#trying to legislate away our founding document as a nation

[airyairyaucontraire]

This is just shameful. I’m glad that at least the MoJ is providing advice that this is a terrible, horrible, racist, destructive idea.

#Aotearoa #new zealand #te tiriti o waitangi #the treaty of waitangi #trying to legislate away our founding document as a nation #so they can pretend all that *history* is over and everyone’s equal now and Māori who aren’t rich and healthy need to stop complaining

[juicycoutureheaux]

Fixer upper: An AU Leon Kennedy x Reader fic Chapter 4

Well y’all, I finally did it. I wrote chapter 4 after being in a slump for two weeks. Thank you all for being patient. This specific chapter has explicit content so please use your discretion. Minors DNI. (Loss of virginity, assault, and explicit *consensual sexual content)

It was still a couple days before the engagement party and Mama was not happy with you.

After the talk with your dad she became upset that you would divulge information to him and not to her. You tried reasoning with her, claiming that she wouldn’t listen; but that just made her more upset, hence the cold shoulder treatment she was giving you right now.

You decided to get out of the farmhouse and get some fresh air.

You were on the road close to town when you heard the sound of tires on the dirt road. You smiled when you saw the familiar *Springfield County Sheriff on the side and Leon’s handsome face peering through the window.

“Hey, y/n. Do you have time to talk?” He said smiling.

You looked around to make sure there was no chance of anyone seeing her get into his car. When you deemed the coast clear you happily obliged and Leon put your bike in his trunk.

You hopped in the front seat and Leon drove to a shady place to get a reprieve from the heat.

Leon was the first to speak once he parked the car.

“I’ve found some interesting things about your fiancé and his father.” He said holding a Manila folder.

“What do you mean by interesting?” You said furrowing your brow.

He put the envelope in your hands and you opened it.

Inside were pictures of Senator Armstrong accepting money from unscrupulous looking people. There were also copies of different documents detailing where the money was coming from. Senator Armstrong was taking bribes from wealthy communists to change legislation.

“Oh my god, how is he getting away with this?” You said.

“He’s not.” Leon said plainly. “Why do you think I’m here?”

“How are you going to prosecute him in this town? There won’t be a jury to convict him!” You said throwing down the paperwork.

“This is now a federal case, Y/N. This is a matter of national security, but to try this case I’m going to need your help.” He said looking at you with an austere disposition.

You had never seen Leon so serious about anything before. You gulped and nodded.

“What do you need from me?”

“We need a confession and tangible proof.”

You instinctively fell back into the seat.

“You really think a powerful man like Senator Armstrong is going to confess to a person like me? I bet he has no respect for women, just like his son.” You couldn’t help but roll your eyes.

“You have the leverage to back him into a corner y/n, with all the shit Patrick has already put you through, not to mention these findings, I’m sure a lot of reporters would LOVE to get to know you.”

You genuinely thought about it. This was the perfect opportunity to get out of this sham marriage, and maybe you could get them to pay for school-no that would be too opportunistic.

The invasive thought made you feel dirty, you didn’t want to turn into somebody that blackmailed people for money.

“I’ll do it, but only because it’s the right thing to do.” You said avoiding eye contact.

Leon grabbed your hands. “This won’t be an easy thing to do, Y/N.” He said, leaning his head down to meet your eyes.

You looked into his eyes, they were warm and assuring.

“If I do this, is there a chance I could get hurt?”

Leon gripped your hands tighter. “I won’t let that happen.”

“What’s your plan, Leon?”

“The night of your engagement party, that’s our only chance. He’ll be surrounded, if you let it slip you know something you can get him alone. He wouldn’t want his associates to find out.”

The thought of being alone with Senator Armstrong was terrifying. He was a powerful man and she was terrified he would do anything to get rid of her; she was expendable to a man like him.

“Where will you be?”

“Close by, every second. I won’t let him hurt you anymore, Y/N.”

You wrapped your arms around his neck and enveloped him in a kiss. You couldn’t hold yourself back any longer.

He returned your kiss enthusiastically. Even though the two of you hadn’t known each other long, there was no denying you had a strong magnetic attraction for each other.

Leon was the one to break the kiss. You couldn’t help but sigh, disappointed.

“I know sweetheart, but we can’t be caught necking in my patrol car.” He said, a smirk growing across his features.

You looked down embarrassed; you were turning into a fast girl.

“Don’t look like that, Y/N! I enjoyed it.”

“Do you think I’m easy?” You asked self-consciously.

“Easy? Of course not. Why would you say that?”

“I’m engaged and kissing another man. If anyone found out, both our reputations would be ruined!”

“Since when do you really care about reputations?” He quipped back mocking you slightly. “I surely don’t.”

You rolled your eyes. “That's easy for you to say, your only options for a future aren’t just to *get married and have a bunch of kids and pray your husband keeps the lights on.” You said theatrically.

“You don’t know what my husband is like!” He said facetiously.

You gave him a limp-wristed punch and he feigned injury. “OW!”

“Come on Kennedy, I’m being serious!”

“You know that’s not the only future you have; you can do so much better than this place, Y/N.”

You paused for a minute and fantasized about taking classes at a REAL University, not just some finishing school for ladies to find a husband.

You thought about all the long nights studying and working a waitressing job maybe; and coming home to a small apartment. It wouldn’t matter how hard the work was or how dingy the apartment you would be; it would be all yours and no one could change that.

“I would kill to get out of this town, so I guess the next best thing would be to throw Patrick and his father under the bus.” You said sarcastically.

“You wouldn’t be throwing them under the bus, you would be assisting in apprehending a criminal. Senator Armstrong is a criminal, Y/N.”

You couldn’t deny that Senator Armstrong was selling out not only the state of Georgia, but the United States as well.

He was selfish and a coward just like his own son.

“Do you think Patrick knows what his father is doing?” You said anxiously, bouncing your leg and straightening out the papers in the manilla envelope. The gears in your head were shifting at a lightning fast pace. Sure, Patrick was a jerk, but was he also as conniving as his father?

Leon tapped his chin thoughtlessly.

“Not only is he completely aware, it’s under suspicion he’s acting as an accessory as well.”

Your heart fell into your stomach, that was all you needed to hear.

“I’ll do it, I’ll ruin my reputation for the sake of national security.”

Leon beamed and kissed your cheek. “Spoken like a true patriot, Y/N.”

*********************************************************

The rest of the week, you were brainstorming ways to shake up Patrick before you confronted him. You wanted him paranoid, in a vulnerable state.

You thought it would be the easiest way to get him to confess, if he felt like someone close to him was going to betray him; they would never suspect it was you.

You started to leave “breadcrumbs.”

You started sending cryptic messages in random places that he would find. You constructed the messages out of newspaper clippings and other materials.

You started to hate how much joy messing with him was, but lord he was an easy target

The night before the engagement party and your official debut as a “couple”, you decided to put him completely on edge by asking him at family dinner why he seemed so stressed.

He looked at you, with the blood drained from his face; the bags under his eyes were emphasized by the lack of color in his face.

“Nothing honey, I’m just so excited for our party that I haven’t been getting any sleep.”

God he was such a smooth liar, it must be second nature. If he wasn’t such a crook, he’d make the perfect politician.

You just smiled, it felt good to be in control.

*********************************************************

The day was busy, you were in the salon for hours with Miss Suzanne and your mother. They were chirping away about wedding plans. You were as silent as a corpse, your mind racing of all the different possibilities of how the night was going to go. The first part of the night was going to entail dancing and socializing. When the guests would start to entertain themselves was when you were going to pull Patrick and his father aside to confront them.

You were pulled out of your thoughts when the beautician asked you how you wanted your hair done.

You opened your mouth to answer, but were interjected by Suzanne describing what she expected your hair to look like. You felt your cheeks go red; before your meetings with Leon, you wouldn’t have cared about others making decisions for you. Now, you were starting to get your confidence back, you were going to be in charge of your life from now on.

You looked at the hairstylist and smiled “Actually, I think I may want something a bit more modern. I want to look like Brigitte Bardot.”

You thought your mother was going to kill over in her seat, Suzanne smiled a strained smile.

“If that's what you want sweetie, it’s your party.” She forced the words out through gritted teeth.

“Thank you for understanding, it is what I want.”

Mother and Suzanne were silenced after that.

*********************************************************

You were standing in a guest bedroom of the Armstrong Mansion staring at yourself in the mirror.

Your evening gown was a light pink, the tulle off the shoulder detail accentuated your attractive decollete area. It had a sweetheart neckline embellished with floral embroidery. It was the perfect dress for someone else.

After the beauty salon incident, you managed to slip into Senator Armstrong’s private study and found important documents regarding the exchanging of money for American Secrets. You had the papers neatly folded in you undergarments, it probably wasn’t the best place but it was the best you could do.

You were picking anxiously at your skin when you saw the doorknob slowly turn. You were shocked to see Leon standing there with his hair combed neatly back and wearing a black tuxedo; he looked like a different person.

He whistled low when he saw you.

“Y/n, you clean up nice. You look incredible.”

You beamed at him, he made all your anxieties go away. “I could say the same to you, Deputy Kennedy.”

He bowed shallowly, “Thank you ma'am.”

“How did you get in here? I don’t think the Armstrongs would be too happy to know that the deputy that arrested their son has made an appearance at the most major social event this season.”

“They’re so busy with other matters, they really have no clue who’s really working this party.”

Your eyebrows furrowed.

“Who else is here, Leon?”

“No one you need to be worried about.”

You felt your heart fall into your tummy. This was really happening, they were going to arrest your fiance and it was going to be a huge mess.

“Are they here to arrest Patrick and his father? Does it have to be here, at such a public event?”

Leon sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. “Y/N, it’s the only way. We need witnesses to his confession and the only way we can accomplish that, is if we’re there.”

“I’m scared Leon, what if we fail?”

“I promise you, we won’t.”

You turned away. The reality of how serious the situation was finally setting in and this was no longer just a final act of defiance; the night would end with someone going to prison.

You sighed, “Let’s just get this night over with.”

*********************************************************

You had just finished your first dance with Patrick, the entire time he was shaking. He was no longer the overly confident ladies man; he was just a scared little boy.

You felt guilty over betraying him. He wouldn’t do well in prison; hell, he wouldn’t even do well in an apartment.

The crowd rumbled into applause over your overly rehearsed waltz and the band began to play an upbeat tune. Most of the guests made their way to the dance floor, while others spoke amongst themselves.

Patrick excused himself politely when the two of you noticed his father motioning for Patrick to follow him.

You made eye contact with Leon and he gave you the signal to follow them. You tried to slip away but just as you were about to leave the main hall, you were stopped by Suzanne.

“Y/N, let me borrow you for a minute.” She grabbed your arm and pulled you aside.

She yanked you closer and whispered harshly into your ear.

“Don’t EVER embarrass me like you did in that beauty salon ever again.” You were stunned. She had apparently been suppressing her feelings all day.

“I’ll attribute this to you being nervous for an event like this, since you and your white trash family aren’t used to these kinds of things; but YOU are marrying into this family and YOU will do as you're told. Do you understand?” She was fuming, her nostrils flaring, making her look like an angry lizard.

You were seething and did the most rational thing you could think of; you smiled at her.

“I do understand, Suzanne, I really do; but what you don’t understand is that my white trash family has morals, unlike yours.” Suzanne looked at her mouth agape. She was not expecting that kind of response, especially not from you.

You stepped closer to Suzanne, closing the distance between you in an intimidating manner. “What you also don’t understand, is that you will remember this night for the rest of your miserable white trash life.”

With that, you left Suzanne standing in shock as you went into the empty hallway of the grand house. You could hear your heart beating heavily in your ears as you made your way down the hallway.

Your peripheral vision was blacking out due to your blood pressure rising.

You heard two hushed voices arguing vehemently.

“What do you mean someone knows?” The heavy voice was one she recognized as Patrick’s father.

“I mean that I’ve been receiving disturbing letters everywhere I go! It’s like someone is following me, waiting for me to crack! I can’t take it anymore father.”

You heard Senator Armstrong scoff at his son. “So a couple of threats already have you over the edge? You’re weak minded son, I shouldn’t have gone so easy on you, we should have shipped you off to the military when you got that girl pregnant at UGA. Do you know how much it took to make sure she had that abortion? I had to pay off the doctor too!”

“You know I didn’t want that! I would have manned up!” Patrick pleaded with his father.

That must have been the incident the girls in the diner were talking about. She didn’t know it was that bad, she just assumed he was making a fool` of himself at a party or something.

“Would you really? Don’t be daft, son. Your mother and I have spent so much of our lives cleaning up your messes.”

You decided this was the best time to confront them when they were arguing amongst themselves. If they were mad at eachother, maybe she could get them to reveal more of the truth to her.

You hoped that Leon was closeby, he did in fact see you on your way out, there was no reason he wouldn’t look out for you.

You slowly opened the door to the Senator’s personal study, where Patrick and his father stood, looking petrified at you.

You cleared your throat before speaking. “Good evening, gentlemen.”

Senator was the first to compose himself to speak. “Good evening, Y/n. Shouldn’t you be outside enjoying your party? I apologize for taking my son away, we had business to discuss.”

You looked at Patrick who was avoiding your gaze by peering down at the floor.

“What an odd time to discuss business, Mr. Armstrong, it wouldn’t have anything to do with the strange letters Patrick has been receiving has it?” You questioned nonchalantly, but you felt the energy in the room change drastically.

Patrick looked wide-eyed at his father, but Mr. Armstrong maintained his composure.

“My dear, what did you say you came in here for, again?” He cocked an eyebrow.

“I know of your meetings with the Soviets, Armstrong.” You said shaking. You were changing, you were becoming brave, but nonetheless, you still felt like a scared little girl when confronting the two men.

“That is quite the accusation, y/n. I think you’ve been reading too many stories. All this excitement and attention must be getting to you.”

You clenched your fists.

“I’m thinking more clearly than ever, maybe you should cover up your tracks better. I found your financial documents out in the open.”

Patrick stepped angrily towards you. “You little whore! How could you? What do you want? Money?”

You glared at him, your blood felt like fire in your veins.

Patrick’s father started to laugh. “Patrick, you’re definitely your mother’s son. How could you think this was just about money? Obviously, if it was, she would keep her mouth shut.” He looked at you. “Y/N, you’re a reasonable girl. Those documents you have obtained could make our lives…inconvenient.”

You scoffed, “No kidding.”

“I think we both could help each other out. Did you know why we thought of you as a suitable bride for my foolish son?”

You just stared daggers into him. He stepped so close to you that you could smell whiskey on his breath.

“We own your fathers land. You see, your father had so many debts, some from gambling, some from drinking. You know who bailed him out? You’re a smart girl, you can put two and two together.”

“That’s wrong, daddy would never do anything like that.” You said shaking. This criminal was insinuating your father was a bad man and you didn’t take that lightly.

“Oh but you’re wrong young lady, I served with your father in the war, he was quite the rowdy soldier. There’s a lot about your father you don’t know,” he said, pulling out a whiskey decanter and pouring himself a glass. He gulped the double shot of whiskey down like water.

“I like you alot y/n, you’re a smart girl, very smart in fact. I knew eventually, you would figure out that my dear son here is the run of the mill imbecile and not worth marrying.” Patrick started to object to his father’s insults.

“Be quiet boy!” His father snapped at him and Patrick backed down.

“I promise you he’s worth it, if not for companionship, but for your family’s land and for your own future. Do you really want to struggle for the rest of your life? Marry a man for love for him to only disappoint you and leave you destitute? I promise that will not happen if you marry my son. I will make sure of it.”

You were starting to rethink all of your plans, if you didn’t marry Patrick where would your family live? Daddy was disabled from his time in the war and Hank had a new baby to worry about, if they took away the land they would be homeless. Everyone. On the other hand, you would be stuck in a loveless marriage always having to mind yourself, no true friends, just surrounded by illegal riches brought to her by others having to suffer; and that was not sustainable.

That's not the future you wanted, you had already started the wheels in motion and you weren’t about to halt it now.

“No.”

“Excuse me?” For the first time tonight Mr. Armstrong’s composure faltered a bit.

“You heard me, Armstrong. You know, that I know how you maintain your wealth. I’d rather be destitute than have a palace built upon your own moral failures.”

“You self-righteous bitch!” Senator Armstrong threw the heavy whiskey decanter off the side table as he lunged at you. He managed to pin you to the wall by your throat.

You were gasping for air, having the wind knocked out of you. His grip around your throat was tight, you were hyperventilating now.

“Father stop! She’s not worth it! Let her go!” Patrick pleaded with his father.

His father just ignored him and sneered at you. “I’m done with people like you threatening to take away everything I've earned!”

You were clawing at his hands with your nails, “You’ve earned nothing!” You gasped out.

Senator Armstrong threw you to the ground harshly. You tried to scramble away when he picked up a sharp, antique letter opener and stood over you.

“I’m not going to let some little white trash tramp ruin my life.”

You flinched as he was about to strike, when the heavy doors of the study bursted open. Agents flooded in to apprehend Patrick and his father.

“Malcom Armstong you are under arrest for treason and attempted murder, you have the right to remain silent…” The agent’s voices trailed off as you looked around the room in shock.

Leon ran to you and cradled you into his arms.

“Y/N I’m so sorry, it wasn’t supposed to happen this way. Are you okay? What did he do to you?” He said holding you gently as if you two were alone.

You were shaking and unable to get your balance or even talk. Another agent with brown cropped hair walked over to them.

“She’s in shock sir, we should get her checked out by paramedics.”

Leon looked at you sympathetically and looked back at the agent again. “You’re right, take her out of the back entrance. We don’t need more of a show than we already have.”

***********************************************************************

You were in the back of the ambulance with a blanket around your shoulders as another agent was taking your statement.

You witnessed a crowd surrounding the squad cars as they were taking Patrick and his father into US Marshall custody.

Suzanne looked disheveled as her once prim updo was now askew as she pleaded with the agents not to take her son and husband. The reporters that were supposed to report on the party were now snapping pictures of the scene, their fancy bulb cameras flashing as other members of high society laughed at her misfortune.

The only ones who seemed concerned were the members of your own family.

You shivered as the reminder of how fragile the life you would have had, was. People who were talking of this party as the social event of the season were now laughing in Suzanne’s face in one of the worst moments of her life.

She deserved it, but it still didn’t feel good to watch.

You were brought out of your thoughts when the agent left and a familiar handsome face came into sight.

“Leon!” You said excitedly.

He came over and sat next to you with a bottle of soda.

“This is for you, you earned this and a thousand more after tonight.” He popped off the cap and handed it to you.

“Thanks Leon.”

“Your statement as well as the other guests of the party that heard the commotion are going to be good enough to keep the Armstrong men away for a long time.” He said putting an arm around you.

“Let’s hope so.”

“How are you feeling?”

“I’m scared.”

“For what? Everything’s going to be okay, they’re not going to be able to hurt you anymore.” He said rubbing your back.

“Senator Armstrong said something disturbing about my father, he said he didn’t really own the land we live on.”

Leon turned to face you. “You can’t trust anything he says. He was trying to manipulate you. I promise I’ll look into it for you.”

You hugged his neck tightly. “Thank you Leon, for everything.”

He returned your hug.

“Anything for you, Y/n.”

*****************************************

Leon was right, The Armstrongs didn’t own your family’s land. In fact, after the arrests it was clear the Armstrong’s were in major debt themselves.

Suzanne, lonely and destitute, started selling the family’s possessions. She quickly moved out of town to be “with family in her time of need.”

Word got out that you had played an active role in the investigation and apprehension of Patrick and Malcolm. Reporters would flock to the farm and loiter around just to get a glimpse of the young lady who helped “save the state of Georgia.”

Eventually, the reporters’ harassment became so bad you had to have an onsite police officer, and Leon was happy to volunteer for the job.

Leon spent the next few days following the incident patrolling your family’s land. Your family started to warm up to Leon, even your mother.

One Sunday, your mother invited Leon to stay for dinner, which was a big deal; usually, only immediate family members were invited to dinner.

The night was enjoyable with daddy talking happily about his time in the service and Leon talking about working in the Nation’s capital.

The table grew quiet when Leon broke the news that he had to go back to accept a higher position with the FBI. He had earned his spot for his work on the Armstrong sting and would be moving back to Washington D.C.

