Thomas Jefferson Hated Hate Crime Legislation

President Jefferson, an icon of early American architecture, education, and, of course, statesmanship, would not like modern day censorship of opinions.

William J. Federer, national speaker for Christian causes,
noted this last week.

When I was a child, I remember being told that "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me." My parents and teachers used that as a way of helping us to stop hitting each other when someone called us names. Of course, we were also expected to "turn the other cheek." I wonder if anyone is teaching these things today?

I guess that is an old-fashioned notion. Therefore, not worth teaching or considering in the modern age.

Nothing to Say

Actually, I have had nothing much to say in the last few days. I have been at trial. All that has been necessary to say has been said there.

However, while driving south from Newark to Lancaster on Thursday, I saw some artful wording on the back of a small SUV in front of me. I had time to read and examine the writing because we were in stop-and-go traffic due to a school zone.

Anyway, the writing on the SUV said "If it is too loud, then your too old." Yes, there was an incorrect use of a word. I was thrilled! I suppose the owner of the SUV intended to slam those who complain about the driver's loud music (i.e. the artful use of an automobile as a boom box).

The driver of the SUV was playing his music a wee bit too loud, but I did not find that offensive or irritating. However, I REALLY wanted to quickly create a beautiful font, print it out on sticky plastic, and get out of my car and paste my message on his car.

The message? I had no clue! I wanted to slam the improper use of "your" instead of "you're" or "you are." Something witty, to the point, and not too offending.

What did I come up with? Nothing!

Any suggestions out there in blog land?

Education Classes and Indoctrination

Many years ago, while I was taking classes to become a school teacher (post-graduate classes), I thought most of the classes were stupid and not terribly helpful. (Note, this castigation does NOT apply to my graduate classes at ETSU or EMSU.)

The only kind of indoctrination that I felt we received was essentially thus: smart kids will always be able to take care of themselves (so do not worry about them), and slow or uninterested students are the most important people in the world. Oh, and we can feed those students uninteresting and intellectually insulting material in order to teach them basic skills at the secondary school level.

Apparently today, that kind of indoctrination is unnecessary, and now the new indoctrination of educators is much more important socially and economically: the current message is that Marxism is good and perpetual revolution against the capitalist system is necessary to achieve social justice. Never mind that the taxpayer dollars that go to support public education come from the capitalist system. Never mind that a number of these academic training sessions come from consummately successful capitalists. Pigs. I forgot.

As a former teacher in a ghetto in a western state, I am offended by the notion that the topic of social justice warfare is more important that the study of higher mathematics and

I suppose that one reason I left K-12 public education was associate with social justice: the "man" wanted me to feed pablum to my kids, and I had to be a wee bit discreet and had to "buck orders" in order to give my kids the best possible education I could give them: to become readers at the ripe old age of 14 years old.

I personally think that teaching students how to read, to compute, and how to think though problems addresses more social injustice than any of the "social injustice" training that modern day educators must undergo.

Abortion and Potential Regret

I discovered an interesting blog today: Mirror of Justice - A blog dedicated to the development of Catholic legal theory.

The notion that a woman who is pregnant with an unwanted baby might be fully informed about the procedure, the risk to herself and the risk to the baby (sometimes they survive the procedure only to be killed outside the womb), is an idea that is overdue.

According to the blog cited above, the state has a legitimate purpose in reducing the risk that a woman discovers (much too late) that (1) she was woefully uninformed about the above risks, and (2)(my addition) that she has tremendous regret at having chosen an abortion over other legitimate choices.

The blog cites Justice Sandra Day O'Connor in the Casey decision. It is worth a read.

Truckers Are Set to Voice Their Opinion

In the wake of an interesting "international" - err - should I say "national" decision to allow truckers from a neighboring county (here, Mexico) to travel deeper in to the United States (or perhaps all the way through to Canada), U.S. truckers are going to protest.

Imagine that! They are taking their time and money (and time is money in that industry) and are going to Washington D.C.

But why?

Well, they expect that truckers and trucking firms from Mexico are going to undermine the wages (about $.47 a mile around here) that U.S. truckers earn. Outsourcing within our own boundaries. Oh, yeah, I forgot! President Bush wants this. Oh, well. I suppose that what he wants, he will get, no matter the consequences to US citizens.

The taxpayers will likely be paying for the unemployment benefits of a whole lot of truckers. Who cares about that? After all, we consumers (taxpayers) will also be paying less for all our goods - after all, shipping costs are quite a huge part of the price of each and every item that we buy.

Of course, there is also the issue of the road worthiness and safety of the trucks coming from Mexico. But, perhaps, this issue will be solved by charging all the suppliers less money to ship stuff, and more stuff will be shipped, and costs to maintain trucks will be less, etc, etc, etc.

Anyway, U.S. truckers are planning to drive around state capitols and the US Capitol, slowly.

Just keep on trucking!

Separation of School and State

It is about time! I only wish I had thought of it first.

Jeff Jacoby, in his Boston Globe Op-Ed, A Call for Separation of School and State, pointed out a nearly perfect solution for those who are offended by what public schools are teaching their children. Get the government out of education!!

Presently, public school teacher unions try to force all students into a "one size fits all" K-12 curriculum, to curtail all home education, and to stop public monies from being distributed to legally organized charter and religious schools. Thus, parents and students are losing their battle to have their own religious/anti-religious, liberal/conservative, market economy/socialist etc. viewpoints either taught at the schools or protected from being trashed by school curricula.

Hooray! Talk about democratic choice and voting with one's feet. This is an idea whose time has arrived. I cannot imagine how the system would actually be dismantled, and, of course, there is the problem of unemployment for many ineffective school teachers and administrators. However, as a former public school teacher, I can attest that many teachers long for the freedom to properly teach their students and for the freedom to serve the students that they want to serve.

What? A Market for education? Some will say that is wrong - that society has a responsibility to take children from their parent's influence and to bring them up the way of righteousness (defined by the educational leaders). Oh, right, that is what the Boston religious leaders wanted, and why the first public schools were developed in Massachusetts - to save little kids from parents who refused to bring their kids to church services.

I remember my own mother, upon visiting the elementary school that I attended, being told by my principal, that she should leave my education up to the "professionals" - and that she had been wrong to teach me how to read before I started kindergarten. Mom was suitably outraged. Of course, a couple of years later, the school told my mom that they had done all they could for me, and that the family would have to find something else to occupy my intellectual curiosity. Imagine that!