Speaking of Insanity

An Epidemic of Stupidity

by Bill Neinast

IN PERSPECTIVE

Anne Murray”s song “A Little Good News” is a lament about the prevalence of bad news in 1983.  If penned today, the longing for a little good news would be even stronger, because bad news has become even more dominant.  

The little good news that does exist is being pushed further back by the growing evidence that stupidity is contagious. 

The contagion has spread to Texas.  The outbreak of the affliction in the state dominated the national news last week just below the coverage of the tanking of ObamaCare.

The severe case of stupidity in the state is being treated in Aledo. That is the home of the football coach whose team beat the Western Hills team 91-0.  The coach pulled his first string after the first 21 plays, played the last strings of his team for all of the second half, and the game clock was not stopped through much of the 3rd and all of the 4th quarter. 

So what is stupid about that?  It is not the game or the coach.  Stupid comes in as the father of a player on the losing team.  He accused the Aledo coach of bullying.  Even though the coach of the losing team has no complaint with his competitor, the Aledo school system was still required to investigate the complaint.

If Mr. Stupid, the father, is ever identified, there should be no objection to picketing his home with signs reading simply “STUPID.”

On the other hand, maybe there should be more sympathy than signage.  After all, as mentioned above, stupidity is contagious.

The bullying complaint was filed just after the publicity of sheer stupidity in another state.  That is the case of honors high school student Erin Cox, who was captain of her volley ball team in a school near Boston.  She went to rescue a friend who had become wasted at a party and realized that she was too drunk to drive.  So she called her friend to come and take her home.  The sober friend did so in her own car.

The not so brilliant administrators in the school of those two young ladies took disciplinary action against both.  Among the punishments of the girl who kept her drunk friend from being a danger behind a steering wheel is removal from her leadership position on the volley ball team and suspension from five games.

This news was being broadcast over radio stations that are airing the Ad Council’s “Friends Don’t Let Friends Drive Drunk” ads involving the young girl whose arm was broken in an auto accident caused by her friend who is “just buzzed, but not too drunk to drive.”

Are the administrators who disciplined one of their sober star students for “associating” with other students who are drinking, stupid or just caring?

To repeat, stupidity is contagious and is spreading rapidly.  The rare day of news is one in which there is no case of applying rules without exercising one iota of common sense.  

The senseless or stupid actions frequently occur under policies of zero tolerance.  

This altering or closing of the thinking process leads to actions like suspending two students from school for playing with air guns that shot soft plastic balls.  They were not on school grounds but were in front of the home of one of those “dangerous shooters” that the administrators thought was too close to school. 

In another recent case, a high school student was suspended for bringing his fishing tackle box to school.  The box was locked in the trunk of his car in the parking lot, but nestled with the tackle was his fishing knife.  That’s it!!  Another case of zero tolerance.

That case could possibly be fodder for a spirited discussion about what is essential to protect school kids left under the wings of school authorities.  If the conclusion, however, is that there can be no exceptions, even for fingernail clippers in one’s pocket or purse, avoiding use of the word stupid becomes increasingly hard.

Less difficult to place in the stupid column is the case of suspending the two youngsters for playing the ageless boy’s game of cops and robbers and pinging each other with their hands cupped in the form of pistols.  Right beside that one is the suspension of the young boy who ate his pop tart into a shape that looked like a gun to his teacher.

The peak of stupidity, however, is reserved for the federal government.  The brains in Housing and Urban Development spent 2.6 million of your dollars to build a complex of 75 apartments specially designed and equipped for the hearing impaired in Tempe, Arizona. Wait a minute, however, denying residency in those apartments for people who can hear would be discrimination.  As a result, only 18 of the units will be made available for the deaf.  

So here’s the perspective. 

The spreading rash of stupidity can be traced directly to the current passion for political correctness.  Everyone is a winner, no one can be a loser.  If a student gets a failing grade, his or her self esteem may suffer, so do not let anything put anyone else in a losing column.  Treating individuals differently, like recognizing some of their unique abilities, would be unfair and politically incorrect.  So everyone always wins an “A” and “F” and thinking is banished from the dictionary.

This list of idiocy proves the validity of the adage of stupid is as stupid does, meaning that an intelligent person who does stupid things is still stupid. 

