Educationists ... bad for education

This is so true: Dressing Up Standards, Dumbing Down Schools

Blogging for Cathy

Blogging for Cathy ... Or, It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over

Over at April's (the Hyacinth Girl) blog, Cathy made a comment which I wish to share with Gentle Reader --

Now, and of course, April has far more readers (and commenters) then I -- for I have only you, my Gentle Reader -- but comments may easily be lost in all that bustle. Here, in the undisturbed peace and quiet of my tranquil (i.e. dusty) little corner of the blogosphere, one may more easily reflect at leisure.

First, for context, we need April's post:

While it would be superawesome if this guy were right, (the guy Steyn quotes, not Steyn), I’m not holding my breath. Perhaps I’m too cynical, but with our near-permanent welfare class and a generation of kids who’ve been told that they are children into their late 20’s, I cannot imagine a prolonged revolt against Obamacare. As I’ve said before, ultimately. free candy wins. Of course, there will still be the core of the Tea Party, but when the outrage wanes, a lot of people are going to tell themselves that, well, if the government is giving things away, they might as well get in on it.

I mean, why fight it? If it’s going to happen anyway, might as well benefit from it. Culturally, we readily accept the idea that we must follow the whims of our “betters”-how else do you explain the thousands of “Rachels” roaming the country throughout the ’90’s? How else do you explain the persistence of Hollywood to dictate public policy and influence presidential elections? Barack Obama is our first cool president, put into office by the endorsements of our self-appointed betters. Celebrities are our new royalty, and sadly for this nation, the opinion of Jennifer Aniston is a lot more important than cold, hard facts.

We are a lazy, spoiled, ADHD culture-soft and uninterested in thinking for ourselves. At least my generation is. I’ve met women my age who are almost proud of “knowing nothing about politics.” A mom told me once, “Can you just write up a list of people we should vote for?” Her playdates, soccer games, and story times at the bookstore were much more important. Obviously.

Sooner or later, the outrage runs out. The relentless media rebranding of the “Teabaggers” as angry, racist, uneducated, violent militants becomes mainstream knowledge and a pushback against the gaping maw of massive government and taxpayer debt becomes the last gasp of the marginalized, unnecessary white male. (Which is, paradoxically, sometimes led by an attractive, young, strong and well-spoken woman. But it’s best not to think about that for too long.)

As a society, we’ve accepted the idea that the famous are better than the normals. certain educational levels render one more or less credible to form a coherent thought, where one’s diploma is from further underscores the previous point, the wealthy are inherently smarter than the poor, and that journalists have our best interest at heart, and since they’ve got degrees, we should really listen to them.

So I’m not buying the idea that Obama is effing up in phenomenal fashion and taking the Democrat party with him. If a coordinated attack on the American mainland and the deaths of over 3,000 civilians doesn’t rouse (and maintain the interest of) a sleeping giant, what makes you think that the (relatively) instant gratification of unsustainable, expensive entitlements will?

First, a side comment about the "teabagger" smear of which the "liberals" are so fond: like most normal persons, I'd never heard of "teabagging" before Anderson Cooper decided to make the smear. Nevertheless, I'm fairly confident that I understand what "teabagging" -- as a social phenonenon -- is about: it's a display of dominance and submission.

SO: if the leftists see *us* as the "teabaggers," that must mean that they see themselves as the "teabagees." They call us "teabaggers" because they're afraid of us. They call us "teabaggers" because they *know* we can win this battle for the soul of America.

And now, without further adieu, Cathy's comment:

OK, so here’s what I’m thinking.

April is half-right (wait!), and so are we ALL when we say things about “the American People”, “the voters”, “our society” ETC.

As dissatisfied as we may be with the current administration, we just discourage ourselves when we say “This is what we did to ourselves,” when actually, it was only a little over half of the electoral college that did it to all of us.

When we say “the people want” we are generalizing inaccurately, just as the majority of the media, with their “mainstream knowledge”-inducing relentless repetition of spin, “suggestion”, un-checked-gossip-as-news, and occasional blatant B.S. (corrected on page 17), intend.

It may be “half true” that Americans are” soft and uninterested in thinking for ourselves.” But if we convince ourselves that this is true for everyone, instead of the maybe-half of the society around us, we forfeit the battle, unfought, to those who want to see ALL of us “infantilized” - dependent on, and uncritical of, an increasingly socialized system.

