Hello again. I've been offline for almost a month, but now I'll resume this blog. It would be helpful to get some feedback comments, though.
Third-world people living in a first-world country: They have three alternatives:
1. Leave. There are plenty of third-world countries they would find more accommodating.
2. Get with the program of becoming a first-world citizen-- Civilized, Educated, and Responsible (CER).
3. Stop reproducing. Women on welfare, in particular, shouldn't be bringing more children into the world while they're being supported by the taxpayer. For whatever reason, these are people who can't figure out how to put one foot in front of the other in life. Their children are likely to be similarly encumbered.
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
hmmm . . .
Hmmm . . . Well, I seem to be getting a few more pageviews, but still no comments. Sometime in the next few weeks I should be back online at home and will be able to start paying more attention to this.
Tuesday, April 9, 2013
return
I haven't been able to post here for awhile, but I'm beginning to think it's pointless anyway in the abence of any comments.
Monday, January 14, 2013
il duce
On issues ranging from global warming to Keynesian economics, I consider myself on the progressive left. But there is one issue on which I stand somewhere to the right of Benito Mussolini: In general, people shouldn't have children they can't support, and in particular, WOMEN ON WELFARE SHOULDN'T BE REPRODUCING at all.
There is no point of view from which this is a good idea. Not from the point of view of the women and her child themselves. They're already in a hole; they shouldn't be digging any deeper.
Not from the point of view of the taxpayer, who doesn't want to be shelling out even more to support the idle poor and their broods.
Not from the point of view of society as a whole. For whatever reason, these are people who can't quite figure out how to put one foot in front of the other in life. We should not be subsidizing the least successful people in our society to reproduce. Moreover, it is the progeny of these people who cause problems in the schools, making it hard or impossible for others to learn. The boys drop out and join gangs; the girls get pregnant, drop out, and continue the cycle.
There should be no additional benefits for having additional illegitimate children. Rather, there should be a stipend for each month the mother remains un-pregnant. If she becomes pregnant and gives birth again, she loses the stipend. And this stipend should be significant-- a quarter or a third of her basic check. This should be one of a set of carrots and sticks designed to SUCCESSFULLY discourage these women from reproducing.
There is no point of view from which this is a good idea. Not from the point of view of the women and her child themselves. They're already in a hole; they shouldn't be digging any deeper.
Not from the point of view of the taxpayer, who doesn't want to be shelling out even more to support the idle poor and their broods.
Not from the point of view of society as a whole. For whatever reason, these are people who can't quite figure out how to put one foot in front of the other in life. We should not be subsidizing the least successful people in our society to reproduce. Moreover, it is the progeny of these people who cause problems in the schools, making it hard or impossible for others to learn. The boys drop out and join gangs; the girls get pregnant, drop out, and continue the cycle.
There should be no additional benefits for having additional illegitimate children. Rather, there should be a stipend for each month the mother remains un-pregnant. If she becomes pregnant and gives birth again, she loses the stipend. And this stipend should be significant-- a quarter or a third of her basic check. This should be one of a set of carrots and sticks designed to SUCCESSFULLY discourage these women from reproducing.
Wednesday, December 26, 2012
2012: watershed year
Think about it. Over the last year, it seems to me, there have been fundamental-- one might almost say seismic-- shifts in public opinion in four important areas:
1. President Obama was reelected. True, it wasn't a landslide, but it wasn't a squeaker, either. He will not now take his place in history alongside Jimmy Carter and Herbert Hoover. Given the state of the economy, the Presidency should have been the Republicans' for the taking. In addition, Democrats gained two seats in a Senate they were widely expected to lose control of, and the aggregate Democratic total in House races was 500,00 more than the Republican total (voided by absurd gerrymandering of districts).
Aside from the weaknesses of their candidate (would Rick Santorum or Michelle Bachmann have done better?), I think this election represents a fundamental repudiation of Republican ideas. A rising tide does not lift all boats-- only the yachts, for some reason. And Republican willful ignorance of science is coming back to bite them, which leads to the next point:
2. Climate change is back on the agenda. Despite being a no-show during the presidential debates, this issue has a secret weapon going for it: reality. The long drought this summer and fall (which is continuing in some places even into winter) plus the more dramatic evidence of Hurricane Sandy have made people into believers. The evidence of one's own eyes and ears is somehow more persuasive than ignorant ideological rhetoric.
3. Gay rights have gotten over some kind of hump of popular approval. All four ballot initiatives involving this were won by pro-gay forces. We have a president who is on record in favor of gay marriage, and Wisconsin has elected the first openly gay US senator in history.
4. Gun control is now again open for discussion. I don't think it's going away this time. People are seriously starting to ask these questions about just why people should have these crazy levels of firepower at their private disposal, and why there is such an ineffective effort to regulate just who has access to any weapons at all. Mayor Bloomberg was right to say that NRA bigwig LaPierre's speech smacked of paranoia. It's a facet of this whole issue that really needs to be explored in depth.
There is one more issue that needs to be put on the front burner: The absurd disparity of income and wealth we now have in this country. Rep. Boehner's 'Plan B' fiscal-cliff proposal went down in flames because the Tea Party types in the House refused to raise taxes even on people making over $1 million a year. This kind of thing presents the Democrats with a golden opportunity to ask an uncomfortable question: Why should a small group of people be allowed to live on a plane of existence completely different from the rest of us, while people holding down full-time jobs can't make ends meet? And then, of course, there are those who can only find part-time work or none at all. Students taking on absurd levels of debt at the beginning of their adult lives, etc. This issue has got to start coming to the fore. Well, we had to leave something for 2013.
