Bob Shepherd is a polymath who has written curriculum, textbooks, and assessments. He recently retired as a teacher in Florida. We are fortunate to have him as a regular commenter on the blog.
He describes two promising opportunities for Florida, which is poised to transfer billions of dollars from public schools to unregulated, unaccountable private schools.
Vouchers create many business opportunities: Here are a couple that occur to me:
Business Plan 1 (We Put the Duh in Flor-uh-duh):
Come on down to our “Race to the Top of Mount Zion Enrollment Jubilee” in the old K-Mart parking lot this Saturday and sign yore kids up for Bob Shepherd’s Real Good Floruhduh School. You can use yore Florida State Scholarships to pay for it, and so its absolutely FREE!!!! No longer due you havta send yore children to them gobbermint schools run by Socialists whar they will be taut to be transgendered! We offer compleet curriculems, wrote by Bob’s girlfriend Darlene herself, including
World HIS-story (from Creation to the United States of Dimocrat Babylon to the Rapshure)
Political Science (We thank you, Lord, for Donald Trump; the Second Amendmint; and protecting our Borders from invading hoardes of rapists and murderers)
English (the offishul langwidge of the United States, and the langwidge the Bible was wrote in)
Science (the six days of creation; how to make yore own buckshot; and how Cain and Abel survived among the dinosaurs)
Economics (when rich people get tax brakes, that makes you richer)
And much, much more!!! Plus, you don’t havta worry yore hed about safety, cause all are teachers is locked and loaded!
Bob’s Real Good Florurduh Skool, located across from Bob’s Gun and Pawn right next to Wild Wuornos’s Adult Novelties.
It’s been real good runnin’ this here skool. Free innerprize! So much better then tryin to live on Darlene’s disability! Make America Grate Agin!
Business Plan 2 (Akashic Kakistonics, or Opening Heaven’s Gate to Every Child):
Tired of those failing public schools? Want to send your child to a true Akashic Academy where he/she/they can receive nourishment for the mind AND the soul?
Then enroll him/her/them in Enlightened Master Bob’s AYAHUASCA SCHOOL FOR LITTLE COSMIC VOYAGERS.
Here at Enlightened Master Bob’s, your child will learn how he or she can skip breakfast, lunch, and dinner and draw nourishment directly from Father Sun in our Solar Temple.
We offer complete holistic health training, using our proprietary textbooks on the Ethereal Body, including uncapping and aligning children’s Chakras so they can download DIRECTLY from the Mother Ship the Cosmic Light necessary for the coming Transformation from Earth-bound Homo sapiens to Interdimensional Beings.
In our history classes, students will learn all about Atlantis, Lemuria, Camelot and Glastonbury, the Black Rock Desert, and other Places of Power throughout the Ages.
Students will also learn how to protect themselves against the forces of the Evil Galactic Emperor Xenu and his band of sometimes invisible, shape-shifting reptilian aliens from Alpha Draconis.
But don’t delay! Soon, as our galaxy moves into proximity to the Pleiades, the vibrational tone of the entire planet will rise to such a pitch that we will either undergo Ascension or explode, and everything—the FATE OF THE PLANET– depends on how many young Lightworkers we can bring into Alignment and Cosmic Consciousness before then!
Of course, all this is absolutely FREE because you can use your State Scholarship Voucher to pay for it.
And best yet, all classes are taught by the Spiritual Wives of Enlightened Master Bob himself!!!!!

Hell, that ain’t no big deal about Floriduh. We been taachin’ that stuff out hear in Ohiowa fer years…
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HAAAA!
Ever at the forefront of the backassward
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Ohio.
This is a word in Japanese, right?
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I would say what it means, but Diane does not allow that sort of language on her blog.
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Our Japanese exchange student said something that sounded like Ohio as a greeting. My joke for her was to say Nebraska to her at breakfast each morning
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Ohayou gozaimasu means “good morning” in Japanese.
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I was joking about its having a bad meaning in Japanese.
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But wait, there’s more. If you order now, you will not only receive free hot dogs and balloons for your kids, but the entire cast of “Shiny Happy People” will be brought in as guess lecturers to show you “the way.” Corporal punishment, sure why not? That’s what schools need now, more discipline. Roe v. Wade? What? Never heard of that landmark Supreme Court case. And those pesky space lasers will never touch us because we will have “Universal Soldiers” manning our fortresses with the AR2023BLASTER. Geez, and we will make sure cultural diversity is simply “achromatic” heh, heh, get what I mean? And the only “woke” will be after you sign over your state money to us on the “Wokey, Dokey” it’s all guuuud dotted line.
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They’s a place fer yew in are marketin departament, Brother Rchavey!
