Wednesday, December 31, 2008

The Folly of College Skills For All

Charles Murray says not everybody is cut out for a 4 yr college degree:

Barack Obama is ideally positioned to do it. He just needs to say it> over and over: "It's what you can do that should count when you apply> for a job, not where you learned to do it."> > http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/28/opinion/28murray.html

This notion that not everybody should be required to get a 4 yr degree to get a job is related to the education reform madness that the curriculum should be covering college level algebra, geometry and statistics as early as kindergarten, and students should be required to pass "standards-based" tests that most adults could not get a passing score on. The set theory with unions, intersections and venn diagrams now being given to 4th graders in READING assessments was introduced in the new math in the 60s only a few years before it was INVENTED in math research fields.

They say society should not be materialistic to judge you by how much stuff you have, then they say it's a require if some people have more education than others. They say you should judge education by outcomes, not inputs, then demand you spend more money, more classroom, days, more homework hours, and more parent time.

ARGH.

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Tuba Man

In case you haven't heard, Seattle lost its beloved Tuba man (just google "tuba man" in google news) who played in front of sports and arts venues for decades. Here's a song for him:

A long long time ago
I can still remember
How that guy used to make us laugh
I can't remember if I cried
When I read about his cruel attack

But something touched me deep inside
The day the Tuba Man died.....

** change of key, with harmonica and tuba ***

Its one o' clock on a sunday
The seahawks crowd shuffles in
There's an young man standing next to me
And he's brought his wife and his kids.

He says, son, can you play a tune for me?
But he's not not really sure how it goes
So he puffs My Sharona and everyone is in stiches
as he wears Seahawks on his hat and his clothes

La la la, de de daLa la, de de da da da

Chorus:
Play us a song,
you're the Tuba Man
Play us a song tonight!
Well we're all in the mood for your melodies
and you're the greatest fan in our sight

Now Ed McMichael was a friend of mine
They'd invite him and get his tickets for free
He could left town for the symphony
But this was where he'd rather be.

Oh, la la la, de de daLa la, de de da da da

Chorus
Play us a song, you're the Tuba Man
Play us a song tonight!
Well we're all in the mood for your melodies
and you're the greatest fan in our sight

It was a pretty good crowd after game at the Key
And the passers by give him a smile
And they stood from afar, and put bread in his jar
And asked, man, what are you doin here?

But one fateful night, those kids knocked him down
They patched him up and sent him home
He quietly went, and he didn't get up
And we pondered, who was this great man!

McCaw Hall sounded like a Carnival
At Quest field they all gave a cheer
As the Husky Band spelled out "Tuba Man!"
We'll never forget when you were here.

Play us a song, you're the Tuba Man
Play us a song tonight!
Well we're all in the mood for your melodies
and you're the greatest fan in our sight

Thursday, November 06, 2008

Ding, Dong, the Bergeson is Gone

Thanks to all of us who bitched and complained the past 15 yearsabout the WASL, VICTORY! Next the rest of the ed reform program that Dorn help to create... I'm going to ask Randy if he can hire me as the or an assessment expert person, and I'd appreciate anyrecommendation letters to that effect, I'm sure where's the math has people they'd like to put in charge of math.

We still need to repeal 1209.

Seattle Times: Washington voters elect new schools chief State schools chief Terry Bergeson says she has conceded. Randy Dornis Wahington's new superintendent of public instruction.SEATTLE —State schools chief Terry Bergeson says she has conceded. Randy Dornis Wahington's new superintendent of public instruction.Bergeson told The Associated Press she called Dorn on Thursdayafternoon to congratulate him. She made her decision after seeing thelatest vote count from King County.As of Thursday afternoon, with some votes still to be counted, Dornwas leading Bergeson 51 percent to 49 percent of the statewide vote.Dorn has promised to replace the Washington Assessment of StudentLearning with another achievement test.

Tuesday, November 04, 2008

Edward McMichael the Tuba Man (Seattle Youth Symphony) dies after assault

In the P.I. and KOMO 1000 today, Ed the Tuba guy died after he was assaulted near the Seattle Center waiting for the bus. Thousands in Seattle knew the guy from playing outside of stadiums and arts events, but my family knew him from the Seattle Youth Symphony and Marrowstone Music Festival music camp in the mid 1970s, and I introduced my kids to him when we walked by outside the coliseum, though they say they don't remember him. With so many in the seattle arts community from the SYSO that knew him, they should have no problem putting together an orchestra or a tuba group for his funeral, sorry to see him go this way.

Tuesday, November 4, 2008Last updated 2:17 p.m. PT
Violence takes iconic Tuba Man
By ROBERT L. JAMIESON JR.P-I COLUMNIST
OLD-TIMERS who have seen it all say this is the worst year for Seattle sports.
To this list I pass along another loss, perhaps the saddest: Seattle's most visible, beloved and melodic sports fan -- Tuba Man -- is dead.
Seattle knew Edward McMichael by sight or sound, the bespectacled guy with the wispy beard and floppy Uncle Sam and Dr. Seuss hats. For decades he breathed life into his shiny brass instrument, outside city sports venues.

Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Arthur Hu's Bothell / Snohomish Voter Guide Endorsements

I live in Bothell, WA in state legislative District 1, so here's how I recommend my votes.

If you're liberal, you might consider voting the OPPOSITE of me, except for Superintendent of Public Instruction, where both Democrats and Republicans (and "corporate" types of both stripes want to keep) want to dump Terry Bergeson who has failed miserably by sticking with WASL and fuzzy math, and going for Dorn.

YES Initiative 985: Transportation. This is the Eyeman initiative this year, I don't neccesarily agree everything in it is a perfect idea, but it does emphasize that transportation money should be used to ease congestion rather than to get people to stop driving cars.

NO Initiative 1000: They call it death with dignity, but it's doctor assisted suicide. Last time I checked, suicide was still something you're not supposed to do, I don't like the idea of getting a permission slip from your doctor to kill yourself.

NO Initiative 1029: Certification for long-term care workers. I wasn't aware there was a crisis in underqualified care workers, or sudden need for 75 hours of training. Not surprisingly, supported by the people already in the field that it would end up protecting their jobs and raising barriers to entry. I don't see this a neccesary in exchange for the increase in cost and fees.

President: John McCain / Sarah Palin. Some people think Palin should be at the top of the ticket. Sure she's a little rough, but the main reason people say she's unqualified isn't because of her actual experience, which as a governor is as much or more than Obama who won't be a heartbeat away, but running AS president. They don't like that she's not a professional politician, she's not married to a politician, she shoots animals like the Indians used to, she's pro-life, and pro-christian. McCain may be dull, and you can attack Palin all you want over bridges, clothes, and firing people, but they don't advocate raising taxes on the rich to pay for handouts to people who don't owe taxes, they didn't have to quit a church that preached God d---- America, they never worked with a guy that used to bomb America in his youth, they didn't hire as advisors the same Fannie Mae CEO's that ran the economy into the ground, never bought a house with the help of a convicted criminal, or attended a dinner for an Palestinean apologist professor, and never had to pretend he never had two muslim dads, one of whom enrolled him in school as a muslim and took him to the Mosque to pray. Never mind that Obama doesn't know a thing about botched tanker deals or Littoral Combat ships, or why the Vietnam war was badly run. If you want to voter for hope and change, go with Obama. If you want experience, integrity and character, I'm sticking with McCain.

Runner Up: Bob Barr (L) Dorey Monson has a point that Washington is probably far enough away from McCain getting the points, Bob Barr, who opposed the bailout, would be a good libertarian minimalist government vote. Don't bother with the socialists, you've got one in Obama.

Congress Dist 1: Larry Ishmael.(R) He recognizes Democrats pass environmental laws that raise the cost of energy. Inslee was one of the few like Obama to oppose taking out Saddam Hussein's regime, still wants to "end the war in Iraq" (how??), wrote a book comparing energy to the Apollo program, which is a silly "if we could go to the moon we can do anything". Apollo was a textbook implementation of 1960s technology that didn't have to make economic sense.

Governor: Dino Rossi. (R) Frankly, the anti-Gregoire ads annoy me, but not as much as the anti-rossi ads. Gregoire ads don't make any sense to me to try to convice the far-left that Rossi is really a conservative republican. Rossi on the other hand makes the case Gregoire did a poor job regardless of what party you are in. Rossi wants to end the WASL, which was my idea for SPI back in 2000, now I'm not the only one.

Lieutenant Governor: I like that Marcia McCraw (R) speaks mandarin, french, spanish and Japanese, served on the board of just about everybody, and doesn't like Olympia coming up with expensive programs to fix everything.

Secretary of State: Sam Reed. Everybody like this guy (R). Osgood complains about bar-coded ballots and vote counting machines nobody has had problems with.

Attorney General: Rob McKenna (R), another popular guy, he investigated the oil companies to conclude they're not just a bunch of crooks, the same thesis of my high school study of the energy crisis when government regulation gave us gas lines, not just high prices.

Commisioner Public Lands Doug Sutherland (R) Another republican with broad support and approval, Dan Evans and democrat house speaker likes him.

Superintendent of Public Instruction: Randy Dorn. I was the first guy to scream bloody murder over the awful WASL test which claims to set high standards. What I could see putting math problems this MIT guy couldn't solve in a half hour on a alleged 4th grade test, and she just approved math standards that have kindergartners doing multiplication, and a crazy music WASL test that expects all 5th graders to sight sing from sheet music. Now Dorn realizes how badly bungled the WASL is, as well as the ridiculous no-arithmetic mathematics standards Bergeson pushed with the WASL. Dorn is a democrat that was part of the original misguided outcome-based education reform law of 1993, but at least he's willing to kill the worst parts of it. Bergeson has been in too long, and her program revolves around the WASL, even as the original EALR standards and Certificate of Mastery have been abandoned here and in other states as unworkable.

Insurance commissioner: John R. Adams.(R) He's an insurance guy who runs an agency who recognizes that bad regulations that make companies leave the state and doctors leave their practice. Kreidler has been school board member, state rep, state senator and US congress - impressive but what does he know about insurance other than "fair treatment at a fair price" which means making it tough for insurance companies to do business in this state?

State Senator Dennis Richter (R) Rosemary McAuliffe (D) is an arch-supporter of the WASL, though even she recognizes it punishes all kids. Richter is a Boeing electronics engineer who doesn't like the WASL, though I wonder about the monorail.

State Rep District 1, pos 1 and 2: Arthur Hu write-in (live in Bothell, ran for SPI 2000, just missed 2nd place, won primary for Lake WA school board in 2003)
There is no republican or any other opponent for either Al O'Brien (12 yrs) or Mark Eriks (2 terms), this is a district where Joshua Freed (R) got nearly 50% of the vote, now he's on the city council, so we have two reps and a senator who all have very liberal voting records. At least O'Brien doesn't like Bergeson's WASL either, but I would provide Republican / Libertarian balance to keep the budget under control and limit government to what it has to do best. Write-ins aren't counted though unless you pay the filing fee. 2 year term so I could run with Freed for these positions. GOP spends a lot for Kirkland ,but not trying hard at all in this district.

Supreme Court Justice:
None of the above: Mary Fairhurst, Charles Johson, Debra Stephens - All unopposed, supported by the usual liberal groups - firefighters, conservation voters, state labor council, so I'm leaving blank.

Robert Leach - at least he has Slade Gorton (but so does Terry Bergson ugh)

Snohomish Superior Court - George Appel (R) is backed by Koster and Stevens, well respected conservatives, various law enforcement groups. Wilson is backed by the liberal sherriff, democrats and labor council.

Tuesday, October 07, 2008

The forbidden skit: transcript and screenshots of SNL’s Soros/Sandler bailout satire

The whole thing at Michelle Malkin.com


Pelosi: Thank you, Mr. President. I, too, applaud Congress for this vote and add that without your vote, this bill might well have failed. Even though this crisis was 100 percent the fault of your administration and it’s insane economic policies. And though I’m sure you’ll agree, you will go down in history as our worst president ever. This one time, you did manage to not screw things up and I wanna acknowledge that.
Bush: Thank you, Madame Speaker. I was glad to do it.
Frank: Let me add, Mr. President, I was also pleased to see that for the first time during your eight years in office and possibly your entire life, you were able to demonstrate leadership, not to mention simple human decency.
Bush: You bet, you bet.
Pelosi: Let’s not forget, Mr. President, that it was the Democrats that first sounded the alarm about the risky mortgage loans that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were encouraging and that your party resisted all our efforts to rein them in.
Bush: W-w-w-w-ait. Wasn’t it my administration that warned about the problem six years ago? And it was the Democrats that refused to listen?!
Pelosi: What? Who told you that? That’s crazy. It was completely the other way around.
Frank: Actually. This time, he’s sort of right.
Pelosi: Shhh! Don’t say anything. He doesn’t know. Now, there was another point we wanted to make here and you are welcome to stay.
Bush: Thank you. I’d like that.
Pelosi: Back there would be better.
Bush: No problem.

Sunday, October 05, 2008

Sing For Change Video Withdrawn - 100s of parodies posted

Here's a good post I found about the Sing for Change video. I just did a search and omigod, there are dozens of "tributes" interspersing it with videos of Hitler, Mao, North Korean and other socialist and facist kid propoganda. I don't think I saw even one sympathetic response. The original which I spotted has been made private, so nobody can see the original post, the only versions you can see are the anti-Obama versions, some unchanged from the original.

Looks like unlike the MSM, conservatism is alive and well in the blogosphere and YouTube-sphere. Similarly, nearly every "Obama mortgage crisis" video is anti-Democrat, some like "burning down the house" have logged 1-2 million hits.