Obamacare and the Edsel: A Tale of Two Lemons

With the government shutdown you may have missed the press (what little there was) about the problems www.healthcare.gov.  So let me ask a question, if the government after spending over a $500 million dollars with a Canadian firm, can't design and implement a web site that works, how is the world do you think they are going to provide healthcare more efficiently that private providers, whose web sites work, do now!

David Carton at The American Spectator wrote a great article that you might enjoy!

Marc

This makes me Laugh!

 From a major university of higher learning web site! 

"Graduating with student loans? In addition to mandatory online exit counseling, Scholarships & Financial Aid is offering student loan repayment workshops to help you better understand the repayment process." 

The part I laughed about was the "mandatory online exit counseling".  Just strikes me as funny that only the intellectually superior nincompoops that fill the hallowed halls of academia would connect online counseling in the same sentence!  I mean really what could go wrong with that!  

The second part that caused a smile was the, " . . . understanding the repayment process" comment.  Is there really a person who graduates with a four your degree from a major university that doesn't understand you have to repay your student loans?  Well sadly I fear the answer is yes!

Remember these are the folks who shape the thinking of our brilliant American students every day!

You just have to laugh at his stupidity!

The Stupidity Continues!

Please send a copy to all taxing authorities of the "Goose that laid the Golden Eggs".  Phil Michelson wins a bit over $2,000,000 for his work in the UK at the Scottish and British Opens in the last few weeks.  After being taken to the cleaners by the UK, California, and US Phil nets a little less than $900,000.  The taxing authorities confiscated over 61% of his earnings.  Phil has options, much like John Galt, he can move or simply leave the profession.  Who could blame him!

What makes me laugh?

Anthony Weiner looking into the camera, lying to the folks he wants to elect him Mayor of New York City, while continuing his disgusting sexually perverted habit.   What makes this funny is that  intellectual nincompoops in NYC may well elect him!

What makes me Laugh?

A President who was raised by Communists, who has never held a job that wasn't funded by donations (community organizer) or other people's tax money, who now lives opulently off of the American public, who has become wealthy through the deeds of others on his behalf, going around the country making speeches about how to grow the economy!

Who Should Prepare Lesson Plans for Public Schools?

Bill Neinast

IN PERSPECTIVE

There was an interesting discussion at the Brenham Independent School District Board of Trustees meeting last week.  The discussion was over who should prepare lesson plans.  Should it be the teachers or unknown bureaucrats of unknown lineage in unknown hideaways?

The wrong question, however, was being debated.  The question should be why instead of who.  Why are lesson plans required?

Not too long ago, public schools were expected to prepare children for life by teaching the three Rs--reading, righting, and rithmetic.  The schools were funded with taxes on property in the district and controlled by local property owners.

Students passed or failed on the judgment of their teachers and there were no “social promotions” to keep failing students from “losing self esteem.”

Graduates of that system were able to communicate among themselves orally and in writing and were able to cipher (youngsters may have to find the meaning of that word in a dictionary, if any such are still around) well enough to make change even when the computer operated cash register is down.  Those graduates were able to construct huge military bases almost over night, to build the largest, most deadly military force in history, invent the computer and nuclear weapons, and on and on.

After the big war, however, things began to change in the education community.  Learning the three Rs was no longer sufficient.  Now every student had to be prepared to earn a college degree.  Every student meant every child of school age.  

Mentally disabled or learning challenged children had the right to be in the class rooms of their age group and they had to be taught at the same level.  This was the genesis of the dumbing down in education where instruction had to be geared to the lowest level in the class room.

Concomitant with this move to teach to the lowest level was the curtailment of teachers’ authority to maintain discipline and decorum in the class room.  To  publicly humiliate or punish a student might hurt his or her self esteem.

Then it was noticed that some city schools were more modern and nicer than the rural schools with smaller tax bases and that the city teachers were being paid more than their country cousins.

That was not “fair,” so more money had to be funneled into those poor school districts.  The only source for that money at the time was the state government.

So the big guys in Austin who are very magnanimous with other people’s money stepped in to equalize the system.  Big Mistake!  With money comes control.  