You felt your heart drop at the news, but you were happy for him.

“Leon, it feels like we’re just getting to know you,” Mama said sadly. “Are you sure you’re heading back so soon?”

“Yes ma’am, unfortunately duty calls. I will miss your family’s hospitality.”

“It’s alright son, I remember those days,” Daddy said to Leon. “Feel free to keep in touch if you ever come back to Springfield county.”

“Of course, I plan to.”

That night, you were at your regular meeting spot, unsure if Leon would meet you there. You were about to go back to the house, when familiar headlights rolled up behind you.

Leon walked out of the car and jogged over to you.

“You’re late.” You said sardonically.

“I’m sorry sweet girl. Would you forgive me if I told you I have good news?”

Your heart fluttered and you were stunned. He was definitely leaving, what good news could he possibly have?

Leon pulled out an envelope and handed it to you. It was plain white but it was addressed to you.

“Well open it!” He said grinning excitedly.

You fumbled the envelope in your hands, ripping it open. The official “NASA” letterhead was printed on the top of the page. You thought you were going to pass out. They were offering you an internship at their headquarters in D.C.

“Leon, how did you manage this? I didn’t submit any of my work!”

Leon smiled mischievously. “I may have pulled a string or two, when I mentioned who you were and a certain former secretary of mine left samples of her work in the office.”

You were shocked. “I don’t know if I deserve this, I feel like I’ll just mess it up, surely there’s someone more deserving,” you stammered out.

He grabbed you by the waist and pulled you close. “Baby, you deserve this more than anyone I know.”

You blushed, this was the first time Leon called you by a pet name.

“Thank you Leon, I don’t know what to say.”

“Say that you’ll come with me, I’ll promise to take care of you. I’ll prove to your parents I’ll keep you safe.”

“Is this your way of making things official, Leon?”

He smiled and cradled your face in his hand, his thumb brushing against your cheek.

“Yes, if you’ll have me too.”

You leaned up and kissed him, enveloping him in a passionate kiss. Leon couldn’t hold himself back and deepened the kiss.

For the first time, you felt a fire in your belly, you couldn’t deny the attraction and wanted to take things further.

You let your fingers wander to his chest and Leon moaned into your mouth. He took this as an invitation to start kissing at the nape of your neck and you let out a whimper of pleasure.

Leon abruptly stopped.

“Maybe we should continue this back at my place, would you be okay with that?” He asked, his face flushed.

You nodded enthusiastically.

The ride felt like hours, the sexual tension building between you two. He couldn’t keep his hands off you, grazing his fingers along your bare thighs. You had never felt so attracted to anyone before, the fire in your belly was getting more intense and it was starting to become painful.

When you arrived at Leon’s small home, the two of you wasted no time continuing where you left off. After a couple of minutes of heavy petting and kissing you broke off.

“Leon, I want you.” You managed out in between kisses.

“Are you sure you want to do this with me?”

You kissed him roughly. “Didn’t you just hear me? I want you, I want you to be my first.”

It was his turn to blush. “If you’re sure.” He went to his bedside table and grabbed a small square foil packet.

Suddenly you felt nervous again. Leon must have sensed this because he kissed your forehead sweetly.

“We can stop anytime you want, I won’t be upset, okay?”

You just nodded.

He crawled on top of you and you wrapped your arms around his neck, bring him closer as he started to kiss the sensitive skin of your neck and your collarbones.

You shivered as you started to shrug off the top of your dress. Leon noticed and started to help you out of the flimsy fabric restraints.

You felt exposed as you instinctively covered yourself with your hands.

Leon smiled at you. “You’re too sweet, here I’ll make you feel less self conscious.” He started to unbutton his shirt and revealed his chiseled body. He looked like one of the Greek statues you saw at the art museum in Atlanta. He was perfect and you wanted to be completely enveloped in him.

You removed your hands from your breasts and shivered at the cold air hitting your skin.

The feeling was short lived as Leon brought his large warm hands to your breasts and began to massage them.

You moaned out, not expecting the sensation to arouse you as much as it did.

He kissed you again, “You like that baby?”

You just shook your head aggressively, you were suddenly too timid to speak.

“Don’t get shy on my now baby, we're just getting started.” He said as he took one of your nipples into his mouth, rolling it softly.

You squeezed his bicep tightly, you wanted more. You instinctively opened your legs so he could move closer to you.

He started to Kiss down your abdomen lingering in the area where your lower belly meets your pelvis, scattering the sensation along the area.

You began to Intuitively arch your back to bring your most sensitive parts to him. His teasing was causing your core to ache.

“Leon please,” you pleaded, you were unsure of what you wanted, all you knew was that whatever it was, Leon would know.

“Be patient baby, I have to make sure you’re ready for me first.”

He brought his fingers to gently remove the thin fabric of your panties off your thighs.

You were left completely exposed to him, just how you imagined.

“You are so beautiful, I can’t believe you’re all mine.”

You leaned up to kiss him. “Same to you.”

He wasted no time finding your sensitive clit, the sensation of someone else stimulating your most sensitive and intimate area was intense. You leaned back and tried to relax, to experience the pleasure fully.

“That’s my good girl, let me take care of you.” Leon said kissing your inner thigh. You were closing in on your first orgasm and your lower body twitched as the waves of pleasure hit you.

You moaned Leon’s name as you felt your body spasm uncontrollably.

“That’s it, I want you nice and ready for me baby.” He said putting a thick digit into you.

You were so right around his finger. You had never tried to feel yourself down there. You heard the girls at school talking about it, but you were always too embarrassed to even try.

“Baby, you’re so tight. You might not be able to take me.”

“Leon, please, I want you in me.” You moaned. You didn’t care if it hurt at first, you just wanted to be close to him and for him to feel the same pleasure you were experiencing. It was only fair.

“If you say so, but I need you to come one more time for me and we’ll try.”

“Yes sir.”

He smile at you and pet your hair. “Be careful baby, I like the sound of that a little too much.”

He inserted two fingers inside of you, stretching your tight opening, while stimulating your clit. You moaned in pain and pleasure as you tried to adjust to his size.

He whispered sweet nothings to you and it took a little bit longer, but you came again, this time around his fingers.

He pulled his fingers out of you revealing your slick around him.

“I think you’re ready for the real thing baby.”

He grabbed the little square packet from earlier and opened it up. He undid his pants revealing his entire naked body to you.

You couldn’t help but blush, never seeing a man fully naked in the flesh. Leon seemed to be perfect in every way.

He leaned down and kissed up your neck to your cheeks sweetly. He gently laid you down on the pillows, and entertained himself into you.

He leaned his face close to you that your noses almost touched. “Are you ready?”

“Yes I am, I don’t want anyone else but you.”

“If you insist, baby. Just tell me if you need to stop.”

Leon sat back up and aligned his tip with your tight entrance. He slowly pushed himself in. Your face contorted in slight discomfort and anxiety.

“Do you want me to go slower? Or would you want me to just rip the bandaid off?”

“I think I just want to get the hard part over with.” You answered honestly.

“If you insist, babe.” He said and thrusted half of his length into you.

You squealed, feeling the unfamiliar sensation of something that deep inside of you, your vagina stretched to accommodate his size. You were grabbing at his forearms, tense.

“Let me know when you’re ready for me to keep going sweetheart, you’re doing great.” He said assuringly, littering you with gentle kisses.

“I’m ready, I can handle it.” You said, half believing yourself.

“I know you can, baby girl.”

He began to thrust slowly into you. The burning sensation slowly turned into pure pleasure, the new sensation of having someone inside of you was exciting.

It was so erotic, you didn’t care. You couldn’t have picked a better partner for your first time. You were experiencing so much pleasure you hadn’t realized when Leon’s thrusts became shallow.

“Mmm, baby I’m gonna cum,” he panted out.

“I want you inside me when you cum.” You pleaded, you knew he was wearing a condom and you didn’t want the moment to end so abruptly.

He said nothing as he lifted your legs behind your knees and began to thrust into you, this time rougher. You loved it, he was hitting your innermost parts and wasn’t holding back.

He had given so much of himself to you, the feeling of your body giving him pleasure felt gratifying, the thought of it alone pushed you to your third orgasm.

Your body twitched around him, causing him to climax, his member thrusting into your now overstimulated body.

He remained inside of you for a short time before pulling out and discarding the used condom.

The two of you laid in silence embracing before you broke the silence.

“That was amazing.”

He leaned over to you. “I’m glad you liked it.”

“Liked it? I loved it. No wonder Patrick was a tail chaser.”

Leon laughed out loud.

“I’m glad we don’t have to worry about him anymore.”

“Me too,” you said thoughtlessly.

“What’s on your mind baby?” Leon said, pulling you to look into your eyes.

“Do you think we have a chance of making it? You’re not going to get bored of me that we’ve slept together?” You asked innocently.

He embraced you. “Y/N, I love you. I wouldn’t just abandon you after everything I put you through.”

“You really mean that? You love me Leon?”

He kissed you passionately. “I do, I just hope

you feel the same.” He looked at you with pleading eyes.

“Of course, I love you too, and I won’t ever stop.”

The two of you held each other until you fell asleep in each other's arms.

#resident evil fanfiction #resident evil #leon kennedy #leon kennedy x reader #resident evil infinite darkness #resident evil alternate universe

[engie-ivy]

“What are you saying, Remus?”

Remus doesn’t spare him. “You won’t get custody over Harry as long as I’m around.”

Sirius closes his eyes. “It doesn’t stop, does it?”

It was supposed to be better after the war...

Already Decided

“I’m surprised you found me,” Remus says, folding his arms over his chest.

Dumbledore looks up from the cup of tea he’s holding. “I wasn’t aware you were trying to hide.”

Remus shrugs. “I wasn’t. Not per se. It’s just been so long. I figured I’d be hard to track.”

Dumbledore takes in Remus’ worn robes, greying hair and the dark circles under his eyes. “You look bad.”

“Why, thank you,” Remus says with a wry laugh. “That’s what years of living with my condition tends to do.”

“I would’ve thought the new Wolfsbane Potion made things easier for you.”

Now Remus laughs out loud. “Yes, because of course an expensive potion targeted to a population for whom it’s practically impossible to get a decent job is going to solve it all.”

“I actually got a job offer for you,” Dumbledore responds. “I’m in need of a new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher.”

This makes Remus laugh again. “Well, that doesn’t surprise me.”

Dumbledore puts down his tea. “I assume you’ve heard about Pettigrew’s escape?”

Remus’ face darkens. “Yes. I assume you know about...?”

“His Animagus form?” Dumbledore finishes. “I’ve been informed. I must say, Lupin, I’m disappointed in you. When I gave you the opportunity to attend Hogwarts, I had expected you to adhere to the rules set for the other students’ safety.”

There was a time in which Dumbledore’s disappointment would’ve gutted Remus. Hearing the words now, however, he can’t bring himself to care. It’s been a long time since he cared. “So, do you expect that Pettigrew will be targeting Harry Potter?”

“It’s possible,” Dumbledore replies calmly. “Harry Potter’s godfather is concerned, to say the least. It’ll help if I hire a trustworthy Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher to keep an eye out. He wasn’t well pleased with me when the last one I hired tried to Obliviate Harry, and the one before that tried to kill him.”

“I reckon he wasn’t,” Remus replies.

“If you were willing to fill the position, you could be provided with a vast supply of Wolfsbane,” Dumbledore says casually.

“While if I refuse your bribe, you’ll leave me to my fate?”

Dumbledore doesn’t even bother to reply.

Remus sighs. “I used to admire you, you know.” He shakes his head. Anyways, if you want to appease Harry Potter’s godfather, you shouldn’t be asking me. I’d assume he hates me.”

“I thought Harry Potter’s godfather was your friend?” Dumbledore asks innocently.

Remus clenches his jaw. “You know very well what he was to me.”

12 years earlier

Remus lowers the letter he’d been reading when he hears the front door open. He still feels the urge to jump to his feet and grab his wand, but the war is over and a door opening doesn’t mean an attack might be coming anymore.

“So, Dumbledore tells me they’re going to give Malfoy the benefit of the doubt,” Sirius immediately goes off as he enters the kitchen. “Can you believe it? I’ll kiss Kreacher before I believe he acted under the influence of the Imperius Curse!” He shrugs off his leather jacket and hangs it over a chair. “But Dumbledore says we have to believe it as long as we don’t have strong evidence that proofs the contrary.” He rolls his eyes. “Yet they sent Pettigrew to Azkaban without so much as a trial.”

Remus arches an eyebrow. “Surely you don’t mind that?”

“Of course not!” Sirius’ face darkens as he remembers the mass murder, but even worse, the betrayal that signed their best friends’ death sentences. “But if they’re going to send people to prison without a trial, I wish they’d do it with the rich ones as well. No double standards, y’know?”

His eyes fall in the letter Remus had been reading. “What’s that?”

Remus hands it to him wordlessly. No use postponing it.

Eviction Notice

To: R. J. Lupin

According to our information, you, as a registrant of the Lycanthrope Database, are currently the inhabitant of this premise.

Regretfully, we must inform you that under the recently passed Anti-Werewolf Legislation Act of 1981, it is stated that ‘no one affected with the Lycanthropy affliction is allowed to live within a 10-kilometre radius from an urban area, where the creature can pose a danger to others’.

In accordance with this law, we urge you to vacate this premise as soon as possible, as otherwise legal action shall be undertaken.

Was signed,

The Ministry of Magic

Remus studies Sirius’ face closely while he’s reading, and he sees it: Sirius is worried and tired. So very tired. Only for a split second, then Sirius plasters that unaffected smile on his face as he throws the letter back on the table. “Well, that was to be expected any time now. We’ll find a way to deal with that later.”

He’s pretending for my sake, Remus thinks. Acting like he’s not concerned, so I won’t feel guilty.

“I should leave,” Remus says.

“We probably should,” Sirius sighs. “I don’t really see another outcome. I’m sure we’ll be able to find a new place we can live. I’ll start asking around.”

“And then what?” Remus asks. “A week, maybe two, until another letter comes?”

“What would you suggest, then?”

“I already suggested it,” Remus says. “I should leave.”

“No.”

“Padfoot...”

“No! For Godric’s sake, Moony! We fought a war together! We risked our lives for each other! We faced death side by side! We managed to withstand suspicion and false accusations! And now you want to give up because of a dumb letter?”

“It’s not just the letter,” Remus says. “You know it’s not! The attitude towards werewolves in England has always been bad, but now so many werewolves have fought on You Know Who’s side during the war and the tales of Greyback’s cruelties are rapidly spreading through the wizarding community, it has gotten so much worse. It won’t stop here.”

“Then we’ll spread the tale of the brave werewolf in the Order of the Phoenix who risked his life fighting for what's right!” Sirius exclaims.

Remus shakes his head. “They won’t listen. You know what people are like. They only listen to stories that fit within their pre-existing worldview. Fear will lead to hatred, and it’s only a matter of time before hatred leads to violence. It’s not safe for me to remain in England.”

“We’ll move to some cottage in the countryside,” Sirius pleads. “Far away from any ‘urban area’, where no one will bother us! Or we’ll cross the English Channel into France! I speak French!”

Remus gives him a small, sad smile. “You’re trying to get custody over Harry. The Ministry won’t grant you custody if you live in some abandoned cottage, far away from any facilities, schools, and other children to play with, much less if you go abroad without a job, or even a place to live.”

“The hearing for Harry’s custody is next week,” Sirius replies stubbornly. “Once we have it, we can do whatever we want!”

It’s tempting. Merlin, it’s tempting. Remus wants nothing more than to be persuaded by Sirius’ arguments, to believe it really is possible, that Harry, Sirius and he can live happily ever after in some cottage in the countryside, together. But Remus has to be sensible.

“Harry is their national treasure,” he says. “The famous Boy Who Lived. Lily and James made their wishes evidently clear, but still many people from the Ministry don’t want to see him raised by a Black. They’ll latch on to every little thing they can to deny you custody. And being associated with a werewolf is no little thing.”

Sirius looks at him, fear visible in his eyes. “What are you saying, Remus?”

Remus doesn’t spare him. “You won’t get custody over Harry as long as I’m around.”

Sirius closes his eyes. “It doesn’t stop, does it?”

“Sirius...”

“Fabian, Gideon, Marlene, Dorcas, Regulus, Lily, James... Hasn’t it been enough?”

Remus gets up from his chair and sits down on his knees in front of Sirius, taking his hands in his own. “Look at me, Sirius. Please look at me.”

Sirius opens his eyes, silent tears streaming down his face. “Don’t,” he whispers. “Don’t make me choose. You’re all I have left. You and Harry... You’re all I have left. Please, don’t make me choose.”

Remus gathers the trembling man in front of him in his arms and rubs soothing circles on his back. “I won’t,” he says. “I promise I won’t make you choose.”

Sirius pulls away slightly to cup Remus’ face in his hands and searches his eyes, looking for the lie. Remus encircles his wrists with his hands and looks back with a steady gaze.

“I love you, Remus Lupin,” Sirius says earnestly, almost like a challenge.

“I love you too, Sirius,” Remus replies without hesitation.

Sirius kisses him fiercely, desperately. Remus allows himself to get caught up in it, allows himself to forget. Forget about the prejudice, the legislation, the letter, the hearing. Forget about everything, just for the moment. Everything but the feel of Sirius’ lips on his skin and Sirius’ hands on his body.

Afterwards, Remus is lying on his back in their bed, staring up at the ceiling. Sirius is fast asleep, tucked against his side, an arm splayed across his chest and his head resting in the crook of his neck.

Moonlight drifts through the curtains. Moonlight. Moonlight that has already taken so much from him. This will be the last. After this, there’s nothing left.

He carefully detangles himself from Sirius and silently puts his clothes back on. As he looks down on Sirius’ sleeping form, he can’t help but reach out and carefully brush a strand of hair from his face. “I won’t make you choose,” he whispers. “I’ve already chosen for you.”

Sirius takes a few sips from the water placed in front of him, while the wizard at the other side of the table, a middle-aged man in sharp, dark blue wizarding robes, rummaged through his papers.

“Well, Mr Black,” he says, as Sirius places his glass back down. “The documents seem to be in order. Mr and Mrs Potter were very thorough in their paperwork. They have fully filled in each form, dated and signed by both of them. I must say, their wishes are evidently clear.”

The witch sitting next to the man, a short woman with a broad face, wide mouth and bulging eyes, somehow reminding Sirius of a toad, wearing pink, frilly robes, lets out a small cough.

The wizard, however, ignores her. “I assume you’ve been thinking about practical matters, such as education and healthcare?”

The witch makes another coughing noise.

The wizard pointedly keeps ignoring her. “I must tell you, even if you’re given custody, the Ministry is planning on monitoring the child closely. With everything he’s been through and the publicity around him, it’s a precarious situation. If we find that you cannot offer the boy a stable home environment...”

The toad-like witch lets out another small cough. The wizard grits his teeth, but Sirius is barely aware of it. He finally feels an emotion burning through the numbness, something fierce. “I will provide him with a home.”

“Don’t get me wrong, Mr Black,” the wizard says. “I’m not trying to aggravate you. It’s for your own sake, as well as the boy’s. Mr Black, you’re only twenty-two years old, you’ve been through some very traumatic events, and you’re offering to take care of an infant child as a single parent. It’s not unreasonable to fear you may get overwhelmed-”

Another one of those small coughs, and the wizard jerks his head around. “Dolores, is there anything you’d like to add, or can I perhaps get you something for your throat?”

The toad-like witch doesn’t hesitate to take over the conversation, her iron-grey eyes boring into Sirius’ empty grey ones.

“You’re known to have close associations with a Lycanthrope.” She speaks in a high-pitched voice that makes an oddly terrifying contrast with the cruelty in her eyes.

“I used to have,” Sirius replies.

She raises her eyebrows. “Not anymore?”

“Not anymore.”

“So there won’t be a dangerous dark creature hovering around the small child?”

“There won’t.”

“And where is the werewolf now, then?”

“I don’t know.”

“How do you not-”

“Mr Black,” the wizard interrupts the toad-like witch. “Perhaps you can save us time by just telling Ms Umbridge what your current relationship to R.J. Lupin is?”