1. President Obama was reelected. True, it wasn't a landslide, but it wasn't a squeaker, either. He will not now take his place in history alongside Jimmy Carter and Herbert Hoover. Given the state of the economy, the Presidency should have been the Republicans' for the taking. In addition, Democrats gained two seats in a Senate they were widely expected to lose control of, and the aggregate Democratic total in House races was 500,00 more than the Republican total (voided by absurd gerrymandering of districts).
Aside from the weaknesses of their candidate (would Rick Santorum or Michelle Bachmann have done better?), I think this election represents a fundamental repudiation of Republican ideas. A rising tide does not lift all boats-- only the yachts, for some reason. And Republican willful ignorance of science is coming back to bite them, which leads to the next point:
2. Climate change is back on the agenda. Despite being a no-show during the presidential debates, this issue has a secret weapon going for it: reality. The long drought this summer and fall (which is continuing in some places even into winter) plus the more dramatic evidence of Hurricane Sandy have made people into believers. The evidence of one's own eyes and ears is somehow more persuasive than ignorant ideological rhetoric.
3. Gay rights have gotten over some kind of hump of popular approval. All four ballot initiatives involving this were won by pro-gay forces. We have a president who is on record in favor of gay marriage, and Wisconsin has elected the first openly gay US senator in history.
4. Gun control is now again open for discussion. I don't think it's going away this time. People are seriously starting to ask these questions about just why people should have these crazy levels of firepower at their private disposal, and why there is such an ineffective effort to regulate just who has access to any weapons at all. Mayor Bloomberg was right to say that NRA bigwig LaPierre's speech smacked of paranoia. It's a facet of this whole issue that really needs to be explored in depth.
There is one more issue that needs to be put on the front burner: The absurd disparity of income and wealth we now have in this country. Rep. Boehner's 'Plan B' fiscal-cliff proposal went down in flames because the Tea Party types in the House refused to raise taxes even on people making over $1 million a year. This kind of thing presents the Democrats with a golden opportunity to ask an uncomfortable question: Why should a small group of people be allowed to live on a plane of existence completely different from the rest of us, while people holding down full-time jobs can't make ends meet? And then, of course, there are those who can only find part-time work or none at all. Students taking on absurd levels of debt at the beginning of their adult lives, etc. This issue has got to start coming to the fore. Well, we had to leave something for 2013.
Friday, December 21, 2012
newtown and the NRA
Chez La Pierre, nothing at the 'supply' end is up for discussion
. Not the question of why high-end military weapons (and accessories) designed to kill large numbers of people as efficiently as possible should be available to private citizens. We're not talking whitetail deer here. Why on earth should private citizens to be able to buy bullets that can pierce inch-think armor at 1,000 yards (to choose but one example)?
.No mention of how the NRA colluded with the gun manufacturers to reverse declining profits. In an increasingly urban nation, hunting is simply not as popular as in the past. It's part of a demographically declining rural culture. But selling cool state-of-the-art military hardware has more than made up the deficit. Talk about male enhancement!
.Not the question of why we continue to allow this gun-show 'loophole.' Loophole? More of a gaping hole, in which 40% of gun sales require no federal background check.
No, there's nothing at the prevention end at all. It's all about the Gunfight at the OK Corral, this bunch's most fervent fantasy. And even within that context, putting an armed guard in every school hardly seems like the best allocation of resources. There might be a few school districts in Texas or Mississippi that would be willing to lay off yet another teacher to do this, but the appeal would seem to be quite limited. And certainly not on my federal tax dollar.
. Not the question of why high-end military weapons (and accessories) designed to kill large numbers of people as efficiently as possible should be available to private citizens. We're not talking whitetail deer here. Why on earth should private citizens to be able to buy bullets that can pierce inch-think armor at 1,000 yards (to choose but one example)?
.No mention of how the NRA colluded with the gun manufacturers to reverse declining profits. In an increasingly urban nation, hunting is simply not as popular as in the past. It's part of a demographically declining rural culture. But selling cool state-of-the-art military hardware has more than made up the deficit. Talk about male enhancement!
.Not the question of why we continue to allow this gun-show 'loophole.' Loophole? More of a gaping hole, in which 40% of gun sales require no federal background check.
No, there's nothing at the prevention end at all. It's all about the Gunfight at the OK Corral, this bunch's most fervent fantasy. And even within that context, putting an armed guard in every school hardly seems like the best allocation of resources. There might be a few school districts in Texas or Mississippi that would be willing to lay off yet another teacher to do this, but the appeal would seem to be quite limited. And certainly not on my federal tax dollar.
Thursday, November 15, 2012
'different learning styles'
This is a phrase that ed-school leftists seem quite enamored of. What exactly does it mean? What does it mean to say that inner-city youth aren't stupid, they simply have different 'learning styles' from suburban white and Asian kids. I've never heard any specifics as to how these people's 'learning style' differs from that of other people. Moreover, I've never heard any indication that this different 'learning style,' whatever it is, is remotely as effective as that of other people. If the only difference between one 'learning style' and another is that one is more effective than the other, you should simply ditch the ineffective one, n'est ce pas?
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