Category: Education

We is all suffering …

This happened long ago in human history, as my son is now in his early forties and I am pushing fifty. We placed our kids in Catholic schools, as my childhood indoctrination mandated. But that makes no difference. His teacher, a nice lady whose main job was to keep order, found him to be acting up. She decided it was time to have him drugged, and suggested we turn him over to the experts in the Billings, Montana School District #2 for testing for ADHD. My son is of normal intelligence, certainly not slow. I intuitively knew they would find him guilty of excess brain activity.

I rebelled at the idea, and instead decided to take him to a pediatrician for separate testing. I was burdened at the time with child support and alimony, so the $300 bill had to be paid off in $50 chucks, but I did it.

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Unction this: Froward cozenage

I attended Catholic schools for the first 12 years of my life. The first eight years were taught by Dominican nuns, with one lay teacher covering second grade. Our school was one block away from the church, so that you can imagine frequent trips there for various ceremonies, like confession, stations of the cross, or just weekday mass. Weekends consisted of Saturday, a free day, and Sunday, at least part of which had to be used to attend church under penalty of mortal sin and eternal damnation if we failed. Unless we had a good excuse. However, going fishing, playing baseball with the neighborhood kids, or even reading a book were not considered good excuses. There were no good excuses, really, save deathly illness, or perhaps death.

One memory to emphasize that we were not wealthy kids attending this school … girls, on entering the church, had to have head covers. None of them had any such thing, no lace or doilies, so on entering they would pin a Kleenex on top their heads. It got the job done.

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Montana Judge Kathy Seeley issues brain-damaged fact-free ruling

Big Swede commented the other day that, amazingly, a nonsense lawsuit filed by some kids in Montana had received a favorable ruling from a judge. Here is the link he supplied. The ruling is simply outrageous, but also chilling. Was there a fix at work? Was it understood in advance that the judge, Kathy Seeley, would allow the bullshit claims to proceed?

Emily Flower, spokeswoman for Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen, correctly slammed the ruling as absurd in an emailed statement and vowed to appeal.

This ruling is absurd, but not surprising from a judge who let the plaintiffs’ attorneys put on a weeklong taxpayer-funded publicity stunt.

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Make it so

Years ago, when I lived in Bozeman, Montana, something was going on at the federal level regarding Social Security that inspired me to organize a meeting, and to publicize that meeting on radio. I was quite the activist. It was nerve wracking, as I had no idea what the turnout would be. The subject of the meeting was the viability of the Social Security Trust Fund, and of Social Security itself. I was not receiving benefits, but since I was a wonk, I was steeped in numbers regarding the Trust Fund. I did not understand at that time that that Trust Fund was nothing more than a plot device crafted to create the illusion that benefits were threatened, and to convince young people that Social Security would not be there for them when they retired. Overall, the big picture was a movement behind corrupt senators like our then entrenched Baucus and Burns that Wall Street should be in charge of our retirements, and that the concept of “defined benefit” needed to be replaced by “defined contribution”. (If you do not understand either of those terms, now is the time to get up to speed. They are critical.)

The group I used was called “Wonderlust,” and the meeting was a huge success, even drawing a wonk from Washington to act as monitor and inspiring a huge turnout with older people asking and demanding answers to intelligent questions. What a relief! I feared a cricket fest. But to this day I regret my own lack of understanding of the nature of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and all of our “entitlements”.

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Fear is the enemy of freedom

As a youngster in the 1950s and 60s, the big thing hanging over my head was the Russians and the bomb. The propaganda was relentless. The fear we felt during the Cuban Missile Crisis (1962) was real in us. I remember a gal named Susan who was teachers’ pet assigned to go to all eight classrooms in our school to announce that the Russians had backed down. Our sense of relief was palpable. Creating fear in children in that manner is abusive, but the idea is to get ’em while they are young, instill the fear so that it will reside in them for their entire lives.

At age 38 I finally realized that the USSR never posed a threat, that the Cold War was not real. I felt a physical sense of relief, as if a cloud had been removed, a weight taken off my shoulders. That physical sensation was real. All the fear they instilled in me as a child vanished, and I felt a wonderful freedom I’d never before experienced.

I did this for myself, that is, I was not following some leader or guru. I was just exploring and testing my boundaries when the dam broke. It was an accumulation of questions and doubts arising, and no specific instance. But I do remember a particular moment. In the book The Fish is Red, by Warren Hinkle and William Turner, there is a a brief section (pp 129-31) where it is alleged that Havana had concocted a plan to overthrow the Arturo Frondizi Ércol government of Argentina. A Cuban career diplomat serving in Buenos Aires resigned and took with him eighty-two documents that purported to detail such a plan. The Cuban government claimed that the documents were forged by Cuban exiles working with the CIA. The US State Department announced that it had exhaustively studied the documents and that they were genuine.

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The “New Normal”: Are we there yet?