Wednesday, October 01, 2008

KathySawada video... Read Lori Kalner again after this one...
UPDATE @ 7:27PM Oct 2, 2008... she has once again made HER video 'Private'... Ok, so now Kathysawada seems to have it back on, OR IMAO has been given access. (Read Lori Kalner letter again after you read this one... for clarity).Kathy Sawada had made it private, removed most of the comments (the majority speaking of very similar feelings as Lori Kalner expressed), which I had copied because I had a FEELING that they were going to disappear. As I watched her youtube site, MANY of those were reported as SPAM, though they were not. There were PAGES of comments from Sept 30, suddenly down to 74, and then, in the time it took to go from one view to another view (read all comments), it dropped to 54. Yes, Kathysawada was online. Those 20 missing were at that time, still there, marked as spam, and I read them, as well. They were not spam, they WERE mostly critical of the video.So, the link through IMAO is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TW9b0xr06qA&eurl=http://www.imao.us/There are also three videos in response at this writing...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMnk29qgSHI&watch_responseThis one has the sound of glass breaking, and it reminds me of Krystalnacht...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdm6AX8VtLQ&watch_responseThis one is the Three Stooges (you can skip it if you like)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58HAEmfZdhg&watch_responseThis one uses the infamous song using Obama's words "Yes, We Can", etc, but intersperses comments/photos...OH... one more thing. THIS is her description of the 'event'....
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Sing for Change chronicles a recent Sunday afternoon... Sing for Change chronicles a recent Sunday afternoon, when 22 children, ages 5-12, gathered to sing original songs in the belief that their singing would lift up our communities for the coming election. Light, hope, courage and love shine through these nonvoting children who believe that their very best contribution to the Obama campaign is to sing.Sing for Change was a confluence of hard work, good will, and shared vision. Inspired by ideas raised at a grassroots Obama fundraiser, a music teacher, Kathy Sawada, and the children composed and rehearsed the songs in less than two weeks. Several musicians heard of the effort and volunteered to accompany the children. Parents and older siblings designed and provided the T-Shirts and the banner. There's a first for everything, but rarely do so many firsts come together at once: for the children and their parents, this is their first performance, first video, first banner, and first involvement with grassroots work on a presidential campaign.As Sunday approached, a neighbor volunteered a home. Production wizards got wind of the project and offered their help in recording it.What we accomplished in a few hours on a Sunday afternoon embodies the nature of the Obama campaign: its grassroots inspiration, its inclusiveness, its community building. People pitched in quickly for a cause that resonated with them. There were not many conditions: "Think this is a good idea? Want to help? Great. Sunday at 12:00." At the heart of the project were 22 children and their music. The willingness of all involved to come together for them was a testament to our hope, unity, courage, joy and belief in the future represented by these children.We are offering the video to everyone, the Obama campaign and all media with high hopes that we can all join together to Sing for Change.Technical info: Running time = 3 minutes; Standard Definition and HD Broadcast qualityWE'RE GONNA CHANGE THE WORLDWe're gonna spread happinessWe're gonna spread freedomObama's gonna change itObama's gonna lead 'emWe're gonna change itAnd rearrange itWe're gonna change the world.SING FOR CHANGEMusic and lyrics by Kathy SawadaNow's the moment, lift each voice to singSing with all your heart!For our children, for our families,Nations all joined as one.Sing for joy and sing abundant peace,Courage, justice, hope!Sing together, hold each precious hand,Lifting each other up;Sing for vision, sing for unity,Lifting our hearts to Sing!YES WE CANMusic and lyrics by Kathy SawadaYes we canLift each other upIn peace, in love, in hopeChange! Change!sing...vote
posted by WICatholic @ 10/01/2008 03:21:00 PM

Friday, September 26, 2008

The Affirmative Action Economic Meltdown

docweb200809AffirmativeMeltdown.doc


Arthur Hu / Hu’s on First Asian Week September 26, 2008

I thought I’d never live to see my bank go bust. Wamu? Boo Hoo! Back in 1999, Fannie Mae first introduced rules for sub-prime loans to increase minority homeownership and boost profits. The government subsidized corporation was founded as part of the New Deal in 1938 before it was spun off in the 1960s. Once a monopoly, it still has about half the market of reselling mortgages backed with guarantees of payment. At the time, economists warned that relaxed lending rules might lead to a giant failure that would have to be bailed out by the government if the real estate market cooled like it did in the 1980s. [1]

As we all know, that just happened as Uncle Sam took Fannie Mae back. Talk about obscene executive pay, over $100 million was spent on the paychecks of just three Democrats. James Johnson, who was briefly on Obama’s VP committee, earned $21 million in just one year of being CEO for 7 years. Obama’s housing policy advisor Franklin Raines earned $90 million in his five years as CEO, and Jamie Gorelick earned $26 million as vice chairman, even as Raines and other top executives were caught using accounting tricks to trigger massive bonuses and understate their pay.

It was left wing meddling inspired by affirmative action that led to politically correct credit decisions. As Ann Coulter put it, “They gave your mortgage to a less qualified minority”. The Clinton administration investigated Fannie Mae for discrimination. Ending “redlining” of minority neighborhoods became the new crusade, even if factors such as credit histories, job stability, loan-to-value ratios and income levels were completely different between communities. It was urged that half of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac’s portfolio be made up of low / moderate income borrowers by 2001.


Discriminatory criteria such as credit history and down payment ability would become less important, as welfare and unemployment payments would be counted, and “stated income” allowed borrowers to make up their own income, whether it was backed up by a cash business or nothing but thin air. People were rewarded for signing up loans, not for making sure they would be repaid when they were resold. When G.W. Bush entered office, his economist warned that loans to under-qualified borrowers created a risk for the entire financial system. In 2003, Treasury Secretary John Snow proposed oversight with strict controls over risk and capital reserves.


When Senator John McCain joined the fight for reform of corruption, the effort was stopped by Democrats such as Barney Frank who stated there was no financial crisis at Fannie Mae / Freddie Mac, and such pressure would reduce affordable housing. As McCain observed that Obama collected the 2nd highest amount of Fannie and Freddie contributions in his short career, “Senator Obama may be taking their advice and he may be taking their money but I want to tell you in a McCain/Palin administration, there will be no seat for these people at the policy making table.”


Whatever the proper role government has in cleaning up this mess, one thing must be clear. A diverse nation cannot commit to spend whatever it takes to put everybody in a solar house and hybrid car, all-you-can-eat medical coverage, college, preschool, and high test scores for all. Yet this is precisely what Obama promised to do at the debate. Only John McCain committed to fight to control spending which threatens the entire American economy with imploding so badly that no one will be able to will bail out Uncle Sam.







http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0DE7DB153EF933A0575AC0A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1 Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending By STEVEN A. HOLMES Published: September 30, 1999

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Transcript of Tiny Fey Palin Clinton Saturday Night Live Sketch

The transcript of the Palin-Clinton sketch is below:
FEY AS PALIN: "Good evening, my fellow Americans. I was so excited when I was told Senator Clinton and I would be addressing you tonight."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "And I was told I would be addressing you alone."
FEY AS PALIN: "Now I know it must be a little bit strange for all of you to see the two of us together. What with me being John McCain's running mate."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "And me being a fervent supporter of Senator Barack Obama -- as evidenced by this button."
FEY AS PALIN: "But tonight we are crossing party lines to address the now very ugly role that sexism is playing in the campaign."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "An issue which I am frankly surprised to hear people suddenly care about."
FEY AS PALIN: "You know, Hillary and I don't agree on everything..."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: (OVERLAPPING) "Anything. I believe that diplomacy should be the cornerstone of any foreign policy."
FEY AS PALIN: "And I can see Russia from my house."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "I believe global warming is caused by man."
FEY AS PALIN: "And I believe it's just God hugging us closer."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "I don't agree with the Bush Doctrine."
FEY AS PALIN: "I don't know what that is."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "But Sarah, one thing we can agree on is that sexism can never be allowed to permeate an American election."
FEY AS PALIN: "So please, stop photoshopping my head on sexy bikini pictures."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "And stop saying I have cankles."
FEY AS PALIN: "Don't refer to me as a 'MILF.'"
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "And don't refer to me as a 'FLURJ.' I Googled what it stands for and I do not like it."
FEY AS PALIN: "So we ask reporters and commentators, stop using words that diminish us, like 'pretty,' 'attractive,' 'beautiful.'"
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "'Harpy,' 'shrew' and 'boner shrinker.'"
FEY AS PALIN: "While our politics may differ, my friend and I are both very tough ladies. You know it reminds me of a joke we tell in Alaska..."What's the difference...
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "Lipstick."
FEY AS PALIN: "...between a hockey mom..."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "Lipstick."
FEY AS PALIN: "...and a pitbull?"
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "Lipstick."
FEY AS PALIN(AFTER A BEAT): "Lipstick. Just look at how far we've come. Hillary Clinton, who came so close to the White House. And me, Sarah Palin, who is even closer. Can you believe it, Hillary?"
POEHLER AS CLINTON: (AFTER A PAUSE)"I can not."
FEY AS PALIN: "It's truly amazing and I think women everywhere can agree, that no matter your politics, it's time for a woman to make it to the White House."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "No. Mine! It's supposed to be mine! I need to say something. I didn't want a woman to be President. I wanted to be President and I just happen to be a woman. And I don't want to hear you compare your road to the White House to my road to the White House. I scratched and clawed through mud and barbed wire and you just glided in on a dog sled wearing your pageant sash and your Tina Fey glasses."
FEY AS PALIN:"What an amazing time we live in. To think that just two years ago, I was a small town mayor of Alaska's crystal meth capitol. And now I am just one heartbeat away from being President of the United States. It just goes to show that anyone can be President."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "Anyone."
FEY AS PALIN: "All you have to do is want it."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: (LAUGHS) "Yeah, you know, Sarah, looking back, if I could change one thing, I should have wanted it more." (RIPS OFF PIECE OF PODIUM)
FEY AS PALIN: "So in the next six weeks, I invite the media to be vigilant for sexist behavior."
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "Although it is never sexist to question female politicians credentials. Please ask this one about dinosaurs. So I invite the media to grow a pair. And if you can't, I will lend you mine."
FEY AS PALIN: And as we say in Alaska...
POEHLER AS CLINTON: "We say it everywhere..."
FEY/POEHLER: "Live from New York, It's Saturday Night!!!
“Saturday Night Live” is from SNL Studios in association with Broadway Video. The creator and executive producer is Lorne Michaels. Steve Higgins produces. Marci Klein and Mike Shoemaker are producers. Seth Meyers is head writer. Don Roy King directs.
Palin updo beehive







The Upshot on Palin and Her Updo



Jim Wilson/The New York Times

LOCAL COLOR Jessica Steele of the Beehive salon, where Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has been a client.







Published: September 12, 2008


THE customer has always been listed in the salon’s appointment book as “Sarah P.”




Enlarge This Image


Jim Wilson/The New York Times

Jessica Steele started the Beehive salon in the garage of her home.



Enlarge This Image

Courtesy Jessica Steele

Jessica Steele with Gov. Sarah Palin, started the Beehive salon in the garage of her home. Mrs. Steele, who helped with the candidate’s updo, says the governor is very involved in her look.



Enlarge This Image

Jim Wilson/The New York Times

PINK STATE The Beehive salon in Wasilla, Alaska.


“We would talk about pedicures and manicures and moose and politics, all while Sarah was having foils in her hair and holding my baby on her lap,” said Jessica J. Steele, the owner of the Beehive Beauty Shop in Wasilla, Alaska, where Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential candidate, has visited over the last six years, most recently in July, refining her much-discussed updo.


Hair, of course, is never just about the hair. Intentionally or not, hairstyles help answer the voters’ throw-down question: “Who does she think she is?”


Hillary Clinton struggled for years to achieve hair credibility. Now Ms. Palin’s upsweep is being praised and derided across the Internet. Do her bun and bangs signal that Ms. Palin does not want to attract attention to her appearance — even as she wants to remain presentably attractive?


Of course, a hairstyle may not tell you about her views on universal health care. But how Ms. Palin honed her image can be glimpsed at the Beehive, a tiny pink-collar haven in Wasilla, a mountain-rimmed community of less than 10,000.


According to Mrs. Steele and another Beehive employee, Ms. Palin has patronized the shop since at least 2002 (the McCain-Palin campaign did not reply to e-mail inquiries, but an assistant in the governor’s office in Juneau said that there was back and forth between the shop and the governor).


The ballerina-pink Beehive, in a 1,400-square-foot ranch house, is a cut-and-color shop. A haircut is $30, discounted to $20 if you get the $95 color treatment. In a downstairs nursery, the stylists’ babies play with mannequin heads. In a phone interview, Mrs. Steele, 37, described a kind of “Steel Magnolias” on permafrost, featuring Ms. Palin as a recurring presence.


Ms. Palin’s appointments were multitasking events, Mrs. Steele recounted. The governor would sit in full foil, checking her BlackBerry, writing speeches and chatting with customers as her daughter Piper played nearby.


“Brooke, my manager, is always telling hunting stories with Sarah,” Mrs. Steele said. “Brooke is a cute blond babe, but she wants to get a bigger grizzly than her husband got last year.” (For the record, Brooke Mongeau said her husband’s grizzly was nine and a half feet.)


As Mrs. Palin became a public figure, Mrs. Steele said, she gave more thought to her image.


“She’s very involved in her look and how she’s perceived,” Mrs. Steele said. “We would talk a lot about how if she looked too pretty or too sexy, people wouldn’t listen to her. How important it was for people to see her as an intelligent, smart woman. It was comical when her hair was down, how big a difference that would make, especially when she was running for governor.”


With more-established salons throughout the valley, the Beehive would seem a surprising choice for Wasilla’s then-mayor. Mrs. Steele started the salon in 1997 when she, a recently separated mother of two, put a salon chair in her garage and painted the interior Barbie pink.


Mrs. Steele relied on word of mouth through local congregations: “We’re all really strong Christians in this shop.”


Around 2000, the mayor called, needing rescue from a bad color job. Back then, Mrs. Steele recalled, Ms. Palin often wore her hair loose. “She’d just say, ‘Whatever is quick and easy, let’s just roll up our sleeves and get this going.’ ”


Eventually, Mrs. Steele suggested that Ms. Palin put up her hair because “Sarah wanted to look more professional and ready to work and not come across as high maintenance and fussy.”


The updo had another benefit. “Sarah’s short,” Mrs. Steele said, and wanted to look taller in front of cameras.


When Mrs. Steele heard that Ms. Palin was running for governor, Mrs. Steele called her: “Let’s get you all picked up for campaigning!”


