Why Kids First Isn't The Best Policy

Disclaimer: I don't have kids. I don't like kids. I don't want kids. 'Nough said.

There is a push in the land of America to put all kids "first". Now, in principle, I understand this concept. Raise a child in the best possible environment with all of the love and affection they can stand to make a better human adult. The trouble is, it's bullshit.
More to the point, it's gone way too far. Parents are indulging their little monsters to the point of raising a self-absorbed, pouty, self-indulgent, whiny, little turd for whom the words "discipline" and "responsibility", not to mention "courtesy" and "respect", mean nothing. Failure is always an option in the great competition for status, money, and power we call life, but heaven forbid someones' little angel 'fail' at something for fear of bruising their fragile, little egos. The parents become indignant that their underachieving brat is shown to the world to be, well, an underachieving brat, and storm the bastions of education we call "public school" with a demand that their adorable idiot be allowed to pass.

Life doesn't work that way.

And speaking of public education, let's look at how the concept of "no child left behind" has fucked up the entire U.S. educational system.

Despite the desire on the parts of do-gooders to believe otherwise, children are, indeed, like adults. In other words, you have bright ones and dumb ones. Don't talk to me about their "potential". Everyone "potential" is set in stone the moment they're born. A dumb kid IS going to work retail, at best. (Unless they're born into a family with political connections in which case, they'll be called "Bush" and babysat throughout their careers by older puppet-masters, but I digress...). A smart kid MIGHT work retail. That's about the only sure difference. But in that narrow maze of smart and dumb, there is a wide gap in mental ability - which means the smart ones will do very well in school and the dumb ones can't. So how do you keep from leaving anyone behind? You have to dummy it all down so the dumb ones can keep up.

Looking over at the smart ones while all this dummying down is going on, they're no longer engaged in the lessons. When they're spinning differential equations in their head but the material is still mastering one plus one for the idiots in the classes, they're going to lose interest. And when the smart ones have no chance to out-perform the dumb ones with special rewards for outstanding achievement, their eventual arrival in the land of retail becomes more likely. Positive reinforcement is the best way to teach. But when everyone gets a reward regardless of their level of work in order to not single out the idiots in the class who can't really compete to avoid damaging their sense of self esteem, the whole concept of a reward goes out the window.

And let's not kid ourselves about rewards here. If you take an outstanding student and give them "something" for their achievement, then give "something else" to the other, under-preforming kids, you just undermined that reward for outstanding achievement. It's tainted because it's no longer a unique event. People try to kid themselves that differing the reward has any positive impact on the child. Imagine an Olympics were everyone got medals “just for trying”. It degrades the accomplishments of the winners. That decreases the incentive to “win”.

Everyone can't be winners all the time.

So what happens is that you have a whole generation of people who were raised in an environment where no one was allowed to fail, who are then thrust into the real world where failure is always an option? You get a shit-ton of pathetic whiners. Is it any wonder that the products of this environment enjoy movies and celebrities exhibiting nihilistic, self-absorbed, self-indulgent, pouty natures? (Like Vampires, werewolves and Lindsey Lohan).

The bottom line is that kids need to be shown the consequences of failure at a time when failure doesn't mean putting them on the streets, in a hospital, in rehab or in jail like it does in the real world. Kids need to be shown that making a mistake has consequences - real ones - and to show that failure is one of the best teaching methods to actually learn something of value. Flunk them if they don't do the work. Hold them back in grade level if they aren't applying themselves or lack the mental ability to go on. Don't dummy down the material but brain it up to the highest point that the child can stand. Challenge them to excel and hold them to that expectation. Failure should have consequences worth avoiding, but also should be shown to be an opportunity to learn.

And for heaven's sake, stop giving out awards for finger-painting, citizenship and other BS garbage where everyone is intended to feel good about failing. Failure should hurt. Fail big, it should hurt big. And when you win big, well, in life the fact is, when you win big, the congratulations only last a short time, so teach them to keep reaching for their goals. Winning should be its own reward and the way people are taught should be geared toward that idea.

The idea here is to teach responsibility and discipline. Teach kids how to THINK, not just how to take tests and "not fail". Everyone fails - some more than others and some bigger than others. Someone wins and that win is recognized until someone else wins. Teaching that failure is always an option will help people learn discipline and responsibility. You don't always win with a sense of responsibility and self-discipline, but you are far more likely to fail without them.

It may go against the grain of the do-gooders to teach this to kids, but the truth is, life leaves people behind. Education by idealistic slogan is a failure for both the child and society. LEAVE some behind and let society deal with them. If the ones who are going to get ahead are encouraged to do so, they may actually do something for those left behind. But when those who are better than those who would be left behind are treated the same as those who would be left behind, they lose interest. Mediocrity becomes the new "best". And society suffers all the more for it.

What's worse, kids today (at least those I've encountered all over the country in America), are, by and large, the rudest little shits on the planet. They are self-absorbed, self-entitled, self-indulgent monsters running amok with the parents looking on with apparent delight in their child's inability to get along with anyone else. Apparently, parents today (at least most of them, it seems) believe that being respectful and courteous toward others is some kind of handicap. It's not "being strong and independent" in their eyes.
A strong person doesn't need to prove they're strong and being discourteous, rude, whiny little shits in public only tells me that there is yet another asshole on the freeway, bully in the classroom, back-stabbing fucker at work and a bar-fight to be in the making. It also tells me that the parents should have been "fixed" before they had kids because these asocial creatures, and likely their get, will do little to nothing to contribute to the human race in any way whatsoever.

Wastes of DNA.

Children need discipline. They need structure. They need limits. It's not going to bruise their little egos if you, as a parent, impose a little of each. Just keep in mind the word, "moderation".

Discipline for a child includes two things: Punishment and reward. Punishment MUST be painful, but applied proportionately and not always physically. Rewards should be very small for small things and very large for large things. There can be only a few absolutes. The idea is to teach your child that hard work is most often rewarded and doing bad things is most often punished.

And above all, this has to start EARLY in the child's life. Suddenly being confronted by a mouthy, disrespectful tween isn't an accident. It's negligence on the part of the parent. Being independent doesn't mean being rude or discourteous.

I DO believe in spanking a child, but I don't believe in HITTING one. Spanking is to be reserved for the worst things a child does, and must always be accompanied by other lesser punishments like grounding, denial of access to favored toys, enforced curfews, etc. A spanking is most effective when it is meted out sparingly, preceded by a talk explaining what's coming and why, giving the child time to think about it, then administering the punishment and reinforcing the lesson with another talking to afterward. It is the epitome of punishments, one meant to instill fear of it in the child and is to be used only when all other punishments have failed.

If they still act out, sell them to gypsies or put them in a burlap bag and drown them like kittens. They'll bring you nothing but misery the rest of your life, otherwise.

In all seriousness, kids must have structure and limits, be taught self discipline, respect and manners. They must learn to do this for everyone, and not just a favored few. That means the PARENTS need to do it, too, because nothing fucks up a kid's head like being told one thing by their parents then seeing them do something entirely different.

They resent the hypocrisy, even if they don't know that it's called hypocrisy. If you tell the kid not to lie, never lie to them. If you teach them to keep promises, keep your promises to them (and others, for that matter). YOU set the standard of THEIR behavior, and they will do what you do. If you don't like what you see in your kid, chances are, others don't like what they see in you. If people don't like what they see in you, you can bet your last dollar they hate your kids because they act the same way as you do.

