Of course very few people would deny that the character of American schoolchildren has changed dramatically over the decades. Back in the 1950s, some of the biggest school discipline problems were gum chewing and hair pulling. Today, kids bring knives, guns and drugs with them to school. Gang activity is rampant in many of our schools and in some schools kids are even having sex in the school bathrooms.

So there is definitely a discipline problem in our schools.

But what is going on in many areas of the country is absolutely ridiculous. For example, in 2010 alone police down in Texas issued an astounding 300,000 tickets to school children.

Yes, if a kid pulls a knife on someone the police should get involved, but teachers and administrators should be able to use some common sense and handle the vast majority of discipline problems that happen themselves.

What you are about to read is absolutely going to amaze you. The following are 19 really crazy things that school children are being arrested for in America....

#1 At one public school down in Texas, a 12-year-old girl named Sarah Bustamantes was recently arrested for spraying herself with perfume.

#2 A 13-year-old student at a school in Albuquerque, New Mexico was recently arrested by police for burping in class.

#3 Another student down in Albuquerque was forced to strip down to his underwear while five adults watched because he had $200 in his pocket. The student was never formally charged with doing anything wrong.

#4 A security guard at one school in California broke the arm of a 16-year-old girl because she left some crumbs on the floor after cleaning up some cake that she had spilled.

#5 One teenage couple down in Houston poured milk on each other during a squabble while they were breaking up. Instead of being sent to see the principal, they were arrested and sent to court.

#6 In early 2010, a 12-year-old girl at a school in Forest Hills, New York was arrested by police and marched out of her school in handcuffs just because she doodled on her desk. "I love my friends Abby and Faith" was what she reportedly scribbled on her desk.

#7 A 6-year-old girl down in Florida was handcuffed and sent to a mental facility after throwing temper tantrums at her elementary school.

#8 One student down in Texas was reportedly arrested by police for throwing paper airplanes in class.

#9 A 17-year-old honor student in North Carolina named Ashley Smithwick accidentally took her father's lunch with her to school. It contained a small paring knife which he would use to slice up apples. So what happened to this standout student when the school discovered this? The school suspended her for the rest of the year and the police charged her with a misdemeanor.

#10 In Allentown, Pennsylvania a 14-year-old girl was tasered in the groin area by a school security officer even though she had put up her hands in the air to surrender.

#11 Down in Florida, an 11-year-old student was arrested, thrown in jail and charged with a third-degree felony for bringing a plastic butter knife to school.

#12 Back in 2009, an 8-year-old boy in Massachusetts was sent home from school and was forced to undergo a psychological evaluation because he drew a picture of Jesus on the cross.

#13 A police officer in San Mateo, California blasted a 7-year-old special education student in the face with pepper spray because he would not quit climbing on the furniture.

#14 In America today, even 5-year-old children are treated brutally by police. The following is from a recent article that described what happened to one very young student in Stockton, California a while back....

Earlier this year, a Stockton student was handcuffed with zip ties on his hands and feet, forced to go to the hospital for a psychiatric evaluation and was charged with battery on a police officer. That student was 5 years old.

#15 At one school in Connecticut, a 17-year-old boy was thrown to the floor and tasered five times because he was yelling at a cafeteria worker.

#16 A teenager in suburban Dallas was forced to take on a part-time job after being ticketed for using foul language in one high school classroom. The original ticket was for $340, but additional fees have raised the total bill to $637.

#17 A few months ago, police were called out when a little girl kissed a little boy during a physical education class at an elementary school down in Florida.

#18 A 6-year-old boy was recently charged with sexual battery for some "inappropriate touching" during a game of tag at one elementary school in the San Francisco area.

#19 In Massachusetts, police were recently sent out to collect an overdue library book from a 5-year-old girl.

Unfortunately, what is going on in our schools is a reflection of the broader society as a whole. Our schools are being turned into prisons because our entire society is being turned into a giant prison.

Our nation is rapidly heading down the toilet, and the children of this nation do not have a bright future to look forward to.

If the police really want to find some criminals, they should start investigating some of the sickos that are in charge of some of these classrooms.

It seems like almost every day now there is a news story about some public school teacher that is involved in some kind of really perverted stuff.

For example, just check out what police down in Los Angeles recently found that one teacher was hiding....

A former Los Angeles elementary school teacher has been arrested for felony molestation of nearly two dozen students, accused of gagging children and putting live cockroaches on some of their faces. Deputies say the crimes were committed on campus.

Sickos who do that kind of stuff to kids should be punished very severely.

America's schools are changing, and not for the better.

Personally, I went to public schools all my life, but I would not recommend that anyone send their kids to public schools today. There is just way too much crazy stuff that goes on.

