No one wants to give up their slice of the pie. Every one wants less taxes, but they don't want to do it if it hurts their own neighborhood or causes us to actually realize that life is not a guarantee of comfort.
1 out of 7 people in this country without insurance. OK, how many of those are people who willfully refuse to get insurance?
In my state we are dealing with a property tax crises. We have seen property taxes go up anywhere from 10% to 400%. Yes, Four hundred percent. Property taxes pay for the "poor" to be helped in my state. It also pays for schools and libraries.
How many schools have pools, bleachers, locker rooms, and other facilities that have absolutely nothing to do with the ability to do math or develop critical thinking skills? Why are we spending more on jocks while losing PE programs?
Property taxes pay for local poor relief. Why am I paying so much for "poor" people to refuse to; go to school, quit smoking, get sterilized after their 2nd or 3rd kid, give up the cable, cell phone and fast food? Before all of you who want to post telling me your own sad story and what an evil woman I am for even speaking thusly; for every person with a true story of circumstances beyond their control there are probably at least 2 or 3 families on welfare/food stamps/ emergency utilities relief that can dam well get out and make their own way in the world without robbing me blind.
Effective police would be a lot more effective if people were more polite to each other. We have become a society of whiners, calling the cops at every opportunity because someone has loud music, or the neighbors won't lock up their dogs, or the kids down the street are yelling while I'm trying to listen to Bach. Save the calling of police for when you really need them, like when you have just shot the intruder/rapist/child molester and you need someone to come clean up the scene. Take care of yourselves and don't depend on others to do it for you.
Paying for books to be kept in a library that have shelves, good lighting and environmental control like heat and air conditioning. Atriums, auditoriums, and fancy tile work do not help anyone to enjoy a good story any more than a comfy old couch does.
We have lost our way and we want the community to pay for it. We have become a nation of whiners who expect all and want to give nothing. No wonder the rest of the world has nothing but contempt for us. Even the poorest of our poor live better than people in many other countries. But those who don't have to be poor (those who quit school, make babies they can't afford, spend what small earnings they have on "wants" and let the others supply their "needs")are sucking the life out of the rest of us.
Those of us who get up everyday and not only go to work to EARN our money but work at home taking extra classes, shoveling snow, mowing grass, painting, cooking, cleaning, and all the other things that we do to keep ourselves from relying on others should not have to be forced to the point of homelessness to take care of those who don't care any more about me than they do themselves. Imagine if I paid my mortgage but not my property taxes? I'd be homeless AND in court. Get rid of property taxes and stop enabling people to live as if they have no responsibility to take care of themselves on our dime.

   Last August I posted  about my friend who had no insurance. In my frustration with the hue and cry of all the "poor uninsured" I used her and her family as an example of why that was a bogus claim. I still stand by the idea that too many are uninsured out of choice and not circumstances, but that's not what this particular post is about.
   My friend read my post and became quite upset. Her personal life was on the net for all to see. She had a right to be angry. Sometimes people, as it was with me, become so emotionally involved in a political stance that they forget that people really are just people. This woman and her husband do things that I don't agree with politically, but they are good people. They have raised two children in a neighborhood most people would drive through with the doors tightly locked. They have taught their children to be respectful of others and to ignore the color of one's skin. My friend grows a beautiful garden that she has carved out of the poor city soil completely alone and by hand. She has worked for years to bring beauty to her small portion of the world, and has done so quite spectacularly.
   When we become so involved in the machinations of politicians, to the point of skewering our own friends, we become no better than those we castigate. There has never in the history of the world been a politician who truly cares about the daily lives and routines of those they profess to lead. Politics can very easily cause people to become arrogant, antagonistic, and blind to the multifaceted facts of any topic. I bought into that, and I sincerely regret it. My friend had a right to be angry with me, and I am glad she has forgiven me for my stupidity.
   I will still probably disagree with her on some things. I will probably still manage to tick her off by running my mouth once too often. But in our basic beliefs about life and how to treat others we are as one, and I forgot that for a time in my earnestness to show how smart I was. It is very humbling to have to say you were wrong, but I was. I saw a quote somewhere once, I apologize for not being able to cite the source, but it is apropos of this moment;
   "A friend is one who can see right through you and still enjoy the view."

I hope we can all remember that in the coming months of political rhetoric and frustration.

