In the short haul, my wife and I agree that the USA is a pretty darned good place to live and our freedoms are partly what makes it great to live here. Barb and I are pretty different in how we want our Government to ensure the freedoms we have. I think the Constitution backed by the Bill of Rights is a pretty darned good start and only minor tweaking is needed by the States and Local Governments. Even that tweaking should be very minor and driven by the differences in the location of the States. I feel that when Barb and I talk, she loves the ideas of the rights but feel the Government needs to step in more than I do to ensure the maintenance of those rights.
Therefore, I as a conservative think that the Government intrudes to guarantee our rights and the unintended consequences of that intrusion offsets a lot of the gains. In the 1960's, just as most of the States were becoming more accepting of the color of a man and understand it is character not color that is important, the US Government stepped in with a broad sweeping set of programs to ensure equal rights. We created programs to build housing and throw money at the poor that in a lot of ways took their pride and inner strength away. We housed them in projects that dehumanized them and were in a lot of ways not as safe as where they lived before. Instead of building families, we made it easy for their families to survive without the male in the family. In fact, I think we punished the typical poor married family by providing a surrogate dad to provide money, housing, parenting and day care. Where did the vibrant black owned businesses in out small towns go to?
I want everyone to have the opportunity to work hard and get an education. Based on that body of work and the education, I want everyone to be as successful as they can be. I will also refuse to feel sorry if the people out there don't get that education or training to get a job that pays them well enough to live like they want.
One thing Barb and I do agree on is that the cost of an education is steadily growing way more than the cost of everything else and has reached a point where the return is often below the investment cost. She attended Junior College in Kala-li-Fornia and attended for little more than the cost of the books. OK, I understand that the great State of oranges and sunshine is going broke right now but who isn't. My point is that education must change and stay fairly cheap if we are to progress. Who said that all the brick and mortar Universities are important? I got my education at one just as the Computer world was starting and little has changed at KU. (Other than they have coach Bill self and a few more trophies) If all the people in Academia worked as hard to find good ways to learn and utilize the computers, inter-nets and mass communication medias they could keep the cost down. Or, even make it cheaper, lord forbid they would ever do that.
Sometime in the near future, I will be sitting on the beach somewhere south of here and kicking back for a week or so. I plan on spending time with the boys (Austin and Ryan) and learning how to smile on my face as much as I do in my heart. One time in the middle of a discussion period, one of my students asked me why in spite of a great attitude I didn't smile much. I asked them what that was all about, couldn't they tell I loved the time I spent with them and was bursting with pride when they did well? Well, NO! Was their answer. I guess you can take the Colonel out of the Army but you can't take the Army out of the Colonel.
I am going to work on my smile.
MUD
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