Higgenbotham's Dark Age Hovel

[Higgenbotham]

After I posted earlier today, a parent of one of my daughter's classmates was saying all but 2 of the public elementary schools in Pflugerville, Texas have basically collapsed and aren't worth sending your kids to. According to her, school after school has collapsed in that district over the past 10 years. Then she went on to say that in one school, there is a child who has hour long tantrums and everyone is told to stand back and do nothing until the tantrum plays out. So twenty some kids are basically on standby doing nothing for an hour. They are told that every child has a right to learn as the reason for allowing this. She said, therefore, for her it is either the private school our kids are going to or home schooling. Public school is now out of the question for her family. We then carried on with a discussion of how we have to pay for this nonsense, the amount of money public schools waste and how high our taxes are.

In an accelerating collapse, there are some silver linings. Also during that conversation, we talked about how truly excellent the school is that we send our kids to. Many of the teachers there are what I call "public school refugees" who are experienced teachers and administrators who have left the public schools in disgust so they can now do what they are called to do, albeit for less money. We traded stories about how the teachers there discipline to a higher standard than what we as parents expect. Therefore, we know that things are in good hands and we don't have to babysit situations we hear about from our kids. Of course, as those highly competent teachers and administrators flee the public schools, the collapse of the public schools accelerates.

This afternoon I checked this information with a parent who was an elementary school teacher. She verified that this is common now in the public schools and that she was aware that this occurs in this district exactly as it was described to me earlier this week. I told her I wanted to be sure because I could hardly believe it.

All I knew from her previously was that she is no longer teaching but had applied to be a substitute teacher at our daughter's school (both of our daughters are in kindergarten there). She said the wait list is long and she doubted she would get in for some time, if at all.

Today she told me that in the elementary school in a different district she had taught in there was something called a special behavioral unit comprised of a number of kids who had behavioral problems. She said the kids in this unit were spread out among all the classrooms in her elementary school, so every teacher had to deal with some of them. She said that one of the kids in particular would have tantrums, overturning shelves, throwing chairs, etc., and she would have to call in a trained person who was the only person allowed to touch these kids. This specially trained person would give the kid a bear hug and go about calming him down, then return him to the classroom. She said the whole situation is ridiculous and she is sending her daughter to this private school because she doesn't want her being traumatized watching this.

[Higgenbotham]

Re Tim's post about PFAS. Pest control companies routinely apply a PFAS called bifenthrin to lawns and even inside homes. Bifenthrin has been classified as a PFAS by Maryland and a few other states. Bifenthrin is also used in agriculture and has been detected in strawberries. The industry line is that it is safe for humans but that seems doubtful to me.

What Is—and Isn’t—a PFAS?

One of the most widely used fluorinated pesticides is bifenthrin. It targets insects’ nervous system and is the prime ingredient in more than 600 pesticide formulations used on corn, soy, vegetables, berries and orchard crops. It is also used to treat seeds and to control ants, termites and other pests in urban settings. Its potential effects on human health are not well known, though there is some evidence that chronic exposure is linked to neurotoxicity, and the EPA has classified it as a possible human carcinogen. Ultimately, the EPA concluded in a 2020 human health risk assessment that “dietary exposure and risk estimates are not of concern for the existing uses of bifenthrin”—at least when levels designated as safe for human consumption are not exceeded. But amounts found in recent years on collard greens, eggplants, spinach, cherry tomatoes, sweet potatoes and peaches have exceeded those EPA safety levels. Removing such residues from produce requires extra scrubbing because bifenthrin is an oily substance.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti ... ists-warn/

Bifenthrin (BF) is a Type 1 synthetic pyrethroid that accounts for over 25% of commercially used pesticides worldwide (Deanovic et al. 2018). Its extensive application is underscored by its substantial purchase volume, estimated to exceed 1 million pounds of active ingredient (USEPA 2020). BF's physicochemical characteristics, including high hydrophobicity and photostability (Table S1), contribute to its environmental persistence. These properties and broad‐spectrum applications facilitate the accumulation of its residue in diverse environmental matrices, such as soil, air, and water (Budd et al. 2020; Li et al. 2018; Sanders et al. 2018; Yang et al. 2018). The resulting environmental ubiquity inadvertently creates human exposure pathways and health risks (Corcellas et al. 2012; Liang et al. 2022; Yoshida et al. 2021). Although regulatory frameworks have been developed to ensure its safe use, emerging investigations, spurred in part by BF's growing relevance in green chemistry and nonagricultural sectors, have highlighted its potential toxicological effects (Gargouri, Yousif, Attaai, et al. 2018; Morgan et al. 2018). Findings from these studies underscore the need to revisit the toxicological database from a risk‐safety perspective.