It’s not as though all the other people who voted for Not Obama left the country. Admittedly, there may be a variety of reasons “Tea Partyers” gather to protest legislation and denounce politicians. As Ilion points out in a comment at his blog:

If the people showing up are simply protesting the hit to their own pocketbook, the nation is doomed; if the people showing up are [] protesting on *principle* we may ride out the Obamanation storm.

But the fact that they DO gather, means that they share common ground; they DO think, they DO care, and they are NOT NECESSARILY going to give up and decide “If you can’t beat ‘em…”.

And the fact that those who do attend the meetings, and rallies, and “town halls”, statistically represent many others who feel as they do, means that a reversal in the leftward trend in this country’s institutions is still possible.

But no matter how long the outrage holds out, the battle cannot be won on outrage alone.

The hard part will be recognizing that an election in seven moths, or in two-and-a-half years, might not be all it takes to put things right. The hard part will be creating a slow, steady program of reasonable, rational persuasion, by conservative voices who have not undermined their credibility with hyperbole and histrionics, and by conservative politicians who have not already demonstrated the fragility of their convictions. The hard part will be finding leaders who can draw together Americans worried about the Constitution and Americans worried about their pocketbooks; American concerned about the availability of medical coverage for their children, and Americans concerned about the tax burdens their children will bear.

The GOOD part is, the job for those leaders is already half done.

Remember this, always: just because many American should-be citizens have already sold their minds (and liberty) for the chimera of statist promises of "security," does not mean that all have. Just because many should-be citizens wish to sell your and my liberty for those worthless and empty promises, does not mean that all do.

There are still Americans!

And the Fat Lady doesn't even want to sing.

(Michael W. Smith: 'There She Stands')

Oh! Those perfidious 'birthers'...

Apparently, even Mrs Obama is a "birther" --

Here is Mrs Obama, in 2008, referring to Kenya as Barack Hussein Obama's "home country" (see the :40 to :47 mark):


The fact is, none of us has any good reason to believe that Obama meets the Constitutional requirements to occupy the office of the Presidency, but we do have good reason to suspect that he does not.

Anyone who is not a “birther” proves thereby that he does not really care about the US Constitution. Anyone who mocks or disparages the “birthers” for simply asking for the relevant evidence proves thereby that he despises the US Constitution … and the citizens of the US.

The meaning of the Resurrection

Edward Feser: The meaning of the Resurrection

As with Christ’s Passion, people are always trying to attach to His Resurrection various counterfeit meanings. But it is, in this case, harder to do it with a straight face. Were you present at the crucifixion, you would have seen what on the surface required no supernatural explanation – a man nailed to a cross, as so many had been before by the Romans. Were you present at Christ’s tomb on that first Easter Sunday, you would have seen a corpse returned to life. “Keep hope alive!” “Jesus is still with us in our hearts!”“You can’t keep a good man down!” and all the other banalities liberal pastors will waste their congregations’ time with today rather fail to convey this central fact about the Resurrection. It was a divine suspension of the natural order, a miracle, or it was nothing. “If Christ is not raised,” St. Paul tells the Christian, “your faith is worthless.” And by “raised” he meant raised – reanimated, brought back from the dead – not eaten by wild dogs but remembered fondly, or whatever it is the John Dominic Crossans of the world want to put in place of what Christianity has always claimed. The Christian faith has, historically, laid everything on that line: Accept the Resurrection, and you must accept what Jesus Christ taught; reject it, and you must reject Him too as a fraud.

Thus, while the Resurrection is an affront to naturalism, it is not primarily that...
...
The Resurrected Christ will not be dialogued with. He will be worshipped, and obeyed, or He will simply be rejected as one would reject the ravings of a Jim Jones or David Koresh. Politely rejected, perhaps, at least this side of the grave; we can concede to the dialoguers their good manners. But rejected, and in no uncertain terms. “Let your Yes be Yes and your No, No.” Unless you are prepared to call Him your Risen Lord, seek no religious meaning in His life and teachings. Nor in His death; for the Passion is what it is only in light of the Resurrection. If we who did not know Him in the flesh worship at the foot of His cross, it is because we have worshipped first at His empty tomb.

I Don't Worry About The Constitution On This

"I Don't Worry About The Constitution On This"

"I Don't Worry About The Constitution On This"

Meet Congressman Phil Hare (D-IL). He actually appears to be dumber than the guy who is worried about Guam capsizing.

