I personally like this judge's ruling. Its requires that parent's meet a certain minimum educational bar, rather than us just assuming these parent's know what they are doing.

Because while parent's may not as Kerry put it like the propaganda that teachers teach their kids, we as a society are the ones who are going to get stuck with the product of these parent's teachings if we don't ensure they are taught to a high enough standard.

Just to stir up the put a bit I will use evolution and biology as an example here. Frankly if you want a job in the real world dealing with biology or organic chemistry, this BS debate about the merits of creationism versus evolution go out the window real quick. Because the real world where real medicine, and real genetic science happens it is known that if Darwin were full of it, alot of the ground breaking work in medicine and genetics that we rely on every day as a society would have fallen apart long ago if it were crap.

The same is true of any other discipline. Personal beliefs and opinions can't circumvent reality or the truth just because a parent doesn't like to face them.

And since the parent's aren't going to be supporting their kids for the rest of their lives, we as a society frankly get to have a say in how that kid is taught. Because we ultimately have to deal with those kids after the parent's believe their obligation is over. Just like we'd have to deal with a school that producing muslim terorists. Nobody would think twice us intervening to stop the brainwashing of those kids. And if that is true, we shouldn't think twice about setting basic educational standards for all kids, and if their parent's can't or won't meet those standards, then intervening to make sure the kids get a proper education, rather than ending up with a kid at the end of the day thinks the Earth is flat, that 2+2=1, that America was settled first by Israelites, that blacks are the devils representatives on Earth, that whites are the superior race, that the moon landings didn't happen, that immunization is bad, that fluoride is bad (all examples of some of the BS things that ignorant parent's try to engrain in their kids...something alot easier to do, when you get to control your kids education entirely).

Oh and I would be all 100% supportive of homeschool without rules if I could put all of those parent's and all of their offspring on their own little island, and let them create their own community that they must support 100% on their own, with no affect to the rest of us.

Something tells me after a generation or two that a mandatory educational standard will have been set even in this society, because if you don't set a standard ultimately you are going to generate a bunch of smart people and a bunch of morons, and the smart ones aren't going to want to continue having to put up with the morons if it can be prevented by a simple set of rules that prevent one generation of morons from producing the next.

"I personally like this judge's ruling. Its requires that parent's meet a certain minimum educational bar, rather than us just assuming these parent's know what they are doing."

Given the number of mistakes in this statement, you wouldn't pass any such requirement.

But I still don't think the state has a right to tell you how to educate your kids.

Let me just state that again. Quite honestly, ahmanrah, I have a very difficult time reading what you write because of the huge number of mistakes you make. You think you are some kind of genius, but the way you write does not demonstrate any such wisdom. If you want, I will go through your post line by line and show you your mistakes. It would take a while.

My point here is that you are not unique among the college-educated, nor, sadly, are you any different than far too many teachers and "educators" these days. The standards the state holds dear are not what I consider education. My state teaches nonsense like recycling and mandates the teaching of "standards" like this:

"Explain that doing science involves many different kinds of work and engages men, women, and children of all ages and backgrounds."

This isn't education; it's idiocy.

As long as the educational system of the state of California is controlled by "educators," the teachers' unions, and people with an agenda, parents should not be forced by law to subject their children to the kind of indoctrination California wants to engage in.

Kerry,

Sorry but what you deem a lack of education on my part, is more a reflection of me being lazy when it comes to checking my posts before hitting the button. So if you are trying to score points that way it ain't going to work.

As far as the state not having a right to tell parent's what they can do. I would agree with you as long as parent's remain one hundred percent responsible for what they produce. Which means if they produce an uneducated idiot, the parent's should be responsible for everything that idiot does. Which is to say that if that kid becomes a welfare case, or commits a crime because they don't have a decent education, the parent's should be responsible for picking up all the pieces. Like footing the bill for housing and feeding the kid, plus the cost of their jail cell and any costs related to the harming of people or the stealing or destruction of other people's property. If the parent's don't want this responsibility, then they forfeit their rights in my opinion to having 100% control over their kids education. Because ultimately society suffers when parent's don't properly educate their kids. And while society should have to pay for bad education standards that society as a whole set, society shouldn't have to pay for parent's who don't want to educate their kids to the minimum standards a society sets for their kids.