Government bureaucrats are not going to ladle out money without the authority to direct and supervise how that money is spent.  And how will they know if the money is spent wisely?  By testing, of course. 

The old testing or teachers’ judgment is no longer reliable.  Only smart bureaucrats isolated from the classrooms can develop tests to discern if the students have really learned whatever it is that they were being taught. 

If too many students from one school fail the tests from on high, it is obvious that neither the teachers nor their supervisors are doing a good job.  So to incentivize   them, we will prepare and require more tests.

These tests then changed character very quickly.  They were no longer viewed as tests of students knowledge, but were tests of teachers ability to impart knowledge.  Failing grades are now the fault of teachers, not of students.

When teacher employability, promotion, and salary became dependent on the grades of their students on tests developed by personnel outside their schools, instruction had to change.  School text books became largely irrelevant if they did not relate directly to those foreign tests.

So teachers can no longer teach to the texts, they have to teach to the tests.  This is a big difference.  The teachers can have a text book in front of them and know how to impart the knowledge in that text to their students.  Those foreign made tests looming at the end of the semester, however, might emphasize things in the text different from what teachers think is important,

So forget what’s in the text, just make sure the students know what bureaucrats think is important.  In other words, teachers must teach to the tests.

The best way to do that is to follow lesson plans developed by bureaucrats on the same plane as the bureaucrats who draft the tests.

That is why the question should be why rather than who.

So here’s the perspective.

Local control of schools in Texas is a fiction.  To keep funds rolling in from higher sources, local schools must bow toward Austin every morning and pray for guidance on how the bureaucrats want the students taught.

We asked for it. We got it.  We must live with it.  There is no turning back. Government bureaucracies are the most intransigent things on earth and no school wants to bite the hand that feeds it.

If a bet is ever proposed on what is more permanent, the pyramids of Egypt or government bureaucracies, put your money on the bureaucracies.

The Mushy Foreign Policy of the United States under Obama

IN PERSPECTIVE

by Bill Neinast

Commentator Charles Krauthammer and Power Line blogger Attorney Paul Mirengoff characterize President Obama’s foreign policy the same way.  They call it mush.

That may be a bit harsh, as mush is defined as a soft, wet, pulpy mass.

  Conversely, there may be some basis for the observation.   What can be deciphered from the conflicting signals emanating from the administration is a mess rather than a mass.

The difficulty in discussing the Obama foreign policy is determining the content of the policy.  The bed rock of foreign affairs is to protect the country from foreign invasion or control and to protect or promote our vital interests.

Currently, the primary vital interest of the country is the preservation and protection of access to energy, particularly from the Mid East.  Today, that interest is inextricably tied to the threat of foreign control or invasion, like the destruction of the World Trade Center in New York, from radical Muslims.

How much energy, i.e. oil, we have to import depends on how much of the need can be satisfied from domestic sources.  Because of significant improvements in recovery techniques in old fields and the development of new fields, experts in the oil patch believe that we can be close to self sufficiency in a few years.

Reaching that goal of self sufficiency, however, requires opening federal land for development, removing restrictions on improved methods of hydraulic fracturing (fracking), authorizing and completing the Keystone Pipeline, ending the war on coal, etc.

Each of these required actions is vehemently opposed by radical environmentalists who believe we should live and commune with nature as the earliest humans did.  As this group is a  major supporter of the class warriors, the chances of Obama crossing them is slim at best.

This means that we will have to continue to rely on oil from the Mid-east many years into the future.  This means, in turn, that we will continue to bow and kiss the rings of the Muslim potentates controlling that oil.

Dealing with the threat or possibility of a Muslim “invasion” is even trickier.    During his first months in office and before he had even a clue as to the complexities of foreign affairs, Obama made his apology throughout much of the world. 

He figuratively beat his chest and said, “We’re sorry.  We’re sorry we provided a shield for you through the years and funneled trillions of American taxpayer dollars into your coffers.  Forgive us and we will relinquish our spot as leader of the pack.”

If those speeches did anything, they established the United States as a severely weakened player on the international football field.

Heeding this new posture of the formerly strong country in North America, the Muslim Brotherhood openly took up arms against Hosni Mubarak.

