Politico in May of 2016 was true.  We’ll let Brazile describe it herself –

“Individuals who had maxed out their $2,700 contribution limit to the campaign could write an additional check for $353,400 to the Hillary Victory Fund—that figure represented $10,000 to each of the 32 states’ parties who were part of the Victory Fund agreement—$320,000—and $33,400 to the DNC. The money would be deposited in the states first, and transferred to the DNC shortly after that. Money in the battleground states usually stayed in that state, but all the other states funneled that money directly to the DNC, which quickly transferred the money to Brooklyn.”

Money from the lavish fundraisers Hillary was holding all over the country for the DNC was actually laundered from the states, then to the DNC, and then to her own campaign coffers.  The state parties got less than ONE HALF OF ONE PERCENT.  So all you suckers donating in Texas to rebuild the party were actually backdoor funding Hillary’s campaign.  The party sucked wind. As Brazile describes this shameful scheme, the operation wasn’t illegal, but it was certainly unethical.

So let’s recap.  The charge that Hillary controlled the party during the primaries is true.  She controlled the DNC from the summer of 2015, controlling the primaries, party strategy, fund raising, management, and all other aspects of the DNC’s operation. Her people ran it, including the moron who ignored the FBI’s warning that the DNC’s email system was compromised.  The board of the DNC was sidelined.  The primaries WERE RIGGED.  Debbie Wasserman Schultz was nothing more than a tool for Hillary’s campaign, since she was installed to get Hillary elected.  The entire DNC effort from 2015 on had one goal – getting Hillary elected.

This shameful corruption does more damage than even Brazile described; it not only “compromised the party’s integrity” as she said, this documented and incontrovertible evidence of corruption plays directly into the stereotype of the Clintons running right on the edge of ethics and even legality.  While Hillary spoke loudly about campaign finance reform, blah, blah, blah, she was doing exactly, no, precisely the opposite.

You wanna know what really pisses me off?  These revelations of Hillary’s behavior adds fuel to the “lock her up” fire. It’s going from a bonfire to a 10,000 acre blaze that’s going to rage for months. Trump is already playing with the matches, tweet raging this morning that the FBI should investigate her criminality.  Here we go.

Hey, Hillary folks – hate Trump?  Well, goddamit, go buy a mirror.  Hang it on the wall, and then look into it for a long time.  Thanks.  For nothing.

UPDATE:  Let’s summarize comments from our hardcore Hillary supporters:

  1. Nothing to see here.  Move along.
  2. So?  Doesn’t everybody do it?
  3. She won by 3 million votes!
  4. It wasn’t criminal, so it’s OK.
  5. Bernie’s not a Democrat and wouldn’t have won anyway.
  6. El Jefe is an asshole.
  7. Brazile is a LIAR!
  8. Nuh Uh!

First, I didn’t believe Bernie would win the general, but I voted for him in the Texas primary.  What’s more important, and most Clintonistas IGNORE, is that the wall of money Hillary had erected scared off really good candidates like Joe Biden.  No one can deny that if Biden had run he would have decisively won.

Second, I’m always amazed at the prevarication and excuses from Hillary supporters.  Since when is corruption OK?  Trump and other Republicans are excoriated for this kind of conduct.  When it’s a Clinton, its like, “What? That’s a problem?”  I personally find it shocking the lengths Clintonistas reach defending her Highness, no matter the scale of the offense.

I personally witnessed the lengths that Howard Dean went to in 2006 and 2008 to make it clear that the DNC supported ALL candidates and was diligently neutral in partisan races.  He steadfastly defended neutrality and honesty.  Hillary poured kerosene all over those principles and struck the match herself.  Those who dismiss this kind of conduct are nothing short of radical hypocrites, and are no better than the hypocrites on the other side.

So there.

UPDATE 2: Lets talk about Bernie not being a Democrat.

This is the stupidest argument forwarded by Clintonistas.  “Bernie’s not a Democrat!” “He should have run on his own!”  “He should have not been allowed to run!”  And other BS.  OK, let’s settle this – BERNIE RAN UNDER THE RULES OF THE DNC.  HE QUALIFIED UNDER THE RULES OF THE DNC.  Period, end of story.  YOU may not like it, but he ran under the rules and qualified for the primaries.  He had EVERY RIGHT to run, even though YOU want to deny him that right.  The laws of the United States are stacked against independent runs.  It’s virtually impossible for an independent to qualify in all 50 states.  The state governments even pay for the major party primaries.  An independent run is virtually impossible to pull off.  You may hate him, but Bernie ran under the only rules that allowed him to run, AND HE QUALIFIED.  Don’t like that?  Then get all 50 states to make it easier for independent runs.  Until then, get over yourself and stop making stupid, irrelevant arguments.

A New Drinking Game?

August 15, 2017 By: El Jefe Category: Alt-Right Racists

A lot of us have been engaging in a drinking game since Cheeto Jesus’ inauguration.  Here’s the game: Think of the absolute worst person that he could nominate for an administration position, and when he nominates that person, DRINK!  Personally, the game has been tough on my liver these last 7 months.  Well, we have a new drinking game that we can start right away…

Think of the absolute LAST criminal that any sane president would pardon, and when he pardons that person, DRINK!  That’s right, folks – we have a new game.  Think of the LAST person on the planet, especially in light of the events of last weekend, that Trump should pardon.  The last person that any president, no matter how tone deaf and ignorant, would let off the hook…

That’s right, folks, Donald Trump, Worst. President. Ever., is “seriously considering” pardoning…wait for it…former Arizona sheriff Joseph Arpaio, recently convicted of criminal contempt for ignoring a judge’s order to stop rounding up and persecuting Latinos.  Arpaio is probably one of our country’s most famous loud-mouthed bigots, who came to notoriety for violating the civil and human rights of thousands of people, dressing them in pink underwear, housing them in sweltering tents in the desert, feeding them rotten food, and and unjustly imprisoning them in these conditions with almost complete impunity until recently.  When the jig was up, Arpaio shot the justice system the finger, continuing his unlawful activities until charge with contempt.

Naturally, Trump simply can’t abide any kind of reasonable verdict for one of his base’s most favorite racists, so he’s announced to Fox Noise that he’s seriously considering pardoning him.

It’s morning, but I’m drinking.

Remember When?

June 19, 2017 By: Juanita Jean Herownself Category: Uncategorized

Remember when Republicans were calling for more civility after last week’s shooting of a Republican congressman?

Remember when Charlie Brown would try to kick the football and Lucy would pull it up at the last minute?

Yeah, the Lucy Republican strikes again …

 

 

The Atlanta Journal Constitution covers the story.