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

A Grand Compromise for consideration by the GOP

Offer up a bill that:

1. Eliminates the debt ceiling.  It is a false number anyway, provides no real control, is never enforced, and allows the idiots to aggravate themselves and the taxpayers with their stupidity.
2. Enact zero based budgeting effective immediately, no further automatic increases for anything.
3. Sunset all current legislation and government programs over the next five years.  All programs will have to be re-jusified every five years including welfare, food stamps, and income taxes.
4. Require every American and illegal immigrant, including those on government assistance (welfare, food stamps, AFDC, etc) pay a minimum 5% tax on all funds received from all sources.
5. Since the Democrats have yet to pass a budget, we revert to the 2006 budget levels upon passage of the bill.  
6. In future years require a firm budget to be passed prior to the start of the fiscal year.  If a new budget is not passed then the prior year budget, cut by 20%, automatically takes affect. If Congress fails to pass a budget automatic budget reductions will go into effect and no one in the House, Senate or White House (or their staffs) will be paid until the next budget cycle.  If they can't live with that, they can resign and get a real job!
7. Once a budget is set Congress & White House must live within the budget, no exceptions.  If extraordinary measures (direct attack on the US mainland by some idiotic nut cases) require a budget increase, Congress must pass a clean budget approval for the specific event.  No other amendments, special projects, ear marks or other non related attachments.
8. Stop all multi-topic bills.  One bill one topic, vote for or against.  Amendments related to the bills topic will be allowed but no none related amendments or ear marks!
9. Revoke all special provisions for Senators, Congressmen and the White House, and their staff members, starting with all Obamacare subsidies. Force them to live under the same laws, same benefits as our military.
10. Let Obamacare continue to evolve, let all delays and waivers put in place by the White House stay, except for the congressional subsidies (see 9 above).  Obamacare will fail on its on, once the low info voters realize they actually have to pay for healthcare.  Let next years congress take up the fate of Obamacare.

 Marc

Inarticulate Republicans!

"The Republican speaker of the House of Representatives, John Boehner, epitomized what has been wrong with the Republicans for decades when he emerged from a White House meeting last Wednesday, went over to the assembled microphones, briefly expressed his disgust with the Democrats’ intransigence, and walked on away. . . and yet, with multiple television-network cameras focused on Speaker Boehner as he emerged from the White House, he couldn’t be bothered to prepare a statement that would help clarify a confused situation, full of fallacies and lies.

If Republicans want to show some seriousness about articulating their case, they might start by deleting the abbreviation “CR” from their vocabulary. As has been said, “the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” That journey is long overdue."

The above is an excerpt of an article in National Review by Thomas Sowell, the most brilliant economist ever to have lived.  Read the entire article here! - Marc

Henny Penny or Chicken Little is at it again!

IN PERSPECTIVE

   by Bill Neinast

Henny Penny or Chicken Little is at it again.  This time, however, she has morphed into members of Congress and the TV networks.

Her message has changed too.  The sky is no longer falling but all the guns going off have her clucking that Armageddon is just around the corner.

Members of Congress are getting hours of free TV time bemoaning the spate of mass shootings in this country.  Their agitation, of course, is that the government must do something to prevent this from ever happening again.

Henny Penny did not convince anyone that the sky was falling.  Will Congress have better luck in panicking the country?   

This is not to belittle or treat lightly the tragedies of the Navy Yard, the theater killings in Aurora, Colorado, the Newtown school rampage, the Fort Hood terrorist attack, and similar incidents.  None should have happened.  None should happen again.

The task facing Congress, however, is much  simpler than the one faced by the chicken. Why can the hand wringers not see it?  

All that is needed is a law to prohibit such activity.  Just make it a crime for anyone to kill another person and impose a punishment of life in prison or execution for anyone who violates the law.

What?  You mean there are already laws on the books that do just that?

