The Purpose of Public Schools

Once upon a time, public schools were established to ensure that we would have something resembling and educated populace. Increasingly, they are being used as just another laboratory in which to inflict the state- or union-approved ideology on students. The school may not be free, but they can ensure its free of education (with a few notable exceptions).

If that's not reason enough to make parents look for alternative option, a school in Wisconsin has come up with a new reason to homeschool. Children may have an older brother, but there's no Big Brother present:

A middle school in Marinette, Wisconsin got a group of 5th-8th graders together and organized a really fun game that asked students to step forward to answer “yes” to a series of highly personal questions...

I think we can all see how easily this could go sideways. This collection of information from unwitting children could be used to instigate social services investigations, to find out which parents are using their 2nd amendment right to own firearms, whether they’ve complied with Obamacare, what their lifestyle choices are, how they practice their religious beliefs, what the family’s political beliefs are, or to single out kids for forced medical or mental health treatment against the wishes of their parents. We need only look at all of the zero tolerance hysteria to see how quickly this could get out of hand.

Most kids don’t understand the greater ramifications of sharing this type of information, and that is exactly what the administrators are counting on. They are taking advantage of a relationship of trust between students and faculty, and exploiting that for their own purposes. So many things are illegal or illicit now that it’s impossible for a child to judge whether what he or she is saying will get someone into trouble.

I would ask "What could go wrong?," but that question only works if the possibility of something going wrong isn't at least a little intentional.

In Case You Missed It--The Big Lipinski

I'm not normally a huge fan of ice-skating, but sometimes I can make exceptions:



I think I'll go for a white Russian now.

How Many Scientists Really Believe in Anthropogenic Climate Change

...apparently a lot fewer than claimed. I've found that many people who believe in man-caused global warming (or cooling, or the less specific "climate change") do so because they like the solutions and not because they understand (let alone agree with) the science.

The Devil Abroad

The devil walks abroad, and stalks a broad. Demoniacs exist, but who will believe they are possessed? Alas that there were no exorcists on hand.

Closer to home: a woman can't afford her own birth control, but somehow can afford to run for Congress. That's not really demonic activity, though it becomes diabolical when said woman's supposed inability to buy her own birth control leads to attacks against the freedom to follow the Church's teachings on the matter.

Closer still, and less obvious too: it's eery the number of formerly good, faithful Catholics and other Christians have suddenly decided that they were same-sex attracted and, shortly thereafter, have ceased to practice Christianity. Same-sex attraction happens and provides a tough struggle for the person involved; so do all other temptations, though we spend a lot less time celebrating certain of them, and I can name few (which is not none) others which have had such a tendency of rejecting all of Christian Truth (or, on a smaller scale, merely Christian morality) upon being discovered.

Is there demonic activity here? Perhaps it is the whisper which finds the excuse to abandon Christian morality in whole because some part of it has become difficult. That is a temptation faced by everyone, in differing degrees and kinds.

Super Bowl

I didn't watch the game, I didn't watch the halftime show, and I didn't watch the commercials. From what I've been hearing, I didn't miss much.

Well, unless you count this epic commercial, but since I don't live in Georgia, I wouldn't have seen it anyway.



Whoa.

Aside from that, I am told that there wasn't much worth watching. The only other commercial I've heard bantered about is the Coke commercial celebrating homosexual unions. I don't drink much Coke anyway (I prefer the HEB brand sodas, since they use cane sugar instead of high-fructose corn syrup), and honestly don't see this as being nearly as militant as, say, Starbucks.

The Super Bowl is considered one of the major cultural "events" in America--along with Grammys and Emmys and Oscars and Golden Globes--so it has naturally become one more venue to try pushing the envelope in the culture wars. For that matter, a pair of homosexuals holding hands while the song America the Beautiful [1] plays is hardly the most grievous example of envelope-pushing out there, especially given the context of an ongoing "gay rights" boycott of Coke over its sponsorship of the Winter Olympic Games.