Very rarely has so much stupid been packed into just a little more than 3 minutes.


Now meet Bobby Schilling, he's the Republican running against Hare.

The district is a Democrat leaning one but not by an insurmountable margin (D+3). It's right next door to the district that's home to Caterpillar's corporate HQ, so I'm guessing the whole $100 million in health care charges thing might come up a time or two during the campaign.

I hope the congressman enjoys his moment in the limelight.

As the man behind the camera says: "Jackpot, Brother!"

Hasn't this fellow just *admitted* that he perjured himself with his oath of office? Hasn't he just *admitted* that he doesn't belong in Congress ... but may, perhaps, belong in prison?

Is there really *any* Democrat, anywhere, who worries about the Constitution? On any matter?


As a general rule, "liberals" care very much about optional rules, about bureaucratic rules, about rules which are at best of secondary importance (and I think care even more about tertiary rules) -- say, an EPA bureaucratic ruling which effectively shuts down hundreds of square miles of farmland. But, the rules which are primary? The rules which are non-optional? They shrug about those rules.

The Democratic Party *needs* to be destroyed. We can worry about putting the Republican Party out of business on the next day: but if we want America to survive and prosper, we *must* put the Democratic Party out of business, permanently.


=============
In the spirit of the "environmental impact statements" which are now required (under what Constitutional authority?) before most economic development may procede, I offer Gentle Reader --

The 'Constitutional Impact Statement' amendment to The United States Constitution
1) Every bill submitted before Congress shall explicitly defend all its provisions by demonstrating at least one Constitutional power and authority under which each of the provisions is justified.
2) No bill shall be voted upon by Conrgess except it shall have been read aloud, by a living human being, in full, in its final form, in a normal speaking voice, before each Chamber of Congress.
3) No member of Congress who shall not have been physically present for the full and final reading of any bill before Congress shall have the ability to vote upon the bill.

Of course, that third provision does have a bit of a loophole, in that it doesn't require that Congresscritters be attending to the reading, or even that they be awake. The purposes of this provision are to "encourage" the Congresscritters to write short bills, and, in keeping with the spirit of The Founders, to put another roadblock in the way of Congress passing bills in the first place.

But, it's the first and second which shall go furthest in taking back, and securing, our liberty, by requiring and forcing Congresscritters to perform their Constitutional duties to uphold and defend the US Constitution.


Also, we need a Constitutional provision that no new bureaucratic rule may be promulgated or enforced except it has been read in full before Congress and explicitly approved by Congress.

I have long wondered

I have long wondered how long it would take for this particular chicken to come home to roost.

The chicken I have in mind is the Kelo decision; what I have wondered is how long it would take before some State government sees the implications of the Kelo decision and then chooses to act upon those implications.

Apparently, Utah has: Utah gov. OKs eminent domain use on federal land

SALT LAKE CITY — Fed up with federal ownership of more than half the land in Utah, Republican Gov. Gary Herbert on Saturday authorized the use of eminent domain to take some of the U.S. government's most valuable parcels.

Herbert signed a pair of bills into law that supporters hope will trigger a flood of similar legislation throughout the West, where lawmakers contend that federal ownership restricts economic development in an energy-rich part of the country.

Governments use eminent domain to take private property for public use.

The goal is to spark a U.S. Supreme Court battle that legislators' own attorneys acknowledge has little chance of success.

But Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff and other Republicans say the case is still worth fighting, since the state could reap millions of dollars for state schools each year if it wins.

More than 60 percent of Utah is owned by the U.S. government, and policy makers here have long complained that federal ownership hinders their ability to generate tax revenue and adequately fund public schools.

Utah spends less per student than any other state and has the nation's largest class sizes. Under the measure Herbert has approved, the state will set aside $3 million to defend the law.

Lawmakers recently slashed education funding by $10 million and raised taxes on cigarettes by $1 a pack. Democrats have decried the eminent domain measure as a waste of money, and Democratic gubernatorial hopeful Peter Corroon is making it an issue in this year's special election.

But if the law is as bad as Democrats say it is, a court will quickly overturn it and the state won't have to spend much money defending it, Herbert said.

Initially, the state would target three areas for the use of eminent domain, including the Kaiparowits plateau in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, which is home to large coal reserves.

Many people in Utah are still angry that then-President Bill Clinton's designated the area as a national monument in 1996, a move that stopped development on the land and greatly pleased environmentalists as he ran for re-election.

