In light of a recent column by Jonah Goldberg in which he notes that President Obama is "polarizing" and the repeated references at Trump rallies to the President possibly being a Muslim and not being born in the US and therefore not actually being President... I think we must ask "Why is he so polarizing?" (Goldberg used the term three times in his column).

From the first time they laid eyes on him they pledged to make him a one term President. They opposed everything he proposed no matter if it was good for the country or not, or even if it was a Republican idea in the past. Polls show large majorities of Republicans still think he might not have been born in the US (birth certificate be damned), and they still think he is not a Christian; and Trump doesn't question those assertions when they are made. The right wing may have some real political differences with our President but the number one reason he is "polarizing" to Goldberg and the right wing, the reason they walked straight to the opposite pole from him as soon as he was elected, is that he is BLACK and they just can't stomach that. He is polarizing because they want him to be perceived as being "polarizing."

Lee Augustine
Wawarsing

The Common Core curriculum that fails to adequately serve nearly two-thirds of children has been forced upon parents and teachers alike by appointees with absolutely zero accountability to the people whose future they are experimenting with.

Make no mistake that Common Core is an experiment, the extension of a case study in cost management called uniformity. It's what allows the cost-cutting American businesses to pick up shop and transfer their operations to the lowest-cost locale; it's what social engineers with aspirations for the next round of Great Society welfare programs salivate over when they scrub the tax numbers looking for money to divert to their peculiar social agendas.

These planners are bent on crafting a fungible, one-size- fits-all education, administered by technicians rather than teachers, in classrooms with "Ask Google" apps instead of books. Busting up teachers' unions on the supply side and strangling off enrollment by destroying parent satisfaction on the demand side are the two prongs in a war on American education currently being fought. Parents, teachers and students are on the one side and un-elected bureaucrats on the other. Charter schools fit nicely into this model as a floodgate to pick up the slack from hamstrung public schools, but depending on the motivation and competence of the charter sponsor, that options often falls short as well.

The Reform Party of New York, originally conceived as the "Stop Common Core Party" by Rob Astorino, recognizes that the debacle of Common Core owes its roots to the insulation of decision-makers and centralized planners from the collective superior wisdom that happens when you enable individual choice. With individual teacher's judgment replaced by rules and regulations down to the finest detail including how many seconds a child should be given to do X, Y, or Z, the renowned mechanism called the free market withers and dies.

All the highly vetted, glossy, statistics about education's best practices cannot seem to account for the fact that the old way of doing things produced octogenarians who can still balance their check books or, in more than a few cases figure out interest and principal on a loan using nothing but a pencil and the back of an envelope. The old ways produced brilliant minds ranging from Thomas J. Watson (founder of IBM) to James Watson (co-discoverer of DNA). The new way of doing things teaches kids to rely on "the system" instead of learning to rely on what they know (substantial things that incidentally, used to be taught as matters of fact in school).

As for the subject of history, let's just say that the new way of teaching "process" over "substance" is the revisionists' dream when it comes to re-casting who were the good guys and who were the bad guys of our national history. Parents are told, "Don't worry that it doesn't look like the math/ science/ history you know...when the answer comes out the other end, it will be right."

Unfortunately the answer the kids are producing often is not right. Parents are told that its just a matter of time and fine tuning the curriculum machine, but children are not widgets, nor are they working prototypes of a hypothetical perfect "B" student who passes every subject, but excels at none with groundbreaking incite.

The aggregation of judgment that has guided our country since its founding, the democratic voice of people, knows better than to trust the future of our children to education policy wonks pondering how to get more for less in their ivy tower sanctuaries.

That is why I will proudly be running for town supervisor in my town on the Reform Party line. As a conservative I believe even more generally that government should not dictate the finest grain of detail how we live our lives-from how much gas per mile our cars are allowed to use, to how many times a person's weight must divide into their height before they are prodded into "weight re-education" and given a prescription of potentially deadly side effect diet pills.

Make no mistake; the potentially deadly side-effects of Common Core are there: namely, diversion of focus from teacher –student relationships to standardized testing results, the alienation of parent-voters, and the stifling of excellence in pursuit of a standard, reproducible result. An essential step in shutting down government encroachment into the most mundane details of private life is to shut down Common Core.