Mubarak was the dictator of the largest Muslim country on the planet, but he was a staunch friend of the United States and was in the forefront of maintaining peace with Israel.  Barak’s response was to throw Mubarak under the bus by suggesting that he resign and to welcome the rise to power of the Muslim Brotherhood through the “democratic election” of Mohammed Morsi. 

When millions of Egyptians began to protest the movements of Morsi toward a Muslim dictatorship under Sharia law, Obama’s response was to suggest negotiations.  Then when the Egyptian military comes to the aid of the protestors,   we take no action to keep the Muslim Brotherhood in check, but suggest negotiations instead.

The Suez Canal is in Egypt.  Keeping that vital link in the supply line of oil from Saudi Arabia and other oil producing countries in friendly hands seems to have no apparent effect on the Obama team’s involvement.

Similarly, in Libya when the rebels attempting to overthrow Mummer Gadaffi, a recognized enemy of the United States, requested assistance, Obama suggested a no fly zone, but then “led from behind” and let France and England do the work.

Possibly the worst wiggle in our Mid-east policies, however, was Obama’s bluster of establishing a “red line” in Syria.  Threatening involvement if President Basher al-Assad used chemical weapons against those intent on deposing him.  

The use of those weapons has finally been acknowledged by Obama, but where is his promised reaction?  

So here’s the perspective.

Say what you will about President George W. Bush.  There is no question, however, that he said what he meant and did what he said.

Other countries knew exactly what the United States wanted and that it would do what its leaders said under Bush.  

Today, the rest of the world has no clue as to what we expect or whether we will do what we say.

That’s a heck of a way to run a country.

How is your blood pressure?

By Bill Neinast

Slacker is not heard so often today as it was 75 years ago.  During WWII, the word was frequently used as an epithet for a man who was avoiding military service.

That pejorative term came to mind recently while reading Dr. Stuart Yoffe’s comments on the prisoners in the Washington County jail who are drawing monthly SSI checks from the U.S. Treasury. 

Dr. Yoffe believes that many of the SSI prisoners he treated in jail were fully capable of productive work but had managed somehow to get on the federal disability dole.  While the county was providing them free room and board, they were getting monthly checks of federal money that average $600.

He calculates that, if there is only one such prisoner in each of the 254 county jails in Texas, “we are spending at minimum $64 million on non-disabled individuals just in Texas.”

As my blood pressure was returning to normal after reading those statistics, another Banner Press hit my doorstep.  “Taxpayers shell out nearly $3.7M for ex-presidents” was headlined on page 2 of that issue.

Those millions did not include the amounts spent to provide the very necessary security for our former leaders.  This was money for offices, secretarial help, postage, travel, etc.

Thinking about shelling out $64 million a year for dead beats in jail and another $3.7 million for individuals at the other end of the economic spectrum shot those blood pressure readings back into the stratosphere.

The largess for those poor presidents who have been sent back home is provided under the Former Presidents Act of 1958. Under that act, ex-presidents get a lifetime pension equal to the annual rate of basic pay for the heads of executive branch departments. 

This pension is “earned” after just four or eight years of service.  In 2011, that meant the federal treasury piled $199,700 on top of their personal income.

Congress, however, was looking out for the poor taxpayers.  The act provides that the pension is taxable.

Except for Truman, and possibly Ford, every president during the last 100 years has been a millionaire or in the highest echelon of the upper class. So providing rich people with such benevolence is as bad or worse than sending SSI checks to prisoners.

Another blood pressure enhancer was on page 3 of the same paper.  It reads, “USDA expanding program to fight poverty in rural areas.”  The gist of the article is that Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack was in South Carolina to kick start new initiatives in the war on poverty.

Interestingly, the only activity in this program that is discussed in the article is the assistance being given to Larry Harris.

Harris has been operating a “small” farm for 15 years.  The USDA is now going to help him dig a new well so that he can expand his farm and grow vegetables.

That’s fighting poverty? 

In the 40 years that my father owned and operated a small retail business in Somerville, he expanded or improved the physical plant four times.  He got the money for each expansion or improvement from his own operating budget.

So why is government assistance needed for Harris to expand his business?