The two experimented with full bangs, side-swept bangs, clips, curls, twists and blond streaks. “We just kept polishing her look,” Mrs. Steele said. “We would try more warm, red and coppery highlights or more of a contrast with pale highlights, not to be severe but just more striking.”


Over the years, Mrs. Steele said, their lives have intertwined. Ms. Palin attended Mrs. Steele’s bridal shower; this spring, the five “Beehive Beauty Shop girls” were invited to a baby shower for Ms. Palin’s son. Hairdresser and client belong to Wasilla Bible Church.


During Palin appointments, Mrs. Steele, divorced and financially stressed, confided in her client. “Sarah was always saying that God was in control and to have faith that there is a reason for everything,” Mrs. Steele said. “We would say it together.”


Mrs. Steele became engaged. In June 2006, Ms. Palin attended her bridal shower, presenting her with a bright red coffeepot.


“When she became governor,” Mrs. Steele said, “she still came to my small salon in my small town to get her hair done, instead of Anchorage, the big city” — an hour’s drive away. Mrs. Steele gave birth to her third child and began bringing the baby to the Beehive. When Ms. Palin asked how she was doing, Mrs. Steele burst into tears, overwhelmed by competing needs.


“Sarah said: ‘If you love what you do, if you were a stay-at-home mom, a part of you would miss what you love. And if you were at work, you’d miss your kids,’ ” she recalled. Ms. Palin told her “not to make excuses for why I am not a stay-at-home mom or have my kids at the shop.”


When Mrs. Steele expressed frustration with her industry, Ms. Palin told her to stop complaining and “run for something!” (She didn’t.)


Mrs. Steele’s fourth pregnancy overlapped with Mrs. Palin’s fifth. “She kept it quiet,” Mrs. Steele said. “But I remember her hair was acting different. And I thought, ‘Something is going on!’ ”


For the May baby shower for Trig Palin, the Beehive women filled a basket overflowing with homemade gifts: baby blankets, including one sewn from material with salmon and moose designs, and a breast-feeding blanket. In camouflage.


RIGHT before the Labor Day weekend, Ms. Palin’s office left a message, but Mrs. Steele’s attempts to return it were in vain. Days later, she learned why Ms. Palin had been so hard to reach.


Since then, she has observed Ms. Palin’s hair evolution. She approves: “Me and the girls at the salon were saying we’ll probably not see her anymore because she is on a whole different level. And she’ll make a huge difference. But a part of us is like: ‘Ohhhh, we’ll miss her. We won’t have our woman pep rally in the salon.’ ”







 

Monday, September 01, 2008

AsianWeek/ Obama: A Cliche is a Terrible Thing to Waste
Arthur Hu for AsianWeek 9/1/2008 www.arthurhu.com

docweb200809AWObamaClicheIsATerribleThingToWaste.doc

Blogger Taylor Marsh proclaimed Obama's speech was "unmatched ... in U.S. history", and "met Martin Luther King, Jr." What a load of bitter melon. There is nothing post-partisan about blasting Bush with "Eight is Enough", an old 70s TV show. A cliche is a terrible thing to waste. His warm up speaker already used up the Einstein insanity quote. Compare that with "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live..." King did not undermine John F. Kennedy's commitment in Vietnam to "bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe". It was George W Bush, not Obama who proclaimed "We will not waver; we will not tire; we will not falter; and we will not fail" after 9/11. Bold leadership is driving Al Queda out of Afghanistan, not leaving Iraq. Obama's "Ich bin ein Berliner" and "Tear Down This Wall" was "we have not lived up to our best intentions".

Obama can "End dependence on oil in ten years" by raising gas prices well above the $10 a gallon it already costs in Europe. Offering the expensive Congressional health plan to everybody is brilliant. Michelle never mentioned her $200,000 raise to "outreach" to tell the uninsured to not use her hospital. Folks, nothing Obama will EVER say will hold a candle to best of MLK, JFK, the Gipper or even George W. Bush.

Sarah WHAT?

McCain is playing Obama's game when Palin stole the headlines from THE SPEECH. He's got the Democrats complaining how McCain can run somebody like Alaska Governor Sara Palin for VP that rivals Obama in youth and inexperience. But instead of soaring rhetoric, she's got a solid track record of shaking up government of a state that now adores her. Compared to Hillary's wooden "as I recall we did it before", and Michelle Obama's contrite celebration of how proud she is of America (now), Sarah's honest speech was a breath of fresh air. Palin was Alaska's youngest as well its first woman governor. Her 3AM wake up call was to hunt for moose with her folks. "Sarah Barracuda" played a mean game of high school basketball. She was runner-up for Miss Alaska, a TV sports reporter, and she worked with her steelworker husband summers in commercial fishing, and went back to work 3 days after giving birth. So far, everything I've heard about her I like. She didn't have to quit a hate-spewing church, pretend she was never a Muslim, or apologize for ex-terrorist friends. A real-life Wonder Woman who is proud to own guns, hunt, fish, owns a float plane and doesn't think it's her above her pay grade to declare that life starts at conception is a leader we can believe in, not a man who sells the magic words "hope" and "change".



Monday, August 25, 2008

priv200808An Olympic Perspective on Diversity

Special Web column for Asian Week Aug 25, 2008

489 words

Obama has focused Americans on the conversation of diversity and excellence. We are a nation that carefully selects school superintendents, democratic convention delegates, and appoint public officials and hire executives carefully to reflect the racial, ethnic and gender diversity of America. But the Olympics show us that all of our conventional wisdom about affirmative action and radical liberation are dead wrong.

Can we truly celebrate a winning basketball team of diverse talent when all of them are African Americans? Can a gymnastics team composed completely of European American women be fair? In this age of Title IX and gender equity, why are Olympic athletics judged without regard to racial proportionality in outcomes? When we have committed to create standards where “all will succeed” without ranking people, why do we continue to specially recognize only the best 3 athletes?

Why did China, whose athletes are almost completely of one ethnic group, the Han Chinese, get the most gold medals, while Japan beat diverse America in women’s softball? Why were women relegated to softball instead of baseball? The United States clearly can credit the wealth of our economic system for winning the most medals, yet some of the fastest and best runners come from economically disadvantaged nations such as Jamaica and Kenya. Why was there no outrage at the dominance of Nordic peoples in the javelin toss, or West Europeans in mountain biking? Blaming the plight of the have-nots on the bad intentions of the have-groups is widely applied to world economics, politics and education, but why not athletics?

The Olympics is not about creating a world where everyone is proficient, or is given an equal opportunity to win at every sport. When it’s not just about participating, it’s about competing to be the best in the world. And who is the best is not determined by what race or gender you are, or how free or controlled or wealthy your country is, but by a host of factors, none of which is necessarily fair. The best may come from the north or the south, by someone from a wealthy or a less affluent nation, from a very large or very small country, by someone with heritage from any of the world’s continents. When it comes down to it, nobody is equal to anybody else, and only the few can ever be the best.

No athlete declares their race, ethnicity or heritage. Nobody compiles statistics to prove which peoples suffered from unfair discrimination that must be rectified by race-based remedies on the part of Olympic committee or judges. No one is required to take a high stakes test to meet a “high” standard of fitness or suffer the consequences. Now as John Lennon once sung, the Olympics can let us imagine a world or nation where we live in peace in harmony and we can celebrate both excellence of the few and the participation of the many, without hurting each other and arguing over who is to blame why some groups get more than others.


Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Real Asian Education: Not Excellence For All
It's not your father's education. Now it's about reforming society, not teaching. Marxism's brave new producation targets sought to erase inequality, but brought famine and poverty. Today, federal mandates such as No Child Left Behind legislate that "all will succeed". But kids are suffering under unrealistic goals and in the name of "higher order thinking", they get math books don't teach math, and reading methods that don't teach how to read. Washington's Terrry Bergeson is running for re-election as state superintendent up here in Washington waving a 90 percent WASL high stakes test pass rate as proof that "all high school graduates will reading and compute at a high level".
If John "not my baby" Edwards promised that every school should be excellent, would Asian parents really stop aspiring to send their child to the "best" schools and push their children to be the best when every school and child is "equally excellent"? If excellence is to exceed average, isn't a level passed by 90 percent a very low level of performance? How could any diploma set at such as level good enough to guarantee admission to Stanford or a job with Google, when in truth you would still have to (*horrors*) compete to be best? My elementary kids wrote better than the high school papers in the bottom 10 percent that I graded. The ugly secret is that the pass levels in every state are set by officials to whatever it takes to fail everybody the first year, but pass all but the worst by their "deadline" for success. The 90 percent pass rate is just the statistical rug that hides that our WASL and every other test has still not escaped the curse of underperformance. It is a lie to claim success for all when ethnic, income, language and disability groups continue to fail at 2 to 4 times the rate of average, with the best scores going to the most affluent and best educated ethnic groups.
It was protests from "back to basics" parents that led California to junk the worst of whole language, which dropped phonics, spelling and grammar, and fail the new-new math like the miserable Mathland which tossed out standard arithemetic in favor of singing, writing, and finger counting. There is nothing progressive about requiring everybody to jump as high as the university bound. Soon, all California 8th graders must pass algebra when many never mastered arithmetic. My son had to write sentences on his first day of 1st grade with no instruction. His math books had cutting, pasting, and card playing but no actual instruction in carrying, long division or common denominators. Now his high school "Core Plus" shortchanges basic algebra, but critically asks "if John's IQ is 75, is he retarded?" Asian parents need to be able to critically recognize nonsense when the emperor has no clothes, and put an end to misguided "reforms". Promising or demanding excellence of all is doomed to fail. The true ancient wisdom America can, but hasn't learned from an Asia that has never believed that all students can be "best" is to simply teach challenging material to memory, and reward only the the highest achievers with the grade of "excellent".

Sunday, July 06, 2008

Obama's Little Asian Sister

Hu's on First 7/6/2008

The Chicago Sun Times featured Barack Obama's little half-sister Maya Soetoro-Ng who the Obama campaign hopes will help bring votes from the Asian American community. Her mother is Ann Dunham who grew up in Kansas and later moved to Seattle and Hawaii, but her father was Indonesian businessman Lolo Soetoro. Maya is married to Chinese Canadian Konrad Ng. Though her father was a muslim, she is Buddhist, and she would be the first Asian relation to the first family if Obama is elected.

According to the story, the campaign first downplayed race, and spent much more effort to win over Hispanics, with Hillary appearing by video, Obama by phone, and McCain skipping one Asian faith event. They glossed over that Obama lived in Jakarta with his step father between 1967 and 1971, and grew up in the predominantly Asian state of Hawaii. Soetoro-Ng is nine years younger than Obama, and looked up to him after her mother divorced and moved away from her father. She followed Barack into the same elite Punahaou School that Barack's grandfather got him into. She said that he ''has a lot of affection for Asian cultures". It was noted that Asian American vothers are about 5 percent of the population, but my figures show Asians should be 2 or 3 percent of voters, as 56 percent of Asians favored Democrat John Kerry in 2004.

Is Barack Obama a ... Liar?

Obama's campaign states that he is not, and has never been a Communist, er, Muslim. His campaign even apologized for chasing away muslims at a campaign event who were visible on camera. But Fox's Bonney Kapp interviewed Obama who stated that since her mother was a Christian "so I've always been a Christian, I've never practiced Islam".

Yet according to his own book "Dreams From My Father", he wasn't baptized until 1988. He attended "the Muslim school" where he "made faces during Quranic studies". Worldnet Daily notes a friend Zulfin Adi who says that as friends he went with Obama to play and prayed in a mosque, though "not really seriously". Sister Maya stated they attended Mosque for big communal events, though not every Friday. High school friend Maxine Box remembers that Dunham touted herself as an atheist, not a Christian.

In January 1968, Obama was registered as a Muslim even at Jakarta's Roman Catholic Franciscus Assisi Primary School. Obama's father was buried as a muslim, and all of his Kenyan family were muslim. It's just as significant for America to elect a president of muslim as much as African heritage, yet why would he run away from that?

Wesley Clark says McCain's getting shot down has nothing to do with being a president. Yet George Bush Sr. was shot down in his TBF Avenger, and John F. Kennedy's PT 109 got run over by a destroyer. Thank goodness Obamania still hasn't pulled Obama more than a few points ahead of McCain. At least McCain and his friends don't say anything outrageously stupid every week, or promise the US will hand over Iraq to the insurgency within 16 months of an Obama adminstration.

Links:

http://www.suntimes.com/news/politics/obama/1034827,CST-NWS-sister02.article Chicago Sun Times article

http://blip.tv/file/332972 Video Podcast: Maya Soetoro-Ng, Barack's Half Sister

http://bourbonroom.blogs.foxnews.com/2007/12/22/obama-ive-always-been-a-christian/ "I've always been a Christian"
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=60559 Worldnet Daily

Friday, June 20, 2008

YFZ Ranch Raid Storyboard

"The Flower Cried in Texas"

Outline:

The ranch

The characters

The raid

The removal

The_separation

This is the ranch

In order to split up these people (note the violent appearance)


From left: FLDS leaders Roy Steed, David Allred and Ernie Jessop gather for a meeting with Eldorado officials. Sheriff David Doran, who is watching the group closely, has built a relationship with its leaders, visiting the ranch nearly a dozen times. The Eldorado Success

Prophet Warren Jeffs

Zion’s Dystopia: The FLDS in Eldorado, Texas (Part 2)

Willie Jessop, elder of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ ...

Willie Jessop


Darrell Azar
The CPS Mouthpiece
Photo: AP

cbs11tv.com/local/Teen.FLDS.Mom.2.711470.html

CPS spokesman Darrell Azar said he was unaware that an FLDS teen had gone into labor, but added that typically, a child born to a ward of the state becomes a ward of the state itself.

On Monday, CPS announced that almost 60 percent of the underage girls living on the Eldorado ranch either have children or are pregnant.

Of the 53 girls between the ages of 14 and 17 who are in state custody, 31 either have given birth or are expecting, Azar said.

