Common Core: More Like Common Crap

I’ve been here less than two months and I’m already stirring the pot. Feel free to copy and send this letter to your own newspaper’s editor if your state has adopted Common Core.

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I was dismayed to read in last week’s Herald that our children, at the ripe old age of five, will be subject to the same rigorous hours of any full-time employee. Instead of allowing our children to learn at their own pace they will now be required to learn at the pace of their elders without the benefit of rest and play that are so crucial to growing minds.

It gets worse; the State of Tennessee has effectively said that we don’t know what is good for our children and has adopted the D.C.-devised, one-size-fits-all-across-the-nation program “Common Core”. Unproven, thrown together, and wielded by big government to send (or withhold) education dollars to states, Common Core dictates what will be taught and what will be read by our students.

I have reviewed the Common Core literature requirements: stepping away from the 50% fiction/50% non-fiction ratio, our 12th graders will be reading 70% non-fiction, all of which is dictated in Appendix B of the English Language Arts & Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects order sent down from Washington-On-High.

Instead of Tennessee being trusted to choose from a world of compelling, complex literature, D.C. has ordered that such literary gems as the EPA’s Recommended Levels of Insulation and Atul Gawande’s The Cost Conundrum: Health Care Costs in McAllen, Texas will be read.

46 states are adopting Common Core but 10 of those are already having second thoughts including our neighbor, Georgia. These 14 states realize what D.C. does not: that central planning makes gathering people’s real preferences and needs impossible.

By adopting Common Core, Tennessee has effectively said, “Big Brother knows better than we” and will allow our children to become good little statists. But at least they’ll have read the riveting GSA’s Strengthening Federal Environmental, Energy, and Transportation Management.

The Looters Are In Control

Taking this directly off ZeroHedge’s website this morning because it’s just so damn important.

[And now it’s time for Mr. Obama to start paying for all those votes by reaching deep into our pockets. If you intend to avoid paying your “fair share,” however, please take note: There will be  few places to hide. For a gimlet-eyed view of what may lie in store for taxpayers and citizens of all political persuasions during the next four years, ponder the guest commentary below, from Wayne Siggard, a regular in the Rick’s Picks forum. RA]

The election was all about new math:  47 = 51. The foresight and genius of the Founders knew no bounds.  Ben Franklin said, “Once the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.”  The trumpets have sounded.  The heralds have announced the awakening of the masses to that reality.  The greatest and most free nation the world has ever known has just sold its birthright for a mess of pottage; or, at least, the promise of an Obama phone. The takers have voted to take control over the producers.

Everyone will now get a fair shot — except that those who work in government and those who take government welfare will get a fairer shot.  Obama knows that you didn’t build that company.  You didn’t live frugally and save more money than your neighbor while they spent theirs on drugs or riotous living.  He knows this because he didn’t get anything without government assistance — affirmative action put him ahead of more qualified people who earned a spot that he took, just like Elizabeth Warren. You couldn’t possibly have gotten anything on your own merit or hard work.

“A claim for material position can be met only by a government with totalitarian powers.” – Friedrich von Hayek

Von Mises said that full government control of all activities of the individual is virtually the goal of both national parties.  Have you ever tried to drill an oil or gas well?  Have you ever tried to build a house or commercial building?  Have you ever tried to manufacture and sell a product?  The International Building Code (IBC) increases in size, restrictions and requirements every year. Why? Because a bureaucracy needs to expand to justify its existence.

 “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” – Lord Acton

Have you ever experienced the disdain and contempt of a bureaucrat whose permission you sought?  It used to be that their power to grant a license or permit was retribution for their pay being less than that of the private sector.  Now, you get to pay them 50% more than you would get for the same job, and the disdain has not decreased.  Firemen, police officers, and military personnel can retire as young as 38, many making over $100,000 per year if they work until 50, and many can take another job and collect another pension on top of the first.  Meanwhile, according to the Census Bureau, the average middle class family’s income has decreased $4,019 during the Obama years, to $50,964.  More than half of the lifeguards in Newport Beach, CA, make over $150,000 per year and can collect more than $100,000 in pension benefits starting under 50 years of age.

So, What’s Coming?

That paradigm of preternatural  prestidigitation, the Federal Reserve Bank, will continue its policy of zero percent interest.  The big banks will mask their insolvency with free money from the Feds.  Greedy speculators and fools who overspent on housing will have their mistakes paid for by those taxpayers who had the foresight to save and invest wisely.  Obama bundlers and other insiders will continue to get billion dollar investments from the government, sucking valuable capital from the private sector. The official inflation rates will miraculously stay low while you are paying 100% more for gasoline and food.

