“All forms of tampering with human beings, getting at them, shaping them against their will to your own pattern, all thought control and conditioning is, therefore, a denial of that in men which makes them men and their values ultimate.” — Isaiah Berlin
“We must create out of the younger generation a generation of Communists. We must turn children, who can be shaped like wax, into real, good Communists. … We must remove the children from the crude influence of their families. We must take them over and, to speak frankly, nationalize them. From the first days of their lives they will be under the healthy influence of Communist children’s nurseries and schools. There they will grow up to be real Communists.” —Communist Party Education Congress
“Any power must be an enemy of mankind which enslaves the individual by power and by force, whether it arises under the Fascist or the Communist flag. All that is valuable in human society depends upon the opportunity for development accorded to the individual.”—Albert Einstein
“Man exists for his own sake and not to add a laborer to the State.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson
Last year, I was surprised to read about Chicago Public Schools banning students from bringing lunches and snacks from home. The rationale was typical. “Educators” were alarmed that when students had a choice, their choice didn’t include broccoli and whole wheat pizza with goat cheese and tofu, and like good little tyrants, substituted their judgement for that of the parents and their children. Now in a school where the kids MUST eat what the school provides, the opportunities for graft and corruption become endless, so it wasn’t entirely surprising that this is “the Chicago Way”. In an era when the First Lady has made it her mission to cajole and browbeat various restaurant chains into removing french fries from children’s menus, and lecturing every one else how to eat, while enjoying a burger and fries, it was inevitable that other localities would ignore the disconnect of a society that doesn’t want any government in their bedrooms and see nothing wrong with putting that same government in your kids’ lunch boxes.
Which is why the only part about this story that is surprising is why parents let it happen in the first place. The only bright spot in this story is that this wasn’t an act of federal overreach. The bad part is that states should know better. In an era of unfunded mandates and huge state budget deficits for many of the states, a smart person might ask themself “Does it make sense to usurp parental authority, and hire new state employees to be nosy busybodies?” In truth, I wouldn’t be surprised if this was funded by some sort of federal grant, but the principle remains the same: The state has absolutely no business assuming my duties as a parent, regardless of their motive. This is not the intervention necessary to prevent an immediate imminent harm; this is deciding for the parent what their child will eat. And while I’ve read some arguments that attempt to make this kind of base encroachment on parental authority akin to the same thing as an immediate imminent harm, you may now color me unimpressed, because if it is all about fostering healthy habits and taking care of one’s body, then there is no reason to market sex and contraceptives to older children, who may be physically mature enough for sex, but who are still children who don’t need to be encouraged to engage in risky behavior which is only made marginally less risky if they are “responsible”, and who are often not prepared for the emotional effects that sexual activity can have on them either.
The nannyism that pervades certain parts of government today is an affront to humanity. The only possible compelling reason the state would have to substitute its judgment for your own, such as in this example, is that you are either too stupid to do it correctly yourself, or that you simply cannot be trusted to make the right decisions. Neither option is flattering, and both would lead to subsequent queries about why we are allowed to do so many other things without such flagrant interference. This only underscores the real reason for such intrusion: power (and the wealth to be made in exercising it). For quite sometime now, government has been engaged in the act of saving us from ourselves, not out of any altruistic motive, but because its natural inclination is towards tyrannies, large and small, and it was long ago revealed that intrusion on individual sovereignty was much easier to sell if it was packaged as something “good” for us. Whether it has been a damnation of safety nazi laws and regulations, or benignly offering a pecuniary incentive to do something government’s way until it becomes a habit, or until it has built up a bureaucracy with the motive and determination to defend its financial turf, the beast keeps growing, just like the dependence on government that it was intended to foster. It isn’t an accident, and it is now accelerating.
What? Those petty tyrants know better for us all than what we our selves know..? Say it isn’t so! (Sarcasm for the intellectually challenged)
This is the state of political correctness that we find ourselves in. Mostly because so many have become lazy. Too lazy for personal accountability and responsibility.
We allow others to decide what is right and wrong without any input at all. No resistance whatsoever… We allow ourselves to be led by the nose in all things. Least we be considered not to be law abiding, and therefore socially acceptable citizens. We allow those same people to raise our very progeny and then wonder why children are without any sense of morality or conscience.
We allow those with a bent for authoritarianism to decide that things such as the taking of an inalienable right is not a punishment but simply a change in status. We allow those same people to force utilitarianism upon us and take hard earned private property from us so that the government can take in more tax revenue. We allow the government to force their moral codes on us while at the same time deciding that our own sense of more’s simply do not count. The list goes on…
And we sit on our butts and elect the very same people or don’t vote ate all.