"It shows you a pretty distinct pattern, that it was pretty pervasive," Azar said. (They had two pregnant women, both were married, ages 18 and 22, with drivers licence and birth certificate)

Parker has disputed the CPS count of teen mothers. He said that from talking to ranch residents, he believes at least 17 of those labeled as minors by child welfare authorities are actually adults.

Angie Voss

Angie Voss

http://vp.victimasectas.com/Sectas/YFZ-Texas/AngieVoss.jpg

http://www.flds.ws/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/commissarinavoss-213x300.jpg

The Yearning For Zion Hearings: Duplicity in Action

http://blog.thecurseof1920.com/?p=13

Filed Under Yearning For Zion Ranch


CPS investigator Angie Voss

Photo: CPS investigator Angie Voss

CPS investigator Angie Voss testified with a like outsider criticism regarding the training the girls receive: “Having children is what they were supposed to do.” Has Ms. Voss ever heard of the “Middletown Studies” of 1924? Sociologists Robert and Helen Lynd performed a study on an average American town to see what values and attitudes were being held at that time. Women in 1924, by and large, worked at home as housewives, and the Lynds reported that having children was considered a “moral obligation.” The women also dressed and wore their hair more in keeping with the women at Yearning For Zion.

So have we strayed so far from the moral standards of 1924 that we now criticize and even condemn a people who still hold to those same values today? This belief regarding bearing children that was held in 1924, and is still held by those at the Yearning For Zion community, has a basis that afforded this nation its founding government—the Bible—which states, “But women will be preserved through the bearing of children.” And in the beginning, Adam was told to be fruitful and multiply. Again, Ms. Voss reveals moreso the biased error and frequent atrocities of family-unfriendly CPS.

Also, Voss’s ill and prejudiced attitude regarding men is rather obvious. As with our failing public school system that is 75 percent women and, as stated in a recent report highlighted by former Secretary of State Colin Powell, is “obsolete” and “in a state of crisis,” CPS is stacked with feminists. Ms. Voss stated, revealing her biased feminism, “I believe that the boys are groomed to be perpetrators.” Voss disparagingly describes young men who desire to be husbands as perpetrators. She condemns the older men, she condemns the young—is there any male left she does not despise?

Marleigh Meisner

www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/04/18/polygamy.custody/

Officials are now looking for "the very best temporary placements for these children," said Marleigh Meisner, CPS spokeswoman.

"This is not about religion -- this is about keeping children safe from abuse," she added

edition.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/04/04/texas.ranch/Marleigh Meisner, a spokeswoman for the Texas Child Protective Services Division.

The children -- most of them girls -- were being interviewed by special investigators, she said.

"We're trying to find out if they're safe," she explained. "We need to know if they have been abused or neglected."

Rozita Swinton

http://iperceive.net/judge-barbara-walther-madame-defarge-of-san-angelo-texas/

Unable to locate the “girl” who supposedly called a shelter complaining of “abuse,” authorities are now investigating as the likely hoaxster the Arizona woman pictured below whose phone number was used in calls to the shelter. Records of this investigation have been sealed by Arizona authorities at the request of the State of Texas. Don’t expect the CPS to go away quietly. It’s not the CPS way.

David Doran, sheriff of Schleicher County, is shown during an ...

Sheriff David Doran Scheicher County


Nancy Grace of CNN


Nancy Grace of CNN

link

Flora Jessop: Indian Scout

www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,351969,00.html

VAN SUSTEREN: OK, so here's what I don't get. If it didn't add up to you, this Dale Barlow, and you were suspicious, do you have any theory why it didn't add up to the Texas authorities before they went to a judge and got a warrant and went in? If you were suspicious, as a non-law enforcement, why -- you know, why didn't they have some suspicion that this was a hoax?

JESSOP: You know, Greta, she was very convincing. Obviously, she's been doing this for a long time. I would like to point out that the system absolutely worked in this case. When -- as hotlines get calls from children purporting to be abused, just as I do, it's not my responsibility and my job to decide whether those calls are legitimate.

VAN SUSTEREN: No, it's the state.

(CROSSTALK)

JESSOP: ... Over to the proper authorities. They go and investigate.

VAN SUSTEREN: I'm not critical...

(CROSSTALK)

JESSOP: The system absolutely worked.

VAN SUSTEREN: Flora, I'm not the least bit -- you know, I understand exactly. And that was what you should do if you get a call. You should turn it over. What I don't understand is that if you were suspicious of it and turned it over to the people who were supposed to be investigating it and they weren't suspicious, and it turns out to be a hoax, that's unusual.

(CROSSTALK)

JESSOP: It's very unusual that a hoax is carried out to this proportion. And that just goes to show how smart or how much this woman has done this type of thing. I think she's very disturbed and I hope she gets help for that. But I also, in a little bit of a way, want to give her a hug because she's protected hundreds of children from the abuses, the widespread systematic abuses they were suffering in this group.

VAN SUSTEREN: Except for, just as an aside, is that -- I mean, at least as far as we know, what's being reported tonight, at least from lawyers who represent them, that we're talking about five people, which is less than 1 percent of the 400 that are seized. But a lot of investigation still to go on. Flora, thank you, and I hope you'll come back.


Judge Barbara Walther

Judge Barbara Walther: Texas-Sized Mike Nifong or Madame Defarge?

http://iperceive.net/judge-barbara-walther-madame-defarge-of-san-angelo-texas/

CPS and Judge Walther in this case actually thought that they could get away with this atrocity because they do this same kind of thing every day to individual families who have insufficient knowledge, resources or press coverage to defend themselves. For them, this was all hum-drum, business as usual. It came as a huge shock to them that the Texas Supreme Court disagreed.

Rick Perry, Governor

“Texas- Where the criminals cover their crimes

There were no e-mails directly from Gov. Rick Perry because he prefers to stay informed by using the phone or through staff briefings, said spokeswoman Krista Piferrer.

The governor's office learned of the planned raid on April 1, two days before it was carried out.

Dr. Bruce Perry Child Psychologist in charge of interrogation of minors

Carolyn Jessop
Former FLDS Member

I was shocked when I heard the news of the Texas Appellate Court ruling this afternoon.
Waves of horror washed over me at first as I thought that the children might have to be immediately returned. But that’s not going to happen. This ruling will be appealed. It’s not a knockout punch, but the FLDS obviously gained some ground today.

If those children go back to the complete, unsupervised control of the FLDS at the Yearning for Zion Ranch it would be like throwing gasoline on a fire that’s already burning out of control. It would send a message that the FLDS can get away with any level of crime which would reinforce what society, through its inaction over the years, has reinforced for a very long time. The pattern in the FLDS is, from my experience, that once its leaders can get away with one level of crime they move on to the next.

Zion’s Dystopia: The FLDS in Eldorado, Texas (Part 2)

Thehttp://www.eloquentatheist.com/?p=210

control of children begins at infancy, according to Carolyn Jessop, whose autobiography “Escape” calls Colorado City “a police state” where everyone was monitored. As previously noted, Carolyn was forced at age eighteen to marry the fifty-year old Merril Jessop, already with three wives. She bore eight children by him, and watched her husband methodically gain control of infants through water torture. After the YFZ compound was raided, in an April 8 interview with NBC’s Today Show, Carolyn detailed her husband’s practice of “breaking” babies: “He would spank the baby until it was screaming out of control, and then he would hold the baby face-up under a tap of running water so it couldn’t breathe. He would do this repeatedly. Sometimes, it would go on for an hour, until the baby was so exhausted it couldn’t cry anymore.”

Issues of civil rights and separation of Church and State were raised after the YFZ compound was raided. Merril Jessop, the compound’s leader, compared the police to Nazis: “The nearest thing I have ever seen comparable to this, even on the TV shows, is Nazi Germany,” Jessop told Salt Lake City’s Deseret News.

nn

May 22nd, 2008 7:21 pm ET

Carolyn,

I don’t believe your drivel for a second. You are a master manipulator. Your only goal right now is to sell books and make money. So you didn’t like the FLDS and you got out. Boo Hoo, I don’t give a crap. Truthfully I think you’re a spoiled brat, but whatever. Go on and on about your tortured life and whatnot. The Court of Appeals did the RIGHT thing today, and your rants about how terrible it is will fall on deaf ears. Leave these people alone, you’re out of their church, you made your decision. But you don’t have the right to take away their decision to stay in. Now get off your butt and do something productive with that pathetic life of yours.

C, Ca

May 22nd, 2008 7:38 pm ET

Oh jeez, here we go again.

Afraid this ruling may cut into the book profits?

LawnBott

May 22nd, 2008 8:08 pm ET

I am curious, these children have been away for 6 weeks. Yet they all want to go back. The women have had ample time to run, yet the CPS has not brought one mother, one young girl, or anyone else front and center to stand up against what is going on.

http://www.gosanangelo.com/news/2008/apr/18/live-from-the-courthouse-day-2-of-updates-from/

Dr. Bruce Perry

The child psychiatrist continues to testify, saying the FLDS members also are faced with false choices. A 14-year-old girl told him she didn't have to get married, but her father said to her, "Do you want to go to Zion?"

She said yes, and her father drove her to the YFZ Ranch, and she was asked whether she wanted to marry a man there, the psychiatrist says.

The girl said yes, and she could have declined the marriage, he says - but the choices on the other side were not very attractive. She would want to conform to the group's beliefs, he says.

The prosecutor says: How is the YFZ Ranch harmful to boys?

The environment there is creating the high possibility that these boys will become sexual abusers down the road, the psychiatrist says. He adds that during childhood, the parts of the brain responsible for speech and language are forming, and if you read to the child, speak to the child and give the child lots of opportunity to hear language, the child will grow up with a healthy language capability.

A part of the brain, he says, is involved in forming healthy relationships, and if there's no bonding, that part of the child's brain does not develop.

The prosecutor asks the witness what he advised CPS to do regarding the children. The psychiatrist says he felt it was highly likely that these children would not be comfortable providing certain information.

"They would be very cooperative to a point, but they just wouldn't talk about certain things," he says.

They would have likely been told not to discuss their beliefs and practices outside of their community, the psychiatrist says. Children in such an insulated environment "tend to be very slow" in talking about very intimate things, or things that make them uncomfortable, he says.

The best thing to do would to just be around the children and treat them respectfully because traditional interview techniques would not be useful, the psychiatrist says.

The prosecutor says: What's the harm in their society?

Girls age 14, 15 or 16 are not emotionally mature enough to consent to marriage, the witness replies.

"Do you think there's any harm to younger children being in this environment?" the prosecutor says.

"Oh, man, I have lost sleep about this question," the witness answers


Ranch is Raided by SWAT teams and Tank


  • KLSTFLDSCar2008-04-22-1208907736.JPGState And Local Law Enforcement Officials First Entered The Ranch Thursday, April Third With Child Protective Services Investigators. Among The Photographs Taken During The Six Day Search Of The Ranch Are This Photo That Includes A D-P-S Trooper Visiting With Teenage Boys At The Y-F-Z RanchKLSTFLDSBoys2008-04-22-1208907696.JPG And Another Photograph Of Two Boys From The Ranch Sitting In The Midland County Swat Team's Armored Personnel Carrier. You Can See These Photos And More On The "Eldorado Success" Website At myeldorado.net

Sniper


Every child and some suspected children are removed to "safety"

Friday, April 4,http://www.deseretmorningnews.com/article/1,5143,695267411,00.html

Child welfare workers have taken custody of 52 girls from the Fundamentalist LDS Church's compound in Eldorado, Texas, after a raid over allegations of child sex abuse on the Utah-based polygamous sect's ranch.

"We legally removed 18 children. We concluded they had been abused or were at immediate risk of future abuse," said Darrell Azar, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services. "Under Texas law, either one is grounds for removal."

An additional 34 girls were taken Friday afternoon to the nearby city of San Angelo, where they are being interviewed to determine if they should be placed in state protective custody.

Police are also serving warrants in connection with the investigation.

bus ride to Fort Concho Shelter

Children being taken from FLDS compound

link

link

onthebus2520 1.jpg

Children Removed From Jeffs' Compound

Child Welfare Investigators Question Children

POSTED: 9:59 am CDT April 4, 2008
UPDATED: 6:34 am CDT April 5, 2008

Child welfare officials following up on an abuse complaint took custody of 18 girls Friday who lived at a secretive West Texas religious retreat built by polygamist leader Warren Jeffs.


Kids and moms held at Fort Conch Internment Camp

Young FLDS men from the Yearning for Zion Ranch walk outside Fort Concho in San Angelo, Texas, Sunday. (Keith Johnson, Deseret News)

[FLDS+Children.jpg]

link


Fort Concho is Crowded, Uncomfortable Internment Camp

Fort Concho had no indoor plumbing. CPS workers were told that YFZ ladies had sexually transmitted diseases and would not use the same facilities.

10th Eyewitness...

"At one point I headed toward the public restroom and was immediately grabbed by the arm by a CPS worker who told me to use the port-a-potties outside the rock wall, "because we don't know what kind of diseases these people might have, and we don't want to catch anything from them". I was later told that it had been determined that STD's were rampant among the women because of their promiscuous lifestyle. I did not believe that information...

Cell phone pictures of conditions in shelter:

One small room, no AC, that's back wall and two side walls you see here, about size of large living room. How many people are in the picture?

5 days with no change of clothes. CPS is holding clothes as evidence. Officers are walking among sleeping women and children. Very unnerving to peaceful rest. Refuse to connect girls with their mothers, it is very traumatic. Some of the lawyers are acting like another CPS interview, we don't know which ones to trust.

Several of the women inside the shelters spoke by cell phone to the Deseret News on Saturday to describe the living conditions there. Children could be heard crying in the background of each conversation. The News published an article on Sunday quoting the women, who complained there was no privacy and that their children were getting sick.

Nation: Polygamists' Kids in Their Own Private Gitmo

By Richard Wexler

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080609/wexler

A little boy, maybe 3 years old, walks past row after row of cots arrayed in a sports coliseum in Texas, carrying a little pillow. "I need someone to rock me," he says. "I just want to be rocked, I want to find a rocking chair." Two adults, whose job is child protection, are following him. But they make no move to comfort him. They just follow him and write in their notebooks.


