Attorney generals trying to shut down usenet?

[James Arthur]

we learned the basics in health class
[...]concerned parents' kids could opt out

We're seeing what the opt-out nonsense gets us
with the idiots who won't vaccinate their kids.

I saw some of those loonies interviewed on PBS. Except
they were wealthy residents of some super-exclusive island
off Seattle, Democrats.

Choose to be a member of this society or find another.
Being a member comes with obligations.

"Obligations" meaning you want to enforce your morals
on others. IOW, exactly what you accuse conservatives
of doing, except you really mean it.

To me, "liberal" means generous, inclined toward the
common good; free of bigotry; tolerant of the ideas
and behavior of others.

What you describe is dictating, imposing your values,
my-way-or-the-highway.

That's not liberal. It's becoming that which you
fear in others.

I know you mean well. But maybe you've conjured up
an evil conservative / jack-booted "neo-con"
boogeyman ... and he isn't real? Or worse, maybe
he's real, and he's you.

Best wishes,
James Arthur (a liberal)

 

[James Arthur]

I will celebrate my 50th high school reunion this summer. I believe
the educational system was far better back then. Kids around here now
in AZ can't do fractions nor make change :-(

...Jim Thompson

Besides the scoop from a family-member who IS a public school
teacher, I've had many recent dealings myself with the public
high schools.

I cannot begin to adequately convey my contempt, or disappointment
in what was once a fine system and a noble calling. They now
exist simply to perpetuate themselves, political-correctness,
and idiocracy.

There remain some brilliant, shining stars amongst them, but they
fight such hopeless odds, such a heavy burden of bureaucratic
self-important no-nothings...[1]

[1] bureaucrat-to-teacher ratio = 1:1, I kid you not.

Two brilliant kids, graduated with top marks, and they can't read.

James Arthur

 

[James Arthur]

[...privately or home schooled ...]

You're passing a moral judgement here: you'd decide (or
have government decide) which parents are fit to raise
their own kids. That's monstrous. Can't you see that?

It defies imagination that any parent so motivated could
be worse than the public schools, even if they tried.

You have a *very* weak imagination or you have seen only a very small
section of mankind if you can't imagine parents doing far worse than
the public schools.

You must have much less experience with them than I do, and
much less faith in the basic goodness of the common man.

Anyway, it's not for us to judge: when kids reach 18 they
can do as they wish; until then, parents rule.

As a society, we take children away for seriously
bad parents all the time.

Oh no we don't. O.J. Simpson still has his kids. All manner
of druggies, misfits, teenagers, etc., all have theirs. Why?
Because the courts have decided they have that right.

"Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" includes "and
oh yes, an idiot government that'll confiscate your kids?"
Sheesh.

Can't you imagine parents that are not bad
enough to have their children removed by only a small margin.

We decide these sorts of things all the times as a society. We don't
let bad parents impose their evil will upon their children. Someones
children are their charge not their property.



How many have you known?

Obviously a small percentage. What's the high-school graduation
rate in your neck of the woods?

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[James Arthur]

Yes but remember that republicans run for and get elected to school
boards too. The best we can hope for is to prevent the republicans
from turning the schools into mindless drone factories.

Democrats have already done exactly that ! That's one of my
greatest laments. I'm not saying Republicans could do better
or any other such thing--I do not know. But, Democrats are
overwhelmingly in charge, and they have actively made fine
schools abysmal, on their watch.

The teacher's union is a big part of it.

It needs to be solved.

Best,
James Arthur

 

[Don Klipstein]

[...privately or home schooled ...]

You're passing a moral judgement here: you'd decide (or
have government decide) which parents are fit to raise
their own kids. That's monstrous. Can't you see that?

It defies imagination that any parent so motivated could
be worse than the public schools, even if they tried.

You have a *very* weak imagination or you have seen only a very small
section of mankind if you can't imagine parents doing far worse than
the public schools.