Gaetana Ciarlante
Saugerties

I think I was one of the last in the tradition of hiring professionals when I taught high school. By 1976 when new tenure rules made a teaching degree mandatory I moved on. Twenty years later Massachusetts instituted its standards, nullified licenses from teacher mills and began to hire professionals into teaching positions that actually had experience thinking for themselves that students could emulate. That same period saw a national push by employers and colleges to change the course that had been leading to such a lack of qualified high school graduates coming their way. It took a decade for this to become the Common Core but for that entire time the successes in Massachusetts were guiding the development.

As a person that stays up to date I was totally dismayed when the Beacon response in Oct. of 2013 initiated this whole campaign against the Common Core. It was done by uninformed people with personal gain over the needs of the community as their concern; a perfect formula for a political bandwagon and an embarrassment to New York State. Politicians do nothing but get attention for themselves. Learned professionals actually doing something are always the target for their peevish behavior. The successful politicizing of Common Core only proves the politicians' assessment that ignorance is the norm of the electorate.

In my opinion anyone that makes a statement that the Common Core is bad for education either has never successfully applied their education or is clueless as to what education is for. In either case, they prove the case for Common Core.

Michael Sullivan Smith
Saugerties

As time goes on and the candidates for the President of the United States continue to deny what almost all scientists now accept as the truth, along comes the Pope, who hopefully may bring some sanity and actual "thinking" to our candidates for President.

He has already made it clear that he accepts the facts of climate change. To quote him in translated English he said:, "Economic powers continue to justify the current global system where priority tends to be given to speculation and the pursuit of financial gain. As a result whatever is fragile, like the environment, is defenseless before the interests of the deified market, which become the only rule."

So what will the Republicans do about the Pope's statements? So far, they are doing their best to have him avoid the subject. To put it simply, they have too much money invested in the companies that profit by polluting our air and water, and other products that are destroying our planet.

The Pope is doing what he is supposed to do. He's just trying to save life on earth and to keep it as peaceful as possible.

Tom Jacobs of Pacific Standard did a study on who believes in Climate Change around the world. He examined the platforms of the top conservative parties in each of nine countries — the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Germany, Spain, Sweden, Norway, Canada and New Zealand — and found that the Republican Party here was the only one to deny the existence of human-caused climate change.

I am going to bring my optimism up to the forefront, due to the visit of the Pope, and ask only that everyone that reads this pay attention to the candidates reactions to the now visible subject of Climate Change.

Jill Paperno
Glenford

The Pledge of Allegiance, composed August of 1892 by Francis Bellamy, a Baptist minister and Christian socialist, has gone through four makeovers, each adding just a little bit more while detracting from its original purpose, to be quick and to the point. Bellamy designed it to be recited in 15 seconds. I like the original "I pledge allegiance to my flag and the republic for which it stands, one nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

Anyone from any nation could make this pledge to their flag and yet it's a very personal and passionate proclamation of love and loyalty. There are no conditions or gods mentioned. The current version, adopted Flag Day in 1954, is longer, less personal and brings God into the picture. Consider, there are many Muslim American citizens who recite The Pledge of Allegiance and for them, it's "one nation, under Allah."

For what it's worth, here is my Pledge: I pledge allegiance to my planet and the solar system in which it orbits third from the sun, one Earth, teeming with life unimaginable, with mercy and justice for most... some... a few that is.

Ingrid A. Ilkiw
Walden

As we keep populating and grow and burn more and more fossil fuels and make the rich richer and the poor poorer, we are damning ourselves unto a toxic Earth where the air itself will eventually lead to cause our destruction.

It is so sad because for the greed of so few we are allowing our dear Earth to be devastated to the point that we will be breathing in toxic fumes. In school 50 years ago, they talked of the excitement of the future of mass transportation; of the high-speed rail trains that would link us all together in a few minutes.

So whatever happened to this grand idea of mass transportation in the future? Why are some so interested in outer space, where we spend billions even trillions of dollars? Why is humanity so interested in each other but spend trillions of our dollars fighting each other in costly wars and destroying some of the most beautiful cities that man has created?

Why are we letting our dear schools fall into shambles?

I blame it mostly on man's greed. Take what you can today and forget about tomorrow. Let the next person or the next generation take up the slack, but give me mine first and let them all do it the right way tomorrow.

What we have today, after all these years, are the fat cats getting richer, the bigger populace content on sitting back and enjoying what they have and the poor wanting but taking what is given to them.

Where and when will we eventually wake up and use our brains for solutions instead of looking for future generations to solve everything that we have messed up?

David M. Wolff
Kingston