Among the issues most commonly discussed are individuality, the rights of the individual, the limits of legitimate government, morality, history, economics, government policy, science, business, education, health care, energy, and man-made global warming evaluations. My posts are aimed at intelligent and rational individuals, whose comments are very welcome.

"No matter how vast your knowledge or how modest, it is your own mind that has to acquire it." Ayn Rand

"Observe that the 'haves' are those who have freedom, and that it is freedom that the 'have-nots' have not." Ayn Rand

"The virtue involved in helping those one loves is not 'selflessness' or 'sacrifice', but integrity." Ayn Rand

For "a human being, the question 'to be or not to be,' is the question 'to think or not to think.'" Ayn Rand
Showing posts with label parenting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label parenting. Show all posts

03 December 2016

Progressive Elitist Cronyism on Bloomberg Business Radio

While on my way to my laboratory this morning, I heard two federal government ads on Bloomberg Business Radio between 0430 and 0435 hours.  The first was an ad admonishing fathers to spend time with their children.  The second was a FEMA ad telling you to have an emergency plan and to have supplies prepared.

Now Bloomberg Business Radio is very much a Progressive Elitist operation.  Its audience is not one filled with the poor and under-educated.  If the government ad telling fathers to spend time with their children was aimed at reducing federal welfare costs to single-parent families, this is not the audience to be directing such an ad to.  In fact, I am pretty sure that the audience is very heavy in Progressive Elitists who feel quite superior in their parenting skills and in their superior incomes.  Should these generally more educated and wealthy listeners also need to be harangued to have emergency plans and supplies as well?

Should the federal government be acting as the adult in the room to educate and request responsibility from the more educated and wealthy people who listen to Bloomberg Business Radio at the expense of the general population?  It really is not a proper function of the federal government to be running such ads on any radio station, but it is especially odd that it is running them on Bloomberg Business Radio.

Unless, one views this from a rather cynical angle.  Bloomberg Business Radio is quite the dependable supporter of an expansive role for government.  It is very friendly to big government and a government that is a growing government.  So if you are a government agency that appreciates that support, why not encourage it with an advertising budget?  Yes, preferentially spend your advertising budget on a crony business even if the audience is not the right audience for the message.  We will rub each other's backs.  Here is some advertising money so this friendly radio station can stay on the air and continue to praise the benefits of big government.  This is a form of bribery.


06 August 2009

Embedding Government Deeply into Your Private Life

Obamacare will embed the government deeply into our private lives.

The HR 3200 Health Care bill which appears to be the core plan under discussion in the Democrat Congress will cover Marriage and Family therapy and Mental Health Services. It will also provide Nurse Home Visit Services to improve maternal and child health and pregnancy outcomes and to increase birth intervals between pregnancies. The Nurse Home Visit Service will evaluate economic self-sufficiency, employment advancement, and child readiness for school. The government will also require "qualified" health insurance plans to cover State Family Planning Services. The government will also implement a Home Visitation Program for families with young children or expecting a child. This program will enter your home and tell you how to be a "good" parent and how to raise your child.

So, the national medical records to be kept on each of us will include our complete financial information, all information about any marriage or family issues from therapy sessions including all accusations of insufficient love that many a teenager can imagine, all discussions relating to any mental health issue ever faced, all the observations of our home and family life made by the Nurse Home Visit Service and the Home Visitation Service, and anything discussed with the State Family Planning Services.

It seems clear that the intention is that the Nurse Home Visit Service and the State Family Planning Service will be providing information on birth control and abortions. Now, I am not opposed to birth control in the least and I definitely believe it to be within a woman's right to decide to have an abortion. But, there are many Americans who oppose both and it is wrong to set up a system which forces them to subsidize such activities, which is exactly what the inclusion of these activities will do. This is a violation of freedom of conscience and of freedom of religion.

The Nanny state has long wanted to be involved in every personal decision that every American makes, especially if that American is not a graduate of one of America's finest universities. Those who did graduate from the finest universities are the elite and it is their job to help the poor uneducated, bewildered, redneck Americans live their personal lives more wisely. Of course, these elites do not really know you and they do not know much about your life experience, your family, your friends, and your actual knowledge and values, but this will never stop them from the presumptuous belief that they can manage your life better than you can. They also cannot fix their own car problems, solder their own pipes, drive a nail straight, or even identify a soybean plant, let alone grow one. This will give them no pause. So just think about how much more deeply they can reach into your life and how much easier it will be for them to micromanage your life when they have all of these records at their disposal. Why, it is the dream of the elitists come true.

If you think you are walking on eggshells now as a parent raising your children, just imagine how much worse things will be when the elitists can point at each and every financial misstep, any marital problem, any teenage child's fit of imagined insufficient love and attention, any comment that you did not feel ready to raise children or did not want children at some time of your life, or any bout of depression you may have once suffered through. While I do not know that it was mentioned in the bill, it seems almost inevitable that such information is also likely to be shared with the public schools to which your children are going as well.

Frankly, there is nothing in the history of governments generally and nothing in the history of the U.S. government in particular, that gives me any confidence that such a huge role in our lives can be handled by the government with even the most minimal competency. Many people do not live their lives without serious errors, but at least most people are paying some attention to their lives most of the time. The government, even with all of these records on us, is going to swoop down on us from time to time and impose judgments on each of us, despite the fact that most of the time, they are not paying any attention to our lives. We can also be sure that government will not share our values, so we will be judged by such values as the government bureaucrat exercising the judgment may have, not by our values. Once government starts making judgments of our lives, it will find ways to impose its values on us by forcing us to live our lives in accordance with its values.

This is not the way for an American to live. This will impede our exercise of our right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for sure.