Jay Bennish, a geography teacher in Aurora, Colorado, is seemingly fond of force-feeding liberal rhetoric and political propaganda to his captive audience of impressionable young minds.
So fond, in fact, that a student decided to record one of his tirades.
The recording was played for school officials and Bennish was placed on suspension (with pay). Seems he is now suing the school. Sounds like a true liberal to me. For a picture of this whacko leftie, please see the link.
Diatribe on Bush taped; teacher placed on leave
By Valerie Richardson
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
March 3, 2006
AURORA, Colo. -- By many accounts, teacher Jay Bennish was notorious for veering off topic to blast President Bush, capitalism and U.S. foreign policy during his social-studies classes here at Overland High School.
Then Sean Allen got an MP3 player for Christmas.
This week, Mr. Bennish was placed on administrative leave pending a school-district investigation after 16-year-old Sean recorded a lecture during his sophomore geography class in which the teacher compared Mr. Bush to Adolf Hitler.
During the 20-minute recording, Mr. Bennish said there were "eerie similarities" between "things that Adolf Hitler used to say" and Mr. Bush's statements during his Jan. 31 State of the Union address.
Mr. Bennish also said that capitalism was "at odds with human rights," and that the United States was "probably the most violent nation on planet Earth."
Jeff Allen, Sean's father, said his son would often complain about his teacher's left-wing rants, but Mr. Allen assumed he was exaggerating -- until he heard Mr. Bennish on the recording.
"I had no idea he was this nuts," said Mr. Allen.
The Cherry Creek School District is conducting a "thorough investigation" into the matter, but in a statement released Wednesday, officials said "it seems evident that a breach of district policy occurred regarding the balanced presentation of sensitive material."
District policy allows teachers to offer their views on issues, within certain parameters, said district spokeswoman Tustin Amole.
"We encourage teachers to express their opinions, but they must be in the context of the class they are teaching and they have to provide both sides," she said.
She added that students are permitted to bring recording devices to class, and that Sean will not face disciplinary action for recording the lecture.
Mr. Bennish was placed on paid leave in part to shield him from the public outcry over the issue, she said. Sean has discussed the matter publicly on two popular Denver radio talk-show programs.
The following transcript was taken from Rush Limbaugh's site.
Idiot Teacher Justifies 9/11 Attacks
March 3, 2006
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: All right, I want to go to the audio sound bites. Two things. We've got more from this long-haired, maggot-infested FM type teacher, Jay Bennish, out in Aurora, Colorado. We have four more bites. I'm going to try to limit my commentary because they speak for themselves. Here's the first of the four.
BENNISH: Now, if we have the right to fly into Bolivia and Peru and drop chemical weapons on top of farmers' fields because we're afraid they might be growing cocoa and that could be turned into cocaine and sold to us, well, then don't the Peruvians and the Iranians and the Chinese have the right to invade America and drop chemical weapons over North Carolina to destroy the tobacco plants that are killing millions and millions of people in their countries every year and causing them billions of dollars in health care costs?
RUSH: This is a guy teaching geography, human geography in Aurora, Colorado. Here's the next bite.
BENNISH: Where in this definition does it say anything about capitalism is an economic system that will provide everybody in the world with the basic needs that they need? Is that part of the system? Do you see how this economic system is at odds with humanity, at odds with caring and compassion, it's at odds with human rights?
RUSH: What have I told you? These people don't like capitalism because they think it chooses winners and chooses losers, and they think the winners choose themselves, purposely leave the losers out, everything is unfair and unjust, and the more I hear of this guy... I mean, we've had callers. We've had liberal callers that are smarter than this guy, but he's just a cliché. He's so stereotypical. Here's the next one.
BENNISH: Now, do we really want to kill innocent people? I don't know. I don't know the answer to that. I know that there are some Americans who do, people who work in the CIA, people who have to think like that, those kind of dirty minds, dirty tricks, that's how the intelligence world works. Sometimes you do want to kill people just for the sake of killing them.
RUSH: (Laughing.) And the next one.
BENNISH: When Al-Qaeda attacked America on September 11th, in their view they're not attacking innocent people, okay? The CIA has an office in the World Trade Center. Pentagon is a military target. The White House was a military target. Congress is a military target.
RUSH: This guy is justifying the attacks of 9/11 now because the White House and Congress are military targets. CIA has an office there, means it's a military target. I tell you, focusing on this guy's comment that Bush equals Hitler is to miss the point of who this guy is and what he's teaching. We've got one more, and here it is.
BENNISH: To many Americans, that flag is no different than the Nazi flag or the Confederate flag it. It represents people that came and stole their land, lied, brought disease, rape, pillage, destruction, et cetera.
RUSH: This guy, has he become an adult yet? Do you hear his voice? This guy sounds like he's a paper boy still doing his route. My gosh, folks. This is just... totally believable. American flag no different than the Nazi flag, Congress is a military target, White House is a military target, World Trade Center was a military target. CIA has an office there! All of this is our fault. We deserve this. We deserve all of this because of what we have been doing around the world. That's what this guy's thrust is.
END TRANSCRIPT
Now, this joker is there, and is paid by the taxpayers, to teach their kids geography, not to propagandize for the liberal Left. Tell'em about the states and countries and save your flaky, opinionated rants for Open Mike night at the Funny Bone.
Adminstrative suspension is better than he should have gotten, in my humble opinion.