If you have the attitude, "Kids will be kids", you're dead wrong. Kids will be ADULTS, and a hell of a lot sooner than you think. If people are bitching about your little angels, you have a problem and you can see who caused it in the damn mirror.

The purpose of having kids isn't a trophy for you to parade around. It isn't to fulfill some inexplicable need or hole in YOUR life (because 18 years later, that hole is there again when they leave the nest, and you've solved nothing). It isn't an "accomplishment" to be proud of since just about everyone on EARTH does it at some point, many doing it way too often.

The purpose of having kids is to prepare the human race for the next generation. That means teaching them how to get along, cooperate, think, reason, work as an individual and work together. THAT'S how mankind made it as far as we have. And that's the ONLY way mankind will survive our technologically-laced adolescence.
Kids first isn't the best policy because it puts mankind and the planet behind them. Put mankind and the planet first, raise your kids up right to become contributing and welcome members of our society and they will go and do things for which you CAN be justifiably proud.

The Zombies Are Here!!!

Last night, I had a Zombie dream.

Now, to be perfectly honest, though I have a vivid imagination and have dreamt of many things, I have to admit Zombies was not what I would have expected me to dream about. Zombie movies have never been a favorite genre for me and way too much has been written about why people like them. The last thing I would have expected me to dream about was Zombies. I've never done it before, and haven't watched a Zombie movie in many a month. None the less, last night, I dreamt about Zombies.

I'm not sure it was the classic Zombie movie, but it had elements of it. Zombieland is a Zombie movie I actually enjoyed because it was so tongue-in-cheek (and in seat, and on floor and flying through the air and... well, you get the picture), but it had elements my (apparently deranged) mind threw into my dream. That is to say, it didn't focus so much on the beginning of the disaster as the point of view of someone just trying to make it through the day.

It all started out normal enough (as all Zombie movies do). It was from the perspective of a "regular guy" (yours truly) who was just going about his life. Only, occasionally, someone would pop up as a Zombie.

Mostly, they were ignored.

They'd be in theaters, in the supermarkets and malls, going about their business as well. But they were Zombies and everyone knew it. Gradually, though, more and more of them appeared. They still went about their business, but they were a touch more hostile than all the other "normal" people out there. If you pointed out to one they were a Zombie, they'd actually attack you.

Eventually, of course, there were Zombies everywhere. They weren't interested in eating your brains so much as they were interested in turning you into another zombie, or killing you if you resisted. Not typical Zombie behavior I grant you, but it was pretty typical of the mentality (if not NECESSARILY the actions) of some folks today.

It took a while for me to remember, but the Zombies in my dream were Red, White and Blue and looked like they lived mostly in trailers before they went on their world-wide rampage of "Join us or die!!!".

Is anyone out there beginning to draw the same parallels I did?

Let's look at politics today: A bunch of people who can't think being led by party platforms which have no chance of becoming reality, each using the platforms of the other party as the boogie man's whip to keep their followers blindly in line. Anyone who raises a voice against these blindly shuffling, Red, White and Blue zombies of either party are shouted down, attacked (and in some cases killed) or vilified as someone who must be converted to their point of view or "die" (metaphorically at the least, literally at the most).

Now, I tend to equate violent zombies with the right wing (mostly because a conservative is more tolerant of violence, and tends to use violence and violent imagery as their "weapons" of choice in convincing others to go along with them, but I digress), but in this case, both parties can be called Zombies. Right wingers believe in their political nonsense because politicians tell them what they must believe. Left wingers believe in their nonsense, partly as an anti-reaction to the Right-wingers platform, but also because they believe what their politicians tell them.

The politicians are the APPARENT zombie masters. Of course, the politicians are themselves zombies of the Corporate World (and if you don't believe the corporations run the world, you should read up about what the British trader said on the BBC the other day about how Goldman Sachs runs the world and not governments ), which makes the Corporate World and bankers the true Zombie Masters. I expect he'll meet a bad end in the near future. Defamation or death is what I expect to see happen. He was telling the TRUTH, after all, and the Corporate World doesn't want anyone to know the truth.

But the bottom line isn't so much who controls the zombies. It's that the zombies really made themselves by refusing to think for themselves. I've written about the dearth of people thinking for themselves before, but perhaps haven't mentioned HOW they fuck this up so badly.

Most people believe they are thoughtful and hold opinions that are well considered. They think they listen to what other people say and decide for themselves whether to believe in it or not. Of course, this isn't what's really happening, but they think it does. They then become entrenched in these beliefs and will often react belligerently when those beliefs are challenged - ESPECIALLY when those awful, inconvenient "facts" are used against them.

That is NOT being thoughtful nor creating well considered opinions.

The truth is, in politics, OPINIONS SHOULD NEVER BE SET IN STONE. EVER!

Life isn't static. It's always changing. Societies grow. New technologies create new ways of looking at things. Knowledge and discoveries open new vistas and new horizons. And because of this, what was true about things yesterday may not be true about them tomorrow. Going back to my favorite whipping boy, politics and the right wing, I can say with utter certainty that today's right wing was NOT what it was twenty years ago. Today, it's militantly opposed to compromise that would benefit the people and the country. Even if you go more than half-way to their position, they will not accept that, and demand they get everything their way or nothing gets done. They aren't called the Party of NO! these days just because they're against drugs, sex - outside of a marriage between a man and a woman, of course - and abortion.

Since the right wing refuses to budge, the left wing has started doing the same thing and nothing is getting done.

People aren't thinking. They're reacting.

If the reactions were beneficial, that would be fine, but the reactions are to only entrench one's opinions more solidly in an unyielding matrix of political ideology.

Way back when, I had a friend who recited T. A. R. as a way to go through life. It turned out he was looney as a Wanner Brother's cartoon, but this advise always struck me as one of his more lucid moments.

T. A. R. Think. Act. React.

Notice the first word. Think. Always think first. You think about your action AND your reaction. When I was in college, I did a speech on this using the acronym SCAB Act. - Stop and Consider Actions Before you Act. I said that if you remember SCAB, you might avoid a few of your own. I thought it was catchy.

The point is THINK FIRST! ALWAYS think first. But here's a few more hints about how to do it since, apparently, people are so out of practice in doing it for themselves.

The first thing you do is stifle the emotional reaction. Being emotional is a reaction. It's not thinking. You can use the energy to do something constructive like mow the lawn, build a sky-scraper or something equally affirming, but the last thing you want to do is use that emotional reaction to respond.

Next, consider what you heard/saw/experienced. People often go with a first impression of what was put before them without actually absorbing it. They have prejudices, preconceptions and perspectives that may interfere with what was actually intended to be put across. Flying off the handle by jumping to an erroneous conclusion is a great way to end up with foot-in-mouth disease.

Once you've accurately absorbed what you experienced, next consider WHY. Now, granted, there isn't always a why. But if it's an argument, and someone is trying to convince you of something, or is getting angry at you over something, consider the whys. Whys are the underlying motivations for what you have absorbed. When considering the whys, try not to let your prejudices, opinions and other set-in-stone aspects of your personality/life get in the way of arriving at a conclusion. This may not be possible for some people to do, but none the less, it's a step that shouldn't be skipped.

Finally, respond. Do it calmly, rationally and with a factual basis to support and justify your response. Because sure as hell, when you respond in such a manner, the other person will probably fly off the handle and your point looks far more reasonable and rational than theirs.

