"...In An Ideal World, Just Knowing All The Words To 'Blank Space' Won't Get You That 'I Voted' Sticker...

Old saying.

A conservative is a liberal who got mugged.

New saying.

A conservative is a liberal who has reached an age where the truth about freedom becomes unavoidable.

I've said before, and often, that I don't like the whole liberal/conservative concept because it oversimplifies the complex hard wiring of the operating system inside each and every one of us as human beings.

And unlike pregnant, for which there can be no "a little bit", it's not only conceivable, but factual, that we, the people, can be liberal about many things while being conservative about others.

Insisting on wearing, or tagging others with, a single designation of "liberal" or "conservative" is like saying that you, or they, are always only "happy" or "sad" or "generous" or "selfish".

And we are never only one thing.

Meanwhile, back to the truth about freedom.

I don't remember when I discovered it.

But I've been writing about it and talking about it on the radio shows for quite a while now, never more so, or more often, than that moment the presidential campaign of 2016 began some, uh, what has it been now, about five years ago?

(New spin on old joke....doctor says I've got only a year to live, I say, oh my God, is there anything I can do?....doctor says just watch all the debates and news shows you can find regarding the election...I say will that cure me?...doctor says, no, you'll still die but it will be the longest damn year of your entire life....)

And that truth about freedom is a little off putting when people hear it for the first time.

Especially the people to whom it specifically applies.

And...coming up....in just a few minutes.....you'll hear.....that truth.

But, first.....

Matt Walsh is a blogger, talk radio host, husband, and father of twins. And like most bloggers and talk radio hosts, he is, depending on whether you sling your particular political dirt clods at people from the left or from the right, either an inspiration or an idiot.

Hey, buddy, I feel your pain.

The Walshster and I, though, find ourselves on the same side of one particular issue, of late. And although Matt has a wider audience  (he's younger and that rebel/rogue shit seems to get you in doors you might not otherwise get to even knock on....not that there's anything wrong with that), I'm pretty confident that I was beating my regional tom tom about this very issue long before Matt waxed prolific on his own blog site.

I mention that not by way of trying to hog limelight, but just to affirm what he has to say here.

It's a simple, if potentially volatile, premise.

It's really time we stop letting people vote.

Read what he has to say.

I'll be back with my two cents.



If you’re like the majority of Americans, you labor under the faulty and quite ridiculous assumption that everyone should have the right to vote. Even more outrageous, you probably think our nation is somehow benefited when everyone exercises that right.

It should be of some interest that our Founders — you know, the guys who came up with this whole “America” idea — had no such notion in mind. They only gave the vote to landowners, which, of course, had the effect of automatically disenfranchising blacks and women.

Thankfully, over the course of the next century and a half, voting was opened to those groups. But somewhere along the way we got it into our silly little heads that allowing whites, blacks, men and women to vote meant we must allow all whites, blacks, men and women to vote. We rightly did away with race and gender discrimination at the polls, but ran too far in the other direction, erroneously deciding that there ought to be no discrimination of any kind. We declared voting a “sacred right,” and the best way to preserve its sanctity, we determined, is to shake the whole mass of the American electorate out of their drooling stupor for long enough to randomly cast a ballot based on which candidate has the nicest smile or most inspiring campaign slogan.

In those early days of America, when relatively few citizens had a say, we ended up with leaders like George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison. In recent times, with voting open to most adults, and with politicians and celebrities and Hollywood galvanizing the barely sentient hordes to intrude upon the electoral process of a nation they know nothing about, we’ve been subjected to a long succession of tyrants and buffoons in the White House and other elected offices. This all culminated in the record number of chumps who flocked to the ballot box in 2008 and settled on an obscure, corrupt, cliche-spewing left-wing radical named Barack Obama. And now many of those same negligent voters have brought us near the precipice of electing the likes of Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, or Bernie Sanders.

Enough is enough, I say. Not that it matters what I say. As a basically informed voter what I say matters less and less with each election cycle. That’s the whole point, after all. Those in power aim to cancel out the Informed Vote by drowning it in a sea of stupidity and self-interest. They back up their dump trucks and bury the Discerning Minority under a mountain of ignorance and apathy.
To make matters worse, the whole dastardly conspiracy is disguised with righteous platitudes about “civic duty” and “honoring the Constitution.” They encourage half-awake voters to close their eyes and throw a dart in whatever the direction the wind is blowing, and then they hand out “I Voted” stickers and send the semi-cognizant citizens home with an unearned sense of accomplishment.

Civic duty is a real concept, but our first and foremost civic duty is to be informed, aware, invested, contributing members of society. Alas, that duty proves too difficult for some, so they vote every two or four years and figure that’s good enough. But claiming to have done your civic duty by voting in ignorance is like saying you practiced gun safety by getting drunk and playing Russian roulette.

If we wanted to correct the problem, we’d adopt the following three point strategy. I know this plan will never happen, but I’ll flesh out each point anyway, in hopes that perhaps some of the more honest members of the Incompetent Voter Community might decide to abstain from voting for the sake of the common good.

In my dreamland where things are reasonable and laws are written in accordance with common sense, here’s what we’d do to repair our electoral process:

1. Require Every Voter To Take And Pass A Fifth Grade Civics Exam

If you think planes fly because of pixie dust, you don’t belong in the cockpit. If you think chicken can be consumed if it’s cooked medium rare, you don’t belong in the kitchen. If you think the phrase “branches of government” has something to do with arboriculture, you don’t belong in the voting booth. This isn’t a debatable proposition. If you lack even basic, fundamental knowledge about our government, our laws, and the current political scene, you should not be anywhere near a polling station on voting day. A country that cares about preserving itself would in fact take steps to legally enforce this point.

I’m not suggesting every voter should have a degree in American History or Political Science. I’m merely saying every voter should be able to stroll into any fifth grade social studies or history class on exam day and at least escape with a passing grade. I’m saying, as an adult, you shouldn’t be able to walk into an elementary school cafeteria during lunchtime and discover that the discussions of politics and current events are flying over your head.

In other words, you should not be among the majority of American adults who can’t describe the purpose of the Constitution, or identify the Speaker of the House, or name one of the senators from your home state, or name your governor, or give a brief explanation as to the function of the Judicial Branch. And you certainly shouldn’t be one of the ignoramuses who constantly pop up in dumb-guy-on-the-street videos reacting with confusion when asked to name the winner of the War Between the States, or the century of our country’s founding, or which side America fought on during World War II, or who our nation’s capital is named after.