Indianapolis just had a huge upset in our local politics. In a city that had become a Democratic stronghold a stranger came in the guise of a Republican and sailed into office on the tide of anger and frustration from the citizens.
    Greg Ballard exemplifies everything the Democrats hate; he is a retired Marine who served his country through thick and thin. He is a leader of the military ilk; he brooks no silliness and intends to make changes. I wait anxiously to see if he is able to overcome the entrenched politics of arrogance in this city. He is a man who no one knew, for whom his own political party showed very little support and who campaigned the old-fashioned way in a city of a million people; he went door to door and told the folks about who he was and what he wanted to do. In the face of outrageous property tax hikes and an insulting 65 percent raise on the previous income tax levels requested by our out-going mayor and levied by the Democratic controlled City-County Council it was inevitable that Greg Ballard would win. On the face of it it is a no -brainer; Bart Peterson was arrogant and the people of this city took notice (and gave notice).
    For me the big question of the day is this; Will the people by virtue of this victory once again realize they CAN make a difference and gather up the courage to vote for the good of the country and not just follow a "fashion statement" philosophy of politics? I am praying every day that the powerlessness that this city felt over the last year and the sweet feel of directing destiny that we felt on Wednesday, November 7 will spread to other states and municipalities in preparation for the very important Congressional and Presidential races next fall. The city of Indianapolis has proven that those who bother to take part in the process can direct the process. Now can people learn that the issues need to be more important and better understood than the sound bites and pabulum we are fed on a daily basis? 
    To truly have a successful Representative Democracy requires that the citizens who vote also educate themselves. The War on Terror, the War on Drugs, the War on Poverty; all wonderful feel good words but impossible to clearly define. A good argument depends on the definition of terms. The political class of this country on both sides of the aisle have obfuscated the real issues with slogans and promises of victory over things that are too abstract and complex to be discussed in terms of 3 or 4 word sentences. The feeling of stupor and hopelessness engendered by the mainstream media and further inculcated by the politicos wishing to keep their seats of power could possibly be countered by the upset victory of a small city in the Midwest. 
    This is the time that people can see, from the proof that is Indianapolis, that the true power in this country lies in the pens of the voter citizens. We have a responsibility to go into the polls knowing the issues and understanding the various methods that we have at our disposal to address those issues. We cannot continue to be more absorbed by news of Brittany Spears than news of tax hikes and government mandated self-protections such as seat-belt laws or insurance coverage. Those who have felt hopelessness in the face of ever increasing losses of personal freedoms and burdens of taxation can look to the Midwest; the twelfth largest city in the country has proven that we can once again be a free people if we are willing to do the work required to achieve such a goal.

http://www.euro.who.int/Document/E87954.pdf

"Now Canada is well served by a clear and extremely thorough description of its
health system in this monograph authored by Professor Gregory Marchildon, a
careful and thoughtful academic and former senior public servant."

A bureaucrat examining a bureauracracy.

"Due to the lack of a uniform data source,
quantitative data on health services are based on a number of different sources,
including the WHO Regional Office for Europe health for all database, national
Health systems in transition Canada
statistical offices, Eurostat, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD) health data, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the
World Bank, and any other relevant sources considered useful by the authors.
Data collection methods and definitions sometimes vary, but typically are
consistent within each separate series."

Socialist groups justifying the removal of personal choice and individual freedom.

I will be reading the entire document but I must say that one needs to research the sources before blathering about how wonderful this document is. The WHO information discussed in the preface is based not so much on quality of care but the "fairness" of care. In other words, everyone should be able to access the same crappy hospitals without regard to the ability to pay.
In case some have forgotten (or never learned); the work ethic of this country exists in order that the citizens can to afford to pay for the better things in life. Thus our system abolishes the "caste" system found elsewhere. You can be born at any strata of the economic ladder, but by the application of hard work and good decision making one can make it to the very top tier of wealth.
To berate someone for wanting a better life is to buy into the socialist/communist mind-set of equality, but based on the Animal Farm version. "Some animals are more equal than others." Lest some disbelieve me, I suggest looking into what happened in Russia (aka the Soviet Union) during the first half of the 20th century. If the nationalized health-care group wants me to read their documents with an open mind, I suggest they do the same with their research into how wonderful governments  micro-managing the citizens do it to the detriment of those being governed.
You will NEVER find a politician or member of the royalty living as the average citizen does, no matter what the political system. And that is just another part of the issue that shows the resistance to national health care makes sense.