Thinking, as I pointed out 20 or 30 years ago, should be an Olympic sport. It requires CONSTANT practice and it's obvious some do it a lot better than others. But it's an activity that everyone should be doing whether they're good at it or not. An open mind, some has said, can't hold onto anything. But a closed mind can't get anything into it. What we need are minds that allow things in, and can arrange them neatly according to our own experience and reasoning.

No one is going to be perfect at this - especially those whose opinions tend to be handed to them on silver platters and catered to by those wishing to manipulate them. So to finish it all off, when it comes to thinking, assume no one is telling you the truth.

In politics, this is ESPECIALLY true. There is so much spin going on to sway and convince that no one really knows what the truth there is anymore on either side of the political spectrum. If you assume everyone in politics is hiding something, spinning the truth, trying to get their own way at the expense of everything else (a not unreasonable starting point given the way Washington hasn't worked in the last two or three years), think before you react, try to discern all of the whys and, above all, search for the truth on your own using sources that are NOT part of the world where the spin is coming from, then you are well on your way to creating well considered, thoughtful opinions which can change as the circumstances and world changes.

Zombies can't think. And even if you paint them all red, white and blue, they're a hazard to life because they want you to be just like them. The horror in my dream had more to do with becoming a mindless automaton unable to think or mentally do for myself than any possible physical mutilation of body that becoming a zombie might bring. (I don't look good in red or white, but blue is okay).

In my dream, feeling cornered, I stopped running from the Zombies and started attacking them instead. I was using my fists - but in reality I was using my mind. I could think. They couldn't. In the end, I was the one left standing amid a lot of broken Zombies and the world was once again safe to be in.

We need more thinkers and fewer zombies if THIS world is to be safe again.

Why Rednecks Are So Stupid

I can't help but wonder why the average "conservative" supporter is so adamant about voting against their own best interests so constantly. I mean, from a bottom line point of view, every time they vote for a conservative, their lives get worse.

Conservatives believe in "fiscal responsibility", but exactly what does that mean? Not spending more than you make? No, that's not true because when it comes to military spending, conservatives are more than willing to print a bunch more dead presidents to finance a war. The same goes for subsidies of industries and businesses (what we also refer to as "corporate welfare"). This has come at the expense of the average taxpayer - and more so from those who traditionally support GOP policies. Far more of the budget is spent on military spending (including veterans benefits, research and whatnot) than on any three "welfare" programs, but the way "rednecks" talk about it, all the government wants to do is tax and spend on "socialism".

Given all the things the right-wing does (outside of advancing repressive social programs), it's patently obvious that they are catering to the rich at the expense of the poor, but the poor vote for them anyhow.

Case in point: GWB's proposal to privatize Social Security.

I don't think anything gives the rich a hard-on more than thinking about all those tax dollars being invested in their companies instead of the insurance policy that is Social Security. But let's face it, had GWB's plan been implemented, most people's retirements would have been wiped out due to the proliferation of subprime mortgages in investment packages, causing those packages to tank.

The rich, of course, were never hurt by this. They only got richer.

Another case in point: The number of government subsidies going to Big Oil. These are supposedly to offset the costs of finding and developing new reserves of oil. But when a company is making hundreds of billions of dollars in PROFITS (not just revenue, but extra cash that hasn't been spent that year), investors and executives get paid off, but the tax payers get left holding the high gas prices and bill to subsidize the oil company's search for more of what made them rich to begin with.

Taxpayer money going to increase oil company profits while the average American gets financially hammered at the pumps.

Another case in point: The GOP's adamant refusal to extend gas mileage requirements on new vehicles. Way back when, the Auto Industry predicted bankruptcies and millions out of work - over seat belts. The same was predicted over air bags. The same was predicted for improved auto safety standards. None of these predictions materialized due to those improvements. But again, they're bleating to the GOP about improved gas standards cutting into profits and the government backtracked.

FYI: Improved gas mileage saves you money, and cuts down on the amount of gas sold, which means smaller profits for Big Oil, but more green in your pocket, and possibly, in your back yard, too.

EVERYTHING the GOP and political conservatives have done has benefited big business at the expense of the people. Even creating jobs hasn't been terribly beneficial because the GOP's job creation method has always been to start a war (In fairness, Johnson continued the Vietnam war to finance his Great Society, but he was from Texas, so he was a conservative liberal - if there is such a thing these days).

And despite all the evidence that the conservatives favor the good of business and the enrichment of the wealthy over the good of the people, the most desperate and least wealthy of the people in the country still vote for them.

I believe it has to do with a carefully crafted campaign to misdirect them into this behavior. And with this "class" of people, it's a fairly simple thing to do.

Now before I get anyone's patched long johns in a twist, I'm using the Jeff Foxworthy definition of a Redneck: A person with a glorious lack of sophistication. They are not bright, but they are steady. They aren't quick, but they are stubborn and reliable. They aren't well educated, but they make their own way. They come from a culture where a man's word is his bond and a handshake is as good as gold. There is much to admire from this culture. In many ways, it's the backbone of the country. They are the "salt of the earth" types, who are, sadly, easily misled due to that lack of sophistication.

This lack of sophistication translates into a very narrowly focused understanding of the world. They want things simple, traditional and the way "god intended things to be". This, in and of itself, is fine and dandy. But with a simple point of view of things, they are very easily manipulated.

A typical conservative candidate is against abortion, pro guns, against "gay marriage", is all for a strong military, against "socialism" or "welfare", in favor of low taxes and less government in your life. Some go further, but we're going to use a "middle of the road" conservative as an example.

The typical redneck believes in all of these. Some because it's part of his culture. Some because it's part of his religion. But the typical redneck doesn't want anything to do with helping the rich get richer unless the rich are working hard for the money and earn it the old-fashioned way. This is where conservatives are very quite about what they do when they're in power. And this is why conservatives are in power at all: Money.

The conservative fiscal policy makes the rich get richer at the expense of the poor. And it's a policy which perpetuates itself. For example, a strong military is a conservative cornerstone. But if there aren't a lot of poor, uneducated Americans willing to die for their country, there can't be those wars the military is being strong for.

So it becomes necessary to ensure a continuing supply of people so poor, their only way out of grinding poverty is the military. To do this the tax burden is shifted from those who can afford it (the wealthy) to those who can least afford it (the poor). Further, the tax dollars, rather than being used to help the poor with education or vocational training to find better jobs, are given to businesses which are already making substantial profits. This is allegedly done to stimulate job growth, but in effect only stimulates the bank accounts of the rich and the company's investors. No number of tax incentives or subsidies has stimulated a significant number of jobs. Even today, this variation on the thoroughly discredited "trickle down" hypothesis of economics is still believed by fairly bright people to work.

It doesn't. It never has. It never will.

The ways the GOP have shifted the wealth from the poor to the rich are insidious, varied and effective. They have effectively created a "pro business" mentality among their followers which worships the notion of the "Free Market" (Something I had a few words to say about not long ago). But this is a vital part of the strategy they've used. In a "Free Market" the theory is that anyone, through hard work alone, can become a rich person. This is the dream of most of our oppressed "rednecks". They believe that through hard work, a person will "make it". The day they "make it" is always next year, though. The whole system is stacked against them. The illusion keeps them going, but the reality is, none of them are going to get there.