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@Bubba Shepherd — U 2 phuuunee!
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That’s Brother Bubba Bob to you, son
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Good grief, another far right wing Flower-ah-dumb GOP looney tunes:
Anthony Sabatini, the chair of the Lake County GOP, #Florida, Caught on Camera Saying ‘We Need to Extinguish the Left’ –and Defunding PUBLIC SCHOOLS!!
Please, keep this gargoyle locked up in FL, we don’t need him going to DC at some point in the future.
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Sorry for being off topic but this Sabatini thug, who has not too subtly argued for violence against his political rivals is a certified rabid fascist/falangist:
Wikipedia
In 2022, Sabatini quoted Spanish dictator Francisco Franco on Twitter, tweeting that “I answer only to God and to History.” In response to criticism of Sabatini’s tweet, Sabatini posted a picture of Franco with President Dwight Eisenhower and stated that critics of his tweet were “extremely un-American.”
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Distinguish the Left!
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I love you, Bob.
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I love Bob too.
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Awwww! I love Bob too!
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Awww. Love to you, too, Steve!
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The spiritual wives of Bob the Great is a frightening image. Move over, Rasputin.
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Jealous, huh
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For your free copy of “Becoming a Spiritual Wife of Enlightened Master Bob,” just send $20 in postage care of this address in the Cayman Islands.
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Bob,
Have you contacted The Onion yet?
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Funny you should mention this, Mr. Swacker. Training in The Way of Enlightened Master Bob is very like peeling away the successive layers of the onion to achieve the central of being, which is purest bliss. Believe me, I know! This is why, in his wisdom, Enlightened Master has created his “Layers of Light” Quantum Ascension Course with aspirants like you in mind! How did Enlightened Master Bob know that you would be seeking him via this channel in the spatiotemporal matrix? He just does. Amazing, huh?
–Spiritual Wife “Divine Voice”
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cx: the center of being”
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Hello Bob,
Before you go mocking things like “Enlightened Masters” and “purest bliss,” you might try to learn something about them. 🙂 Seriously, though…concerning consciousness…you might be interested in Advaita Vedanta. I love most that its philosophy is grounded in your own experience. Nothing to BELIEVE in but your own experience of the transcendent-immanent. Swami Sarvapriyananda gives wonderful lectures in which he speaks clearly about consciousness. I recommend his Ask Swammi videos that you can get on YouTube. But the resources on the Vedanta Society website are wonderful too.
https://www.vedantany.org
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“you might try to learn something about them”
Mamie, what makes you think that I have not spent a significant amount of time throughout my life studying the scriptures, teachings, and histories of religions and cults worldwide in their enormous variety? That’s rather presumptuous. I suspect that there are SOME religion professors who have read more widely than I have on these subjects. You are writing to someone (me) who can tell you what’s in Mircea Eliade’s monumental study of Yoga and in Second Baruch, who can explain to you the teachings of the Diggers and the Marcionists and among an enormous variety of schools of Hinduism and Buddhism. Why on earth would you assume that I am ignorant of these matters?
I try to laugh at most religious and cult phenomena, but these are typically no laughing matter. That said, I’m not interested in getting into a flame war about this. After listening to or reading hundreds and hundreds of gurus over the decades, I’m pretty much done with adding more to the list. I’m with Krishnamurti on that. From my book Notes to Krystalina:
Back in 1909, the British occultist Charles Leadbeater met a boy, perhaps 14 years old, on a beach by the Andyar River, in India. Leadbetter saw something astonishing in this boy and took him under his wing. Ledbetter and his friends in the Theosophical Society educated the boy, preparing their pupil to hold the office of “world teacher,” the guru of all gurus. And indeed, the boy, Jiddu Krishnamurti, grew up to be one of the greatest of gurus, FOR HE TAUGHT PEOPLE TO DISTRUST GURUS. He said, you go to a guru because you have a problem, and you seek gratification. You seek the truth you want to hear, and someone to lead you to it, but the truth is not something static that you can be led to, as though it were a roadside attraction and the guru your bus driver. “You are more important than I,” said Krishnamurti, “more important than any teacher, any saviour, any slogan, any belief; because you can find truth only through yourself. . . . When you repeat the truth of another, it is a lie. Truth cannot be repeated. . . . There is no saviour but yourself.”
The Buddha put it more succinctly. “If you meet the Buddha on the road,” he said, “kill him.” This is what the Buddha thought of Buddhas.