I think that voting based on religious values is going to kill this country regardless of the flavor of religion one follows. The Constitution of this great nation was written by Christians who believed in the rights granted by God to every human being. The right to be successful or make mistakes based on individual choices. The right not to have the government tell you how to do ANYTHING that affects your life. It was known by the Christian minds of the 18th century that the entire premise of faith in God is based on the Word of God, the Bible. And the Word of God makes it very clear that, spiritually, people have been given a choice. To strive to be as close to perfect as humanly possible, or to turn from God and revel in the darkness. Whichever way a person chooses to lead their lives, for the "Christians" of the Republican party to declare that they will leave the entire country to the like of Hillary Clinton and her minions by basing their votes solely on their spiritual beliefs is selfish. The fact that the evangelical right would even speak such a thing out loud shows that their earnestness to be "Good Christians" lies in their unspoken desire to force the entire country to follow a religious dogma.
  The real issues of government are not even being addressed. The real issue of an infrastructure that is rapidly moving to foreign countries. Infrastructure such as manufacturing and steel mills. The ability to make our own goods can make or break us when (not if) we are invaded by an enemy seeking to quash this "Great Experiment".
The real issue of men and women volunteering to be our protectors, to go wherever we send them in the "National Interest", and then paying them less than an illegal immigrant can earn, deploying them for long stretches at a time, expecting them to eat MREs and sleep in dust and dirt and share a bathroom with 4 or more of his/her  fellow soldiers, all the while talking about "supporting"  them by not helping them do their jobs. The fact that there is more of an outcry over $90 thousand in a politicians freezer than in the rejecting of our Marines in a major US city says more to me about the evangelical christian base than any belief in the "rights of un-born children".
   The real issue is that people who choose to make lousy decisions in their lives have the government at their disposal to force the rest of us to pay for their mistakes. The generous heart of America has become the gullible stupidity of the Hippie Generation that came of age in the Sixties. For every dime the working American earns, we are forced to give 4 cents to someone who wants to watch Maury all day, brown paper bag in hand.
   The real issue is that our children become less and less educated as we become more and more obsessed with pouring taxpayer money into worthless schools run by people who are more worried about their petty local political power than they are about the children who (may) graduate able to read at a 6th grade level and who have absolutely no critical thinking skills to speak of. A Representative Republic cannot function with illiterates in the voting booth.
   The real issue is that the ability of the American citizen to find work is being threatened by our southern neighbor who has made it plain that we are being re-patriated into Mexico. We have people pouring into this country from our southern border costing us billions of taxpayer dollars (that's your money and my money) by providing housing, food, health care and what passes for an education to almost every one of them. And let us not forget the prison space we're paying for.
   The real issue is that we are sending people to Washington who vote on appropriations of OUR hard earned dollars based on how many buildings, roads, or bridges will be named after them and not voting to keep all the above issues taken care of.
   As a person with a deep faith in God and His ability to know and see everything, I am far less worried about the state of a person's Christian alignment than I am about their willingness and ability to understand that the President, and more importantly the Congress, is charged with making sure the citizens of this great nation are free to  live their lives, consequences and all, without interference from anyone as long as the individual does not seek to harm others.
   The fact that so many posting here would be insistent that it is religious dogma and not practical necessity that drives their vote shows me that we have people in this country that are just as fascist in their desire to force their beliefs down my throat as the Islamo-whack jobs of the Middle east are. Someone please explain to me how doing something so heinous is actually more respectable when you're a "Christian" than when you're a Muslim. Or a Buddhist.Or a Wiccan. Or a strong believer of any religious system. Only when the people on both sides of the aisle remember that the individual was respected over the mob during the founding or this country will we see true change. Only when all of us, as citizens of the United States, realize that you can't legislate charity, understanding, kindness, and concern for fellow man, only then will we once again get the government we deserve.
   I haven't decided who I'm going to vote for. I have 13 months to figure it out. But you can bet I'll be doing my homework. And in the end I will vote for the people I will believe to have the interest of true freedom at heart. And then I'll sleep soundly that night knowing I have exercised the greatest freedom in the world; the freedom to make my own choice.