I would suggest a simple 10-question quiz, covering the questions listed above, administered at the polls on voting day, with an exceedingly generous five minute time limit. Answer seven out of 10 correctly and, after showing your photo ID, you can vote. Answer four to six correctly, and your voting privileges will be suspended for a period of two years. Answer zero to three correctly, and you’ll be exiled to an island in the Pacific.

Perhaps that last step is a bridge too far for some, but at a minimum we need to prevent these people from inflicting their willful ignorance on the electoral process. If it’s illegal to drive while drunk, it ought to be illegal to vote while clueless. There is a real moral imperative here. If you honestly have no idea how the government works, I believe you have a moral responsibility to stay home on election day. If we lived in a more rational nation, that moral responsibility would be a matter of law.

Some might worry that such a system would be abused, but I would argue there’s a lot more abuse in a system that allows and encourages people who can’t name the vice president to vote in federal and state elections. Indeed, the entire system is abuse.

2. Abolish Early Voting

We refer to “voting day” but in reality it’s more like “voting week” or “voting month.” It’s apparently too ambitious to expect citizens to get to the polls during a particular 12 hour span, so now we can leisurely saunter in at some point vaguely within the time frame of the election. Instead of 12 hours to vote, we’re given a gaping window of 80 or 100 hours or more.

This is problematic for a few practical reasons, namely that people are voting before the candidates have actually completed campaigning. The Louisiana GOP primary on Saturday was called for Trump about 20 minutes after the polls closed because so many people voted before they opened that day. That means many of them probably voted before Trump’s disastrous Michigan debate. 

They cast their ballot for him, then turned on the TV to see him bragging about his penis size. Perhaps that wouldn’t have changed their minds, but it’s nonetheless foolish to officially give your vote to a candidate before he’s finished making his pitch.

That aside, why shouldn’t voting be a bit inconvenient? Sure, The Powers That Be would make it as effortless and passive an activity as possible, but that’s because effortless voting ensures the participation of people who aren’t all that interested in doing it. I’m sure if our politicians could, they’d send lackeys to your home to cradle you like an infant and carry you to the polls while they sing lullabies softly in your ear. If the law would permit it, they’d let you vote through text message or an iPhone app. Eventually, if they get their way, you’ll be able to cast your ballot over the phone while you order a pizza, and you’d get free bread sticks as a reward.

“Yes, I’d like a large deep dish with extra pepperoni. Oh, and put me down for Donald Trump

 Man, if feels so good to be an involved citizen!”

Mark my words, if we continue on this trajectory, soon you’ll be able to walk out your front door in your pajamas and belch, and there’ll be some kind of satellite in space that picks up the sound and interprets it as a vote. And I’m sure voter turnout will be almost 100 percent! What a win for democracy!

Or maybe a real win for democracy would be a voting system that requires a small smidgen of sacrifice, energy, and effort. Yes, that sort of system would immediately weed out 30 percent of the electorate. That’s the point. Our country would be better off if only the folks willing to make the sacrifice and the effort participated. I’m not saying you should have to ride a donkey into the forest and wade through a swamp and climb a mountain and plunge into a cave and navigate an obstacle course and find the Holy Grail in order to vote — although I wouldn’t necessarily be opposed to such a policy – but I am saying, at the very least, voting should require you to carve out a couple hours on one particular day.

Obviously active duty military would be an exception here. Folks who are serving or who have served already made the sacrifice and the effort. If their duties require them to vote early or mail a ballot in or whatever, they’ve earned that right. They’ve earned the right to vote in every sense. The rest of us have not, which is where step three comes in.

3. Only Grant Voting Privileges to Tax Payers

My rights as a taxpayer are severely infringed when those who are not paying into the system get to decide how it allocates my money. This is called taxation without representation and we fought a war over it. A minority of voters can identify that conflict as “the Revolutionary War.” A majority, when asked, identify it is as “oh crap, this is a tough one — they made a Mel Gibson movie about it, right? I know it happened like a while ago probably in like the 1920′s or something. Is it the one with the Nazis and Lincoln? Oh! HUNGER GAMES! Right? No?”

It’s been warned for centuries that democracies collapse when voters learn they can vote themselves money and entitlements from the public treasury. It collapses all the faster when the people awarding themselves money have not paid into the treasury to begin with. These are people with no chips on the table. They are permitted to steer the ship without contributing to its maintenance. They are eating from a bounty collected and harvested by their neighbors. They are participating in a variety of other mixed metaphors.

On top of the profound conflict of interest, there’s also a matter of maturity. A college kid who has never worked or paid a bill or lived as an independent adult does not yet possess the experience and comprehension necessary to be granted the power to vote. She has been, up until this point, a taker not a maker. A receiver not a contributor. She has no skin in the game. Indeed, she’s playing with someone else’s skin. Now my analogies are getting creepy, but you get the point.

It’s absurd to think that a 19-year-old college sophomore who lives in a dorm and spends his evenings getting drunk with the booze money his parents gave him has the same voice and the same vote as a grown man with a wife, three kids, a house, two cars, a job, a mortgage, and a PTA membership. These two people are not equal contributors. They are not equal, really, in any practical sense. They are equal only in human worth, but a first grader is also equal in worth and he is not granted the right to vote either. The college sophomore in this scenario is much closer to the first grader than the father or three.

The system is rigged against the informed, the competent, and the contributing. Yet, ironically, it’s the uninformed and the noncontributing who often complain the loudest of being screwed by the system. The reality is precisely the opposite. These people shouldn’t be given any direct influence on the government, but instead they are, when the numbers are added up, granted more influence than the people who do all the physical and mental work in this country. The ignorant and noncontributing folks should be falling over in gratitude.

Or perhaps they shouldn’t be so grateful after all. The only reason they’re involved is because they’re easy to exploit. They may think it works well for them in the short term — what with the perks and the entitlements they’re promised — but in the long run they’re losing their liberty and their dignity just as quickly as the rest of us. For their own good, and for the good of society as a whole, they should be disenfranchised.

I know this will never happen. The tide is moving in the other direction entirely. But if you read this and see yourself — as hard as it may be to admit — among the masses of the uninformed and the noncontributing, I can only hope you’ll choose to do the right thing and ban yourself from the voting booth until you can honestly look in the mirror and tell yourself, “I deserve to have a say.”


