Private sector union membership has been on a slow and steady decline for decades. While union leaders decry the numbers, saying that good union jobs are disappearing, the reality behind unions is much more complex. To an extent, they have become a victim of their own success.
With literally nothing to show for the $100 billion it has wasted so far, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services wants even more money to "strengthen" Head Start, a preschool program its own study finds is a failure.
Not only aren't your children learning much of anything in public school, they may well be in mortal danger, thanks in part to the attitudes and beliefs of their teachers and school administrators.
Here, we talk to Sam Blumenfeld, the legendary critic of state controlled education, and the man who predicted that the look-say method of teaching reading would produce millions of illiterate American children.
Imagine being a child who takes peppermint into school -- and is suspended for it and told he or she engaged in "wrongdoing". Imagine being a parent who has his or her money forced from him in order to perpetuate this school system, and can get little if any satisfaction in changing the bad system.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture is buying beef and chicken to serve to your children in public school that fast-food chains reject as poor quality or even unsafe.
In this special reissue of Gardner Goldsmith's extensive essay on the dangers of government, he explains why even Thomas Jefferson overlooked some of the inherent contradictions inherent in the "small government" concept of Locke. Please enjoy this, part two of Gard's discussion of fundamental principles. It will serve as a bulwark against statists of all kinds.
After years of writing about how governments abuse, murder, and imprison innocent people and destroy life around the world, I find that I have been wrong, really wrong. All this time, I wrongfully tried to convince readers that terrible things are done in the name of "good government," and now I have to apologize to them.
So many of the world's billionaires and other great achievers, past and present, never graduated from high school, or never even went to school at all, that one begins to wonder if there's a pattern here. Could removing your children from public school entirely be a key to their future success?
When I think of public schools, the first thing that comes to mind now is the high school principal who was removed from his position and escorted from the building by police because he wanted his teachers to use lesson plans. Everyone knows public schools are broken. Can they be fixed?
If you consider yourself a citizen of the United States of America, or of any other country, you should not watch this video until you have mentally prepared yourself to have everything you believe in challenged. You have been warned.
Separate school and state? But how will children get an education unless the government gives it to them?
We've all heard the real economic news by now, or worse, experienced it. You've gone to the bank to find it closed, or you've gotten laid off, or you're just feeling the pinch in your wallet as money grows ever tighter. You need to understand how and why it happened if you're going to get yourself out of this economic mess, because surely you've figured out by now that your so-called leaders in Washington aren't going to do it; they seem hell-bent on making things even worse for you.
Economics isn't merely a dry, boring study of money. It is, boiled down to its essence, a study of human nature: how people interact and trade with each other. Since this obviously involves money, there is no shortage of people who want some of that money for themselves, when they haven't earned it. And the chief ways in which they take that money are to confuse people and to establish governments.
How has government violated your rights to life, liberty and property? Tell us your story.
The United States Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, commonly known as WIC, distributes vouchers for food for low-income families. Among the food distributed is about half the infant formula in the entire U.S. According to a study from the University of Hawai'i, WIC's distribution of infant formula not only distorts the market for infant formula, it puts these infants at risk of illness and death.
"Federal, State, and local governments are responsive, innovative, and effective because of the outstanding work of public servants."If you believe that, I've got some critical infrastructure to sell you. But Congress certainly seems to believe it, unless they've recently taken to passing satire off as Congressional resolutions.
California Polytechnic State University, Pomona, is persecuting its own librarian for trying to save 300,000 library books from destruction, threatening to have him brought up on criminal charges for simply trying to tell people that the university is planning to destroy the books to make room in the library for a full-service Starbucks Coffee.
Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) drew a crowd of 150 supporters to Pembroke, N.H., late Saturday night to support his potential bid for the Republican Presidential nomination.The fundraising reception, organized by a supporter and held at a private home, raised over $14,000 for Paul's campaign.
Your most private personal information is not truly safe anywhere except in your own head. Several examples this week show that it's certainly not safe with the government.
