Posted on 12/18/2014 10:19:55 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Redstate catches an unguarded moment with Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper at a lunch earlier this week where he speaks extemporaneously and gives us a peek into what he believes the proper role of government to be. You might be surprised at just how little responsibility he feels you should take for yourself.
Government should do what people individually can’t do, or can’t do well themselves. You know, educating our young people, [emphasis added] making sure our roads are designed and built properly, making sure our communities are safe…that our economic system is robust, but at the same time fair…that every person has a fair shot at creating their own quality of life…we protect for the longterm our environment and Colorado’s natural splendor…I mean, that’s pretty much the basic…when I look at the core list…I’m sure you would all have something you would add…but that’s where it’s gets the problem.
It’s a revealing conflation of the responsibilities we generally assign to the government and those best left to the individual. Some of the other, more mundane items on the Governor’s list are details of daily life in our society which few say are beyond the province of government at some level. Fewer still would probably care to take up these roles themselves. I don’t generally hear anyone complaining about government workers fixing the potholes in the street and bemoaning the fact that they don’t just leave the job for private citizens to handle on a volunteer basis. Law enforcement is a bit trickier proposition, but we have designed a system where those wearing the badge are under the direction of the people we elect to executive positions. How the government ensures that “our economic system is robust” is a debate for another day.
But educating our youth is probably the most volatile and dangerous assignment one could ever hand over to the government in its entirety. Our public school systems may look like a branch of the government because they are paid for by tax dollars, but this is a quite unique and far more complicated scenario. School taxes are, in large part, a very local matter. The state and federal governments stick their beaks into the pool quite handily through subsidies and attempts at regulating curriculum, but the day to day operations should have always remained rooted in parents and homeowners in each district voting on school budgets, attending school board meetings and – most importantly – supervising the education their children are receiving and helping them to succeed. I understand that the sad reality is far different, with too many modern parents treating public schools as little more than free babysitting services, but that doesn’t mean it has to work that way for everyone.
Hickenlooper’s comments are revealing if only for the mindset which leads to such comments. It seems that he believes that parents have neither the capability nor the authority to educate their children or take a direct hand in seeing that it is done properly. Harsh reality may make a point in his favor on the former, but we should still strive to ensure they retain the latter, at least for the parents who care enough to do so.
and he’s come up with a Great name for the schools ,Gulag
You might be surprised at just how little responsibility he feels you should take for yourself>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Why don;t people just GET IT ?
The democrat party has morphed into “liberal fascists.” No kidding. They are just so right, they are willing to take away YOUR freedom and ram what they think is BESt for us right down our little ignorant throats.
Freedom be damned.
This is not the United States we want or even know. It is the United States of Zimbabwe.
Tyranny is the order of the day. Suck it up people or rebel against it. But for effs sakes do not lie down and just TAKE it up the ass quietly.
Read this:
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/05/barack_obama_the_quintessentia_1.html
I had a commie tell me once that our children belonged to the state. The conversation did not end well for her.
Hickenlooper is what happens to your state when it is 100% CALIPORNICATED!
Hickenlooper’s gun law was shockingly evil - trampling our God-given and constitutionally-protected natural right to defend ourselves. That single sin is decisive, and it requires a response similar to my reaction to a rapist (for the good reason that he reduced the ability of women to defend themselves against bigger, stronger attackers), so that I would not trust him or support him for any office under any circumstances. However, even someone as disgusting as that petty tyrant should be criticized only when it is deserved.
“Government should do what people individually can’t do, or can’t do well themselves. You know, educating our young people . . .” It is my absolute responsibility to ensure that my children are educated, but the government has an essential role in supporting me in that responsibility. I am extremely good at math (multiple prestigious degrees in the field, followed by a long and lucrative career applying that math). I am more than proficient in communicating clearly and grammatically. I know science up to a high school level and beyond. But when it comes to the arts, most foreign languages, and some other fields, educating my kids would not have gone well. Education is a shared responsibility, where we should expect to pick up the slack and correct errors in government schools, while the government picks up the slack and fills in gaps in what we do with our children.
The government is populated with people who say they know better than you on how to run your life. These same people wouldn’t know how to pour water out of a boot if the instructions were printed on the bottom (love those grandad quote).
Private companies pave roads...
Well, considering that neither of my children ever set foot in a government school until they hit college, I would tell the governor that he is full of s-—t. And if you are curious, my daughter has put 5 semesters of college behind her, magna cum laude at the community college, full ride academic at a four year, and just nailed 5x5 A’s for a 4.0 her first semester there. The other one has a 3.5 GPA in a fashion design program and is already creating ART with clothes.
You and the horse you rode in on, guv’ner...
The government is the problem not the answer.
It takes an idiot to raze a village.
Here in NJ we’re seeing the last educated group of teachers nearing retirement age; while they weren’t very good, what is replacing them is terrifying. Most of them are from the bottoms of their college classes, and know less than high school grads of thirty years ago. My children have homework assigned to be done via computer, and often it is work they haven’t done in class; to complete the assignment the parents have to teach the children themselves.
At the same time a pre-K teacher I know makes nearly $100K working 180 days per year, 6 1/2 hours a day...
That HArris-Perry comment wasn’t even surprising; many urban blacks don’t raise their children anyway, and are happy to turn them over to some government institution or other to get them out of their hair. They literally breed children for freebies, and only view them through that prism.
I was surprised the movie “Precious” was so candid about the scamming and laziness involved.
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