Obama vs. the individual

Creepy collectivism in these lines from the classroom speech?

If you quit on school, you’re not just quitting on yourself, you’re quitting on your country….

Don’t ever give up on yourself, because when you give up on yourself, you give up on your country.

The story of America [is] about people…who loved their country too much to do anything less than their best….

What will a President who comes here in 20 or 50 or 100 years say about what all of you did for this country?…

Someone like him, he means, making it explicit:

I expect great things from each of you. So don’t let us down. Don’t let your family down or your country down.

I? Us? Then family and country. Wow. “Creepy” is right, “the president as national dad.”  Straight from the shoulder of the Maximum Leader.

Or as Dr. Helen asks, “Who Cares What Presidents Think?”

Rather than this “What can you do for your country?” stuff, she refers to Milton Friedman:

The paternalistic “what your country can do for you” implies that government is the patron, the citizen the ward, a view that is at odds with the free man’s belief in his own responsibility for his own destiny.

The organismic, ‘what you can do for your country’ implies that government is the master or the deity, the citizen, the servant or the votary. To the free man, the country is the collection of individuals who compose it, not something over and above them.

He is proud of a common heritage and loyal to common traditions. But he regards government as a means, an instrumentality, neither a grantor of favors, and gifts, nor a master or god to be blindly worshipped and served.

Can you imagine getting elected representative of the 7th Illinois district on such a platform?  Telling people about their glorious personal responsibility?  After 70–plus years of creeping creepy collectivism?

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Obama in the classroom

Spokesman Robert Gibbs about objectors to Oh-bama addressing school children:

“It’s a sad state of affairs that many in this country politically would rather start an ‘Animal House’ food fight rather than inspire kids to stay in school, to work hard, to engage parents to stay involved and to ensure that the millions of teachers that are making great sacrifices continue to be the best in the world.”

It’s in The Hill’s Blog Briefing Room, where it picked up 420 comments as of 10:30 Monday night, the first of which, by “tropicgirl,” is quite good:

This would never have happened if people did not dislike the president so much. There are many reasons for that, and Glibbs [sic] needs to take responsibility for some of that dislike he has helped create, because of his sour attitude, along with the inexperienced, off-timing and condescending reputation those around the president have helped create. [Italics added]

Yes, these are flip wise guys, from Rahm E. on down.  Remember when gravitas was an issue?

The second commenter qualifies the first nicely, without shooting it down:

It’s not a matter of “liking” it’s a matter of “trusting.” I voted for him, regret it. The bottom line, “We – most of the American People” now, do not trust him.

If not most, then an awful lot.  He’s a jerk.

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Coach, cop, saver of young men

“I don’t want to lose any young men. I look at it as me being a vessel through God to minister to these young men,” Proviso East High School head coach Aaron Peppers, who is also a Maywood policeman, told Chi Trib in an excellent page-one story by Brian Hamilton.

This is rock-solid stuff.  Peppers grew up in Maywood, is a Proviso East alum, lives there still.  His charges are threatened by the allure of mostly-black Maywood’s mean streets.

“That’s the hand we’re dealt in this community,” Peppers says. “Just know that you’re not going to coach football. You’re not just going to be a police officer answering service calls. You’re going to have to teach. You’re going to have to love. If you’re a selfish person, you’re going to have to change.”

As we used to say in the Jesuits, edifying —  considerably more so than an account of a celebrity finding God, as we sometimes read.  It’s a religion story of merit.

Another good one, by the way, was Manya Brachear’s account of the senior minister of First United Methodist Church, also known as Chicago Temple, across from the Daley Center, who reads poetry to his former English teacher now stroke-ridden, bringing him back to life as it were.

This was “Their Friendship: Pure Poetry,” on 8/31.

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Say it with numbers

How we doin’?  Depends whom you ask.  Here’s a graph worth studying:

Augustunempdata

(Oops, not all of it prints, including note that says maroon dots are actual unemployment data, everything in blue was created by Obama’s economic team.)

It’s from Innocent Bystanders by way of Power Line, which notes that Biden says the stimulus is working better than expected, then adds:

Biden’s dissociation from reality is nearly complete, but one wonders: aren’t there any journalists who are capable of looking up the administration’s predictions and asking Biden fact-based questions? Or is that considered too much work? 

Yes.  Too much.

Biden also plays the morality card:

“I believe this was the right thing to do morally,” Biden said in a speech the White House billed as a major address. “It was also the smart thing to do economically.”