   My Dad died this week and I feel really introspective. It's not as if I hadn't been praying for it. It's not as if I wasn't relieved. It's not even the fact that I had been expecting it. He was miserable and suffering. He's gone now and I'm very happy for him. But all the same the gut wrenches and the heart twists in grief. And in all of this my mind returns again and again to thoughts of what Dad must have learned, seen and tried to pass onto his daughters in 84 years worth of life.
   Born a Deaf man in 1923, Dad came into a world where men were only men if they could beat the crap out of anybody who threatened them and talking was merely a prelude to the first punch, an earlier version of  today's "trash talking". In 1930 the attitudes were the same, and Dad entered his first year of school only to find out that kids are not kind, that the teachers expected nothing but obedience, and that any deviation from the rules got your butt whipped fairly soundly. The problem was that Dad didn't know the rules yet because he was never diagnosed with a hearing problem until after the Nuns had had enough. His "rebellion" was due to not hearing, not due to stubbornness. (Although he could certainly be stubborn, oh my yes!)
   So the powers that be saw fit to send him to a residential school for the deaf. The dreaded "institution" of limestone walls and the "dedicated" hearing people there who would force Dad, along with hundreds of other kids, to drill and train and cry and suffer while learning to be "hearing". The hours of learning to pronounce your words so that hearing people could understand your speech. The smacked and tied hands when trying to convey a thought via the use of a signed and visual language. The dark nightmare of all hearing people everywhere; to be deaf and dumb.
   But the Deaf kids who attended the school dealt with the bad because the light outweighed the darkness. At home you got thumbs up and smiles or frowns. At school you got stories of catfish 3 feet long and the struggle to get it to the bank of the river. You heard tales of cities in the north, and farm life and the births and deaths of people you never met. You learned more about your classmates families than you did your own. You learned about the latest football strategies and how to pitch pennies. In other words, childhood happened, even in a residential school in the 1930s. Even when the folks in charge thought you were barely smarter than the moneys at the zoo.
   Being a rebellious sort, Dad was asked to leave around his junior year of high school.  (How quaint. In today's world he would probably have been officially expelled and escorted to the front gate by our local boys in blue.) Luckily for the Deaf, our Nation was gearing up for World War II. Men and boys all over the country donned the uniform of the Army, Navy and Marines. No, there was no Air Force then, it was the Army Air Corp. This meant that all those factory jobs were ready and waiting for the Deaf men and women of America to step in. Jobs were fairly easy to get after the war officially started, but Dad had already managed to get a position and by 1942 was trying to help his Deaf friends get positions too. He worked hard. He spent long hours in a sweat-shop-like environment, exposed to dangers I can't even imagine, working for the hourly pay plus piecemeal. He supported his mother even when she was being a crotchety old witch and even though his entire life she was ashamed that she had given birth to a deaf child.
   My parents met  in the early '50s and married. In 1955 the eldest girl was born. In '59 another girl, in 1962 the last of three females. Mom had several miscarriages in between the live births. I am sure to this day that it must have broken both their hearts to see that happen. Dad always wanted at least one boy, Mom never cared either way. So Dad worked hard, walking to the factory when the car broke down, brought home a paycheck and provided food and clothing and shelter to his family. The American Dream achieved by a man born to a poor family in the '20s, whose own parents were ashamed and lived in denial of the child they had wrought. Dad spent his whole life proving that "Deaf Can". And he did a damned fine job of it. We were never hungry or cold. We did things together as a family. We suffered together through the years of the siblings reaching puberty and beyond. And we mourned together when our mother died at the young age of 56 years.
   The kind of values that I learned through all of this are the values that I know the Republicans and Democrats refer to in their 30 second spots when campaigning. The kinds of values you rarely see today. Truth in all things (whenever possible). Honor to family, friends, and those who treat you with respect. I've learned that sometimes it's worth it to fight, and sometimes you're better off keeping your mouth shut. Actually, I've had a really hard time with the latter lesson, but I keep trying. I learned that when you work as hard at actually accomplishing the task as you do trying to talk your way out of it you derive a satisfaction unequal to the instant gratification of laying around on your butt. I learned that keeping the old skills honed may someday help you out. Skills like learning to build a fire, cooking in a cast iron pan, putting up a tent and baiting a hook may actually save your life someday. I learned that self-sufficiency makes you free. I've learned that cutting other people more slack than you cut yourself often keeps you humble. I learned to apologize. I've learned that the phrase "I'm from the government and I'm here to help you" really is an ominous phrase and not just an old vaudeville joke. I learned that standing up for what you believe in is preferable to lying down for the beliefs of others.
And above all I have learned to love deeply my friends and family. To value the human over the material in all things. And to come out swinging when any of that is threatened. My Dad taught me well. I will miss him.