Sirius drinks the rest of his water, which he knows to be heavily spiked with Veritaserum, before answering. “There is none. He left, and I don’t think I’ll ever see him again.”

#my tumblr writing #wolfstar angst #sad wolfstar #wolfstar #wolfstar fanfiction #wolfstar fic #marauders #marauders fanfiction #marauders fic #sirius black #remus lupin #remus x sirius #first wizarding war #hurt sirius black #sirius black does not go to azkaban #hurt remus lupin

[socialjusticeinamerica]

I post somewhat regularly about current trans issues and these articles get the lowest number of likes and reblogs of anything I put up. It’s almost like nobody cares. Things will never improve for anyone if we only concern ourselves with our own micro-causes. We’re waging a war for the soul of this country and we need to focus on the big picture. These attacks are increasing because of the sudden wave of trans-phobic hate inspired by Republikkkan state legislatures introducing a tidal wave of anti-trans bills.

If we don’t resist all the Republikkkan attacks we will be fractured and will be under the boot of another fascist Trump. One that is more zealous and competent. BLM is the tip of the iceberg. We must end the hatred of all marginalized people. We must stand up for people of color, all lgbt, undocumented and documented immigrants, religious minorities, atheist and agnostic minorities, the elderly, the poor, the disabled and chronically ill, the traumatized veterans, victims and families of gun violence, the disenfranchised, victims of police brutality, victims of minimum wage and wage theft, the homeless, those suffering from gender inequality, and so many more that aren’t listed.

You can nitpick this, ignore it, or continue to focus on just your cause. I’m hoping more people see the big picture and stand together to support all marginalized people and all social justice causes. Privilege isn’t always literal. For example just because many cops are racists and disproportionately shoot African-Americans doesn’t mean they don’t shoot white folk as well. They do and in shockingly large numbers, it’s a matter of percentages and perceptions. I support BLM 100% and you should as well, but remember, if the cops/racists/Republikkkans/corporations can get away with targeting one group today you can expect them to go after another next until you have a domino effect where nobody is safe, which many are already starting to realize.

It’s impossible to please or even placate all the tumblr communities, seems like someone is always disgruntled, offended, or disenchanted for whatever reason. Odds are if you’re reading this you have a sense of how the billionaire/corporate class is using the Republikkkans against nearly everything most of us stand for. They are a numerical minority and rely on a poorly educated, and mostly bigoted base, located mainly in the south but spreading into the southwest and lower Midwest. We’re only human and it’s natural for us to have some disagreements and dislikes but we’re mainly progressives and decent people. We must RESIST as a block and lookout for everyone. There is strength in unity. Billionaires have unlimited dark money and they fund hundreds of foundations which spread their message of corruption, hatred, and discrimination. They have purchased an entire political party and now have three cable propaganda outlets (Fox, OAN, & Newsmax). They own most of the talk radio stations in the country and buy huge blocks of time on most of the others. This is their gateway drug for radicalization of right-wingers. Thousands of internet sites bolster their message and hundreds of print and publishing outlets further their agenda. They spend billions per year to oppress us and have thousands of employees spreading propaganda and radicalizing recruits 24/7/365. Meanwhile the Dems have a handful of progressive politicians begging for grass roots donations.

BOTH parties are not the same. The Republikkkans are a well oiled machine with unlimited resources, tens of thousands of worker bees, and cutting edge technology. They have hundreds of lawyers and academics working in far right think tanks to write state and federal legislation for their minions to pass to disenfranchise and oppress us. The Dems are the proverbial blind men feeling the elephant. They are completely lacking a national structure and cohesive agenda. As a whole they are working for us but are years behind in structure and funding.

We are the numerical majority! We must resist at every level and every opportunity and we must do it together. We must protect the small number of trans, force an end to the police violence that plagues the African-American community, and show the same zeal for ending the epidemic of gun violence that could take anyone of us at anytime. If we can bring the same mass participation enthusiasm we have for some causes to all causes we can prevail and have the modern progressive nation we deserve. I’m not trying to be preachy, self-righteous, or a common know-it-all. We have the numbers and the momentum. Let’s use it. Ousting Trump was only the beginning. The Republikkkan empire is striking back hard and historically the party that loses the White House tends to take the Congress in the mid-terms. Do you want to lose our power to Mitch McConnell, Kevin McCarthy, and all their heinous minions?

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

May 2, 2021

Heather Cox Richardson

On Friday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and 36 Republicans sent a letter to Education Secretary Miguel Cardona accusing him of trying to advance a “politicized and divisive agenda” in the teaching of American history. This is a full embrace of the latest Republican attempt to turn teaching history into a culture war.

On April 19, the Department of Education called for public comments on two priorities for the American History and Civics Education programs. Those programs work to improve the “quality of American history, civics, and government education by educating students about the history and principles of the Constitution of the United States, including the Bill of Rights; and… the quality of the teaching of American history, civics, and government in elementary schools and secondary schools, including the teaching of traditional American history.”

The department is proposing two priorities to reach low-income students and underserved populations. The Republicans object to the one that encourages “projects that incorporate racially, ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse perspectives into teaching and learning.”

History teaching that reflects our diverse history and the way our diversity supports democracy can help to improve racial equality in society, the document states. It calls out the 1619 Project of the New York Times, as well as the resources of the Smithsonian’s new National Museum of African American History, to note how our understanding of diversity is changing. It notes that schools across the country are teaching “anti-racist practices,” which it follows scholar Ibram X. Kendi by identifying as “any idea that suggests the racial groups are equals in all their apparent differences—that there is nothing right or wrong with any racial group.”

The Education Department invited comments on these priorities. The department does not have much at all to do with local school curricula.

McConnell’s letter in response to this call for comments is disingenuous, implying connections between the teaching of a diverse past, the sorry state of history education, and the fact that “American pride has plummeted to its lowest level in 20 years.” There is, of course, no apparent connection between them.

He complains that Cardona’s “proposal”—it’s a call for comments—would “distort bipartisan legislation that was led by former Senators Lamar Alexander, Ted Kennedy, and Robert Byrd.” That legislation was indeed landmark for the teaching of American history… but its funding was cut in 2012.

What McConnell’s letter is really designed to do is to throw a bone to Trump Republicans. On Thursday, Trump called for Senate Republicans to replace McConnell with a Trump loyalist, and embracing their conviction that our history is being hijacked by radicals is cheap and easy.

The prime object of Republican anger is the 1619 Project, called out in McConnell’s letter by name. The project launched in the New York Times Magazine in August 2019 to coincide with the 400th anniversary of the first landing of 20 to 30 enslaved Africans at the English colony of Virginia. Led by New York Times reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones, the project placed race and Black Americans “at the very center of the story we tell ourselves about who we are as a country.”

The 1619 Project argued that the landing of the Black slaves marked “the country’s very origin” since it “inaugurated a barbaric system of chattel slavery that would last for the next 250 years.” From slavery “and the anti-black racism it required,” the editors claimed, grew “nearly everything that has truly made America exceptional: its economic might, its industrial power, its electoral system, its diet and popular music, the inequities of its public health and education, its astonishing penchant for violence, its income inequality, the example it sets for the world as a land of freedom and equality, its slang, its legal system and the endemic racial fears and hatreds that continue to plague it to this day.”

Their goal, they said, was “to reframe American history,” replacing 1776 with 1619 as the year of the nation’s birth.

The most explosive claim the project made was that one of the key reasons that the American colonists broke away from Britain was that they wanted to protect slavery. Scholars immediately pushed back. Northwestern University’s Dr. Leslie M. Harris, a scholar of colonial African American history, wrote: “Although slavery was certainly an issue in the American Revolution, the protection of slavery was not one of the main reasons the 13 Colonies went to war.” The project tempered its language over that issue but stood by its larger argument.

Trump Republicans conflated this project with so-called “Critical Race Theory,” a related scholarly concept that argues that racism is not simply the actions of a few bad actors, but rather is baked into our legal system, as well as the other institutions that make up our society. This is not a new concept, and it is not limited to Black Americans: historian Angie Debo’s And Still the Waters Run: The Betrayal of the Five Civilized Tribes launched this argument in 1940 when it showed how Oklahoma’s legislators had written discrimination against Indigenous people into the law. But the idea that white people have an automatic leg up in our country has taken on modern political teeth as Trump Republicans argue that Black and Brown people, among others, are at the bottom of society not because of discriminatory systems but because they are inferior.

The former president railed against recent historical work emphasizing race as “a series of polemics grounded in poor scholarship” that has “vilified our Founders and our founding.” Calling them “one-sided and divisive,” he opposed their view of “America as an irredeemably and systemically racist country.” He claimed, without evidence, that “students are now taught in school to hate their own country, and to believe that the men and women who built it were not heroes, but rather villains.” He said that “this radicalized view of American history” threatens to “fray and ultimately erase the bonds that knit our country and culture together.”

On November 2, 2020, just before the election, former president Trump established a hand-picked commission inside the Department of Education to promote “patriotic education” in the nation’s schools, national parks, and museums.

The commission released its report, written not by historians but by right-wing activists and politicians, on Martin Luther King Day, just two days before Trump left office. “The 1776 Report” highlighted the nation’s founding documents from the Revolutionary Era, especially the Declaration of Independence. It said that the principles written in the declaration “show how the American people have ever pursued freedom and justice.” It said “our history is… one of self-sacrifice, courage, and nobility.” No other nation, it said, had worked harder or done more to bring to life “the universal truths of equality, liberty, justice, and government by consent.”

Then–Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tweeted that multiculturalism [is]... not who America is.” It “distort[s] our glorious founding and what this country is all about.” Hannah-Jones retorted: "When you say that multiculturalism is 'not who America is' and 'distorts our glorious founding' you unwittingly confirm the argument of the 1619 Project: That though we were ... a multiracial nation from our founding, our founders set forth a government of white rule. Cool."

On his first day in office, President Joe Biden dissolved the 1776 Commission and took its report off the official government website.

But the fight goes on. The Pulitzer Center, which supports journalism but is not associated with Columbia University’s Pulitzer Prizes, produced a school curriculum based on the 1619 Project; Republican legislators in five states—Arkansas, Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri, and South Dakota—filed virtually identical bills to cut funding to any school or college that used the material. Other Republican-led states have proposed funding “patriotic education.” In Mississippi, Governor Tate Reeves called for a $3 million fund to promote teaching that “educates the next generation in the incredible accomplishments of the American Way” to counter “far-left socialist teachings that emphasize America’s shortcomings over the exceptional achievements of this country.” South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem proposed a curriculum that explains “why the U.S. is the most special nation in the history of the world.”

——

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

#political #Letters From An American #Heather Cox Richardson #history #racism #exceptionalism #corrupt GOP #criminal GOP #multiculturalism

[robert-c]

Traditional Values

This phrase always tempts me to laugh, especially when I see who says it, and hear what they mean by it. I would imagine it included things embodied in say, the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution; things about freedom of religion, speech, liberty and justice. The ideals we are still striving to fully implement.

But apparently those most fond of using this phrase mean traditional practices, not values. For example, black people were slaves for almost the first 100 years of this republic and for the next 100 couldn’t use the same water fountains, go to the same schools, etc. as white people. Despite the progress of the last 60 years there is still an enormous difference between people of color and whites in education, income, and incarceration for similar crimes.

Support of “traditional” practice doesn’t stop there. Despite the fairly clear language prohibiting legislation favoring a particular religion they cling to the days when a particularly Christian Protestant view was not only dominant, but influenced law even more than current anti-Choice advocates desire (e.g. Sunday closing laws, “blue laws”, prohibiting the sale of certain items on Sundays [hammers OK, nails NO, and more], prohibitions on birth control, etc.).

And let’s not forget the simple censorship of language and subject matter that to some extent still exists on major public networks; all defended on the basis that these are “offensive” to some people. Well, if there is a right “not to be offended” then my rights have been violated. I am offended by televangelists. I’m offended by racists, and those who “blindly back the blue”. Being a defender of the Constitution I don’t think I have the right to shut them down – but neither do I think they should have the power to shut down anyone else.

Let’s take the mask and gloves off. “Traditional Values” is just code for enforcing a social order and culture that existed 50 to 100 years ago and was always out of step with the best interpretation of ideals in our founding documents. It is language crafted to appeal to a nostalgic image of your youth, or even the fabled youth of your parents. It isn’t about what is fair, just or reasonable.

Self-centeredness is also part of our “traditional values”, so let’s look at that. How in the world does the personal sexual preferences of a waiter or waitress affect their service to someone at the restaurant? Why is it any of their business as long as they get what they have paid for; efficient, friendly service? Why do they care who is in the stall next to then in the public restroom? What’s it to them if their neighbor doesn’t go to church and stays drunk on Sunday? Don’t they believe that God is going to deal with him later? Why do they think it’s their business? Is their God so weak that He needs their help?

Let’s call it like it is – “traditional values” is nothing more than an excuse for trying to dictate to others how they should live in the most personal ways. It is the opposite of everything this country ever stood for. Let’s not let them get away with projecting their ideas as somehow the “real America”. They are nothing more than a group of petty wannabe tyrants masquerading as a persecuted minority. Everything they attempt to claim that the “radical left” will do to personal liberty is exactly what they will do if they get power.

Perhaps their idea of “traditional values” has to do with business. Historically, most of the time that meant little or no regulation. Child labor, manipulation of the stock market, selling “medicines” that were ineffective or even dangerous, work places that were unsafe due to improper handling of hazardous materials, are just a few of the things that businesses used to be able to get away with, traditionally.

There has been more than half a century of myth making and lies to support the idea that the “old ways were the better ways”: that businesses are always good; that regulations are always bad; that we were founded as a “Christian” nation; that people are poor because they are lazy or stupid and don’t deserve any better; that material success means you are smarter, or a better person than others; that people receiving welfare or other charity are lazy cheats; that tolerance of those who disagree is the same as agreeing with them; that “political correctness” is something new and “leftist” (during the segregated south any mention racial equality or criticism of white supremacy could result in violence against you),and more.

We don’t have 50 years to combat these myths, but we may not need it if we call bullshit every time we hear one. I hope that everyone challenges these presumptions when people spout them. I know it won’t be easy, I generally prefer to avoid conflict and controversy in otherwise friendly settings. However, those on the extreme right have never followed these social conventions; they are almost always the first to bring up a controversial political or religious topic to give themselves an excuse to “share their beliefs”. I see now that maintaining a polite silence only encourages them further and gives the impression of a greater agreement with their positions. We don’t have to become the obnoxious initiators of these conversations in every setting, but we shouldn’t sit quietly by.

[xtruss]

Diggers, Denial and Despair: The Macabre Story of the Srebrenica Cover-up!

“A Genocide of Muslims By the Criminal Christian Serb Forces!”

— Alastair Sloan, Peter Oborne | 6 May, 2017 | Middleeasreye.Net

Bosnian Serb genocide deniers are being courted by the Trump White House. Could rising anti-Muslim hatred in Europe lead to another killing spree?

TUZLA, Bosnia-Herzegovina — There is no ventilation in the room where they keep the bodies. There is no central heating in the room the forensics team work in. The cleaners were laid off long ago because there is no money to pay them. The plumbing in one of the lavatories is bust. The rent has gone unpaid for 12 months. The building is a dreary industrial unit with uncleaned windows and broken shutters.

Welcome to the International Commission on Missing Persons in Tuzla where earnest and stretched forensic anthropologists try to identify the victims of the Srebrenica genocide.

'He said he wanted to kill me, he chased us across the field cursing my dead children ... The police did nothing; this is Srpska now'

We had blithely assumed that the international community - and the governments of both Bosnia-Herzegovina and Serbia - would have ensured that the organisation working to find mass graves, painstakingly identify the bodies and then inform the families, would be adequately funded until the very last victim was found. We were wrong: "We wanted to get sniffer dogs to find the remaining graves," the only staff member in the building told us, "but we couldn't afford it."

The rundown building is a perfect metaphor for a genocide that is forgotten by many, ignored by others, and completely denied by many of those most closely involved.

Dragana Vucetic, a 36-year-old Serb, is the director of the centre. A forensic anthropologist by training, she was a child in Belgrade during the terrible civil wars that ripped apart the Balkans in the 1990s.

Dragana joined the International Commission on Missing Persons straight after university and has worked tirelessly in the 13 years since.

Bida Smajlovic, 64, survivor of July 1995 massacre in Srebrenica, stands at a memorial center in Potocari, on March 24, 2016, while pointing at the name of her husband, engraved among names of other victims of the massacre. (AFP)

She showed us half a skeleton in a room next door to the mortuary, laid out on an aluminium table. She holds up a "skeletal inventory" in which they track the bones. Most of the diagram is red, indicating the bones that are missing. "It's a relief every time we identify someone," said Dragana. She described what she knew about the human remains in front of her. They belonged to a male, who was probably killed with a gunshot to the head.

Thanks to modern DNA techniques, the International Commission on Missing Persons has been able to identify him, even though much of his body is missing.

His family have been informed, and they are now ready to bury the remains. Many families, however, delay for years, waiting for more bones to be found. The reason for the majority of these delays is macabre.

Mass Graves Dispersed With Diggers

As Serbian paramilitaries found themselves hounded by international investigators intent on bringing the murderers to justice, they would carve up the mass graves at night with diggers, move the soil and bones to secondary sites, and then perhaps move them again for good measure.

The skeletons of Srebrenica were therefore spread across mass graves up to 20 kilometres apart.

It dawned on us that the genocide had actually worked

In the mortuary we see half a jaw with five teeth left in a semi-translucent plastic bag. On the shelves above each set of remains are corresponding brown paper bags containing whatever clothes, wallets or other scraps of belongings may have belonged to that person.

Most of the mass graves are now thought to have been found, but Dragana tells us there are one, "perhaps two”, still to go. Now that funding has dried up, they may never be discovered.

From Tuzla we drove towards Srebrenica, some 32 kilometres to the southeast, a haunting journey through villages that had been ethnically cleansed by Bosnian Serb forces and Serb militias during the war. Many Bosnian Muslims have left forever, while newly built churches mark Bosnian Serb possession of the territory.

We also realised that that we were taking the same journey – only in the reverse direction – as the so-called "Death March" of 11 July 1995 when 10,000 Bosnian Muslims fled Srebrenica towards Tuzla after UN forces refused to protect them. Of those 10,000, some 7,000 were killed by Serbian forces.

Eventually we reached Srebrenica, the site of the only genocide in Europe since the Second World War. The UN camp, which failed so terribly in its task to protect, has now been turned into a museum.

As at Tuzla, we were in for a very nasty shock. We had come to Srebrenica to learn about the events that led to the genocide. Chillingly, we learnt something else as well. It dawned on us that the genocide had actually worked.

Act of Defiance

With most of the town's former Muslim residents dead or emigrated, Srebrenica is now controlled by Bosnian Serbs, the majority of whom refuse to accept that that genocide took place.

We met a survivor of the genocide who moved back to Srebrenica in an act of defiance, marrying a fellow survivor and having three children.

'They are being taught that the genocide never happened. You turn on the TV and it is like the war never ended'

"For a long time I thought we could make a life here," he told us, but now they want to move away. "Our first child is starting at the local school. They are being taught that the genocide never happened. You turn on the TV and it is like the war never ended."

Nedzad Avdic cannot doubt the genocide took place because his uncle and father, and many other male relatives, were also killed (only the bodies of his uncle and father have been found so far). His story is horrific: he himself survived after crawling away badly wounded from a mound of defenceless men who had been shot dead by the Serbs.

Nedzad Avdic survived the massacre by crawling away (Rooful Ali/MEE)

"The denial of the genocide hurts," said Mejra Dzogaz, whose sons were murdered in the hills around Srebrenica. The elderly lady told us her story in the United Nations base from which refugees were expelled by Dutch United Nations peacekeepers in the hours before the killings began.

"We are still hoping the deniers will turn round finally and think about us and all the other mothers, but all they want to do is deny. If you turn the TV on all you can hear is them denying. We cry and cry and they still deny."

The mother told us that the first time she returned to her home, a neighbour threatened her. "He said he wanted to kill me, he chased us across the field cursing my dead children. Luckily my neighbour came. The police did nothing; this is Srpska now."