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And yes, I am familiar with Advaita Vedanta and likewise find it attractive. As a good friend of mine recently said to me in a texts, those authors of the Upanishads were building jetliners 3,000 years before Western psychologists figured out go-carts. My biggest takeaway from that whole era: noncontingency, which is incredibly empowering
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Hello Bob,
I also do not “believe” in gurus. Run from any “guru” who tells you his way is THE way you should follow. Any great teacher worth his salt will support you in finding your OWN way. But a teacher may have knowledge and experience that you don’t and that you might CONSIDER. I am NOT advocating gurus. I agree 100 percent with Krishnamurti!!!!
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xoxoxxoxoxo!!!!
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I have long experience of losing friends to gurus and cult leaders. Many horrific stories there, really, really horrific ones, but I will spare you.
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Hello Bob,
People follow gurus and cult leaders and religious leaders because they have completely stopped listening to themselves and feel that their own inner life has no value and that someone else can provide answers, certainty and erase any ambiguity in life. It is the result of a severe disconnect and valuing of one’s OWN EXPERIENCE. That is what is happening when one tries to imitate, believe and follow another. But if we can know ourselves in the deepest way – not just the ego – but as more than that, then we see that we don’t need to follow and imitate anyone. We don’t need to be angry and hurt and disappointed. We can be a sort of witness without getting mired in all the drama of life. We can discuss and argue and give opinions but we don’t have to see them as “me.”You say you don’t want to get involved in a
“war” with me over this. I see no war. Don’t take my word and don’t believe anything I’m saying. But maybe it might ring true for you in some way. Maybe not. That’s ok. 🙂 🙂
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My apologies. I was just trying to ward that off if it was coming. Agree with everything else you say here. Mamie, I’m a satirist. I do a lot of that. But I am just about the complete opposite of an angry guy, and that’s because a) I accept the ambiguities of life and the limits of our knowledge and understanding and b) I understand that I am noncontingent. Melville put this beautifully in what I think of as the greatest American novel, Moby Dick:
“But even so, amid the tornadoed Atlantic of my being, do I myself still for ever centrally disport in mute calm; and while ponderous planets of unwaning woe revolve round me, deep down and deep inland there I still bathe me in eternal mildness of joy.”
–Chapter 87, “The Grand Armada”
This noncontingency despite our facticity is the most important thing that I can teach to a young person, the most valuable tool that I can hand over.
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I love that quote, Bob. Thanks. Yes, I agree about accepting ambiguity. I think maturity entails comfort with ambiguity, paradox and uncertainty in our lives. I TRY to be aware of that always. 🙂
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xoxoxoxxo!!!
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Did you ever consider a Nightly show. Of course after the writers strike is settled .
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Coming soon
Muskrat or DuhSantis: Who Bombed Bigger?
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I have title choices. Bob unhinged. Bob: Beside Himself. The Gospel According to Bob. Plumb Bob.
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Haaaa!
I had been turning over ideas for my next career. Some possibilities I’ve considered: Beauty influencer on Instagram and TikTok because I’m fabulous that way? Japanese pop music idol? Dirigible driver? Cat wrangler? Crow whisperer? King of Thailand? Masked avenger? Low-wire artist? Rock trainer? (“Sit, rock, sit.”) Alienist? Ghost buster? Yoga pants designer? Poet taster? Evolution research and development engineer? Plant psychotherapist?
But this works.
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https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=756537279851607&set=a.219620833543257
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Very funny, Bob!
So sad, though, that the location of said “Bob’s Real Good Fouruhduh Skool” isn’t too far from the truth: “across from Bob’s Gun & Pawn & next to Wild Wuornos’ Adult Novelties.” I’ll NEVER forget when Diane posted the nightmarish (but all too real) FL psychologist’s post about such a “school” located in a strip mall, where the “playground” was the alley/parking area behind the mall, the school “registrar” was also the school “counselor” & G-d knows whateverelse.
I remembered that I cried when I read that post.
Surely, Bob’s Skool doesn’t teach about climate change. Gotta go: thunderstorming here in Cook County w/possible tornados. IL had a total of TWELVE the other evening.
But, Bob, keep teaching your younguns that there’s NO such thing as c.c. (or evolution).
The world is flat, & we’re merely falling off the edge.
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Will do, Sister Retired! You know, they’s room for u in the exciting, ever-expandin world of chartery vourchery schoolin!
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Thank you for a very welcome laugh!
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Interrogation | Bob Shepherd
State your name, please.
OK. I can do that. I mean, I can give you some names. But these are misleading.
You intend to give us false names?
I did not say this. But a name suggests a finitude entirely inappropriate to all that I am. “I contain worlds. There is that lot of me.” –Whitman. However, if you insist. I used to be called Bobby Dale. That was a long time ago in human as well as dog years. To my high-school friends, I was Bobby Clean. To Joe the Body Builder, The Professor. My students called me Mr. Shepherd.
And where do you live, Mr. Shepherd?
