A girl from the Brainerd schools is accused of making an off-the-cuff comment to a friend about Donald Trump, something to the effect he should be beheaded. It ended up somehow in the school yearbook.
The girl denies saying that, and what she did say wasn't even meant for publication anyway.
Adults maybe should've caught the remark before it was published. It's common knowledge, though, that we overload our teachers, in order to save a buck so it can be put into something of "higher importance," things like snowmobiles, sports stadiums, CEO compensations, smartphones, or corporate profits.
We do know that sometimes our young ones can slip something past us anyway. But what's hard to excuse is WCCO-TV and the Dispatch for publishing the girl's first name. It's an unusual name, so it's not hard for anyone to determine who it is. "Sad," as our National Beacon of Blather would say.
Credit is due KSTP-TV for withholding her names, first and last.
ADVERTISEMENT
Why would anyone show any animosity toward our hero, the "Swamp Drainer"? Republican Paul Ryan's new budget calls for cuts to Medicaid of $800 billion, cuts to food stamps (SNAP) of 30 percent. Oh, and tax cuts for the wealthy, who've never had it so good. I'll spell it out: make the poor poorer; the rich richer.
Trump's Secretary of Education, billionaire Betsy DeVos, wants to raise the interest rates of student education loans. (DeVos and her husband are in the education loan business!)
If you were dumb enough to vote for this awful scenario, it's proof we need to put more help into education, not find ways to hinder it!
It shouldn't be a surprise to any politician to see crowds descending onto the capital, not with scimitars, but with pails of tar, and plenty of feathers.
A. Martin
Merrifield
Editor's Note: The Dispatch did not identify the student in the first stories about the yearbook incident. The student's first name was used later in an interview with her and with her consent and in front of her parent.