Under a European Union directive tabled this week, anyone found denying or even questioning the official history of the Holocaust or recent conflicts in Africa and the Balkans could be punished with up to three years in jail.
In today's complex society it's more important than ever that all Americans understand how to be good, patriotic citizens. Obey these simple rules and the government will let you live your life without too much harassment.
The Texas State Legislature has introduced a bill that will fine parents $500 if they miss or choose not to attend a meeting with their child's teacher.
On Thursday, the Fairfax County, Virginia, school board voted to defy the U.S. Department of Education and not test immigrants with the same reading exams as their native English-speaking peers.
California Assemblywoman Sally Lieber plans to give California parents a lesson in parenting -- whether they like it or not.Next week, she will introduce a bill that will outlaw the spanking of children under four by their parents, a move that has sparked a flurry of both criticism and support in California and beyond.
The rite of custom brings us together at a defining hour -- when decisions are hard and courage is needed. We enter the year 2007 with large endeavors underway, and others that are ours to begin. In all of this, much is asked of us. We must have the will to face difficult challenges and determined enemies -- and the wisdom to face them together.
The Department of Defense will remove some personal information about high school students from a military recruiting database and shorten the amount of time it keeps the information, a civil liberties group announced last week.
One of the many goals of No Child Left Behind is to decrease the "achievement gap" between rich and poor, white and minority. We already know that isn't happening. At the center of the debate is often money. If these schools only had more of it, they could solve all their problems. In fact, the states themselves seem to generally favor NCLB if only they got a larger portion of the taxpayers' income.Much of what No Child Left Behind seeks to accomplish is "contrary to the letter and spirit of the Constitution and subversive of the whole theory upon which the Union of these States is founded."
Yes Virginia, many people do socially beneficial things without taxpayer support! Take homeschoolers. "Please" say those who think homeschools turn children into illiterate religious nuts. As opposed to illiterate godless nuts. No such thing as a godless nut? Think again.
Homeland Stupidity is a bit over two years old, so as 2006 draws to a close it's time again to look back at what has passed, and to look forward at what may come.Some other site I read is doing a "Top 20 posts of 2006" as a year-end review. But I've always been about bringing attention to important things which might otherwise pass unnoticed, so I'm going to do something different: The top stories you probably missed.
I think there is something fundamentally wrong with a society that has become so violent that we must have a show of armed government force to keep order in a public school. If anything should hint to America that school is no longer a safe place for children, the perceived necessity of police force should.
Virginia is planning a pilot program for the state's proposed universal preschool program. The pilot program is to begin next year for 1,000 children and gradually expanded to include all four year olds in the state.
Henry David Thoreau once said something like: "There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root."And that's what we defenders of liberty must begin doing more of: striking at the root of evil.
Research done by Tel Aviv University Professor of Psychology Avner Ziv confirms that students retain more information when humor is used effectively to illustrate important points. Of course, humor is very subjective, but here is a roundup of stories that I have run into recently that are at least worth a smile.
It is possible for students from lower socio-economic backgrounds to achieve at levels equal to and even superior to their more economically advantaged peers. The problems inherent in poverty are great, but they are not insurmountable. I know this because I have seen it done, and the children involved are not statistical anomalies.
On Tuesday, school districts in Michigan, Vermont and Texas, together with the National Education Association asked a federal appeals court to revive an old lawsuit, arguing that schools should not have to comply with requirements which aren't funded by the federal government.
Beginning in 2007 all Florida eighth grade students will be required to choose from a list of state-approved "majors." School board member Sandra Richmond thinks the program won't "do too much damage."
Nine year old Tyler Stoken of Central Park Elementary School had always been instructed to write about the first thing that entered his mind on such tests. The first thing he thought of, however, was his principal as a witch. He thought this was mean, so he left the answer blank.Under normal conditions, a student may be encouraged to fill in a blank item or asked why he left it blank. But under the intense pressure of No Child Left Behind's testing component, conditions are not normal.
