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Casey Heynes has captivated the world’s attention with the video of him standing up to a bully and laying the smackdown. As some news reports analyze the consequences of the fight, one news show in Australia went right to Casey to get his inspirational story. Casey provides play-by-play commentary for his bully confrontation and admits that he wasn’t really thinking. The interview reveals that Casey suffered from a “lifetime of torment and abuse” and was all alone since his friends had deserted him. Casey sadly spoke about how he could only remember a couple of days when nobody would tease...

Bully kids? Bad. Union bullies? Role models for kids. There was an excellent article a few days ago on some of the reasons why the government is too big, expensive and pervasive. There are additional reasons, including the very nature of the bureaucratic process and the propensity of many to demand that the government do something no matter how trivial their cause may be. Since few politicians feel that they can get elected or reelected by failing to construct or at least to stumble onto bandwagons, that’s what they do. Fortunately for them, President Obama is spearheading a new warm...

IT'S a tale of David and Goliath at an outer western Sydney school - with Goliath fighting back against his much smaller schoolyard bully. But now the bully's mother has retaliated against her son's victim and the video footage of the fight which has gone viral. The emotional mother of Ritchard Gale, Tina, told the Seven Network last night that she and her family have been victimised by the footage, which has spread worldwide. She also demanded an apology from the victim. "We don't need this posted everywhere," she said. "I would like him to apologise."

Roughly 150 various advocates — lobbyists for gays and lesbians, legislators, White House officials, at least one cabinet secretary and the first lady — gathered around President’s Obama’s bully pulpit in the White House Thursday to cheer for increased government monitoring and intervention in Facebook conversations, in playgrounds and in schoolrooms around the country. No officials at the televised East Room roll-out of the White House’s anti-bullying initiative suggested any limits to government intervention against juvenile physical violence, social exclusion or unwanted speech. None mentioned the usefulness to children of unsupervised play. None suggested there were any risks created by...

Leadership: When Democrats held Congress, the Obama agenda was audacious. Today, faced with global unrest and an economic reckoning, the president is filling out basketball brackets and scolding school bullies....The soothsayer famously told Julius Caesar to "beware the ides of March." One of the priority items for Obama on Tuesday, March 15, was taping his picks for the NCAA basketball tournament. Last week, the president and the first lady were holding a "White House Conference on Bullying Prevention," at which he recalled being taunted because of "big ears and the name that I have."... Then, of course, there is the...

It's a video that is sweeping the Internet -- an Australian boy fights back against his bully. Yet he was the one suspended from school. The video shows a far bigger boy named Casey Heynes minding his own business when a smaller boy starts harassing him. The bully punches Casey in the face -- which doesn't seem to faze Casey. The boy tries to hit Casey again, but he's able to fend off the punches. Finally, Casey gets fed up and picks up the smaller boy and body slams him to the ground. The smaller boy may have learned his...

Parents across the metro area, in different school districts, have similar stories to tell when it comes to the way their children were treated after reporting they were bullied. “The other kid jumped in and had the boxcutter up and threatened to stab her over and over again,” Tina Williams said. “And he said, ‘I wouldn't stab a girl, but I'd stab a b**** and I'm looking at one right now,’ when he looked at my daughter.” “At lunch I am kind of afraid that they are going to threaten me again,” said Williams' daughter, Kayla. “She's heard jackass, b****,...

U.S. President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama arrive to speak at the Conference on Bullying Prevention in the East Room at the White House in Washington, March 10, 2011

The White House held their Bully Prevention Summit today. Why the federal government feels the need to interject itself into the schoolyard bullying issue is beyond me. What is even more troubling is how it has focused on bullying with LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgendered) students.

President Obama showcased federal, state, local initiatives to address bullying, at a White House webcast on bullying prevention. He and First Lady Michelle Obama opened a conference on bullying prevention Thursday morning by calling on all adults to consider the role they can play in creating a safer climate for children.