Oh yes, the nanny state is the exclusive venue of Democrats isn’t it? Take a look at Arizona where a State law has been drafted and advocated by Republicans in such nutty language that folks cannot cuss in their own homes.
At the core of the legislation is book banning based on profanity.
I’d submit BiW that given the option, government, Dem and GOP, tend to overreach. So rather than wag your finger at the First Lady, take a good look around and try some bipartisan finger wagging.
And if it was so poorly written, it won’t stand…the First Amendment will apply to their private activities, and you know it, so quit being a jackass.
And yet the FLOTUS feels perfectly entitled to waive her finger at parents about what my children eat, emboldening other busybodies to make my children’s food their business. I fingered her, because she is very visibly wagging her finger AT ME.
Very true. So why are you invariably in the camp of more and more government overreach? It’s you that fought every step of the way to impose national health care. It’s you that has bought off on the idea of government being the arbiter of conscience. It’s you personally invested in $17,000 of debt per man, woman and child under the Obama Administration as sound economic policy.
It would seem to me either you are confused concerning your logic of your conclusion, or being intellectually dishonest in your statement above.
If you were a Ron Paul fan, I might understand your statement about government overreach of both camps. But you’re solidly in the camp of the biggest overreach in the history of the Republic.
For the record Tex, I do blame both party’s. However I find more fault in we the people for allowing these rubes to do all this to us. No, I am in no way siding with Rutherford. I am a Libertarian with a serious Conservative bent. In other words a Philosophical Libertarian. The kind that Reagan spoke of. Not a Ron Paul whacko…
We have, and seemingly everyday are allowing our Constitutional Republic to deteriorate into into a modern sort of despotism called direct democracy, or, mob rule.
Oh, I’m with you Patrick. I think. We would have to discuss further to confirm. As it is, I’m of the opinion we are already operating under a form of mob rule, and most don’t recognize it.
Government is a necessary evil, that in its purest, freest, capitalistic form should be kept to a bear minimum – that includes the state and local levels as well. I would call myself a Conservative Christian, but Philosophical Libertarian will do.
And I believe that is the way the Founders saw government too – that the wishes of the people prevail. I’m not Constitutional expert like BIC. I enjoy his posts for no other reason, they are one of the few I actually learn something important while reading. But gut instinct of observation tells me we are venturing far, far away from the original intent, and in fact repeating the same mistakes England did hundreds of years ago.
The point is this. Barack Obama is dangerous and grossly inept. If the American public is stupid enough, in conjunction with a rank propaganda arm called MSM, to be duped once again to vote for this pathetic and evil man for four more years, then it deserves everything it is going to get in spades. And I guarantee you whether Obama the President in residence or not, his legacy will lead to ruin. I have no intentions of going down with the sinking ship, nor going quietly while doing so. I will do what is necessary for me and my family to get off his ship, even if it means doing what I thought unthinkable ten years ago – getting out and letting Rome burn.
But Obama really is a symptom of a much bigger problem. The problem is the large number of apathetic, uninformed, amoral, ignorant, and lazy citizens of this country. I condemn Rutherford. History is replete with examples of his mindset leading to disaster. But I give him this – he’s involved and active. He fights for what he believes. I don’t believe Obama’s opponents, though more competent, understand much better. I (and millions like me) don’t want more promises of “good” government intervention. We don’t need the same level of different government. What I want are assurances that they will begin to constrain the beast that is consuming us.
Patrick isn’t this an oxymoron? A despot is a dictator. Direct democracy is each individual participating in government. Were you just shooting for a nice rhetorical flourish or was there a deeper meaning there that I missed?
The notion that we won WWII and came away the victors is really just a notion. The history we read in our school texts records it that way. The communist goals to destroy our nation from within have prevailed, however, though publicly the threat was dissolved.
And we allowed it to happen. We were fast pursuing the American Dream, consuming the good life, without realizing the constant sinister undermining of our nation’s moral foundation.
Many of the stated goals have come to pass, regardless of which party was/is in power.
http://www.rense.com/general32/americ.htm
Actually the basis of the AZ bill is to specifically meant to prevent teachers from swearing in front of students in CLASS/SCHOOL settings. It doesn’t include speech directly tied to lesson plans/subject matter.
The bill seems to want to get around tenure in a way regards being able to discipline and ultimately remove teachers from the schools.
Most of the legitimate stuff I’ve seen on this indicates it is indeed an overreach,silliness kind of thing and that it won’t find its way to brewers desk.
