The Superintendent And The Merchant Of Merch
Ooooouuuuuccccchhhhh!!!!!!!!!!
This is so painful that we’ll just quote, cite and provide sources:
“Oklahoma’s teen birth rate is 25.0 births per 1,000 women - the fourth-highest teen birth rate in the United States… 1-in-5 births to girls ages 15 through 19 are not the mother’s first child. One issue seen in the state is that some of the school districts, such as the Oklahoma City Public Schools, fail to provide sex education at any grade level.” Teen Pregnancy Rates by State 2025.
“The teen pregnancy rate in the United States has been declining in the past 20 years. In 2018, the United States teen birth rate was 17.4 births per 1,000 females between the ages of 15 and 19. In 2019, it decreased to 16.9. Despite these lower rates, the U.S, continues to have the highest teen pregnancy rate of all developed nations.
“Teen pregnancy has substantial health, economic, and social costs. Pregnant teenagers are more likely to experience miscarriages, maternal illness (preeclampsia, hypertension, etc.), stillbirth, and neonatal death. Teenage mothers are also more likely to drop out of school and never return to raise a child. Teen mothers, therefore often lack a high school diploma, let alone a college degree, and more likely face unemployment and poverty. Children of teen pregnancies are sometimes forced into foster care if the mother cannot care for them. Then teenage females in foster care are twice as likely to become pregnant, creating a cycle.”
Source: Teen Pregnancy Rates by State 2025. Citing the United States Center for Disease Control.
Between the years 2019 and 2023, the rate of sexually transmitted diseases (STD) per 100,000 in Oklahoma nearly doubled from 44.2 to 86.4. Table 3. Total Syphilis* — Reported Cases and Rates of Reported Cases by State/Territory and Region in Alphabetical Order, United States | STI Statistics | CDC based on the Sexually Transmitted Infections Surveillance, 2023.
A review of “SAT Scores by State” for 2022 and published by Wisevoter, indicated that:
“Wisconsin has the nation’s highest SAT scores with an average SAT score of 1,252, closely followed by Wyoming at 1,244 and Kansas at 1,238. These states have consistently demonstrated strong performance on the SAT. On the other end of the spectrum, West Virginia and Oklahoma have the lowest SAT scores with 938 and 951, respectively. It is important to note that these rankings are based on the data for the year 2022 and may vary from year to year.
“SAT scores are often seen as a measure of college readiness and academic achievement.”
Statistics release on April 30, 2024 by the National Education Association, the largest teachers union in the United States, rank Oklahoma 43rd in the nation for average teacher salaries - $55,505; that’s a drop from the 2021-2022 rank of 38th at $54,804.
Source: Oklahoma’s KFOR television news: Oklahoma teachers are paid less than the national average, according to new report
Oklahoma is rank 47th of the fifty states and the District of Colombia on Public Funding for k-12 Students - $10,479.
Sources: Per Pupil Spending by State 2025 and U.S. Public Education Spending Statistics – Education Data Initiative.
On December 15, 2024, Visual Capitalist, using date from the latest American Community Survey published by the U.S. Census Bureau, ranked Oklahoma 46th of the 50 states and the District of Columbia with 29% of the state’s population holding college degrees.
Admittedly, statistics are just statistics, but, with statistics like those, one would think Oklahoma Superintendent of Public Instruction just might find a better way to spend three million bucks.
Naaaah!!!!!
In late June 2024, Superintendent Ryan Walters ordered public schools across the state to incorporate the Bible into lessons for grades 5 through 12. Walters’ called adherence to the mandate compulsory and demanded “immediate and strict compliance is expected.”
In his statement, he declared:
“The Bible is an indispensable historical and cultural touchstone. Without basic knowledge of it, Oklahoma students are unable to properly contextualize the foundation of our nation which is why Oklahoma educational standards provide for its instruction.”
While Oklahoma law already explicitly allows bibles in classrooms and permits teachers to use them in instruction, state law says individual school districts have the exclusive authority to decide on instruction, curricula, reading lists, instructional materials, and textbooks.