Nobody wants to hear the truth. And those of you who say "support the troops, bring them home" apparently don't realize how badly you're hurting morale. It's just as if your family said "we need food and shelter, but we know you can't provide it."
Those soldiers who joined the military to be true soldiers know the costs of war. That's why they don't fight for us, they fight to protect each other. As it should be. But those here in America who claim the war is lost, who support the troops by asking them to fail in their mission, or those who joined the military thinking it would be an easy way to get some bucks for their bank account; all of you need to think about the ammunition you give those low-life sons-of-biatches with the IEDs and the roadside car bombs in terms of propaganda. My nephew is there. My friends are there. And my husband served honorably in Desert Storm.
I hope every single person who hides their cowardly heart behind the cries of "Support our troops, bring them home!" remembers how broken and heartsick our men and women were when they came home from Viet Nam. They came home that way because we forced them to fight in a way that was sure to cause the most human loss through the political and ignorant actions of Robert McNamara and JFK, LBJ, Nixon and many others. Read your history. We didn't lose that war. We walked away from it because it was a nightmare for our politicians. And when we left, more than 2 million people were killed by their government.
Is this really what the left and anti-war at any cost people really want? You complain about our negligence to the suffering of the Iraqi women and children, yet neglect to mention that the killers are purposely using churches and schools from which to fire their weapons. You forget that if we leave now, those same women and children will suffer even more because those wonderful Muslim men believe women and children are just proof of their virility and have no other value. You fail to mention that we tie the hands of our soldiers with bleeding heart BS and demand that our congress complain loudly and mightily that "we are causing those poor people to suffer" and yet ignore the reality that our options are  limited militarily because of your whining.
This war could have been over a year ago or more had the spineless cowards of this country not insisted on acting as if we were merely at gathering in which some of the invitees were being rude.
If you really want to support our troops, send them letters telling them that we love them, honor them, and pray for them. If you don't believe in prayer, then support them by writing them and telling them that they are honorable people even though their actions are dictated by the whims of a politician 5 thousand miles away. Let them know that you empathize with them for having to endure the hardships caused by others. Send packages with chewing gum, sun-block, cookies, books, magazines, and packages of goodies that they can eat and remember home.
But stop the hypocritical whining. Because every one who looks into their heart and wants to see the real truth will realize that if you were in the kind of tortuous life that Saddam Hussein had imposed on his citizens, you would want the Calvary to rescue you too.
And also remember that to many in the military, patriotism and a love for country is not an abstract philosophy practiced only by the ignorant or superstitious. It is a feeling of love and gratefulness to have been born in the best possible country where freedom and the rule of law are the standard.

that is issue for me. I do now, and always have, felt that abortion is a moral  issue best left for the woman and the man who impregnated her to decide what to do. After all, they're the ones who will stand before  God and have to defend their choice. What gripes me is the fact that not one single cent of American tax-payer money should go to pay for such a procedure. Anywhere. For any one. I feel the same about birth control. Why do we continue to enable people to make bad choices by handing over billions of our dollars for what boils down to ethical or religious choices? If the issue were money being spent on churches the Dems would be screaming to the rafters about separation of church and state. Why not for this issue too?
I often get into discussions with Agnostics or Atheists about ethics and religion. My questions to them are; which came first, Theology or Philosophy? Ethics or Laws? The chicken or the egg? The point is that whether you believe in God or not, our entire human existence has been centered around the fact we have a need to be at least minimally ethical in order to survive.
Is murder ethical? Why not? One of the commandments is "Thou shall not kill". For me that is a powerful commandment from God that I follow because I love God. But Murder is also against the law. And the definition of "Murder" changes with each culture and with each individual. So if I'm an agnostic or an atheist, why do I support secular laws that say you cannot kill another human being? If you support pre-natal abortions, why not post-natal abortions? After all, the post-natal abortions are when you know a person really is a worthless piece of breathing space, when a pre-natal abortion leaves into question whether or not you are depriving the world of the next Beethoven or Rembrandt. (At least that's the argument.)
But back to the money. The Dems and Republicans both have no business funding anything other than infrastructure for commerce  and the military for national protection from our enemies. Religious topics should not ever enter the financial picture. Personal beliefs on how one should lead a life should never influence the collecting or distribution of our tax dollars. And enabling people to make true, responsible, personal decisions can only come when we stop giving out other people's hard earned dollars to support the ethical (or unethical) actions of the citizens of the greatest country in the world. We are great precisely because our country was founded on the principle that we all have the right to pursue happiness from the same starting line. It doesn't guarantee that we will all prosper, it merely guarantees that we will all have the same chance to prosper. Our country was also founded on the right to deal with the consequences of a person's behavior, whatever that behavior is. We all scream about rights, now let's hear some discussion about responsibility. Using tax money to regulate or reward behavior is not only the antithesis of all our forefathers stood for, it is antithesis to the American spirit of individual liberty.