Consider this: To be good in business you need native smarts or an education. Most people lack native smarts, so they need an education. This is the first step.

To get a good education, the average person needs good schools, good fortune and a lot of help from higher up on the food chain. Granted, there are success stories about ordinary people having a great idea nad getting rich because of it, but they're about as frequent as hen's teeth. For every success story, you have tens of millions of people left behind. The sad fact is, most Americans will barely scrape by their entire lives and few will ever elevate themselves beyond what they grew up with - if even that.

The GOP has systematically destroyed the education system, creating one so expensive and impractical, we are graduating fewer people who can actually think from high school than ever before. The GOP has used the mythology of creation as a corner stone in the dumbing-down of America. We used to graduate more Doctors and Engineers than we needed. Today, we have to import them. Why? Because the lessons science teaches - critical thinking, logical progression and rational thought - are being undermined by conservatives pushing for a religious agenda in our nation's schools. Texas tends to push harder than the rest because if the Texas school system (one of the largest in the nation) adopts a particular policy regarding the sciences (or any subject for that matter), text book publishers tend to only publish that one policy, leaving the other states to deal with the aftermath. Texas is a conservative state, its policy makers brainwashed by the powerful who cater to religious notions (because it serves their purposes of having a large number of expendable minions to serve and service the rich) in order to forward the goals of their masters, the wealthy.

But in even more direct ways, the conservatives have undermined education. They have cut funding, raised tuition, and created a public school system that is perpetually underfunded, understaffed, overworked and focused on bogus issues like "no child left behind" (an impractical, unfunded and useless policy which focuses on passing tests rather than learning a subject). The scholastic emphasis is misplaced resulting in graduates who can't grasp subject matter and focus on tests. And the atmosphere in schools has never tended to encourage thinkers in the first place.

Cut off the head and the body will die. The rich can always afford to educate themselves at private schools. The rest of us... Not so much. The brain drain has created a dumber, less capable, less insightful America who needs to bring in educated foreign workers to help raise the bar in innovation, industry and manufacturing.

But it doesn't stop there. Aside from destroying most American's ability to educate themselves (and earn a more respectable income) through dismantling the education system and making what is left almost prohibitively expensive, the GOP and their rich puppet masters have managed to be more direct in reducing the average American's options by taking money from them directly. Policies that favor businesses have been a staple of the GOP diet for decades. But only now are those policies paying off in the form of higher prices, lower wages and other impacts that cost Americans more than they realize.

Oil futures were (and still are) manipulated by the rich to ensure the price stays high. This means more money out of our pockets just to get to where we have to go. And that price has been inching higher over the last ten years - 300% higher from about $1.50 to (at times) nearly $5.00/gallon. It's expected to go higher than that. People in Europe pay more, but much of that is taxes.

Union busting has been embarked on in a big way these days, reducing the wages of workers. It also reduces their benefits, which leads them to a decreased financial ability to practice preventative health maintenance resulting in higher health care costs and increased poverty because of it.

Relaxed regulations for Big Pharma (and anything else "big" for that matter) result in skyrocketing prices for medications which, several years years later when the patents finally wear off, can be had for pennies. Pharma says they have to recoup their losses on research. Well, GOP leaders made sure the FDA streamlined approval of these drugs - many of which have been found to be hazardous to human health and life. Further, they allowed advertising of these hideously expensive drugs, and allowed big Pharma to bribe doctors into prescribing them unnecessarily. All of this reduces the money the average American needs in order to get the education, material and means necessary to better themselves.

Subsidies for companies engaged in "alternative fuel", which is neither "Green" or particularly efficient (ethanol) have cost the taxpayers billions, but what is worse is the impact switching from food to fuel production in agriculture had on food prices globally. The price of edible corn went up 400% in one year. This cascaded throughout the agriculture world, resulting in higher demand (and prices) for other foodstuffs like rice and wheat. The cost of bread alone went up 200%. And despite vast profits for big Agra, they still were subsidized with taxpayer money for doing this. We all paid more for our food, leaving us with less for other things.

Nickle, diming and dollaring us to death, our money went from our pockets, to the rich, in a barely noticed, but highly effective stream of shifting revenue unparalleled in world history.

But it's the poor who suffer the most from this - and rednecks aren't known as the most well-0ff class of people on the face of the planet.

Which means these poor sods, the redneck, is still stuck with the Army or poverty.

So why do these people continue to vote against their own best interests?

Because the conservatives have poisoned the well.

Simple people don't like anything different than themselves. They are often racist, intolerant, blindly faithful to family traditions and religions and are pretty much incapable of breaking out of that mold. But within this predisposition lies the handle one can grasp to manipulate them.

In manipulating a simple-minded culture, one must first create a scapegoat. In this case it's "liberals". Liberals have to be "the enemy". They are vilified, demonized and finally cast into a political purgatory no self-respecting redneck would ever want to visit. They are stereotyped as elitist intellectuals who don't know any better (at best). This creating the scapegoat is exactly the same thing Nazi Germany did to the Jews. Much of the impact of that scapegoating they did in the 1930's and 1940's remains today.

As long as there is an "enemy" upon which to focus their hate, these folks can be relentless. Not once will they stop to question things if they can be made to believe something is a certain way.

Next, one must cater to their culture by supporting those "traditionalist" beliefs in a socially proactive way. Promoting the banning of abortions, demanding a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, demanding that public buildings be used for religious purposes.

It's all a bunch of horseshit.

This is the distraction they use. The handle they have on the average "redneck". The smoke and mirrors the politicians pull on their followers. If they're asked a question about their support of a particular bill that gave billions of taxpayer dollars to Chevron, the crafty conservative politician will say, "I supported the rights of a baby by blocking Planned Parenthood funding when I was a state representative!". Or he could respond with, "I voted to increase military funding and saved 500 jobs!" Anything but a straight and honest answer to the question.

This is how they use their voters. They find some stupid, utterly meaningless social issue and blow it up out of proportion. "Gay marriage undermines the sanctity of marriage!" I don't know of a single straight marriage ruined or made weaker because a bunch of homosexuals want to have the same civil rights as them. There never has been. There never will be. It's a horseshit issue. The same for abortion. If you don't like abortion, don't get one. Beyond that, it's a horseshit issue. All of the conservative social agenda is for is to garner support among a people who love traditional values, and practice them. Making them a party platform is blatantly catering to them to get their vote. But with that vote comes the authority to strip them of their wealth and give it to the wealthy.

The wealthiest 20% of Americans control 85% of the country's wealth, earn 85% of the income and only pay 35% of the total taxes. The rest of us (80% of Americans) split the remaining 15% of the wealth and income available, but pay 65% of the taxes that are needed to run the country.

Now, I don't know about you, but to me, that doesn't seem like a fair and reasonable disposition of the tax burden in the country. The bottom 15% paying 65% of what it takes to run the country? And here's the kicker: The poorest 20% of Americans control 0.1% of the wealth and income and pay about 15% of the taxes.

All thanks to the misdirection and horseshit smoke and mirrors tactics the conservatives have played on them all these years. These poor slobs actually think these social programs are going to ever be put into effect despite their blatantly unconstitutional natures just because some candidate in the back pocket of some big corporation or conglomerate says they're going to do it. They say these things (and occasionally try to implement them) simply because to do otherwise would eventually be noticed and remarked upon by the rednecks who elected them.

Rednecks may be unsophisticated, but if you hit them over the head enough times with something, eventually you get their attention.