I wouldn’t say it that way.  I’d say it’s the right thing because it’s the smart thing, understood “we’d be derelict in our duty” if we didn’t do it.

But if it’s not working, it’s not smart, and therefore not right.  He’s better off leaving morality out of it.  It’s the last refuge of political scoundrels.

But what if “[t]he unemployment rate went up to 9.7% [in August], reversing the improvement we saw in July,” as Innocent B. says, citing Bureau of Labor Statistics reporting?

And what if jobs are down too, as here?

Joblosses

Sign of government activity that is neither smart nor moral. 

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Looking for a good man at Wheeling Jesuit

Search team in place for successor to fired Wheeling Jesuit U. president.

Board of Directors Chairman Bill Fisher says two employees, one student and one community representative will help five board members choose candidates to replace Julio Giulietti.

Otherwise, mum’s the word:

Fisher said Monday he’s still not at liberty to discuss the nature of the board’s concerns. But he says Giulietti is to return to New England for consultation about a new ministry and assignment.

The directors have endorsed the all-Jesuit trustees’ decision to oust Giuletti, having earlier not ousted him for lack of a 2/3 vote to do so.

Not surprisingly, the Maryland Province provincial also endorsed it.  West Va. is in that province.  And the New England provincial, Giuletti’s superior, “has asked Giulietti to return to New England for discernment regarding a new ministry and assignment,” according to the [Charleston] State Journal.

This man is Myles Sheehan, S.J., M.D., who was based at Loyola Hospital and was Cardinal Francis George’s physician until his recent appointment as provincial.

Meanwhile, two directors had resigned as of 8/28,

Lynda C. Wolford, C.P.A., Director of Internal Audit and Management Analysis at Georgetown University for 12 yrs, and Rudolph L. DiTrapano, Esq., one of the very few lawyers listed in The Best Lawyers of America,

according to the “Save! Wheeling Jesuit University” website created to protest Giulietti’s firing.

Also, a students’ FaceBook group has been formed in his support.

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Snake oil bad for adults, worse for kids

Oh-bama is not welcome in schoolrooms in lots of places.   In the Detroit area,

Districts throughout the suburbs have been hit with complaints from parents who are worried about their children hearing a message from Obama that they won’t have a chance to preview.

I wouldn’t want him talking to my kids or grandchildren.  Don’t trust him.

The districts acknowledge that the message is intended to stress the importance of education and taking responsibility for learning. Some parents say the uproar is much ado about nothing.

Nope.  Nothing he and Axelrod do is about nothing.  Typical Democrats, always campaigning.  Stay away from kids.

Mike Reno, a member of the Rochester [MI] Board of Education, said the idea behind the message is noble, but the timing is bad because of the politically charged climate.

It will always be bad, because always politically charged.  Dems keep it that way. 

[Rory] Cooper [of Heritage Foundation] criticized Obama for pushing his message through both the official White House Web site and Organizing for America’s BarackObama.com. 

“Barack Obama needs to quit the perpetual campaign … he needs to choose which one he’s going to communicate with the American public through,” Cooper said.

But crisis mode suits them.  They dare not waste crises, because those are the golden harvest times for statist schemes.

For instance, health care legislation will (a) save money and (b) provide care for all.  Sure.  Increase services at lower cost.  No.  The cost of snake oil is what should worry us.  It’s going higher and higher, always does when Dems are in charge.

Later: I see Ann Coulter has an idea about that talking to school children, related to one of Oh-bama’s splendid czar choices.

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Look me in the eyes and say that

Waited a while in my eye doctor’s office the other day, got feeling like an English patient, asked the desk woman what was my estimated time of arrival.  She said 15 minutes, but I was antsy that day and knew getting in would be only half the fun: there would be another wait after drops were administered, etc. 

Last time, for instance, I sat while one of the docs told three or four non-doc staffers about the call from an emergency patient that had just come in: pure gossip it was.

Also, in the outer office this time, I was looking at people arguably in the last year of their respective lives, the ones who cost so much but will be winnowed by a panel come the revolution in health care.  There they (we) all were, waiting . . .

I asked if I might reschedule, and the desk woman said sure, pointing to another woman.  I hesitated, then suggested I call to make the second appointment.  No problem.

That was ten days ago — time flies when you’re avoiding the eye doctor.  I just called, and . . .

. . . asked for a non-busy time, got 8:45 tomorrow morning.  Good.  I will arrive at 8:30 with at least one good book, one that will absorb me completely.  Oh, but if it’s not a large-print one, I won’t be able to read it, and maybe not even then. . . .  

