Members of the Maine Republican Party decided to ransack a classroom of a middle school teacher, when they were allowed to use the room for a caucus meeting. Here is a list of what happened (courtesy of Think Progress):
– For seven years, Clifford has had “a collage-type poster depicting the history of the U.S. labor movement” on his classroom door. He uses it “to teach his students how to incorporate collages into their annual project on Norman Rockwell’s historic ‘Four Freedoms’ illustrations.” When Clifford returned to his classroom on Monday, after the GOP caucuses, the poster was gone; in its place was a sticker reading, “Working People Vote Republican.”
– Republicans opened a “closed cardboard box they found near Clifford’s desk” and later objected to the fact that it contained copies of the U.S. Constitution donated to the school by the American Civil Liberties Union.
– After the caucuses, “rank-and-file Republicans who were upset by what they said they had seen in Clifford’s classroom” began calling the school, objecting to student art they had seen and a sticker on a filing cabinet reading “People for the American Way — Fight the Right.”
Since this the Maine GOP has issued an apology and promised to return all the items that were taken. Here is an interview conducted by FOX23 in Maine with the teacher, Paul Clifford:
But what does this tell the younger generation about the GOP? Well Think Progress has obtained a letter from one of Clifford’s former students:
I am an unapologetic graduate of Paul Clifford’s eighth grade English class at King Middle School. I participated in the “Four Freedoms” expedition, and I made a poster decrying war quite similar to the one with which the Republicans took issue.
I am not brainwashed, I am not a puppet, I am not anti-American or anti-religious, and I am certainly not stupid. Paul Clifford’s class taught me to think critically, to deductively reason and, if anything, to appreciate America for all the freedoms with which I am ensured on a daily basis.
Clearly, the Knox County Republicans — who took a cherished, pro-Labor poster from Clifford’s room and who now are making slanderous and uninformed claims about Clifford — have a different agenda.
For a party working so hard to shake the “old white man” image, they sure seem hell bent on keeping it according to their actions. We are talking about kids around the ages of 13-14 here, and the GOP is acting like they are unable to draw their own conclusions on life and are some weak minded individuals that are being “brain washed”. Of course the only ones trying to brain wash here is the GOP and the fact that these kids are coming out fine shows that the so-called “indoctrination” of our children isn’t going to happen.
So now we have the GOP alienating another generation of future voters, one school at a time. Keep it up Republicans, you truly are your own worst enemy.