The state has failed to provide effective oversight of public school children in foster care. Now a candidate for Michigan's state legislature has stated that he intends to give the state the power to destroy the lives of homeschooled children in his state.
Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings notes that college graduates have an unemployment rate of 2% as compared to an overall unemployment rate of 4.6%. This, I guess, is not tolerable.
"As Americans we must always remember that we all have a common enemy, an enemy that is dangerous, powerful, and relentless," humorist Dave Barry once wrote. "I refer, of course, to the federal government."This, apparently, is "patently offensive" to State-worshipping academics at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wis.
Is it possible to have a society without a government?The Center for a Stateless Society would say so.
Do we want our next generation's philosophy of government based on China's and India's philosophies?
A rash of fatal school shootings has again brought the physical safety of our students to the forefront of education discussions. On Tuesday, President Bush announced plans to form a conference on school violence to see what federal action can be taken to support communities in preventing violence and dealing with its consequences.
For all of you libertarians who are hearing new calls from Democrats saying that they, not the Republicans, are now the party of smaller, less intrusive government, I say to you, do not believe it.Especially do not believe Markos Moulitsas, who, despite getting some undue attention for his fatally flawed "Libertarian Democrat" idea, is still, by his own admission, a socialist authoritarian at heart.
Why is it, Secretary Spellings, that we are so graciously praising mediocrity and penalizing success?I want my children to learn so much more than how to answer multiple choice questions based on lower order thinking skills and how to fill in all the bubbles neatly with a number two pencil.
The reforms advocated by the Commission for the Future of Higher Education and reiterated by Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings are sweeping and invasive. Through No Child Left Behind, the Department of Education has successfully hindered the progress many schools were making toward greater proficiency. So we are going to extend these same principles to high school, and to colleges and universities which have long been viewed as the best in the world.
The Lincoln Park (Mich.) School District passed a controversial dress code which prohibits school students from wearing T-shirts with any images, writing or political statements on them, including 9/11 commemorative T-shirts and copies of the First Amendment.
One of the greatest hypocrisies of No Child Left Behind since the beginning has been its "fourth pillar" of "local control and flexibility." Federal involvement by its very nature is the antithesis of local control, and every school is being forced to show more concern for following the federal mandates than addressing the concerns of the parents whose children they are responsible to educate or risk losing their funding.An internal review from the Department of Education Office of Inspector General has found mismanagement of funds and a violation of legal and ethical standards.
September 17, Constitution Day, celebrates the signing of the U.S. Constitution in 1787 by 55 delegates at the final meeting of the Constitutional Convention. It has served this nation for over 200 years and is the cornerstone of our liberty. How dedicated are we to the basic principles on which it rests? Our students do not even know basic information about our founding documents, let alone the principles upon which they are built.
The Bush administration has been engaging in an Orwellian tactic known as doublespeak in its justification for the global war on terrorism, according to a paper published by the Cato Institute last week.
Is homeschooling such a dangerous threat to the health and safety of children that all homeschools must be regularly monitored by the state, with visits from social workers and medical records kept by school officials?
As many as 21,000 students who applied for federal student financial aid may have had their personal data compromised after an error with the U.S. Department of Education's Financial Student Aid web site showed other users' personal data to logged in users, the department said.
The purpose of the Secretary of Education's Commission on the Future of Higher Education is to analyze higher education in four areas: access, affordability, quality and accountability. Change "accountability" to "trackability" and we might have a more accurate reflection of one of the main sources of controversy surrounding this document.
Last week, the Secretary of Education's Commission on the Future of Higher Education released a report on the future of higher education which details perceived problems in our higher education system and proposed solutions. But the recommendations threaten to damage postsecondary education much as No Child Left Behind damaged K-12.
The Government Printing Office on Wednesday published the 2006-2007 U.S. Government Manual, which "provides comprehensive information on the agencies of the legislative, judicial, and executive branches" as well as "information on quasi-official agencies, international organizations in which the United States participates, and boards, commissions, and committees."It makes a great indicator as to how the federal government is growing out of control and desperately needs to be scaled back.
