Rodent Regatta

Republican blue jays and their education entitlement
By Craig J. Cantoni
June 30, 2004

It is said that Social Security and Medicare are the third-rail of politics. If you dare mess with the entitlements, AARP will electrocute you on the third rail and then tell grandma and grandpa to drive the train back and forth over your body for fun.

But there is another entitlement that is even more entrenched than Social Security and Medicare. If you have the temerity to even suggest that it is an entitlement, its beneficiaries will torture you before throwing you on the third rail.

What entitlement am I referring to? Public education.

And who are the people most likely to become hysterical when their government-granted ”right” is questioned? Republican women. I know, because I have been on the receiving end of their temper tantrums.

For example, in a recent Arizona Republic column, I said that local parents in a predominately Republican, upper-income part of town were like greedy pigs at the public teat for squealing about the local school district denying their request to build an unnecessary high school in their housing development at a cost of tens of millions of dollars.

Given my history of being a leader in equal rights for women and being married to a professional woman who is a rational thinker, I don’t like to say this, but the sorry fact is that women responded to my article with emotional outbursts, while men responded with reasoned arguments. Sadly, this has been the case whenever I’ve written about public education.

For example, one mom sent a nastygram and said, ”My children deserve a high school in their neighborhood, and I think you’re a jerk for trying to stop it.” Another said, ”We are not loaded and want our child to attend public school, not as a privilege but as a right.” She went on to say that she ”won’t walk away from making sure that all of our kids have a right to a free and appropriate education!!!”

Neither women offered a logical argument for spending taxpayer money on an unnecessary high school. They simply squawked as mindlessly as mother blue jays looking for more bugs for baby blue jay.

Dads, on the other hand, were open to having an intelligent debate about the facts of the matter, about whether public education is still providing a public good and about different funding mechanisms. One wrote, ”Vouchers would allow rich and poor students to attend the school of their choice instead of being told by the school board what school they can attend.”

If he knows what’s good for him, the dad won’t say that in front of mother blue jay. Squawk! Peck, peck!

In previous articles, I have raised a fairness issue of parochial parents having to pay double for education, once in public school taxes and once in private tuition, in order to exercise their right of religious freedom. I suggested that a fairer system would be for them to receive a tax credit equal to what they pay in public school taxes for each of the 12 years that their children are in private school. Since the average household in my home state of Arizona pays approximately $190,000 in public ed taxes over the adult lives of the heads of the household, the credit would be about $45,000, thus leaving a balance of $145,000 for public schools.

Squawk, squawk, squawk. For suggesting that private school parents keep $45,000 of their own money while letting public school parents take $145,000 of it, I was attacked by flocks of screeching blue jays, as if I were a cat trying to get into their nest and eat their offspring for lunch. One squawked, ”You’re mean-spirited and selfish!” Another peeped sorrowfully about her lot in life: ”You don’t care that I have bills to pay and have to drive a minivan instead of a nice SUV.” Still another made a birdbrained remark that no one forces parochial school parents to send their kids to private school, apparently not realizing that they are forced to pay public school taxes, although their kids don’t attend public school.

Over the years, I have learned how to stop the mommy blue jays from pecking at me. I say, ”Okay, your arguments are so compelling and intelligent, that I’ll drop the tax credit idea if you send a thank-you card to me or another private school parent for giving you tens of thousands of dollars.” It’s like asking Medicare recipients to please send a thank-you card to my son or other another kid for picking up the multi-trillion-dollar tab for their medicine and medical care that will be imposed on future generations by our benevolent and munificent government.

I never hear from the blue jays again. My request doesn’t change their entitlement mentality, but at least it stops their mindless squawking.

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Mr. Cantoni is an author, columnist and founder of Honest Americans Against Legal Theft (HAALT). He can be reached at ccan2@aol.com

Shooting liberals and loons
By Craig J. Cantoni
June 24, 2004

I recently shot a liberal who had been haranguing me for the last two years over my weekly opinion column in the Arizona Republic. I’ll never hear from him again. If you want to know how to shoot liberals and other loons without getting arrested, read on.