And sorry I couldn't care less about parents who think teachers have some grand conspiracy to educate their kids in subjects they disapprove of. Some parents who are on the fringe don't like alot of things that main stream society teaches, but that doesn't make their teaching preference right and society's teaching wrong. Kids for example should know that immunization is the right thing for people to do, regardless of what their parent's may think. Immunizations have a proven track regard of saving 100's of millions of people's lives. And frankly there is no debate to be had on this subject. And child should have the right to get a balanced education, and not have his head filled with a bunch of one-sided bullshit, just because his parent's think their opinion is more important than what is correct and true.

My state teaches nonsense like recycling

So recycling is nonsense?

Did you know that if mining companies actually mined the garbage dumps of the US for gold, the concentration of recoverable gold is greater than it is percentage-wise than it is in most ore bodies found on earth. Did you know purer oil can be obtained from all the food waste we toss in the landfill on a daily basis, than the finest light sweet crude that comes out of Saudi Arabia?

Recycling isn't bullshit. Ignoring recycling is bullshit.

Less than two summers ago I made $70/hr during the evenings for several weeks stripping copper pipe out old military housing. Letting the copper go to waste in some land fill would have been completely assine. And creating a new copper mine when you have tons of it already wasting away in a landfill is just stupid. So recycling isn't dumb, its people who can't see the benefit or the cost savings of reusing material that is just sitting in a landfill doing nothing.

Kerry,

And it makes absolutely no sense to toss something in the trash when you can give it to someone who can reuse it to make something else. Nobody is stupid enough to use their dollar bills for a single transaction and then toss them in the trash, why would you cling to the idea that you can't reuse everything else a few more times, just because that is the way you did it in the past.

Just because you have to do a little work, like put it in a recycle bin, or take it to a recycling center, is hardly an excuse to remain wasteful when you don't have to.

But I am not surprised by your entrenched unthinking, "status-quo" is good position, because conservatives have never been the ones with new thoughts, and new approaches to doing things. That's why they call you conservatives and the rest of us progressives.

Kerry,

And here are the links to back up my comments above.

Knowledge and an open mind are the key's improving society. We would never have thought of some of these techniques for reusing America's valuable resources if you ran the board of education in your state.

Anything into Oil http://www.mindfully.org/Energy/2003/Anything-Into-Oil1may03.htm

Urban Mines http://www.copperwiki.org/index.php/Urban_Mines

Here is an interesting statement from the above Urban Mine link, to give you an idea how rich landfills have become...uuugh ick recycling is bad, stupid....maybe not.

One ton of scrap from discarded PCs contains more gold than can be produced from 17 tons of gold ore, according to the US Geological Survey

Another juice tidbit...that shows just how stupid we are not to recycle. And this is just from Japan. Just imagine what is sitting in US landfills.

The National Institute for Materials Science [2] has calculated that Japan's urban mines contain 1,700 tons of indium -- about 61 percent of known natural reserves -- 60,000 tons of silver (22 percent of natural reserves), 6,800 tons of gold (16 percent of natural reserves) and 5.6 million tons of lead (10 percent of natural reserves). The study also estimated that Japan's urban mines contain 1.2 billion tons of steel, which is about 2 percent of the world's natural reserves, 60 million tons of aluminum -- 0.2 percent of the total amount in the world -- and 8 percent of the world's copper, with 38 million tons.

In conclusion Kerry, this is why the state should have a say in kid's education. So they will be more enlightened about things that matter in there society. Because you obviously aren't very well informed about the importance, rather than the stupidty of recycling.

What I do with my garbage is a personal choice, not a matter for public school indoctrination.