The budget foolishness discussed here is so minuscule in the overall scheme of the massive federal budget that it probably will not be noticed by sincere  reformers.  Thus the vexatious question is how, when, and why did these items get in the budget to begin with?

So here’s the perspective.

SSI payments for prisoners, pensions for well heeled presidents, and wells for farmers are the proverbial tips of the iceberg.  If the entire ice berg of foolish federal programs were melted, however, the problem would not be solved.

The problem is the mind set of most of our elected representatives in D.C.  As a group, they seem to lack any understanding of why budgets must be balanced, with income equalling or exceeding outgo.

If the long list of wasteful spending identified by Representative Paul Ryan were eliminated during this session of Congress and if the safety net entitlement programs were controlled, the fix would be only temporary. 

Until common sense individuals like Dr. Ben Carson, Senators Marcus Rubio and Ted Cruz, Governors Nikki Haley and Bobby Jindall, and others like them get into positions of decision making prominence the country may patch a few pot holes but will continue down the same old road.

Eliminating some of the pot holes, however, may be good for blood pressure.

Wasserman-Schultz: My Aides on Brink of Starvation

WASSERMAN SCHULTZ: MY AIDES CAN'T AFFORD GOOD MEALS

By MIKE FLYNN  | Breitbart.com

On Tuesday, FL Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz and her colleague VA Rep. Jim Moran openly whined about the impacts of spending cuts on their personal office budgets. Moran fretted that, with the looming sequester cuts, he may have to cut one staffer from his office. Wasserman Schultz upped his ante, however. She, almost literally, suggested that her staff were on the brink of starvation, due to the cuts. 

Speaking at a hearing of the House Legislative Branch Appropriations Subcommittee, Wasserman Schultz worried that prices of meals in House restaurants are getting so high that aides are being "priced out" of a good meal.

At the carry-out cafe in the Cannon Office Building, where Wasserman Schultz has her office, you can get an 8oz bowl of Ham and Bean soup for $2. You can buy gourmet sandwiches and wraps for around $5. Both of these are cheaper than I can get at delis down the street from my house. 

Her aides could walk across the street to the Longworth Building, which has a large sit-down cafeteria. Today, it is featuring a roasted stuffed Chicken, with asparagus and mashed potatoes, for around $7. Or, one could opt for a heaping 12oz bowl of Chicken Chili for $3. 

There is also the tried and true method enjoyed by millions of workers around the country: a brown-bag lunch. 

Wasserman Schultz's top aide earns around $160k a year. She pays two additional aides around $120k a year. She has five additional aides who earn between $60-100k a year...

Read more: http://nation.foxnews.com/rep-debbie-wasserman-schultz/2013/03/22/wasserman-schultz-my-aides-brink-starvation#ixzz2OLkbQebR

And it is worth pointing out that none of these looming sequester cuts (reductions in spending increases) has even hit yet. 

Is it any wonder why Americans simply don't believe what Congress tells them?

OMG - The Sky is Falling, The Sky is Falling

My friend Bill Neinast's regular column discusses the Henny Penny's tactic used so regularly the world has tuned him out.

Bill Neinast


IN PERSPECTIVE
Not a single plane fell from the sky.  No elevators stopped forever between floors.    Ninety-nine percent of the world’s population is still alive.  None of the ground water under Washington County has been sold and siphoned off to metropolitan areas.  Flu did not devastate the country.  Finally, as of this writing, the federal government is still alive and well.

This is an abbreviated list of catastrophes recently predicted that never occurred.  Remember that at one second past midnight on Dec 31, 1999, airplanes, elevators, and anything dependent on computers would crash. When that occurred, very few people would be effected because most of the world would have succumbed to AIDS.

Although AIDS is a devastating disease, the world’s medical community rose to the occasion.  Through the development of medicines and education, at least in developed countries, the disease is now just another serious but controllable condition like cancer and other deadly diseases.

By now, according to one scenario, Washington County would have been drained dry by “Water Barons.” There was nothing to fear, however, because another bureaucracy would be created to challenge those Barons.  You know, those friendly guys who say, “Hi!, I’m from the government, and I’m here to help you.”

At the crucial time back then, the voters were smart enough to say, “No thanks.  We have too many bureaucrats already.”  Everyone, including those in panic mode over this, are still drinking, cooking, showering, and watering their gardens from the same local sources as before.