Srpska is the semi-autonomous northern and eastern region of Bosnia-Herzegovina which includes Srebrenica and borders Serbia. Since the war ended Srpska has been dominated by Bosnian Serbs.

Mejra Dzogaz told us that many of the same men she remembered carrying out the killings she now sees around the town, some holding offices at the local council or senior ranks in the local police force.

"I put so much sugar in my coffee every morning," she added, "but no matter how much I put in, it still tastes bitter."

Every year, the international community gathers in the cemetery at Srebrenica to commemorate the genocide.

The ceremony remains an important reminder that a genocide in Europe has happened since the Second World War, and that leaders should always be on their guard to avoid it happening again.

Mejra Dzogas says that she still sees people responsible for the genocide walking freely in Screbenica (Rooful Ali/MEE)

This year, the preparations for the memorial must be in doubt. Last October a Bosnian Serb nationalist politician, Mladen Grujicic, was elected mayor of Srebrenica. “When they prove it to be the truth," Grujicic has said, "I’ll be the first to accept it."

Like many Bosnian Serb nationalists, he still refuses to use the word genocide about the atrocities of July 1995 - even though Srebrenica is now regarded as the most well-documented and best evidenced war crime in history.

"I always said that what happened in Srebrenica was a terrible crime against the Bosnian population and that there were also terrible crimes against the Serbian population." Grjujicic has said, adding that "I leave it to competent institutions to qualify it."

Genocide Denial

This is genocide denial. He ignores the fact that the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia have both clearly ruled the killings "genocide".

A United Nations Security Council motion proposing to condemn the Srebrenica killings as genocide in 2015 was vetoed by Russia, Serbia and Republika Srpska's ally, but both the US Congress and the European Parliament have also passed resolutions calling the massacre a genocide.

The chairman of Remembering Srebrenica, Dr Waqar Azmi, said: "It is a cruel irony that the election of a new mayor of Srebrenica, who is a genocide denier, was made possible only because of the ethnic cleansing of its Muslim population." In Serbia itself, one 2015 poll showed 54 percent people do not question the crime's brutality, but an extraordinary 70 percent still deny it was "genocide". In November 2016, Serb legislators excluded Srebrenica from a new law forbidding genocide denial more widely.

Grujicic does not hold a minority view among political leaders in both Srpska and Serbia, and Bosnian Serbs who now live in the Republika Srpska.

Once 2015 poll showed that in Serbia, 54 percent of people do not question the crime’s brutality, but 70 percent still deny it was "genocide". In November 2016, Serb legislators excluded Srebrenica from a new law forbidding genocide denial more widely.

Boak Bollocks Mladen Grujicic, mayor of Srebrenica, with Zeljka Cvijanovic, prime minister of the Republic of Srpska, at the 65th National Prayer Breakfast in Washington on 2 February 2017 (Republic of Sprska Government)

With such a palpable atmosphere of denial everywhere we went, one question lingered on - could such a crime happen again?

It is as if European Jews who survived the Holocaust had found themselves being ruled by the same criminals who denied the gas chambers existed, and who themselves had ordered the killings.

There is more than a little crossover between the anti-Muslim Chetnik Serb nationalist ideology, and anti-Jewish German Nazism.

"It was genetically deformed material that embraced Islam," Biljana Plavsic, the president of the Republika Srpska from July 1996 to November 1998 - regarded as the ideologue who provided the pseudo-intellectual underpinning for the genocide - once said.

She was later sent to The Hague and convicted of war crimes. "And now, of course, with each successive generation it simply becomes concentrated," she continued.

'It really hurts when people deny the murder of your family. It is just like a dagger to the heart, as if they never even existed'

- Lilian Black, chair of the Holocaust Survivors' Association

"It gets worse and worse. It simply expresses itself and dictates their style of thinking, which is rooted in their genes. And through the centuries, the genes degraded further."

Plavsic was a former Fulbright scholar and acclaimed biologist, lending a chilling air of scientific callousness to the "Greater Serbia" ideology of Slobodan Milosevic.

Lilian Black, the chair of the Holocaust Survivors' Association and director of the Holocaust Heritage and Learning Centre for the North, was also on the trip.

Black was shocked by the culture of denial in Srpska, and drew comparisons with her own family's experiences.

"It really hurts when people deny the murder of your family. It is just like a dagger to the heart, as if they never even existed. When we got the Nazi records from the International Tracing Service in Germany of our family’s persecution it was a truly cathartic experience," she said.

"It was like saying yes they were here and this is what happened to them. It doesn't change their fate, but it is somehow a means to helping us accept what happened."

Bosnian Serb Nationalists' Trump links

Hungary was only a few hours drive from where we were standing, where Prime Miniser Viktor Orban has recently framed his own anti-refugee policy on distinctly religious grounds.

"Those arriving have been raised in another religion, and represent a radically different culture," Orban wrote in a commentary for Frankfurt Allgemeine Zeitung, a German newspaper.

"Most of them are not Christians, but Muslims."

In December, Slovakia banned public authorities from allowing Islam to be recognised as a religion.

Potocari cemetery overlooking the old United Nations base (Rooful Ali/MEE)

In the recent Dutch election, Geert Wilders described Islam as "possibly even more dangerous than Nazism". During his election campaign, US President Donald Trump called for a "total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States".

One of the most disturbing aspects of our trip was the discovery of links between the new Trump administration and the genocide-denying tendency amongst Bosnian Serb nationalists.

Mayor Grujicic, who denies Srebrenica was a genocide, was invited to attend the prestigious National Prayer Breakfast event in Washington two weeks after Trump was inaugurated.

Grujicic said he hoped it would be "an opportunity to make contacts with some important persons, and I will try to do something useful for Srebrenica's residents".

Milorad Dodik, the president of the Republika Srpska, also received an invite to the Trump inauguration ceremony, extended by his transition team (before it was knocked down by a concerned US State Department).

'Nobody tries to argue that the Holocaust wasn't so bad because the allies also committed some war crimes'

Dodik has called Srebrenica "the greatest deception of the 20th century".

Our trip, which was organised by the British charity Remembering Srebrenica, was hosted by Bosnian Muslims who had fought or suffered greatly during the war.

Systematic Atrocities

None denied that crimes by Muslim fighters had also taken place against Serbs, but there was an important and qualitative difference between the two.

According to Azmi, who is now working on plans for a Srebrenica memorial centre in Britain, "Nobody tries to argue that the Holocaust wasn't so bad because the allies also committed some war crimes.

"Bosniak [Bosnian Muslim] war crimes were sporadic and isolated, and Bosniaks were fighting for a multi-ethnic, multi-religious society. Serb war crimes were organised and systematic, and Serbs were fighting for a mono-ethnic 'Greater Serbia'."

It is clear when you visit Srebrenica that what happened there in July 1995 was by far the greatest atrocity of the Yugoslav conflict.

It was also not an incident that can be understood simply by tracing out the mechanics of what took place minute by minute, hour by hour, on those particular days.

Srebrenica was the culmination of years of increasingly explicit anti-Muslim hate speech in the Serbian media, and in the speeches and rhetoric of figures like Slobodan Milosevic, and the Bosnian Serb political and military leaders, Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic.

Milosevic, who was overthrown in 2000, was extradited to The Hague and accused of genocide and other war crimes but died before his trial concluded. Karadzic and Mladic were both captured in Serbia, in 2008 and 2011, respectively, with the former found guilty of genocide and sentenced to 40 years in prison. Mladic's trial, in which he faces two indicted for two counts of genocide, is ongoing.

Yet the strength of their anti-Muslim ideology clearly lives on in Serbia and Republika Srpska. It is this that made us wonder - could a Srebrenica-style genocide in Europe happen again?

— Alastair Sloan focuses on injustice and oppression in the West, Russia and the Middle East. He contributes regularly to The Guardian, Al Jazeera and Middle East Eye. Follow Alastair's work at www.unequalmeasures.com

— Peter Oborne was named freelancer of the year 2016 by the Online Media Awards for an article he wrote for Middle East Eye. He was British Press Awards Columnist of the Year 2013. He resigned as chief political columnist of the Daily Telegraph in 2015. His books include The Triumph of the Political Class, The Rise of Political Lying, and Why the West is Wrong about Nuclear Iran.

— The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.

— Photo: A Bosnian woman mourns over a coffin of a relative at the Potocari Memorial Center near the eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica on 10 July 2015 where 136 bodies found in mass grave sites in eastern Bosnia will be reburied on 20th anniversary of the Srebrenica massacre. (AFP)

— This article is available in French on Middle East Eye French edition.

[speakinghistorically]

Indigenous Peoples’ Day

Happy Indigenous Peoples’ Day! Of course, by the time most people will read this, it won’t be Indigenous Peoples’ Day, but that doesn’t mean we can’t talk about it. Before I start, I want to warn you that this post will be longer than usual and will mention American politics. I’m sorry, but I promise it is important.

The second Monday of October is Canadian Thanksgiving, as well as Columbus Day. It is a day to be thankful for friends and family, but it also celebrates a man whose legacy is one of genocide and slavery. For decades Indigenous activists have fought to have critical discussions of Columbus and his legacy enter the public sphere. They have been working for decades to educate the public about the atrocities Columbus committed. For much of the last few centuries, Columbus was portrayed as a brilliant explorer who fought the ignorant belief that the world was flat and sailed across the Atlantic to find the New World. And that is where the story ended; “In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue”. But because of the tireless work of activists, we have a much better picture of the real Columbus in our collective minds. The image of the whitewashed explorer is being eroded by a steady stream of actual history. Christopher Columbus, like most educated people in Europe, knew the world was round. He underestimated the size of the globe and thus came to the New World by accident. Once he was here, he began a regime of slavery and genocide that would eventually kill millions, all in the name of finding gold. His actions were seen as atrocities even at the time, as we can see based on the writings of Bartolome de las Casas, who witnessed Columbus’ impact on the New World. De las Casas said of Spain’s impact on Hispaniola (now Haiti and the Dominican Republic) “What we committed in the Indies stands out among the most unpardonable offenses ever committed against God and mankind and this trade (being the trade of Indigenous slaves) as one of the most unjust, evil, and cruel among them.” Even at the time, people knew what was happening in the West Indies was wrong. It would be wrong of us as modern historians to dismiss Columbus as “a product of his time”.

But there is hope. As more and more people become educated about the negative effects of colonization, the conversation surrounding Columbus and his contemporaries has changed markedly in the last two decades, moving from educators uncritically teaching children that Columbus discovered America to devoting more time to learning about the millions of people who already lived here and the impact colonization has had on them. Governments changing this day from Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples’ Day is a small step, but it is a step in the right direction. I am not saying the way North Americans are taught about Columbus is perfect, or even really good. We have a very long way to go before we can say that. But because of the work of activists and legislators, there has been progress toward fixing this false narrative of Columbus discovering an untouched paradise, rather than a continent inhabited by millions of people. I feel secure in saying that the next few years are going to chip away further at this myth and the real Columbus will no longer be able to hide behind the white-washed version of his actions. The tide of historical facts is turning.

Which it is so strange to me to see people who should know better defending Columbus. I am talking, of course, about the White House Proclamation that was issued on October 9th, 2020. In addition to being incredibly condescending to Italian-Americans and failing to mention the millions of Indigenous people still living in the United States, it is also an absolutely terrifying document to be issued by a standing government. I know everything that comes out of the White House for the last 4 years has been awful, but this one is particularly awful in terms of public history. There is one section that is particularly bone-chilling:

“Sadly, in recent years, radical activists have sought to undermine Christopher Columbus’s legacy.  These extremists seek to replace discussion of his vast contributions with talk of failings, his discoveries with atrocities, and his achievements with transgressions... We must not give in to these tactics or consent to such a bleak view of our history.  We must teach future generations about our storied heritage, starting with the protection of monuments to our intrepid heroes like Columbus.  This June, I signed an Executive Order to ensure that any person or group destroying or vandalizing a Federal monument, memorial, or statue is prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law...I have also taken steps to ensure that we preserve our Nation’s history and promote patriotic education... In September, I announced the creation of the 1776 Commission, which will encourage our educators to teach our children about the miracle of American history and honor (sic) our founding.  In addition, last month I signed an Executive Order to root out the teaching of racially divisive concepts from the Federal workplace, many of which are grounded in the same type of revisionist history that is trying to erase Christopher Columbus from our national heritage.  Together, we must safeguard our history and stop this new wave of iconoclasm by standing against those who spread hate and division.”

In addition to standing by Columbus as a shining paragon of discovery despite the increasing movement to de-canonize him as a saint of American history, which I personally find incomprehensible, this document also presents a deeply troubling vision of historical thought. In the world view this excerpt describes, there can be no criticism of historical figures. It is as simple as that. Any historical scholarship that threatens the vision of America as “miraculous” is not to be accepted by the government as legitimate. Any movements to question the existing narrative or the monuments that reinforce that narrative will be “prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law”. Policies like this will not only undo decades, if not centuries, of efforts to create a national history that reflects all of the nation’s past, the good and the ugly. Marginalized voices that have been speaking about injustices for centuries will be silenced. Students will be taught only one version of history. Columbus will remain a hero, his statues will stand over land that was stolen by him and people like him. History that is hard to hear or upsetting will not be told. Worst of all, students will be taught to never question this history. If that doesn’t scare you, I don’t know what will.

#Public History #Columbus Day #History #October 15

[mongoose232323]

#YukYkYuk #RudyIsStillInUkraine #TrumpIsSoSmart #SoCleverIgnoringSubpoenas

~ I M P E A C H E D ~

The 30 Stupidest Lines From Donald Trump's

Unhinged Letter To House Speaker Nancy Pelosi

From Article

On the eve of his impeachment by the House, President Donald Trump sent a blistering letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi -- airing his grievances with her and the broader Democratic Party while insisting that the actions taken on Wednesday will doom her to the dustbin of history.

I went through the letter -- which, from its first words, you can tell has the President's rhetorical fingerprints all over it -- and highlighted some of the most, uh, important lines. They're below.

1. "This impeachment represents an unprecedented and unconstitutional abuse of power by Democrat Lawmakers, unequaled in nearly two and a half centuries of American legislative history."

So, two things. One, impeachment is built into the Constitution and two past presidents have been impeached by the House. Two, it's "Democratic lawmakers" not "Democrat Lawmakers." And away we go!

2. "You have cheapened the importance of the very ugly word, impeachment!"

Like I said: You can clearly see Trump's involvement in the letter.

3. "By proceeding with your invalid impeachment, you are violating your oaths of office, you are breaking your allegiance to the Constitution, and you are declaring open war on American Democracy."

Wow. Lot to unpack here. Whether or not Trump likes it, the House is tasked with carrying out impeachment if a majority of members believe it is warranted. So, it's not "invalid." As for "declaring open war on American Democracy," well, Trump never pretended to be understated.

4. "You dare to invoke the Founding Fathers in pursuit of this election-nullification scheme?"

There's almost never a good time for the "how dare you?" construction.

5. "Even worse than offending the Founding Fathers, you are offending Americans of faith by continually saying you pray for the President when you know this statement is not true, unless it is meant in a negative sense."

WHOA BOY. So, Trump knows Pelosi doesn't actually pray for him? How? Did he someone eavesdrop on her prayers? Also, what is the "negative sense" of praying? I spent more time than I'd like to admit thinking about this and decided that Trump is suggesting that if Pelosi prays for him, it's for his demise. I think.

6. "It is a terrible thing you are doing, but you will have to live with it, not I!"

Nothing is ever Trump's fault. Ever.

7. "Fortunately, there was a transcript of the conversation taken, and you know from the transcript (which was immediately made available) that the paragraph in question was perfect."

What would a perfect paragraph look like? Do we even know? Anywho, here are 4 facts from that July 25 phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky: a) Trump tells Zelensky that the US does a lot for Ukraine b)Trump reminds Zelensky that Ukraine doesn't reciprocate c) Trump asks Zelensky for a favor: to look into a debunked conspiracy theory that the hacked Democratic National Committee server is in Ukraine and d) Trump asks Zelensky to look into Joe and Hunter Biden. To my mind, the White House transcript of that call reads more like a smoking gun than an exoneration.

8. "I said to President Zelensky: would like you to do us a favor, though, because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it? I said do us a favor, not me and our country, not a campaign."

Trump didn't start making this "me" versus "us" argument until the past few weeks. But even putting that aside, the two things he asks of Zelensky (whereabouts of DNC server and investigation into the Biden) were not mentioned at all in Trump's notes for the call, which were supposed to focus, generally speaking, on the country's corruption problems.

9. "You are turning a policy disagreement between two branches of government into an impeachable offense."

At issue is not the separation of powers or even really a disagreement. The issue is whether a president can ask a foreign country to investigate one of his potential political rivals. And, even if he can do it, should he?

10. "You know full well that Vice President Biden used his office and $1 billion dollars of US aid money to coerce Ukraine into firing the prosecutor who was digging into the company paying his son millions of dollars."

Reminder: Biden called for the firing of Ukraine's top prosecutor as part of an international coalition designed to address corruption in the country. There is no evidence of any wrongdoing in Ukraine by Joe or his son Hunter Biden.

11. "Now you are trying to impeach me by falsely accusing me of doing what Joe Biden has admitted he actually did."

Apples and oranges here. Again, Biden called for the firing of the prosecutor as part of a coordinated -- and transparent -- strategy to address corruption in Ukraine. Trump got on the phone with the Ukrainian president and, contrary to the notes prepared for him in advance of the meeting, freelanced to ask him to investigate one of his main rivals for the GOP nomination.

12. "President Zelensky has repeatedly declared that I did nothing wrong, and that there was 'No Pressure.'"

Zelensky is no dummy! He knows he needs future aid from the US in order to fight the Russians at his borders. Given that, why would he piss Trump off by saying he felt pressure? Also, not for nothing: Why is "No Pressure" capitalized?

13. "Ambassador Sondland testified that I told him: 'No quid pro quo. I want nothing. I want nothing. I want President Zelensky to do the right thing, do what he ran on.'"

Yes, Trump did tell US Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland that. After the White House had been made aware that Congress was looking into the withholding of military aid. So....

14. "Your chosen candidate lost the election in 2016, in an Electoral College landslide (306-227), and you and your party have never recovered from this defeat."

The 2016 election ended 1,134 days ago.

15. "You have developed a full-fledged case of what many in the media call Trump Derangement Syndrome and sadly, you will never get over it!"

An incurable case of TDS??? Call the CDC, STAT.

16. "You view democracy as your enemy!"

Just a reminder here: This is the President of the United States, on official White House stationery, telling the Speaker of the House that she believes democracy is the "enemy." Very normal! Nothing to see here!

17. "As you know very well, this impeachment drive has nothing to do with Ukraine, or the totally appropriate conversation I had with its new president."

Wait. Is this the "perfect" conversation? Or are we referring to another "totally appropriate" conversation here? Either way, Trump did nothing wrong! Ever!

18. "Congressman Adam Schiff cheated and lied all the way up to the present day, even going so far as to fraudulently make up, out of thin air, my conversation with President Zelensky of Ukraine and read this fantasy language to Congress as though it were said by me."

This claim, which Trump repeats constantly, makes me insane. Because it's just wrong. Here's what Schiff said before paraphrasing what was in the July 25 phone call: "In not so many words, this is the essence of what the President communicates." He literally makes clear that he is paraphrasing Trump, not directly quoting him. Why is this a thing???

19. "You conducted a fake investigation upon the democratically elected President of the United States, and you are doing it yet again."

To be clear: Pelosi had zero to do with the special counsel investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. That was the Justice Department under Trump. Also, that investigation wasn't "fake" -- it led to a number of arrests and prison sentences, not to mention documenting the deep and broad efforts of the Russian government to meddle in the 2016 election to help Trump and hurt Hillary Clinton.

20. "And by the way, when I speak to foreign countries, there are many people, with permission, listening to the call on both sides of the conversation."

Again, Trump misses the point here. The issue is not that other people were listening. The issue is what he told Zelensky -- even with people listening! If he talks like that when he knows people are on the line, how does he talk on the sidelines of summits and the like when there are far less staff nearby?

21. "You are the ones interfering in America's elections. You are the ones subverting America's Democracy."

I am rubber and you are glue. Whatever you say bounces off me and sticks to you.