Utah lawmakers contend the federal government should have long ago sold the land it owns in the state. Because it hasn't, the federal government has violated a contract made with Utah when statehood was granted, they say.

Eminent domain would also be used on parcels of land where Interior Secretary Ken Salazar last year scrapped 77 oil and gas leases around national parks and wild areas.

It's a "BFD"

Cathy brings this to our attention: Health Reform Is a BFD...Says Democratic Party T-Shirts

The signing ceremony for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act on March 23rd was supposed to be a winning moment for President Obama. Unfortunately for the President, his historic victory after a 14-month legislative battle was momentarily overshadowed by Vice President Biden's accidentally audible profanity. Many Americans were put off by the gaffe, a purportedly inappropriate slip during such a historic moment. Others were nonplussed. President Obama laughed off the comment, telling reported he wished he'd said it himself. Nobody issued an apology.

A week later, the Democratic National Committee is trumpeting Biden's gaffe in commemoration of Obama's health care victory. The DNC released a series of sponsored Google ads today for T-shirts marking Obama's health care victory. Among them was this gem:



"There are things that are a big deal -- birthdays, anniversaries, the NCAA Championship game. And then there are things that are a BFD, like delivering health insurance to 32 million Americans."

When reached for a comment, Organizing for America National Press Secretary Lynda Tran said that the shirt was designed to be "a little tongue in cheek fun, something supporters could connect with."

"We agree with the vice president," said Tran. "We think that this was a really big deal that we passed reform, and we want people to be excited for the future."

Cathy's comment was: "Ah, the ever-tasteful Left."

My response was:
The Leftists are both ever-tasteful and ever-short-sighted -- for, the *other* (and primary!) meaning of calling something a "BFD" is denegrate it as being of no account and/or contemptable.

So, yes, let us all agree: the "health" "care" "reform" pseudo-law is, indeed, a "BFD."


A related thought --
So, thanks to the great public service of the Gaffe-o-matic, in informing the whole world that the "health" "care" "reform" pseudo-law is a "BFD," we can see that the various "Deals" offered by "progressive" politics seem to be going down hill:
TR -- the Square Deal
FDR -- the New Deal
Truman -- the Fair Deal
Zero, The Won -- the Big F***in' Deal

Another thing to notice about all those "Deals" is that they see the (purported) citizen as standing in the relation of a supplicant to, and client of, the federal government.

A Conservative Argument Against the Senate Filibuster Rule

Drew Justice: Rollback by reconciliation -- he's convinced me.

The Parable of the Satellite Dish

Doctor Zero: The Parable of the Satellite Dish

The Parable of the Satellite Dish

Imagine a large condominium complex is meeting to consider a package deal with a cable TV company. Over eighty percent of the condo owners have their own satellite dishes, and are quite happy with the service. Some of them don’t bother to watch television at all, preferring to rent movies from Blockbuster or Netflix for entertainment. However, the condominium Board of Directors says they’re getting a lot of complaints from the residents who don’t have satellite dishes, demanding the condo association purchase a cable TV package, and fold its cost into the monthly homeowner dues.

The homeowners already pay extremely high dues, and they’re not happy with the quality of service they receive. They also notice that most of the people clamoring for cable television aren’t even homeowners – they’re renters, so they don’t pay the association fees directly. The condo owners already host regular movie nights at the clubhouse, which also has a well-stocked library, so no one is truly starved for entertainment. Still, the owners feel guilty that anyone has to make do without TV service in their home, so they invite a cable company to give them a sales pitch.
...

There is more, of course.

Now, the thing is, the very fools in the body politic who are salivating over "health" "care" "reform" would never stand for such a situation with respect to mere entertainment. Apparently, far too many people care about having choice about incidentals ... but not so much about liberty. And, such folk are not only not jealous of their own liberty (see the Founding Fathers if you do not understand that), but are quite resentful of *my* liberty.

Obamandias

Obamandias

Obamandias
I met a traveller from a once free land
Who said: A vast and fathomless ego hath
Scorched the earth. Nearby, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose contempt
And tilted chin, and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read.
Few survived that parliamentary Armageddon
The rest were run out of town on a rail, or fled.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Obamandias, king of kings:
Look on my legislation, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains. Round the ruins
Of that colossal Self, burnt and bare
The lone and lifeless prairie stretches far away.