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Readers!

 

It is now July, time once again to celebrate the start of this webpage in 2010 with my annual July fund-raising campaign.

 

This year I celebrate the fifteenth anniversary since I began Behind the Black. During that time I have done more than 33,000 posts, mostly covering the global space industry and the related planetary and astronomical science that comes from it. Along the way I have also felt compelled as a free American citizen to regularly post my thoughts on the politics and culture of the time, partly because I think it is important for free Americans to do so, and partly because those politics and that culture have a direct impact on the future of our civilization and its on-going efforts to explore and eventually colonize the solar system.

 

You can’t understand one without understanding the other.

 

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A teacher molests an underage student for three years and, when caught, his fellow teachers come forward to support him.

Modern America: A teacher molests an underage student for three years and, when caught, his fellow teachers come forward to support him, not the student.

At the sentencing hearing seven teachers plus a school board member, stood with the teacher, Neal Erickson, calling for a reduced sentence. The judge’s response?

Judge Michael Bumgartner told Erickson he was “appalled and ashamed that the community could rally around, in this case, you,” according to the Herald. “What you did was a jab in the eye with a sharp stick to every parent who trusts a teacher,” he said shortly before sentencing Erickson to 15-30 years in prison.

The parents of the student are now trying to get these teachers fired, as well as recall the school board member. The local authorities are hesitating out of fear of lawsuits, while hundreds of parents are telling them if they don’t fire these teachers they will pull their kids from these public schools.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

3 comments

  • Kelly Starks

    Its one of those days when I realize that – despite my best efforts – I’m just not cynical enough.

  • Mark

    It world were a teacher who makes 30-50k a year costs on average at least in my state half a million dollars to fire to the school or district in question. Something is off, and I think that number is on the low end. I even live in a a right to work state. I once was sitting in on a talk where a school union rep basically said the worse you are the more they will protect you. It little wonder so many teachers can’t teacher and aren’t fired either.

  • wodun

    A woman would not have received 15-30 years.

    Also, looks like there is more going on than just a rapist teacher.

    ““They never found out who sent the emails and brought it to the surface,” Janczewski said. “On the one hand, we’re very appreciative … but on the other hand, we’re angry. Why didn’t they come forward sooner? Why did they put the pictures on a porn site?””

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