 As promised, here's my two cents...

Yup.

And yup.

All I'd add to the conversation is that, in my humble, albeit older, opinion, Matt was overly considerate right there at the end.

That courteous, but academic, Hallmark card malarkey about "read this and see yourself" and "honestly look in the mirror and tell yourself  "I deserve to have a say"....

Pish and tosh.

And bullshit.

I get what he's trying to do. He seems like a nice kid and he was obviously brought up with a sense of graciousness and good manners. And he was trying to end his piece with a little "hey, gang! go out and be a good American! Okay? Neat-o!"

Here's the thing about that.

Goes back to a belief I've held for a long, long time, that sometimes you simply have to rip the band aid or lance the boil or yank the tooth and let the pain be what the pain gotta be.

The example I used to use to illustrate the point had to do with the idea of not being harsh or blunt, something I'm personally hard wired to do, when telling insensitive or rude people that they have done something insensitive or rude. That the "compassionate" way to handle it is to take them aside and gently offer them that they might want to think about their behavior and adjust it for future.

My theory, proven time and again, is that if they were going to be at all receptive to reflecting on their insensitivity or rudeness, they wouldn't have been insensitive or rude in the first place.

I think of it as the Forrest Gump corollary....

Stupid is as stupid does....and once an asshole, always an asshole.

And while I have no difficulty in recognizing an asshole, it's not my place to judge them.

The same goes for the uninformed, the uneducated, the indifferent, the irresponsible and/or the incompetent.

Especially when it comes to having an equal say in the kinds of decisions that affect the future of mankind on the planet.

Oh...it should go without saying that includes the insensitive and rude.

Assholes.

Due respect to Matt and his essay there, here's my slightly tweaked suggestion for an alternate ending to that essay.

People need to get over the idea that they can vote simply because they can. And they need to either be willing to meet basic, common sense requirements to be qualified to vote or they need to shut up, sit down and let those who have gone to the time and trouble to get qualified take care of business.

And as for that inevitable, huffing and puffing and who the fuck do I think I am telling you that you can't vote because you were born in America and the right to vote is one of your freedoms?

Well, here's that truth about freedom I talk about a lot in print and on the air.

The truth I promised you a few minutes ago.

The problem with freedom...is that you have to give it to everybody.

"....Hmmm....Who's Buried In Grant's Tomb....Wait....Wait....Don't Tell Me....."

Let's just suck it up and admit what we all know.

There is absolutely nothing "high road" about this Presidential campaign.

And, all of the other candidates' cheap shot, low rent tactics notwithstanding, the lion's (or elephant's if you wanna be logo correct) share of the blame for the tone and tenor this time around is the Donald's.

Donald, himself, would surely not disagree with that assessment.

Although, he'd find a way to delegate the blame and/or responsibility, bet the heavily mortgaged farm.

Still, it's not unreasonable to counter that he takes a lot of shots along the trail, shots that have nothing to do with his promises (whatever they are on any given day), his plans for the country (whatever they are at any given moment) or the specific plans he has to keep those promises or follow through with those plans (whatever they are at...well, whatever they are).

Instead, they're just cheap shots from the other cheap seat in the not even close to Presidential peanut gallery.

Jokes about his hair.

Jokes about his unpolished, rambling style of public speaking, featuring, of course, his delightfully lampoonable way of pronouncing the word "huge".

Although, his taking us all down the path of palm to penis ratio in that debate gives the sound of "yuuuugge" a new, and, though we thought it impossible to pull off, even creepier association than ever.

And, of course, there's the face.

Somewhere on the color palette between the finer Sunkist oranges, tiptoeing up to, but not quite, crossing over the line into full blown jaundice with those sometimes impish, sometimes vapid eyes circled with a fun and funny impression of aviator goggles worn just a bit too long on a bright day without benefit of sunscreen.

As Donald would probably say if he, himself, were running against Donald...

"...hey, come one, you know, it's a funny face...am I right...?

Here's the thing, though.

It's not that face that should be causing us to face up to how much trouble we're in.

PoliTech, based in Lubbock, Texas is a non-partisan political organization that focuses on promoting political awareness to colleges across the nation.

As part of that "awareness", of late, they've been sending their "roving reporter" to campuses around the country and assessing the state of the union when it comes to whether the leaders of tomorrow know the difference between a state and a union.

Here's just one, of several, of their "surveys".





One of the more common criticisms of the Donald Trump candidacy is that it incites, as opposed to inspires, that it cheapens, rather than enhances....and one of the reasons people who support him offer for that support is his connection with the concerns of everyday folks.

There really isn't any counter to that.

Because he keeps winning and the number of people falling in behind him keeps growing.

But any criticism that he is uninformed, uneducated,  unqualified, unfit, even dangerous, as a potential President of the United States is, like resistance to the Borg, futile.

And the way he looks?

Well, those looks might conjure up some laughs when he appears on "Face the Nation".

But here's what's not funny at all.

Judging by what these kids have to say.....

....Donald Trump is the face of the nation.

"...Leave It To Beaver....Quickly....Seriously, Right Now, We Don't Have All Day...."

We all long for simpler times.

And, yes, for you youngsters who are eye rolling and "whatever"-ing at the moment, trust me when I tell you that, eventually, you'll come around.

Ideally, those simpler times would look and sound a lot like life in Mayfield, heartland, US of A, with Ward and June lovingly guiding Wally and Beav through the pinnacles and pitfalls of daily life with a heart full of love and a satchel full of straighten up and eat your Brussels sprouts.

Of course, there's simpler.

And there's just plain simple.

Yesterday, I sent my friend Lin a link to a piece here on the old P.I.P.E having to do with the mystery of why so many people seem compelled to support a guy like Donald Trump, what with his obvious and inarguable lack of class, style, grace, compassion, yada, yada.

My friend, a talented artist and educator, posted the following on her own page.



Scott Edward Phelps says in his blog Politics In Plain English

"Put in blunt Trump-speak...just how many deaf, dumb and blind Americans of voting age are currently living in the United states? Come July in Cleveland or, God forbid, come November all across the country...we're going to find out the exact numbers."