J Appl Toxicol. 2025 Sep 17;46(1):61–77. doi: 10.1002/jat.4929
Bifenthrin Under Scrutiny: Revisiting Toxicological Evidence Amid Regulatory Gaps
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12668871/

[Higgenbotham]

Prepare for automotive sticker shock next year – again.

Average new car prices briefly topped $50,000 in September for the first time, before slipping back under that level in October.

But now, automotive experts say, car prices are headed back over that level. And this time, they might stay there.

The higher prices for cars – a necessity in many transit-starved cities and towns – are part of a larger affordability crisis that’s squeezed Americans, leaving many living paycheck to paycheck just to get by.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/12/03/business ... wtab-en-us

[Higgenbotham]

After I posted earlier today, a parent of one of my daughter's classmates was saying all but 2 of the public elementary schools in Pflugerville, Texas have basically collapsed and aren't worth sending your kids to. According to her, school after school has collapsed in that district over the past 10 years. Then she went on to say that in one school, there is a child who has hour long tantrums and everyone is told to stand back and do nothing until the tantrum plays out. So twenty some kids are basically on standby doing nothing for an hour. They are told that every child has a right to learn as the reason for allowing this. She said, therefore, for her it is either the private school our kids are going to or home schooling. Public school is now out of the question for her family. We then carried on with a discussion of how we have to pay for this nonsense, the amount of money public schools waste and how high our taxes are.

Local News
Modesto teachers say classroom chaos, violence reaching "breaking point"
By Nina Burns
Updated on: October 21, 2025 / 6:40 PM PDT / CBS Sacramento

Modesto City Schools teachers say classroom destruction and violent student behavior are reaching a breaking point, and they're calling on district leaders to take action.

Photos shared with the Modesto Teachers Association show overturned desks, ripped bulletin boards and supplies scattered across the floor. Educators say they're often forced to evacuate students during outbursts and wait for help to arrive.

https://www.cbsnews.com/sacramento/news ... ncreasing/

[Higgenbotham]

It's hard to know what's going wrong in the elementary schools. The Modesto Teacher's Association had some ideas in the link above. I think it has to be realized, though, that the forces creating collapse all interrelate to some extent and it's hard to go back to tried and true solutions from the pre-collapse past to fix anything. To what extent we don't know. For example, these kids may have had a lot of bifenthrin and other exposures in the fetus which permanently damaged their brains. Saying that is just picking from other recent posts as an example, not saying that seems to be the most likely cause. All I can think of this whole putrid mess is that it will not be sorted out, the accelerating collapse will accelerate further and therefore it is high time for individuals and families to prepare for collapse. Problems like these will be sorted out at the village or small town level some centuries hence when it is do or die. The offenders will be killed or disciplined and when those who are disciplined are unable to rectify their own situations, they will be ostracized and eventually expelled from the village or town and be forced to survive on their own, most likely facing death with no descendants. But for now, as we can see, these kids are the stars of the show and they can puff their chests out, take their rewards, and come back and make an even bigger mess of their classrooms...as the new dark age tightens its grip.

Teachers say those "quick fixes" included new behavioral policies known as Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports, or PBIS, a program to keep kids in school by promoting positive behavior instead of suspending them.

McGrath said the policy is being misapplied.

"What's been happening is they get counseled, and then they would come back with a bag of chips, or they would come back with a juice box or a prize," she said. "That's rewarding them for their bad behavior."

During Monday night's board meeting, several teachers described being kicked, bitten and cursed at, while others spoke about students destroying classrooms and frightening their classmates.

https://www.cbsnews.com/sacramento/news ... ncreasing/

[tim]

https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/glypho ... ostwritten

Glyphosate “Safety” Study Ghostwritten by Monsanto Retracted After 25 Years of Deception

Millions of pounds of glyphosate were approved, defended, and sprayed worldwide on the basis of a paper we now know was fundamentally compromised and scientifically invalid.

In a long-overdue move, Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology has formally retracted the landmark 2000 glyphosate “safety” review by Williams, Kroes, and Munro — a paper Monsanto and global regulators have relied on for decades to assert that Roundup poses no carcinogenic risk to humans.

Crucially, the Editor-in-Chief confirms that Monsanto employees likely secretly wrote substantial portions of the paper, despite never being listed as authors or acknowledged — a revelation uncovered through U.S. litigation.

The retraction states that the article’s integrity has collapsed entirely, citing undisclosed corporate authorship, omitted carcinogenicity data, financial conflicts of interest, and a complete failure by the surviving author to respond to the journal’s investigation.