RedStateEclectic

Big-Headed Presidents

The More Things Change…

“You are in the process of being indoctrinated. We have not yet evolved a system of education that is not a system of indoctrination. We are sorry, but it is the best we can do. What you are being taught here is an amalgam of current prejudice and the choices of this particular culture. The slightest look at history will show how impermanent these must be. You are being taught by people who have been able to accommodate themselves to a regime of thought laid down by their predecessors. It is a self-perpetuating system. Those of you who are more robust and individual than others, will be encouraged to leave and find ways of educating yourself - educating your own judgment. Those that stay must remember, always and all the time, that they are being molded and patterned to fit into the narrow and particular needs of this society.” ~ Doris Lessing

Urine Trouble, Mr. Green

Plans to build an inside outhouse backfire:

Students at a high school in Boca Raton, Florida, must step over rivers of urine and endure the stench of rancid waste after a plan to bring 'green' waterless urinals into bathrooms backfired.

School officials at Spanish River High School thought they had found an environmentally-friendly, cost-saving solution for their bathrooms when they installed Falcon Waterfree urinals in their boys bathrooms.

But with no water moving through the school's copper pipes to flush the urine into the sewer system, the waste produced noxious gases that ate through the metal, leaving leaky pipes that allowed urine to drip into walls and flow onto floors.

'It was pretty disgusting,' school board chairman Frank Barbieri told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

'The girls had to step over a river of urine. I could smell it as soon as I walked into the hallway.'

Now, the school district, which was hoping to save $100 a year in water costs for each waterless urinal, must pay $500,000 to repair the damage and replace the appliances with the traditional flush variety in four high schools.

Full article.

The environ-mental solution here is obvious: get rid of the boys.

Homeschool Hurrahs

A good Mises Institute article this morning about the praises of homeschooling.

Homeschool parents, or parentrepreneurs, are not waiting for politicians and technocrats to fix broken systems of education. Rather, they are eschewing the status quo and finding innovative ways to advance the intellectual, emotional, and spiritual growth of their children.

While the homeschooling sector is portrayed as a bunch of Christians wishing to avoid a secular environment, it seems to be more about the broken system described above. When my wife and I checked out the school monopoly in our area, we found a classroom where the teacher/student ratio was over 30 to 1. That was our biggest concern.

[See the comments sections for the rest.]

(2/2) The Obamatised Nation - The War on Kids

In the Bubamatised nation not only are grown ups treated as if they were kids, there is a war on real kids going on as well.

This looks a bit like the martial occupation of America - by herself. Kids being eyed with an attitude as if they were Muslims (the fancied incarnation of evil, a foreign culture of faith conveniently graphic to fool the undiscerning suffering from quick-to-trigger xenophobia), Iraqis, the Taliban. If the own offspring is treated that way, it is hardly surprising that foreign people(s) are so easily bedevilled.

Is America suffering from an anxiety psychosis? I am beginning to understand those who consider the USA a police state, or a country far advanced on the way toward being a police state.

Anyone having problems with the below video embedded below, here is the link to the source - hat tip LRC. (I did have reception problems, with long upload breaks.)

 

End of the Year Video

Reason.tv is running a series of their “best” videos of the year.  Dr. Walter Williams is one of my favorites:

Education and the State

You're looking for outstanding literature on liberty? Listen to this guy:

 

The source.

Another Gift From Us To The Bankers: $50,000 Housing Grants

From Boston.com:

A federal program that will provide interest-free loans to unemployed homeowners so they can make mortgage payments was launched yesterday after months of delays, with $61 million earmarked for Massachusetts.

(Love the program name - "NeighborWorks." Heh.)

The Department of Housing and Urban Development and NeighborWorks America, a Washington, D.C., nonprofit that is helping to administer the $1 billion program, said it will benefit about 30,000 homeowners nationwide — including more than 1,000 in Massachusetts. Applications are due by July 22, and officials are anticipating needing a lottery to determine who receives money. Those who meet eligibility requirements will be able to borrow up to $50,000 over a two-year period. Under some circumstances, the money will not have to be paid back.

“We know there are so many people in need,’’ said Finfer, who has been pushing for help for unemployed homeowners for several years. “This will make the difference between people saving their homes and losing their homes.’’ - (snort)

To qualify, homeowners must be able to prove they have had a drop in income of at least 15 percent due to job loss, wage cuts, or a health emergency, and be at least three months behind on their mortgage payments. Borrowers also must meet certain income requirements, which differ by region. In the Boston area, a family of four’s income could not have exceeded more than $110,150 before the drop in salary, according to federal documents.

