• Bush pretty much says if Iraq denies having weapons of mass destruction, we will attack them.

Anybody thinking Salem Witch Trials? There is no right answer. Denial means they are lying and they burn. Admission means they burn.

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• South Knox Bubba reminds us not to give pets as presents.

Thinking of giving a pet as a gift? Thinking of getting one for yourself? Read SKB's blog entry before you do.

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• A pictorial history of Georgia's state flags.

Did you know that in the there have actually been 6 different state flags? Do you know what they looked like? Did you know that the Confederate battle symbol was not entirely removed, just drastically shrunk in the spirit of compromise?

My favorite is the 1920-1956 flag, followed by the original unofficial flag. Parts of both of them appear on the newest version.

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• AJC columnist Cynthia Tuckers argues to get rid of worst teachers, but fails to suggest how.

There are two steps to improving the quality of our teachers in the state. First you have to evaluate the teachers, and then you have to get rid of the bad ones. Governor Barnes had made teachers mad by putting into place methods of accomplishing both of these tasks.

To evaluate teachers Barnes decided to monitor the standardized test scores of their students. Barnes admitted that this method needed to be tweaked, and planned to do so. However, there has to be some method of evaluating teacher's effectiveness. If a teacher cannot teach her students standard material that all other students are required to learn, then maybe that teacher should not be teaching. How can you call teachers that fail to educate their classes the basics "good," and justify keeping them?

To keep the school system clean of under performing teachers, Barnes had stripped incoming teachers of the tenure rights that veteran teachers have. Even Tucker points out, "Superintendents and principals across the state contend that they find it difficult to fire incompetent teachers." With these protections gone, protections that most workers in Georgia do not have, teachers could now be terminated if they failed to teach effectively. If you were ineffective in your job, wouldn't you be fired?

Governor Elect Perdue plans to return tenure to the new teachers, and to stop evaluating them based upon their student's standardized test scores. Tucker writes that Perdue must find a way to get rid of bad teachers. How? You are losing your ability to terminate the bad ones, and the method of evaluating which ones are good and which ones are bad. Any suggestions?

Rest assured Georgia. Your most valuable possessions are marching off to school every morning to a system where bad teachers have just been given the go ahead to hang around and not educate them. And all because they, the teachers, were upset that they were going to be held accountable to teaching standards. How unfair!

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