Once More, From the Top!

Or, My Rant in Defense of Homeschooling

Here is a little (snort) note I left as a comment on this poor woman's blog this morning, found as I was perusing local blogs. I certainly don't expect everyone in the world to agree with me, but I am getting really tired of having to 'explain myself' every time the subject of homeschooling comes up. Her post was just the same old, same old, hackneyed, tired, worn-out stereotypical rant against homeschooling, written after meeting a mother who works full time and homeschools two kids at the same time. The blogger goes on to condemn homeschool parents who dare to put their kids into sports programs or other activities associated with the public schools in their area, saying it should be an all or nothing proposition. In her defense (and she has a really cute name for her blog, lol), she did concede the point in a response to my comment.

Note: If you think you are one of the 'friends and family' I mention below, you probably are. I still love you, I just wish you would not get your panties in a bunch over something that really has nothing to do with you. I am not judging you, so please give me the courtesy of doing the same.

You didn't say how old these kids are, but if they are old enough to be left at home alone, then they are certainly at the point in homeschooling where most of their curriculum can be self-directed, with grading being done by mom and dad later in the day, or, if they are doing online classes (which most homeschoolers I know are doing these days), the work is monitored remotely. In this day and age, you can 'spy' on your kids from any computer, or even you phone, seeing exactly what they see on their screen at home or in another room. Not to mention the fact that actual 'class time' needed for homeschoolers is WAAAAY less than the 6 or 7 hours spent in a traditional school, due to the individual attention given to these kids. Most elementary grades don't need to spend more than 2 hours, with a max of usually no more than 4 hours for higher grades.
Please don't lump everyone in who homeschools as 'weird', when you don't know them personally. I do not homeschool (yet), but I am leaning heavily towards it, for financial and other reasons, and I am getting these same stereotypical judgements from close friends and family even, who really don't understand the motivation behind this decision. My girlfriends with kids in public school immediately get all defensive if the subject of homeschooling arises because (in their 'everything is about me' little world) they assume YOU are judging THEM, roflol!! Nothing could be farther from the truth. It's not about the school, I live in an area with the best public schools around (Great Bridge). It's not even about religion, or some holier-than-thou ideal that I am earning points in heaven or something like that. It is, however, about curriculum, and my kids learning styles, and character training, and the individual attention that some kids with ADD and other issues need.
Now I was lucky enough to grow up around a lot of homeschooling families (I went to Va Beach public schools myself), and I have a lot of friends today who do it. Yes, one or two are what some people might call 'weird', but isn't weird just a label for 'unfamiliar', 'not like me', 'different', etc? But they are a tiny, tiny minority of the millions of families that choose to follow this path. 99.9% of the kids and adults I know that are/were homeschooled have gone on to excel in their life pursuits, not handicapped in any way. In fact, these people and their example are a big part of the reason I defend homeschooling whenever I hear these stale myths being dragged out again. I am sorry this is so long, but I guess I am just as passionate about defending this very personal choice as some are to condemn it.

Here's a link to some interesting stats, if you would like to educate yourself on this topic a little better.
http://www.hslda.org/docs/nche/000010/200410250.asp

Oh, and yes, I absolutely would take advantage of every single resource available to me as a parent, especially public school sports and other extracurricular activities. The taxes used to pay for those non-academic pursuits is MY MONEY. You jump through hoops every year to get your tax refund and wouldn't dream of leaving off a child or two worth of deductions, would you? It's YOUR MONEY. You ever apply for a student loan or grant in college? Hello! No difference. Shoot, I would apply for and gladly accept any kind of government assistance/food stamps/WIC/whatever if I qualified, AND fight for welfare reform at the same time, without one ounce of guilt. Anyway, I am not here to berate or guilt you into or out of anything, just to provide information and open up a window of understanding on something that is much maligned and sorely misunderstood.

It's bad enough I have had to justify my decision to put my kids in private school, and a religious one at that. I have just had it up to here with people who don't know jack about a subject, or have had very little exposure to something, thinking they are the expert and know how to run everyone else's life around them. That kind of thinking is what got us a Socialist in the White House. I also just don't get the passion (fear?) that this topic seems to engender in people when it comes up. It's worse than discussing race relations or abortion! What is it about the choice to homeschool that freaks people out so much? Are folks afraid they may take over the world? That it might actually work? What is so threatening about that? I don't know.