Yet another case of partisan theatrical hysterics. Granted that is a bipartisan thing but for crying out loud.
Next time a lib explains to you how Obama deserves reelection, it really is as simple as just passing them this link as reminder that they are suffering from a severe form of dementia…
Tex, you show your charts, I show mine.
Good job, Rutherford. Glad to see you can construct the most elementary chart I’ve witnessed in some time.
————-
Except you left out the first seven years of Bush’s employment numbers and your chart is mathematically impossible – in fact, it’s a bald faced lie. But that has become typical of you anymore, as you’ve grown more desperate in Obama’s fiscally disastrous reign.
If a market is contracting, and it clearly is, you’re chart is not counting the net – people who have left the market. And that far exceeds anything Obama has added to the fudged numbers. Even the Washington Post has admitted as much, so you can stop with the baloney.
If Mitt Romney can’t point out that simple fact of market contraction, then we deserve as a country to go down the tubes with Obama – and we are well on our way.
Democrats said their costly plan ($1.2 trillion, including interest) would “save or create” up to 4 million jobs and bring the unemployment rate down to about 6% today. The unemployment rate has not fallen below 8% at any point in the last 36 months. Furthermore, the official unemployment rate does not actually count unemployed people who have given up looking for work.
The above chart shows the “labor force participation rate.” This statistic represents the share of working-age Americans who are either employed or unemployed but looking for work. It is not a pretty picture. Only 63.7% of working-age Americans are currently in the workforce – the lowest in almost 29 years.
To put it another way, 36.3% of working-age Americans do not have a job and are not even looking.
Food stamp President.
Patrick isn’t this an oxymoron? A despot is a dictator. Direct democracy is each individual participating in government. Were you just shooting for a nice rhetorical flourish or was there a deeper meaning there that I missed?
James Madison would like a word with you:
The Federalist, No. 10
*ROARS LAUGHING!*
Thanks, that is the very quotation that I was thinking of when I intentionally wrote the “oxymoron.” Two full semesters of The Federalist and Anti Federalist papers certainly can fill a persons head with such ideas.
That’s ok. Its pretty rare to find it taught anywhere now.
The only ideas they want people getting now is that they can find all manner of salvation in their neighbor’s wallets, because SHUT UP!, that’s why!
How sleazy is this entire Administration when the curtain is pulled and people are fair minded in judgment? It is mind boggling to me that there are still people of good conscience who would vote for this horrid administration. It is absolutely corrupt to the core and actively involved in a transformational change that it is wicked.
Even those reprobates are being sucked dry for no favor to them, but because they too are so ignorant and amoral, so dependent upon state, so easily duped, they will never know until too late the boot in on their throat as well:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/larrybell/2012/02/16/you-thought-solyndra-was-bad-theres-more-on-the-way/
Guys, I’m forewarning you. Simply battling ideas on a blog and casting your ballot with the lost will soon not be enough. Fundamental change will require some skin and much pain to restore virtue.
The way I see it we can adopt Patrick Henry Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death, or we can be betrayed with a kiss and a toothy smile. But I think most of us are discounting just how dangerous, how corrupt we’ve become at the highest levels.
BIC, Have you seen this? Not that it will surprise you, and will lend further credence of how Obama not only won in 2008, but will attempt to win in 2012.
http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/record-19-reporters-media-execs-join-team-obama/380971
We all knew this had been going on for years. But the fact that they don’t even try to hide their contempt or their bias tells me that in their desperation of losing the war of ideas, they will head to retaliation against anybody, large or small, that will dare criticize.
I don’t exaggerate when I say this. Be vigilante. You’re a wonderful author, and a clear voice against malice. And it will take an entire Army of Davids to go against Goliath this go around, because the game is rigged and the playing field slanted way left.
We are treading dangerously close to tipping past the point of infringement and treading the thin ice toward tyranny. It is frightening how many people of supposed good conscience don’t realize how quickly they may wake up one day and realize their liberties gone, their pursuit of happiness now one of survival. And they never even lifted their voice, much less a finger, to fight it.
A nice, simple explanation of our so-called Obama Recovery that Rutherford and his ilk speak. Hint: It’s a ruse….surprise, surprise:
http://hotair.com/archives/2012/02/20/this-is-your-obama-recovery/
Awesome post.
Being single, I had no idea that the school lunch regulations had gone this far. I keep trying to impress on friends and coworkers the importance of individual freedom. I fear it’s a losing battle though.
Time for me to start blogging again.