I remember watching the Republican convention on TV where IKE was nominated for his second term in 1956...I was 8 years old. My first brush with presidential politics impressed me enough to remember that I believed what was being said...it must be true...who would lie or exagerate. Daily media coverage of a presidential campaign was maybe five minutes on the evening news. Most of the campaign battles were waged in the print media and some personal appearances. TV and the print media presented a very edited lens to what was being said and we only discovered, much after the fact, that most presidential candidate decisions were made in backrooms during conventions where influence was for sale. 

Enter the 24 hour news cycle...the internet...social media. I remember thinking that NOW we will have all the facts in real time to be considered. There is still a lot of spinning going on but NOW we know that's exactly what it is. It's debate...trying to convince others of your point of view. The consequence of this, I thought, would be a more informed electorate...making intellegent choices in the face of the truth. 

Unfortunately not so much... not all citizens are willing to see the truth or consider the whole picture to make sane and rational decisions. Many still want to live in that edited lens era...staying uninformed or not willing to consider the truth in their decision. 

Congress has insighted the angry citizens. They sit on their hands and clearly don't work for any of us. Yet "us" elected them. Be careful what you wish for...it might become a reality in a way that doesn't resemble your original wish. All we can do now is VOTE.


In response to that post, one of Lin's friends posted...


"...If you can't say it in 100 words or less, I don't have time..."


One of two things struck me as options here.

Lin's friend was either weighing in, in sardonic agreement, with the premise of the ever shrinking attention span.

Or she was, intentionally or inadvertently, stepping up to be a stunning example of the premise.

Hard to tell which.

If the former, then "testify, sistah."

If the latter, well, to paraphrase an old saying about the American Vice Presidency, "to be just another face in the crowd is no disgrace...but it's no distinction, either."

Frankly, I want it to be the latter because the alternative is that the "dumbing down" of the culture has, of late, been taking on Invasion of the Body Snatchers proportions.

I even wrote on that very subject recently.


http://politicsinplainenglishsep.blogspot.com/2016/03/and-while-were-at-itgeneral-election-is.html


All of that said, and after all the humor of it is extracted, the sad fact remains that we are, ironically, living in a period filled with, literally, dozens, even hundreds of ways to communicate with one another and yet, increasingly, effectively communicating less and less. Nuance, tone, subtlety, critical details, key facts, notions, ideas and/or observations are being sacrificed on the altar of impatience and instant gratification. We read less so we learn less and so we benefit less while, again ironically, feeling more confident with each and every day that we know it all and that, more regrettably, is...

100 words.

Maybe it's just a simple case of misunderstanding.

Or misinterpretation.

Or, wouldn't you just know it, miscommunication.

The kind that occurs when people mishear what was said.

Like, for example, a few moments ago, I said we all long for simpler times.

Not "we all long for simpler minds".

Gee, Wally.

 

 

 

"...And, While We're At It...'General Election' Is Not When We Elect Our Generals...."

You just never know where you're going to find insightful political analysis.

Sometimes, like love, it's found in the most unexpected places.

Today, I came across this "worth the time to read it" piece courtesy of Julian Lennon who posted the link on FB.

Written by Ray Williams in Psychology Today.



There is a growing and disturbing trend of anti-intellectual elitism in American culture. It's the dismissal of science, the arts, and humanities and their replacement by entertainment, self-righteousness, ignorance, and deliberate gullibility.

Susan Jacoby, author of The Age of American Unreason, says in an article in theWashington Post, "Dumbness, to paraphrase the late senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, has been steadily defined downward for several decades, by a combination of heretofore irresistible forces. These include the triumph of video culture over print culture; a disjunction between Americans' rising level of formal education and their shaky grasp of basic geography, science and history; and the fusion of anti-rationalism with anti-intellectualism."

There has been a long tradition of anti-intellectualism in America, unlike most other Western countries. Richard Hofstadter, who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1964 for his book, Anti-Intellectualism In American Life, describes how the vast underlying foundations of anti-elite, anti-reason and anti-science have been infused into America's political and social fabric. Famous science fiction writer Isaac Asimov once said:

"There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."

Mark Bauerlein, in his book, The Dumbest Generation, reveals how a whole generation of youth is being dumbed down by their aversion to reading anything of substance and their addiction to digital "crap" via social media.

Journalist Charles Pierce, author of Idiot America, adds another perspective:

"The rise of idiot America today represents - for profit mainly, but also and more cynically, for political advantage in the pursuit of power - the breakdown of a consensus that the pursuit of knowledge is a good. It also represents the ascendancy of the notion that the people whom we should trust the least are the people who best know what they are talking about. In the new media age, everybody is an expert."

"There's a pervasive suspicion of rights, privileges, knowledge and specialization," says Catherine Liu, the author of American Idyll: Academic Antielitism as Cultural Critique and a film and media studies professor at University of California. The very mission of universities has changed, argues Liu. "We don't educate people anymore. We train them to get jobs."

Part of the reason for the rising anti-intellectualism can be found in the declining state of education in the U.S. compared to other advanced countries:

• After leading the world for decades in 25-34 year olds with university degrees, the U.S. is now in 12th place. The World Economic Forum ranked the U.S. at 52nd among 139 nations in the quality of its university math and science instruction in 2010. Nearly 50% of all graduate students in the sciences in the U.S. are foreigners, most of whom are returning to their home countries;
• The Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs commissioned a civic education poll among public school students. A surprising 77% didn't know that George Washington was the first President; couldn't name Thomas Jefferson as the author of the Declaration of Independence; and only 2.8% of the students actually passed the citizenship test. Along similar lines, the Goldwater Institute of Phoenix did the same survey and only 3.5% of students passed the civics test;
• According to the National Research Council report, only 28% of high school science teachers consistently follow the National Research Council guidelines on teaching evolution, and 13% of those teachers explicitly advocate creationism or "intelligent design;"
• 18% of Americans still believe that the sun revolves around the earth, according to a Gallup poll;
• The American Association of State Colleges and Universities report on education shows that the U.S. ranks second among all nations in the proportion of the population aged 35-64 with a college degree, but 19th in the percentage of those aged 25-34 with an associate or high school diploma, which means that for the first time, the educational attainment of young people will be lower than their parents;
• 74% of Republicans in the U.S. Senate and 53% in the House of Representatives deny the validity of climate change despite the findings of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and every other significant scientific organization in the world;
• According to the 2009 National Assessment of Educational Progress, 68% of public school children in the U.S. do not read proficiently by the time they finish third grade. And the U.S. News & World reported that barely 50% of students are ready for college level reading when they graduate;
• According to a 2006 survey by National Geographic-Roper, nearly half of Americans between ages 18 and 24 do not think it necessary to know the location of other countries in which important news is being made. More than a third consider it "not at all important" to know a foreign language, and only 14 percent consider it "very important;"
• According to the National Endowment for the Arts report in 1982, 82% of college graduates read novels or poems for pleasure; two decades later only 67% did. And more than 40% of Americans under 44 did not read a single book--fiction or nonfiction--over the course of a year. The proportion of 17 year olds who read nothing (unless required by school ) has doubled between 1984-2004;
• Gallup released a poll indicating 42 percent of Americans still believe God created human beings in their present form less than 10,000 years ago;
• A 2008 University of Texas study found that 25 percent of public school biology teachers believe that humans and dinosaurs inhabited the earth simultaneously.