I love reading blogs, essays, opinion pieces and what passes for newspapers these days. It never ceases to amaze me that people will go out of their way to misunderstand instead of understand. I believe it has to do with the old axiom "The truth is painful". But the belief that "the truth shall set you free" is too painful for most to deal with.
I believe that homosexuality is something a person is born with. I believe it because my cousin has had "gay" tendencies since he was old enough to express himself. I believe it because my nephew has had "homosexual tendencies" since he was able to express himself. I wish for a better life for both of them. I personally feel that their homosexuality has caused them much grief in the respect that they are incapable of good decision making, but they are who they are nonetheless.
I've never met a gay person who didn't have more issues than a magazine stand. "Drama queen" doesn't even begin to tell the tale. And yet to point that out to anyone means being prepared to be called a "homophobe".  How silly. That's as if pointing out that the cabbage roses on my grandmother's couch makes me a divanaphobe. or that my mother's being fat makes me an obeseaphobe.
Next time you read the responses to a column, opinion piece, or blog make note of how many people will completely miss the point. Is this a statement of how woefully unprepared our school systems are in educating our citizens? Or is it a by-product of "The truth hurts"?
I wrote the above in frustration with some responses to Dr. Adam's piece "Of Mice and Mormons".  The twisting of words and meanings were blatantly obvious in the comments, but it is not only on that essay you will find comments coming out of left field. It is everywhere. People hear one word in a sentence, clause, or paragraph and they are so busy formulating a retort (different from a response, which requires true thought) that they miss the point, thus missing an opportunity to learn something new.
How sad.

Cruelty to animals is a psychotic behavior. It shows a sociopathic tendency that often carries over to how one deals with humans. Michael Vick is yet another example of how kids with an ability to throw, bounce, toss, or kick a ball are placed on too high a ground from the time they are very young.
We have a senior in High School here in my home town who is already being watched by the pros. He has been lauded as an up and coming hero since he was 12 years old. He has been trained to believe that being rich and famous takes precedence over any empathy towards others. The kid is a complete and total jerk. I have no doubt that we will one day soon see his face on the news; face stuffed with cocaine or raping unsuspecting female fans, or yes, even engaging in cruelty to animals. This is why the NCAA needs to go away. The absolute stupidity over the importance of college sports has become obscene in itself. As long as we place these hoodlums on a pedestal we will continue to see horrific behavior not only in the pro sports, but in the children who look up to them.
But back to the subject at hand.

 Laws protecting cruelty to animals are justified in that animals have no say about their futures. At the same time, mankind has dominion over the animals according to the Good Book and if they are killed humanely there is no reason not to eat them. (As the old joke goes; I didn't fight my way to the top of the food chain to eat lettuce.)
I recently interpreted a public meeting about dog fighting. The dogs, yes they are almost exclusively pit-bulls, are thought of as having the same qualities as inanimate objects. To the dog fighter, the pit bull is no more or less than his vehicle or the coffee table in the living room. These despicable people not only force the dogs to fight to the death, these people will buy or kidnap smaller animals, usually kittens or puppies, with which to train their dogs. I won't go into the gory details. Suffice it to say that only a sub-human could do such a thing. And the saddest part of all is that this is happening not only in the urban areas, but in the lovely farmland of the rural counties of America. That beautiful old barn you passed on your way to the last antique market could very possibly have had a dog fight going on inside at that moment.
People who fight dogs are teaching their children to adopt the same attitude toward not only dogs, but their fellow humans. These children are becoming tomorrow's socio-paths.The de-sensitization of these children is one of the worst by-products of the dog fighting scene and I have no doubt that as these children grow, so will the number of rapes, armed robberies, and murders. After all, "It's all about me."  Isn't it?