Although the flu was more widespread than normal in the last few months, the extraordinarily long funeral lines did not develop.  Now the disease is not even making the evening news.

The most ridiculous of all these bugaboos is the one kept alive and hyped by President Obama.  On his campaign stops, and that is what they were, he was scaring his staged audiences with predictions of a virtual governmental slow down or shut down if the Republicans did not compromise and give him more “revenue enhancements.”

As the leader of the tax and spend party, he is the one who would not compromise.  He refused to come off his, “If we do not make millionaires and billionaires pay their fair share, I will not approve any budget cuts.”

If that failure to come off his demand for more taxes is compromising, why is the Republican failure to abandon its insistence on attacking the problems with budget reductions a refusal to compromise?

In any event, as of this writing, the sequester has been in effect for more than 48 hours and the federal government is still alive and well.  Actually, the left leaning press is even beginning to question the President’s prediction of disaster.

The Washington Post is now assigning its caricatures of Pinocchio with a nose that gets longer with each lie to the President’s and cabinet members’ tales of dire consequences if the sequester takes effect.

Secretary of Education got four Pinocchios for his claim that 40,000 teachers could lose their jobs.  The President got two Pinocchios for his claim that janitors and security personnel in the capitol building would get pay cuts.  The Architect for the Capitol and the Sergeant at Arms who supervise those employees also denied this claim by the President.

Senator John Cornyn recently commented on the President’s scare tactics. 

He stated, “To put this in perspective, lets look at what a 2.4 percent cut to a family budget would look like. To reduce their spending by 2.4 percent, the average Texas family would need to:
 “Run cars on 94.7 gallons of gasoline a month instead of 97 gallons per month
“Find $6 in savings from a $250 monthly grocery budget
“Look for ways to conserve $4.20 from a $175 monthly utilities bill
“All working Americans had to figure out how to make ends meet with 2 percent less in their paychecks last month when the payroll tax expired. How is it that Washington can’t do the same?”

So here’s the perspective.

The sequester will cut $85 billion from a $3.8 trillion budget.  Relatively speaking, if this sentence represents the budget, the cut is equivalent to the period at the end.

The effect of the cuts can be ameliorated by moving funds among line items in each department’s budget.  Some claim that the President already has authority to make those moves and the Congress is willing to give him specific authority to do so.

He refuses to do so, however, because that would weaken his arguments of impending doom and blame for the Republicans when the economy goes South this year.

Rising gas prices and the pay cuts that kicked in for all American workers on Jan 1 when the reduction of payroll taxes expired will be major factors in the slip back into recession. 

You will never hear that from the White House.  Everything coming from that source will be that any down turn is due solely to the Republicans insistence on spending cuts only and no new taxes.

All of this over a 2.5% cut in a budget that has grown by 17% in the last five years.

The sky did not fall on Henny Penny’s head.  All the feared catastrophes mentioned above fizzled.  A good bet, therefore, is that the feared “devastating” effect on the bloated federal government will meet the same fate.

Oh, the irony of stupidity!

And we wonder why there are security leaks from "inside the beltway"?

If you are in the military in this country you must go through a rigorous security clearance process before you can be exposed to, work with, see or handle any classified information that could impact the security of the United States.  It takes weeks and sometimes months for security professionals to check your character and background before a security clearance can be granted.  Not everyone who is screened is granted a clearance, there are many reasons for denial of a clearance!  As I understand the process if you happen to have prior illegal drug use, or perhaps have been engaged with former known terrorists you would be denied a security clearance.

Ironically, if you are elected to the office of President, Vice President, or one of the other 435 seats in Congress and/or Senate or you are appointed to a cabinet position you do not have to undergo a background check or security clearance investigation.  Yet these folks have access to all levels of security information and there are more than a few instances where "loose lips" have cost American lives!

Wouldn't it seem reasonable that anyone running for a national office should be required to obtain a security clearance before they could even enter the race for a national office?

I would bet serious money that if this were the law we would see an significant improvement in the quality of applicants and leaders who run this country and a much needed improvement in the security and safety of this great Country!

Just a thought!