Unfortunately for the country, the damage has been done insofar as trying to bring these folks back into the political fold goes. In creating their horseshit smoke and mirrors tactics, the conservatives have managed to turn what are supposed to be (and were in the past) political issues into a religion. The faithful shall forever be voting more and more radically conservative while the rest of the "libturd", "libtard" heathens rot in their socialist hell. Or something like that. I was never very good at creating words to insult other people with. I figure the words we all already know are good enough for that.

The rednecks can now be called rednecks because they have served themselves up to be beheaded on the altar of corporate greed and the pursuit of political power, willingly sacrificing themselves on the battlefields chosen by the rich and powerful strictly to preserve the wealth and power of the rich and powerful having been tricked into believing it will make any difference or help the average American back home.

And despite mounting evidence of the detrimental nature of their relationship with and support of conservatives, there is no sign that they're going to wake up from their enchantment anytime soon. They are being beaten over the heads repeatedly, spilling their blood endlessly, almost never able to live better than their parents, believe the conservatives who say it's all the Liberals fault and keep voting for more of the same from their elected officials. Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result each time. In politics, it doesn't ever change if you vote for the same platforms over and over and over again. And yet, they expect things to get better for them each time.

And that's why Rednecks are so stupid.

Wake up, people. See what's happening. Whether intentional (which I think it is) or not, it is what is happening NOW. Conspiracy theories aside, this is what's going on and the GOP and conservative movements are all behind it. Cause and effect, whether intended or not, the GOP and conservatives are keeping you down and doing everything to keep you there. I'm not saying you need to vote for a bunch of incompetent liberals, but for your sake and the sake of this great nation, don't vote for conservatives who always say what you want to hear. The essence of politics is compromise. Absolutism is destroying us.

And you're helping them do it.

Passing the Constitutional Muster

I wrote earlier about the need to repeal the Second Amendment. Obviously, this will never happen. Common sense isn't and, as I've pointed out repeatedly, people are stupid.

So, let's examine the Second Amendment and see if we can accomplish the same goals (reducing the number of firearms-related deaths in the United States) but still pass constitutional muster.

"A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a Free State, the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

There are two parts to this: the justification and the prohibition. The justification says we need a well regulated militia. The prohibition is not infringing on the right to keep and bear arms. But as I've argued, without the former, you really can't justify the latter. We have no well regulated militia based on the right to keep and bear arms. We only have the right without justification.

Previously, I pointed out that this means the Second Amendment is obsolete (it is) and utterly unnecessary (also true) based on its justification. But in light of human stupidity, another justification for dealing with the propensity of people to use their lawfully acquired weapons to wreck havoc on their family, friends, neighbors, co-workers and loved ones, it behooves us to come up with a justification to "regulate" arms in such a way that the Second Amendment actually fulfills its purpose., and still fulfills the need to stop the slaughter.

Right now, a major threat to the security of the United States is the fact that any idiot can go out and buy or own a gun - and most do, resulting in 30,000 American deaths per year. That's a major threat to the security of the United States. The first part of the Second Amendment clearly says this is why we need well regulated militias.

So the big things here are fulfilling the mandate of the Second Amendment without necessarily regulating who can own a gun.

As I mentioned before, the Second Amendment arose due to a lack of funding in the nascent United States Government to support a standing army capable of defending itself. Obviously, we've come a long way from that point and militias aren't strictly necessary to defend the United States. However, although they aren't necessary, they are mandated by the Second Amendment.

After all, it clearly says that a well regulated militia is necessary to the security of a Free State.

And our militias aren't exactly well regulated nor do any of them have anything to do with the U.S. government. We have a National Guard (the modern equivalent of the Militia), but at the same time, they don't need the RIGHT to keep and bear arms outside of their duties as National Guardsmen. They have the obligation to do so while on duty as directed by their commanding officers.

So, it comes down to cases of actually adhering to the reason we have the Second Amendment: Maintaining well regulated militias. The implication is that these militias will be armed by the personal arms of its members.

The biggest problem with gun ownership is idiocy and a lack of training and responsibility.

So let's bring back militias.

Simply put, militias were required to drill and train to defend the country. It was expected of every man (women weren't given the vote till the 1920's, after all) to fulfill their obligation by being responsible, training and being disciplined by the training in their local militia. Obviously, we don't need a bunch of "citizen soldiers" acting as local militias, but according to the Second Amendment, it CAN be made compulsory for all gun owners to drill and train become well regulated.

After all, that well regulated militia is necessary to the security of a Free State, according to the Second Amendment.

But given the more modern context, these "militias" aren't really needed for defending the United States (as they once were). However, they ARE necessary to the security of our country, since ignorant, stupid, untrained, mentally unbalanced and utterly unfit people are allowed to go out and buy guns with no obligation to fulfilling the reason for the Second Amendment. There is no constitutional barrier to creating and enforcing a requirement to fulfill the first part of the Second Amendment: To create well regulated militias.

This doesn't mean arming "citizen soldiers". It means teaching these idiots how to properly use their guns - and repeating this training based on proficiency and elapsed time. One must train more than once in order to maintain and prove proficiency in the proper care and feeding of a firearm. It also makes it compulsory if you own a firearm.

Your right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. But if you own one, you will be REQUIRED to attend monthly sessions in training, use, practice, etc. You won't lose your gun if you don't. You'll simply go to jail, become a felon and by long established law, you can't own a gun if you are a felon.

Problem solved. Constitutionality is maintained and gun owners either stay good militia members, give up their guns or go to jail and lose the right to own or carry them forever.

Personally, I like this option the most.

Safety Last

There is a trend lately - whether in the world or in the U.S. or both - to demand that the government make us "safe".

"There ought to be a law!" is the battle cry of the folks who seem intent on swaddling the public in legal and regulatory cotton so that nothing harms them. Now, I'm not talking about product safety wherein blatant negligence results in injury or death. We need to have products, food and drugs that contain what the label says without necessarily killing or hurting anyone in the normal use/consumption of said product. There's nothing wrong with insisting on an acceptable level of product safety. But what is acceptable?

This is where the line between reason and insane becomes blurred. To some, acceptable risk is bungee jumping with moth-eaten elastic. To others, they have to weigh the risks between holding one's breath and breathing. But this is on an individual level. People deciding for themselves what their acceptable levels of risk is. This is all well and good. People shoud decide for themselves how much risk they want in their lives. If it kills them (hopefully, BEFORE they procreate), their bad risk assessment abilities aren't passed on to the next generation, or they serve as a good example of how not to do things for the more risk assessment aware. If it stops people from doing anything productive at all, then they do nothing to endanger anyone else and life goes on without them (because eventually, there's too much risk involved in procreation, they stop procreating and die out).

It's a win-win for Darwin and the Human Race.

But somewhere between the two extremes, we have the government. Swaying between aggressive self preservation and avoiding preservation at all costs, what we end up with is a mash-up of utter indifference and over-zealous protectiveness in the form of laws, regulations, procedures and rules that are glaring in their extremes.

When it comes to business, we have regulations that often are at odds with what is in the best interests of the people - regulations and rules that hold the environment and the health of people in what is arguably utter contempt. On the other end, we have laws and regulations that invade the individual person's dignity and person for the sake of "safety".