Judge orders confiscation of cell phones

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,695270279,00.html

Deseret Morning News (owned by LDS church) By Nancy Perkins
April 14, 2008

SAN ANGELO, Texas — A Texas judge on Sunday ordered law enforcement officials to immediately confiscate all cell phones in the possession of FLDS women and children now housed in temporary quarters here.

"I just called to say hi. They are about to collect the phones, I think," one soft-spoken FLDS woman said during a telephone call to another member of the Fundamentalist LDS Church who was outside the shelter. "I don't like what they're doing."

FLDS faithful outside the shelter are convinced Sunday's court order is a direct result of the women speaking to the newspaper.


Welcome Prisoners. This is a concentration camp, just like Utah's Topaz. These conditions are unsuitable for criminal detainees.

People magazine - a girl crossed out "Welcome guests" and wrote in "prisoners"

comments:

Judge orders confiscation of cell phones http://www.deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,695270279,00.html

Deseret Morning News (owned by LDS church) By Nancy Perkins
April 14, 2008

cornered | 6:39 a.m. April 14, 2008
This is a concentration camp, just like Utah's Topaz. Hopefully things won't get any uglier, but I won't hold my breath.
Bill | 6:54 a.m. April 14, 2008
I am a former law enforcement liason with Texas CPS. I have been following this situation and it appears that something is terribly amiss.
CPS has a directive to make every attempt to keep the family together.
If things are as they are claimed to be in the press, then the 16 year old who allegedly made outcry as to ongoing abuse should have been the only child to be removed pending investigation.
The removal of more than 400 children at one time is unprecedented. These children are being forced to undergo intimate physical examinations without cause, other than a fishing expedition by the state of Texas.
The conditions described that these people are being confined in would be deemed to be unsuitable for criminal detainees.
This has the appearence of being a complete travesty of justice.
I am not a Mormon, but my prayers are with these people.
TROrmond | 7:00 a.m. April 14, 2008
These women and children are in a *shelter* correct? I ask because this is sounding more and more like an internment camp to me.

Freedom Lover | 8:04 a.m. April 14, 2008
CPS are now the real abusers. Can you imagine being a sheltered religious young girl who has never been seen naked, now being forced to undergo an OB/GYN exam, and not even having the right to consent or have your mother present, now that is abuse! CPS and Warren Jeffs are essentially equally evil.
Doug S | 10:12 a.m. April 14, 2008
Frankly, considering that the Deseret News more or less threw the FLDS under the bus during Short Creek, I'm glad to see them taking a more nuanced view this time around.
Ther entire experience at Ft Concho and the Coleseum were surreal. At times it feslt like these women and children were prisoners. I heard some people wonder out loud if this was Nazi Germany. The thought had struck me too. Is this what it was like for the people in concentration camps in Germany? The women and children from El Dorado were basically lied to and deceived on several occasions. MHW: "when first arriving at Ft. Concho"
We all were proud to be a part of this experience as advocates for the wonderful loving women and children that are being treated like convicts in a concentration camp by the state of Texas. Something must be done to undo the horrible injustice that has been done. MHW"as a mental health professional"

Children and Mothers not Allowed to Wave at Each Other, Threatened with Jail

"Separated from older children (12 and up) and for days not even allowed to wave at them across the open field - they were told they would never see them againif the continued to wave. They were threatened with jail for waving at them" (mental health worker)

The CPS workers were openly rude, yelled at them for trying to wave to friends and family members in surrounding shelters, threatened with arrest if they did not stop waving to others. MHW "we attended a briefing"


No baby beds or high chairs for infants or toddlers

"there were no baby beds or high chairs for days and often our women had to go buy things for the women" (mental health worker)


I have never seen women and their children treated this poorly

"They were devastated by what they could not understand about their treatment and the unknown reasons this was all happending to them"

"This ordeal left me with a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach at the seeming injustice that has been inflicted upon these families."

"I have worked in Domestic Violence / Sexual Abuse programming for over 20 years and have never seen women and children treated this poorly, not to mention their civil rights being disregarded in this manner. It makes us all wonder how safe anyone is who has children". Mental health worker ("I was part of the team")


The kids entered happy and healthy, they left sick and crying

Mental health worker ("we were told before we ever saw...")


Women were constantly lied to

"women were constantly lied to about where their children's where and when they could see their lawyers and about when they would be reunited with their children" MHW

The women and children from El Dorado were basically lied to and deceived on several occasions. MHW: "when first arriving at Ft. Concho"

Most went to the shelters because they were told they would be able to see thir children if they did not return to the ranch. This, of course, was another lie. MHW"our experience in San Angelo"


Mental health workers admired the mothers and children

The women carried themselves with confidence. They were polite and respectful. They displayed what we would consider a great deal of self-esteem.

MHW "when first arriving at Fl Concho"

the thoughts of the inconsistency created more confusion as I watched the healthy interaction between mother and child. Many of the mothers tried to continue with their normal daily activities such as education, worship, and chores. I was impressed by their dedication to their children and the needs of their children. MHW "I am thankfrul for the opportunity"

the women and children were all well mannered and extremely cooperative. MHW "I participated in the San Angelo"

To my surprise when I entered the shelfter, I found a group of healthy, happy children and loving, caring mothers. Certainly not anything you expect to see in an abusive situation. MHW "as a mental health professional"

The children were amazingly clean, happy, healthy, engergetic, inquisitive, well behaved and self-confident, while the mothers were consistently calm, patient, and loving with their children. Discipline was firm and consisten, with never a hand or voice raised. These mother's parenting skills were textbook child development strategies. The children did not bicker among themselves and seldom cried. If a child did cry, his or her needs were met immedidately and the crying stopped. MHW "we attended a briefing"


Mental health workers constantly threatened with arrest

"after I spoke out for the children, I was asked to either leave the bus or be arrested" MHW "I am thankful for the opportunity"


(Mental Health) Caregivers blast Texas' treatment of polygamous sect's women, children

Below, are some damning reports...written by staff members of the Hill Country Community MHMR (Mental Health-Mental Retardation Center). These 'unbiased' mental health professionals, were asked to assist Texas CPS, during the internment of the FLDS mothers and children, at Fort Concho and the San Angelo Coliseum. These reports describe in detail...the horrible conditions and cruel treatment, suffered by those innocents...

- - - - - - - - - -

1st Eyewitness...

"I arrived at the Pavillion on my first night, and was startled by my feelings of admiration for the women and protectiveness for the children. By the second day, I was ready to run in front of the CNN cameras to shout that there was a travesty happening inside those walls..." (READ MORE)

- - - - - - - - - -

2nd Eyewitness...

* "We were told before we ever saw these women that they would not talk with us and that they were dressed "fancy" and had the best of everything. That they would only respond to us with "You will have to talk to my lawyer" This was an absolute lie and it was to "brain wash" MH to think like CPS. I never heard 'talk to my lawyer' once, while I sat and talked and played with the children. Everyone was polite and nice but very upset and confused. They were gracious, and tried very hard to not be afraid and nervous.

* We were also told to observe only, and not to help. We were told we were surround(ed) by DPS and there were snipers on the buildings for our protection. Our badges were checked constantly by CPS to make sure we were not in the "wrong place".

* The women and children were placed in barracks built in 1800, with no air and no indoor plumbing, 80 women and children on cots side by side, even pregnant ladies.

* Separated from older children (12 and up) and for days not even allow(ed) to wave at them across the open field - (they were) told they would never see them again if they continued to wave - threaten with jail for waving at them.

* Constant reminders that the adult women were only guests, and that they were not in charge of the children and what CPS did to them. They belonged to CPS now and they could talk, interrogate, separate and treat them any way they wanted. This included physical exams and x-rays without adult supervision.

* Not allowed to talk to the outside world.

* Women were constantly lied to about where their children were, and when they could see their lawyers, and about when they would be reunited with their children.

* No consideration for their diets, so all the children had diarrhea for days.

* No consideration for food, (meals served as late as 8pm, when these children were used to going to bed by then) clothing (Only 1-2 sets of clothing) or cleaning of sheets and clothing-washers were brought, but others had to do the washing.

*The more uncomfortable they were, the more CPS thought they would talk.

* We were told that if we interfered with any of the investigation, we would be arrested and handcuffed and placed in jail - this was said often to MH workers.

* There were no baby beds or high chairs for days, and often our women had to go buy things for the women

* The entire MH support staff was "fired" the second week; we were sent home due to being "too compassionate".

* The children and women learned quickly who to trust and if you did not have a CPS badge they would talk with you.

* After being removed the women stopped talking to CPS and we were "begged" to come back- when we returned we were told again, to not interfere, but "to do what we did best". THE WOMEN HUGGED US AND STARTED TALKING AGAIN. Then they sent them all home, with no children.

* The children were kept inside the arena, for 23 hours a day.

* The children arrived healthy and happy, and left sick and crying.

* Mothers and children were watched like they were criminals, and every word or deed they did, was written down by CPS.

* CPS yelled at the children, would not allow the women to talk with their laywers, deprived them of sleep, and constantly accused them of things most of them did not understand.

* Never once did I see a mother loose her temper, strike out at a child or discipline a child in an inappropriate manner.

* The last 2 days were the worst- over 100 State troopers surrounded these women and children, in the arena and they were told they were having all their children taken away from them and only the nursing mother's could keep their children. They were then escorted to a bus by a CPS worker and a DPS officer.

* Again we were warned if we interfered or helped the women we would be arrested, place in handcuffs and would go to jail.

I am thankful I was able to go and see all fo this. Never in all my life, and I am one of the older ladies, have I been so ashamed of being a Texan and seeing what and how our government agencies treat people. Thank God for the Mental Health field, who have not forgotten what compassion looks like and still tries to help everyone. This must stop somewhere and somehow. This invasion of their property and the disruption of their lives could happen to anyone anytime if all power and authority is give(n) to CPS. Remember this was an anonymous phone call..." (READ MORE)

- - - - - - - - - -

3rd Eyewitness...

"It was frightening to watch women and children being herded and separated like cattle, with no regard for human rights, or the needs of the group or individuals. How could this happen in America? How could this happen in Texas? If this had happened in another country, our government would have tried to prevent it! Old films of Concentration Camps came to mind..." (READ MORE)

- - - - - - - - - -

4th Eyewitness...

"At least 5 mothers reported, that at night CPS circled their beds, held flashlight(s) in their faces & then would sit inches away from them as they tried to sleep..." (READ MORE)

- - - - - - - - - -

5th Eyewitness...

"A Mother had asked if she could cover her infants play pin, in which he was taking a nap, half way with a blanket (it was a very thin blanket). She stated that he had not been able to take his naps and rest due to the lights. CPS told me no, that it was a health hazard..." (READ MORE)

- - - - - - - - - -

6th Eyewitness...

"This ordeal left me with a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach at the seeming injustice that has been inflicted upon these families. I continue to question the way this was conducted and have to question: If the "fathers/men are the alleged perpetrators, why were they not taken from the ranch and the women and children (alleged victims) left in their homes?
Why was an investigation not held prior to taking the children?
Why were the women treated as they were guilty of child endangerment/mistreatment before there were grounds to implicate each and every woman?
Why were the women not allowed to keep there children at the shelters considering the alleged perpetrators were not present?
Isn't there more potential injury incurrred on these children being yanked from their homes and families, over a potential allegation...?" (
READ MORE)

- - - - - - - - - -

7th Eyewitness...

"The entire experience at Ft Concho and the Coliseum was surreal; at times it felt like these women and children were prisoners; I heard some people wonder out loud if this was Nazi Germany? The thought had struck me too. Is this what it was like for thte People in concentration camps in Germany? The women and children from El Dorado were basically lied to, and deceived on several occasions. I often felt helpless..." (READ MORE)

- - - - - - - - - -

8th Eyewitness...

"For me, on a personal level, the most difficult aspect of the entire experience was the apparent lies being told to the mothers. I myself felt the inconsistency in information, when we had been told that Special Needs children were to be allowed to stay with their mothers and, yet, by that afternoon, that was no longer the case. This left me in a strange position, in which I felt compelled to voice the needs of these children and their mothers. This was met with less than enthusiastic response and after, after I spoke out for the children, I was aksed to either leave the bus or be arrested..." (READ MORE)

- - - - - - - - - -

9th Eyewitness...

"Even to be an observer was difficult. I could see the women and children being escorted by a string of law enforcement into the facility. They were escorted from the Coliseum into the Pavilion. CPS workers approached the "guests" and asked the women to follow them into another room whild the children were asked to follow other CPS workers and escorted them to the other end of the facility. As the children became scared and realized that their mothers were not going to return to them, they began to cry and become emotional. CPS responded by placing (bed) cots upright and building a wall so that the children could not see what was going on at the other end of the facility. At one point, when the children were all separated, one male child who was about 9 years old, broke away from the rest of the children who were all hurtled together, being comforted by each other, and walked up to a police officer. I heard him say, "You're the police, help us. Help me get my mother back. She has done nothing wrong." The police officer could only respond by saying, "I can't do that...(snip)..."At one point, I joined a conversation of two young and relatively new CPS workers. They were upset with their leader on the bus because they believed they were asked to purposely mislead the women about if, and when they could get the custody of their children back...(snip)...There was evident deterioration with regard to behavior, nutrition, anguish, health, etc. However, the "guests" never showed any signs of disrespect to anyone, even if they were not given the respect, in return..." (READ MORE)

- - - - - - - - - -

10th Eyewitness...

"At one point I headed toward the public restroom and was immediately grabbed by the arm by a CPS worker who told me to use the port-a-potties outside the rock wall, "because we don't know what kind of diseases these people might have, and we don't want to catch anything from them". I was later told that it had been determined that STD's were rampant among the women because of their promiscuous lifestyle. I did not believe that information...(snip)...The CPS workers were openly rude to the mothers and children, yelled at them for trying to wave to friends and family members in surrounding shleters, threatened them with arrest if they did not stop waving to others, continually reminded them that the women were guests only, and could be made to leave if they did not cooperate, threatened the mothers with never seeing their children again if they did not cooperate, and ignored requests for anything...(snip)...By day three, it became obvious that both the mothers and the mental health workers were being lied to and/or ignored. Even the simplest request was discounted. At one time a mother told me she wished she had some peppermint or chamomile tea to give to her toddler daughter, for her runny nose. I approached the shelter supervisor with the request. Later his supervisor came to me and told me that herbal teas were medication and could only be approved by a physician. The request was denied...(snip)...Chicken was served almost every meal with little or no seasoning and no flavor. Vegetables were scarce and everything was highly processed - very different from the women and children's typical diet of homegrown organic and unprocessed foods. Very quickly, many of the children developed diarrhea and gastrointestinal problems..." (READ MORE)

- - - - - - - - - -

11th Eyewitness...