I’ll start with how I shot the haranguer.

I shot him with a rhetorical bullet by asking him the following: ”Since you dislike my libertarian views, could you please describe your political philosophy? To make it easy for you, pick a point on a 10-point scale, in which ’0’ represents totalitarianism, ’5’ represents contemporary liberalism, ’6’ represents neoconservatism and ’10’ represents the full array of liberty, including civil liberties, economic freedom, property rights, and the rights of self-defense and free association.”

The haranguer wrote back and said that he was too busy to answer my question. Yeah, right. He is not too busy to send me long, haranguing e-mails, but he’s too busy to pick a point on a 10-point scale. In reality, the question flummoxed him, because like most people, he had spent his adult life thinking in terms of the traditional left-right scale, or liberal-conservative scale, and not a liberty scale. Like a shot in the forehead, the question undoubtedly made him realize that his political philosophy was not about complete freedom, and he was not about to admit it.

Here are six other bullets that I have found effective in shooting liberals and loons:

Bullet One:

When a liberal or loon says that taxes should be increased in general or for some utopian purpose, shoot back with this loaded question: ”Given that government spending has increased 300% in inflation-adjusted dollars over the last 100 years, given that the cost of government is $24,000 per household, given that a clerk earning $64 a day at a convenience store has almost $10 taken for the Social Security and Medicare of well-off retirees, and given that I pay more than 40% of my income in taxes, what do you think is a fair percentage of income for people to pay in taxes?”

I have asked at least 50 liberals and loons this question. None has ever answered the question with a specific percentage. Most answer with platitudes and generalities about fairness and justice. A few have actually said that no one should pay more than 25% of income in taxes.

Bullet Two:

When a liberal or loon says that schools are underfunded and need more money, fire the following question: ”How much do you pay per year and over a lifetime in school taxes?” If the person doesn’t know (and few people do), fire a follow-up question: ”Then how do you know that schools deserve more of your money and whether you are getting your money’s worth?”

Bullet Three:

When a liberal or loon says that health care should be provided by the government, squeeze off this round: ”Do you also believe that everyone should get free food, shelter, clothing and transportation from the government, and wasn’t that tried by the Soviet Union?”

Bullet Four:

When a liberal or loon says that health care is right, pop ’em with this: ”Aren’t you really saying that people have a right to take other people’s money for their health care? If so, where is that right written?” If he responds with claptrap about the profit motive not working in health care, ask him the following: ”Are you aware that the government critically wounded a consumer market in health care 60 years ago, when misguided policies resulted in employees getting their medical insurance from their employers instead of buying it on their own, and that the government delivered the coup de grace with Medicare in 1965? Why do you blame the market when there is no consumer market in medical insurance?”

Bullet Five:

When a liberal or loon says that higher gas prices are due to price-fixing by Big Oil, blast back with this bullet: ”Then why does Big Oil allow prices to fall?”

Bullet Six:

When the first five bullets mortally wound a liberal or loon, and in his dying breath he calls you mean-spirited and selfish, finish him off as follows: ”Gee, if you care so much about other people, why don’t you give them your money instead of mine?”

Lock and load. Happy shooting—rhetorically speaking.

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Mr. Cantoni is an author, columnist and founder of Honest Americans Against Legal Theft (HAALT). He can be reached at ccan2@aol.com

K-12 Group-think
By Craig J. Cantoni
June 22, 2004

Does group-think result from the government, unionized teachers and a few textbook publishers having a near-monopoly over K-12 classroom thought? And if so, is this a good thing in a free society?

Judging from reader responses to my articles in the mainstream media over the years, the answer to the first question is yes, at least in terms of group-think about public education, government and economics. The answer to the second question is no, as group-think certainly is not good in a free society, especially group-think about the subjects of public education, government and economics.