Well, then pass laws to keep guns out of the hands of individuals who might use them to kill someone.  Requiring back ground checks on anyone who wants to buy a rifle might be the answer.

What?  There are already laws requiring such checks?

Gee, this is harder than it first seemed.  Is there not a single new law that can be dreamed up to stop this slaughter?

What about prohibiting assault weapons with magazine clips that hold more than ten bullets?  That, at least, would prevent incidents like the one at the Navy Yard.

What?  Aaron Alexis did not use an assault weapon?  TV newscasters reported for 48 hours or more that the murder weapon was an assault weapon.

What?  You say he used a 12 gauge shot gun like the one quail and water fowl hunters use in their fall and winter outings?

Well, unless those things are plugged to the three shell limit, they can be loaded with six shells.  So why not ban all weapons that hold more than two or three bullets or shells?

What?  That would ban weapons like the old faithful “six shooters” that helped tame the west?

All of this seems to leave only one solution.  The possession of any weapon, regardless of size, shape, magazine size, and possible use, will have to be prohibited.  This is a law abiding country and every man, woman, and child with access to any prohibited weapon will certainly scamper to turn it in for scrap metal.

OK, it’s time to take my tongue out of my cheek.  The foregoing is a facetious attempt to illustrate the obvious.  Laws to prevent the rash of mass shootings were already in effect when the killings occurred.  In every case, the weapons were either legally acquired or stolen.

Unfortunately, also, the recent mass murders are nothing new in this country.  Grant Duwe’s  2007 book Mass Murder in the United States: A History chronicled 909 cases of mass murder between 1900 and 1999.

There is, however, one major difference between the murders of the 20th and 21st Centuries.  That difference is today’s instantaneous, mass communication, particularly TV coverage.  There is concern by some that flooding the airwaves with the repetition of what was done and how it was done may encourage copy cats or some who want to make a name for themselves.

Aggravating that weeklong repeating of the gruesome pictures and detail of each crime scene is the tendency for the news coverage to be slanted and inaccurate.

An example is the totally inaccurate reporting of the Navy Yards massacre for at least 48 hours.  That slanted reporting was that Alexis entered the facility with an AR 15 and several pistols. 

The facts that finally broke through are that he entered the installation where he worked with a 12 gauge shot gun that he had bought legally a few days previously and acquired the pistols from security guards that he killed or wounded during his shooting spree.

So here’s the perspective.

The loss of the innocent lives mentioned above is hard to understand and accept.  

The grieving surviving family members deserve our sincere sympathy and understanding.

The number of innocent lives lost is those massacres, however, pales in comparison with the number of lives lost in automobile accidents caused on highways every day by drunk driving, speeding, reckless driving, texting, inattention and negligence of every imaginable type.  

There are ample laws on the books to prevent every one of these deaths at the end of a gun, in an automobile, or under other circumstances.

Let’s send Henny Penny back to her cage.  Quit screaming about the lack of protection of life and begin enforcing existing laws.  One more law will not avert a single heinous act being hatched in the minds of sick individuals.

Politics

“Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it whether it exists or not, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedy.”

It Don't Cost Nuthin' to Be Nice. . . .

This story has probably been told and re-told, embellished and perhaps improved upon many times.  I got this from the internet so . . . . . let’s just call it a legend because Bear Bryant certainly is a legend.  Regardless of whether this story is true or not is irrelevant, however the message certainly is profound and one we all need to heed.

The message:

The lessons your mama taught you are right. It don't cost nuthin' to be nice. It don't cost nuthin' to do the right thing most of the time, even when it cost, it always cost less to keep your word than it does to lose your good name by breaking your word to someone.

Enjoy the Legend

So the legend goes like this . . .

At a Touchdown Club meeting many years before his death, Coach Paul "Bear" Bryant told the following story:

I had just been named the new head coach at Alabama and was off in my old car down in South Alabama recruiting a prospect who was supposed to have been a pretty good player and I was having' trouble finding the place.