Moreover, if you want to make parents responsible for everything their "educated idiots" do, then why don't the public schools bear the same burden? If I'm compulsorily required to relinquish my kids to the "state standards" in education for the majority of their waking hours, why isn't the SCHOOL then responsible for everything they do?

And I don't buy your claim that your only problem is hasty editing. Careful and long-term observation reveals that you do not know what an apostrophe is for, where commas belong, or the difference between "their" and "there." In my world, those problems earn an F on a student's term paper and a dim view of any teacher that produces material demonstrating them.

"And it makes absolutely no sense to toss something in the trash when you can give it to someone who can reuse it to make something else."

It makes absolutely no sense to give an incompetent government bureaucracy the responsibility to fill human needs that the private sector is capable of addressing. But the school system doesn't teach that, even though it is far more vital to the long-term interests of society than separating paper from plastic.

I just prefer an educational environment that redeems the time it's given to produce functional citizens of the United States--not glassy-eyed, terrified, gun-grabbing, PC greenie globalists.

That is not to say that I would pull my kids out of the public schools, or that I have done so. But the parents (or, if you want to be PC, the "parenting community") of California have the right to decide how their children will be educated.

Kerry,

Its not the school that should be responsible for the failures of that school, it is society as a whole, and society as a whole does take responsibility of those failures, in the form of taxes for welfare, police, etc. But the minute you want to prevent society from having any impact on your child, it is your responsibility to raise them to a high enough standard that it doesn't burden society in some undue fashion.

I know damn well that you would find it perfectly acceptable for society to control the actions of fundamentalist muslim's trying to teach their kids to destroy America. Well fundamentalist Muslims aren't the only thing that can destroy America. Ignorant parent's of all kinds filling their children's heads with ignorance, half truths, and bullshit is just as much a danger to society as any jihadist crackpot.

And as far as your garbage. Frankly how you and 300 million other American's deal with your garbage has an impact on more than just you. So sorry to say it but society has a say in how you deal with your garbage. And that say will come if it hasn't already in charging you higher fees for your wasteful habits. Because you impose a burden on society that has clearly been demonstrated, and that burden is going to start coming with a price tag or some other consequence.

What I do with my garbage is a personal choice, not a matter for public school indoctrination.

And yet you would have us legislate morality, because you find homosexual partnerships a danger to America. Well creating cesspools of unnecessary garbage causes a danger to America too. How much you want to bet they are going to start legislating how you can dispose of your prescription drugs in the future...because the current methods people have been using are impacting the water supply of millions of Americans.

http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/20080310/tap-water-prescription-drugs.htm

No society at large has a say when your actions impact more than just you.

Kerry,

If you want to live in a society without any rules being imposed on you by the state, with regard to education, or how you handle your garbage...there are plenty of third world countries that would love to take you. And when you move into your mud hut, with garbage all around you, sewage running in the streets, half the population infected with AIDS or other disease, and most of them with no education whatsoever....you might begin to understand after a few days why laws exist in the US to regulate education, health, and yes garbage disposal.

And I don't buy your claim that your only problem is hasty editing. Careful and long-term observation reveals that you do not know what an apostrophe is for, where commas belong, or the difference between "their" and "there." In my world, those problems earn an F on a student's term paper and a dim view of any teacher that produces material demonstrating them.

Kerry,

Frankly if I don't make my English grammar teacher happy I couldn't careless. Its far more important to have a balanced education, and when you are done be able to think critically, in a reasoned manner, and for yourself. These are skills far more important than knowing how to place an apostrophe each and every time. There are editors out there for that sort of thing. But you never want to let someone do your thinking for you.

that should have been could, not couldn't. Pesky double negatives. You happy now...

"Its not the school that should be responsible for the failures of that school, it is society as a whole, and society as a whole does take responsibility of those failures, in the form of taxes for welfare, police, etc. But the minute you want to prevent society from having any impact on your child, it is your responsibility to raise them to a high enough standard that it doesn't burden society in some undue fashion."