With current emphasis on tracking every aspect of American life, it is of little wonder that one of the hottest young businesses is nFocus, an Arizona-based software company specializing in developing and marketing tracking software to schools, community organizations and government agencies.Children spend 87% of their time outside the classroom, clearly time that the state cannot so easily monitor or direct. KidTrax helps to fill this gap.
Early America boasted an educational system almost entirely supported by local communities without tax money. And they gave rise to one of the most literate societies of the time, with literacy rates perhaps higher than today. Consder the fact that the Federalist Papers, rarely read today even in universities, were written for and understood by the common man. Today, our focus seems to be minimum competency, measured through minimum competency testing for the purpose of establishing a competitive workforce.
Welcome to the 56th Carnival of Liberty, celebrating the principles of Life, Liberty and Property, a weekly whirlwind tour of the blogosphere's best writings on these principles.
Over the past several years, Columbus Public Schools have lost 7,000 students to charter schools. More students are expected to leave this fall with the implemenation of school vouchers. This may prove to be a serious issue for Columbus Public Schools. According to a survey by KidsOhio, only 49% of CPS parents with preschool-aged children plan on sending their children to CPS when they reach school age.
Hacking is the process of discovery. It's unrestrained curiosity channeled to self-directed learning. As I prepare to leave New York City after attending my first hacker conference, the thing foremost on my mind is this: Why do so many people consider learning a bad thing?
In 1971, Michael Hart invented the eBook and founded Project Gutenberg in one stroke. Now he wants to give away 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 eBooks. That's one quintillion eBooks. And he's sure it can actually be done.
Republican Rep. Bob Bishop has asked lawmakers and education officials in his home state of Utah for input on the No Child Left Behind Act in preparation for debating its reauthorization.But most of those officials want the law repealed entirely.
The National Center for Education Statistics released a study Friday comparing private and public schools and factoring for socio-economic differences between the two populations. The study measured fourth grade and eighth grade reading and math achievement using the National Assessment of Educational Progress, which has been testing children for more than thirty years to provide information to policy makers. In summary, the report concludes that after factoring for population differences, there is little difference in achievement for students in public vs. private education settings.
Perhaps best known as the "guy with the baseball cap," former Silicon Valley heavyweight and current U.S. General Consul to Bermuda Gregory Slayton, who spent years in Asia and Africa studying how to improve the economic situation of the poor in the Third World, has taken a stand on education.
Welcome to the 53rd Carnival of Liberty, where we celebrate the rights to life, liberty, property and the pursuit of happiness. "That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed," Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence.
With No Child Left Behind, there is an increasing focus on standardized testing as a means of assessment. This is not a new phenomenon, nor is it unique to the public school system. At every turn, there is a test waiting to be taken, whether for school, college or the workplace.But actual performance is routinely overlooked in favor of test scores in attempting to predict a student's subject mastery, readiness for higher education or ability to perform in the workforce.
Research overwhelmingly shows that parental involvement in education leads to greater student achievement. In fact, in his 1984 review of 29 studies of school-parent programs, Herbert J. Walberg found that the family's involvement in education was "twice as predictive of students' academic success as family socioeconomic status." More intensive programs lead to effects ten times greater than other factors.
Minarchism, sometimes known as "minimal statism", is a governmental framework that aims to keep government as small as possible and places an emphasis on constrained government power, minimal spending and minimal levels of intervention. Minarchism is in keeping with liberal tradition and has won particular favour amongst libertarians.
The National Education Association approved a plan Monday to aggressively lobby Congress to reform the No Child Left Behind Act. Only three of the 9,000 members argued against the lobbying effort, saying the act was too flawed to reform.America's largest education union, the NEA has been critical of the act but this will be "the most organized effort to date."