Where I see the big hotspots of fuckups with public school students, I
also see megatonnage of poor parenting. The schools there are mediocre
and the parents tend to be a good half an order of magnitude worse - in
significant part by expecting the schools to do all the teaching work that
parents normally do some of. Also by all-too-much ignoring their kiddies
until they act up and try merely to control their kids and make them
behave, as opposed to showing their kiddies the world, answering as best
as most good parents can their kids' questions as to how things work, and
satisfying/feeding as opposed to punishing children's natural curiosity
into what is in the world around them, what goes on, how things work,...
Along with speaking to their kids too much in a harsh tone, and
excessively reserving a nice sweet tone of voice to current or prospective
sexual partners.
Along with considering the school to be "The Enemy" should the school try
to discipline the child who misbehaves mainly as a result of parental
failure (or as a result of living in a neighborhood with culture of
parental failure and lack of respect for education).

You must have much less experience with them than I do, and
much less faith in the basic goodness of the common man.

Anyway, it's not for us to judge: when kids reach 18 they
can do as they wish; until then, parents rule.


Oh no we don't. O.J. Simpson still has his kids. All manner
of druggies, misfits, teenagers, etc., all have theirs. Why?
Because the courts have decided they have that right.

Society largely removes children from unfit parents only for the
exceptionally spectacularly severe and spectacularly politically incorrect
crimes. My experience in Philadelphia is that too many low-class unfit
parents get away too much with physical abuse of their children as long as
the abuse is not sexual in nature. Let alone mental abuse, or educational
abuse such as expecting the schools to do all the teaching and having 2 or
fewer books in the house while children in the household go from age 2 to
past an age at which they should read well.

<SNIP all too much>

- Don Klipstein ([email protected])

 

[Don Klipstein]

Democrats have already done exactly that ! That's one of my
greatest laments. I'm not saying Republicans could do better
or any other such thing--I do not know. But, Democrats are
overwhelmingly in charge, and they have actively made fine
schools abysmal, on their watch.

The teacher's union is a big part of it.

It needs to be solved.

I just wish that Republicans actually repair Democrat-caused problems,
as opposed to requiring existence of Democrat-caused problems to persist
in order to try to get re-elected into office after failing to fix
Democrat damage when Republicans had majority rule in the Federal
government and most of the 50 "states".

I speak from experience in PA. My experience is that Republicans try to
say they are good by merely slightly slowing the rate of destruction on a
statewide level, and on a Federal level the Republicans like to say they
are good with a fiscal policy that they criticised Democrats on (I
believe rightfully) in the 1960's and 1970's, especially the 1960's.

- Don Klipstein ([email protected])

 

[JeffM]

"Obligations" meaning you want to enforce your morals
on others.

Again, you are conflating *beliefs* and *science*.
"Obligations" means just what it says.
There's no need to interpolate it or parse it.
Every society has them.
A society has a baseline. It's called "The Law".
In the typical case, that is derived via a *what works* analysis.

It's too bad some of these yuppies and know-nothings
haven't found themselves in an infected 3rd World village
where a modern health infrastructure ISN'T the norm
(to include simple things like sewers and clean water),
so they can experience what CAN happen.

Pathologists have worked for over 100 years
to determine *what works*.
"Herd immunity* depends on EVERYBODY getting vaccinated;
that way, one or two deviations from outside is tolerated.
If everybody starts to think of himself as *special*,
the science becomes useless and **public** health fails.

....and the problem with the anti-vaccine movement
is that is is based on junk science.
The wacko who is promoting it has been thoroughly discredited.
http://www.google.com/search?q=cach...rippled-*-*-*-*-*+*-British-*+*-money&strip=1

You keep defending junk science and ANTI-science.
It's as though you don't know what Science *is*.
It's clear that the loonie frindge we are talking about doesn't.

It's the New-Agers and their *belief* systems
who are disassembling the public health paradigm
which has been established over the last century or more.

The danger is in treating ignorance as equal with knowledge;
in treating belief as equal with fact.
I don't understand you defending that.

Tolerating a belief that something is true
when the science clearly says it is nonsense
exceeds the limits of Liberalism.
When that is able to impact the health of EVERYONE,
that becomes a common concern.