Hmm. I dwell on the Earth. More proximately (though these are relative matters), in the skin that I’m in. Contentedly, I must say, especially when I hear about events like the Omaha student protests. Sometimes, though, ecstatically, when under the wide sky, in the presence of the gods.
So, you are a believer. What religion?
I am an omnitheist. I believe in all the gods. And some of the people. Especially in those students. May all the gods bless them. They are the future. DeStalin et al., the dead weight of an ugly past.
Are you going to answer our questions or not?
Yes. That, for example, is an answer.
OK. Look, enough of this. We’re just going to leave you here until you are more cooperative.
I take that seriously.
You had better.
No, I mean, I take seriously whom I cooperate with.
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Off topic but maybe not.
I said this at the time of course our resident Manhattan,lawyer,skeptic,threw cold water on it. One did not have to be a genius to figure it out. In fact all you had to do is be on a political Facebook page, in my case a Trade Union page. The usual suspects had no qualms about saying the unspeakable out loud or almost out loud. If racist Steam Fitters and Iron Workers figured it out when they canceled the Saint Patrick’s day parade March 17 2020 . It was not unreasonable to believe that even the “Evil Genius ” picked up on it .
https://www.alternet.org/trump-politics/
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It is absolutely the case that Donald Trump has a lot of blood of Americans on his tiny hands. He had decided to run on his “greatest economy ever” (lie, ofc), and so he went into denial mode rather than have shut downs and distancing. And hundreds of thousands died unnecessarily because of this. It’s truly obscene.
Remember, too, that this is the same guy who screamed at his Secretary of Homeland Security because she wouldn’t (and couldn’t) follow his orders to have Border Patrol SHOOT innocent asylum seekers.
He is an extremely sick and dangerous man (using the term man quite loosely).
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Much easier when it was “those people ” who were dying anyway.
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YUP. Once Jared told him that it was mostly black and brown people dying, it was greenlight. What an evil $&$@&@$&$@&@$$@)*@$)!!!!!!
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And in other news, the indicted war criminal at the head of the kleptocratic/Mafia state Russia has signaled that he does not intend to extend the deal that allows exports of Ukrainian grain via the Black Sea, which will cause food shortages everywhere, but especially in poor African countries where lack of that grain could be truly disastrous.
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Joel, this remains uncompelling and evidence-free. I’m proud to have thrown cold water on it then and to do it again.
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Look, Bob lifting and rewriting a Jordan Peterson lecture is not that original! 🥸 Think I’m kidding? Here’s a great explanation tying this lecture to Diane’s educating us about manipulation and misinterpretation of made-up statistics as the basis of the “logic” of Bob’s lecture. 53:00-1:18:18
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Sorry, Greg. This went entirely over my head. Not sure what any of this has to do with me and my takedown of voucher schools. I certainly did not lift anything from his moron (ancient depictions of DNA? that is just about as wacko as it gets).
Agree that Jordan Peterson is just a well-compensated court singer for the oligarchy and patriarchy–an incel who did all the reading for the intro to Humanities class. But the fellow here doing the takedown of Peterson should do his homework a little better. The Pareto Principle–the 20:80 thing–IS a widely encountered phenomenon.
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I am saying there is no difference between the person above giving the fictional lecture and the person I cite with a specific time stamp, although any part will do. The difference is that you know you are joking, he and his followers don’t (or will be offended by what you write). You point out the absurdity of it all. Someone who gets it also connects it to many issues in the way the [r]ight attempts to frame issues. He sees the same thing and bases his entire worldview on it. And he’s got a lot more influence, unfortunately, than you do.
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Ah, thanks for the clarification, Greg.
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I should add for clarification, those who will be offended will get the joke, those who won’t, don’t.
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Ja
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Or go to 2:10:05-2:12:15 to see the connection from Maistre to Peterson to American fascism to about 50% of our population who think there’s a lot of truth in that lecture above.
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I have you to thank for turning me on to Maistre. Egads! That was some horrible stuff. The great granddaddy of the Beast.
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A fictional representation of Maistre is Stendhal’s The Red and The Black. Fun fact: Al Gore’s favorite novel.
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This has been on my reading list for a long time. Ordering a copy.
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Peterson has gathered quite the online fanbase of incels. Very lucrative.
As for the sources of much of that second satire, above, these were two books written by the founders of a truly wacko “new religion” called Marconics, with a little Scientology thrown in. The list of places of power is based on my memory of a book by Elizabeth Pepper and John Wilcock called Magical and Mystical Sites: Europe and the British Isles.
But making use of knowledge of the world, in this case of cults, is not “lifting and rewriting.” Ouch.
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I think you have the makings of a hit reality show on the History Channel here…
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