I was a nerd from birth. I learned to read at 4 years old, fell in love with the old Encyclopedia Britannica set my mom bought at a yard sale once, and chose Nancy Drew over playing spin-the-bottle every time. My parents were Deaf and didn't really read much, so I pretty well had to learn to love books on my own. You see, they were special education kids. They went to an "institution". (A residential school for the Deaf.) English is not their native language, American Sign Language (ASL) is.
In this "institution" my parents, along with thousands of other deaf kids all across the country, were told that they were required to learn to speak and learn to read lips. They were taught to read and write, which is a good thing, and they were forced to hide their native ASL while in public. They looked normal on the outside, but society viewed them as defective on the inside because they couldn't hear things  like music and radio programs and the neighbors screaming at each other after a good dose of alcohol. I have no doubt that they suffered. After all, most of the people running the Deaf school were hearing, from the Superintendent  and teachers to the houseparents and janitorial staff. What few Deaf teachers there were had the positions of Vocational Teachers (which at that time consisted mostly of training the boys to be printers and the girls to be seamstresses.)
And yet despite the fact that the hearing people from the teachers all the way to the parents (my grandparents) pretty much looked at the Deaf as lacking and to be pitied, my parents married, raised three children, worked for their family, bought a house, paid it off, and finally retired. And they did all of this without taking one dime from the government even though they truly were given a tough break from the get-go.
Now let's jump to the 1970's. Public Law 94-142 and the Vocational Rehabilitation Act of 1973, Section 504 provided that any institution that received federal funds must now provide interpreters (more on the history of that on a later post) so that the few Deaf people who managed to break the bonds of their teachers expectations could attend college and actually get the information they needed without working at twice the pace of their hearing counterparts. These Deaf people went on to become teachers, finacial consultants, accountants, and professors. Some even went on to become PhD's. We are still seeing this generation going without government assistance. No food stamps, Social Security checks, TANF, or other government programs. Don't get me wrong, there were a few who took advantage, but not many.
Then in the late '70's some parents of kids with disabilities like Down's Syndrome and other developmental difficulties decided that their kids should be in "mainstream" classrooms. After all, some research was done that proved that kids who were slower at catching on did better when placed in a room with their "normal" peers. Of course, no one knew what this would do to the "normal" kids. So along comes the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). IDEA  allowed for extra federal money for any school that "mainstreamed" the "disabled" kids into their programs. A little paragraph known as Least Restrictive Environment (LRE) allowed parents to fight schools for the inclusion of their disabled kids. So the kids were put into regular classrooms where the speed of learning suddenly came to a crawl.
The speed of learning, and the type of material taught, is now geared to the lowest common denominator. So the kids who are given the LRE for learning have now caused the kids who could achieve at a quicker pace to lose momentum. While waiting for the slower kids to catch up, the kids who are finishing their work quickly soon become bored. This leads to "behavior problems". Of course, the rigidity of the configuration of a classroom can not allow for individual pacing, so now we have the "ADHD" kids who need to be medicated.
As for the Deaf? Well, they have been mainstreamed for the most part. They are put in "Least Restrictive Environments" where their only companion is often the over-paid, under-trained interpreter who is with them the majority of the day. They have no native language because the interpreter is more often than not liguistically lacking in ASL. The other kids don't want to hang around the Deaf kid because it takes too much effort to communicate. Of course, there is that wonderful new miracle medical solution called a Cochlear Implant that magically gives the deaf child the ability to "hear" and be "normal". But then there is the side effect of all the hours of speech therapy, mapping the computer programming now placed surgically in the child's head, and all the fun hours spent at the doctor's office making sure the implant isn't causing such things as facial paralysis or brain swelling or infection. Oh, and the other kids? Well, it seems they don't like hanging out with aliens that have weird appliances surgically implanted in their heads.
So now we have a generation of Deaf people who can barely read, barely write, and have been told all their lives that they are "special". How many millions of dollars do you suppose has been wasted on Social Secuity Disability payments for these kids? Let's just say the "Bridge to Nowhere" isn't necessarily only in Alaska. 

Social Security is the biggest lie of our time. It is bankrupting not only our spirit of individualism, but our nation and our cities as well. When I was self-employed, 15% of my wages went to social security. From those wages, I will be lucky if I see a 10% return. Had I been able to invest my money the way I saw fit, even if it was only to bolster my Serta, at least it would be my money. 
    
I guess I have an unnatural inclination to want to  be free to make my own choices about my future. The fact the GW was willing to let me invest  3% of my own money in the way I saw fit (instead of giving it to Uncle Dillinger, er, um, I mean Uncle Sam) was a start, but just because others are too stupid to figure out they can't work forever doesn't mean I should be penalized. I should be able to invest 90% of my money and consider the other 10% a charitable contribution to those who really are pretty bad off through no fault of their own. I'm afraid the last generation of true individualists was born in the late fifties or early sixties.
  
  The rampant cheating and favoritism is what aggravates me so much. The Federation for the Blind has managed to lobby the government well enough that a blind  person, who is perfectly capable of doing everything except use their vision, can earn up to $900 a month and still keep their Social Security Supplemental Income (SSI). The SSI runs about $1200 a month on average. Let's assume this blind person owns their own business. Many do thanks to a federal law and a few state laws,including Indiana, that allows only blind people to establish vending areas in public buildings. The vending/convenience store business is pulling in roughly $40K a year. Should be enough to stop the SSI, right? Not so fast my fellow victims of Uncle Sam. Remember that $900 a month allowable income? The allowable extra income isn't counted until all the expenses are paid out. Then we start the tally of cash. So, for example, if I am blind and own my own business, I can deduct from that $900 a month:
depreciation on technology such as talking $$ bill checkers,talking cash registers, talking computers, etc.
dog food (for my working dog)
100% of transportation costs to get me around
100% of the cost of my lunches
These are just a few of the deductions I am allowed thanks to the powerful lobbying of the Federation for the Blind.  Now that I've racked up some expenses, I get to take all that money and subtract it from the money I'm earning ( as I should be doing since I'm quite able-bodied and capable of thinking). By now the total amount of money I am "earning" has slipped down to $500 a month. So Uncle Sam sends me $1200 of your money to supplement my income. My official income is now $1700 a month or  $20,400 a year. At that point I can take all the standard deductions, plus of course the deduction for being blind.  I've paid almost 0% of my income into the system, while I am drawing out $1200 a month. $40K in actual earned income + $10,800 from SSI/SSD = $50,800 a year, before the standard deductions and all the itemizations. Talk about disposable income! Sweet!