Millions of readers have read my articles over the years, and hundreds have responded with letters and e-mails. Whether they are Democrats or Republicans, college-educated or not, the vast majority of them think alike about public education, government and economics. For example:

– Most believe that public schools are underfunded, in spite of a doubling of per-pupil spending in real terms over the last 40 years, and in spite of overwhelming evidence that increased spending has not translated into improved academic results. One soccer mom, in a disagreement with me about education spending, forwarded a newspaper article to prove her point that Arizona and Utah rank at the bottom in education spending. But a sidebar to the article clearly showed that the two states rank near the middle when education spending is calculated as a percentage of personal income, which is the most accurate way of comparing spending between states. She didn’t see the facts staring her in the face, because she had been brainwashed for years by the education establishment to believe the canard about the states ranking at the bottom. – Most want an increase in public ed spending, although they have no idea what they pay in public ed taxes over their adult lives. They have no idea because the education establishment does not want them to know the number. Of course, it is impossible to know whether you are getting good value for your money if you don’t know how much you are paying. – Most believe that public school teachers are underpaid, although the facts show that when teacher pay and benefits are calculated on an hourly basis, they are paid more than many professions that require a more rigorous degree. Naturally, unionized teachers are not about to cite such facts. – Most do not know that government spending has increased in real terms by 300 percent over the last century, that transfer payments have increased 20-fold from 2 percent of government spending 100 years ago to 40 percent today, that the cost of government is $24,000 per household, that the cost of regulations is $8,000 per household, that there are about 10 million more wealth-consuming government employees than wealth-producing manufacturing employees, or that future generations will be left with Social Security and Medicare deficits of over $40 trillion. These are not the kind of facts that government schools and unionized teachers are going to stress. – Most are illiterate in economics, because economics is not taught in government schools. Thus, most fall for claptrap spread by such socialist politicians as Ted Kennedy, who claims that nationalized health care will make health care affordable. Of course, costs don’t decrease because something is socialized. The costs simply become hidden and are transferred from one person to the next in a gigantic government-run shell game, with politicians receiving campaign payoffs to referee the game. – Most don’t know that health insurance is unaffordable for millions of Americans because the government killed a consumer market in health insurance 60 years ago. Government schools, which are used by the government to enroll people in various socialized health care programs, are not about to teach this fact. – When I question why it is fair for private school parents to subsidize well-off public school parents through public education taxes, most readers respond with the same platitudes about public education being for the benefit of the poor. It would be a valid point if not for the fact that the vast majority of public ed parents are not poor and can afford to educate their kids without taking other people’s money, just as they can afford to feed, shelter and clothe their kids without taking other people’s money. If they really wanted to help the poor, parents of public-schoolers would pay the cost of their kid’s education out of their own pockets in direct tuition, so that public school taxes would only go to the poor. Again, this is not a perspective that unionized teachers and government schools would bring to the classroom. – Most readers say that I’m mean-spirited and selfish when I write that private school parents and homeschoolers should get a tax credit equal to what they pay in public school taxes for the 12 years that their kids attend private school or are homeschooled. They even say this when presented with the fact that my wife and I will pay $190,000 in public school taxes over our adult lives, although we get no direct benefit in return, because our son attends parochial school. In our case, the tax credit would be about $45,000, thus leaving $145,000 for public school parents. Only someone who has been indoctrinated in socialism can believe that the giver of $145,000 is mean-spirited and selfish but the recipient is not. – Most readers claim that public schools are a public good like highways and parks. Of course, highways and parks are not in the business of teaching impressionable children. Also, in my home state of Arizona, most highway costs are paid by users through gas taxes, sales taxes on cars and various fees—unlike public schools, which are funded by users and nonusers alike. And those who spout platitudes about the public good rarely offer any coherent theory about what is a public good and what isn’t. The extent of their narcissistic thinking is that public schools are a public good, because they and their kids have attended them and received more ”public good” than those who haven’t attended them. Government schools are not about to disabuse them of the notion.