Be that as it may, there usually is a bit of envelope-pushing associated with these things. Since we're not generally allowed to push back (except when we are)--and more importantly, since we tend to be on the side that isn't backed by wealthy companies which can afford to run such ads--there is only one other alternative: vote with our wallets and our eyes and tune out. I'd prefer pushing back, of course, since I hate to be culturally marginalized. But if the former doesn't happen to greater degree, the latter certainly will (and worse).


[1] God shed his grace on thee/'til selfish cause and unjust laws/no longer trouble thee.

Let 'Em Eat Cake

That might be President Obama's reaction towards those who are complaining about the new costs (the economic costs, not the other costs) of the "Affordable" Care Act. And, to the extent that people did vote for Obama and (by re-electing him and voting in more of his ilk into the Senate) tacitly approved of Obamacare, I actually would agree with him. Don't like Obamacare? Don't vote Democrat.

Meanwhile, a local news station (God bless 'em) brings us this epic live coverage of employees in Pittsburgh reacting to their new healthcare under Obamacare. Live.

I wonder if it gets made into a Republican ad? It is, in any case, a rather excellent job of reporting. And, it should be repeated by news affiliates and played by Republican (and heck, third party) politicians from now until the next round of elections are over.

Of course, Obama and his progressive harpies and their Democratic allies in the House and Senate are all-too-happy to double down on Obamacare, costs and all (and on all of its costs for us and potential costs for them).

Thought of the Day: Grammy's Edition

"Thought for the day: Why did the programmers of the Grammy's link satanic ritual and gay nuptials? Had faithful christians done that, the howls would be deafening."
Dr. Gerard Nadal, Ph.D.

Inquiring minds want to know how this got past the cultural censors and propagandists which put on these kinds of shows.

Georgetown Shocker

It's nice to see an ostensibly Catholic university actually do something to promote its Catholic identity. There is no space for a "pro-choice" group on a Catholic campus, "diversity" be damned. Those who don't like it should consider going to a secular university where that kind of thing is not only tolerated but openly celebrated and even to some extent worshiped.

Laura Narefsky and Abby Grace, the president and vice president of H*yas for Choice, respectively, write that they now feel unwanted on campus.  “Instead of being recognized as a contribution to a campus that strives for diversity, we are treated like a nuisance that undermines the university’s image,” they write.

Georgetown has apparently done the right thing here, even if only in a rather bizarre context. They still have a ways to go if they host a free-speech zone in which condoms may be distributed. Condoms are not free speech, and they are not a celebration of "diversity." Nor, for that matter, are private institutions such as Georgetown under any particular obligation to respect "diverse" groups whose purpose is the perpetuation of one of the greatest of evils, and which further exists to undermine the Catholic identity of the institution (however weak or tenuous the university has allowed that identity to become).

SOTU Summarized in Five Words

"Government's Great! All Hail Government!

It's tempting to stop there.

Here's why it's so big:

"Each party can be depended upon to denounce the power grabs of the other; but this sort of thing is never reversed because when the opposition party is in power, they will not voluntarily relinquish that power."

Democrats make government the solution. Republicans call it the problem. Right up until they're elected.

Yellow Journalism by Green Journalists

Student papers aren't necessarily professionally done, even if many of the folks working on them today are tomorrow's journalists. Here is one example of an article which has managed to anger (or disappoint, or depress)...basically everybody who reads it.

The pro-life folks are frustrated, because the thing is covering a small counter-protest in response to the Rally for Life in Austin. The pro-life rally's attendance is usually numbered in the thousands or even tens of thousands (ok, usually around 10,000). The opposition's counter-protest typically turns out in the hundreds (if that). This year there were supposedly more counter-protesters than usually, which means a few hundred: so I was told by several different friends and acquaintances who attended the Rally (I did not, as I had to work that day).

The entire article, however, mentions only the counter-protest. There isn't even a hint that it is in response to the much larger Rally for Life, and not a single suggestion that there were any pro-lifers anywhere. One would think there is a actually pointed silence towards the pro-life movement at work, a cover-up by the opposition.

Screenshot: Disqus apparently didn't get the memo about the headline.