22. "If you truly cared about freedom and liberty for our Nation, then you would be devoting your vast investigative resources to exposing the full truth concerning the horrifying abuses of power before, during, and after the 2016 election -- including the use of spies against my campaign."

There has never been a shred of evidence that spies were used against Trump's campaign. In fact, in the report released by Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz earlier this month, it's made quite clear there is zero evidence of spies being sicced on the Trump campaign.

23. "Any member of Congress who votes in support of impeachment against every shred of truth, fact, evidence, and legal principle, is showing how deeply they revile the voters and how truly they detest America's Constitutional order."

"Detest America's Constitutional order"? Really?

24. "In other words, once the phone call was made public, your whole plot blew up, but that didn't stop you from continuing."

As I wrote at the time, the transcript of the July 25 phone call is pretty damn close to a smoking gun against Trump.

25. "More due process was afforded to those accused in the Salem Witch Trials."

Uh, paging John Proctor...

26. "This is nothing more than an illegal, partisan attempted coup that will, based on recent sentiment, badly fail at the voting booth."

Definitely not illegal! Or a coup!

27. "Your legacy will be that of turning the House of Representatives from a revered legislative body into a Star Chamber of partisan persecution."

Not to be a contrarian here, but pretty sure that no matter what happens with impeachment, Pelosi's legacy will be as the first female Speaker of the House.

28. "You apparently have so little respect for the American People that you expect them to believe that you are approaching this impeachment somberly, reservedly, and reluctantly. No intelligent person believes what you are saying."

Really? And how did Trump learn to glean people's "real" motives? Is that some sort device you can buy on Amazon? If so, send me a link!

29. "I write this letter to you for the purpose of history and to put my thoughts on a permanent and indelible record."

"This will go down on your permanent record." -- The Violent Femmes

30. "One hundred years from now, when people look back at this affair, I want them to understand it, and learn from it, so that it can never happen to another President again."

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2019/12/17/politics/trump-letter-nancy-pelosi-impeachment/index.html

[ayittey1]

Gambia 2019 Draft Constitution Needs A Rewrite

 Gambia unceremoniously unveiled its 2019 Draft Constitution. It will be presented to the people for approval in a referendum in 2020. The Constitutional Review Commission (CRC) must be commended for crafting a Constitution within such a short time after the former president, Yahya Jammeh, was ousted in January 2017. But the draft Constitution Is 185 pages long – way too long. Rhetorically, it careens from one extreme to another. If Gambia with a population of 2.35 million people needs a 185-page Constitution how long should be the Constitution of Nigeria with a population of over 200 million?

 The chapter outline of the draft Constitution specifying freedoms, rights, responsibilities of public officers alone take up 12 pages. Then it goes into mind-numbing detail on the following topics:

·       Leadership and integrity,”

·       Responsibilities of leadership

·       Restrictions on the activities of public officers;

·       Restrictions on persons dealing with public officers in the service of this date

·       Legislation on leadership

·       The national assembly

·       The judiciary

·       Human rights commission

·       Anticorruption commission

·       State owned enterprises

·       National Council for civic education

 Are you still awake?

 Well, one must give the CRC some credit for being original. At least, they did not try to copy and blend the America and the French constitutions together as Ghana did in 1992. A: Constitution reflects the political history experience and aspirations of the people and, therefore, has a cultural imprint. For example, if a people have labored under a despotic monarch for a long time, they may want to craft a Constitution that avoids another form of despotism. One simply cannot copy such a Constitution if one has never had such an experience, let alone blend two dissimilar experiences together.

 Should Ghana copy the Japanese Constitution whose head of state has historically been an Emperor? So why copy and blend the American and the French? Rather interestingly, the American and the French constitutions approach the issue of liberty from two diametrically opposed angles. The American people see the date as a necessarily evil monster that will gobble up all trample on the rights of the people. They have alienable rights which must never be breached by the state. These are Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness which are enshrined in the Constitution. In the American political scheme of things, the Constitution serves as a shield against a marauding state. The more power that state has, the less free its people.

 By contrast, the French Constitution sees the state as a guarantor or protector of the rights of the people .The French Revolution of 1789 overthrew the despotic monarchy of Louis XIV, who famously declared that, “L’etat cest moi” (the state is mine). When the people rose up in the 1789 Revolution, they wanted to make it clear to the ruler that the state belonged to the people and they have the rights that must be protected and guaranteed by the state. It is difficult to see how the two views of the state can be reconciled or blended.

 Now how do Gambians see their state? Obviously, the answer must reflect their postcolonial experience with government, which is not different from other Africans ’experiences. In postcolonial Africa, government ceased to exist and failed to provide basic levels of security, freedom, human rights and social services for its people. In many countries, including Gambia, the government was at war with its own people, repressing and brutalizing them. Worse, the government was hijacked by a phalanx of bandits, crooks and vagabonds who used the machinery of the state to enrich themselves, cronies and tribesmen, excluding everybody else. Jammeh plundered the state treasury of nearly $1 billion. Obviously in a new constitution, this monstrosity should not begin more powers. Instead, every effort must be made to clip its wings so that it does not abuse its powers in the future. The draft Constitution gives the state too much power.

 It is understandable why the CRC produced a voluminous Constitution that .long because they wanted to nail everything down. You see, the former president -, ahem, a military coconut - insisted on being addressed as His Excellency President Professor Dr. Al-Haji Yahya Abdul-Azziz Jemus Junkung Jammeh. He governed on the fly – from the seat of his pants, making up rules as he went along. He vowed to rule for 40 years and claimed to have discovered the cure for HIV/AIDS. He also claimed he had mystic powers and would turn Gambia into an oil-producing nation. He threatened to behead gays. But despite his bluster, he was terrified of witches and evil sorcerers. He was booted out of office by ECOWAS troops in January 217. He is being sheltered in Equatorial Guinea by another scrofulous dictator. He must be expelled and sent to the ICC for crimes against humanity.

 Not wanting to take any chances, the CRC tried to put everything down. It would have said this to Jammeh, “Hey, it says here that you cannot rule for 40 years; only two terms in office.” But then, in so doing, the CRC went overboard and it is not alone. You see, in Africa, the art of Constitution making is not well understood.

 A Constitution is a social contract between the people (the governed) and the rulers, regarding how they shall be ruled. It should not be a document codifying how the president would like to rule the country – as was the case in Ghana in 1992 when Ft./Lte. Jerry Rawlings created a very powerful executive. Nor should it be a phantom document favoring one political candidate – as was the case in Nigeria in 1999. Under pressure to return the country to civilian rule, Nigeria’s military brass produced two constitutions in 1999 hidden from sight and held closely to its chest. Which one to release to the public depended upon who won the March 1999 elections. So Nigerians went to vote without seeing their Constitution, nor knowing their contents. Imagine.

 More than half of Gambia’s draft Constitution is unnecessary or somewhere else and can be cut. For example, a Constitution should never attempt to define leadership qualifications for the president as one can to draw up more than 100 traits of leadership – from bravery and diligence to honesty and trustworthiness. Even then, should the lack of a redeeming trait disqualify one from becoming president? Nor should the Constitution wade into normative subject areas such as integrity. How does one determine if a person has integrity or not if they have not been tested as president?

 A Constitution should not be the place to specify duties and restrictions on the activities of public officers. These are best placed in the Civil Service Code. The Constitution may specify broadly the functions of the National Assembly and the Judiciary but should stay away from detailed exposition of how they should be run. For example, the Constitution may say that they shall be a Speaker, chosen from the party that wins the most seats in the National Assembly. How they select the Speaker or what their function should be ought to be left out of the Constitution.

 The duties of the president should also be left out of the Constitution. For example, the Constitution may say that the president should act in cases of national emergency to protect the people and safeguard the security of the nation. It should not specify what is a national emergency, nor what actions the president should take. Naturally, what constitutes an emergency may change over time. The U.S. Constitution was promulgated in 1789 and what was an emergency back then is no longer today because of technological advancements in dealing with hurricanes, fires and flooding. The Constitution may also assign foreign policy to the president but should not go into specifics how foreign policy should be conducted as circumstances would change over time depending upon the nature of the foreign government.

 On rights, the draft Constitution goes into incredible detail about the rights of women, minorities, the youth, the elderly, the disabled, children, etc. it should as well have included the rights of cockroaches! All that was needed to say was to enshrine the dignity and rights of persons. For example, the Constitution may recognize a person’s right to a dwelling or home. It should not attempt to define a home as what constitutes a dwelling will change over time.

 A Constitution for an African country should not exceed 20 pages. One thing we should understand in Africa is that the more power the state has, the less free its people. Our ancestors in some ethnic groups very well understood this axiom and abolished the state altogether. They are called stateless societies – such as the Igbo, Somali and Gikuyu. By contrast, we write Constitutions in modern Africa by assuming that head of state is a Messiah, bestowing powers upon powers on dictators such as General Samuel Doe of Liberia, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, etc. Then when they started abusing those powers, we found to our chagrin that we had no countervailing powers to check them.

 A good Constitution should start from this premise: No offence is intended and your academic credentials notwithstanding, we regard you – the president – as a potential bandit and tyrant. Then the Constitution proceeds to put in place measures and safeguards to prevent him from becoming a tyrant and a bandit. For example, you cannot dictate or take decisions alone by yourself. You must take decisions by consensus with your Council of Elders or Village Assembly. Fantasy? This is exactly how or illiterate peasants govern themselves in the traditional system.

 In line with indigenous African philosophy, the state should be regarded as necessarily tyrannous that should be chastened, not over-empowered. This is akin to the American ethos. This does not mean the state must necessarily be abolished but rather finding ways of reining in a state which is out of control. In many African countries The American way of dealing with an out of control state is to create three equal branches of government – the executive, the legislature and the judiciary, with each checking the others. Africa may devise a different system. For example, Africa may establish a Supreme Council of Elders, given the reverence Africans confer on the elderly. Such a Council, given their collective wisdom, may veto legislation, cause the removal of the president or judges.

 Another innovative feature for on Africa Constitution is to exempt the president from the appointment of the heads of those institutions designed to check him. The president should Not be allowed to appoint the Atty. Gen., Supreme Court Justices, electoral commissioner, Speaker of Parliament, Governor of the Central Bank, etc. A conflict of interest situation is involved. It is difficult to have free and fair elections when electoral commissioner is appointed by the president.

 It must be noted that the inviolability of the Constitution is not assured by inserting into the Constitution a clause saying that “military coups are illegal” – as Nigeria did with its 1979 Constitution. In 1983, Maj. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (the current president) tpssed the Constitution aside after seizing power in a military coup. Clearly, that constitutional clause did not stop him. A better deterrent must be devised.

 Gambia’s National Assembly may lodge a copy of the Constitution with the African Union or the United Nations with the express instructions that the international community shall recognize only the civilian government that upholds this Constitution. It Cannot be a tended, abridged or abrogated without the approval of supra=majority (at least 66%) of the National Assembly/this is to prevent a situation where some military coconut, waving a bazooka, seizes power, suspends the Constitution, plays martial music and declares himself president. To succeed, he must also suspend the Constitution lodged with the African Union or the United Nations.

 Even more important, , if Africa needs a Constitution, it should go back to its roots and hold a constitutional convention on the Manden Charter, promulgated at Kurukan Fuga. According to UNESCO, the Charter is one of the world's oldest constitutions, predating the U.S. Constitution. Proclaimed in 1236, following a major military victory, by the founder of the Mandingo Empire and the assembly of his wise men, the Manden Charter, was named after the territory situated above the upper Niger River basin, between present-day Guinea and Mali. The Charter, though mainly in oral form, contains a preamble of seven chapters advocating,

 “”Social peace in diversity, the inviolability of the human being, education, the integrity of the motherland, food security, the abolition of slavery by razzia (or raid), and freedom of expression and trade.

 The Empire disintegrated when Mahmud Keita IV died around 1610. According to oral tradition, he had three sons who never agreed about succession and this sibling rivalry contributed to the end of the Mali Empire. But he words of the Charter and the rituals associated with it are still transmitted orally by griots from father to son in a codified way within the Malinke clans.

 To keep the tradition alive, commemorative annual ceremonies of the historic assembly are organized in the village of Kangaba (adjacent to the vast clearing of Kurukan Fuga, which now lies in Mali, (close to the Guinean border). The ceremonies are backed by the local and national authorities of Mali and, in particular, the traditional authorities, who see it as a source of law and as promoting a message of love, peace and fraternity, which has survived through the ages. The Manden Charter continues to underlie the basis of the values and identity of the populations concerned.

The Charter was transcribed, translated and republished. It divided the empire into ruling clans (lineages) that were represented at a great assembly called the Gbara. There were 16 clans known as the Djon-Tan-Nor-Woro (quiver carriers) responsible for leading and defending the empire. There were also 4 clans known as the Mori-Kanda-Lolou (guardians of the faith) who guided the ruling clans in matters of Islamic law. There were 4 nyamakala clans (people of caste) who had the monopoly on certain trades, which included but was not limited to smelting, woodworking, and tanners. Lastly, there were 4 clans of djeli (masters of speech) who recorded the history of the empire through song and story-telling.

 Apparently, there was clan specialization or division of labor – just as we saw about sexual division of labor. Certain tasks such as defending the Empire and recording its history were reserved for certain clans. The Constitution contained 44 edicts, divided into four sections relating to Social Organization (edicts 1-30), Property Rights (edicts 31-36), Environmental Protection (edicts 37-39) and Personal Responsibilities (edicts 40-44). The constitution also required women to be represented at all levels of government (edict 16) [The Kingdom of Benin and the Swazi Kingdom also required government ministers to be balanced with female counterparts or advisers].

The Charter also guaranteed and upheld, among others, the following edicts,

 Edict 5. Everybody has a right to life and to the preservation of its physical integrity

Accordingly, any attempt to deprive one’s fellow being of life is punished with death

Edict 9. The children’s education behooves the entire society .The paternal authority in consequence falls to everyone.

Edict 14.Do never offend women, our mothers.

Edict 16: Women, apart from their everyday occupations, should be associated with all

our managements.

Edict 20: Do not ill-treat the slaves. We are the master of the slave but not the bag he

         carries.

Edict 23: Never betray one another. Respect your word of honor.

Edict 24: In Manden, do not maltreat the foreigners.[Tell that to black South Africans.]

Edict 31: We should help those who are in need.

Edict 32: There are five ways to acquire property: buying, donation, exchange, work and

inheriting. Any other form without convincing testimony is doubtful. [Tell that to those who preach communal ownership.]

Edict 40: Respect kinship, marriage and the neighborhood.

Edict 41: You can kill the enemy, but not humiliate him.

Edict 44: All those who will transgress these rules will be punished. Everyone is bound to make effective their implementation.

(It is noteworthy that the Charter affirmed the equality of women, freedom of expression, freedom of trade and frowned upon laziness and idleness. From Edict 9 may be traced the African saying, "it takes a village to raise a child." The laws were binding on all, including the ruler (the rule of law). In those earlier times, the most common type of political configuration was the Confederation of clans, which could constitute a state. The Ga Kingdom in Ghana, for example, is a Confederation of six extended families or clans.

It may be noted that the Charter forbade wronging foreigners. Africa has always been hospitable to foreigners. Africa's traditional system of governance has always been open and inclusive, which helped achieve stability. The Mali/Madinke Empire was a confederacy – like all other ancient African empires – and lasted for 400 years. (The Ghana Empire also lasted for 800 years).

 Stability, to a large extent, owed its origin primarily to the design and operation of the indigenous political system in which anybody -- even including slaves -- could participate in the decision-making process, the essence of which was achieving consensus. Note that dictatorship and consensus building are never compatible.

 There was representation of slaves, the freeborn and the nobility at the royal court in most African states. There was even foreign representation. The kings and chiefs of Angola and Asante, for example, allowed European merchants to send their representatives to their courts. No one was "locked out" of the decision-making process, to use modern phraseology. "The Dutch dispatched an embassy to the Asantehene's court as early as 1701" (Boahen, 1986; p.58). In Angola, King Alfonso allowed the Portuguese merchants to send their spokesman, Dom Rodrigo, to his court. Europeans could even be selected chiefs. For example, in 1873, Zulu king Cetshwayo made an English hunter/trader, John Dunn, chief of an isifunda, or district. "Dunn, not content to hover on the periphery of Zulu society, became fully integrated into the social system. He married 48 Zulu women, accumulated a large following of clients, and even rose to the rank of isikhulu" (Ballard, 1988; p.55). Also, the case of Englishman Jimmy Maxen may be cited,  who in 1968 became the odikro of Anyaisi at Aburi in Ghana, shown below. in fact, foreigners can be Chiefs and there are white chiefs in Ghana and Nigeria.

 Africans should be proud of and celebrate this constitutional heritage. First, the Framers of that Constitution may have been backward and illiterate but displayed astonishing sophistication in regards to the rights of women, environmental protection and even compassion. Evidently, African women were liberated centuries before their Western counterparts.

 The political entity – structured on the Confederacy principle in decision-making by consensus – lasted for 400 years. By contrast, modern African leaders and elites, who sport a string of Ph.D.s, including Agricometriiology (the application of nuclear technology to the cultivation of cassava or manioc) could not write a Constitution that would last even 40 years after independence. Why did the primitive Empire built on the Confederacy principle lasted for centuries whereas the modern state built on the unitary state system barely lasted for 50 years after independence? Did our ancestors know something about governance that modern African leaders and elites do not know? It would take a great deal of humility on the part of Africa's ruling elites to answer those questions.

 The peasants could afford to make a white man chief – not so much because they were in awe of white people – but because in their system, real power lay with the people and they could remove bad Chiefs at any time   – not after any specified number of years, such as four years.

 This author has always decried the foolish aping foreign systems and paraphernalia to impose upon the African people after independence in the 1960s. There is s nothing wrong with Africa's own indigenous economic system. All the leadership had to do is to go back and build upon the native traditions of free markets, free enterprise and free trade. But they never did this on the economic front; nor on the political and constitutional front. This was why things went so awry in postcolonial Africa.

In Mali, this betrayal was most perfidious. Instead of decentralized governance – as in a Confederacy – the ruling elites established a highly centralized one in Bamako, the capital. The one-party state system was adopted as well as collectivist agriculture under the banner of socialism. And get this: The one who supervised the destruction and desecration of Mali's heritage was the country's first president, Modibo Keita, who was honored by a number of local griots (a semi-endogamous group of professional bards) in celebratory songs in which the political leader was depicted as the direct descendent of Sunjata Keita, the founder of the Mali empire. The Keita government progressively lost its popularity among various strata of the population. An alliance between the dissatisfied segments of the Malian population—the peasants, the merchants, and the army —led to the success of the military coup d'état of 1968 that ousted Keita. But then the next "rat" -- Moussa Traore -- came to do the same thing: reintroduced the socialist one-party state system, collectivist agriculture, among others,/

 On March 18, 1991, angry Malians took to the streets to demand democratic freedom from the despotic rule of Moussa Traore. He unleashed his security forces on them, killing scores, including women and children. But pro-democracy forces were not deterred and kept up the pressure. Asked to resign on March 25, he retorted: "I will not resign, my government will not resign, because I was elected not by the opposition but by all the people of Mali!!!! But two days later when he tried to flee the country, he was grabbed by his own security agents and sent to jail. From there, he lamented: "My fate is now in God's hands."

 The lesson in all this can be gleaned from this African  proverb: "He who does not know where he came from does not know where he is going." Africa is lost because its ruling elites do not know where they came from. China has Confucius; so they have built 54 Confucius Institutes. Go figure.

Let’s hope the Gambian Constitution Review Commissioners know where they came from.

-------------------------------------------

 The writer, a native of Ghana, and President of the Free Africa Foundation, both in Washington, DC. He is the author of the forthcoming book, The African Take-Off

[nearthecityofchorrol-blog]

Business of ABAC Never Far from Mind of David Bridges

By Mike Chason

Operating a enterprise with a finances of $64 million a yr would eat each waking moment of most people.  Dr. David Bridges, president of Abraham Baldwin Agricultural School, is not any exception.

“The large difference between operating a enterprise and being the president of ABAC is our return on funding could be very difficult,” Bridges, the longest serving president of the 26 establishments within the College System of Georgia (USG), stated.  “Our return would have to be calculated over the lives and careers of our graduates.”

