Nothing in life happens in a vacuum. Everything is interconnected to everything else. There is a school board election in Fairfax County, Virginia this Tuesday but there is more at stake here than somebody filling out the last two and a half years of the previous member’s term. This is the first election that has taken place in the country since Charlottesville and perhaps not coincidentally it is taking place in Virginia. Virginia has become ground zero in the fight against racism and hate in this country. If you doubt that Virginia is now a microcosm of what is happening in America, or if you have forgotten what was happening in Charlottesville less than two weeks ago, this will refresh your recollection. Washington Post:
Men wearing fatigues and armed with semiautomatic rifles passed by, [synagogue president Alan] Zimmerman said, and he recalled hearing one shout: “There’s the synagogue.”
As the ralliers raged, Zimmerman stood outside the synagogue with an armed security guard hired because Zimmerman was concerned for the safety of his congregants praying inside, he said. “I had no choice but to be out there,” Zimmerman said. “I’m not suggesting I could have done anything, affected anything, but there was no other place that I could be at that moment.”
Zimmerman felt close to crying, he said, as he later told the roughly 40 people gathered in the synagogue that it would be best for them to leave through the back door after services and to travel in groups.
That’s a scene straight out of Nazi Germany and that was the scene in Virginia the night before the incident in Emancipation Park which is simply referred to now as “Charlottesville.” It’s against that backdrop that this school board election is being held. Now don’t dismiss lightly a local school board election. The School Board in any given county is not a mundane administrative entity, it is key to the culture of that county and as such it has political importance. If it wasn’t key, right wing televangelist and Trump supporter Franklin Graham would not be advocating that the school boards be taken over by his evangelical kith and kin. Foremost amongst that group is none other than Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, sister of Blackwater mercenary Eric Prince. The DeVos and the Princes have been advocating for a dominionist culture in the United States for quite some time and if you doubt for an instant that they are not planning to go through the schools and get to the children early, you simply have not been paying attention.
There is something that we can do about this. The Democratic candidate in Fairfax County, Karen Keys-Gamarra, is highly qualified. Her Republican opponent, Chris Grisafe, wants to hold the racist line in the county. He has the support of the local white supremacists, including one who has been threatening the Fairfax County Democratic Committee. Go to Blue Virginia, a webpage which is maintained by our fellow kossack lowkell to get the details. This is yet another election where there is a stark contrast between an unqualified Republican candidate with a racist agenda and a highly qualified Democratic candidate who is fighting the good fight. Keys-Gamarra has the endorsement of the Washington Post:
Tuesday’s special election comes as the 189,000-student school system grapples with fiscal challenges caused by the inability of state and county funds to keep up with its fast growth. A meals tax that would have provided extra resources to public education was roundly defeated in a referendum last year. The candidate with the best understanding of these complicated issues is Karen Keys-Gamarra. Ms. Keys-Gamarra, an attorney and child advocate whom we endorsed in 2015 when she unsuccessfully ran for the school board’s Sully District seat, doesn’t offer simplistic solutions but instead understands that competing needs must be weighed and prioritized — and that the school board must work as a partner with its county counterparts.
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Ms. Keys-Gamarra’s work as a court-appointed guardian and experience as the parent of three children who went through Fairfax schools gives her a broad perspective on challenges facing students and a special interest in wanting to tackle bullying. She understands the importance of diversity in the school system and is committed to ensuring that students from different backgrounds have the same access to opportunity and the means to succeed. The other candidates are Sandra Allen, Chris Grisafe and Michael Owens.
Keep all of these issues in proportion. Karen Keys-Gamarra must win this election for a lot of reasons, first and foremost because she is the most qualified candidate. Her agenda is to be the advocate for the kids, to encourage small class size, address the bullying issue which has increased exponentially in schools since the rise of Donald Trump; and to encourage after school programs which are so crucial to the development of the children.
The children are our future. We cannot turn a blind eye to Virginia Republicans like Grisafe who are more concerned about schools being named after confederate heroes traitors and civil war monuments being kept intact, not to mention placating the Republican party’s once-fringe elements, the neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan, both of whom came out and marched triumphantly in the streets after Trump was elected, taking a higher profile in this country than they have in decades.
The white supremacist hate mongers are desperately seeking to revitalize themselves in 2017. We must make sure that this is their last hurrah and that they are confined merely to the dusty pages of a dark history, which is where they belong and not in a free and democratic society.
This is not a time to be complacent or have a laissez faire attitude. If we are that way, we will lose democracy, plain and simple. The signs are everywhere. What fascists and dictators do is debase the media and the courts. This we have already seen in the Trump regime. Then they look to take over the institutions of society, education being a prime target. This we are seeing as well. Franklin Graham and Betsy DeVos’ are religious fanatics and their agenda is clear and certain and does not bode well for our young students.
Destiny works in mysterious ways. Rosa Park’s bus seat was not about a bus seat. Jane Pittman going to the all-white drinking fountain was not about a drink of water. This school board election is not just about a school board election. There’s a lot more riding on this than just getting a first rate Democrat elected, although that is our primary purpose here. This is the first election since Charlottesville and our chance to make a statement, loud and clear, that racism and hate will not be tolerated by decent Americans.
Take a stance for this fine Democratic candidate, now. If there’s any question in your mind that Keys-Gamarra knows so much more about the issues than Republican Chris Grisafe, listen to their recent debate at the end of the diary linked to below.
If you can do anything at all, now is the time to do it. If you are a Democrat in Virginia, drop everything and help Karen Keys-Gamarra win. If there was ever a time for all good men and women to come to the aid of their party, this is it. Remember, democracy grows from the grass roots up. This election is important. If we can GET OUT THE VOTE in Fairfax County, Virginia WE CAN WIN!
Karen Keys-Gamarra
Fairfax County: At-Large School Board Special Election
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