Getting hungry I spied an old cinder block building with a small sign out front that simply said "Restaurant." I pull up, go in and every head in the place turns to stare at me. Seems I'm the only white fella in the place. But the food smelled good so I skip a table and go up to a cement bar and sit.  A big ole man in a tee shirt and cap comes over and says, "What do you need?"

I told him I needed lunch and what did they have today?

 He says, "You probably won't like it here, today we're having chitlins, collared greens and black eyed peas with cornbread. I'll bet you don't even know what chitlins are, do you?"(small intestines of hogs prepared as food in the deep South) I looked him square in the eye and said, "I'm from Arkansas, I've probably eaten a mile of them. Sounds like I'm in the right place." Everyone in the restaurant smiled as he left to serve me up a big plate. When he comes back he says, "You ain't from around here then?"

I explain I'm the new football coach up in Tuscaloosa at the University and I'm here to find whatever that boy's name was, and he says, "Yeah I've heard of him, he's supposed to be pretty good." And he gives me directions to the school so I can meet him and his coach.

As I'm paying up to leave, I remember my manners and leave a tip, not too big to be flashy, but a good one and he told me lunch was on him, but I told him for a lunch that good, I felt I should pay. The big man asked me if I had a photograph or something he could hang up to show I'd been there.

I was so new that I didn't have any yet. It really wasn't that big a thing back then to be asked for, but I took a napkin and wrote his name and address on it and told him I'd get him one. I met the kid I was looking for later that afternoon and I don't remember his name, but do remember I didn't think much of him when I met him. I had wasted a day, or so I thought.

When I got back to Tuscaloosa late that night, I took that napkin from my shirt pocket and put it under my keys so I wouldn't forget it.  Back then I was excited that anybody would want a picture of me.

The next day we found a picture and I wrote on it, "Thanks for the best lunch I've ever had."

Now let's go a whole bunch a years down the road. Now I'm back down in that part of the country scouting an offensive lineman we sure needed. Well anyway, he's got two friends going to Auburn and he tells me he's got his heart set on Auburn too, so I leave empty handed and go on to see some others while I'm down there.

Two days later, I'm in my office in Tuscaloosa and the phone rings and it's this kid who just turned me down, and he says, "Coach, do you still want me at Alabama?" I said, yes, I sure do.  And he says OK, “I will come”.

I ask, well son, what changed your mind?

His answer surprised me, "When my grandpa found out that I had a chance to play for you and I had to you no, he pitched a fit and told me I wasn't going nowhere but Alabama and wasn't playing for nobody but you. He thinks a lot of you and has ever since y'all met."

Well, I didn't know his granddad from Adam's housecat so I asked him who his granddaddy was and he said, "You probably don't remember him, but you ate in his restaurant your first year at Alabama and you sent him a picture that he has had hanging in that place ever since."

That picture's his pride and joy and he still tells everybody about the day that Bear Bryant came in and had chitlins with him since y'all met."

"My grandpa said that when you left there, he never expected you to remember him or to send him that picture, but you kept your word to him and to Grandpa, that's everything. He said you could teach me more than football and I had to play for a man like you, so I guess I'm going to."

I was floored. But I learned that the lessons my mama taught me were always right. It don't cost nuthin' to be nice. It don't cost nuthin' to do the right thing most of the time, but it costs a lot to lose your good name by breaking your word to someone.

When I went back to sign that boy, I looked up his Grandpa and he's still running his place, but it looks a lot better now; and he didn't have chitlins that day, but he had some ribs that would make Dreamland proud and I made sure I posed for a lot of pictures; and don't think I didn't leave some new ones for him, too, along with a signed football.

I made it clear to all my assistants to keep this story and these lessons in mind when they're out on the road. If you remember anything else from me, remember this. It really doesn't cost anything to be nice, and the rewards can be unimaginable.  ~ Coach Paul "Bear" Bryant