In some cases, the federal loans will turn into gifts. Borrowers who remain in their homes and stay current on mortgage payments for five years — after they stop receiving the federal help — will have their debt balance reduced by 20 percent annually until it is eliminated.

The program, which targets residents in 27 states and Puerto Rico, is meant to complement a similar effort managed by the Treasury Department for states that were “hardest hit’’ by the US financial crisis, according to federal officials. Massachusetts was not part of that program.

 

 Look at the math - you have to be behind 3 months to apply, another 1 - 2 months for the lottery, then one can assume the paperwork will begin in earnest.  

This is what my Grandma always calls "throwing good money after bad." I don't believe that anybody who is 3 months behind on their mortgage payments on an expensive house in Boston is going to be able to dig themselves out from under the late fees and attorney's bills.

Couple that with the fact that $1,000,000 divided by the $50,000 maximum is only 20,000, but they're anticipating helping 30,000 - and you know the bureaucrats aren't working for free, either.

This has to stop. 

Acton Day One Recap

Great day at Acton University. Aside from the many interesting people I ran across, the four classes I had leant me perspectives I hadn't had coming in (which are the best kind of classes.) The 45 minute lectures and 30 minute Q&As are all available on the website for a fee of $2.99 for those interested. 

In the "Rise and Fall of Neoclassical Economics" by Dr. Robert Nelson I learned a lot about what the 'current' economics taught at schools theory is. I've read lots about Austrian economics over the past few years but I was largely ignorant about what the mainstream teaching was based on and Nelson made a compelling argument that it is a sort of religion in its structure. I'm sure his new book, The New Holy Wars: Economic Religion versus Environmental Religion would be a fascinating read.

Dr. Todd Flanders had a wonderful lecture about Frederic Bastiat titled "Christian and Apostle of the Market". It was fun discussing Bastiat's Christian roots, a little of his history, and then reading how he brilliantly whittles down an issue to its essence and show the fallacy of much of yesterday's (and today's) flawed economic thinking.

Dr. John Pinheiro's talk on the Political Economy of the American Founding helped add a little fullness to my vision of what the Founders (Jefferson, Madison, Hamilton) were like. Reading too much of from the Lew Rockwell site will seriously skew your opinion of Hamilton and probably give you just as unrealistic picture of who Jefferson was. Like many things, it is important to understand why the men held the opinions of politics that they did which was in many ways a reflection of the times and how they viewed the world at that time. It is very easy (for me anyway) to view the men as living in a vacuum and writing and debating the virtues of liberty and government without also rounding them out with their flaws and theories. One interesting one is that Jefferson believed that the Louisiana Purchase would allow for people to become more spread out - including slaves - which would diffuse the tension of slavery. The solution to secession was dilution I guess.

The final session was by professor Ross Emmett about innovation and entrepreneurship. This is one of those lectures where you really have no idea what will be discussed and whether or not it will be pertinent to your life or way of thinking. Fortunately, he very compellingly made an argument that our current way of seeing innovation is too simple (and allows for points of meddling from governments). The current thoughts sees innovation as working: creating new product -> commercialization -> consumption -> profit. He argued persuasively that creation and innovation is a complicated collaborative process with an interplay between consumers and creators. Therefore, the question we should ask is not, " What are the features of an innovative and entrepreneurial society," rather, "What are the features of a society which enables people to express love and charity toward others?" The second question, he argues, will naturally lead to innovation and entrepreneurship.

Today: Poverty in the Developing World by Michael Miller. I'm sure this will focus in small part on Acton's new initiative which launches in a few months, Poverty Cure.

Biblical & Theological Foundations of Environmentalism - Dr. Jay Richards

Myths about the Market - Dr. Jay Richards

Development, Microfinance, and Foreign Direct Investment - Aneilka Munkel

Going Places [5] - Luzern, Switzerland - 'Ta-ka-di-mi-ta-ki-ta'

Luzern is a place, where I would like to live. Every time I go there, Luzern silently invites me to come back. Perhaps, one day I shall be back for good.

 

Accomplished jazz musician (winner of the BMW Welt Jazz Award 2011) and professor of jazz trombone at Lucerne University, Nils Wolgram helps us improve on our trombone playing skills:

 

See also Going Places [1] - Panama Canal, Going Places [2] - Sunday Morning in America, Going Places [3] - Rio de Janeiro - Samba, Bamba, and Going Places [4] Finland and Sibelius - A Quick Visit.