On October 4, 2024, The Oklahoman (part of the nationwide Gannett chain of newspapers) reported;
“According to the bid documents, vendors must meet certain specifications: Bibles must be the King James Version [incidentally, not used by Roman Catholics]; must contain the Old and New Testaments; must include copies of the Pledge of Allegiance, Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights; and must be bound in leather or leather-like material.
“A salesperson at Mardel Christian & Education searched, and though they carry 2,900 Bibles, none fit the parameters.
“But one Bible fits perfectly: Lee Greenwood’s God Bless the U.S.A. Bible, endorsed by former President Donald Trump and commonly referred to as the Trump Bible. They cost $60 each online, with Trump receiving fees for his endorsement.”
Walter’s original “gimme” for 55,000 bibles at a cost of $3 million was specific: they must be “bound in leather or leather-like material for durability” and include both Old and New Testaments, the Pledge of Allegiance and the Bill of Rights.
Country music singer-songwriter Greenwood first published his God Bless the U.S.A. Bible in 2021.
In March 2024, Trump heralded his newest merch on his “Truth Social” site:
"Happy Holy Week! Let's Make America Pray Again. As we lead into Good Friday and Easter, I encourage you to get a copy of the God Bless The USA Bible."
Yup! Just what every Oklahoma school needs! A bible endorsed by the man who, according to The Washington Post, on January 31, 2016 “put a couple of bills in the Communion plate” at the nondenominational First Christian Church’s Orchard Campus in Council Bluffs, Iowa.
“’I thought it was for offering,’ he explained and laughed, according to a report by The Associated Press.”
On October 18, 2024, the Associated Press offered a summary of the week’s “Best Of AP,” including a story by Washington-based Richard Lardner and China-based Dake Kang:
“Based on databases that use customs data to track exports and imports, Lardner and Kang calculated the estimated value of three separate shipments at $342,000, or less than $3 per Bible. The minimum price for the Trump-backed Bible is $59.99, putting the potential sales revenue at about $7 million.
“While it is not news that China is one of the world’s leading producers of Bibles, it may be news to readers that Trump’s administration chose to exempt Bibles from tariffs imposed on billions of dollars of Chinese goods.
“This exclusive story explained how selling products at prices that exceed their value may even be considered a campaign contribution. It also noted that there’s an opportunity for Trump to sell thousands of his Bibles to the state of Oklahoma which plans to spend $3 million on Bibles that are a close match to Trump’s edition.
“The story uncovered that a U.S. publisher backed away from the project under pressure from religious scholars who denounced the merger of Scripture and U.S. founding documents as a ‘toxic mix’ that would fuel Christian nationalism sentiments in evangelical churches. Others called it blasphemous.”
Shocking!
Absolutely shocking!
Trump’s GBTUSAB is the King James Version.
First published in 1611. Meaning…
Trump and associates never had to pay copyright fees for their bible and its add-ons. (Cheap?)
Absolutely shocking.
And consider…
The earliest “Pledge” has no relation to the to the nation’s Founders or the 1776 – 1791 era of the Declaration of Independence, the Revolutionary War, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. It’s not a founding document of the United States. The first version was composed in 1887 by former Union Captain George T. Blach:
“We give our heads and hearts to God and our country; one country, one language, one flag!”
Baptist minister and Christian socialist Francis Bellamy composed a “Pledge of Allegiance” for the September 8, 1892 issue of The Youth’s Companion:
“I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
In 1923, the National Flag Conference recognized the form
“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
In 1948, Louis Albert Bowman, an Illinois attorney and chaplain of the Illinois Society of the Sons of the American Revolution, led members of the organization in a recitation of the Pledge with the addition of the words “under God.” In 1951, the Catholic organization the Knights of Columbus adopted a policy of including “under God” in the Pledge at the beginning of their meetings.
The phrase was incorporated into the Pledge by a 1954 Joint Resolution of Congress amending the Flag Code enacted in 1942.