 “History is largely a history of inflation, usually inflations engineered by governments for the gain of governments.” –Friedrich von Hayek

Foreign nations are no longer purchasing U.S. government bonds. The largest purchaser is the Federal Reserve Bank.  In other words, the government is printing money from thin air. In 1970, you could go to Las Vegas and buy a silver dollar for one paper dollar. It now costs around $35. A mansion behind the Beverly Hills Hotel sold for $200,000. It resold in 2004 for $16 million. A house in Flintridge, CA, sold for $115,000.  Its current value is $4.5 million. The base price for a Corvette was $5192.  It is now $49,600, a comparative bargain.  What you could buy for $1 million in 1970 now takes $36 million.  Senator Everett Dirksen in the 1960s is reputed to have remarked,” a billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon we’re talking real money.”  You can now add three zeros.  The bottom line is that if you are collecting 0.15% interest on your CD, you are losing real purchasing value of at least 10%, and that rate will be accelerating in the next four years.  Carlo Ponzi was a hopeless naïf compared to our elected officials.

Harry Reid Has a Plan

Harry Reid already has a bill on his desk which requires that all pension plans (except for the unions, of course), 401Ks, and IRAs be converted to annuities from the government.  This pile of cash represents the largest pile of readily available cash in the world right now.  The money will be gone as soon as it hits the government’s account, and you will be left with empty promises.  There is no money, only a printing press.

Capital export controls will be enacted.  You will not be able to get your money out of the country.  Already you can no longer open a bank account in Switzerland unless you have over $30 million because the reporting requirements are too onerous for a smaller account.  All requests to Switzerland for visas from Americans will be suspended. History will be repeated (shocking, I know), and all gold in private hands will be confiscated.  The Republicans will cave, the tax rates will rise, and anyone making more than the insider politicians and government employees will encounter ever-increasing marginal tax rates.

Payoffs for votes will be made.  Affirmative action requirements will be increased in every field of endeavor.  Women’s abortions and contraceptives will be free. Regulations will stop the advent of fracking and the boom in oil and natural gas will come to an abrupt halt.  Payments to environmental groups for lawyer’s fees will expand exponentially.  Government-controlled lands with oil and gas potential will be declared wilderness or national monuments, just like Grand Staircase-Escalante in Utah.  I could go on for another ten pages, but , in a nutshell, the message from Mr. Obama is, “You lost.”

And finally, Israel has recognized that Mr. Obama will offer no succor.  Before the end of January, they will raid Iran.  Gasoline will reach $7 per gallon, and voila, solar and wind energy will be competitive.  No matter that your thermostat is set at 40 degrees, if you can get fuel or power.

The looters are in control.  Set your alarms.

Ayn Rand’s Screen Guide for Americans

While written for Americans attempting to write for the Hollywood Progressive machine, this document can be used as a reference for anyone trying to figure out how we’ve gotten where we are, especially as it relates to our entertainment industry. It can be used to begin to objectively look at movies you watch. And, it can be used to evaluate those movies you love; if you love a movie that is clearly morally corrupt, check your premises, because one of them is wrong.

Screen Guide for Americans

Give Them What They Want

Just found this over at townhall.com and thought I’d share. And, for the record, I completely agree.

Dear Republican Congress,

As a conservative Republican I am begging you to give president Obama and those who voted for him everything they want.

They want higher taxes on the rich and companies. Give it to them.

They want higher capital gains taxes that will hurt their investments. Give it to them.

They want a system that will make Medicare insolvent by 2024 and Social Security insolvent soon after that. Give it to them.

They want policies that will lead to constant double-digit unemployment rates for minorities and young people. Give it to them.

They want an educational system that entraps the poor in failing schools. Give it to them. 

They want higher energy prices. Give it to them.

They want to spend trillions of dollars fighting global warming while China and India continue to tap oil and coal. Give it to them.

They want 20 trillion dollars plus in debt. Give it to them.

They want the Obamacare penalties to kick in next year. Give it to them.

They want a larger, more powerful Washington DC. Give it to them.

They want a more secular society that is increasingly hostile toward religion. Give it to them.

They want a more “fair” society run by bureaucrats. Give it to them.

They want socialist cronyism. Give it to them.

They want to go down the road of Europe. Give it to them.

In addition to the aforementioned, I say that we legalize weed from sea to shining sea. Wait … not just weed but acid. Think of how creative everyone could be and how it would distort the Obama voters’ reality from the truly sucky conditions his policies have created. That’s what you call a bona fide two-fer, folks. You’re welcome.

Oh, and we mustn’t forget cocaine and heroin legalization. And bath salts! How could I forget bath salts? Bath salts help spice things up during an unemployed weekend! Calgon’s calling. Nothing like dumping drugs into a culture of entitlement. I can’t imagine that going south.

Yes, I join with my friend Irwin and say that we give it to them and find out once and for all who is right. If we are right, they will have no one to blame but themselves, and maybe we will finally get true change in this country and in the Republican party so that we have a real choice in the years to come.

If we are wrong, then so be it. I will gladly repent of my evil conservative ways and become a socialist … I mean Democrat.