Maybe I will bring my excellent $15 Radio Shack am/fm pocket radio, which I can hold to my ear and listen to Don & Roma, at least until 9 o’clock.  Whatever.  In any case, I know this sort of thing takes planning, and that I am up to it.

Later: How’d it work out?  Splendidly.  For my 8:45 appointment, I arrived 8:35 or so, found a couple and a single before me, waited in empty room for a few minutes, was called, tested, eye-dropped, examined by doc, who found no change from last time. 

Also, I brought up computer glasses, which seem for me a writer what a hard hat is to a construction worker.  He prescribed some — bifocals with reading lens below computer lens.  Bingo. 

I bought some before I left in a package deal: frame and glasses for a comparatively low price which I won’t divulge, having seen what they cost on Internet.

As the Age of Obama grows more with us, such bargains I may not be able to afford passing up.

Why are such glasses important?  Try this:

CVS or Computer Vision Syndrome. The most common symptoms include headaches, focusing difficulties, burning eyes, tired eyes, general eyestrain, aching eyes, dry eyes, double vision, blurred vision, light sensitivity, and neck and shoulder pain.

Any one of those can unmake my day.  All at once, and I’d go to bed.

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Look out for trucks and autos

The new Randolph tot lot, Grove to Oak Park Ave., will be a park with an alley running through it.  A “speed table” will slow vehicles down to minimize danger of a tot being run over when he or she runs from one half of the park to the other. 

Gates across the alley appear in one of three plans offered, but these would be very expensive, to judge by comments by park officials.

This is what the park district is planning in its expansion of the lot’s western half to a newly acquired eastern half in land recently ceded to it by the village. 

Plans were explained to 35 or so citizens in a meeting 8/26 at Pleasant Home by John Mac Manus, a consultant on whom the park district has been relying extensively in recent months.

No one at the 8/26 meeting made much of the danger factor, though most comments were from people living close to the lot.

It’s a busy alley, however, serving several large apartment and condo buildings.  In fact, the whole block, Randolph to Washington, has only one single-family residence on the alley’s Oak Park Ave. side. 

Among vehicles who use the alley regularly are autos, garbage trucks, and moving vans, the latter more in some seasons than others, of course.

The three plans currently under discussion are Scheme 1, Scheme 2, and Scheme 3.  A survey monkey will send your comments on to the park district.  It’s not too demanding as those things go, asking what you like or don’t like about each scheme, which you like best, and what else you’d like to say.

I’m going to paste most of this in the latter portion.  You do what you feel like.  There’s no obligation.

Later: I did this, adding words to this effect, that kids amuse themselves when permitted, and this is the goal of any park.

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Honduras no, Chavez yes?

Obama admin putting screws to Honduras:

The most recent example of the Obama-style Good Neighbor Policy was the announcement last week that visa services for Hondurans are suspended indefinitely, and that some $135 million in bilateral aid might be cut.

But these are only the public examples of its hardball tactics. Much nastier stuff is going on behind the scenes, practiced by a presidency that once promised the American people greater transparency and a less interventionist foreign policy.

And Hillary’s State Dept. (I think it’s hers) is contributing:

Prominent Hondurans, including leading members of the business community, complain that a State Department official has been pressuring them to push the interim government to accept the return of Mr. Zelaya to power.

When I asked the State Department whether it was employing such dirty tricks a spokeswoman would only say the U.S. has been “encouraging all members of civil society to support the San Jose ‘accord'”—which calls for Mr. Zelaya to be restored to power. Perhaps something was lost in the translation but threats to use U.S. power against a small, poor nation hardly qualify as encouragement,

says Anastasia O’Grady in Wall Street Journal.

It’s sickening.  A U.S. ally, a democracy, is following its constitution — the ousted Zelaya has no case — and in the process erecting a barrier to Chavez of Venezuela.  And we’re giving them grief?

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Doesn’t like their coverage

Harry Reid shook hands with the ad director for the Review-Journal of Las Vegas, Bob Brown, before a Chamber of Commerce luncheon last week as part of “a meet-‘n’-greet and a photo.”

[A]s Bob shook hands with our senior U.S. senator in what should have been nothing but a gracious business setting, Reid said: “I hope you go out of business.”

Whoa.  What a time to wish that on anyone.  He’s our head Senate Democrat, isn’t he?  Has risen to the top, you might say.  Yuck.

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