On this president's day I thought I would just do a short blurb on where we have gone as Americans. George Washington was a very tall man, but a man with wooden teeth. He also may not have been the best orator in the world. Abraham Lincoln was a good speaker, but perhaps pound for pound our ugliest (physically) president. Yet, most historians and casual observers put them in our top five.
Now, I present the following as only an example. It is a doctored picture obviously and I realize it will offend some. I put it forth as an example of how far we have fallen as a society. The quick question is how many men and women would vote for this person based on how she looks.
http://www.whiterabbitcult.com/sarah-palin-to-openfor-jonas-brothers-in-anchorage-alaska/
Again, I'm not to objectify women, but I suppose the same could be said of Rick Perry on the reverse end. I know what the people that read my blogs will say, so this is more of a rhetorical question. How have the qualifications for president changed over the years? Would Washington and Lincoln even be electable today? How would they stand up to Governor Good Hair and the woman we all know and love above (warning: dangerous levels of sarcasm)? What does this say about as a people collectively?
Do we need to expect Carrie Prejean in the cabinet or maybe Pamela Anderson as the Secretary of the Interior? What has happened to us? What has happened to the intelligence and thoughtfulness we used to require? Again, just remember these are global rhetorical questions unless you vote for the person above no questions asked.
I'm pretty sure that Perry was hoping that nobody was gonna be quite as analytical as you Scott.
Seems longer than 5 years to me, too. More like 10 ????
Just a stupid political question. Perry seems to be bragging about five consecutive balanced budgets. First, don't we have a balanced budget mandate (amendment) or am I smoking crack? Secondly, hasn't he been governor for longer than five years. Hasn't it been since 2000? So, he's only balanced half of his budgets? I don't know, I'm a little slow on math, but that's not very good is it?
Irrespective of his politicial views, I think that is a given.
Carguy,
just between you and me I think Rick Perry is purty... :o)
Bagwell is my favorite player but I don't comment too often on another man's looks. I enjoy the debates Rockheadedmama and I have. I learn some and it's good for business.
Are you tellin' me there is not one Jeff Bagwell fan on this blog????
Scott......27!!!
The REAL leaders of this country, the corporations, want puppets to run for office. Who better than celebrities and non-critical thinkers.
Speaking of Jefferson, he's a nice looking fellow. Would be even with today's standards.
You don't have to be that way. I never disputed your source. Your source indicated that most places did not have it. I was simply quoting your own source. I also never said that Jefferson dud not have a hand in the Bill of Rights. I simply said he was not all pleased with the document itself and thus became an anti-federalist. Admitedly, my fathers thesis was on colonial America and that is the way he taught history. So, maybe I'm biased that's always possible. I thought we were having a good discussion. I don't want to ruin that.
Land Ordinance of 17 EIGHTY-FIVE
Okay Scott. You win. Public education did not exist until only a hundred years ago. Jefferson was not a prime maker of the US constitution and he wanted public education in the US constitution but it was left out because of Hamilton and Jefferson was not there to "fight" to put it in. The quotes I provided you about public education being left to the states (and Jefferson's use of the words "I did not place it with") doesn't mean a damn thing.
John Locke, Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and others (Mann, Turnbull, etc. did NOT influence this country towards public education from the beginning (1690's). The Land Ordinance of 1765 granting land out of every 640 acres for a PUBLIC school does NOT establish a means for a public school system to evolve as the country was settled. Abe Lincoln did NOT live on the frontier, he lived in a metropolis that refused to have a public school.
We do not currently have a 2 tiered educational system (vocational/trades and professionals) as envisioned by Jefferson et al. We do not STILL have in print (and use) the speller Jefferson wrote (and I was educated with).
The FFs did not "trust" people, so, setting up the constitution for people to elect their state leges that, in turn elected senators and decided who won the presidency does not count as "trusting" people to elect. Also, their inclusion in the constitution of ways to amend it to correct or change as society saw different does not count.
The Bill of Rights had nothing to do with Jefferson. His letters to Madison vigorously enumerating them mean nothing as does the fact their were included as amendments by Madison.
The fact that Jefferson had always insisted on a bill of rights (because of the influence of Mason on Jefferson) does not exist.
Your understanding of our democracy and the role the FFs saw public education playing is probably widely held.
You da man.
That should have been "I wish I could have written...."
I need more sleep....
Leonard Pitt's column in today's Chronicle is classic. He so ably points out that Palin represents not conservatism, but downright ignorance....and the part of America that resents intelligence and education.
Read it. I know you'll understand that wish I could have said it as clearly as he does.