And how does one guarantee that? I would be willing to bet (if I were the betting type) that home-schooled kids end up far LESS of a burden on society than kids that go through the public school system.

In fact, here's a report (one of very few that have ever been done on the issue) that tends to support that argument:

http://www.hslda.org/research/ray2003/HomeschoolingGrowsUp.pdf

"I know damn well that you would find it perfectly acceptable for society to control the actions of fundamentalist muslim's trying to teach their kids to destroy America."

I would arrest people for teaching people--kids or otherwise--to destroy America.

"Well fundamentalist Muslims aren't the only thing that can destroy America. Ignorant parent's of all kinds filling their children's heads with ignorance, half truths, and bullshit is just as much a danger to society as any jihadist crackpot."

See, it's conclusions like this that lead one to think you are one of the arguments for getting one's children OUT of the public school system.

"And as far as your garbage. Frankly how you and 300 million other American's deal with your garbage has an impact on more than just you."

That's true. That's why the taxpayers pay for sanitation. And, in my case, I pay for my own sanitation. But that doesn't mean the state gets to tell me what to do with my garbage.

"So sorry to say it but society has a say in how you deal with your garbage."

Only to a limited extent. That's why recycling is VOLUNTARY.

"And that say will come if it hasn't already in charging you higher fees for your wasteful habits."

I pay plenty to have my trash picked up.

"Because you impose a burden on society that has clearly been demonstrated, and that burden is going to start coming with a price tag or some other consequence."

What burden? I'm PAYING for my trash pickup. "Society" has nothing to do with it. My wastefulness provides jobs and income to refuse haulers. I'm feeding the economy.

"And yet you would have us legislate morality, because you find homosexual partnerships a danger to America."

No, I would have us NOT legislate IMMORALITY. There is a difference.

"Well creating cesspools of unnecessary garbage causes a danger to America too."

If you don't like what's being done with my garbage, talk to my trash hauler. After it's out of my house, I have nothing to do with it. I pay for it to be disposed of; I don't care how that's done.

"How much you want to bet they are going to start legislating how you can dispose of your prescription drugs in the future...because the current methods people have been using are impacting the water supply of millions of Americans."

Here's a better idea--STOP TAKING SO MANY DRUGS!!!!

By the way, I have no problem with regulating the disposal of prescription drugs. Prescription drugs are a controlled substance, and they should be disposed of in keeping with that.

"No society at large has a say when your actions impact more than just you."

That depends on the impact. If you take this statement seriously, you would have to regulate everything. There are very few literally isolated acts.

"If you want to live in a society without any rules being imposed on you by the state, with regard to education, or how you handle your garbage...there are plenty of third world countries that would love to take you."

No, there aren't. Most third-world countries are much more regulated than we are. Because so many of them are (incompetently) run by the UN, tyrants, thugs, and warlords.

"Frankly if I don't make my English grammar teacher happy I couldn't careless."

That's a joke, right? If so, it's rather clever. If not, I weep for your teachers.

"Its far more important to have a balanced education, and when you are done be able to think critically, in a reasoned manner, and for yourself. These are skills far more important than knowing how to place an apostrophe each and every time."

Like "Its far more important...?"

"There are editors out there for that sort of thing. But you never want to let someone do your thinking for you."

And apparently you never want to let someone do your editing, either.

Like "Its far more important...?"

Kerry,

Which would you prefer it is, or it's? Sorry to tell you I know what you think I don't.

If you don't like what's being done with my garbage, talk to my trash hauler. After it's out of my house, I have nothing to do with it. I pay for it to be disposed of; I don't care how that's done.

You should care, because like this prescription problem demonstrates, how other people operate, both government, and society in general can have a damaging impact on you. So if you were at all logical, it would seem to me that rather than piling up garbage in a landfill, that could eventually leak and affect your water supply, you'd be a little more proactive, rather dismissive about what is the best use of the trash you accumulate.