Dr. David Bridges simply started his 14th yr because the ABAC President.

Since Bridges turned the 10th president within the historical past of ABAC on July 1, 2006, over 7,000 graduates have acquired their ABAC diplomas.   In contrast to a company that makes just one product and that product ultimately rusts away or in the case of meals, will get eaten, Bridges hopes that ABAC graduates proceed to thrive and construct extra businesses.

“College students are our business, and our graduates begin businesses of their own,” Bridges stated.  “During their lives, our graduates generate financial influence in their communities so the ABAC funding continues to develop.”

The newest statewide economic influence research commissioned by the USG showed that ABAC’s economic impression on South Georgia skyrocketed to a document $529,838,507 in fiscal yr 2017.  The multiplier effect turned 444 jobs at ABAC into 1,382 jobs off campus for a total influence of 1,826 jobs in South Georgia.

“Extra jobs at ABAC means more jobs in South Georgia,” Dr. Renata Elad, Dean of the Stafford Faculty of Business at ABAC, stated.  “ABAC had a a lot greater employment impression plus the price of housing went up, and the typical lease in Tifton went up that yr.  Personal expenses for leisure, apparel, and providers have been additionally up.”

Elad analyzed the USG numbers for ABAC and found the ABAC financial impression a monumental 31 per cent larger than the $369,874,664 influence within the 2016 fiscal yr.

“ABAC wants South Georgia, and South Georgia needs ABAC,” Elad stated in her analysis.  “With complete employment of over 1,800 jobs instantly from scholar spending activities and an general labor impression of virtually $66 million, ABAC is certainly a robust associate in regional progress.”

Bridges pointed out that these numbers mirror solely South Georgia and the school has changed fairly a bit because the research was carried out in 2017.  Bainbridge State School merged with ABAC in 2018, leading to a document enrollment of four,291 college students through the 2018 fall semester.

ABAC attracted college students from 30 nations, 18 states, and 155 of Georgia’s 159 counties during the 2018 fall time period.  Because of the consolidation, ABAC provided courses in Bainbridge, Blakely, and Donalsonville in addition to its courses in Tifton and Moultrie.

Many of these college students choose to remain at ABAC to finish one of 12 four-year degree packages.   ABAC provided solely two-year degrees from 1933 to 2008.  As an alternative of staying two or three years at ABAC for an associate degree, students stay at ABAC four or five years to finish their bachelor’s degree.

With a bachelor’s degree in hand, graduates have more to offer the world of work.  That expands the ABAC financial impression even additional because graduates discover greater paying jobs.

ABAC President David Bridges (r) with ABAC Director of Amenities and Land Assets Tim Carpenter (l) look over plans for the Wonderful Arts building with Jody Buchan from Allstate Development.

In addition to the $64 million annual price range, there’s also the matter of capital investment at ABAC.  Since Bridges’ presidency started, over $84 million in capital tasks have been completed or are within the development part at ABAC.

These tasks embrace the Health Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, ABAC Lakeside at $17 million, Historic Entrance of Campus at $15.5 million, King Corridor at $2.7 million, Donaldson Eating Hall at $four million, Thrash Wellness Middle at $4.5 million, the Laboratory Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, and the continued Carlton Middle/Fantastic Arts Constructing undertaking at $24 million.  Street improvement provides one other $2 million.

“Each of these tasks has made this campus higher,” Bridges stated.  “That plays an element in recruitment of students as properly.   When college students go to ABAC, they like what they see here.”

Bridges takes advantage of every waking moment to promote ABAC.  His stamina is known as is his means to get things executed.  Since his first day on the job, he has been on the move with a wide variety of activities, many of them within the first time ever category.

Bridges’ presidential inauguration at ABAC in 2006 was the first time that ABAC has had an inauguration ceremony.  He kicked a soccer ball into the web to announce the first ever ladies’s soccer program.  He also pushed a plunger to set off a small charge of dynamite to open the construction on the ABAC Lakeside scholar housing complicated.

ABAC President David Bridges at his inauguration ceremony on Aug. 25, 2006.  It was the first inauguration ceremony for a president in the history of ABAC.

Bridges assisted 103-year-old ABAC alumnus Ethel Arnold Talley when she rang the original ABAC bell on the opening of the Historic Entrance of Campus undertaking, honored the reminiscence of ABAC alumnus and Medal of Honor recipient Harold Bascom Durham, Jr., on the opening of the Freedom Gallery, and used a cross-cut saw on a log to announce the beginning of ABAC bachelor’s levels in forestry and wildlife.

With an incredible sense of satisfaction in his alma mater, Bridges watched fireworks explode over the campus at the conclusion of ABAC’s 100th birthday celebration.  He guided the method when the former Georgia Agrirama turned an element of the ABAC campus as the Georgia Museum of Agriculture and Historic Village, headed up the consolidation with Bainbridge State School, and served as Interim Director of Georgia’s first ever Middle for Rural Prosperity and Innovation.

“Rural communities have very tangible advantages to supply society as an entire,” Bridges stated of Georgia’s Rural Middle.   “The Middle has a statewide mission and one of the tenets to that mission is to find a path to prosperity for rural communities.”

All these tasks took mammoth amounts of time for the ABAC President whose day typically begins in the pre-dawn stillness with breakfast at the Northside Café in Tifton.

In the course of the past 13 years, Bridges has enlisted the help of legislators underneath the Golden Dome for ABAC tasks, spoken to civic clubs and group groups far and broad, accepted the award as the Arts Citizen of the Yr for Tift County, and acquired the USG Gold Excellent Customer Service Management Award.

Bridges, who turned 61 in June, points to the establishment of ABAC as a State School as the proudest accomplishment of his tenure.

“That modified all the things,” Bridges stated.  “In any other case we can be floundering.  The power to supply bachelor’s degrees changed ABAC ceaselessly.”

Most chief operating officers develop their own administration type or try to duplicate the type of different successful leaders of organizations.  Bridges believes his fashion hasn’t modified a lot since 2006.

“In some ways, I am slightly extra affected person now than I used to be once I first turned president,” Bridges stated.  “In other methods, I feel I’m less affected person.  Common George Patton stated, ‘lead, follow, or get out of the way.’  I like that.

“My position is to get individuals to have a vision of the place ABAC needs to go.  Finally, most people know the best thing to do.  It’s just a matter of getting them to do it.  Typically they must be nudged just a little bit.”

Dealing with the many complexities of the job is usually probably the most troublesome half of being the top of a serious company or in Bridges’ case, a university.

“The most important challenge is assembly the expectations of individuals,” Bridges stated.  “In our case, meaning college students, mother and father of students, school, employees, alumni, donors, buddies of the school, and the public.  Typically individuals come to the table with totally unrealistic expectations.

“Take students for instance.  Some college students anticipate to breeze by way of school just the best way they breezed by way of high school.  School is totally different than highschool.  College students and fogeys come to know that.  Typically it takes a while.”

When asked what offers him with probably the most satisfaction as the ABAC President, Bridges points to 2 days every year.

“Fall graduation and spring commencement,” Bridges stated.  “The graduates have cleared that hurdle.   They’ve diplomas.  Our expectation is that they may go out and do something with these levels.”

When he left the tiny town of Parrott in Terrell County in 1976 to attend ABAC, Bridges had no concept he would meet his wife, Kim, in Rosalyn Donaldson’s English class and that at some point he would grow to be the only ABAC President who was as soon as a scholar at the school.

ABAC President David Bridges spends numerous hours talking on his favourite matter, ABAC.

“It was never my dream to develop into president of ABAC,” Bridges stated.  “Actually, I never really considered it.  Even once I was 40 years previous, I hadn’t considered it.

“I’ve had opportunities to go away however I all the time asked myself, ‘is that a better fit for me than ABAC?’” Bridges stated.   “ABAC has been a reasonably good fit for me.”

Bridges has far surpassed the typical tenure of seven years for a university president.  In reality, he’s now the second longest serving president within the historical past of ABAC.  George P. Donaldson was the ABAC president for 14 years from 1947-61.  Bridges has 13 beneath his belt and is steaming full velocity forward into his 14th yr.

“Fortunate 13 is over, and now we’ll see what occurs in 14,” Bridges stated.

Is being president of ABAC in 2019 more durable than being president of ABAC was in 2006?

“Oh sure, rather a lot more durable,” Bridges stated.  “Now, everyone needs to inform you the best way to do what you are promoting. In 2006, we didn’t have to fret about cyber-security threats.  I didn’t have so many people wanting over my shoulder.

“Individuals in our society at this time are typically much less self-reliant, more contentious, and more self-absorbed.  There seems to be rigidity about every part, notably in relation to political correctness.  Individuals are hyper-sensitive about being offended.  It turns into extra pervasive day by day.

“It keeps us from specializing in our central mission because we’re coping with all this other stuff.  My aim is to get something accomplished and make ABAC a better place.”

But at some point, there shall be a life for Bridges after his ABAC profession is accomplished.

“Positive, that day will come,” Bridges stated.  “When it does, I need to continue to be lively within the public service sector but in a much less outstanding means.  I’ll return to the farm and be an element of one thing that’s not seven days every week, 24 hours a day.”

Bridges owns the household farm in Terrell County and retreats there as typically as potential.  However wherever he goes, ABAC is all the time on his thoughts.

“I don’t worry concerning the day-to-day operation because we have now nice individuals to hold on,” Bridges stated.  “However it’s all the time one thing.  It’s often an external factor that can cause the wheels to return off pretty shortly.”

Until that retirement day comes, Bridges finds it straightforward to encourage himself to stay true to the ABAC mission every single day.

“We now have made nice progress,” Bridges stated.  “But there’s still quite a bit to be achieved.”

###

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[my-scorched-earths-insides]

Business of ABAC Never Far from Mind of David Bridges

By Mike Chason

Operating a enterprise with a finances of $64 million a yr would eat each waking moment of most people.  Dr. David Bridges, president of Abraham Baldwin Agricultural School, is not any exception.

“The large difference between operating a enterprise and being the president of ABAC is our return on funding could be very difficult,” Bridges, the longest serving president of the 26 establishments within the College System of Georgia (USG), stated.  “Our return would have to be calculated over the lives and careers of our graduates.”

Dr. David Bridges simply started his 14th yr because the ABAC President.

Since Bridges turned the 10th president within the historical past of ABAC on July 1, 2006, over 7,000 graduates have acquired their ABAC diplomas.   In contrast to a company that makes just one product and that product ultimately rusts away or in the case of meals, will get eaten, Bridges hopes that ABAC graduates proceed to thrive and construct extra businesses.

“College students are our business, and our graduates begin businesses of their own,” Bridges stated.  “During their lives, our graduates generate financial influence in their communities so the ABAC funding continues to develop.”

The newest statewide economic influence research commissioned by the USG showed that ABAC’s economic impression on South Georgia skyrocketed to a document $529,838,507 in fiscal yr 2017.  The multiplier effect turned 444 jobs at ABAC into 1,382 jobs off campus for a total influence of 1,826 jobs in South Georgia.

“Extra jobs at ABAC means more jobs in South Georgia,” Dr. Renata Elad, Dean of the Stafford Faculty of Business at ABAC, stated.  “ABAC had a a lot greater employment impression plus the price of housing went up, and the typical lease in Tifton went up that yr.  Personal expenses for leisure, apparel, and providers have been additionally up.”

Elad analyzed the USG numbers for ABAC and found the ABAC financial impression a monumental 31 per cent larger than the $369,874,664 influence within the 2016 fiscal yr.

“ABAC wants South Georgia, and South Georgia needs ABAC,” Elad stated in her analysis.  “With complete employment of over 1,800 jobs instantly from scholar spending activities and an general labor impression of virtually $66 million, ABAC is certainly a robust associate in regional progress.”

Bridges pointed out that these numbers mirror solely South Georgia and the school has changed fairly a bit because the research was carried out in 2017.  Bainbridge State School merged with ABAC in 2018, leading to a document enrollment of four,291 college students through the 2018 fall semester.

ABAC attracted college students from 30 nations, 18 states, and 155 of Georgia’s 159 counties during the 2018 fall time period.  Because of the consolidation, ABAC provided courses in Bainbridge, Blakely, and Donalsonville in addition to its courses in Tifton and Moultrie.

Many of these college students choose to remain at ABAC to finish one of 12 four-year degree packages.   ABAC provided solely two-year degrees from 1933 to 2008.  As an alternative of staying two or three years at ABAC for an associate degree, students stay at ABAC four or five years to finish their bachelor’s degree.

With a bachelor’s degree in hand, graduates have more to offer the world of work.  That expands the ABAC financial impression even additional because graduates discover greater paying jobs.

ABAC President David Bridges (r) with ABAC Director of Amenities and Land Assets Tim Carpenter (l) look over plans for the Wonderful Arts building with Jody Buchan from Allstate Development.

In addition to the $64 million annual price range, there’s also the matter of capital investment at ABAC.  Since Bridges’ presidency started, over $84 million in capital tasks have been completed or are within the development part at ABAC.

These tasks embrace the Health Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, ABAC Lakeside at $17 million, Historic Entrance of Campus at $15.5 million, King Corridor at $2.7 million, Donaldson Eating Hall at $four million, Thrash Wellness Middle at $4.5 million, the Laboratory Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, and the continued Carlton Middle/Fantastic Arts Constructing undertaking at $24 million.  Street improvement provides one other $2 million.

“Each of these tasks has made this campus higher,” Bridges stated.  “That plays an element in recruitment of students as properly.   When college students go to ABAC, they like what they see here.”

Bridges takes advantage of every waking moment to promote ABAC.  His stamina is known as is his means to get things executed.  Since his first day on the job, he has been on the move with a wide variety of activities, many of them within the first time ever category.

Bridges’ presidential inauguration at ABAC in 2006 was the first time that ABAC has had an inauguration ceremony.  He kicked a soccer ball into the web to announce the first ever ladies’s soccer program.  He also pushed a plunger to set off a small charge of dynamite to open the construction on the ABAC Lakeside scholar housing complicated.

ABAC President David Bridges at his inauguration ceremony on Aug. 25, 2006.  It was the first inauguration ceremony for a president in the history of ABAC.

Bridges assisted 103-year-old ABAC alumnus Ethel Arnold Talley when she rang the original ABAC bell on the opening of the Historic Entrance of Campus undertaking, honored the reminiscence of ABAC alumnus and Medal of Honor recipient Harold Bascom Durham, Jr., on the opening of the Freedom Gallery, and used a cross-cut saw on a log to announce the beginning of ABAC bachelor’s levels in forestry and wildlife.

With an incredible sense of satisfaction in his alma mater, Bridges watched fireworks explode over the campus at the conclusion of ABAC’s 100th birthday celebration.  He guided the method when the former Georgia Agrirama turned an element of the ABAC campus as the Georgia Museum of Agriculture and Historic Village, headed up the consolidation with Bainbridge State School, and served as Interim Director of Georgia’s first ever Middle for Rural Prosperity and Innovation.

“Rural communities have very tangible advantages to supply society as an entire,” Bridges stated of Georgia’s Rural Middle.   “The Middle has a statewide mission and one of the tenets to that mission is to find a path to prosperity for rural communities.”

All these tasks took mammoth amounts of time for the ABAC President whose day typically begins in the pre-dawn stillness with breakfast at the Northside Café in Tifton.

In the course of the past 13 years, Bridges has enlisted the help of legislators underneath the Golden Dome for ABAC tasks, spoken to civic clubs and group groups far and broad, accepted the award as the Arts Citizen of the Yr for Tift County, and acquired the USG Gold Excellent Customer Service Management Award.

Bridges, who turned 61 in June, points to the establishment of ABAC as a State School as the proudest accomplishment of his tenure.

“That modified all the things,” Bridges stated.  “In any other case we can be floundering.  The power to supply bachelor’s degrees changed ABAC ceaselessly.”

Most chief operating officers develop their own administration type or try to duplicate the type of different successful leaders of organizations.  Bridges believes his fashion hasn’t modified a lot since 2006.

“In some ways, I am slightly extra affected person now than I used to be once I first turned president,” Bridges stated.  “In other methods, I feel I’m less affected person.  Common George Patton stated, ‘lead, follow, or get out of the way.’  I like that.

“My position is to get individuals to have a vision of the place ABAC needs to go.  Finally, most people know the best thing to do.  It’s just a matter of getting them to do it.  Typically they must be nudged just a little bit.”

Dealing with the many complexities of the job is usually probably the most troublesome half of being the top of a serious company or in Bridges’ case, a university.

“The most important challenge is assembly the expectations of individuals,” Bridges stated.  “In our case, meaning college students, mother and father of students, school, employees, alumni, donors, buddies of the school, and the public.  Typically individuals come to the table with totally unrealistic expectations.

“Take students for instance.  Some college students anticipate to breeze by way of school just the best way they breezed by way of high school.  School is totally different than highschool.  College students and fogeys come to know that.  Typically it takes a while.”

When asked what offers him with probably the most satisfaction as the ABAC President, Bridges points to 2 days every year.

“Fall graduation and spring commencement,” Bridges stated.  “The graduates have cleared that hurdle.   They’ve diplomas.  Our expectation is that they may go out and do something with these levels.”

When he left the tiny town of Parrott in Terrell County in 1976 to attend ABAC, Bridges had no concept he would meet his wife, Kim, in Rosalyn Donaldson’s English class and that at some point he would grow to be the only ABAC President who was as soon as a scholar at the school.

ABAC President David Bridges spends numerous hours talking on his favourite matter, ABAC.

“It was never my dream to develop into president of ABAC,” Bridges stated.  “Actually, I never really considered it.  Even once I was 40 years previous, I hadn’t considered it.

“I’ve had opportunities to go away however I all the time asked myself, ‘is that a better fit for me than ABAC?’” Bridges stated.   “ABAC has been a reasonably good fit for me.”

Bridges has far surpassed the typical tenure of seven years for a university president.  In reality, he’s now the second longest serving president within the historical past of ABAC.  George P. Donaldson was the ABAC president for 14 years from 1947-61.  Bridges has 13 beneath his belt and is steaming full velocity forward into his 14th yr.

“Fortunate 13 is over, and now we’ll see what occurs in 14,” Bridges stated.

Is being president of ABAC in 2019 more durable than being president of ABAC was in 2006?

“Oh sure, rather a lot more durable,” Bridges stated.  “Now, everyone needs to inform you the best way to do what you are promoting. In 2006, we didn’t have to fret about cyber-security threats.  I didn’t have so many people wanting over my shoulder.

“Individuals in our society at this time are typically much less self-reliant, more contentious, and more self-absorbed.  There seems to be rigidity about every part, notably in relation to political correctness.  Individuals are hyper-sensitive about being offended.  It turns into extra pervasive day by day.

“It keeps us from specializing in our central mission because we’re coping with all this other stuff.  My aim is to get something accomplished and make ABAC a better place.”

But at some point, there shall be a life for Bridges after his ABAC profession is accomplished.

“Positive, that day will come,” Bridges stated.  “When it does, I need to continue to be lively within the public service sector but in a much less outstanding means.  I’ll return to the farm and be an element of one thing that’s not seven days every week, 24 hours a day.”

Bridges owns the household farm in Terrell County and retreats there as typically as potential.  However wherever he goes, ABAC is all the time on his thoughts.

“I don’t worry concerning the day-to-day operation because we have now nice individuals to hold on,” Bridges stated.  “However it’s all the time one thing.  It’s often an external factor that can cause the wheels to return off pretty shortly.”

Until that retirement day comes, Bridges finds it straightforward to encourage himself to stay true to the ABAC mission every single day.

“We now have made nice progress,” Bridges stated.  “But there’s still quite a bit to be achieved.”

###

The post Business of ABAC Never Far from Mind of David Bridges appeared first on Laptop Computer Info.

#Blog #Featured Stories

[tarsoakedgossamer]

Business of ABAC Never Far from Mind of David Bridges

By Mike Chason

Operating a enterprise with a finances of $64 million a yr would eat each waking moment of most people.  Dr. David Bridges, president of Abraham Baldwin Agricultural School, is not any exception.