President Obama said today at the White House Conference on Bullying Prevention that even a future president doesn't escape the taunts of bullies. "I have to say that with big ears and the name that I have, I wasn't immune. I didn't emerge unscathed," the president said. Mr. Obama, who hosted the conference at the White House with First Lady Michelle Obama, added that he had childhood memories of other kids being bullied. "As adults, we all remember what it was like to see kids picked on in the hallways or in the schoolyard," he said. President Obama and First...

The scourge of bullying is getting all sorts of attention -- internet bullying in particular. The White House, always hot on a trend story, next week will host a White House Conference on Bullying Prevention. "Stop bullying now!" barks the Department of Health and Human Services website, somewhat aggressively. They are co-hosting, with the Department of Education. "The conference will bring together communities from across the nation who have been affected by bullying as well as those who are taking action to address it," the White House said. "Participants will have the opportunity to talk with the president and representatives...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama will host a White House conference next week on preventing bullying. The White House says the March 10 conference will bring together students, parents and educators to discuss ways to end bullying and make schools safer for students.

It is the kind of torment that no parent would want their child to endure. Cyberbullying can and does lead to suicide. Special laws have now been passed to try and deal with this relatively new phenomenon, which affects an estimated 50 percent of all teenagers at one time or another. That's because the Internet is now part of our daily routine. But increasingly, online communications cause severe trauma. Take the case of Jessi Slaughter, a young girl whose You Tube video that has gone viral. It shows her crying hysterically, telling her peers to "stop hating." Young people with...

Raise your hand if you're disgusted with the Wisconsin school teachers who selfishly left thousands of school children and their parents in the lurch to demand protection of their contractually guaranteed goodies. Those professional educators and role models called in sick and even picked up fake doctor's notes during rallies to avoid trouble with school administrators while on their field trips to Madison to protest. The teachers were cheese-brained for walking out of work, denying schooling for four days to the very students they profess to care so much about — even after the head of the state's largest teacher's...

Monika Shreves, a college senior with a petite frame and long, black hair, remembers the first mean girl she met. The girl lived in Shreves's Northern Virginia neighborhood and had the blondest hair and eyelashes Shreves had ever seen. The two arrived together at Girl Scout camp, and the girl assumed command of the cabin they were to sleep in. "This is the cool cabin," she told the other girls who wandered into the campsite, looking for a place to throw down their stuff. She'd size up each girl. "You can come in," she'd tell one. "You cannot," she'd tell...

Civility is making the headlines lately, but if you dig a bit deeper, barbarism is the real story. To wit: Last month, MSNBC.com carried this story from Reno, NV: “Six girls arrested for Facebook ‘Attack a Teacher Day’ invite.” One middle school girl was arrested for inviting 100 fellow middle schoolers on the social networking site to participate in something she called “attack a teacher day,” while five other girls were arrested for responding to the invitation with threats against specific teachers. <---snip---> I hate to be the one to burst our national bubble about the potential for greater civility,...

Gov. Chris Christie has signed a bill advocates say gives New Jersey the toughest anti-bullying law in the nation. Christie signed the “Anti-Bullying Bill of Rights,” according to a press release from Garden State Equality, the state’s largest gay rights organization, which advocated for the bill. ..."He signed it, and we're overjoyed," said state Sen. Loretta Weinberg (D-Bergen), one of the bill's prime sponsors.

The U.S. Justice Department went into a public high school on Tuesday with a message for students: If you’re “different,” if you’re gay, and if you’re being bullied – don’t feel alone, don’t be ashamed, and don’t hesitate to call on the federal government for help if your school doesn’t stop the bullying. “If you have been targeted for harassment or bullying because of your sexual orientation, because of your gender identity or expression, or simply because your classmates see you as different, I am here to tell you that the Civil Rights Division will not stand for it,” Tom...

Please, we need your help... you know where this is headed: Please take a couple of moments for 1.38 million schoolchildren What could be wrong with a tough new law targeting gay-bullying in our schools that is now sitting on Governor Christie's desk? After all, the activist Gay and Lesbian groups that spent over a year writing the language of the bill are publicly describing it as the "most sweeping anti-bullying legislation in America". Isn't it a good thing that New Jersey will become the national leader in the fight against gay bullying? Isn't it good that New Jersey will...