In American schools, the culture exalts the athlete and good-looking cheerleader. Well-educated and intellectual students are commonly referred to in public schools and the media as "nerds," "dweebs," "dorks," and "geeks," and are relentlessly harassed and even assaulted by the more popular "jocks" for openly displaying any intellect. These anti-intellectual attitudes are not reflected in students in most European or Asian countries, whose educational levels have now equaled and and will surpass that of the U.S. And most TV shows or movies such as The Big Bang Theory depict intellectuals as being geeks if not effeminate.

John W. Traphagan,Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Texas, argues the problem is that Asian countries have core cultural values that are more akin to a cult of intelligence and education than a cult of ignorance and anti-intellectualism. In Japan, for example, teachers are held in high esteem and normally viewed as among the most important members of a community. There is suspicion and even disdain for the work of teachers that occurs in the U.S. Teachers in Japan typically are paid significantly more than their peers in the U.S. The profession of teaching is one that is seen as being of central value in Japanese society and those who choose that profession are well compensated in terms of salary, pension, and respect for their knowledge and their efforts on behalf of children.

In addition, we do not see in Japan significant numbers of the types of religious schools that are designed to shield children from knowledge about basic tenets of science and accepted understandings of history - such as evolutionary theory or the religious views of the Founding Fathers, who were largely deists - which are essential to having a fundamental understanding of the world, Traphagan contends. The reason for this is because in general Japanese value education, value the work of intellectuals, and see a well-educated public with a basic common knowledge in areas of scientific fact, math, history, literature, etc. as being an essential foundation to a successful democracy.

We're creating a world of dummies. Angry dummies who feel they have the right, the authority and the need not only to comment on everything, but to make sure their voice is heard above the rest, and to drag down any opposing views through personal attacks, loud repetition and confrontation.

Bill Keller, writing in the New York Times argues that the anti-intellectual elitism is not an elitism of wisdom, education, experience or knowledge. The new elite are the angry social media posters, those who can shout loudest and more often, a clique of bullies and malcontents baying together like dogs cornering a fox. Too often it's a combined elite of the anti-intellectuals and the conspiracy followers - not those who can voice the most cogent, most coherent response. Together they forment a rabid culture of anti-rationalism where every fact is suspect; every shadow holds a secret conspiracy. Rational thought is the enemy. Critical thinking is the devil's tool.

Keller also notes that the herd mentality takes over online; the anti-intellectuals become the metaphorical equivalent of an angry lynch mob when anyone either challenges one of the mob beliefs or posts anything outside the mob's self-limiting set of values.

Keller blames this in part to the online universe that "skews young, educated and attentive to fashions." Fashion, entertainment, spectacle, voyeurism - we're directed towards trivia, towards the inconsequential, towards unquestioning and blatant consumerism. This results in intellectual complacency. People accept without questioning, believe without weighing the choices, join the pack because in a culture where convenience rules, real individualism is too hard work. Thinking takes too much time: it gets in the way of the immediacy of the online experience.

Reality TV and pop culture presented in magazines and online sites claim to provide useful information about the importance of The Housewives of [you name the city] that can somehow enrich our lives. After all, how else can one explain the insipid and pointless stories that tout divorces, cheating and weight gain? How else can we explain how the Kardashians, or Paris Hilton are known for being famous for being famous without actually contributing anything worth discussion? The artificial events of their lives become the mainstay of populist media to distract people from the real issues and concerns facing us.

The current trend of increasing anti-intellectualism now establishing itself in politics and business leadership, and supported by a declining education system should be a cause for concern for leaders and the general population, one that needs to be addressed now. 



 Right off the bat, there's a raging irony bouncing all over the room at this moment.

An irony you can only appreciate if you are reading, at this moment, that there's a raging irony bouncing all over the room at this moment.

That being that, in the dumbed down, anti-intellectual culture that Mr. Williams spotlights, odds are good that the number of readers who have actually read enough to get to this point are fewer than the number of people who still believe Jeb has a chance.

As to the premise, and arguments underscoring it, I got nothin' to add but an "amen, brutha" with maybe a little value added "yeah, you right".

This POV, combined with my own two cents that America is also allowing its arrogant belief that we are still the best and the brightest simply because we used to be the best and the brightest, has been a staple of both my printed and on air work for the better part of a year now.

Much to the delight of those who I'm delighted and privileged to have on Team SEP and much to the chagrin of those who.....well, those who don't have a clue what the word chagrin means.

And I'd say "no offense", but no need.

All of those folks stopped reading no later than mid way through the second graph of Mr. Williams' piece.

If you, like me, assumed, not too far along, that he was headed toward an obvious connect between the dumbing down of the culture and its new sidekick, the presidential campaign of 2016 only to find yourself a little puzzled that it didn't end up there, with the exception of the lightly sprinkled mention of "politics" in the very last graph, puzzle no more.

Rather, ponder the man's prescience.

The article was written in June of 2014.

Long before the familiar Looney Tunes theme began playing in the background of our current daily news cycles.

Oh....and for those aforementioned chagrined folks who might have wandered down to these sentences on the off chance they might find somethin' worth their time at the end, the word "prescience" means "the fact of knowing something before it takes place; foreknowledge."

And it's pronounced "PRESS-see-ents" not "pree-SIGH-ents"

Hey, Team SEP is all about helping us all to increase our word power.