There is another impact to wasteful trash habits like yours, and that is it will ultimately degrade the life style of the entire society. Every piece of trash you throw in the garbage has to be put somewhere. And space on this planet, and in this country isn't infinite, despite how you seem to perceive it sometimes. And every ounce of "valuable trash" you throw away leads to one more mine that has to be dug, and another plot of land that has to allocated to collecting your trash than being used for something far more useful, like a city park, a business park, or school.

Of course where you live, the Midwest, the land isn't all that wonderful to look at, but where I have lived, mainly in the West, there is alot of beautiful land that could get unnecessarily strip mined, or otherwise destroyed, just so you can have the luxury of not using your brain when you discard your trash. But one of these days people like me are going to ensure that recycling is no longer "voluntary". Because frankly the preservation of open wild space, and the use of land for things more valuable than trash heaps, frankly out ways supporting your lazy habit of not caring what happens to your trash once it leaves your door.

I would arrest people for teaching people--kids or otherwise--to destroy America.

"Well fundamentalist Muslims aren't the only thing that can destroy America. Ignorant parent's of all kinds filling their children's heads with ignorance, half truths, and bullshit is just as much a danger to society as any jihadist crackpot."

See, it's conclusions like this that lead one to think you are one of the arguments for getting one's children OUT of the public school system.

All I see frankly is that your eyes are closed to the possibility that there are other nut jobs out there, that your hands off approach to education might shelter. I for one wouldn't want the Fred Phelps', David Koresh's, and the Warren Jeff's of the world to be able to legally isolate their kids from the world and full their heads full of crap. We see what gets produced when that happens. A bunch of brainwashed morons. Yes there are more dangers in this world than Muslims fundamentalists. Ignorance has no boundaries if you let it run free.

And how does one guarantee that? I would be willing to bet (if I were the betting type) that home-schooled kids end up far LESS of a burden on society than kids that go through the public school system.

In fact, here's a report (one of very few that have ever been done on the issue) that tends to support that argument:

http://www.hslda.org/research/ray2003/HomeschoolingGrowsUp.pdf

BTW, I totally agree there are some home school kids who get far better educations than you can in public school. But I am not worried about these kids, I am worried about those on the other end of the spectrum, who get taught by parent's who are ill equipped for the job. And if society maintains a totally hands off approach to education, you are going to get a completely mixed bag of kids. This is why standards for teacher training, student education, and testing exists. To make sure that we know about kids that are falling through the cracks. The biggest problem frankly is that we have to data that shows which kids are failing and where, but we aren't doing an adequate job to address the problem to solve the problem.

But not enforcing minimum education standards, and testing kids and parent's to see if they meet them, doesn't solve the problem. It just creates a big black hole of no data, and no ability to fix a problem that is developing whether we wanted to or not.

"But one of these days people like me are going to ensure that recycling is no longer "voluntary".

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is all you need to know about our little fascist friend.

Thanks for the object lesson, ahmanrah.

"But one of these days people like me are going to ensure that recycling is no longer "voluntary".

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is all you need to know about our little fascist friend.

Thanks for the object lesson, ahmanrah.

Hmm, that was interesting...where did the rest of my post go.

Basically Kerry at one point modern society drew the line at defecating and dumping trash in the streets. And nobody in modern society would call laws against these acts fascist. And I suspect future society's won't consider it fascist to tell people they need improve the way they dispose of their trash, because of its impact on the quality of life society in general.

Oh and do you consider littering laws fascist? Or do you believe you should be able to do whatever you damn well please. Some people still think they have the right to toss their cigarette out on the road or their fast food wrappers in parking lot. And the hell with the impact of that on the rest of us.

That's why we have $1000 fines to remind these idiots that we live in a modern society with rules, not the anarchic free-for-all cavemen.

ahmanrah,

You seem to have the public street confused with the trash-hauling truck I pay to have come to my house every week.

There are laws against littering because it involves PUBLIC property. If I want to drop a cigarette or a hamburger wrapper in my own back yard, the state has no right to stop me.