"I have always been proud to be an American and a Texan, but this incident is not what America or Texas stands for, and something must be done..." (READ MORE)

Wednesday, May 28, 2008 Child Welfare Blog

Their own private Guantanamo

The website for The Nation magazine has published my article about civil liberties violations in the Eldorado case. The article includes excerpts from those searing statements from the mental health workers who actually saw what was going on. So, in addition to providing the links to the full statements, I thought I'd provide some more excerpts below.

For those who may have forgotten: After Texas Child Protective Services removed more than 400 children from the YFZ Ranch, the state arranged for the Hill Country Mental Health and Mental Retardation Center to send mental health professionals to the scene.

CPS required them to sign confidentiality agreements. But 11 of the workers were so appalled by what they saw that they felt they had to go public. Their anonymous statements were released to the media, and the Salt Lake Tribune posted them on the newspaper's website. I've previously posted the full statements on this Blog here Below, some excerpts:

All of the children were healthy when they were taken from their home, but when herded into extremely crowded quarters with an artificial environment (lighting on 24 hours a day, no fresh air, no sunlight, strange food, uncomfortable beds, surrounded by strangers watching their every move) they became ill. Chicken pox ran rampant through the children, diarrhea, respiratory conditions and other illnesses created greater discomfort and even hospitalizations.

Living conditions in the coliseum were not conducive to good health for anyone, and the presence of hostile CPS workers who spied on them constantly, kept them awake at night by shining lights in their faces and talking and laughing created enormous stress for the mothers and children. None of them slept well or enough.

The women and children were placed in barracks built in 1800 with no air and no indoor plumbing, 80 women and children on cots side by side, even pregnant ladies.

The more uncomfortable they were, the more CPS thought they would talk.

The women were lied to and denied access to their attorneys. They were told that they were going to be moved to another location so families that had been torn apart during the move from the ranch could be reunited, but when [we] got off the bus at the new location, the mothers of children age 12 and older were taken through a door and loaded onto another bus to take them back to the ranch. They didn't even get to say goodbye to the children.

On the awful day that they separated the mothers and children the level of cruelty and lack of respect for human rights was overwhelming. Crying, begging children were ripped away from their devastated mothers and the mothers were put on buses to either return to the ranch or go to shelters. Most went to shelters because they were told they would be able to see their children if they did not return to the ranch. This, of course, was another lie.

The floor was literally slick with tears in places. A baby was left in a stroller without food and water for 24 hours and ended up in the hospital. A 4-year-pld boy was so terrified that he snuck away and hid and was only found after the coliseum had been emptied the next day.

CPS workers were everywhere and these people had no privacy. CPS intruded on their every activity and conversation, and even followed us around and made notes on everything we said.

I witnessed a small boy, maybe 3 years old, walking along the rows of cots with a little pillow saying "I need someone to rock me, I just want to be rocked, I want to find a rocking chair." Two CPS workers were following him and writing in their notebooks, but not speaking to him or comforting him.

As I was talking to a mother, her child spilled water down his front; he stood up on the cot so that she could wipe him off. A CPS worker strode over and told the mother "You need to set him down NOW." The woman nodded and continued to wipe his shirt. The CPS worker then said "If you don't sit him down NOW I will set him down for you."

I witnessed a young mother … be required by CPS to board the bus back to the ranch, though her young child was in the hospital with 104 degree fever and even though the child's physician had personally requested the mother's presence at the hospital. This event haunts me still, and I cannot imagine such a heartless act.

CPS yelled at the children, would not allow the women to talk with their lawyers, deprived them of sleep and constantly accused them of things most of them did not understand.

CPS workers … asked the women to follow them into another room while the children were asked to follow other CPS workers and escorted them to the other end of the facility. As the children became scared and realized that their mothers were not going to return to them, they began to cry and become emotional. CPS responded by placing bed cots upright and building a wall so that the children could not see what was going on at the other end of the facility.

On the last day of my stay at the coliseum, the mothers had been removed …The children had cried bitterly on the removal of the mothers and they were not with strangers. The noise level went up several decibels as crying and running and screaming took over. Children were grabbing toys from others and using the toys as play weapons against each other and their 'captors.'

The entire [mental health] support staff was 'fired' the second week; we were sent home due to being "too compassionate."


Internees moved to San Angelo Coliseum after complaints

link link


2 Year Old Hospitalized for Dehydration and Malnutrition, would not meet mother's gaze

New York Times May 29, 2008

Sect Mothers Say Separation Endangers Children

By LESLIE KAUFMAN and DAN FROSCH

Ruth Edna Fischer was first allowed to see her 2-year-old daughter, from whom she had been separated after the raid on their polygamist ranch in Texas, at the child’s hospital room. The child had been taken there because of severe dehydration and malnutrition, Ms. Fischer said.

“Hannah looked like a little orphan sitting on the couch,” Ms. Fischer said. “Her hair was stringy and she was in a diaper, a pair of dirty socks and a hospital gown.” The second visit two weeks later at a state office in Angleton, Tex., was worse. The girl would not even meet her mother’s gaze. “It was like she hardly remembered me,” said Ms. Fischer, who has four children in state custody.


Mothers not allowed to visit sick children

At 10:26 PM, Blogger Kathy said...

Just in from TRLA:

"Mother Searching for Information on Child's Health

TRLA has received information from a CPS worker that a client's child is currently in the hospital, on antibiotics, and being kept at the hospital for observation. The child's ad litem called the hospital and was told that there is no one there with the child's name. A representative from Kidz Harbor has told the ad litem that the child is in the ICU.
TRLA is trying to confirm if the child is in the hospital and what condition she is in.
The child is 2 ½ years old.
Judge Walthers has indicated that CPS was told to allow mothers to be with their children when they are sick. Not only is this mother not able to confirm where her child is or what her current health situation is, but the mother is not being allowed to be with this child or her other nursing children."

CPS didn’t allow an FLDS mother to be with her child, even though the child was hospitalized with a 104 degree fever and the child’s doctor had requested the mother’s presence.

One of the riveting reports written by a mental health worker describes this incident (see all reports by mental health workers):

On … Thursday morning, April 24, 2008, I witnessed a young mother named Rosinith be required by CPS to board the bus back to the ranch, though her young child was in the hospital with 104 degree fever and even though the child’s physician had personally requested the mother’s presence at the hospital. This event haunts me still, and I cannot imagine such a heartless act


The separation

Azar: After about 45 minutes, they cried themselves out and it was a peaceful separation.''
Mothers are separated from Children complete "pandemonuem"

I spoke with Darrell Azar, a CPS spokesman, yesterday and asked him about the rumor that authorities sedated some children before taking them from the San Angelo Coliseum.

Not true, he said.

Here is what he told me happened when CPS separated mothers from children 13-months and older last week:

''We came in and explained what was going to happen,'' Azar said. ''There were tears all around. Mothers cried, children cried and some of our workers cried. We just allowed them to cry. After about 45 minutes, they cried themselves out and it was a peaceful separation.''

Azar said CPS made no threats or ultimatums, such as telling women that if they went to women's shelter they might be reunited with their children sooner.

He said the FLDS keep making untrue allegations.

Protest 1:


''The simple truth is there is a steady flow of misinformation and it is often the case when people who may have abused children and those who never stepped in to protect them will discredit those who move to protect them,'' he said. ''It has been happening in this case.''

I have listened to FIRST HAND accounts of the turmoil and wails that permeated and echoed through the halls of the Coliseum. Believe me, it was not orderly and smooth as CPS would like John Q. Public to believe! There were children literally pulled out of the arms of mothers. These stories can be individually corroborated by the hundreds of mothers present.

Parker protets:

FLDS attorney challenges Texas count of pregnant minors from polygamous sect
By Brooke Adams
The Salt Lake Tribune 04/26/2008

Parker refuted CPS' description of an orderly, calm separation of mothers and children at the coliseum. He said it was "complete pandemonium." As the children, all younger than 5, figured out what was happening, they started screaming and CPS workers had to pry many away from their mothers. "This is inhuman. This is un-American," said Parker, who also said a civil rights lawsuit is possible. He also said CPS assured nursing mothers they would be able to take breast milk to their infants but, as of early Friday, had been given no information on where the children had been taken. They also were told sibling groups would be kept together. Thirteen children from one family were sent to five locations, he said.

* The last 2 days were the worst - over 100 State troopers were having all their children taken away from them and only nursing mother's could keep their children. They were then escorted to a bus by a CPS worker and a DPS officer. We were warned if we interfered or helped the women we would be arrested, placed in handcuffs and would go to a jail. Mental health worker ("we were told before we ever saw")

* On the awful day that they separated the mothers and children the level of cruelty and lack of respect for human rights was overwhelming. Crying , begging children were ripped away from their devastated mothers and the mothers were put on buses to either return to the ranch or to go to shelters. MHW"our experience in San Angelo"


Boy: "You're the police, help us. Help me get my mother back

9th Eyewitness...

"Even to be an observer was difficult. I could see the women and children being escorted by a string of law enforcement into the facility. They were escorted from the Coliseum into the Pavilion. CPS workers approached the "guests" and asked the women to follow them into another room whild the children were asked to follow other CPS workers and escorted them to the other end of the facility. As the children became scared and realized that their mothers were not going to return to them, they began to cry and become emotional. CPS responded by placing (bed) cots upright and building a wall so that the children could not see what was going on at the other end of the facility. At one point, when the children were all separated, one male child who was about 9 years old, broke away from the rest of the children who were all hurtled together, being comforted by each other, and walked up to a police officer. I heard him say, "You're the police, help us. Help me get my mother back. She has done nothing wrong." The police officer could only respond by saying, "I can't do that...(

Closing down the coliseum


Parker: State only has 2 pregnant teens who aren't teens, not 20


http://www.sltrib.com/polygamy/ci_9056589

FLDS attorney challenges Texas count of pregnant minors from polygamous sect

SAN ANGELO, Texas - An attorney for FLDS families in Texas challenged the state's allegations of a "pervasive pattern" of underage girls having children, saying the state's own documents show just three teenagers in custody are pregnant. Of those girls, one will turn 18 in a few months and another merely refused to take a pregnancy test, said Rod Parker, a Salt Lake City attorney representing families at the YFZ Ranch. "That leaves us with one," he said.

The count of children in custody rose again Friday after CPS determined that 25 girls who claimed to be adults are actually minors, said spokesman Chris Van Deusen. That group may overlap with the 20 listed in the court document as pregnant or as mothers, he said. "The only thing we can say is we're aware of 20 young girls who became pregnant when they were between the ages of 13 and 16," Van Deusen said. "That's not to say that there are 20 now, but at the time they conceived they were 13, 14, 15, or 16. "That establishes that there was some sexual abuse here," he said. Van Deusen said the court document may not include minors identified as pregnant or mothers since the court hearing. He also said he could not talk about investigative results that haven't been made public in court or otherwise.

One CPS document reviewed by The Salt Lake Tribune lists just three pregnant teenagers. The court document, also reviewed by The Tribune, includes women who became mothers before the FLDS' move to Texas or before the state raised the age of marriage, with parents' permission, from 14 to 16 in 2005. The chart does not indicate whether the women are legally married or the ages of the children's fathers. Among them: One woman, now 30, listed as having given birth to her first child in 1993 when she was 14. A reference to this situation was made by a CPS investigator without explaining when the pregnancy occurred during the two-day court hearing in which Judge Barbara Walther made her decision to keep the children in state custody


Mothers belonging to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ ...
Reuters
Tue Jun 3, 8:05 AM ET

Prev 24 of 148

Mothers belonging to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) are seen behind bus windows as they leave the San Angelo Coliseum in San Angelo, Texas, April 24, 2008.

(Jessica Rinaldi/Reuters)

Polygamists' children moved
April 22: The children from a Texas polygamist ranch are being moved to foster homes. NBC's Don Teague reports.

Tony Gutierrez / AP

Buses leave the San Angelo Coliseum grounds loaded with members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints as the state relocate women and children.


Texas FLDS children scattered across Texas face grim reality.

04/24/08 | by txwordpounder [mail] | Categories: News

Sandwiched in between DPS Gestapo squad cars, buses carrying scores of FLDS children have begun leaving the San Angelo Coliseum destined for far-flung outposts around the state. The DPS Gestapo escorts are being provided more as a preventive measure against possible escape by the children, than it is as a protective measure.

Polygamy Kids on the Move

State Buses Some Children From Coliseum; Few Parents Arrive for DNA Testing

a.abcnews.com/WN/story?id=4725487&page=1

The state Child Protective Services said that about 100 children were taken from the San Angelo Coliseum Tuesday after Judge Barbara Walther signed an order saying they should be immediately placed in temporary foster homes.

The buses pulled out as attorneys for a group of the sect's mothers went to court for a temporary restraining order to prevent young children from being separated from their moms. Walther refused to rule on a similar motion Monday, calling the request "premature." A hearing on the motion is scheduled for today.

Many of the childrens' lawyers and advocates are outraged. "They are being treated like they are a heard of cattle, that each of them believes the same, that their families are the same and that their interests are identical and they are not," said Polly O'Tooley, one of the lawyers for the children.


Children Delivered to foster homes (orphanges)

http://www.reporternews.com/news/2008/Apr/25/for-now-a-new-home/

Some FLDS children brought to Abilene (VIDEO)

Children believed to be from the YFZ Ranch enjoy themselves on a playground at the Hendrick Home for Children on Friday after being relocated from San Angelo.