If any, or all, of that offends any, or all, of you in Mr. Williams' cross-hairs, in some way, let me offer an apology to you on a conditional basis.

Go back and read the third sentence I wrote (from the very beginning.)

And read the third paragraph of the article I pasted in there (the article is in darker letters than the rest)

Now, I'm ready with that apology for every correct answer.

Show of hands.

How many of you think that "Imagine" is the best song Julian Lennon ever did?

And how many of you were surprised to learn that Sheldon's roommate and Penny's husband was old enough to have won a Pulitzer Prize in 1964?

Yeah.

That's what I figured.

So, you'll just have imagine that I'm sorry.

It's easy if you try.



 



 

"...We're Dead Serious, Man....You've Got Just Ten More Chances To Knock It Off...."

Donald promises to "make America great again".

Hillary has let it be known that "America never stopped being great" and vows to "make America whole again".

Here's a thing.

Neither Donald nor Hillary have what it takes to make either one of those things happen.

Because they are staggeringly outnumbered by the opposition.

Hold that thought.

We'll come back to it.

America is a catchphrase culture.

Always has been.

They're used to sell product.

Advertising slogans like Ivory Soap's "99 44/100 % pure" which came along in 1891, up to and through the arrival of "letting our fingers do the walking" through the Yellow Pages to extolling the virtues of Disney World being "the happiest place on Earth" to the recent re-arrival of the extra crispy clarion call announcing that chicken is "finger licking good (although even since childhood, I could never quite get on board with rating the flavor enjoyment of something based on how much I licked my fingers, if only because, I don't know about you, but I totally know where my hands have been).

They're used to sell candidates for office.

Campaign slogans like Lincoln's second term pitch, "Don't Change Horses In Mid Stream"; FDR's 1932 proclamation that "Happy Days Are Here Again"; "I Like Ike", "All The Way With LBJ", Ronald Reagan alarm clocking us "It's Morning Again In America" (which, frankly, always came off a little ominous, what with the implication that people actually needed to be told what time of day it was).

And, of course, the current crop including the aforementioned America great /whole business but also "Feel The Bern" and Senator Cruz' very clever "Trusted" (Trust...ted....get it?).

Here's a catch phrase that no one has used officially in recent years, if at all, but seems to pop up a lot in print and on air as a rallying cry coming from those who want to conjure up a big wave of patriotic passion in the hopes said wave will wash them, or their particular fair haired choice of savior, right into the office they seek.

"Take Our Country Back".

And, of course, any and all variations of that one that might be applicable or more grammatically adjusted to meet a particular need.

"Taking Our Country Back"

"Let's Take Our Country Back".

"Let's Take Our Country Back Together".

Frankly, I'm a little surprised that the hot shots who package and brand their respective campaigns haven't found a way to wave that one onto the existing bumper stickers.

"Let's Make America Great Again By Taking Our Country Back"

And, of course...

"America Is Already Great, Let's Take Our Country Back And Make It Whole Again".

Come to think of it...nahh...never mind.

Judging from the popularity of reality TV, American Dad, anything that Nicki Minaj records and/or any and/or all seven of the motion pictures that are not only fast, but furious, it's pretty obvious that the contemporary American attention span dictates that campaign slogans be kept to five or less words.

Having spent a lot of time in recent weeks and months sizing up the number of potential Rhodes Scholars in the Trump following, I'm pretty confident that even going with the five word golf cap logo there was flirting with comprehension overload.

A landscape barren of Mensa members aside, that particular slogan grinds my personal pepper.

And, as automatically as "who's there?" follows any utterance of the phrase "knock, knock" whether or not there's a punchline coming down the pike, I find myself, just as automatically, be it out loud or only in my head, responding to "take our country back" with....

...from who, exactly?

There's a pretty big hole in the logic attempted by any, and every, one in this country, regardless of political affiliation, religious persuasion and/or philosophical preference when they mount up, or mouth off, and verbally try to rally the troops and lead the charge toward revolution with that dramatic, but ultimately deceptive, slogan.

It assumes that "our country" or at least the day to day operation of it has been hijacked by some evil force or oppressive regime or power beyond our ability to control and/or conquer.

The simple and, yet, overlooked truth is, though, that the "them" that those who dramatically want to take the country back from is.....wait for it....

...us.

And by us, I'm talking all of us.

Americans.

The Americans who put into office, freely and under no duress whatsoever, the representatives and Senators and ,yes, the President that operate the government under the guidelines, directions and laws that the Founders constructed for us.

Nothing that is happening in this nation at any given moment is happening because we went to sleep as a republic of freedoms and woke up the next morning to find that republic had been overthrown in the dead of night by some dictator and his band of rebel followers, pouring down out of the mountains while we slumbered and taking over.

And, all due respect ("...and Mr. Dennit, I said with all due respect...") spare me the knee jerk flapping of the gums that comes in the form of such supposedly patriotic, but, in fact, primarily moronic outbursts as "...oh, yeah?.....what about that dictator Obama?....", for example, etc, ad nauseum, e pluribus unum.

Personal distaste, disagreement and, even, high blood pressure hatred of one President or another doesn't qualify as evidence, let alone, proof that the Constitution isn't alive, well and operating on all cylinders as it has for nearly 250 years.

One man's loathed leader is another man's captain courageous and all that.

And, like it or not, the Constitution isn't at all like a Sheldon Cooper roommate agreement, tailored to benefit you and your insistence upon French Toast on Monday and that no one, but no one, sit in your spot.

Meanwhile, if you need additional assistance in dialing down the demagoguery and lightening up on your alleged loss of liberties, try these on for size.

What right or freedom guaranteed to you by that very Constitution do you not have right at this moment that you had yesterday?

Did they come and take your guns away from you?

Oh.

No, huh?

How about your right to bluster, brag, bloviate and/or blowhard, all courtesy of that zesty little freedom of speech thing? Have you been muzzled? Muffled? Duct taped over and around the pie hole area?

Oh.

No, huh?

Well, again with all due respect, then, here's a suggestion that you're legally within your Constitutional rights to ignore, but, a lot of us would appreciate if you would consider agreeing to.

Shut up.

And for a few moments, consider this.

The America that we're living in right now, this day, this moment, is the America that we have created for ourselves. It is not the Nazi Germany of the 1930's, it is not the Uganda of the 1970's, it is not the Cuba of the, well, it's not Cuba.