“The large difference between operating a enterprise and being the president of ABAC is our return on funding could be very difficult,” Bridges, the longest serving president of the 26 establishments within the College System of Georgia (USG), stated.  “Our return would have to be calculated over the lives and careers of our graduates.”

Dr. David Bridges simply started his 14th yr because the ABAC President.

Since Bridges turned the 10th president within the historical past of ABAC on July 1, 2006, over 7,000 graduates have acquired their ABAC diplomas.   In contrast to a company that makes just one product and that product ultimately rusts away or in the case of meals, will get eaten, Bridges hopes that ABAC graduates proceed to thrive and construct extra businesses.

“College students are our business, and our graduates begin businesses of their own,” Bridges stated.  “During their lives, our graduates generate financial influence in their communities so the ABAC funding continues to develop.”

The newest statewide economic influence research commissioned by the USG showed that ABAC’s economic impression on South Georgia skyrocketed to a document $529,838,507 in fiscal yr 2017.  The multiplier effect turned 444 jobs at ABAC into 1,382 jobs off campus for a total influence of 1,826 jobs in South Georgia.

“Extra jobs at ABAC means more jobs in South Georgia,” Dr. Renata Elad, Dean of the Stafford Faculty of Business at ABAC, stated.  “ABAC had a a lot greater employment impression plus the price of housing went up, and the typical lease in Tifton went up that yr.  Personal expenses for leisure, apparel, and providers have been additionally up.”

Elad analyzed the USG numbers for ABAC and found the ABAC financial impression a monumental 31 per cent larger than the $369,874,664 influence within the 2016 fiscal yr.

“ABAC wants South Georgia, and South Georgia needs ABAC,” Elad stated in her analysis.  “With complete employment of over 1,800 jobs instantly from scholar spending activities and an general labor impression of virtually $66 million, ABAC is certainly a robust associate in regional progress.”

Bridges pointed out that these numbers mirror solely South Georgia and the school has changed fairly a bit because the research was carried out in 2017.  Bainbridge State School merged with ABAC in 2018, leading to a document enrollment of four,291 college students through the 2018 fall semester.

ABAC attracted college students from 30 nations, 18 states, and 155 of Georgia’s 159 counties during the 2018 fall time period.  Because of the consolidation, ABAC provided courses in Bainbridge, Blakely, and Donalsonville in addition to its courses in Tifton and Moultrie.

Many of these college students choose to remain at ABAC to finish one of 12 four-year degree packages.   ABAC provided solely two-year degrees from 1933 to 2008.  As an alternative of staying two or three years at ABAC for an associate degree, students stay at ABAC four or five years to finish their bachelor’s degree.

With a bachelor’s degree in hand, graduates have more to offer the world of work.  That expands the ABAC financial impression even additional because graduates discover greater paying jobs.

ABAC President David Bridges (r) with ABAC Director of Amenities and Land Assets Tim Carpenter (l) look over plans for the Wonderful Arts building with Jody Buchan from Allstate Development.

In addition to the $64 million annual price range, there’s also the matter of capital investment at ABAC.  Since Bridges’ presidency started, over $84 million in capital tasks have been completed or are within the development part at ABAC.

These tasks embrace the Health Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, ABAC Lakeside at $17 million, Historic Entrance of Campus at $15.5 million, King Corridor at $2.7 million, Donaldson Eating Hall at $four million, Thrash Wellness Middle at $4.5 million, the Laboratory Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, and the continued Carlton Middle/Fantastic Arts Constructing undertaking at $24 million.  Street improvement provides one other $2 million.

“Each of these tasks has made this campus higher,” Bridges stated.  “That plays an element in recruitment of students as properly.   When college students go to ABAC, they like what they see here.”

Bridges takes advantage of every waking moment to promote ABAC.  His stamina is known as is his means to get things executed.  Since his first day on the job, he has been on the move with a wide variety of activities, many of them within the first time ever category.

Bridges’ presidential inauguration at ABAC in 2006 was the first time that ABAC has had an inauguration ceremony.  He kicked a soccer ball into the web to announce the first ever ladies’s soccer program.  He also pushed a plunger to set off a small charge of dynamite to open the construction on the ABAC Lakeside scholar housing complicated.

ABAC President David Bridges at his inauguration ceremony on Aug. 25, 2006.  It was the first inauguration ceremony for a president in the history of ABAC.

Bridges assisted 103-year-old ABAC alumnus Ethel Arnold Talley when she rang the original ABAC bell on the opening of the Historic Entrance of Campus undertaking, honored the reminiscence of ABAC alumnus and Medal of Honor recipient Harold Bascom Durham, Jr., on the opening of the Freedom Gallery, and used a cross-cut saw on a log to announce the beginning of ABAC bachelor’s levels in forestry and wildlife.

With an incredible sense of satisfaction in his alma mater, Bridges watched fireworks explode over the campus at the conclusion of ABAC’s 100th birthday celebration.  He guided the method when the former Georgia Agrirama turned an element of the ABAC campus as the Georgia Museum of Agriculture and Historic Village, headed up the consolidation with Bainbridge State School, and served as Interim Director of Georgia’s first ever Middle for Rural Prosperity and Innovation.

“Rural communities have very tangible advantages to supply society as an entire,” Bridges stated of Georgia’s Rural Middle.   “The Middle has a statewide mission and one of the tenets to that mission is to find a path to prosperity for rural communities.”

All these tasks took mammoth amounts of time for the ABAC President whose day typically begins in the pre-dawn stillness with breakfast at the Northside Café in Tifton.

In the course of the past 13 years, Bridges has enlisted the help of legislators underneath the Golden Dome for ABAC tasks, spoken to civic clubs and group groups far and broad, accepted the award as the Arts Citizen of the Yr for Tift County, and acquired the USG Gold Excellent Customer Service Management Award.

Bridges, who turned 61 in June, points to the establishment of ABAC as a State School as the proudest accomplishment of his tenure.

“That modified all the things,” Bridges stated.  “In any other case we can be floundering.  The power to supply bachelor’s degrees changed ABAC ceaselessly.”

Most chief operating officers develop their own administration type or try to duplicate the type of different successful leaders of organizations.  Bridges believes his fashion hasn’t modified a lot since 2006.

“In some ways, I am slightly extra affected person now than I used to be once I first turned president,” Bridges stated.  “In other methods, I feel I’m less affected person.  Common George Patton stated, ‘lead, follow, or get out of the way.’  I like that.

“My position is to get individuals to have a vision of the place ABAC needs to go.  Finally, most people know the best thing to do.  It’s just a matter of getting them to do it.  Typically they must be nudged just a little bit.”

Dealing with the many complexities of the job is usually probably the most troublesome half of being the top of a serious company or in Bridges’ case, a university.

“The most important challenge is assembly the expectations of individuals,” Bridges stated.  “In our case, meaning college students, mother and father of students, school, employees, alumni, donors, buddies of the school, and the public.  Typically individuals come to the table with totally unrealistic expectations.

“Take students for instance.  Some college students anticipate to breeze by way of school just the best way they breezed by way of high school.  School is totally different than highschool.  College students and fogeys come to know that.  Typically it takes a while.”

When asked what offers him with probably the most satisfaction as the ABAC President, Bridges points to 2 days every year.

“Fall graduation and spring commencement,” Bridges stated.  “The graduates have cleared that hurdle.   They’ve diplomas.  Our expectation is that they may go out and do something with these levels.”

When he left the tiny town of Parrott in Terrell County in 1976 to attend ABAC, Bridges had no concept he would meet his wife, Kim, in Rosalyn Donaldson’s English class and that at some point he would grow to be the only ABAC President who was as soon as a scholar at the school.

ABAC President David Bridges spends numerous hours talking on his favourite matter, ABAC.

“It was never my dream to develop into president of ABAC,” Bridges stated.  “Actually, I never really considered it.  Even once I was 40 years previous, I hadn’t considered it.

“I’ve had opportunities to go away however I all the time asked myself, ‘is that a better fit for me than ABAC?’” Bridges stated.   “ABAC has been a reasonably good fit for me.”

Bridges has far surpassed the typical tenure of seven years for a university president.  In reality, he’s now the second longest serving president within the historical past of ABAC.  George P. Donaldson was the ABAC president for 14 years from 1947-61.  Bridges has 13 beneath his belt and is steaming full velocity forward into his 14th yr.

“Fortunate 13 is over, and now we’ll see what occurs in 14,” Bridges stated.

Is being president of ABAC in 2019 more durable than being president of ABAC was in 2006?

“Oh sure, rather a lot more durable,” Bridges stated.  “Now, everyone needs to inform you the best way to do what you are promoting. In 2006, we didn’t have to fret about cyber-security threats.  I didn’t have so many people wanting over my shoulder.

“Individuals in our society at this time are typically much less self-reliant, more contentious, and more self-absorbed.  There seems to be rigidity about every part, notably in relation to political correctness.  Individuals are hyper-sensitive about being offended.  It turns into extra pervasive day by day.

“It keeps us from specializing in our central mission because we’re coping with all this other stuff.  My aim is to get something accomplished and make ABAC a better place.”

But at some point, there shall be a life for Bridges after his ABAC profession is accomplished.

“Positive, that day will come,” Bridges stated.  “When it does, I need to continue to be lively within the public service sector but in a much less outstanding means.  I’ll return to the farm and be an element of one thing that’s not seven days every week, 24 hours a day.”

Bridges owns the household farm in Terrell County and retreats there as typically as potential.  However wherever he goes, ABAC is all the time on his thoughts.

“I don’t worry concerning the day-to-day operation because we have now nice individuals to hold on,” Bridges stated.  “However it’s all the time one thing.  It’s often an external factor that can cause the wheels to return off pretty shortly.”

Until that retirement day comes, Bridges finds it straightforward to encourage himself to stay true to the ABAC mission every single day.

“We now have made nice progress,” Bridges stated.  “But there’s still quite a bit to be achieved.”

###

The post Business of ABAC Never Far from Mind of David Bridges appeared first on Laptop Computer Info.

#Blog #Featured Stories

[whathungerpangs]

Business of ABAC Never Far from Mind of David Bridges

By Mike Chason

Operating a enterprise with a finances of $64 million a yr would eat each waking moment of most people.  Dr. David Bridges, president of Abraham Baldwin Agricultural School, is not any exception.

“The large difference between operating a enterprise and being the president of ABAC is our return on funding could be very difficult,” Bridges, the longest serving president of the 26 establishments within the College System of Georgia (USG), stated.  “Our return would have to be calculated over the lives and careers of our graduates.”

Dr. David Bridges simply started his 14th yr because the ABAC President.

Since Bridges turned the 10th president within the historical past of ABAC on July 1, 2006, over 7,000 graduates have acquired their ABAC diplomas.   In contrast to a company that makes just one product and that product ultimately rusts away or in the case of meals, will get eaten, Bridges hopes that ABAC graduates proceed to thrive and construct extra businesses.

“College students are our business, and our graduates begin businesses of their own,” Bridges stated.  “During their lives, our graduates generate financial influence in their communities so the ABAC funding continues to develop.”

The newest statewide economic influence research commissioned by the USG showed that ABAC’s economic impression on South Georgia skyrocketed to a document $529,838,507 in fiscal yr 2017.  The multiplier effect turned 444 jobs at ABAC into 1,382 jobs off campus for a total influence of 1,826 jobs in South Georgia.

“Extra jobs at ABAC means more jobs in South Georgia,” Dr. Renata Elad, Dean of the Stafford Faculty of Business at ABAC, stated.  “ABAC had a a lot greater employment impression plus the price of housing went up, and the typical lease in Tifton went up that yr.  Personal expenses for leisure, apparel, and providers have been additionally up.”

Elad analyzed the USG numbers for ABAC and found the ABAC financial impression a monumental 31 per cent larger than the $369,874,664 influence within the 2016 fiscal yr.

“ABAC wants South Georgia, and South Georgia needs ABAC,” Elad stated in her analysis.  “With complete employment of over 1,800 jobs instantly from scholar spending activities and an general labor impression of virtually $66 million, ABAC is certainly a robust associate in regional progress.”

Bridges pointed out that these numbers mirror solely South Georgia and the school has changed fairly a bit because the research was carried out in 2017.  Bainbridge State School merged with ABAC in 2018, leading to a document enrollment of four,291 college students through the 2018 fall semester.

ABAC attracted college students from 30 nations, 18 states, and 155 of Georgia’s 159 counties during the 2018 fall time period.  Because of the consolidation, ABAC provided courses in Bainbridge, Blakely, and Donalsonville in addition to its courses in Tifton and Moultrie.

Many of these college students choose to remain at ABAC to finish one of 12 four-year degree packages.   ABAC provided solely two-year degrees from 1933 to 2008.  As an alternative of staying two or three years at ABAC for an associate degree, students stay at ABAC four or five years to finish their bachelor’s degree.

With a bachelor’s degree in hand, graduates have more to offer the world of work.  That expands the ABAC financial impression even additional because graduates discover greater paying jobs.

ABAC President David Bridges (r) with ABAC Director of Amenities and Land Assets Tim Carpenter (l) look over plans for the Wonderful Arts building with Jody Buchan from Allstate Development.

In addition to the $64 million annual price range, there’s also the matter of capital investment at ABAC.  Since Bridges’ presidency started, over $84 million in capital tasks have been completed or are within the development part at ABAC.

These tasks embrace the Health Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, ABAC Lakeside at $17 million, Historic Entrance of Campus at $15.5 million, King Corridor at $2.7 million, Donaldson Eating Hall at $four million, Thrash Wellness Middle at $4.5 million, the Laboratory Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, and the continued Carlton Middle/Fantastic Arts Constructing undertaking at $24 million.  Street improvement provides one other $2 million.

“Each of these tasks has made this campus higher,” Bridges stated.  “That plays an element in recruitment of students as properly.   When college students go to ABAC, they like what they see here.”

Bridges takes advantage of every waking moment to promote ABAC.  His stamina is known as is his means to get things executed.  Since his first day on the job, he has been on the move with a wide variety of activities, many of them within the first time ever category.

Bridges’ presidential inauguration at ABAC in 2006 was the first time that ABAC has had an inauguration ceremony.  He kicked a soccer ball into the web to announce the first ever ladies’s soccer program.  He also pushed a plunger to set off a small charge of dynamite to open the construction on the ABAC Lakeside scholar housing complicated.

ABAC President David Bridges at his inauguration ceremony on Aug. 25, 2006.  It was the first inauguration ceremony for a president in the history of ABAC.

Bridges assisted 103-year-old ABAC alumnus Ethel Arnold Talley when she rang the original ABAC bell on the opening of the Historic Entrance of Campus undertaking, honored the reminiscence of ABAC alumnus and Medal of Honor recipient Harold Bascom Durham, Jr., on the opening of the Freedom Gallery, and used a cross-cut saw on a log to announce the beginning of ABAC bachelor’s levels in forestry and wildlife.

With an incredible sense of satisfaction in his alma mater, Bridges watched fireworks explode over the campus at the conclusion of ABAC’s 100th birthday celebration.  He guided the method when the former Georgia Agrirama turned an element of the ABAC campus as the Georgia Museum of Agriculture and Historic Village, headed up the consolidation with Bainbridge State School, and served as Interim Director of Georgia’s first ever Middle for Rural Prosperity and Innovation.

“Rural communities have very tangible advantages to supply society as an entire,” Bridges stated of Georgia’s Rural Middle.   “The Middle has a statewide mission and one of the tenets to that mission is to find a path to prosperity for rural communities.”

All these tasks took mammoth amounts of time for the ABAC President whose day typically begins in the pre-dawn stillness with breakfast at the Northside Café in Tifton.

In the course of the past 13 years, Bridges has enlisted the help of legislators underneath the Golden Dome for ABAC tasks, spoken to civic clubs and group groups far and broad, accepted the award as the Arts Citizen of the Yr for Tift County, and acquired the USG Gold Excellent Customer Service Management Award.

Bridges, who turned 61 in June, points to the establishment of ABAC as a State School as the proudest accomplishment of his tenure.

“That modified all the things,” Bridges stated.  “In any other case we can be floundering.  The power to supply bachelor’s degrees changed ABAC ceaselessly.”

Most chief operating officers develop their own administration type or try to duplicate the type of different successful leaders of organizations.  Bridges believes his fashion hasn’t modified a lot since 2006.

“In some ways, I am slightly extra affected person now than I used to be once I first turned president,” Bridges stated.  “In other methods, I feel I’m less affected person.  Common George Patton stated, ‘lead, follow, or get out of the way.’  I like that.

“My position is to get individuals to have a vision of the place ABAC needs to go.  Finally, most people know the best thing to do.  It’s just a matter of getting them to do it.  Typically they must be nudged just a little bit.”

Dealing with the many complexities of the job is usually probably the most troublesome half of being the top of a serious company or in Bridges’ case, a university.

“The most important challenge is assembly the expectations of individuals,” Bridges stated.  “In our case, meaning college students, mother and father of students, school, employees, alumni, donors, buddies of the school, and the public.  Typically individuals come to the table with totally unrealistic expectations.

“Take students for instance.  Some college students anticipate to breeze by way of school just the best way they breezed by way of high school.  School is totally different than highschool.  College students and fogeys come to know that.  Typically it takes a while.”

When asked what offers him with probably the most satisfaction as the ABAC President, Bridges points to 2 days every year.

“Fall graduation and spring commencement,” Bridges stated.  “The graduates have cleared that hurdle.   They’ve diplomas.  Our expectation is that they may go out and do something with these levels.”

When he left the tiny town of Parrott in Terrell County in 1976 to attend ABAC, Bridges had no concept he would meet his wife, Kim, in Rosalyn Donaldson’s English class and that at some point he would grow to be the only ABAC President who was as soon as a scholar at the school.

ABAC President David Bridges spends numerous hours talking on his favourite matter, ABAC.

“It was never my dream to develop into president of ABAC,” Bridges stated.  “Actually, I never really considered it.  Even once I was 40 years previous, I hadn’t considered it.

“I’ve had opportunities to go away however I all the time asked myself, ‘is that a better fit for me than ABAC?’” Bridges stated.   “ABAC has been a reasonably good fit for me.”

Bridges has far surpassed the typical tenure of seven years for a university president.  In reality, he’s now the second longest serving president within the historical past of ABAC.  George P. Donaldson was the ABAC president for 14 years from 1947-61.  Bridges has 13 beneath his belt and is steaming full velocity forward into his 14th yr.

“Fortunate 13 is over, and now we’ll see what occurs in 14,” Bridges stated.

Is being president of ABAC in 2019 more durable than being president of ABAC was in 2006?

“Oh sure, rather a lot more durable,” Bridges stated.  “Now, everyone needs to inform you the best way to do what you are promoting. In 2006, we didn’t have to fret about cyber-security threats.  I didn’t have so many people wanting over my shoulder.

“Individuals in our society at this time are typically much less self-reliant, more contentious, and more self-absorbed.  There seems to be rigidity about every part, notably in relation to political correctness.  Individuals are hyper-sensitive about being offended.  It turns into extra pervasive day by day.

“It keeps us from specializing in our central mission because we’re coping with all this other stuff.  My aim is to get something accomplished and make ABAC a better place.”

But at some point, there shall be a life for Bridges after his ABAC profession is accomplished.

“Positive, that day will come,” Bridges stated.  “When it does, I need to continue to be lively within the public service sector but in a much less outstanding means.  I’ll return to the farm and be an element of one thing that’s not seven days every week, 24 hours a day.”

Bridges owns the household farm in Terrell County and retreats there as typically as potential.  However wherever he goes, ABAC is all the time on his thoughts.

“I don’t worry concerning the day-to-day operation because we have now nice individuals to hold on,” Bridges stated.  “However it’s all the time one thing.  It’s often an external factor that can cause the wheels to return off pretty shortly.”

Until that retirement day comes, Bridges finds it straightforward to encourage himself to stay true to the ABAC mission every single day.

“We now have made nice progress,” Bridges stated.  “But there’s still quite a bit to be achieved.”

###

The post Business of ABAC Never Far from Mind of David Bridges appeared first on Laptop Computer Info.

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[yourmadqueen]

Business of ABAC Never Far from Mind of David Bridges

By Mike Chason

Operating a enterprise with a finances of $64 million a yr would eat each waking moment of most people.  Dr. David Bridges, president of Abraham Baldwin Agricultural School, is not any exception.