And our kids are learning less than ever in these public schools. As I have written about previously, many of them are coming out of the system as dumb as a rock. Instead of teaching our kids how to think critically and examine all sides of an issue, these schools are indoctrinating our kids and pushing particular social and political agendas on them.

There are a few public schools out there that are still good, but the vast majority of them are horrible. They are not producing the leaders of tomorrow and they are not preparing the next generation with the tools that they need to survive in a complex world.

So is there much hope that our schools can be turned around? Feel free to leave a comment with your opinion below....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- U.S. intelligence officials acknowledged Tuesday that the United States may release several Afghan Taliban prisoners from the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as an incentive to bring the Taliban to peace talks.

Meanwhile, Afghan officials told The Associated Press that a plan to give Afghanistan a form of legal custody over the men if they are released satisfied their earlier objection to sending the prisoners to a third country.

Director of National Intelligence Jim Clapper told Congress Tuesday that no decision had been made on whether to trade the five Taliban prisoners, now held at Guantanamo Bay as part of nascent peace talks with the Taliban. He and CIA Director David Petraeus did not dispute that the Obama administration is considering transferring the five to a third country.

U.S. officials and others had previously spoken only vaguely, and usually anonymously, about the proposal to send the prisoners to Qatar, a Persian Gulf country that has asserted a central role in framing talks that might end the 10-year war in Afghanistan. The lead U.S. negotiator trying to coax the Taliban into talks had also publicly acknowledged the possibility of a release, but said there was no final decision.

The prisoners proposed for transfer include some of the detainees brought to Guantanamo during the initial days and weeks of the U.S. invasion that toppled the Taliban government in Afghanistan in 2001. At least one has been accused in the massacre of thousands of Shiite Muslims in Afghanistan, according to U.S. and other assessments, but none are accused of directly killing Americans.

"I don't think anybody harbors any illusions about it, but I think the position is to at least explore the potential for negotiating with them as a part of this overall resolution of the situation in Afghanistan," Clapper said during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing.

The Obama administration has recently embraced the possibility of negotiation with the Taliban much more openly, saying that although they remain cautious they are also encouraged that the militants may be ready to bargain. Peace talks, if they come to pass, would include the elected Afghan government and, at least at the outset, representatives of the U.S. government. With nearly 100,000 troops in Afghanistan and a war and development budget in the billions of dollars, the U.S. remains the largest power broker in Afghanistan.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai supports a prisoner release as a means to build confidence among the Taliban militants that talks are worthwhile, but he had balked at the U.S.-backed plan to send them to Qatar instead of home to Afghanistan. That plan appeared to undercut his authority and offend Afghan sovereignty, Afghan officials said. Karzai yanked his ambassador from Qatar, saying Qatar had not kept him properly informed.

But recent discussions between Karzai and U.S. negotiators found a way around the Afghan objections, a senior Afghan diplomat and another official said. Speaking on condition of anonymity because the arrangement is still under discussion, the officials said Afghanistan could assume a sort of legal custody over the prisoners and then, with the prisoners' own consent, agree to consign them to house arrest in Qatar.

An Afghan delegation would prepare the way for that arrangement by visiting the prisoners at Guantanamo and signing off on the transfer plan, one official said.

The Obama administration does not want to send the prisoners to Afghanistan, in part for fear they might be released. The men are considered "enemy combatants" who were, at least until recently, considered too dangerous to release.

Afghan custody of the men, even if only on paper, could provide sufficient political cover for Karzai against criticism at home that the arrangement is a snub. Karzai has already reluctantly publicly endorsed Qatar as the site for a militant political office that would serve as a headquarters for talks.

U.S. officials would not confirm the possible solution but did not dispute it.

Separately, Afghan officials said their government plans to explore talks with militants under the auspices of Saudi Arabia or others. Those talks would complement talks in Qatar, not undermine them, and carry at least an implicit stamp of approval from U.S. negotiators, the officials said.

The White House National Security Council had no comment on either issue.

The AP previously reported a proposal to release two or three of the Taliban prisoners as an initial goodwill gesture, to be followed by the others. All would go into custody in Qatar, under conditions that are likely to be less secure and less restrictive than at Guantanamo.

Several members of Congress oppose any release, and Congress has erected several legal hurdles that military and other officials acknowledge would slow and complicate the process.

Several GOP lawmakers who object to the transfer are pushing the White House to keep the detainees in Guantanamo "until the end of hostilities," according to a U.S. official with knowledge of the negotiations.

If the Taliban wants to end hostilities through negotiations, "then we could transfer their fighters," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss conversations with the White House.

Of particular concern is Mullah Norullah Nori, described in U.S. military documents as one of the most significant former Taliban officials held at Guantanamo. He was a senior Taliban commander in Mazar-e-Sharif when the Taliban fought U.S. forces in late 2001. He previously was a Taliban governor in two provinces Northern Afghanistan, where he has been accused of ordering the massacre of thousands of Shiite Muslims.