The other side, for its part, was worked into a frenzy by the headline, which was a little too accurate for their comfort. The headline on the print edition reads--and online it originally read--"Pro-abortion rally draws support from political candidates." The headline has since been changed to the less accurate but more politically correct (and less accusatory) "Abortion rights rally draws support from political candidates." This was because virtually every pro-abortion commenter took the the site's Disqus system to complain/lie that there are no pro-abortion people, a claim which is disingenuous at best.

Surely there may be a few people who honestly believe that they are and can be what Mario Cuomo claimed to be--personally against abortion, but politically pro-choice. His son has put the lie to that statement and voiced the much more prevalent view from the Left that pro-lifers aren't welcome. Commenter Charles Findlay puts it well when he writes, "What's the 'choice'?...spell it out in all its ugly forms." You can either be for abortion or against it: all shades of gray ultimately fall on one side or the other, and while posing some legitimate practical challenges to a pro-life society they are generally used more to obfuscate the problem than to honestly seek its solutions.

As for the media's covereage in general and the Daily Texan's in particular, my acquaintance put it nicely with his rhetorical question, " Is the Daily Texan in the business of teaching and promoting Yellow Journalism to students?"

Making Sense of Wendy Davis's Children

People act as if it is utterly shocking that would-be Democratic gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis gave up custody of her children (this, after divorcing her second husband literally the day after he finished paying for her student debts). In our society, I suppose this would be surprising: women almost inevitably get custody of children after a divorce, in particular when one of the children in question is from a previous marriage; and it is a bit of an aberration for them to simply relinquish this custody for whatever reason. So in this sense, it is surprising that Wendy Davis' children are being raised solely by her ex-husband [1].

I however, am not so shocked at this revelation. It means that Davis is one of the only women I've heard of who has managed to be somewhat consistent: yes to abortion for any reason at any stage, presumably no to infanticide, but women still need autonomy. Assuming that she does not believes that abortion takes a life--not a prerequisite to being an abortion supporter by any means--this means that she (and by extension, other "independent" women) must find some other way to pursue a career after having children. The solution to this dilemma without outright murdering the kids is to ditch the husband and then give him sole custody of the children.

By her leaving the kids with him she is basically admitting that he is a good man (or else condemning her own children to living with an abusive father--but see [1]). The whole thing seems awful on her part, but it is consistent with the political/moral position which she has presumably staked out for herself. It is just more fruit of the modern feminist movement, and not the worst fruit by any stretch.


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[1] Said husband really does look like the knight in shining armor in this whole story. One more reason why one wonders about Davis' decision to dump him.

Quick Links: Pro-Life

I'm not going to have time to comment on these extensively. Here are a few posts, articles, etc. all loosely about the pro-life movement.

First, there's a comparison between Carthage and the pro-abortion left. Some people complained in the comments that the Carthaginians knew they were murdering human children and that for them this was a big sacrifice of something they valued to obtain something else they valued; whereas today that is not the case, in abortion the sacrifice is of something not valued and not loved, and not recognized as a human life. The last, at least, is increasingly becoming a non-starter even among those who claim to be "pro-choice."

Second, there's Archbishop Charles Chaput's homily at the National Shrine for the March for Life. He opens strong and doesn't let up:

When evil is strong, real tolerance gets pushed out the door. And the reason is simple. Evil cannot bear the counter-witness of truth. It will not coexist peacefully with goodness, because evil insists on being seen as right, and worshiped as being right. Therefore, the good must be made to seem hateful and wrong.

The very existence of people who refuse to accept evil and who seek to act virtuously burns the conscience of those who don’t. And so, quite logically, people who march and lobby and speak out to defend the unborn child will be—and are—reviled by leaders and media and abortion activists that turn the right to kill an unborn child into a shrine to personal choice.

And on a related vein, might we see an increased amount of persecution against Christians in America? I suspect that the so-called "gay rights" issue (or front in the culture wars) will increasingly turn to this, especially if the nation turns more and more pro-life. The Left (which, in this case, is not merely human powers and principalities) may lose the abortion front, only to pivot and turn the "gay rights" front into a victory which crushes Christianity in the public square, then (with those voices silenced) return to propagandizing for abortion. Or, it may be that we suffer some acute political set-backs (as in states like New York or California, or the passage of something like the evil FOCA bill which was narrowly defeated a few years back).