“The large difference between operating a enterprise and being the president of ABAC is our return on funding could be very difficult,” Bridges, the longest serving president of the 26 establishments within the College System of Georgia (USG), stated.  “Our return would have to be calculated over the lives and careers of our graduates.”

Dr. David Bridges simply started his 14th yr because the ABAC President.

Since Bridges turned the 10th president within the historical past of ABAC on July 1, 2006, over 7,000 graduates have acquired their ABAC diplomas.   In contrast to a company that makes just one product and that product ultimately rusts away or in the case of meals, will get eaten, Bridges hopes that ABAC graduates proceed to thrive and construct extra businesses.

“College students are our business, and our graduates begin businesses of their own,” Bridges stated.  “During their lives, our graduates generate financial influence in their communities so the ABAC funding continues to develop.”

The newest statewide economic influence research commissioned by the USG showed that ABAC’s economic impression on South Georgia skyrocketed to a document $529,838,507 in fiscal yr 2017.  The multiplier effect turned 444 jobs at ABAC into 1,382 jobs off campus for a total influence of 1,826 jobs in South Georgia.

“Extra jobs at ABAC means more jobs in South Georgia,” Dr. Renata Elad, Dean of the Stafford Faculty of Business at ABAC, stated.  “ABAC had a a lot greater employment impression plus the price of housing went up, and the typical lease in Tifton went up that yr.  Personal expenses for leisure, apparel, and providers have been additionally up.”

Elad analyzed the USG numbers for ABAC and found the ABAC financial impression a monumental 31 per cent larger than the $369,874,664 influence within the 2016 fiscal yr.

“ABAC wants South Georgia, and South Georgia needs ABAC,” Elad stated in her analysis.  “With complete employment of over 1,800 jobs instantly from scholar spending activities and an general labor impression of virtually $66 million, ABAC is certainly a robust associate in regional progress.”

Bridges pointed out that these numbers mirror solely South Georgia and the school has changed fairly a bit because the research was carried out in 2017.  Bainbridge State School merged with ABAC in 2018, leading to a document enrollment of four,291 college students through the 2018 fall semester.

ABAC attracted college students from 30 nations, 18 states, and 155 of Georgia’s 159 counties during the 2018 fall time period.  Because of the consolidation, ABAC provided courses in Bainbridge, Blakely, and Donalsonville in addition to its courses in Tifton and Moultrie.

Many of these college students choose to remain at ABAC to finish one of 12 four-year degree packages.   ABAC provided solely two-year degrees from 1933 to 2008.  As an alternative of staying two or three years at ABAC for an associate degree, students stay at ABAC four or five years to finish their bachelor’s degree.

With a bachelor’s degree in hand, graduates have more to offer the world of work.  That expands the ABAC financial impression even additional because graduates discover greater paying jobs.

ABAC President David Bridges (r) with ABAC Director of Amenities and Land Assets Tim Carpenter (l) look over plans for the Wonderful Arts building with Jody Buchan from Allstate Development.

In addition to the $64 million annual price range, there’s also the matter of capital investment at ABAC.  Since Bridges’ presidency started, over $84 million in capital tasks have been completed or are within the development part at ABAC.

These tasks embrace the Health Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, ABAC Lakeside at $17 million, Historic Entrance of Campus at $15.5 million, King Corridor at $2.7 million, Donaldson Eating Hall at $four million, Thrash Wellness Middle at $4.5 million, the Laboratory Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, and the continued Carlton Middle/Fantastic Arts Constructing undertaking at $24 million.  Street improvement provides one other $2 million.

“Each of these tasks has made this campus higher,” Bridges stated.  “That plays an element in recruitment of students as properly.   When college students go to ABAC, they like what they see here.”

Bridges takes advantage of every waking moment to promote ABAC.  His stamina is known as is his means to get things executed.  Since his first day on the job, he has been on the move with a wide variety of activities, many of them within the first time ever category.

Bridges’ presidential inauguration at ABAC in 2006 was the first time that ABAC has had an inauguration ceremony.  He kicked a soccer ball into the web to announce the first ever ladies’s soccer program.  He also pushed a plunger to set off a small charge of dynamite to open the construction on the ABAC Lakeside scholar housing complicated.

ABAC President David Bridges at his inauguration ceremony on Aug. 25, 2006.  It was the first inauguration ceremony for a president in the history of ABAC.

Bridges assisted 103-year-old ABAC alumnus Ethel Arnold Talley when she rang the original ABAC bell on the opening of the Historic Entrance of Campus undertaking, honored the reminiscence of ABAC alumnus and Medal of Honor recipient Harold Bascom Durham, Jr., on the opening of the Freedom Gallery, and used a cross-cut saw on a log to announce the beginning of ABAC bachelor’s levels in forestry and wildlife.

With an incredible sense of satisfaction in his alma mater, Bridges watched fireworks explode over the campus at the conclusion of ABAC’s 100th birthday celebration.  He guided the method when the former Georgia Agrirama turned an element of the ABAC campus as the Georgia Museum of Agriculture and Historic Village, headed up the consolidation with Bainbridge State School, and served as Interim Director of Georgia’s first ever Middle for Rural Prosperity and Innovation.

“Rural communities have very tangible advantages to supply society as an entire,” Bridges stated of Georgia’s Rural Middle.   “The Middle has a statewide mission and one of the tenets to that mission is to find a path to prosperity for rural communities.”

All these tasks took mammoth amounts of time for the ABAC President whose day typically begins in the pre-dawn stillness with breakfast at the Northside Café in Tifton.

In the course of the past 13 years, Bridges has enlisted the help of legislators underneath the Golden Dome for ABAC tasks, spoken to civic clubs and group groups far and broad, accepted the award as the Arts Citizen of the Yr for Tift County, and acquired the USG Gold Excellent Customer Service Management Award.

Bridges, who turned 61 in June, points to the establishment of ABAC as a State School as the proudest accomplishment of his tenure.

“That modified all the things,” Bridges stated.  “In any other case we can be floundering.  The power to supply bachelor’s degrees changed ABAC ceaselessly.”

Most chief operating officers develop their own administration type or try to duplicate the type of different successful leaders of organizations.  Bridges believes his fashion hasn’t modified a lot since 2006.

“In some ways, I am slightly extra affected person now than I used to be once I first turned president,” Bridges stated.  “In other methods, I feel I’m less affected person.  Common George Patton stated, ‘lead, follow, or get out of the way.’  I like that.

“My position is to get individuals to have a vision of the place ABAC needs to go.  Finally, most people know the best thing to do.  It’s just a matter of getting them to do it.  Typically they must be nudged just a little bit.”

Dealing with the many complexities of the job is usually probably the most troublesome half of being the top of a serious company or in Bridges’ case, a university.

“The most important challenge is assembly the expectations of individuals,” Bridges stated.  “In our case, meaning college students, mother and father of students, school, employees, alumni, donors, buddies of the school, and the public.  Typically individuals come to the table with totally unrealistic expectations.

“Take students for instance.  Some college students anticipate to breeze by way of school just the best way they breezed by way of high school.  School is totally different than highschool.  College students and fogeys come to know that.  Typically it takes a while.”

When asked what offers him with probably the most satisfaction as the ABAC President, Bridges points to 2 days every year.

“Fall graduation and spring commencement,” Bridges stated.  “The graduates have cleared that hurdle.   They’ve diplomas.  Our expectation is that they may go out and do something with these levels.”

When he left the tiny town of Parrott in Terrell County in 1976 to attend ABAC, Bridges had no concept he would meet his wife, Kim, in Rosalyn Donaldson’s English class and that at some point he would grow to be the only ABAC President who was as soon as a scholar at the school.

ABAC President David Bridges spends numerous hours talking on his favourite matter, ABAC.

“It was never my dream to develop into president of ABAC,” Bridges stated.  “Actually, I never really considered it.  Even once I was 40 years previous, I hadn’t considered it.

“I’ve had opportunities to go away however I all the time asked myself, ‘is that a better fit for me than ABAC?’” Bridges stated.   “ABAC has been a reasonably good fit for me.”

Bridges has far surpassed the typical tenure of seven years for a university president.  In reality, he’s now the second longest serving president within the historical past of ABAC.  George P. Donaldson was the ABAC president for 14 years from 1947-61.  Bridges has 13 beneath his belt and is steaming full velocity forward into his 14th yr.

“Fortunate 13 is over, and now we’ll see what occurs in 14,” Bridges stated.

Is being president of ABAC in 2019 more durable than being president of ABAC was in 2006?

“Oh sure, rather a lot more durable,” Bridges stated.  “Now, everyone needs to inform you the best way to do what you are promoting. In 2006, we didn’t have to fret about cyber-security threats.  I didn’t have so many people wanting over my shoulder.

“Individuals in our society at this time are typically much less self-reliant, more contentious, and more self-absorbed.  There seems to be rigidity about every part, notably in relation to political correctness.  Individuals are hyper-sensitive about being offended.  It turns into extra pervasive day by day.

“It keeps us from specializing in our central mission because we’re coping with all this other stuff.  My aim is to get something accomplished and make ABAC a better place.”

But at some point, there shall be a life for Bridges after his ABAC profession is accomplished.

“Positive, that day will come,” Bridges stated.  “When it does, I need to continue to be lively within the public service sector but in a much less outstanding means.  I’ll return to the farm and be an element of one thing that’s not seven days every week, 24 hours a day.”

Bridges owns the household farm in Terrell County and retreats there as typically as potential.  However wherever he goes, ABAC is all the time on his thoughts.

“I don’t worry concerning the day-to-day operation because we have now nice individuals to hold on,” Bridges stated.  “However it’s all the time one thing.  It’s often an external factor that can cause the wheels to return off pretty shortly.”

Until that retirement day comes, Bridges finds it straightforward to encourage himself to stay true to the ABAC mission every single day.

“We now have made nice progress,” Bridges stated.  “But there’s still quite a bit to be achieved.”

###

The post Business of ABAC Never Far from Mind of David Bridges appeared first on Laptop Computer Info.

#Blog #Featured Stories

[ultrashipshapesunk-blog]

Business of ABAC Never Far from Mind of David Bridges

By Mike Chason

Operating a enterprise with a finances of $64 million a yr would eat each waking moment of most people.  Dr. David Bridges, president of Abraham Baldwin Agricultural School, is not any exception.

“The large difference between operating a enterprise and being the president of ABAC is our return on funding could be very difficult,” Bridges, the longest serving president of the 26 establishments within the College System of Georgia (USG), stated.  “Our return would have to be calculated over the lives and careers of our graduates.”

Dr. David Bridges simply started his 14th yr because the ABAC President.

Since Bridges turned the 10th president within the historical past of ABAC on July 1, 2006, over 7,000 graduates have acquired their ABAC diplomas.   In contrast to a company that makes just one product and that product ultimately rusts away or in the case of meals, will get eaten, Bridges hopes that ABAC graduates proceed to thrive and construct extra businesses.

“College students are our business, and our graduates begin businesses of their own,” Bridges stated.  “During their lives, our graduates generate financial influence in their communities so the ABAC funding continues to develop.”

The newest statewide economic influence research commissioned by the USG showed that ABAC’s economic impression on South Georgia skyrocketed to a document $529,838,507 in fiscal yr 2017.  The multiplier effect turned 444 jobs at ABAC into 1,382 jobs off campus for a total influence of 1,826 jobs in South Georgia.

“Extra jobs at ABAC means more jobs in South Georgia,” Dr. Renata Elad, Dean of the Stafford Faculty of Business at ABAC, stated.  “ABAC had a a lot greater employment impression plus the price of housing went up, and the typical lease in Tifton went up that yr.  Personal expenses for leisure, apparel, and providers have been additionally up.”

Elad analyzed the USG numbers for ABAC and found the ABAC financial impression a monumental 31 per cent larger than the $369,874,664 influence within the 2016 fiscal yr.

“ABAC wants South Georgia, and South Georgia needs ABAC,” Elad stated in her analysis.  “With complete employment of over 1,800 jobs instantly from scholar spending activities and an general labor impression of virtually $66 million, ABAC is certainly a robust associate in regional progress.”

Bridges pointed out that these numbers mirror solely South Georgia and the school has changed fairly a bit because the research was carried out in 2017.  Bainbridge State School merged with ABAC in 2018, leading to a document enrollment of four,291 college students through the 2018 fall semester.

ABAC attracted college students from 30 nations, 18 states, and 155 of Georgia’s 159 counties during the 2018 fall time period.  Because of the consolidation, ABAC provided courses in Bainbridge, Blakely, and Donalsonville in addition to its courses in Tifton and Moultrie.

Many of these college students choose to remain at ABAC to finish one of 12 four-year degree packages.   ABAC provided solely two-year degrees from 1933 to 2008.  As an alternative of staying two or three years at ABAC for an associate degree, students stay at ABAC four or five years to finish their bachelor’s degree.

With a bachelor’s degree in hand, graduates have more to offer the world of work.  That expands the ABAC financial impression even additional because graduates discover greater paying jobs.

ABAC President David Bridges (r) with ABAC Director of Amenities and Land Assets Tim Carpenter (l) look over plans for the Wonderful Arts building with Jody Buchan from Allstate Development.

In addition to the $64 million annual price range, there’s also the matter of capital investment at ABAC.  Since Bridges’ presidency started, over $84 million in capital tasks have been completed or are within the development part at ABAC.

These tasks embrace the Health Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, ABAC Lakeside at $17 million, Historic Entrance of Campus at $15.5 million, King Corridor at $2.7 million, Donaldson Eating Hall at $four million, Thrash Wellness Middle at $4.5 million, the Laboratory Sciences constructing at $7.2 million, and the continued Carlton Middle/Fantastic Arts Constructing undertaking at $24 million.  Street improvement provides one other $2 million.

“Each of these tasks has made this campus higher,” Bridges stated.  “That plays an element in recruitment of students as properly.   When college students go to ABAC, they like what they see here.”

Bridges takes advantage of every waking moment to promote ABAC.  His stamina is known as is his means to get things executed.  Since his first day on the job, he has been on the move with a wide variety of activities, many of them within the first time ever category.

Bridges’ presidential inauguration at ABAC in 2006 was the first time that ABAC has had an inauguration ceremony.  He kicked a soccer ball into the web to announce the first ever ladies’s soccer program.  He also pushed a plunger to set off a small charge of dynamite to open the construction on the ABAC Lakeside scholar housing complicated.

ABAC President David Bridges at his inauguration ceremony on Aug. 25, 2006.  It was the first inauguration ceremony for a president in the history of ABAC.

Bridges assisted 103-year-old ABAC alumnus Ethel Arnold Talley when she rang the original ABAC bell on the opening of the Historic Entrance of Campus undertaking, honored the reminiscence of ABAC alumnus and Medal of Honor recipient Harold Bascom Durham, Jr., on the opening of the Freedom Gallery, and used a cross-cut saw on a log to announce the beginning of ABAC bachelor’s levels in forestry and wildlife.

With an incredible sense of satisfaction in his alma mater, Bridges watched fireworks explode over the campus at the conclusion of ABAC’s 100th birthday celebration.  He guided the method when the former Georgia Agrirama turned an element of the ABAC campus as the Georgia Museum of Agriculture and Historic Village, headed up the consolidation with Bainbridge State School, and served as Interim Director of Georgia’s first ever Middle for Rural Prosperity and Innovation.

“Rural communities have very tangible advantages to supply society as an entire,” Bridges stated of Georgia’s Rural Middle.   “The Middle has a statewide mission and one of the tenets to that mission is to find a path to prosperity for rural communities.”

All these tasks took mammoth amounts of time for the ABAC President whose day typically begins in the pre-dawn stillness with breakfast at the Northside Café in Tifton.

In the course of the past 13 years, Bridges has enlisted the help of legislators underneath the Golden Dome for ABAC tasks, spoken to civic clubs and group groups far and broad, accepted the award as the Arts Citizen of the Yr for Tift County, and acquired the USG Gold Excellent Customer Service Management Award.

Bridges, who turned 61 in June, points to the establishment of ABAC as a State School as the proudest accomplishment of his tenure.

“That modified all the things,” Bridges stated.  “In any other case we can be floundering.  The power to supply bachelor’s degrees changed ABAC ceaselessly.”

Most chief operating officers develop their own administration type or try to duplicate the type of different successful leaders of organizations.  Bridges believes his fashion hasn’t modified a lot since 2006.

“In some ways, I am slightly extra affected person now than I used to be once I first turned president,” Bridges stated.  “In other methods, I feel I’m less affected person.  Common George Patton stated, ‘lead, follow, or get out of the way.’  I like that.

“My position is to get individuals to have a vision of the place ABAC needs to go.  Finally, most people know the best thing to do.  It’s just a matter of getting them to do it.  Typically they must be nudged just a little bit.”

Dealing with the many complexities of the job is usually probably the most troublesome half of being the top of a serious company or in Bridges’ case, a university.

“The most important challenge is assembly the expectations of individuals,” Bridges stated.  “In our case, meaning college students, mother and father of students, school, employees, alumni, donors, buddies of the school, and the public.  Typically individuals come to the table with totally unrealistic expectations.

“Take students for instance.  Some college students anticipate to breeze by way of school just the best way they breezed by way of high school.  School is totally different than highschool.  College students and fogeys come to know that.  Typically it takes a while.”

When asked what offers him with probably the most satisfaction as the ABAC President, Bridges points to 2 days every year.

“Fall graduation and spring commencement,” Bridges stated.  “The graduates have cleared that hurdle.   They’ve diplomas.  Our expectation is that they may go out and do something with these levels.”

When he left the tiny town of Parrott in Terrell County in 1976 to attend ABAC, Bridges had no concept he would meet his wife, Kim, in Rosalyn Donaldson’s English class and that at some point he would grow to be the only ABAC President who was as soon as a scholar at the school.

ABAC President David Bridges spends numerous hours talking on his favourite matter, ABAC.

“It was never my dream to develop into president of ABAC,” Bridges stated.  “Actually, I never really considered it.  Even once I was 40 years previous, I hadn’t considered it.

“I’ve had opportunities to go away however I all the time asked myself, ‘is that a better fit for me than ABAC?’” Bridges stated.   “ABAC has been a reasonably good fit for me.”

Bridges has far surpassed the typical tenure of seven years for a university president.  In reality, he’s now the second longest serving president within the historical past of ABAC.  George P. Donaldson was the ABAC president for 14 years from 1947-61.  Bridges has 13 beneath his belt and is steaming full velocity forward into his 14th yr.

“Fortunate 13 is over, and now we’ll see what occurs in 14,” Bridges stated.

Is being president of ABAC in 2019 more durable than being president of ABAC was in 2006?

“Oh sure, rather a lot more durable,” Bridges stated.  “Now, everyone needs to inform you the best way to do what you are promoting. In 2006, we didn’t have to fret about cyber-security threats.  I didn’t have so many people wanting over my shoulder.

“Individuals in our society at this time are typically much less self-reliant, more contentious, and more self-absorbed.  There seems to be rigidity about every part, notably in relation to political correctness.  Individuals are hyper-sensitive about being offended.  It turns into extra pervasive day by day.

“It keeps us from specializing in our central mission because we’re coping with all this other stuff.  My aim is to get something accomplished and make ABAC a better place.”

But at some point, there shall be a life for Bridges after his ABAC profession is accomplished.

“Positive, that day will come,” Bridges stated.  “When it does, I need to continue to be lively within the public service sector but in a much less outstanding means.  I’ll return to the farm and be an element of one thing that’s not seven days every week, 24 hours a day.”

Bridges owns the household farm in Terrell County and retreats there as typically as potential.  However wherever he goes, ABAC is all the time on his thoughts.

“I don’t worry concerning the day-to-day operation because we have now nice individuals to hold on,” Bridges stated.  “However it’s all the time one thing.  It’s often an external factor that can cause the wheels to return off pretty shortly.”

Until that retirement day comes, Bridges finds it straightforward to encourage himself to stay true to the ABAC mission every single day.

“We now have made nice progress,” Bridges stated.  “But there’s still quite a bit to be achieved.”

###

The post Business of ABAC Never Far from Mind of David Bridges appeared first on Laptop Computer Info.

#Blog #Featured Stories