It is to the latter that that this posting is addressed. There are a myriad of examples of government-mandated safety regulations. From the seat belt to clean water standards, these regulations help keep us safe in a very real manner. They prevent frequent injury, illness and/or death. But some safety regulations go a bit overboard. These are the kind of things you find at public events: Security screenings for hidden weapons or explosives.

Now, I'm not opposed to these, in general. After all, SOMEONE has to get money for all that high-tech security screening gear people are inventing. But when these screenings are both invasive and utterly ineffective, the overboard-ness of the things becomes glaringly apparent. Take, for example, the TSA's latest brain fart: Virtual strip searches and/or public sexual groping.

For people who are unfortunate enough to be forced to endure the "ham in the can" experience of modern aviation, the indignity of air travel today begins at the security gate. There, they will find a vast assortment of advisory notices telling passengers what they can't bring with them. This list includes the usual things like weapons, pocket knives and other things that have obvious weapons potential. It also includes things like nail clippers (Apparently, the victims of the deadly nail clipper attack dies laughing that some schmuck tried to hijack a plane with them) but, curiously, fails to include pens and pencils as well as car and house keys - all of which are taught in most personal self defense classes to be used as weapons.

One wonders what the hell they're thinking there.

Another thing they are told is the amount of liquids they are allowed to bring on the plane in a carry-on. The maximum, I believe, is 3 ounces per item. This is because it is believed that this amount is insufficient to mix with anything else to create a bomb. This belief is, of course, an utter fallacy, but if the TSA doesn't come up with something new to irritate air travelers every year, people might think they're not doing their jobs.

Once at the actual security station, the by now impatient at the two hour long wait passengers are required to surrender their footwear right off the bat. Most people will then be sent through a metal detector, have their carry-ons x-rayed and, dignity pretty much shot, will move into the canning - or rather boarding - process.

The removal of shoes is because one person, one time, attempted but failed, to ignite a small amount of explosives in his shoe. Whoever decided that three ounces was an insufficient amount of liquid to ignite and do any damage should have checked the shoes of this guy since he carried around three ounces of explosives in each one, but, hey, I'm just a blogger who can read. It would appear that the TSA is contradicting itself, either that or they only really object to people blowing up planes with shoe-bombs but not with OTHER cleverly concealed 3 ounce plastic explosives.

The wonders of modern security never ceases to amaze me.

But despite these, thus far utterly useless, endeavors, we have the most brain-dead, bone-headed, nightmare of security procedures: The Scan and Grope.

This entails a randomly selected victim being singled out of the line to undergo "enhanced security screening" procedures. The poor schmuck is forced to stand in a booth, arms over their head as if in surrender while being irradiated in such a way that the return signal displays what is essentially their naked body to someone in another room. Never mind that radiation exposure and damage is cumulative over a lifetime. Never mind that some people have religious nudity taboos. Never mind that not one of these people - not one - has ever concealed anything of consequence.

Never mind that this device will not show anything concealed inside the human body where considerably more than three ounces of explosives (along with the necessary equipment to set it off) can be concealed. The long and short of it is that this personal-privacy-intrusive scan can not detect what it is designed to detect even if that something is NOT inside someone.

But the ultimate indignity is what happens if you refuse the scan: You are sexually molested.

That's right. In public, in front of several hundred silently consenting witnesses, a stranger grabs you by your private parts, checking for hidden explosives.

Please note, all of this is because one person - once - tried, but failed, to set off a bomb concealed in his underwear.

The horror stories of abuses and indignities - from the cancer survivor who was forced, in public, to show the agent her breast prosthesis to the ostomy patient whose urostomy bag was ripped off in the course of the search and was subsequently forced to sit on an airplane in his own urine - are legion. It is patently obvious that this latest assault on our privacy is neither popular or warranted. The truly sad part is that the underwear bomber would most likely have passed both visual and manual inspection.

Now, I do happen to know a little bit about the constitutionality of security at airports and to what standard it is applied. It is required that the security not be overly intrusive (without probable cause, that is) and that it be effective. This is based on past decisions handed down by the Supreme Court over the years to various things the TSA has implemented. X-rayed luggage, metal detectors and even removed footwear are fine, it seems. They, at least, have some reasonable chance of detecting what they are designed to detect and so, even if it's undignified, that part's constitutional.

Unfortunately, the enhanced security screening procedures - both the scanner and the groping - are acknowledged by security specialists around the world to be ineffective at detecting an "underwear bomb". That is precisely what they are SUPPOSED to detect. Of course, the TSA vehemently denies this, but can you really trust an agency that can get its porn for free through a high-tech peep-show of hundreds of people a day to have the best interests of the flying public at heart?

In all seriousness, the new security screening procedures are so unconstitutional as to be a government sanctioned sexual assault every time someone is groped or scanned. The litmus test for the constitutionality of these enhanced screenings came back blatantly against it, but the TSA soldiers on, groping and sexually violating passenger after passenger at dozens of major airports around the country on nearly a minute to minute basis.

This is how the government has opted to keep us SAFE? By utilizing procedures and technology that don't work?

It would seem so.

I know I've said that people are stupid. I stand by that. Point in evidence: A general lack of rioting in the streets (or at least at airports) over these new procedures. They are an affront to the personal dignity and privacy of the average American air traveler, but aside from several vocal people, the vast majority of them just take it in stride, never realizing the magnitude of liberty and freedom - not to mention privacy - they, with their silent consent, have lost.

And so, in the interests of safety, the people of the U.S. continue to be violated in their person and privacy in a process that guarantees nothing but embarrassment, thus proving Franklin's adage, that those who would give up a little freedom for a little security deserve neither and lose both.

Media Mischief Un-Managed

In case no one's noticed, this blog isn't "monetized". I don't make a thing from it. I'm not blogging here to make money. (Edit added 9/26/2011: Okay, I added AdSense as of today. I don't endorse, sponsor or promote any ads here. Do with them (or not) as you will. The point is, I'm not "bought" by anyone. But I made my Significant Other happy by at least trying to make my time and efforts here pay something - even if I make nothing. As I said, I'm not blogging here to make money. If I do, it's a happy by-product and nothing more.)

(Edited added 02/24/2012: Okay, I have moved the blog to my new persona, and no longer have AdSense, as that requires me to use my real name, so I am no longer monetized on this blog.  Funny how that works, huh?  At least I'm back to staying true to the message, without any financial compensation for it (sigh). )

What I have here is an editorial blog. It's designed to convince, sway, influence and inform - probably in that order. I have my ups and downs and make no apologies for them (unless, of course, I apologize). I update things as situations evolve and become clearer (at least to me), but I make no bones about why I do this. There is no deliberate deception. I have no hidden agendas.

Believe it or not, this makes what I say far more reliable than what passes for news these days from the major media outlets in the United States. Fox, CBS, ABC, NBC, the AP, INS, and most of the other news organizations have two handicaps I don't have:

1. They have to cater to a consuming public
2. They have to sell advertising to make money.

Now, this wouldn't seem to be much of a handicap on the surface of it. After all, all businesses need and want to make money. This is well and good. However the business we're talking about here is the NEWS, and that's where the whole "businesses making money" part goes badly wrong. In the pursuit of staying in business, the news is no longer the news. It becomes entertainment.