Thanks for the link, it confirmed what I was saying. With the exception of massachusets and Pennsylvania, public education did not exist in a form we would recognize until the late 1800s. You are correct about Jefferson and Madison and did not mean to imply that Jefferson was not a founding father. His absence though did not allow him to argue for the inclusion of education Asa stated government endeavor when the chips were down. Compromise is always difficult and most so for those not there. The nature of their correspondence did not allow him to have a hand in the famous compromises there or the exact wording of the bill of rights. I stand by what I said, a majority of those founders were not keen on the masses going to school and your own timeline suggests Jefferson wasn't so much either (arguing for a two-tiered system). A majority did not want us involved in the political process. Thus we had no popular election of the president or senators.
I didn't mean to be quick. Jefferson wanted the fact that he was the founder of the university of Virginia tone on his headstone before the declaration of independence or being president. I did a paper on him in one of my poli sci classes. I remember one story where kids at U of V were protesting having to learn something and it brought him to tears. That convinced the kids more than anything.
Unfortunately, Jefferson wasn't there when the constitution was written and was quite vocal about his disagreements. People like Alexander Hamilton were not as fond of the common man as Jefferson. So, while you are very much correct about his opinions, that did not reflect the mood of the majority of the founders. This is just one reason why public education is still largely a state endeavor and not a federal one.
I'm a little confused about your last comment - are you saying Jefferson was not a FF because he was not present for the CC? Jefferson was in France, but he expressed his views, via Madison, about the constitution, particularly as to how the executive branch should be constructed, and expressed his opinions and views on what was happening in the CC. He had a remarkable 2 year correspondence with Madison and, it is primarily because of Jefferson we have the Bill of Rights - the first 10 amendments of the constitution. The constitution was not written in a couple of months - it evolved out of work done over more than a dozen years - educating, informing and teaching people to think about government & governance in new ways. Jefferson didn't need to be at the convention to write the constitution; his major work in forming our new government was done through his (and others) "students" - in a forum and to the end he (and a very few others) had worked many years for....
here is a timeline about public education (by the end of the 1800's every child had access to free elementary ed). It should also be noted that much of the US was an unsettled frontier even into the mid 1800's...but, in the Land Ordinance of 1785, public education was provided for...
http://www.cloudnet.com/~edrbsass/educationhistorytimeline.html
Yes but Jefferson was in France when the constitution was written
here is the quote I was looking for (Jefferson):
"I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves, (A)nd if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power."
Thomas Jefferson
LOL Scott. We certainly are of different generations. I was taught -- my entire education in a BAPTIST church school, and, later, in PUBLIC schools was based on JEFFERSON's idea that it is a duty and requirement to educate the masses -- otherwise the democracy fails. to wit:
"I have indeed two great measures at heart, without which no republic can maintain itself in strength: 1. That of general education, to enable every man to judge for himself what will secure or endanger his freedom. 2. To divide every county into hundreds, of such size that all the children of each will be within reach of a central school in it." --Thomas Jefferson to John Tyler, 1810. ME 12:393
"Of all the views of this law [for public education], none is more important, none more legitimate, than that of rendering the people the safe as they are the ultimate guardians of their own liberty." --Thomas Jefferson: Notes on Virginia Q.XIV, 1782. ME 2:206
"Education not being a branch of municipal government, but, like the other arts and sciences, an accident [i.e., attribute] only, I did not place it with election as a fundamental member in the structure of government." --Thomas Jefferson to John Taylor, 1816. ME 15:45
"Education is here placed among the articles of public care, not that it would be proposed to take its ordinary branches out of the hands of private enterprise, which manages so much better all the concerns to which it is equal; but a public institution can alone supply those sciences which, though rarely called for, are yet necessary to complete the circle, all the parts of which contribute to the improvement of the country, and some of them to its preservation." --Thomas Jefferson: 6th Annual Message, 1806. ME 3:423
"The present consideration of a national establishment for education, particularly, is rendered proper by this circumstance also, that if Congress, approving the proposition, shall yet think it more eligible to found it on a donation of lands, they have it now in their power to endow it with those which will be among the earliest to produce the necessary income. The foundation would have the advantage of being independent on war, which may suspend other improvements by requiring for its own purposes the resources destined for them." --Thomas Jefferson: 6th Annual Message, 1806. ME 3:424
A Bill for Educating the Masses
"The object [of my education bill was] to bring into action that mass of talents which lies buried in poverty in every country for want of the means of development, and thus give activity to a mass of mind which in proportion to our population shall be the double or treble of what it is in most countries." --Thomas Jefferson to M. Correa de Serra, 1817. ME 15:156
and, yes, it is the SAME ignorant baptists that now embrace Starr
btw: John Locke was a fav of the FF; they liked almost everything he wrote. One of HIS big tenets was PUBLIC EDUCATION in order to MAINTAIN and PRESERVE the democracy. Public ed was a BIG subject of the FF and you are simply mistaken that they did not institute it as part of our democracy.
