This one is more than a little creepy, so bear with me. After you read the article, which I found on Hotair, we’ll discuss it in a broader sense than just a bunch of 8 year old children being asked by the State to rat out their parents in New Jersey. Before anyone points out to me that the Governor of New Jersey is a Republican and would be considered by some to be an actual conservative, let me destroy that rebuttal now. Chris Christie is Governor, but the apparatus that he won the right to manage has been built by a Democrat power structure that has been in place for decades. The Education system in America has been the province exclusively of the most committed leftists in this country since the early 1970’s, and this has been true regardless of who has occupied the White House.
For context, some appropriate quotations from our Constitution:
AmendmentI.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of
religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging
the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right
of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the
Government for a redress of grievances.AmendmentIV.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses,
papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and
seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue,
but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affi rmation,
and particularly describing the place to be searched,
and the persons or things to be seized.
From the article:
Seriously now, how hard is to write questions for third-graders that don’t (a) address creepy topics like cannibalism, (b) ask how many slaves it would take to pick an orchard clean, or (c) intrude on their and their family’s privacy by asking them to write about a secret they had trouble keeping? The answer obviously is (d) very.
Choices a and b were the stuff of math homework assignments earlier this year in schools in D.C. and Georgia, respectively, while c appeared on a statewide standardized test in New Jersey just this week. The test, given to 4,000 students, was a dry run for the Garden State’s Assessment of Skills and Knowledge.
snip:
The Associated Press quotes Susan Engel, a lecturer in psychology and director of the teaching program at Williams University, who said the question isn’t troubling to her:
Asking about secrets is a good way to get children to write, she said. And, she said, children at that age are unlikely to say something that would offend their families, or even bare their own souls. ‘I think by and large, kids are not going to tell a real secret,’ she said.
That reaction begs the question of what to do in the case where children do reveal real secrets—and closely guarded ones at that.
With absolutely no respect to Susan Engel, this has nothing to do with teaching children the basic skills of writing. There would literally have to be thousands of better suited topics for the purposes of getting kids to open up and strut their creative stuff. What I did on my summer vacation always seemed to be a good topic to get the kiddies writing. This has everything to do with getting children to feel comfortable with the concept of ratting out their parents. It has everything to do with getting kids to feel more comfortable confiding in the State and the representatives of the State than with their own families.
As creepy as all of this is, it pales in comparison with the prospect of having a man like Barack Hussein Obama put in charge of a Big Brother apparatus poised to take complete control of America. You may think I am being a little hysterical here, and perhaps I am. It’s just that we already have real live examples of this being played out right now. Barack Obama personally threatening Romney campaign donors with IRS audits and worse is nothing more than old school Chicago style thuggery in action. What’s new about it, is that now it is coming from the White House itself, and not just Mayor Daley’s office in the Windy City.
Richard Nixon had an enemies list as well, and he paid a heavy price for it. He lost the respect of much of the nation, and deservedly so. He was lambasted in the media for it, and deservedly so. There is one major difference between Richard Nixon’s enemies list, and the current version being kept by Barack Obama. Richard Nixon, who was known for his paranoia, kept a list of enemies whom he thought were in fact enemies to the national security of the United States. Barack Obama is keeping a list of people who are enemies to his electoral prospects. While Nixon’s list was probably reflective of that as well, he at least attempted to rationalize it in his own mind. He felt he was doing the right thing, for the benefit of the nation. Barack Obama hasn’t the encumbrance of believing in or caring one wit about our nation. His list is simply meant as a means to create harassment for people who would help to seek his ouster come November, which is a protected right of every American Citizen as guaranteed by the First Amendment.
What should frighten us all however are these two stories combined. Think for one moment of the prospect of your children being asked in their schools to let the public sector union teachers know in advance which of their parents are contemplating financial support of someone opposing Barack Obama’s reelection bid for his 7th term as President. Then the phone call comes from the office of his Unity Czar, Van Jones, very subtly laying out your options in the pay to play life we all will be subjected to. “Nice family you got there, it would be a shame if your allotment of health care units would be cut in half. If your wife for example should meet with an accident, you might not have enough units to get her the treatment she needed.”
The problem with the above paragraph of course is that most of it has either been passed into law already, or put into actual practice by various bureaucracies. The only thing missing from the unfortunately already possible scenario would be Obama’s ability to serve more than 8 years as President. But if you had asked me 20 years ago if we Americans would be willing to give up our entire cadre of Constitutional Freedom for an empty promise of Hopety Change, I would have sworn that you were nuts. If this was possible, than yes certainly repeal of the 22nd Amendment would also be possible.
