The stupid...it burns....

[ellid]

Jonah Goldberg compares Obama's plan to tie national service to student aid to slavery.

Leaving aside entirely the sheer, blinding idiocy of comparing an African-American to a slave owner, Mr. Goldberg is forgetting that we used to have this little thing called the draft, which compelled an entire generation of young men to submit themselves to the possibility of military service regardless of their personal feelings (and still might, since draft registration is mandatory for 18 year old males). Then again, he is a Republican and thus hails from a party with a long and undistinguished tradition of its most hawkish members finding a way to *avoid* military service,* so it may be simply that he's unhappy that the old draft-avoidance standby of college and graduate school is now threatened with the horrors of volunteering.



*the one notable exception being, of course, John McCain.

Comments

[gardengirl6.livejournal.com]

Item: thanks for acknowledging John McCain's exception to the general rule. There was Bob Dole, too, but he's retired now.

Item: " "set a goal for all American middle and high school students to perform 50 hours of service a year, and for all college students to perform 100 hours of service a year."

He would see that these goals are met by, among other things, attaching strings to federal education dollars. If you don't make the kids report for duty, he's essentially telling schools and college kids, you'll lose money you can't afford to lose. In short, he'll make service compulsory by merely compelling schools to make it compulsory."

So... this clown is complaining because Obama wants to set a goal... and is griping that if kids don't meet this goal, they won't get handouts? I fail to see the problem here... and I don't even particularly LIKE Obama. This sort of programme is often referred to as a carrot and stick, innit? Or incentive? Maybe I didn't read far enough, but last I knew, it was NOT a requirement that the Federal Government provide any individual money for education. It's a nice bonus, sure, but hardly a chartered obligation.

Sorry if I sound crabby, I've spent/wasted the past two hours gathering a bunch of bullcrap documents for my (expletive deleted) ex and his lawyer, who are trying to weasel him out of the pittance of child support he presently and grudgingly pays.

[ellid.livejournal.com]

Not to mention that we're talking about less than two hours a week of volunteer service. That is scarcely indentured servitude.

[gardengirl6.livejournal.com]

Yeah. What you said.

[briony530.livejournal.com]

Yes, 50-100 hours of community service TOTALLY = slavery and will double the size of the Peace Corps.

Where do I sign up to get paid for blathering nonsense and making mountains out of molehills?

[juliannajoyful.livejournal.com]

Public education is a handout to you?

Must be nice to be so rich you can afford to pay for private grammar, junior and senior high schools on top of college.

[juliannajoyful.livejournal.com]

At a time when gas costs $4-5 a gallon and the minimum wage at the federal level is just barely above that. Add in state provisions preventing more than 20 hours of work outside of class. Are they gonna do the volunteering within the high school? Otherwise, It would take 2 hours of work to earn a gallon of gas for most teens. Unless they're close to home, that means any work they do will pretty much go to gas for volunteerism and their job. Especially in rural areas where people already drive 30 minutes to get to school.

We are all not middle class urban youth.

[juliannajoyful.livejournal.com]

Whether you consider it slavery or not, it's one of the most ignorant suggestions I've seen in recent years.

[briony530.livejournal.com]

Sorry, but I don't believe encouraging people to serve their communities is ever an ignorant suggestion.

[juliannajoyful.livejournal.com]

Encouragement is not the same as a requirement for funding.

[briony530.livejournal.com]

Conservatives complain right and left about liberal "entitlement programs". Yet when it is suggested that perhaps the young and able-bodied give something back, at a level of a couple of hours a week, or a couple of weeks over the summer, to the community in return, it is equated with slavery.

I'm still not seeing the problem.

[juliannajoyful.livejournal.com]

Well, are you gonna send the parents to jail who just don't send their kids to do it?

Are seriously underfunded districts going to just hemorrhage money when students don't fulfill their obligations? How does that affect the students who have met those obligations? Despite there being a dollar figure per child, it's a pool that all children in the system are purchased for from. So everyone should get a poorer education for non-participants or will we just ban non-participants from receiving an education?

What about illegal immigrants who are already suspicious of the schools as a way for INS to track them in the country? There's a constant battle here in NYC to keep them involved, and even enrolled. This will make it even harder to get these children the education they need to be self-sufficient adults.

And out where there is no public transportation: Rural people who will end up funding the gas for their children's participation, and can't really afford it. Considering some folks in rural America can drive 30 minutes just to get to their county high school, this is a serious financial burden.

What about the loss of time to save for college by working? You do realize that with the difficulty people have getting student loans in today's economy people are already delaying a college education by years on the lower end of the middle class. (This is a near crisis right now in Michigan for high school grads. My nephew just went through it. He got scholarships for most of his tuition, but did not qualify for a $600 loan for the balance.) The time the government is requiring they give freely away is time they will have to make up after they graduate trying to get that cash to get an education.

I was very active in volunteerism in high school. It wasn't compulsory and if it is, there isn't anything voluntary about it. More importantly, if it is a hardship to complete, it will simply discourage volunteerism later in life.

[ladypeyton.livejournal.com]

I don't see the problem with Obama's proposal. 100 hours a week is hardly difficult. Especially when compared with countries who have compulsory military service.

[briony530.livejournal.com]

My goodness, man has an idea and you are all with the obstacle course. What constitutes "service" in this little hypothetical program hasn't even been defined, yet you already have people in jail, starving for want of gas money, and unable to attend college. Gee, what if tutoring a less accomplished kid during study hall counts? What if a couple hours of babysitting the child of another student so she can go to class counts? What if the program is actually implemented as an incentive program, giving more money per hour of voluteer service than cutting funds for non-participants? What if kids find they love the work and some of them end up finding their goal in life because of it?

[gardengirl6.livejournal.com]

Ah, I see that you like to reply to posts with inflammatory and exaggerated comments, so I won't get too upset here. I read this proposal as being linked to FEDERAL STUDENT LOANS, not direct per-capita funding of public high schools. Yes, federally guaranteed loans are a BENEFIT, not an ENTITLEMENT. And, O Judgmental One, I am, in fact, a single mother with four children whose ex doesn't pay dicky bird in support. Yet still, I think it's MY responsibility to provide for these children's higher education, not the taxpayers'. So why don't you try to lighten up and back off, instead of getting into other commenters' faces?