Is anyone still waiting for the end of all this global, digital flim-flam? Like perpetual (conventional) warfare, the ruling class can never quit inventing new methods to control the masses and snatching up an ever greater percentage wealth and natural resources (including “human capital” i.e. slaves). Psychopaths and sociopaths need someone else to blame for their own failings. But who is left to call an external enemy when the entire world is now controlled by one, unified power alliance? The so-called terrorists of the late 20th Century aren’t scaring anyone, and it’s pretty well known that they’re our terrorists, funded via our allies (Israel, Saudi Arabia,  United Arab Emirates  etc.) in the Middle East.

So, where are we in this endless game of fraud and deception? The New Normal (Phase 2) – Consent Factory, Inc.

CJ Hopkins over at Consent Factory, Inc. has a nice overview of our current situation.

“A globally-hegemonic system (e.g., global capitalism) has no external enemies, as there is no territory ‘outside’ the system. Its only enemies are within the system, and thus, by definition, are insurgents, also known as ‘terrorists’ and ‘extremists.’ These terms are utterly meaningless, obviously. They are purely strategic, deployed against anyone who deviates from GloboCap’s official ideology … which, in case you were wondering, is called ‘normality’ (or, in our case, currently, ‘New Normality’) … [t]he new breed of ‘terrorists’ do not just hate us for our freedom … they hate us because they hate ‘reality.’ They are no longer our political or ideological opponents … they are suffering from a psychiatric disorder. They no longer need to be argued with or listened to … they need to be ‘treated,’ ‘reeducated,’ and ‘deprogrammed,’ until they accept ‘Reality.’”

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Part 5: The Virtualization and “Thingification” of Children

Part 5 of the Series, “Of Monkeys, Mice and Men: From Natural Bodies to Digitized Bots”

Life has been incredibly busy on my end. However, I thought this was too important NOT to highlight. I hope you will watch the brief video above featuring the “Daily Pass” for children to regain physical access to public school, and then listen (see video below) to Alison McDowell (of wrenchinthegears.com), as she brilliantly unpacks the devastating implications — including the dehumanization and trauma-based mind control of our children. I have also included a relevant analysis (see second video below) by Peggy Hall (of thehealthyamerican.org). Please read here for a clear understanding of “thingification,” as explained by Alison.

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Teaching versus learning

Some time ago I read the 1971 book Deschooling Society by Ivan Illich (1926-2002). As is my custom, I place 3M flags on passages I want to revisit, and then later come back and re-read and even transcribe those passages into MS Word. Otherwise, it is as if I never read the book. It does not sink in. The second time around is the one that counts with me.

Today I was re-reading a passage by Illich on schooling that so resonated with me that I am reprinting it here. I learned how to read in first grade, how to do accounting in college, and about the tax code early on as a stumbling CPA. When I entered that profession, I was distressed at how little I knew compared to my colleagues, not understanding that we are all like that. Becoming good at what we do is purely on-the-job training. “Brilliant” students who come out of college and take on important roles are a rarity, the stuff of pulp fiction. (I usually put a work of fiction down when I see the words “brilliant young” in reference to a character. I lose willing suspension of disbelief.)

For me, I don’t think I learned anything of value in high school or most of grade school. My real education started in earnest early on and outside my classes.

Our friend and co-writer Steve Kelly refers to schools as warehouses. I could not agree more. We have to do something with these kids to get them out of our hair, so we put them in big buildings with regimented schedules and bells telling them to move about. If they are caught in the hall while class is in session, they better damned well have a pink slip.  (When I was a senior in high school I got hold of a packet of pink slips, which allowed me some freedom to roam.)  Most teachers I know refer to themselves as “educators,” I think because it sounds a little more like a noble calling than being a mere teacher. They look at their job as a mission, helping young people. Illich would set them straight. Here is the part I just transcribed.

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Thanks a bunch, Pogie

I am linking to a site I rarely visit, The Montana Post, run by award-winning high school English teacher Don Pogreba. “Pogie,” as he is known, is famous for the following exemplary form of argumentation … this a conversation I am making up but have experienced nonetheless:

Anyone anywhere: “But Pogie, I’ve got it right here that you’re wrong.”
Pogie: “What’s your source?”
AA: “It’s some research done from a book that was cited on a blog, Piece of Mindful.”
Pogie: That’s not reliable. I want the New York Times, Washington Post, CBS News, otherwise I don’t believe it.”
AA: But Pogie, that’s not the point. You’ve got to look at the material and judge it using your own brain.”
Pogie: “Get real. Give me a reliable source.”

This has long been my beef with Pogie, and maybe with modern education in general – he does not teach thinking. He teaches students to use other people’s brains instead of their own. The result is seen all around us, the masked masses, clueless as to why they are in such garb.

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My Beef with Elmo: Elmo’s World Order?

Today is the 51st birthday of Sesame Street. The show first aired on November 10, 1969.

As a child growing up in the 1970s, I occasionally watched Sesame Street (produced by Sesame Workshop). The Electric Company captured my interest much more, as did Captain Kangaroo, Land of the Lost, and re-runs of Lost in Space. I didn’t watch much TV though. 

Before I proceed with my general grievances with Sesame Street, I just want to air my personal beef with the show — and with Elmo, in particular.

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