A closing question: Is it just a coincidence that most Americans have attended government schools and that most Americans think alike about public education, government and economics? I think not.

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Mr. Cantoni is an author, columnist and founder of Honest Americans Against Legal Theft (HAALT). He can be reached at ccan2@aol.com

Big Butts, Small Brains
by Craig J. Cantoni
June 17, 2004

There is an inverse relationship between the size of American butts and the size of their brains. The bigger the butt, the smaller the brain.

A case in point was the lead story on big butts, er, obesity, in the June 7 issue of Time Magazine. The story included the results of an opinion survey on obesity.

Eighty-seven percent of respondents said that individuals have a great deal or a good amount of responsibility for being obese. About the same percentage said that obese people are not getting enough exercise. At the same time, 58 percent said that the federal government is doing too little about the problem, and 41 percent said that there should be a tax on unhealthy foods, with the revenue being used for programs to fight obesity.

This illogical small-brained thinking can be summarized with the following syllogism: Individuals are responsible for being obese. Individuals can reduce obesity by eating less and exercising more. Therefore, the federal government should do something, including taxing people who are not obese and giving their money to those who are.

Naturally, since it was published by a propaganda arm of the nanny state, the lengthy article did not question the fairness, morality or constitutionality of the federal government taking money from people who control their urges and spending it on butt reduction programs for those who don’t.

To the establishment media, the Constitution is a quaint document under glass at the National Archives, and fairness and morality are always covered from the perspective of irresponsible people instead of responsible ones. This results in irresponsible people being portrayed as victims. And that, in turn, results in more irresponsible small-brained people who believe what they read in Time.

Following the mainstream media formula, the Time piece portrayed the obese as victims of biology, advertising, fast food, poverty, the price of healthy food, the auto, suburban sprawl and global warming. I’m kidding about global warming but not the others.

Before reading the piece, I knew for certain that it would not cover certain issues. It did not disappoint me. For example, it did not mention the following:

– That children in single-parent families are 40 percent more likely to be obese than children in two-parent families. – That much of the rise in single-parent families is due to misguided government policies and programs—the very same government that 58 percent of Americans believe can solve the problem of obesity. – That there is a connection between obesity and welfare, because welfare strips people of personal responsibility, initiative and self-esteem. – That it is a myth that healthy foods are expensive and not affordable for lower-income Americans.

On the last point, Time said that wealthy people can afford to buy an expensive lean steak, but poor people can only afford fatty food. What poppycock! Healthy food is not expensive. I know, because I don’t eat much meat but do eat a lot of salads made with beans, other canned vegetables and fresh produce. Granted, my wife wears a gas mask to bed, but that is beside the point.

Locally, a can of kidney beans costs 50 cents; a can of peas, 60 cents; and a pound of fresh broccoli, $1.64. Two high-protein, low-fat meals can be made out of these ingredients at a cost of $1.37 per meal, excluding the nominal cost of olive oil and vinegar.

The Time piece even had advice to parents for talking to their kids about being overweight. The advice was to be sensitive to their feelings and not be judgmental. I’m a bad parent. I tell my kid that if he eats one more potato chip, I’m going to rip his tongue out of his mouth. He is not overweight but is undergoing psychoanalysis. Just kidding about the psychoanalysis.

A recent PBS NewsHour segment on obesity in Arkansas covered the issue the same way that Time Magazine did. Of course it did. PBS is another propaganda arm of the nanny state.

The segment described the anti-obesity program started in public schools by the Arkansas governor, a former big butt, who, like reformed smokers, wants the state to stick its butt in other people’s business. He believes that the state has a right to stick its butt where it doesn’t belong. Why? Because socialism breeds socialism. PBS didn’t characterize the governor’s initiative that way, but that is how it should have been characterized.

If PBS were not a propaganda arm of the nanny state, it would have explained that socialism is achieved in incremental steps. First, the state socializes health care. Next, the state says it has the right to control obesity because obesity increases the state’s health care costs. Then, the state says it has the right to take money from people who eat responsibly and give it to people who don’t.

