I think that, despite some imperfections in her own life, the good Dr. Schlessinger has got it just right. It is not, IMHO, coincidental that these shows died out and courser shows got their start right after the removal a school prayer. Just more examples of an even increasing number of broken windows and dirty streets that are leading us down a path of decadence and decay that, if unchecked, will be the downfall of our society:
“The reality format [of television] is at its most abusive...in its molestation of the family dynamic and its gross exploitation of children. ‘Motherhood and apple-pie’ is disdained in our popular culture, while the Gotti and Osbourne ‘families’ and the newer ‘Trading Spouses’ and ‘Wife Swap’ are elevated as ‘reality.’
My reality check about families as I was growing up included ‘Leave it to Beaver’ and ‘Father Knows Best’ and ‘The Donna Reed Show.’
Alternative families were represented by overcoming the tragedy of deceased family members as in ‘Bachelor Father’ or ‘Lassie.’
Say what you want about these shows being ‘unrealistic,’ these shows were entertaining and often inspiring, and the plots generally resulted in better understanding, communication and affection between the parents and between the generations as the children confronted ‘issues’ and received guidance, support and consequences from the responsible adults in their lives, who generally role-modeled respectable behaviors.”
--Dr. Laura Schlessinger
An the Federalist has this to say about education and the Governments role in it:
“A most interesting fact of history is that Americans were probably the most literate people in the world before the advent of government schools and compulsory school attendance. Since the U.S. was already highly literate when parents were allowed complete freedom in educating their children, the reason behind compulsory attendance obviously had nothing to do with academics. Neither was the problem one of economics, as there was not a shortage of charity schools. If the purpose was not one of academics or to help poor children receive an education, what was the intent behind the push for government schools and more importantly, compulsory attendance laws? This is an urgent question that begs an honest answer because with ever increasing government controls and compulsory attendance, American literacy rates have steadily plummeted. With the billions of dollars spent on education can this really be an accident?”
--Debbie O’Hara
And
“A 1990 Gallup survey for the National Endowment of the Humanities, given to a representative sample of 700 college seniors, found that 25 percent did not know that Columbus landed in the Western Hemisphere before the year 1500, 42 percent could not place the Civil War in the correct half-century, and 31 percent thought Reconstruction came after World War II. In 1993, a Department of Education survey found that, among college graduates, 50 percent of whites and more than 80 percent of blacks couldn’t state in writing the argument made in a newspaper column or use a bus schedule to get on the right bus, 56 percent could not calculate the right tip, 57 percent could not figure out how much change they should get back after putting down $3 to pay for a 60-cent bowl of soup and a $1.95 sandwich, and over 90 percent could not use a calculator to find the cost of carpeting a room. But not to worry. The American Council of Trustees and Alumni’s 1999 survey of seniors at the nation’s top 55 liberal arts colleges and universities found that 98 percent could identify rap artist Snoop Doggy Dogg and Beavis and Butt-Head, but only 34 percent knew George Washington was the general at the battle of Yorktown. Americans as donors and taxpayers have been exceedingly generous to our universities. Given our universities’ gross betrayal of trust, Americans should rethink their generosity as well as rethink who serves on boards of trustees that, in dereliction of duty, permit universities to become hotbeds of political activism and academic fraud. There are a few universities where there’s still integrity and academic honesty, and they don’t cost an arm and a leg. Among them are: Grove City College, Pa., Hillsdale College, Mich., Franciscan University, Steubenville, Iowa, and others listed at the Web page of Young America’s Foundation.”
--Walter Williams
This does not bode well for the direction our country is taking, is it? At least we have the Federalist:
“FRUIT FROM THE TREE OF LIBERTY”
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