Whew. Now, again, for those of you who still think I am judging your decision NOT to homeschool, or feel that MY decisions regarding MY children will somehow negatively affect you, let's say it all together now, "It's NOT about YOU". That is all.

Win free flowers and support the Troops!!

From Emom at Mail Our Military blog....

Monday, February 2, 2009
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Cap n' Trade is Not a Character on Spongebob

What is Cap and Trade? I kept hearing the term and had no idea what it was, but now that I do, I am sorry I asked. Cap and Trade is a system of selling so-called 'carbon credits' to companies to offset the pollution they create as a byproduct of their manufacturing. These credits are limited, or 'capped' at a certain amount per company, and those who need to make up the shortfall in credits can 'trade' with other companies that produce less waste. The problem lies in the limits, and the huge fines awaiting the non compliant. With only so many to go around, corporations will be forced to significantly reduce their emissions, either by costly retrofitting, or completely shutting down operations in some cases. And don't think it won't affect you. Operating costs will skyrocket, in turn inflating the retail prices of whatever product is being manufactured, be it automobiles, vacuum cleaners, food products, toys, anything. And in this difficult economy, it will be fatal for some industries.

These credits could be completely arbitrary, assigned by a government bureaucracy, more than likely headed by an environmentalist. It is a money making scam, akin to the indulgences sold to the faithful in centuries past. And they say environmentalism isn't a religion. This is also a liberal scheme to gain power over private industry, a dangerous tool that, hand in hand with a few other lovely policies, can cripple our economy in a very short time. This bill of goods will be sold to the American people as a wonderful thing protecting them from the big evil polluting corporations (and they have those deep pockets anyway, right?), preying on the fears of those uneducated to the big lie of global warming.

I don't believe for one second that those in power in Washington attempting to implement Cap and Trade are doing so for the good of the environment. It is purely for power, and to grow the government's size and reach to unheard of levels. Oh, and who doesn't want the government to run every aspect of our private industry? I mean, they are the best and most efficient at everything they put their hand to, right? This is just one more attempt to push us down that slippery slope towards a full on nanny state.

Fairness Doctrine Smackdown

There has been a lot of talk lately about the so-called Fairness Doctrine, and how it will be a damper on free speech because of it's "equal time" provision. Well, I want to explain what it all means for those of you confused and scared by these implications. Without getting into the long involved history of it, the fairness doctrine was established in 1949, suffered a constitutional challenge in 1969, which it survived, setting a legal precedent, and was finally revoked in 1987. The actual language from the 1969 ruling is as follows,

"When, during the presentation of views on a controversial issue of public importance, an attack is made upon the honesty, character, integrity or like personal qualities of an identified person or group, the licensee shall, within a reasonable time and in no event later than 1 week after the attack, transmit to the person or group attacked
(1) notification of the date, time and identification of the broadcast;
(2) a script or tape (or an accurate summary if a script or tape is not available) of the attack; and
(3) an offer of a reasonable opportunity to respond over the licensee's facilities."

This last requirement is what has caused all the worry, and has been popularly interpreted, albeit somewhat incorrectly, to mean that your favorite radio talk show host will be forced to stop speaking freely his/her opinions. While I agree that passage of a bill allowing enforcement of this doctrine would be chilling to free speech, it is not the end of the world. Now don't start sending me hate mail, let me finish! What I mean is that relatively speaking, we have much bigger things to worry about than the fairness doctrine (more on that later...), and secondly, the implementation of this rule-set will be much more harmful to the radio station owners/companies themselves than any individual talk show host or radio personality. You see, the FCC only has jurisdiction over the license holder, the broadcast station. They cannot force anyone to say or not say anything. What they can do is fine the station owners for not providing equal time for the 'opposing view'. For example, Rush Limbaugh does not have to let some liberal talking head onto his show for half of his planned broadcast time. The station carrying his broadcast must provide that time, at their own expense even, if a person or group with opposing viewpoints requests it. And you know they will. Here's the problem. The station is now forced to give away valuable broadcast time, that no advertiser is going to want to support, time that before would have been filled with some kind of revenue-producing programming. I mean, let's be honest, left-leaning radio broadcasts have never attracted a following big enough to justify commercial time to any large advertiser. Can you say 'Air America'?