Photo by Ronald Erdrich

Children believed to be from the YFZ Ranch enjoy themselves on a playground at the Hendrick Home for Children on Friday after being relocated from San Angelo.

Escorted by DPS troopers, buses arrive Friday from San Angelo at Abilene's Hendrick Home for Children carrying children believed to be from the YFZ Ranch.

Photo by Ronald Erdrich

Escorted by DPS troopers, buses arrive Friday from San Angelo at Abilene's Hendrick Home for Children carrying children believed to be from the YFZ Ranch.

A child gets her braid fixed Friday, April 25, 2008, at Hendrick Home for Children. A group of children believed to be from the YFZ ranch arrived there midday after being relocated from San Angelo.

Photo by Ronald Erdrich

A child gets her braid fixed Friday, April 25, 2008, at Hendrick Home for Children. A group of children believed to be from the YFZ ranch arrived there midday after being relocated from San Angelo.

A child enjoys herself on a playground at the Hendrick Home for Children Friday, April 25, 2008. A group of children believed to be from the YFZ ranch arrived there midday after being relocated from San Angelo.

Photo by Ronald Erdrich

A child enjoys herself on a playground at the Hendrick Home for Children Friday, April 25, 2008. A group of children believed to be from the YFZ ranch arrived there midday after being relocated from San Angelo.

Except for the two large white charter buses, three Texas Department of Public Safety patrol cars and the ambulance, Friday could have been any other day at the Hendrick Home for Children in Abilene.

The weather was warm and breezy, birds happily flittered about and a Fed-Ex driver delivered packages, oblivious to the more than 10 children from the Yearning For Zion Ranch who disembarked from buses they had boarded less than two hours earlier.

They were bused in from San Angelo, 90 miles away, where they had been staying before Child Protective Services began placing them in foster homes throughout the state this week. They arrived in Abilene just after noon Friday.

The move to Abilene marks the fourth temporary home for the children, who were first taken from their home at the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints ranch and moved to a community center and church hall in Eldorado. The children were then taken to the barracks at Fort Concho in San Angelo on April 6, and then to the San Angelo Coliseum and the Wells Fargo Pavilion at the fairgrounds complex on the north end of the city.

Other children from the YFZ Ranch, owned by members of the FLDS, an offshoot of the Mormon religion, were placed in foster care facilities in Houston, Austin, Converse, Midland, Round Rock, San Antonio, Waco, Amarillo and Waxahachie this week.

It is unclear how many of the 437 children seized from the ranch were placed in Abilene. Officials at the Hendrick Home for Children also declined to give ages for the children placed there.

David Miller, president and CEO of the Hendrick Home for Children, said the facility typically admits children ranging in age from five years to 16 years. "We sometimes take children younger than five, but we need a special variance from Child Protective Services to do that," he said, declining to say if the facility had received any such variances from CPS in order to foster the YFZ children.

Special needs, medical and dietary concerns, as well as figuring out how best to play with the YFZ children are among the first concerns Hendrick Home staff will address, Miller said.

"We have to work with them, build up their trust," he said, over the sounds of the children playing on the facility's playground.

"They love the playground," Miller said. "Their eyes got as big as saucers when they got off the bus and saw the playground."

Their favorite playground equipment?

"They're most interested in the slides and monkey bars," Miller said. "They are having fun."

In the next few days, the children will be introduced to the horses kept on the 50-acre property and will be given carrots to feed them. They will also be tested to see "where they are" academically, Miller said. The facility has been given special regulations in regards to the children's care, such as diet and television restrictions.

"We'll follow the rules in the next few weeks and see how they do," he said.

The children's arrival in Abilene on Friday came the day after an appeals court in Austin rejected pleas from the mothers of the seized children to keep CPS from placing them in foster care facilities across the state.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/28/31-of-53-teen-girls-at-fl_1_n_99097.html

bus pulls into Methodist foster home

A bus with women and children of the Yearning for Zion Ranch, home for members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, pulls into the Methodist Children's Home, Friday, April 25, 2008, in Waco, Texas. (AP Photo/Waco Tribune Herald, Jerry Larson)

Baptists Caring for FLDS Children LULING—Seventy-five children removed from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints ranch by the Texas Department of Child Protective Services have been placed with Baptist Children’s Home Youth Ranch near Luling.

http://www.flds.ws/2008/04/28/baptists-caring-for-flds-children/

This will allow for large groups of siblings to remain together at the facility which has been adapted to house FLDS children exclusively, administrators explained.

By court order, 462 children removed from the FLDS compound near Eldorado are being moved to children’s homes all across the state.

Baptist Children’s Home is a division of Baptist Child & Family Services, a BGCT-affiliated agency based in San Antonio.

BCFS Health and Human Services, another division of BCFS that provides emergency management and incident management, has been in charge of the San Angelo unified command of state and local government, as well as other nonprofit responding organizations since April 5. At the peak, more than 1,000 responders were involved in the San Angelo operation.
FLDS being kept by the Baptists
“The children are being treated with the utmost consideration, care and respect like all people we care for and we will continue to protect their privacy,” BCFS President Kevin Dinnin said. “Special attention is being paid to ensuring their special dietary and religious needs are honored and met. The children’s education needs are also being met.”

The San Angelo shelters kept more than 50 BCFS incident management team members and more than $1 million of BCFS assets in San Angelo three weeks, including two mobile medical units and the mobile feeding unit supported by Texas Baptist Men.

The transfer of children was expected to be completed April 25. More than 1,000 people from numerous state and nonprofit organizations were slated to participate in a critical stress management process as part of the demobilization plan.

“Though there are significant differences, there is a common denominator between what we are doing in this situation and what we did for Hurricane Katrina evacuees and victims of the Sri Lanka tsunami and what we’re doing to help fight the international sex trafficking in Moldova,” Dinnin said. “We didn’t create the situation but are working to meet the needs of those affected.”
Photo Credit: BCFS Photos…Which I’m pretty angered that they had the nerve to take pictures of these kids. It’s one thing for the FLDS to be showing Their Own Children it’s quite another for an agency of the state to be exploiting them.


CPS: Protecting Children NOT

link


"Monica"Flds

a group of FLDS moms are complaining to the Texas governor about their kids' treatment:

"You would be appalled," the letter said. "Many of our children have become sick as a result of the conditions they have been placed in. Some have even had to be taken to the hospital. Our innocent children are continually being questioned on things they know nothing about. The physical examinations were horrifying to the children. The exposure to these conditions is traumatizing them."


Polygamy sect members insist no force is used

Women fighting for return of children say love, not abuse, binds followers

Video
Sect women discuss seizure of kids
April 16: Women from the polygamist church that was recently raided in Texas -- and a church spokesman, Rod Parker -- talk with TODAY's Meredith Vieira.

Today show

By Mike Celizic
TODAYShow.com contributor
updated 7:11 a.m. PT, Wed., April. 16, 2008

FLDS

a.abcnews.com/WN/story?id=4725487&page=1

Ruth, 34, a member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, covers her face as she tells reporters about being separated from her four children outside of the YFZ Ranch in Eldorado, Texas, April 24, 2008.
(Jessica Rinaldi/Reuters)

http://www.clipsyndicate.com/publish/video/569510/flds_women_interviewed_on_good_morning_america?wpid=0

41. CPS didn’t allow an FLDS mother to be with her child, even though the child was hospitalized with a 104 degree fever and the child’s doctor had requested the mother’s presence.

One of the riveting reports written by a mental health worker describes this incident (see all reports by mental health workers):

On … Thursday morning, April 24, 2008, I witnessed a young mother named Rosinith be required by CPS to board the bus back to the ranch, though her young child was in the hospital with 104 degree fever and even though the child’s physician had personally requested the mother’s presence at the hospital. This event haunts me still, and I cannot imagine such a heartless act.

Click image to enlarge


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FLDS polygamy sect gets a closer look - and it's chilling

Members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter ...
AP
Sat May 31, 12:44 PM ET

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Members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints file out of the Tom Green County Courthouse following the custody hearing in San Angelo, Texas on Friday, April 18, 2008. Child welfare officials on, Friday, May 30, 2008 took a nearly complete turnabout after the state Supreme Court ruled the agency overreached when sweeping more than 400 children into foster care.

(AP


Reader comments: Child welfare worker describes FLDS ranch as 'scary environment'

243 comments | Read story

Page: 1 2 3 4 5

wes | 1:14 p.m. April 17, 2008

An FLDS woman stands in line to get into the Tom Green County Court House in San Angelo, Texas, for the FLDS custody hearing today. (Tim Hussin, Deseret News)

San Angelo resident Bill McNurlen watches FLDS women and their attorneys walk from the Tom Green County Court House to San Angelo city hall for the FLDS custody hearing today. (Tim Hussin, Deseret News)

FLDS men watch a line form in front of the Tom Green County Court House in San Angelo, Texas, for the FLDS custody hearing today. (Tim Hussin, Deseret News)

Mothers Separated From Children, Some Held as suspected Underage, total 462

a.abcnews.com/WN/story?id=4725487&page=1

All 462 children taken from a polygamous ranch in West Texas have been placed into temporary foster homes, state officials said, after a dramatic plea from some of their mothers to be kept together.

Polygamist Mothers
A female member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, holds a sign out... Expand
A female member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, holds a sign out of a chartered bus that reads, "SOS Mothers Separated Help", as she simultaneously yelled out the window, "Help, Mothers Kidnapped", as the bus departed the San Angelo Coliseum where they had been temporarily housed in San Angelo, Texas Thursday, April 24, 2008. Collapse
(Tony Gutierrez/AP Photo)

"SOS Mothers separated Help," read a sign hung from a bus that took some of the mothers from the San Angelo Coliseum, where they have been staying with the children, back to the sect's ranch.

State Child Protective Services officials said Thursday that they believe another 25 mothers from the group are under 18, bringing the total number of underage mothers from the sect to approximately 30.

Those mothers had been staying with their children at the Coliseum voluntarily, but are now in state custody, bringing the total number of children in custody to 462, said department spokesman Chris Van Dusen.


Parents forced to drive over state to visit children, fathers not even allowed to visit

Polygamy sect parents say state has scattered children

I'm homeless and childless’ says mother of six among 460 in state custody

Video
FLDS families want kids back
May 12: Couples from a polygamist group speak to TODAY's Meredith Vieira about their struggle to have their children returned.

Today show

By Mike Celizic
TODAYShow.com May. 12, 2008

More than a month since their children were taken into custody by the state of Texas in a raid on an FLDS compound in Eldorado, Texas, two sets of parents and a representative for the families alleged that the state has deliberately scattered and isolated the children.

James and Nancy Dockstader described living mostly in the covered bed of their truck, traveling to the far corners of Texas in hope of seeing their five children. Another FLDS couple, Rulon and Lorene Keate, said they drive from one end of the huge state to another for three days at a time, trying to see their six children. And even when there are visits, they said, the men who say they are the children’s fathers are not allowed to visit them at all.

“It is truly a nightmare. We just are empty,” James Dockstader told TODAY’s Meredith Vieira in an interview Monday in New York. “We need our children returned. Life is nothing without them.”


Pamela Jessop Gives Birth, State finally accepts she's adult after taking baby


Louisa Bradshaw Jessop Gives Birth, State Admits she's an adult, takes her baby

June 11, 2008...10:29 pm

Dan Jessop and his wife Louisa Bradshaw share a short moment ...
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Sat May 24, 2:25 AM ET

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Dan Jessop and his wife Louisa Bradshaw share a short moment together Friday, May 23, 2008 after a custody hearing on their newborn son. Jessop said this was only the second time he had seen his child. State child welfare authorities have agreed to reunite 12 children from a west Texas polygamist sect with their parents until the state Supreme Court rules on their custody case.

(AP Photo/Trent Nelson - The Salt Lake Tribune)

Dan Jessop and his wife Louisa Bradshaw are surrounded by cameras ...
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Sat May 24, 2:23 AM ET
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Dan Jessop and his wife Louisa Bradshaw are surrounded by cameras as they leave the Tom Green County Courthouse, Friday, May 23, 2008 after a custody hearing on their newborn son. Jessop said it was only the second time he had seen his child. State child welfare authorities have agreed to reunite 12 children from a west Texas polygamist sect with their parents until the state Supreme Court rules on their custody case.

(AP Photo/Trent Nelson - The Salt Lake Tribune)

Photo Tools

Foster Care Personnel Invade Privacy of FLDS Childbirth

State of Texas 42, King George 28

42. Foster care personnel insisted on being in the labor and delivery room while one FLDS “child” (who wasn’t a child) gave birth.
The “child” who was giving birth, 18 year-old Pamela Jessop, says that she showed government officials her birth certificate before she was taken into state custody. A CPS worker signed a document attesting that Jessop had identified herself as being 18. And, the Bishop’s List - see page 8 - agrees that she was 18 at the time of the raid. Nonetheless, it was not until after she gave birth on 29 April that CPS released her from custody.
Childbirth is one of the most personal - if not one of the most sacred events - in life. The idea that the state would consider it necessary to intrude on such an event is an affront to the human dignity of the mother. One could understand such an intrusion in the case of a murderer. However, as far as I know, she was considered to be a child under the protective custody of the state and not a suspected violent offender. Which leaves as the remaining possibility that the intrusion was justified due to the mother being a flight risk. However, If the state was worried that the mother would grab the baby and run the moment she had finished giving birth, it would have been possible to protect against that possibility in a far less intrusive manner, by posting guards at the window and door. Unless the mother had incredible stamina, the guards wouldn’t even need to be Olympic sprinters.

Jessop said, “they’re dealing with our lives and they’ve treated us like animals.” And her lawyers are considering filing suit for civil rights violations against her. Given the grounds that Texas has provided for civil rights lawsuits, this case may end up being more expensive to taxpayers than previously projected

Press Cites Teen Mom who is actually 18 gives birth

cbs11tv.com/local/Teen.FLDS.Mom.2.711470.html

Apr 29, 2008 2:50 pm US/Central State Waits For Teen FLDS Mom To Give BirthSAN MARCOS, Texas (AP) ―

One of hundreds of young polygamist-sect members taken into custody by the state was giving birth Tuesday while child welfare officials and state troopers stood watch outside the maternity ward.