Featured in the PBS segment was a dumpster-sized honor student, whose command of English makes NBA players seem articulate by comparison. If she is an honor student, average students in Arkansas must have the brains of hamsters and the butts of elephants.

The student was shown at home having dinner with her mom, who is the size of two dumpsters. Dinner included a fried chicken leg the size of a mastodon leg, creamed corn and corn bread. Dad was missing from the scene. I’m sure that he was working overtime and was going to be home later. Wink, wink.

The scene then shifted to an interview with a school administrator. Hold on to your chair. You’re going to be shocked by what she said. She said that the schools can’t fight obesity without more money. Shocking! She did not explain why it is the role of schools to fight obesity or why parents can’t simply stop serving fried mastodon legs to their kids. And of course, PBS did not ask her such questions, because PBS and government schools are different arms of the same propaganda ministry.

As butts have gotten bigger, brains have gotten smaller, the nanny state has gotten bigger and the propaganda ministry has become more effective in shaping public opinion. It’s enough to make me want to kick some butt.

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Mr. Cantoni is an author, columnist and founder of Honest Americans Against Legal Theft (HAALT). He can be reached at ccan2@aol.com

PBS Rips Candidate Thomas Jefferson
by Craig J. Cantoni
June 15, 2004

In the event you missed it, last week’s PBS show ”Washington Week in Review” discussed the presidential campaign between John Kerry, George Bush, Ralph Nader and Thomas Jefferson. Here is a transcript of the segment:

Gwen Ifill (Host): It’s not surprising that John Kerry and George Bush are still running neck and neck, but the big news of the week is the huge drop in the polls for Libertarian candidate Thomas Jefferson. CBS is now projecting that he will get fewer votes than Ralph Nader.

Michael Duffy (Time Magazine): I have never seen a candidate with such radical ideas and such a tin ear for politics. The dumbest thing he did this week was poke his finger in the eye of the American Association of Retired People while on the stump in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. In speaking about the trillions of dollars in Medicare bills that will be passed to future generations, he actually said the following: ”I sincerely believe… that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity under the name of funding is but swindling futurity on a large scale.”

David Sanger (NY Times): Yeah, it’s unbelievable that he would equate Medicare to swindling. But then he kept digging his political grave by adding this: ”Then I say, the earth belongs to each of these generations during its course, fully and in its own right. The second generation receives it clear of the debts and incumbrances of the first, the third of the second, and so on. For if the first could charge it [the next generation] with a debt, then the earth would belong to the dead and not to the living generation. Then, no generation can contract debts greater than may be paid during the course of its own existence.”

Tom Gjelten (National Public Radio): And what is it with his funny way of talking? He’ll never get the votes of the MTV generation by speaking above the sixth-grade level.

Gwen Ifill: Good point, Tom. And what do you think of him slamming Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan for not telling the truth about paper money that is not backed by gold?

Tom Gjelten: Jefferson’s ears aren’t tin. They’re hardened steel. Greenspan is an icon, but Jefferson preached to him about the danger of paper money. Let me quote what he said: ”The trifling economy of paper, as a cheaper medium, or its convenience for transmission, weighs nothing in opposition to the advantages of the precious metals… it is liable to be abused, has been, is, and forever will be abused, in every country in which it is permitted.”

Michael Duffy: I don’t think that was his biggest gaffe, considereing that other than Wall Street, no one understands the banking system. His biggest gaffe was alienating Hispanics with his stand on immigration.

Gwen Ifill: I thought he was in favor of immigration.

