JACK'S BLOG
|
|
|
12/29/2013 7 Comments Where did our politicians learn to lie? It seems our schools may be the root of the problemGood ReadsHow will we learn the lessons that history has to teach us if our teachers lie to us? School has a profound effect on children, even those like me who rebelled against authority. This lesson was drilled into me during the early days of the personal computing revolution. Apple invested heavily to influence children. They donated equipment to schools and children were weened on their products. As a result, they entered workplaces with a strong prejudice in favor of Apple and complained bitterly if forced to work on IBM or IBM-compatible computers. The battle took on religious overtones, much like the ideological battles that permeate politics these days. I was constantly amazed at the zealotry of the younger workers.  Combining the influence of educators with adolescents' natural inclination to rebel against their parents, it is easy to see how the political ideology of young adults has been molded by their teachers and professors. This result has the potential to do great harm when the scholastic curriculum is controlled by a state, especially one that is tyrannical. With every passing day, I find new evidence of the insidious nature of Common Core and thank God that I and my children escaped it. Now I worry about the influence it will have on my grandchildren. Then I discover that the progressives were influencing education in the time that attended school in the late 1940s and early 1950s, even before. I should have known better, but I too was a victim of the propaganda that they infused into my studies. This point was driven home with a vengeance when I picked up a copy of The Myth of the Robber Barons by Burton W. Fulsom, Jr. Although I am painfully aware of the unconstitutional growth of government in recent times and that it was largely facilitated on the back of the Interstate Commerce Act and a misinterpretation of the commerce clause of the Constitution, I was completely unaware of the manner in which the financial and industrial titans who helped build this great nation were unjustly vilified to help foist progressivism onto the American people. There is little hope of undoing the damage until these lessons are corrected in our history books and our children are taught the true nature of liberty and free markets.  Although Fulsom's book is a scholarly work, it is written in a conversational tone. The characters are three dimensional. Fulsom makes no effort to whitewash the Robber Barons. He merely puts them into perspective. The first step in this process is to divide them into two logical classes: The market entrepreneurs and the political entrepreneurs.
Anyone who keeps up with current events will recognize the political entrepreneurs. They dominate today's headlines. Solindra. Sachs-Goldman. The crony capitalists that we love to hate. The ones who have sucked our national treasures dry. Unfortunately, the market entrepreneurs aren't readily visible today. We must read The Myth of the Robber Barons to find the last vestiges of them being driven from polite society in the modern equivalent of the Salem Witch Hunts. I feel sorry for any Millennial who reads this book and dreams of inventing, producing and marketing an innovative product or service. Venture capital is only available to the political entrepreneurs who curry favor in Washington. Market entrepreneurs are left with their dreams, languishing in their parents' basements, wondering how they will ever pay their scholastic loans.
7 Comments
12/30/2013 08:27:25 pm
As always, a thoughtful post and (perhaps?) a little extreme. I certainly agree that schools shape the next generation and that professors/teachers and class leaders may instill in our children skewed points of views!
Jack Durish
12/31/2013 02:26:12 am
Of course, my postings seem extreme. I learned my lessons on being reasonable when I divorced my first spouse. When one is reasonable, he is battling himself as well as his opponent. 12/30/2013 11:09:59 pm
In politics, Jack, we have always lived under the big lie. It's just that with today's instant communication, we hear more lies, and the lies are magnified because men and women in power are always telling new lies to try and hide their old ones. Unfortunately, the team with the bet liars wins.
Jack Durish
12/31/2013 02:05:24 am
Are you suggesting that we are rewarding the liars? That we not only give them permission to lie, but also hold them in esteem for their lies? That we are responsible for the problems and ills resulting from attempting to live their lies? 12/31/2013 03:52:59 pm
Oh how apt that Lincoln quote. I have avoided politics most of my life as I have always felt the futility of fighting the system on any scale. My arena for change was education, but very quickly I realized martyrdom was all that awaited me there as well, for education was not only uninterested in change, it was also uninterested in education. I don't see this going to a good place before it goes to a very bad one. What a waste.
Jack Durish
1/1/2014 03:19:49 am
The creation of the U.S. Department of Education was the beginning of the end. Progressives had infiltrated American education via the system itself. College-educated teachers are predominantly progressives having studied at the feet of progressive professors. However, the DoE gave them the opportunity to form an official Propaganda Ministry. Does sound like an over-exaggeration? Just look at the Common Core curriculum. Google "Common Core worksheets". Once you work your way past the links to govt sanctioned propaganda, click on the links to parents' reactions to them. You may then agree with me that the DoE must be abolished ASAP 5/3/2015 05:13:27 am
Hi, I log on to your blogs daily. Your humoristic style is witty, keep doing what you're doing! Your comment will be posted after it is approved.
Leave a Reply. |
Banner photo and portrait by
Mark Jordan Photography
Mark Jordan Photography
|
Copyright © 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 Jack Durish All rights reserved
|
Web Hosting by iPage
|