Petraeus also acknowledged discussions about the five Taliban prisoners, and told Congress that the U.S. government has assessed the risk that the men might still be dangerous.

"This proposed so-called trade has actually not been decided yet," Clapper said, speaking at an annual hearing on worldwide threats. Republicans were openly skeptical, saying recidivism among former Guantanamo detainees is high and the gambit is of questionable value in promoting peace.

Petraeus said his analysts had assessed various scenarios under which the prisoners could be released to countries other than Afghanistan and Pakistan. The analysts sought to determine which countries would be best able to monitor the freed men, and keep them from returning to militancy.

Clapper's office reported in December 2010 that 13.5 percent of released Guantanamo detainees are "confirmed" and 11.5 percent "are suspected" of reengaging in terrorist or insurgent activities after being transferred.

Clapper said in the case of the Taliban prisoners, U.S. negotiators would first have to determine where the prisoners would be released, and how best to make sure they did not return to the fight. The defense spending bill signed by President Barack Obama in December also requires that the Pentagon certify that any release is safe.

"Part and parcel of such a decision, if it were finally made, would be the actual determination of where these detainees might go and the conditions in which they would be controlled or surveilled," Clapper said.

But Clapper said the prisoner release could be a confidence-building measure that helps move negotiations forward.

The intelligence agencies' annual threat assessment said the Taliban was less able to intimidate the Afghan population that last year, especially in areas where NATO forces are concentrated, but that its leaders continue to direct the insurgency from their safe haven in Pakistan.

U.S. officials have pledged to consult with Congress about any release, which was not enough to persuade Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga.

"I want to state publicly as strong as I can that we should not transfer these detainees from Guantanamo," Chambliss told the intelligence agency heads.

Here is a list of a couple of my favorite bands I came across in 2011 with links to some great songs.

• Milo Greene
• Alabama Shake
• The Wild Feathers
• Justin Townes Earle
• The Devil Makes Three
• Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros
• Gary Clark Jr.
• Hey Marseilles
• Tedeschi Trucks Band
• HoneyHoney
• Beth Hart and Joe Bonamassa
• Blackberry Smoke

The DEA program recalls a similar, much smaller scale operation first reported in the Voice last month in our article about government informant Angel Perez. The Voice article disclosed that Perez convinced U.S. Immigration and customs agents to move $500,000 in cash from the Dominican Republic to Miami and Puerto Rico. But, somehow, the smuggling operation didn't result in any arrests or even the identification of the source of the money.

The Times report, meanwhile, says that DEA agents got involved in the illegal scheme back in 2007 to infiltrate and take apart drug organizations in Mexico. The agents also helped the kingpin, Harold Mauricio Poveda-Ortega, move a big shipment of cocaine from Ecuador through Dallas to Madrid. DEA agents posed as pilots offering to ship cocaine for $1,000 a kilo.

Rightly, the Times article asks the question of whether the DEA was "fighting or facilitating crime." And the conclusion? Well, in Timesian fashion, we don't get an answer. The article quotas a former federal prosecutor saying that stateside rules don't apply overseas, so law enforcement agencies "make up the rules as they go along."

"It's a slippery slop," Morris Panner tells the Times. "The United States could end up helping the bad guys more than hurting them."

As for the DEA, the Times got a statement defending the practice, and saying that the operation allowed "Mexican authorities to kill or capture dozens of high-ranking and mid level drug dealers."

The kingpin, Poveda-Ortega, evaded arrest for two years, before he was finally caught in November of 2010.

Archeologists have so far found undisturbed artefacts including wall decorations, pigments and paint pots, which are already increasing their understanding of the Neolithic people.

Experts believe the huge outer wall suggests the site was not domestic, while the layout of the buildings has reinforced the view it might have been a major religious site. Archaeologists think the temple was built 500 years before Stonehenge, regarded as the centre of Stone Age Britain.

However, only 10% of the site at Ness of Brodgar has been excavated and it could be years before the scale and age of the discovery is fully understood.

It sits close to the existing Ring of Brodgar stone circles and the standing stones of Stenness, near to the town of Stromness.

The uncovered wall around the edges of the site was built with 10,000 tonnes of quarried rock and may have been up to 10 ft high.

Thermal technology also indicates the site could cover the same area as five football pitches, with some parts potentially older than Stonehenge, in south-west England, by as much as 800 years.

Charcoal samples from beneath the wall indicate it was built around 3200 BC. A 30mm high figurine with a head, body and two eyes, and called the "Brodgar Boy", was also unearthed in the rubble of one of the structures.