If I pay for a trash company, I expect that company to act within the law. I assume it does. Since there is no recycling service offered, I assume I am not required to have one.

You express your do-gooder fascism in your intense desire to control every aspect of PRIVATE life, on the flimsy theory that, in the long view of history (the Carl Sagan "billions and billions" one), my candy wrapper might have an impact on the universe.

Let me put it this way. *I* cannot recycle anything. I can only send my refuse to people who can. If the state requires me to recycle, it had better provide the means to access those people. It does not; therefore, I do not worry if I miss a trip to the recycle place. If it's that important, they'll come get it.

By the way, could you give some evidence that there is a "problem that is developing" because some people homeschool their children?

And you should be more careful. The cavemen will hear you.

Kerry,

I suspect that if you dumped enough candy wrappers in your yard you will discover there are laws out there that let the state or city to come in and force you to clean them up....and then hand you the bill.

Your trash does have an impact on the public, and its reaching a point where recycling will likely become mandatory, not because the state wants to be authoritarian, but because it no longer makes sense to throw certain things in the trash. There are already precedents to this, like proper disposal of chemicals, oil, batteries, and other items. And I suspect the next one to go on this list is computer equipment. In fact I am already seeing laws out there that are no longer allowing people to just toss this shit in their trash can. They are doing this of course because of chemicals that can leach out of the hardware, but this frankly is only one reason to write laws. It makes absolutely no sense to dump valuable resources into the trash any more. No reason. It makes absolutely no sense to build another mine, while there are greater concentrations of some valuable metals in our own trash. And whether you like it or not, laws are coming, because old wasteful habits are to costly on a variety of levels to allow them to continue...simply so people can continue to be lazy. Most likely those laws are going to come in the form of hefty fees or fines for non-compliance. And hey if you want to blow your money so you can continue to do things the way you always have....more power to you. But seems like your beating your head against a wall in philosophical battle you aren't going to win.

You express your do-gooder fascism in your intense desire to control every aspect of PRIVATE life

Oh and my level of fascism doesn't hold a candle to what you want to do. Telling you what to do with your trash doesn't come close to the life style rules you'd like to impose on an entire segment of the population (Gays) if you had your choice. In fact the most defining aspect of Hitler's fascist reign are the laws and orders he imposed to deal with the elements of humanity who's views and "lifestyles" he didn't agree with. Not on the rules he imposed on their disposal of garbage.

Speaking of fascism, here's another law to gladden the heart of ahmanrah. It's not about the environment, but it's still a silly thing to regulate--when the market will take care of those who already aren't complying:

http://cbs4.com/local/legislature.toilet.paper.2.675445.html

And, ahmanrah, you accuse me of wanting to make things "illegal," such as gay marriage. That's not the case. We are merely asking YOUR side not to make NEW laws that not only legalize IMMORALITY, but mandate its acceptance by private individuals, even when it violates their conscience. As in the city of Philadelphia taking away the Boy Scouts' building because they disagree with the MORALISTIC (not "moral") legislation that city and its state have busied themselves with over recent years.

And, ahmanrah, you accuse me of wanting to make things "illegal," such as gay marriage. That's not the case. We are merely asking YOUR side not to make NEW laws that not only legalize IMMORALITY, but mandate its acceptance by private individuals, even when it violates their conscience. As in the city of Philadelphia taking away the Boy Scouts' building because they disagree with the MORALISTIC (not "moral") legislation that city and its state have busied themselves with over recent years.

Kerry,

Just face it, you are trying to control gays because you don't like the way they live their lives. Period. In this regard you and Hitler agreed 100%. Only difference is that Hitler saw fit to put a bullet between their eyes.

Speaking of fascism, here's another law to gladden the heart of ahmanrah. It's not about the environment, but it's still a silly thing to regulate--when the market will take care of those who already aren't complying:

http://cbs4.com/local/legislature.toilet.paper.2.675445.html

Actually Kerry I find this law rather silly, and agree with you 100%. Surprise....