A clueless New-Ager, having drunk the tainted Kool-Aid,
is not able to determine what is proper public health policy.

If it was only *himself* he was endangering,
that would be one thing; this is another circumstance.
If you want to endanger the herd, go find a self-destructive herd;
we don't want you.

 

[Jim Yanik]

in
On Sun, 15 Jun 2008 18:22:44 -0700 (PDT), MooseFET

On Jun 15, 2:18 pm, Jim Thompson
[....]
The USA is doomed. Stupidity has taken over.
Leftist weenies :-(
Rightist ass-wipes more likely.
At least we're not queer ;-)
Oh oh, a republican just said he's not queer. You know what that
means. *Not that there's anything wrong with it* :>
Doesn't bother me a bit if you want to be a queer ;-)
They have very high rates of serious,incurable diseases,at least
the homo males.
Wait until they win the "right" to donate blood and the supply
becomes a high AIDS risk. Homos have been pushing for that,FYI.
I "banked" my own blood for my hip replacement surgery, but didn't
need any of it... my hip surgeon is ranked one of the best.

Fine for PLANNED operations,but for emergencies,particularly away
from your home area,you get whatever's in their bank.Screening
doesn't always catch bad blood,particularly if the donor has just
recently been infected and hasn't developed enough antibodies yet.
IIRC,donated blood has a shelf life,too,so it will not always be
around for you to use in an emergency.

IMO,this is one major reason why homos should not be in the
military;in combat situations,you don't know who you might be getting
a blood transfer from,or whose blood you just got splattered with.

High-risk people of all sorts are prohibited from giving blood;
Heck, even UK'ers are banned as are Africans, and people who've
slept with Africans. (I donate. The forms are lengthy.)

And U.S. troops are HIV-free, 100% tested, and medically discharged
if they get it (for the reasons you mention).

you forget that testing is not 100% effective,particularly with recent
infections.The 'donor' has not had time to develop the antibodies the tests
detect.And I suspect troops don't get tested after every leave.So,it's not
"100% tested".

So I don't see any problem here, either with the blood supply, or gays
in the military.

Battlefield conditions;blood transfusions get done without proper
testing,other nearby soldiers may donate on the spot,and troops often get
contaminated by blood from wounded soldiers.
It's NOT worth the risk,just for a social experiment.

 

[Jim Yanik]

"government schools" have been taken over by liberal/ssocialists,and
neglect the important stuff for their politically correct
agenda.Troublemakers don't get expelled,and disrupt classes for those who
want to learn.

No, it's to support the teacher's unions whilst they churn out
illiterate, ignorant, droids, devoid of critical thought,
pre-programmed to consume. But I digress.


Again, you're intolerant. That's not liberal.


Again, you demand. Parents who home-school need to be
certified as competent? By whom? By what authority?

They have to be able to demonstrate competency in the standard
curriculum,as determined by the gov't.Who else is going to certify them?
Do you want to just take their home-schooler's WORD that they are competent
in reading,writing,math,science,history? (and computer skills)

Would you exempt them from public school taxes, or,
by force, make them pay for public schools they don't use?
Isn't that imposing on their liberty in a most egregious
way?

You're passing a moral judgement here: you'd decide (or
have government decide) which parents are fit to raise
their own kids. That's monstrous. Can't you see that?

Not all parents ARE fit to educate their own kids to today's standards.
some aren't fit to BE parents.

It defies imagination that any parent so motivated could
be worse than the public schools, even if they tried.

And it's not in the public interest to deny them. The
home-schoolers I've known have all been _lightyears_
ahead of their public (or private) school counterparts.

Best regards,
James Arthur

But do you really know a representative sample.....?

 

[Jim Yanik]

we learned the basics in health class
[...]concerned parents' kids could opt out

We're seeing what the opt-out nonsense gets us
with the idiots who won't vaccinate their kids.

I saw some of those loonies interviewed on PBS. Except
they were wealthy residents of some super-exclusive island
off Seattle, Democrats.

Choose to be a member of this society or find another.
Being a member comes with obligations.

"Obligations" meaning you want to enforce your morals
on others. IOW, exactly what you accuse conservatives
of doing, except you really mean it.