About 18 months ago, a remarkable rock coloured red, orange and yellow was unearthed. This is the first discovery in Britain of evidence that Neolithic peoples used paint to decorate their buildings.

Project manager Nick Card said the discoveries are unparalleled in British prehistory and that the complexity of finds is changing the "whole vision of what the landscape was 5000 years ago." He said it was of "a scale that almost relates to the classical period in the Mediterranean with walled enclosure and precincts".

Mr Card added: "It's a huge discovery; in terms of scale and complexity there really is nothing else quite like it.

"At first we thought it was a settlement but the scale and complexity within the buildings makes you think along the lines of a temple precinct. It's something you would associate with the classical world."

Archeologist Julian Richards, who has written several books on Stonehenge, added: "The indication is that building was taking place when Stonehenge was still, relatively speaking, insignificant. We have tended to think we know how things were in the Neolithic period, then something like this turns that on its head."

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce may sue the Obama administration over President Obama's controversial appointment of Richard Cordray to head a controversial consumer financial board, officials from the business group told Fox News on Wednesday after an unprecedented display of executive power that is sure to poison already-strained relations with the GOP.

Chamber spokeswoman Blair Latoff and colleague Bryan Goettel both told Fox News that their understanding is that "we are not ruling it out." However, they said they still "need to understand the specifics of the appointment to determine if a legal challenge is even possible."

The chamber was early in its criticism of the president's move Wednesday to appoint Cordray to chair the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in a move that invites legal challenge but which administration officials say is perfectly within the president's authority to do.

"To say we are disappointed in the move by the president today would be a gross understatement," Chamber President Tom Donohue said in statement. "This controversial appointment is unprecedented, constitutionally questionable, and puts the authority of the director and the validity of the bureau’s work in legal jeopardy. What's more, it ignores repeated calls to reform the bureau by restoring basic checks and balances."

You almost certainly haven’t had the pleasure of hearing Milo Greene before, but once you do, that first tantalizing hint won’t be nearly enough. With suggestions of a more upbeat Wilderness of Manitoba meets L’Altra, the trio of UC-Irvine alums (named after a fake PR flack they used to send promotional emails on their own behalf) has built its music the hard way, working the bay area’s concert venues while trading demos back and forth until they were able to get the sounds right.

No word yet on the band’s future debut, though they told LA’s Buzz Bands that they’ve got more than a dozen songs written and in various stages of development. But in what has to be a good sign, at least now their official website lists an honest-to-God management and legal team … so they’re definitely on the way up from doing all the legwork themselves.

Skywatchers will be hoping for clear skies from today because particles from a recent solar storm will slam into Earth and produce amazing Northern Lights, or auroras.

On the downside, experts expect radio blackouts for a few days, caused by the radiation from the flare – or coronal mass ejection (CME) – causing magnetic storms.

The flare is part of a larger increase in activity in the Sun, which runs in 11-year cycles. It is expected to peak around 2013.

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Abdel Hameed Shehadeh was a fount of information when lawmen interrogating him last year in Honolulu showed him more than 40 photos of possible evildoers, according to court papers filed in Brooklyn Federal Court.

Shehadeh’s lawyer is seeking to suppress the 22-page FBI report in which Shehadeh spills his guts.

The alleged rogues’ gallery he describes includes Brooklyn teachers of the Islamic orthodoxy Salafism, a livery cab driver, an Ethiopian Muslim in the U.S. Army and a College of Staten Island student who attended a fund-raiser at Brooklyn College for a terrorist.

Others he ID’d had delivered pro-jihadist speeches at mosques or ranted in online chat rooms, he said, and included a reputed member of the terror group Hamas who lives in Syracuse.

Most bizarre is the homeless husband-and-wife — she comes from a wealthy family and he drives a luxury BMW sedan — who watched a beheading video with Shehadeh, according to an FBI report.

Shehadeh recalled attending a lecture at the Brooklyn Islamic Center in 2008 with someone named “Omar” and a second man who peddled pro-jihad T-shirts. “Almost everything [Omar] and his friend . . . talked about was jihad,” the report states.

The names of the persons of interest are being withheld by the Daily News because Shehadeh’s claims could not be independently confirmed.

Shehadeh’s lawyer publicly filed the FBI report as part of a motion to suppress his client’s post-arrest snitching and statements about his own radicalization.

Shehadeh signed an affidavit claiming he was tricked into waiving his constitutional right against self-incrimination.

The Brooklyn-born Shehadeh, 22, is charged with lying to the feds about a failed attempt to travel to Pakistan and join the Taliban.

He also tried to join the U.S. Army himself, but was rejected because he failed to disclose his overseas trips.

“At some point after stopping the interview, Shehadeh was asked what he was thinking about. (He) answered, ‘How much I incriminated myself,’ ” Special Agent John Tinning and Detective Angel Maysonet wrote.