You may be the only person in the US whom an idiosyncratic spelling of the Arab-US torture prison bothers--the prison that I heard one of my Georgia relatives call "the jail of them A-rabs" at the last homecoming.

As for comparing the school system's Professional Standards hell hole--which is in no way professional and whose standards are qualitatively sadistic in line with the administrative whim of the day-- to an infamous prison, you show a lack of appreciation of satirical metaphor, Ms. Cobbe.

What are you up to today: buttering up Heggarty or bucking to replace him by defending the indefensible status quo at the ROSAC Emporium for Fun and Games?

Your devotion to orthography is admirable, but your tacit approval of teachers' being demeaned and invalidated in Kipley's "Professional" Standards Abu Ghraib (did I hit all the consonants that time?)--in Bart Birdsall's case at Ms. Elia's behest--does you no credit. I bet you have never written to Ms. Kipley or Ms. Elia to question that problem.

I infer from your spelling and metaphor rebuke, my dear, that torturing teachers doesn't offend you but that misspelling the infamous prison in Iraq in which Americans tortured Arabs does. You have an all-American jingoistic hierarchy of values.

Where in your job description does it say your duties include lecturing citizens on the appropriateness of their metaphors? Stick to the job we citizens pay you to do, young lady, which is to provide us information about the internal workings of the school system that the Sunshine Law requires y'all to disgorge.

The which reminds me that I have asked Ms. Elia twice for the list of people on the "We Deliver" prize committee---the one that the Education Foundation is supposed to cough up the money for some time in the future as the result of Ms. Elia's charm offensive and which I shall report to every single CEO on the roster if its members give a nickel to this gimcrack project to deflect attention from Ms. Elia's poor performance as superintendent.

Since your huffy email to me will ingratiate you to La Elia, get the list from her as your job duty and send it to me, pray. Such is your job.

lee drury de cesare

lee drury de cesare

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From: Linda Cobbe [mailto:lcobbe@sdhc.us]
Sent: Friday, March 09, 2007 7:51 AM
To: lee decesare
Subject: Re: FW: monkey biz

It bothers me how you consistently misspell "Abu Ghraib," not to mention the outrageousness of comparing professional standards to a prison. No need to reply.

Linda Cobbe
External Communications Manager
Office of Communications
Hillsborough County Public Schools
901 E. Kennedy Blvd.
Tampa, FL 33602
813-272-4602
813-272-4510 FAX