No tanks are rolling in the streets, on the lookout for dissension, ready to crush it instantly and completely. No members of the Politburo are searching high and low for members of the underground, prepared to stamp out any and all resistance without hesitation or mercy.

And no one....absolutely no one.....has taken our country away from us.

The Republic still stands.

There is, in fact, no one from whom we need to take our country back.

The fault, dear Brutus, and Mrs. Brutus, lies not in our leaders...but in ourselves.

And in our selfishness and apathy and arrogance. In our unwillingness to pitch in and do what we need to make the system work as it was designed for us and, instead, ordering Papa John's, popping a top, flipping on the flat screen and enjoying four quarters while bitching and moaning and posting about how it ain't workin' for us.

And in our habit of hating Congress....but loving our own Congressmen to the tune of a re-elect the incumbent rate in this country of 96%.

That's right.

96%.

And only two Presidents since Hoover have been denied election to a second term.

Traditionally (read: since time immemorial) those who go after the gig which requires them to solemnly swear go after it by doing their heavy spendin', rhetoric ramblin', patriotic appealin', God bless America-in' best to convince the masses to swallow their particular recipe for running and/or saving the country.

The masses, by the way, that have their own unique and oft heard catch phrase-y label.

"...the American people...."

The American people who bitch about "the government" and "Congress" and " INSERT NAME OF PRESIDENT HERE" as if those bodies and/or that body were some worthless black sheep brother in the family who just showed up one night, planted himself on the couch and proceeded to eat and drink everything in sight while running up triple digit family budget deficits by ordering every single item listed on the Pay Per View channels and not the worthless black sheep brother who was invited in, told to make himself comfortable and, worst of all, re-invited to come in.

Over and over and over again.

Much like the way those politicians get treated. That Congress with the 10% approval rating and 96% re-election rate.

That incompetent bunch that is invited to come in.

Over and over and over again.

And the Presidents who have been elected over and over.....

and only the 22nd Amendment prevents over and over and over and over.

Donald promises to "make America great again".

Hillary has let it be known that "America never stopped being great" and vows to "make America whole again".

Here's the thing.

Neither Donald nor Hillary have what it takes to make either one of those things happen.

Because they are staggeringly outnumbered by the opposition.

That opposition known as "the people."

We.....

...the people.

"...Hail To The Chief Will Now Conclude With A Resounding And Patriotic Ba Dum Bump..."

(NOTE: the language used in this piece could be considered, by some, to be profane and/or offensive. Readers are advised to have their young children standing by to explain to them what the fuck all those words mean)


Thomas Marshall had a pretty good handle on what the country needed.

Marshall, Vice President under Woodrow Wilson in the early 1900's, was well known for his wit and sense of humor, never illustrated any better than during a Senate debate of the time.

In response to Senator Joseph Bristow's catalog of the nation's needs, Marshall quipped the often-repeated phrase, "What this country needs is a really good five-cent cigar", provoking laughter amongst those gathered.

Thomas Marshall was a funny guy.

During last night's gathering of the GOP candidates (ED NOTE: uh, we're through calling these comedy cavalcades "debates", cause, after all, I mean, come on....) Donald Trump took mock umbrage with one of his fellow rim shot sidekicks who had made a disparaging allusion to the relationship between the size of the Donald's hands and the size of the Donald.


I have to say this. He hit my hands. Nobody has ever hit my hands. I have never heard of this. Look at those hands. Are they small hands? And he referred to my hands if they are small, something else must be small. I guarantee you there is no problem. I guarantee you."


...provoking laughter amongst those gathered.

Social media, as even Helen Keller would expect, exploded with an avalanche of derision and disgust, annoyance and aghastness at the low brow, wait, check that, low crotch humor displayed at such an important, even historical, occasion.

Yeah, yeah, future of mankind, blah, blah, leader of the free world, yada yada.

Come on, America, it's time to resign ourselves to the inevitable and get jiggy wit the wit and wisdom of everybody's favorite Joker....

"...why so serious..?"

After all, it's not like the country is in danger of becoming a laughing stock around the world, at least, the world that we'd still, theoretically, like to be a part of.

We've already got that covered, man.

But, no worries, mates, because we all know that they're all either too stuffy or too lame or too ready to come over here and slit our national throat for us to give a shit about them.

And it's not like hearing Donald amusingly allude to the dimensions of his dick in the context of a discussion among those asking to be the one to decide the fate of a nation for the next four years should give any pause to parents who are trying to raise kids in a Kardashian culture to exhibit manners or graciousness or, God forbid, class.

Where the fuck is the funny in that?

Really, people, let's get serious.

No, wait, scratch that.

Let's knock it off with all that serious shit.

And try to retrieve one of those oh so important qualities key to our survival as a species.

As, I have a feeling, our good friend, the witty, once upon a time, Vice President of the United States might put it...

...what this country needs is a sense of humor.

Lighten up, America.

Donald Trump is a funny guy.

And he's obviously not going anywhere any time soon.

Except very possibly into an office with a unique roundish sort of design.

Now, that.....

That's some funny shit.






 

"...Our Little Johnny Is Only A Sexist And Racist, Not A Bully...We're Thinking He Can Still Make It To The Senate, Though..."

Today's few words offer up a few famous and/or infamous oxymorons.

Jumbo shrimp.

Military intelligence.

Good government.

Pepsi Free. ( I just threw that one in because it's a personal favorite, as explained by noted comic Gallagher---".....dumbest name ever invented....that means it doesn't have any Pepsi in it. That's a Coke....")

And, of course, the more timely and topical of the moronic oxys...

Super Tuesday.

Super for some, not so super for others.

The results of yesterday's primary-ing and/or caucusing were, within a minor hiccup here or there, pretty much what everyone expected the results of yesterday's primary-ing and/or caucusing would be.

And in a campaign that seems to have been with us since our grandparents graduated from high school but is still eight months to go and counting, the second guessing, predicting, armchair and/or Monday morning quarterbacking, pundit-ing, proselytizing and pondering of it all is exhausting, for some, wearying, at least a little, for many.

So we'll have none of that here, thank you very much.

What's on tap here today is not an analysis so much as an announcement.

I'm done.