The current iteration of the fairness doctrine was most recently defeated by Congress in the summer of 2007, but will be revived should the Democratic Party gain a veto-proof majority in the House (which is entirely possible come tomorrow). I am sure that whoever proposes the next bill will try to include internet content such as bloggers, which I oppose more from a 'keep your filthy paws off my internet' perspective than any attempt at censorship. There are a lot of good reasons why the fairness doctrine is bad, besides the obvious ones, and the arguments used to support it in the past just don't hold water anymore. There are so many outlets for varying points of view today that you couldn't read/listen to/watch a fraction of them if you tried. Gone are the days when you got your canned news in neat little prescreened doses at the end of a long day. Today you get your news fresh and raw on your phone via texting the instant it happens, before it has a chance to even hit the mainstream media filter. And analysis from someone you can create a rapport with, not the cute guy in the blue suit on channel eleventy-seven who is reeeeeeally good at reading a teleprompter.

A little something my friends and I like to call the mainSTREET media.

Unfortunately, there is already in place an 'equal time' provision in the US Code, relating specifically to political campaigners. If you really want to make your head explode, take a gander at Title 47, Chapter 5, Subchapter III, Part I, Subsection 315. Talk about micromanagement! I am of course aware there is such a thing as creeping incrementalism, and we must fight this just as vigilantly as any other possible encroachment on our freedoms, but sometimes we must pick and choose our battles. After all, how many of us thought 6 months ago we would be in bed with Hillary supporters, singing the praises of John McCain, of all people?!

Alas, we can fret and worry over the fairness doctrine, but I believe there are bigger fish to fry, and their name is Cap and Trade and the Employee Free Choice Act.

Ship of Fools

Well, well, well. There was one thing that made being forced to sit through HSM3 on Friday night with 7 giggling tweens worth it, sort of. I got to see a commercial about a new series from Animal Planet featuring a beyond leftist named Paul Watson, and his ship of fools, the Sea Shepherd. If environmentalism is a religion, then this guy is their pope. Let me splain: Back a few months ago, I read a bit on Drudge about some moonbat who proposed that having children was the most environmentally criminal thing you could do. Yes, you heard me... he doesn't believe that we should be procreating anymore, since it is the single most harmful thing to do to the earth. And his name was Paul Watson, none other. Specifically, he's the one who said that humankind was a "virus" that needed to be eradicated. At the time I first read that, I looked him up at his foundation and sent him a nastygram with my opinion of his idiocy, but apparently Animal Planet doesn't realize this guy is advocating the end of the human race, their main demographic, and gave him a show. The premise of the show is how these brave activists go out on their trusty ship and throw molotov cocktails at Japanese whaling boats. They are shocked (shocked, I say!) that the fishermen dare to defend themselves and fire back!! This man and his crew have a long history of dangerous, criminal attacks on many ships around the world, and has endangered the lives of MANY fishermen, sailors, and the police forces attempting to protect legitimate working people. I plan on sending my next nastygram to Animal Planet, protesting their glorification of this criminal. It took me less than 20 minutes to find all of the horrific details of the exploits of these people. You would think Animal Planet's legal department could have done a little homework before giving this libtard a platform.

If it won't go down, call Brown!!

I wonder if Bill Ayers had gone into a different line of work, would the elite left would be so quick to circle the wagons around him? Like, oh, say, plumbing?? Or if he had bombed an abortion clinic instead of a federal building, would 3,000 educators have signed a petition supporting him? My friend Sherri tried calling a bunch of those supposed 'college professors' using the info provided on their petition, and quite a few the schools listed had never heard of them, or the person who signed the petition was a student, not a professor at all. And NONE of the ones she contacted would come on her show and defend their stance. Hmmm.

Update!! Here's a related photoshop from my friend Joi the Artist, who rocks!