Again, news can be presented in an entertaining fashion, but it's not what's happening. The news is secondary to the entertainment. It's a by-product. I've seem headlines and news teasers that were the equivalent of saying, "Deadly plague sweeping the planet!!!!", but the story is about the latest round of flu shots being available and lasts less time than the teasers took to air. The news is no longer a place to go to get the facts of the day. It's a place to go to become flooded with sensationalistic hype, leaving you as terrified, sweaty and exhausted as you'd be if you were fleeing a pack of rabid weasels.

But even if you overlooked the sensationalism, we get to the fact that the news isn't just news. It's a perspective. In the pursuit of sensationalism, the news becomes (intentionally and unintentionally) increasingly biased. I wrote a post about this back in 2008. It was how biased blogs were being passed off as "news". The problem, as I expected, got worse. Now it seems that news and bias go hand in hand. News was less important than getting the point across as to how one should feel about that news. What's worse, there is a general blindness on the part of the public and the media to accept that their US news sources are ALL blatantly biased these days.

Fox News is so right-wing, viewers having the stomach to watch it should be rewarded with free memberships to the KKK, NRA and RNC. MSNBC is so left-wing, it should require its viewers to be card carrying members of PETA, Greenpeace and Earth First!. The rest (From the Drudge Report on the right to the San Francisco Chronicle on the left) are so biased that news takes a back seat to trying to convince people that they must believe a certain way about what the stories cover. And this all ties in to sensationalism and the need to make money on the part of these news organizations. Sensationalism sells. Playing it up, slanting it this way or that, making even the mundane sound earth-shaking (or at least implying it's earth-shaking) is what the news is all about these days.

The problem is now endemic in the US and I don't see that it's going to get any better. No news organization that I've found in the US is unbiased. This wouldn't be much of a problem if people didn't stick to one news organization from which they get their information. But they do. And often times, these news organizations try to play on the fears people have that their news might be biased. Fox's "Fair and Balanced" bullshit is a great example. I could say the sun is simply a very large heat lamp plugged into a socket in Soho. But just saying it doesn't make it true. Fox News is as blatantly rightist as MSNBC is blatantly leftist. Only MSNBC admits its bias from time to time.

The only way to deal with the flood of opinionated stories is to hear a lot of them, find what facts are involved and glean the truth of the matter from the sensationalism. It's more work, of course, and I'm sure, given the inherent stupidity of mankind, most people won't do it. But most people are sheep. They want the sensationalism. It's entertaining to them. They can then feel justified in their ignorance of reality because their biased news organization has told them the things they want to hear because it fits their belief system.

This isn't news. It's religion.

Whatever ethical motives our once-great news organizations had in the past to present the who, what, when, where, how and (maybe) why has gone the way of the wind-up watch and Walter Cronkite. We no longer have serious men (and women) giving us the news in a straight-forward manner. We are being "entertained", suckered in by sensationalism, and fed a diet of bias that has helped polarize the country. This is all done to ensure a constant stream of news consumers who will see the advertising and buy the advertiser's products so the advertisers continue to sponsor the Evening Bias Hour.

The fact is, no US news organization has a lock on the news as fact. They will dress it up until even the victims of the event couldn't recognize it and present it, freshly spun in the direction the organization's bias leans. So if you want the REAL news, read between the lines. Ignore the adjectives. Focus on the facts. Better yet, read the news from overseas - especially from countries which are unfriendly toward the US. You already know the news is biased, and can find the facts a bit easier to decipher with that presumption. Above all, DO NOT USE JUST ONE SOURCE FOR YOUR NEWS and ALWAYS KEEP IN MIND whatever you do read, view and/or hear IS BIASED.

If you're ever interested in finding out the real truth out there, this is what you have to do these days. Otherwise, please unplug your mind completely because whatever reality you will be living in will be controlled by the news organization you choose to believe.

A Time-Out for Time-Outs

As usual, this idea is controversial, especially if you believe in the New Age idea of molly-coddling children. If you have a mass-produced bumper sticker on the back of your car that lauds your child's completely irrelevant and minor scholastic achievements, and you read this, you will probably think I'm utterly barbaric. You're probably right, but then, that's the whole reason for this post.

Here's the reason for the post: I DO believe in child abuse.

Let me rephrase that so the politically correct types can stop hyperventilating in preparation for an apoplectic fit of yuppie rage.

I believe that the responsible application of corporal punishment on children for offenses which merit criminal punishment in adults is both a more effective and more suitable deterrent to the possibility of re-offending than the current method of punishment of using "time outs" and the restriction of other privileges.

Lying, cheating, stealing, fighting, public disturbances, talking back; all of these are offenses at some place for an adult for which a civil or criminal penalty is imposed. Most kids these days will get a "time out" for them. Most kids will then re-offend and do the same thing. If, as an adult, you're getting back-talk from a five year old, something is wrong with this picture.

Let's look at child-rearing, then and now, and explode a few myths along the way. This might help put things in proper perspective.

Back when I was growing up (a time somewhat after the last Ice Age, before the Computer Age, when Leave It To Beaver, Gilligan's Island and Star Trek - the one with William Shatner as captain of the Enterprise - weren't in reruns), kids played outside with toys that sparked imagination. The term "helicopter parenting" wouldn't appear for at least four decades and a Bush was household shrubbery. No one talked much about the latest kidnapping, rape and murder of children (though, actually, it happened more often then than now). No one had GPS and cell phones to keep track of their little darlings. School officials were allowed to beat the living crap out of you if you got out of line. (okay, okay, they could spank you - but if you saw my Assistant Principle you knew that if he were to spank you, your odds of survival were the same as those of the proverbial snowball in Hell). While some places had kids acting out, for the most part, schools were gun-free, knife-free and generally well ordered. Crime, for my generation, started a decline. The criminals were people who were either over-the-top abused or were never spanked.

Then we enter into the age of the Time Out.

Now we have children in gangs (lots more gang activity today than back then). We have a new way of teaching everyone that everyone wins in school, when in real life, practically no one wins and no one gets out alive. If someone acts out, they get a "time out" which is a period of not too unpleasant boredom to "think about what they did". What they actually think about is how not to get caught the next time. Corporal punishment was removed from schools and as a result, metal detectors and police were installed in its place. But with the plethora of entertainment devices a child has today, even if they're sent to their rooms, it's not like that's all that much of a punishment. Sitting them in a corner is no more effective than being bored on a Sunday afternoon.

You see, my generation didn't enjoy getting the crap beaten out of us (well, that's how we thought of it at least). We were thinking way too short-term. We felt the pain and thought to ourselves, "Isn't there a better, more enlightened way to direct a child's behavior than by inflicting pain?" We vowed never to beat our kids because we were beaten. But we never really thought about the consequences of our beatings on our behaviors. For the most part, we grew up to be fine examples of modern society. We may have thought of it as having done it in spite of the way punishment was meted out to us. Few ever stopped to consider the probability it was BECAUSE of the punishment meted out to us.

Yes, it was unpleasant, but it was memorable. VERY memorable. And in that is the key to punishment. Is a "time out" memorable? Let's put it this way, if you were ever standing around on a Sunday afternoon, say around three fifteen in the afternoon between games on TV and after mowing the lawn, with nothing to do, you're experiencing the exact same thing as some kid who is sitting in a time-out. I know I can think of a time or two when I was bored, but what kind of an impact does that make on my desire or willingness to break a law (or rule, transgression, etc)?

Pretty much none. It wasn't memorable. It was boring, yes, but it wasn't a trial of any kind. There was no lasting impression made from a time-out.

But a paddling?