A little known provision buried within the No Child Left Behind Act requires schools receiving federal funding to provide military recruiters with student information, including names, telephone numbers and addresses.The Pentagon's database includes birthdates, Social Security numbers, courses and majors, grade point averages, email addresses and ethnicity for high school and college students.
On June 20th, Kareem Elnahal gave his valedictory speech at Mainland Regional High School in Limwood, N.J., quite different from the speech school administrators were expecting. He does not look fondly upon his education, challenging what education has come to mean."Ladies and gentlemen, the spirit of intellectual thought is lost," Elnahal said.
With a growing number of security breaches involving the U.S. government mishandling personal data, it seems one would become increasingly wary of entrusting government entities with any information of a sensitive nature.Unless you are in Virginia and are trying to track sex offenders.
The No Child Left Behind Act, signed into law by President Bush January 8, 2002 includes as one of its measures the standard to staff our public schools with "highly qualified teachers" by June 2007. The main difficulty with this is that school districts are suffering chronic teacher shortages across the nation.
"The state is the Supreme Court. Our decision is as follows: No more private property. No more you."You are nothing. The state is everything.America spent a good part of the 20th century battling that message, and inexplicably, just as it seemed we were winning, gave up and adopted the message as its own.
Are your children in public school?If they are, get them out now, before it's too late.Otherwise, this is what could happen:
We know how to teach children to read. The techniques are well known and private schools and tutoring systems do it all the time. One of the best known examples is Sylvan Learning Center, which guarantees to improve a child's math or reading skills "by one full grade level equivalent in only 36 hours of instruction." Why can't public schools teach children to read?
If you want to make a better life for yourself, if you have long-range goals, or if you reject collective ideologies such as socialism and Communism, Seattle Public Schools say you're a racist.
John Stossel, "scourge of the liberal media," has written a second book, Myths, Lies, and Downright Stupidity: Get Out the Shovel -- Why Everything You Know is Wrong which, unfortunately, I haven't had a chance to read yet. However, I did get a chance to hear Stossel speak about his new book Tuesday at the Cato Institute.
Members at a Chicago, Illinois-area school district have decided that student blogs they deem inappropriate may lead to denial of extracurricular student privileges. The Community High School District 128, ironically headquartered in Libertyville, Ill., voted Monday night to amend the codes of conduct at Libertyville and Vernon Hills High Schools to read, "Maintaining or being identified on a blog site which depicts illegal or inappropriate behavior will be considered a violation of this code."
It's been a very slow news week. As it turns out, Congress was in recess (read: on yet another vacation), so not too much was going on. Here are three leftover headlines which you might have missed while the talking heads were trying to figure out what to talk about.
It must be Week of the Weird. This week I've gathered three of the strangest examples of stupidity of government officials ever to cross my desk.
Welcome to the 40th weekly Carnival of Liberty! As always, the Carnival is full of amazing attractions with fun-filled adventure for the whole family.This is the first time the Carnival has been here at Homeland Stupidity, and I have to say that the hardest part of hosting the Carnival was keeping all of these excellent posts hidden away until Tuesday. And now that they're here, come one, come all, and enjoy the Carnival!
Bits is a bit shorter this week, as I'm experimenting with yet another new format (which you'll see shortly). In the meantime, here are four news headlines from the last week showing just how dumb your government is.
Updated Mark Twain said that "Truth is stranger than fiction." The Chinese have a curse: "May you live in interesting times." I'd say we certainly do live in interesting times, and here's some very strange truth that bears that out. A University of Texas herpetologist went completely off his rocker and called for the eradication of 90% of living humans.Generally, I try not to devote too much time to talking about insane wackos who need to be locked up in white padded rooms. But this particular insane wacko drew the ire of one of my childhood heroes, and is drawing praise from almost every confused college student who hears him speak.
The ridiculous lawmakers in the state of Michigan want to outlaw the dissemination of information on how to make methamphetamine. The bill, approved by the state Senate, now goes to the House. Under the bill, the state attorney general could sue web sites which provide information on how to make methamphetamine, according to WOOD-TV.So I'm going to tell you how to make methamphetamine.