Morals like Thou shalt not murder,thou shalt not commit adultery,thou shalt
not bear false witness,etc.?
IMO,those NEED enforcing.IMO,they are not optional.
"Morals" are a critical and basic part of civilized society.

To me, "liberal" means generous, inclined toward the
common good; free of bigotry; tolerant of the ideas
and behavior of others.

Well,then you are behind the times.
and "Gay" -used- to mean carefree and happy.

What you describe is dictating, imposing your values,
my-way-or-the-highway.

Societies MUST impose "values" on their members.

 

[Jim Yanik]

[email protected] (Don Klipstein) wrote in

[...]
Before a kid is graduated from 6th grade,
he should be required to understand the steps in the
process.http://www.google.com/search?q=Scientific.Method+State.the.P
roblem+Fo...

Kids are natural scientists.
It's when their curiosity is squashed by unquestionable dogma
that their minds switch off and we're left with
another generation of I-don't-WANT-to know-the-truth types.

Yes but remember that republicans run for and get elected to school
boards too. The best we can hope for is to prevent the republicans
from turning the schools into mindless drone factories.

Democrats have already done exactly that ! That's one of my
greatest laments. I'm not saying Republicans could do better
or any other such thing--I do not know. But, Democrats are
overwhelmingly in charge, and they have actively made fine
schools abysmal, on their watch.

The teacher's union is a big part of it.

It needs to be solved.

I just wish that Republicans actually repair Democrat-caused
problems,
as opposed to requiring existence of Democrat-caused problems to
persist in order to try to get re-elected into office after failing to
fix Democrat damage when Republicans had majority rule in the Federal
government and most of the 50 "states".

Sheesh,DemocRATs HAD control for most of the last 50 years.
THAT is when it began getting F-ed up,and worsening with every new DemocRAT
admin and Congress.

 

[JeffM]

Choose to be a member of this society or find another.
Being a member comes with obligations.

James Arthur wrote
"Obligations" meaning you want to enforce your morals

Morals like Thou shalt not murder,thou shalt not commit adultery,
thou shalt not bear false witness,etc.?
IMO,those NEED enforcing.IMO,they are not optional.
"Morals" are a critical and basic part of civilized society.

Societies MUST impose "values" on their members.

<Looks outside for porcine creatures on the wing>
(None there. I can't believe it. I'm agreeing with Yanik. )

Yup. Without *some* shared values, it's called anarchy.

 

[MooseFET]

Democrats have already done exactly that ! That's one of my
greatest laments.

I would say that it is one of your delusions. It is always the
republicans that want to remove courses other than reading and writing
and put in tests that are multiple choice.

I'm not saying Republicans could do better
or any other such thing--I do not know. But, Democrats are
overwhelmingly in charge, and they have actively made fine
schools abysmal, on their watch.

The places where the republicans have been in charge are uniformly
worse so it isn't the democrats that are doing it.

The teacher's union is a big part of it.

I seriously doubt that the teachers union have ever pushed the
standardized testing etc that is the core of the problem.

It needs to be solved.

Agreed. We need to make a next generation that is able to take the
nation forwards.

 

[MooseFET]

On Jun 16, 6:19 pm, James Arthur <[email protected]> wrote:

[...privately or home schooled ...]

You're passing a moral judgement here: you'd decide (or
have government decide) which parents are fit to raise
their own kids. That's monstrous. Can't you see that?
It defies imagination that any parent so motivated could
be worse than the public schools, even if they tried.

You have a *very* weak imagination or you have seen only a very small
section of mankind if you can't imagine parents doing far worse than
the public schools.

You must have much less experience with them than I do, and
much less faith in the basic goodness of the common man.

No, I'd say that you don't understand that the average says nothing of
the range. The common man is good is based on an average. The range
goes from extremely evil to extremely good.

Anyway, it's not for us to judge: when kids reach 18 they
can do as they wish; until then, parents rule.

As I said elsewhere: children are their charge not their possession.
Society have basically always reserved the right to remove children
from the control of a truly bad parent.