The teenager was admitted to the Central Texas Medical Center and was in labor, said Rod Parker, a spokesman for the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. He contends she is 18, but state officials have the girl on a list of minors taken into state custody.

State officials raided the FLDS's Yearning For Zion Ranch in Eldorado on April 3. They took custody of 463 children on the belief that the sect's practice of underage and polygamous spiritual marriages endangered the children. The children are now scattered in foster-care facilities around the state.

CPS spokesman Darrell Azar said he was unaware that an FLDS teen had gone into labor, but added that typically, a child born to a ward of the state becomes a ward of the state itself.

A woman at the hospital who said she was the girl's attorney declined to comment.

On Monday, CPS announced that almost 60 percent of the underage girls living on the Eldorado ranch either have children or are pregnant.

Of the 53 girls between the ages of 14 and 17 who are in state custody, 31 either have given birth or are expecting, Azar said.

"It shows you a pretty distinct pattern, that it was pretty pervasive," Azar said.

CPS Kicked Her and Her Baby Out of the Hospital onto Mattress on the Floor

Day-old baby among 400 FLDS kids in custody

www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24604291/

Louisa Jessop says she, newborn son are sharing a mattress on a floor

Video
Sect moms fight to get kids back
May 14: Lawyers for a Mormon sect in Texas are trying to force the state to reunite mothers and children. NBC's Janet Shamlian reports on the latest developments.

Today show

Dan Jessop and his wife Louisa Bradshaw share a short moment together Friday, May 23, 2008 after a custody hearing on their newborn son. Jessop said this was only the second time he had seen his child. State child welfare authorities have agreed to reunite 12 children from a west Texas polygamist sect with their parents until the state Supreme Court rules on their custody case. (AP Photo/Trent Nelson - The Salt Lake Tribune)
AP Photo: Dan Jessop and his wife Louisa Bradshaw share a short moment together Friday, May 23,...
By Jenny Hoff and Mike Celizic
TODAYShow.com contributor
updated 6:49 p.m. PT, Tues., May. 13, 2008

Louisa Jessop's voice is small and precise and remarkably calm considering where she says she is calling from and what she's just been through.

On Monday, just a day earlier, the FLDS member and former resident of the Yearning for Zion ranch had given birth to a son, Richard, her third child. And now, she tells NBC News, she is in a small and bare room furnished with a foam mattress on the floor in a foster home in Austin, Texas. Her husband, Dan Jessop, is staying at a motel in town. Her other two children, Amber, 4, and Rolan, 2, are in a foster home under the custody of the Texas Child Protection Service (CPS).

"I would like to be with my children and my husband and live in a home where we can take care of them," she said in a telephone interview.

Louisa Jessop's children were among the more than 400 who were taken from the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints compound raided early last month by Texas law enforcement and CPS officials. She says she's 22 and has presented authorities with a driver's license and birth certificate to prove it. But CPS spokesman Chris Van Deusen told NBC that the department has classified her as a "disputed minor," the term used for an FLDS woman whose age has not been established to the department's satisfaction. Until her age is established, they are treating her as if she is a minor.

"They said I looked like I was under 18," she said.

And so Louisa Jessop is stuck. She's been told she can leave, but she has to leave her newborn son and her other two children in foster care. Or she can stay with her newborn son, but can no longer be with her other children.

Two police officers and two CPS officials were present to welcome Richard into his confused world at 11 a.m.

Before Louisa could be separated from Richard, the couple's attorney got a temporary restraining order to allow her to stay with him in the small room where both mother and infant sleep on the same mattress. A hearing is scheduled for Thursday to determine whether to continue the injunction.

Louisa Jessop stayed at the birthing center for just a few hours. By 9:30 p.m., she said, she was at a CPS office. From there she was taken to the foster home where she remains.

"The placement is appropriate and comfortable," the CPS spokesman told NBC.

In the meantime, the young woman says she is trying to improve her living quarters.

"I'm working on cleaning it up so we can have a healthy environment for the baby."

A reporter asked her what it's been like.

"I don't really know," she said. "I don't know — just quite the experience."

"Are you scared?"

A long silence followed. Finally, she said, "I'm not really scared because I know Heavenly Father will see us through."

Despite just having given birth, she says she's not uncomfortable. "I'm doing well myself. I feel like we've been a little abused by the CPS."

Van Deusen, the CPS spokesman, told NBC that the department is trying to determine the ages of all women who may be minors. Officials seized truckloads of records from the compound and have said that it has been very difficult just to sort out which children belong to which women. The commonality of surnames makes the task more difficult. After the raid, the department had said that it believed that 31 girls between the ages of 14-17 were either pregnant or mothers. At least one of those women has since been reclassified as being of legal age.

Louisa Jessop has contributed DNA for state-ordered testing and hopes that the question of her age is soon settled so that she can leave with her son. She said that she is Dan Jessop's only wife and that the couple had moved to the Eldorado ranch from the FLDS community on the Arizona-Utah border just a few months before the raid.

She said she was being treated kindly at the foster home, where a woman loaned her a cell phone so she could call NBC.

Within the FLDS community, Dan Jessop, 24, said, "Everybody has a strong interest in each other and everybody's children ... Out here nobody cares at all from one family to the next."

When Louisa Jessop was asked what she does to pass the time, she said, "Just taking care of my baby."


CPS Knocks Again - Sorry, not without your tanks.

FLDS Child Protective Services

Willie Jessop, right, and Rod Parker head to the front gate at the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints' Yearning for Zion ranch near Eldorado, Texas, Wednesday, May 21, 2008. Church members turned away Child Protective Services caseworkers and sheriff deputies that wanted to enter the ranch to search for more children. The authorities did not have a search warrant to enter the property and left without entering. (AP Photo/LM Otero) (AP PHOTO)

FLDS Stymies Child Protective Workers

Polygamist Sect Stops Officials At Compound Gate, Thwarting Attempt To Find More Children


http://bedrockof87.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/protective_custody.jpg

King George 28, State of Texas 6

A CPS spokesman said it doesn’t matter if the calls that provided the excuse for the raid were genuine.

According to him, what matters is that they found cool evidence after getting there. A spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Health and Human Services also said “it doesn’t matter” if the calls were hoaxes. Their stories are so similar - and so contrary to constitutional principles - that you’d almost think they had been coached … or brainwashed. Claiming that the validity of information used to justify a raid is irrelevant is tightly coupled to the issue of fourth amendment requirements about search warrants. Nevertheless, I believe each of these items qualifies the state of Texas for earning another point in the contest against King George. Constitutionally, it does matter if the search warrant has a more secure footing than a Texas tumbleweed. If there were any real crimes committed, and a court rules that the search warrant does not measure up to the constitutional standard, there will be less ability to prosecute any real criminals.

link

http://familyrights.us/news/archive/2008/flds/april_2008.html


©2008 Nick Anderson, Houston Chronicle
Click on thumbnail image for much larger view.

The FLDS Kids- From one frying pan into a much larger frying pan.

How many “cults” are there in Texas?

As we wait to see if Texas CPS will follow both the letter and the spirit of the State Supreme court ruling, (see previous post to this Blog) here's something else to ponder:

THE OFFICIAL TEXAS "CULT" CHECKLIST:

Criterion for cult status Allegation against FLDS Child Protective Services

Does almost all its business in secret

X

X

Raises children on isolated compounds where they are at serious risk of child abuse

X

X*

Displays a profound bias against African-Americans

X

X

Arbitrarily moves children from home to home, reassigning them to different families

X

X

Kicks some people out when they are deemed too old, leaving them to fend for themselves on the streets

X

X**

*-They're called "residential treatment centers"

**-It's called "aging out"

The Faces of FLDS

From the NEW FLDS website http://captivefldschildren.org


Free At Last

David Hall, executive director of Texas Rio Grande Legal Aid, ...
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Thu May 29, 8:05 PM ET

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David Hall, executive director of Texas Rio Grande Legal Aid, is shown outside the Texas Supreme Court Building before a news conference Thursday, May 29, 2008, in Austin, Texas. He spoke after the Texas Supreme Court ruled that child welfare officials overstepped their authority and that the children from a polygamist sect's ranch located near Eldorado, Texas, should go back to their parents.

(AP Photo/Harry Cabluck)

Children from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter ...

Children from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter ...

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Mon Jun 2, 8:31 PM ET

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Children from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in El Dorado, Texas, wait to be released to their mothers on Monday, June 2, 2008, in Fort Worth,

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Mon Jun 2, 8:31 PM ET

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Children from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in El Dorado, Texas, wait to be released to their mothers on Monday, June 2, 2008, in Fort Worth,

REFILE - CORRECTING TYPO IN SECOND SENTENCE

A woman and and ...

Catholic Charities Assessment Center with an unidentified woman after placing items in their car as they prepare to leave in Fort Worth, Texas June 3, 2008. More than 400 child members of a polygamist sect begin returning to their families on June 2, 2008 after a judge lifted her order giving the state of Texas custody of the children.REUTERS/Mike Stone (UNITED STATES)

REFILE - CORRECTING TYPO IN SECOND SENTENCE

A woman and two ...
Reuters
Tue Jun 3, 4:00 PM ET
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REFILE - CORRECTING TYPO IN SECOND SENTENCE A woman and two child from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in El Dorado, are assisted by an unidentified man and woman as they prepare to leave the Catholic Charities Assessment Center in Fort Worth, Texas June 3, 2008. More than 400 child members of a polygamist sect begin returning to their families on June 2, 2008 after a judge lifted her order giving the state of Texas custody of the children.

REUTERS/Mike Stone (UNITED STATES)

REFILE - CORRECTING TYPO IN SECOND SENTENCE

A woman and child ...

REFILE - CORRECTING TYPO IN SECOND SENTENCE

A woman from the ...

Some of the last remaining children, member of the Fundamentalist ...
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Tue Jun 3, 1:03 PM ET

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Some of the last remaining children, member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, prepare to leave the Baptist Children's Home Ministries Youth Camp with family in Luling, Texas, Tuesday, June 3, 2008.

(AP Photo/Eric Gay)

Members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter ...
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Tue Jun 3, 10:45 AM ET
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Members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints leave the Baptist Children's Home Ministries Youth Camp after picking up two of their children in Luling, Tuesday, June 3, 2008.

(AP Photo/Eric Gay)
A woman from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter ...
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Mon Jun 2, 11:14 PM ET
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A woman from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints leaves the Kidz Harbor facility in Liverpool, Texas with her child Monday, June 2, 2008.

Members from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter ...
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A woman leaves the Kidz Harbor facility in Liverpool, Texas ...

Members from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints leave the Kidz Harbor facility in Liverpool swinging their child after being reunited Monday, June 2, 2008 in Liverpool,

Amy Dockstader, 9, hugs her mother, Nancy Dockstader, both members ...
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Mon Jun 2, 5:00 PM ET
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Amy Dockstader, 9, hugs her mother, Nancy Dockstader, both members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, after they were reunited at the Baptist Children's Home Ministries Youth Camp near Luling, Texas,

James and Nancy Dockstader, members of the Fundamentalist Church ...
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Mon Jun 2, 3:56 PM ET
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James and Nancy Dockstader, members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, leave the Baptist Children's Home Ministries Youth Camp near Luling, Texas, Monday, June 2, 2008, after they retrieved their daughter Amy, 9

James, left, and Nancy Dockstader, center, members of the Fundamentalist ...
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Mon Jun 2, 3:54 PM ET
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James, left, and Nancy Dockstader, center, members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, greet their daughter Amy, 9, after they were reunited at the Baptist Children's Home Ministries Youth Camp near Luling, Texas, Monday, June 2, 2008.

(AP Photo/Eric Gay)

http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/category/flds-update/

The people that have been taking care of the children were doing such a wonderful job. They literally cried when we took them away,” Young said of the foster parents who cared for the children after they were removed from the ranch by state officials in April, citing evidence of underage marriages and statutory rape.

Young said the children had been hit hard by the removal to foster homes around the state. “They are dazed,” she said. “They are not the same. We hope they pull out of it.”

Some reporters asked returning children how it felt to be back with their parents on the ranch. Clearly still shaken by the experience, children clung to their parents and shied away from the cameras.

http://www.gosanangelo.com/news/2008/apr/18/live-from-the-courthouse-day-2-of-updates-from/

What are your beliefs about marriage?" an attorney asks.

"I believe that a woman should not be married until she is mentally and physically mature and able to take care of a family," she says.

She says she recognizes the Heavenly Father as her God.

Lucille says her age of marriage - almost 20 - is a good age to marry.

She says her father asked her if she was ready to marry when she was 18, and she said she was not, so her father respected her wishes.

"We raise our children through love," Lucille says. They have family devotions. They gather garbage off the streets. "It's very peaceful," she says of life on the ranch.

The defense asks if she knows of women under 18 who are married at the ranch.

"I know of them," Lucille says.

She guesses a dozen or so are married under age 18. She says she doesn't know how many under 16 are married at the ranch.

Lucille says about 100-150 women are married at the ranch - the women who have gone to the coliseum to care for their children.

She testifies that she has lived at the Eldorado ranch since 2005 and has never witnessed a woman being physically abused at the ranch. She has not hear

Standard-Times File Photo * Barbara Walther, 51st District Judge.

Standard-Times File Photo * Barbara Walther, 51st District Judge.

Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints members walk to the Tom Green County Courthouse for the second day of hearings regarding custody of the 416 children removed from the polygamist sect's YFZ Ranch near Eldorado.

Standard-Times photo by Patrick Dove

Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints members walk to the Tom Green County Courthouse for the second day of hearings regarding custody of the 416 children removed from the polygamist sect's YFZ Ranch near Eldorado.

FLDS members stand at the front entrance to the Tom Green County Courthouse.

Standard-Times photo by Patrick Dove

FLDS members stand at the front entrance to the Tom Green County Courthouse.

Special to the Standard-Times sketch by Brigitte Woosley * FLDS mothers in court during a break in the custody hearing on Friday.

Special to the Standard-Times sketch by Brigitte Woosley * FLDS mothers in court during a break in the custody hearing on Friday.