Talk to anyone with gray hair. Almost universally, they'll remember being paddled, spanked or in some other way physically touched in order to inflict a mild to moderate amount of pain with no permanent physical harm. And if done right, it will be not only memorable, but effective as well.

This segues nicely into the fact that getting spanked has a right way and a wrong way. The wrong way is to haul off and beat the crap out of a kid the instant the transgression happens. Yes, it's viscerally satisfying on a deep, emotional level to strike at the source of one's irritation, but a civilized society usually refrains from such indulgences. The best way to beat the crap out of a kid so that it is a lesson that is memorable and effective (preferably without requiring a doctor's visit or hospitalization) as opposed to abuse is to be calm, be timely, be consistent, have rules and explain what's happening, when and why.

So, step 1. Rules.

A child can't know when they've broken rules unless they know the rules ahead of time. Ignorance of the rule is no excuse. So a wise parent will have rules and, just as importantly, punishments for breaking those rules. Make sure there's a "when in doubt" rule to cover all bases.

Now that the boundaries are laid, crossing them should always require a parental review. Was it justified? If so, the boundaries have to be moved. If not, it was a violation and punishment is required. That's the consistency part. Look over the transgression. Yes, kids will be kids. I really do get that. But kids need to learn the limits and what better way than to put an electric fence on it - make them stop, look, be very careful if they're going to cross that line and understand that if they screw up, they get zapped. Be consistent in applying the rules and don't be secretive about them.

Next, make punishment a BIG THING. A fast slap on the butt in the marketplace (aside from probably drawing the attention of Child Protection Services) isn't going to leave much of an impression on the child (no pun intended). But if you discover a transgression, treat it as if they're an adult. Depending on the severity of the transgression, place them under "arrest" with restrictions on toys, activities, privileges, etc. Sit them down in a trial. Tell them what they did wrong, why it was wrong, let them argue their case and show them the error of their ways. Then pronounce sentence. Let them think about THAT for a bit. Finally, commence with the bea..., er, spanking, in a calm, measured, dispassionate way. Do not tell them that it hurts you more than it hurts them. They won't believe you. Do not sympathize with them. The lesson won't be learned properly.

When it's over, don't hold grudges.

The point here is that if a punishment isn't memorable, what's to stop a kid from doing it again and again? If there's too much punishment, it becomes difficult for a child to know what's right and wrong. Not every transgression merits a spanking, of course. Every child is different, as well, so one must know whether physical pain, administered in a measured, controlled fashion will be the most effective deterrent to that child's case of bad behavior.

And if you don't have the kind of time to do this, you should give your kids up for adoption. They need parents, not playmates.

Now, as much as I believe in child abuse for kids, I believe even stronger that such punishments should extend to adults. Only with adults instead of safely tucking it away behind prison walls where only whispered stories of various levels of truth leak out from time to time in specials designed to show how awful it is in them, we need to be public, open and visually brutal.

Adults aren't children. They generally don't live to please an authority figure. They have a greater ability to rationalize away criminal behaviors. Adults are capable of a level of brutality far exceeding that of children. Meeting this brutality with a controlled brutality is the only way to mete out a punishment of sufficient intensity to be memorable in such a way that one would NOT wish to experience it again. I think public floggings for relatively minor offenses which would normally merit a jail sentence should be the norm. The number of strokes would depend on the offense. It should be administered by a machine (for the sake of consistency and safety) which is physically constrained from exceeding a safe "per-stroke" level of force. A medic should be on hand to ensure that no permanent damage is done (aside from the potential of scarring unless a scar-free way of flogging someone can be found).

Why flogging? Because it's visual, visceral and brutal. It's MEMORABLE, both for those who undergo it and those who witness it. And it's not an experience one would wish to repeat.

While we're on the subject, I'm NOT an advocate of the Death Penalty. Yes, it gets rid of unwanted vermin, but sometimes they throw out the baby with the trash - innocent people HAVE been executed in the US. That's very bad juju. Instead, I advocate a "Prison TV" channel for people who would otherwise have been executed. Every prison should have their own station, which the viewer can access and control, to watch what happens to a lifer in a prison. No privacy. No escape. Public humiliation. It's been proven that the death penalty isn't a deterrent. But maybe something like this will satisfy society's desire for vengeance.

One thing for sure: It's memorable.

The fact is, the criminals of today's society need a good spanking. If it's memorable enough, painful enough and embarrassing enough, it may have more of an impact than the way we punish criminals today.

Okay, the yuppie, new-age, easily bruised sensibilities people can now go and have some white Zin and tofu cakes and get on with your lives. Keep repeating to yourselves, "It's only a blog... It's only a blog... It's only a blog..."

Definition of morality - 11/23/2004

For those of you who have no clue (and there seems to be a lot) morality is defined as an 'an individual's behavioral limits'.

We live in a society where people are constantly blaming others for their behaviors. I don't know if it started with the infamous 'twinkie defense', but people are constantly saying that they're victims of something instead of standing up and addressing their own behavioral code violations for what they are - a lack of control over themselves.

Attempting to foist off one's personal code of behavior onto another is morally wrong. Society needs to get along. Since it is made up of many individuals, the normal behavioral limits of a group is called ethics. Legislating morality - reducing personal behavioral freedoms of all which previously had not been a crime or had been widely tolerated by a particular society - DOES NOT WORK. It was tried in the 1920's with Prohibition.

An emphasis should be placed on personal responsibility rather than trying to get everyone to goose-step to the same moralistic drum. The typical knee-jerk reaction of the ignorant is to get state and federal legislatures to outlaw all sorts of previously legal behaviors about which they object, citing 'bad examples' as an excuse.

It wouldn't be so bad if those who advocate imposing strict moral behavior by law on the society at large were perfect at maintaining their own moral code. But they don't and the end result of forcing one morality on us all is to make criminals out of innocent people. The price of freedom in this country is tolerance of others. Seems to me that many religions preach this. The trouble is that religions force an impossible morality on people and basing the morality one wishes to force upon a public body on those impossible standards is unrealistic.

Why do I say it's an impossible morality? Simple. Only a very, very few can ever keep it fully and wholly for the duration of their lives. The rest of us would rather live happier lives.

Personal responsibility - deciding what you watch, what you read and what you do and taking the credit or blame for the consequences thereof - is the key. You can't decide what I do, or say, or think. You are not me. I accept the credit or the blame for what I do instead of pointing to a twinkie and saying the surgar made me do it. Or the devil. Or society. Or my neighbor. Or affirmative action. Or male domination. Or whatever excuse seems to be handy.

If more people did this simple thing, we wouldn't be having this talk about morality. And I will fight against any attempt to force a morality onto society by act of law. The United States was founded by a group of people escaping persecution for their moral behavior (look it up if you don't believe me). The pendulum swings the other way now so that the few (and there are fewer of you than you think) who believe they are morally superior (in itself a morally unstable position) will tell those they think are immoral how to act and thus destroy the very thing that makes the United States strong.

Finally, let's look at some recent history. Tell me, how does what we are hearing from our self-appointed 'morals police' differ from what the Taliban advocated in Afghanistan? Different religion, same refrain. I see no moral difference.

I guess that makes those who advocate changes in behavioral law morally no different than those whom they called terrorists. Thus the United States will complete its hypocrisy by adopting a system of law which places religious repression upon its society.

How does the line go? I have seen the Enemy, and we are him.