Then there's the Deaf. Same scenario, they can earn up to $900 a month on top of their SSI or Social Security Disability (SSD). This is how much they can deduct for technology, lunches, and getting around:
$0.00
Looks rather unfair, doesn't it? But the unfairness lies in the fact that a perfectly healthy Deaf person can (and often does) purposely work part time jobs for the sole reason of  keeping that $1200 a month that they get from me and you. $1200 + $900= $2100 a month. $25,200 a year for working approximately 15 hours a week. Again, this is income before standard deductions and itemization, plus the SSI/SSD portion is untouchable by anyone who sues for relief of debt. Wow, that's like sitting on the Indianapolis City County Council!

Lest you think I am picking on the "poor handicapped", let's look at another scenario. Mom is young, say mid-20's, has 4 kids and has never worked a day in her life. She can't read because she didn't bother to get an education after the public schools failed her so miserably, so she's been on welfare since the first child was born. Baby Daddy Bubba goes out and gets himself killed in a meth/crack exchange. Now Mom gets around $600 per month per child from Social Security until they turn 18 years of age, unless of course they bother to go to college which means she draws until they're 23 years of age.  Bonus points are also given because no matter who she gets into debt with she can never be forced to pay the money because her "earnings" are sacrosanct. If she doesn't pay her rent and the landlord takes her to small claims court, he won't get one dime of court ordered garnishment because the courts can't touch her Social Security checks.  4 kids x $600 a month = $2,400 a month. Plus she's eligible for free or reduced lunches, food stamps, and section 8 housing. Pretty good deal for someone who hasn't contributed a thing to society except more expense and aggravation.

Next time: Ponzi Schemes, why are they good for Uncle Sam but illegal for me and you?

Welcome to my first post.
I hope we'll talk about many subjects here. Please send this on to people you know who love to discuss the issues of the day. Any day. History is as interesting to me as the present is.
There will be times when my weird sense of humor will show itself. I forgive you if you think I as funny as a flatulent uncle at a formal wedding. But it happens. Humor is how to deflect hard feelings, and how to help people learn. If you read my bio, you will see that I have a desire to learn as well as to spout off about my own views. I'm fairly open-minded, but I want supporting evidence before I accept anything as fact.
To the topic at hand: Education.

I have 2 kids who went to the public schools. I am always more amazed at what they don't learn than what they do learn. THe teachers who are supposed to be teaching seem to be clueless themselves. Here's a great example:
Some years ago my husband and I took the kids to Florida for a family vacation. It wasn't summer, Spring Break, or Christmas break. It was just a week of off-season enjoyment for the 4 of us. The kids would miss 4 days of school. So the rule was that the kids had to plot the route to our destination, find 3 interesting but historical or scientific side trips to do on the way, figure out how many miles we would drive, figure out how much gas we would use according to the mileage our car was getting and how much we would spend overall for the fuel. They would also have to keep a log of the trip for the purpose of writing an essay about what they had learned.
OK, let's review: Geography, history, science, math, time management, sequencing, reading, writing, spelling and fun.
Wow! Sounds like a pretty heavy curriculum to me!
I was told in no uncertain terms that the children were being deprived of a great education by not sleeping, um, er, sitting in a classroom listening to the teacher talk to the lowest common denominator of kids and wondering what they had done to deserve this living hell.
We went anyway.
Thank goodness my daughter is off to college (and she swears she won't come home a socialist), my son is in the Vocational program in his senior year learning to become a machinist and metal fabricator ( he's an intellectually brilliant kid, but it's obvious people like Jesse James of Monster Garage make the big bucks).

Public education has become the last bastion of those who want to brag about their college educations but don't exactly achieve anything after moving their  tassles to the left. Zero tolerance, filling in test bubbles, and making sure everyone is included even to the detriment of the quicker kids has made our schools factories for the mediocre.