Seems strange that the Greenwood/Trump version of the copyright-free Sacred Scripture doesn’t include the Declaration of Independence.
Maybe because:
Co-author Thomas Jefferson’s “religion” was a combination of Deism and Unitarianism, embracing the ethical teachings of Jesus but rejecting his miracles, Virgin Birth and Resurrection; he produced his own “Jefferson Bible” – “The Live and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth,” sans miracles and without the epistles.
The private educational foundation Online Library of Liberty reports:
“It is worth noting, however, that while [co-author of the Declaration John] Adams [who joined the Unitarian Church late in life] occasionally made positive references to Christianity, he was not a strong advocate of any particular religion (at least in his public statements) or even a specific moral code, except insofar as it condemned a (rather short) list of obnoxious vices. Indeed, Adams was firmly against the official establishment of any religion and was a champion of religious freedom. As Deists, Adams and his like-minded peers believed that any moral system had to be grounded in a belief in God, but the specific aspects of that belief, or how they manifested themselves in a particular religion, were of little if any interest to them.”
Co-author Roger Sherman was a Reformed Christian – Calvinist – with Puritan views. Adams described him as “that old Puritan, as honest as an angel.” The final words of the inscription on Sherman’s tombstone are:
“a true, faithful, and firm Patriot.
He ever adorned
the profession of Christianity
which he made in youth;
and distinguished through life
for public usefulness,
died in the prospect of a blessed immortality.”
The son of a Roman Catholic father and an Episcopalian (Anglican/Church of England) mother, Robert R. Livingston was also a Freemason; in later life he returned to his wife’s Catholic Church.
Benjamin Franklin’s parents were Puritans who fled Massachusetts because of religious persecution; his father attempted to convince him of the dangers of Deism. Yet, the readings his father provided had precisely the opposite effect. In a letter to Ezra Stiles, president of Yale College, Franklin expressed himself in no uncertain terms:
“As to Jesus of Nazareth, my Opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think the System of Morals and his Religion, as he left them to us, the best the World ever saw or is likely to see; but I apprehend it has received various corrupting Changes, and I have, with most of the present Dissenters in England, some Doubts as to his Divinity; tho’ it is a question I do not dogmatize upon, having never studied it, and think it needless to busy myself with it now, when I expect soon an Opportunity of knowing the Truth with less Trouble. I see no harm, however, in its being believed, if that Belief has the good Consequence, as probably it has, of making his Doctrines more respected and better observed; especially as I do not perceive, that the Supreme takes it amiss, by distinguishing the Unbelievers in his Government of the World with any peculiar Marks of his Displeasure.”
It’s simple. The Pledge has no relation to America’s founding documents and the Declaration of Independence was the product of Deists, Puritans, a Roman Catholic, and a member of the Anglican/Church of England. Perhaps that explains it’s absence in the Trump bible.
On March 10, 2025, Oklahoma City’s (ABC) KOCO News reported the state’s Supreme Court issued a decision halting Ryan’s request for bible proposals and a curriculum to go with them.
But that hasn’t stopped the superintendent. Together with Greenwood, he’s announced a new endeavor – seeking $3 million in private donations that will be used to purchase the grifting bibles for the state’s public schools.
In February 2025, the Oklahoma Senate Education Committee unanimously approved legislation to boost the minimum salary for first-year teachers to $50,000 and raise wages for public-school educators across the board. Currently, the state’s minimum required salary for first-year teachers is $39,601.
Here’s an idea for ring-kissing Superintendent Ryan: Forget those copyright-free and costly $60 bibles; use that cash you’re trying to raise and hire sixty sex education – real sex education, not abstinence preaching – teachers at the proposed new salary or 75 at the current starting rate. Or maybe just try to get Oklahoma’s SAT scores out of the basement.
We think some really good – including contraception – science-based sex ed is a great long-term investment. It might lower your Oklahoma’s 25 per 100,000 teen birth rate and save lives.