Lessons

There are lessons all around us, every day, if we just look for them.

For instance, take the two political parties and at least the perceptions people have of their philosophies and policies.  The Democrats want to be nice, to give away things to people they deem to be the downtrodden.  The Republicans want to cut spending, cutting corners if necessary.  Today, we can see how both of these approaches fail.

What is it, almost 50% of Americans receive some sort of government assistance, not including Social Security, Medicare, etc?  That's half of the population!  And that's ridiculous.  There are some people out there who need help and should get it.  But half of Americans don't need it.  I won't go into the many ways we can see every day where people game the system.  What I am saying here is that doesn't work.  People become dependent.  Poverty hasn't at all been eliminated.  In fact, I guess we have greater percentages of people living in poverty today than the '60s, when LBJ's vaunted Great Society started many of the give-aways.  Cutting government dependence isn't hard- or cold-hearted, not at all.  Guess whose policy this is??????

This is the same political side represented by some CT school administrators who want to get rid of special honors cords on student high school graduation gowns.  These kooks are concerned that the students who haven't won/earned honors/honor cords will feel bad.  So, instead of telling these kids to work harder, let's just take away recognition from students who have worked hard.  It's another example of people who do everything right--work and study hard in school, go to college (like they've always been told), work hard at their jobs, and then get hosed to pay for programs that let those who haven't done everything right off the hook.  So, as usual, we reward bad behavior and punish or at least ignore good behavior.

Look at the other side, cutting corners.  To save money, balance the books, whatever it is called, the health of the citizens of Flint were sacrificed.  I'm sure the pols in charge were following "best practices." And look what happened.  Now, more money will have to be spent to take care of the disaster than was saved by creating it in the first place.  Government isn't like a business, big or small.  For politicians and bureaucrats under orders from politicians to pretend or even really believe it is is folly.  There's a lot to be said for fiscal responsibility and I've ranted and railed about the waste politicians have spent for years and years.  Yet, for government, unlike most businesses, the bottom line shouldn't be the only consideration.

We can't keep giving away other people's money (by extorted it from them in the name of taxes) to those we identify as needy and to pay for programs some politicians like.  On the other hand, we have to recognize there are legitimate expenses government has that perhaps businesses don't have.

I have got a big kick out of some of the politicians and LameStream media-types in recent weeks and their comments about the Flint crisis.  Oh, they favored this and they favored that--until this and that resulted in the crisis.  Now, "Where's the accountability?"  "Head must roll!"  Where were these folks when cost-cutting measures led to this mess?  Right......  While we're at it, let's get rid of this "best practices" garbage.  Like so many trendy things, this caught on for whatever reason (It sounded good?).  People just blindly followed "best practices."  What the heck are "best practices?"  Well, our governor who introduced "best practices" here sure showed how well it worked in Flint.  (Oh, I know I am being too hard on him. After all, he did say he was "sorry" about the disaster in Flint."

This lesson comes from decades ago, the '30s.  It was the time of Munich and the Panay Incident.  I am reminded of this frequently with what I think is very misguided policy toward Iran.  It's as if Obama, Kerry, and Clinton before him have no sense of history, not even any knowledge of it.  Like Neville Chamberlain at the Munich Conference at the end of September 1938, they think that they alone can talk sense into a belligerent Iran, that they alone can convince it to be reasonable.  After all, shortly after Munich, Chamberlain said of Hitler, "He's a reasonable man."  Right.  Chamberlain was an extremely arrogant man, elitist in his attitudes.  He could handle Hitler and make him see the right path.  Yep, that worked out just fine, didn't it?  Obama, Kerry, and Clinton are just as arrogant--and I think misguided and ignorant.  I guess that comes with the elitist attitudes.

And the Panay Incident saw the Japanese in 1937 attack a US naval vessel, the USS Panay, which was anchored in the Yangtze River.  It flew a US flag, in daylight, but was torpedoed by Japanese fighter planes.  The ship, of course, was damaged and there were casualties, wounded and dead.  It was a Japanese test of US will power.  How would Americans react?  I'm being only somewhat facetious in saying the US pretty much accepted an apology and some money for damages.  And Congress considered a Constitutional amendment that would have made it very difficult, at least much more so, to declare war.  Obviously, we failed the test and we know the result--Pearl Harbor four years later.  The Iranians, after we have become buddy-buddy with them, after they continue to work toward building a nuclear weapon (I know, I know, they passed their first compliance test, conducted not by independent international observers, but by the Iranians themselves.  "Can I grade my own paper, please?"), after they fired a missile in the direction of one of our aircraft carriers, after they kidnapped a dozen or so US sailors (Hey, if they are our "buddies," why didn't they just turn the sailors' boats around and point them in the right direction??????), Obama and Kerry still apologize for them.  Aren't the Iranians still one of the biggest sponsors of world-wide terrorism?  Oh, first we get lies, from Kerry and Biden, but then videos released (which apparently show the Iranians violating the Geneva Convention?) prove the lies.  And Kerry tells the world that the US "thanks" Iran for the outcome.  And this isn't something new.  When the sanctions (and isn't it nice that we've freed up or would free up about $150 billion for the Iranians to use for.....?) were first before the US Senate about 9 or 10 years ago, the bill failed to pass by four votes.  Guess who voted against sanctions then?  Good guess!  Yep, Obama, Clinton, Kerry, Biden.

We don't learn from history.

I heard some substitute radio host this AM; I don't know who the guy is, where he's from, etc.  But he made some statements that were ignorant.  Either he's ignorant of the specific situation, ignorant of the bigger picture, ignorant of teaching/learning, or just plain stupid.  He was critical of the spate of teacher sick-outs in the Detroit Public Schools.  Things kept coming in and out on the radio, breaking up, but it seemed he thought the sick-outs were in protest of charter schools.  He was critical of teachers for not being in the classroom because, he claimed, "only 8% of eighth grade students can read at grade level."  I don't know if that's true, but it's not particularly relevant, as his own argument showed.  Several callers to the show adamantly agreed with him.  First, the sick-outs are by teachers drawing attention to deplorable working--that is, teaching and learning--condition.  He never once mentioned anything about that.  Teachers aren't calling in sick to protest low pay or poor benefits and certainly not charter schools.  Teachers are protesting the working--teaching and learning--conditions.  They are protesting because they care about teaching and learning.  I would love to ask this guy on the radio how he'd like to do his broadcast with rats running past his microphone in the studio.  After all, with the photos and videos going around here in the newspapers, etc., there are plenty of rat, not mouse, but rat traps.  That seems to suggest rats are aplenty, doesn't it?  With the situation in Flint, how about all the photos and videos of open black mold in the schools?  Does he know of the violence being perpetrated in the schools against teachers and students, with security people being cut?  So, maybe learning ("only 8%") and teaching aren't so easy?  Maybe he should see how easy broadcasting is with rats running all over, with black mold staring him in the face, with the good chance that someone was going to rush into his studio to commit violence??????  I guess he has never considered how many of these kids live with people other than their mothers and fathers or with just mothers.  Likely, too, he's never thought about these kids who often wonder where dinner is going to come from and know that a walk to school is a lot more complicated than a simple walk to school.  There are times for people to be critics.  There are reasons for people to be critical.  But being critical in a position of ignorance doesn't cut it, although to many of the listeners it must sound good.