Going to a private Catholic high school is no guarantee of getting a good education, as several students of Padua Academy, a girls' school in Wilmington, Delaware, found out, when boys from Salesianum School, the Catholic boys' school across town, came over and asked Padua students to sign a petition to end women's suffrage and videotaped them doing it.
The House of Representatives and Senate both voted Saturday in favor of a Constitutional amendment to repeal the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution. The proposal had overwhelming bipartisan support, receiving a 371-55 vote in the House, and a 91-8 vote in the Senate. The proposed amendment now goes to the states for ratification.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, still just another three-letter agency despite their attempts to become more self-important, is moving into a new headquarters building in Washington, D.C. And because they don't want the walls to be bare, they asked their own employees to go home, and have their children draw pictures of what they thought their parents do at work.That was yet another foolish mistake on the part of the government, as a few of them actually did.
Government bureaucrats are the same everywhere. That is, they're stupid. And today's stupid bureaucrat is Jerry Taylor, city manager for Tuttle, Oklahoma.
The federal government wants to perform mental health screening on infants and get them started on drugs which they will take for their entire lives, if the drugs don't kill them first. And you're going to pay for it, whether you want to or not.
If you're new to the idea of liberty, you are sure to find valuable and useful information from The Advocates for Self-Government, a non-profit organization which you're probably already familiar with. The Advocates publish The World's Smallest Political Quiz and are responsible for Operation Politically Homeless, two wildly successful libertarian outreach programs. Today I'm going to tell you a bit more about The Advocates, why I just sent them $50, and why you should too.
It's very easy to take for granted the normal, everyday things and people in our lives. As many of us know, it can also be a terrible mistake to do so. When is the last time you told your significant other how you feel? Yeah, that's what I thought. Go do it now. This message will still be here in a couple of hours.Welcome back. I hope you had fun. Today I am talking about something else we as Americans take for granted, and do so at our peril: our freedom.
Last week I posted the results of a recent poll, asking: What is the proper role of government? As it turns out, this is a hotly debated question, and one that, at least in the U.S., most people don't at all understand. In fact, one reader's misunderstanding was so thorough that I couldn't possibly address it in a single comment, or even a single post.Welcome to the first post in the Liberty 101 series.
Homeland Stupidity is everywhere you look these days. And now, you just might see me posting about it at other Web sites.In the last week or so I've managed to guest blog two posts at two different blogs which you may be interested in reading (or may not care at all about.)
Not sure what a word means? You might be one of millions of Americans who turned to Merriam-Webster to find a definition. And Merriam-Webster's top 10 most looked-up words reveal that Americans are looking for the definition of integrity.
Zach Rubio, 16, of Kansas City, Kan., who is fluent in English, was at school, when his friend asked him, in Spanish, between classes, to borrow some money. He said yes, and shortly thereafter, principal Jennifer Watts suspended him.
An eighth-grade student in Stronghurst, Ill., compiled a list of people he found annoying, and once school officials found out, they expelled the student and notified law enforcement.
Mack Bedor went to the bathroom one day at school, and was shocked to find a video camera. He wasn't sure what to do, so he took out the camera, took it home and showed it to his mother, Cindy Champion. School officials gave him a five-day suspension for "stealing school property."
School police at Hartford Public High School and Bulkeley High School in Hartford, Conn., are writing $103 tickets to students who swear at teachers.
Karl Marx would love the popular moves among politicians in various state governments and the federal government to ban so-called "junk" food in schools, and to "put healthy food in" convenience stores and on the tables of those they define as poor. It's a very elitist and arrogant mindset that promotes this ideology, and it needs to be addressed.
Ultimately, the war supporters in Congress prevailed in the vote on the resolution. Still, the vote was significant because it places every member of Congress on the record as supporting or not supporting the unconstitutional, costly, violent occupation of a country that never attacked us. This vote should serve as an important reminder to the American people of where their representatives really stand when it comes to policing the world, empire building, and war.
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