Michael Duffy: He is, but his mistake was warning about too much immigration from one country at one time. It’s hard to believe, but he actually made the following statement in San Antonio, Texas: ”[Is] rapid population [growth] by as great importations of foreigners as possible… founded in good policy?... They will bring with them the principles of the governments they leave, imbibed in their early youth; or, if able to throw them off, it will be in exchange for an unbounded licentiousness, passing, as is usual, from one extreme to another. It would be a miracle were they to stop precisely at the point of temperate liberty. These principles, with their language, they will transmit to their children. In proportion to their number, they will share with us the legislation. They will infuse into it their spirit, warp and bias its direction, and render it a heterogeneous, incoherent, distracted mass… If they come of themselves, they are entitled to all the rights of citizenship: but I doubt the expediency of inviting them by extraordinary encouragements.”

David Sanger: That was certainly a huge gaffe, but the biggest gaffe was his stand on the Iraq War, Israel and the Middle East. Rush Limbaugh was taken to the hospital with a heart attack when he heard about it. In speaking before the Anti-Defamation League in Manhattan, Jefferson gave a history of European meddling in the Middle East in the early 20th century and beyond, including the Balfour Declaration, the creation of the Zionist State of Israel in what had been a peaceful region, and Britain’s creation of Iraq out of three distinct cultures and warring tribes. He made the point that because European colonialsim is the root-cause of many of the problems in the Middle East, Europeans should solve the problems. Then he sent shock waves through the audience and the State Department by saying: ”I have ever deemed it fundamental for the United States never to take active part in the quarrels of Europe. Their political interests are entirely distinct from ours. Their mutual jealousies, their balance of power, their complicated alliances, their forms and principles of government, are all foreign to us. They are nations of eternal war. All their energies are expended in the destruction of the labor, property and lives of their people.”

Tom Gjelten: Let’s don’t forget that he also alienated the Religious Right and the Unreligious Left. He alienated the Religious Right by saying, ”Whenever… preachers, instead of a lesson in religion, put [their congregation] off with a discourse on the Copernican system, on chemical affinities, on the construction of government, or the characters or conduct of those administering it, it is a breach of contract, depriving their audience of the kind of service for which they are salaried, and giving them, instead of it, what they did not want, or, if wanted, would rather seek from better sources in that particular art of science.” Then he alienated the Unreligious Left by speaking about morals: ”Peace, prosperity, liberty and morals have an intimate connection.”

David Sanger: He even lambasted Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor when he was asked at the University of Michigan what he thought about her affirmative-action decision. He responded that ”Laws are made for men of ordinary understanding and should, therefore, be construed by the ordinary rules of common sense. Their meaning is not to be sought for in metaphysical subtleties which may make anything mean everything or nothing at pleasure.”

Gwen Ifill: I also understand, David, that he has upset the Democratic wing of the Republican Party by attacking Senator John McCain for his campaign finance reforms.

David Sanger: He sure did, Gwen. He did it by expressing his weird view of the First Amendment. It’s hard to believe, but he actually said this about free speech: ”There are rights which it is useless to surrender to the government and which governments have yet always been found to invade. These are the rights of thinking and publishing our thoughts by speaking or writing; the right of free commerce; the right of personal freedom. There are instruments for administering the government so peculiarly trustworthy that we should never leave the legislature at liberty to change them.”

Tom Gjelten: Speaking of weird views, he has Congress and every lobbyist and federal employee up in arms over his warning about the centralization of power in Washington. To quote: ”When all government, domestic and foreign, in little as in great things, shall be drawn to Washington as the center of all power, it will render powerless the checks provided of one government on another and will become as venal and oppressive as the government from which we separated.”

Gwen Ifill: Thanks for your summaries, gentlemen. I’ll wrap up this segment with quotes from the other candidates about Jefferson. John Kerry said that ”Jefferson is a right-wing extremist who has obviously never read the Constitution.” Bush said that ”Jefferson is no compassionate conservative or patriot … uh, terrorism … uh, weapons of mass destruction … uh, a sovereign Iraq.” And Nader said, ”This man is an enemy of the proletariat and the environment.”

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Mr. Cantoni is an author and columnist. He can be reached at ccan2@aol.com. Credit is given to the following University of Virginia website for some of the Jefferson quotations: http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/