No more words wasted on superfluous and academic op/eds on the merits of this one or the flaws of that one, the chances that this one will make a dent or stop a juggernaut or this one will suddenly breakout of the pack or, even, that one still circles around out there, unbeknownst to us, waiting to jump into the fray at the last minute or, better yet, show up like the Cavalry, to offer mature, sensible, honest, trustworthy leadership and free us from this Orwell meets Kafka nightmare of an election year we've lived in thus far.

Jed Bartlet, for the love of God, man, get in this thing and save us.

Barring that or, God forbid, one of the two of them meeting some unexpected, deep ravine of a pitfall or, God forbid, some unexpected end to their life expectancy, only the completely oblivious and/or those who think Samantha Bee is cutting edge insightful would be incapable of a clear grasp of the obvious.

Or inevitable, depending on how super your Super was yesterday.

The Democratic and Republican nominees for President of the United States are, respectively Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

Wow. Typing that was surreal in a way I can't even begin to begin to describe.

Assuming that assumption to be accurate, there will be plenty of opportunity to assess and/or comment on and/or satirically skewer one and the other and both as the eight months of our discontent play out.

Today, Donald is our first contestant.


And when it comes to conjuring up content for satire and/or sardonic op/ed, there are no words to be written any more satirical or sardonic than the actual words of the man of hour himself.

Ladies and gentlemen, presenting the can you fucking believe he's gotten this close next President of the United States.

Donald J. Trump.



“Ariana Huffington is unattractive, both inside and out. I fully understand why her former husband left her for a man – he made a good decision.” 

  “You know, it really doesn’t matter what the media write as long as you’ve got a young, and beautiful, piece of ass.”

“When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending the best. They’re not sending you, they’re sending people that have lots of problems and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bring crime. They’re rapists… And some, I assume, are good people.”

“If I were running ‘The View’, I’d fire Rosie O’Donnell. I mean, I’d look at her right in that fat, ugly face of hers, I’d say ‘Rosie, you’re fired.’” 

“All of the women on The Apprentice flirted with me – consciously or unconsciously. That’s to be expected.”  

“The beauty of me is that I’m very rich.”  

“I’ve said if Ivanka weren’t my daughter, perhaps I’d be dating her.”  

. “I have never seen a thin person drinking Diet Coke.”  

“I think the only difference between me and the other candidates is that I’m more honest and my women are more beautiful.”  

“I could stand in the middle of 5th Avnue and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose votes.”  

 "She got schlonged, she lost, I mean she lost..."

"He's (John McCain) not a war hero. he's a war hero because he was captured. I like people that weren't captured."

 "You could see there was blood coming out of her (Megyn Kelly of Fox News). Blood coming out of her wherever.."

"Look at that face (Carly Fiorina's face) Would anyone vote for that? Can you imagine that, the face of our next president?"

"I'm calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States,"


Okay.

Point made.

And made.

And, like I said earlier, I'm done.

There's no point in wasting thoughts, words or air time trying to convince anyone about this guy one way or the other.

Those who think Trump is the salvation of mankind, at least the mankind that resides in the United States, will, obviously, judging by their passionate support of him no matter what he says about anything or anyone are not going to change their minds for anything.

With the possible exception of his being caught, on live television, viciously raping and murdering, let's say, Marco Rubio's wife.

And...even then.

And those who see the man, judging by his documented actions and his documented statements, as a misogynist, racist, sexist, narcissist, global embarrassment of a bully are neither going to have a change of heart anytime soon or change the minds of anyone in their circle of life who consider him the salvation of mankind, at least the mankind that resides in the United States.

There is, though, a second group that falls somewhere in between, or in the dark and depressing crevice between the two camps.

Folks who are faced with a choice between a woman who is perceived to be a liar, unworthy of trust and a puppet of the same corporate greed that has put America in the current quicksand and a man who, irrefutably, presents himself as a misogynist, racist, sexist, narcissist, global embarrassment of a bully.

Talk about your rock and a hard place.

Lady or the tiger.

Beast or bitch.

Or lesser of the evils.

Or, more aptly this time around, the lesser of the lesser.

Stand by, Trump-eters, there will be plenty of time and print space for Hillary hits as we ease on down, ease on down the road.

For the moment, we're dissing the Donald.

But, in the ongoing attempt to view this Rod Serling meets Dr. Seuss graphic novel of a national presidential campaign from a road less traveled, let's stop talking about what we stand to acquire with our votes in November and spend a minute considering what it is we will be passing on.

At least if, come November 9, we find ourselves Constitutionally obligated to put "the Donald" in nickname storage to be replaced with "Mr. President."

Again, surreal moment for me here.

Already, throughout this campaign, a billion words, with plenty more to come, have been written and/or spoken about various and particular groups that will be radically affected by the grand opening of the newest Trump Tower at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

Muslims.
Gays.
Women.
China.
Mexico.
Immigrants.
Putin.
Megyn Kelly.

The list, like the clacking of a bad engine, goes on and on and on and.....

One group doesn't get much, if any mention, to these eyes and ears.

Our children.

And their education.

But not in terms of better and safer schools, more and better teachers, more and better educational opportunities, more affordable tuitions or even just an overhaul of the educational system itself.

It's about what we're teaching them.

By electing, as the leader of the nation and, ostensibly, the free world, a misogynist, racist, sexist, narcissist, global embarrassment of a bully.

And, in that single act, sending the message to our children that misogyny and racism and sexism and narcissism and bullying aren't, it turns out, character flaws that need to be, at least, discouraged, if not outwardly, swiftly, bluntly and without hesitation prevented and, if need be, forbidden.

But that you can, in the end, present yourself that way in America and, far from being chastised or corrected, find yourself elected President of the United States.

Super Tuesday is behind us.

And for the remainder of the year, we're going to hear thousands of people sharing with us what they see and hear as they watch and listen to the process play itself out.

Watch and listen to who you like because, if for no other reason, no matter who your favorite commentator or pundit or prognosticator might be, the unavoidable truth is the only real absolutely guaranteed to be right about it all in the end political analysis will come not from Fox or CNN or MSNBC or Hannity or Maddow or Wolf or Megyn or Jerry Mathers as the Beaver.

Only one well known name will nail it.

Doris Day.

Whatever will be, will be.

That said, it might be worth mentioning again, that of all the tens of thousands of eyes and ears that will be watching and listening and assessing and determining and predicting there is one critically important bunch of eyes and ears that won't have a word to say about any of it.

But make no mistake.

The children are watching.

And they're listening.