Oh no we don't.

Yes we do. feed "child protective services" complete with quotes into
the google.

O.J. Simpson still has his kids. All manner
of druggies, misfits, teenagers, etc., all have theirs. Why?
Because the courts have decided they have that right.

"Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" includes "and
oh yes, an idiot government that'll confiscate your kids?"
Sheesh.

The government is us acting collectively. It is only "idiot
government" to the degree that we are idiots.

Obviously a small percentage. What's the high-school graduation
rate in your neck of the woods?

Right here it is about 95%. The worst in the bay area is about 75%.

 

[Joerg]

I will celebrate my 50th high school reunion this summer. I believe
the educational system was far better back then. Kids around here now
in AZ can't do fractions nor make change :-(

...Jim Thompson

Besides the scoop from a family-member who IS a public school
teacher, I've had many recent dealings myself with the public
high schools.

I cannot begin to adequately convey my contempt, or disappointment
in what was once a fine system and a noble calling. They now
exist simply to perpetuate themselves, political-correctness,
and idiocracy.

There remain some brilliant, shining stars amongst them, but they
fight such hopeless odds, such a heavy burden of bureaucratic
self-important no-nothings...[1]

[1] bureaucrat-to-teacher ratio = 1:1, I kid you not.

And worse, nobody is doing anything to change that. They only whine for
ever higher taxes which will do nothing to improve our educational system.

You might appreciate my pain... I have 8 grandchildren ;-)

Fortunately they're all sharp as tacks (except for one who is
autistic, and he's beginning to spell); and can beat the system at its
own game.

Fortunately in the US people have the right to home-school. Which is
what a lot of people in our church do.

 

[Jim Yanik]

The Red Cross is VERY particular about the background of those giving
blood. See:
<http://www.redcross.org/services/biomed/0,1082,0_557_,00.html>
for a list of proscribed practices. For example, you have to wait 12
months after getting a tattoo or body piercing jewelery. I had my
cancerous prostate cancer removed about a year ago, and also have to
wait 12 months to donate.

homos ARE pushing to have their restictions lifted.
It's part of their agenda.

 

[Richard Henry]

homos ARE pushing to have their restictions lifted.
It's part of their agenda.

Is their agenda online somewhere where I can read it?

 

[Joerg]

The Red Cross is VERY particular about the background of those giving
blood. See:
<http://www.redcross.org/services/biomed/0,1082,0_557_,00.html>
for a list of proscribed practices. For example, you have to wait 12
months after getting a tattoo or body piercing jewelery. I had my
cancerous prostate cancer removed about a year ago, and also have to
wait 12 months to donate.

Can be worse. I wish I could donate but it seems I am now permanently
banned, based only on the places where I've lived in the past :-(

Quote "You are not eligible to donate if: .... You spent (visited or
lived) a cumulative time of 5 years or more from January 1, 1980, to
present, in any combination of country(ies) in Europe, including ...."
(lists some countries where I lived).

The weird thing is that I can donate in Europe and then that blood could
be used to save any person, including travelers from here who had an
accident.

 

[Joerg]

I'm a product of our piss-poor public school system and teach in it, and
even we undereducated overpaid leftist weenies seem to remember the correct
term is "Attorneys general" and the correct coupling is "neither-nor", not
"can't-nor".

Ok, sorry guys. Attorneys generalissimos, attorneys generals, attorneys
general, ah, got it!

I am the product of a public school in a foreign country and my first
exposure to English happened at around age 10, via the series "All in
the Family". There it would have been attoinees ;-)

For the record: I think teachers are in no way overpaid and are mostly
doing a great job. It's the bloated administration, mandates,
categoricals and so on that's not so good. Plus the lack of motivation
on the children's side, caused by a family "structure" that my
grandparents would have called defunct.

 

[James Arthur]

I'm a product of our piss-poor public school system

I am too, but it was NOT piss poor, it was superb.

and teach in it,

My sympathies. It's my impression, though, that pockets of
excellence persist, far away from the population centers,
in places where Vogons have yet to tread.

Best reagrds,
James Arthur