here is a link to a little book discussing how, what, where mass education could be instituted in Penn. - published by Ben Franklin
http://dewey.library.upenn.edu/sceti/printedbooksNew/index.cfm?TextID=franklin_youth&PagePosition=3
It is true that public education was discussed a little differently than we discuss it now -- but, BION, NO different than was discussed and thought in my youth, i.e., Some people should not be forced to aspire to "university" -- there are people who will be taught enough (high school) to function as a literate, functioning adult (able to read any literature necessary -- manuals, physician instructions, simple contracts, maintain bank accounts, figure up bills, etc. -- these people will go into trades and vocational schools for work training; then, you have 2 levels of "university" trained people -- those professions that require a degree and those that require advanced degrees. The FF thought the leaders would come from this group but BELIEVED and RECOGNIZED that working class people could have children who could be in the second or third group - we have inalienable rights to PURSUE ...
Scott, it wasn't in Texas. I don't remember which state it was in, where the district was considering cancelling school on Friday. I will try to go back and find the article.
Understandably, right now I'm lucky that I remembered to even read the paper today.
Districts cannot cut days. The state requires a certain number of days. Now, a district can set a calendar cutting out Fridays but they must account for those days. I also have to correct the notion that the founders established public education. They certainly did not establish public schools. In point of fact, public schools are only a little over 100 years old in the sense that we know them. Abe Lincoln himself was largely self taught or attended local schools without state affiliation. The founders didn't want the masses to be educated either. Remember, they didn't even want us electing our senators. If one were so inclined, they could argue that Jacksonian democracy spurred on the movement of expanded democracy. The irony is that conservatives have always fought off expanding education and democracy. Now, they want people to be uneducated. Curious, curious indeed.
Let me rephrase this....the opportunity exists to be educated. It is our duty to provide the opportunity.....the classes, the courses. We can't provide the desire. That has to come from within each individual. No one can FORCE me to read up on current events. I have to make that choice for myself.
We need to make education more attractive to the young. You can drag a horse to water but it's up to that horse to drink.
I can force a kid's butt to sit in a chair in school but that kid is going to have to accept the fact that education is a good thing.
Meanwhile, how difficult is it when the whackjobs are praising "Joe SixPack" and Palin as being "just like us".
Schools are cutting back on days; on courses; on standards. I just read where a school district is considering cancelling classes on Fridays to balance their budget. They are balancing their budget on the backs of our future.
I don't think it's a "Republican" thing to expect people to want to take advantage of opportunity that is there. I think the Republicans don't WANT them educated. They might start to think for themselves and vote the GOP out.
Carguy, I'll counter your example with a Grayson, a Franken, a Sanders, etc. Yes, there are plenty of crooks. On both sides. And yep, one side, in particular has a lot of dumbasses...
Shortstuff - it is NOT up to the individual to educate themselves - you've stepped into an old republican meme. Our founding fathers instituted public education and a free press so that would not be the case here in the US - it is our duty to educate each other.
RHM wrote: We are sorely lacking an informed electorate who can demand (and get) better candidates.
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The rigors of running for office, any office, and the lies and innuendo you have to endure not only for yourself but your family, make this career choice for many honest people unattractive. In addition, you have to pal around with and ask for money from people you wouldn't ordinarily associate with. Then, without exception, each and every one comes up after the election and wants a favor for the money they "donated".
Our whole system sucks. And until we get campaign reform, it's only gonna suck more. A perfect example of this is former IL governor Rod Blagojovich.
It's up to us to educate ourselves enough so that we can tell the difference between those who really wish to do good and who wish good things for our country, and those who are simply hard-core opportunists.
Sarah Palin is wily, and will stop at NOTHING to benefit.....not America, folks! She will stop at nothing to benefit....Sarah Palin. Your first-class opportunist in action. I await with bated breath to see if/when Playboy comes calling to Wasilla and we get to see ALL of the Quitter Barbie. The "rest of the story" so to speak. If they offer her enough money, you can't tell me she wouldn't be on the cover and the spread. It's all about HER.
I fear for my country's future when "average" is lauded; when intelligence is derided (as I heard a Scout leader deride it in my church yesterday...I nearly got up and walked out); when people with good educations are sneered at by the whackjobs as "elistist"; when students are not taught basic information, much less how to think, research and reason.
Mike Judge may have thought he was making a comedy when he made the movie "Idiocracy". It just might be a preview into America's future. Sad, that.
Our Founding Fathers (and not just the "one" that Palin could think of) must be turning over in their graves at what we have become.
Grover Cleveland was the only man to serve two non-successive terms as president.
I don't think I have ever seen it put so simply but accurately.
I am a little surprised I have not heard from the Jeff Bagwell fans out there.
There has only been 1 prez since Grover Cleveland who had no college degree - Harry Truman. However, he loved to read ancient history in the original greek and latin. He maintained “The only thing new in this world is the history that you don't know”.
He had the least formal education of any modern prez, but, I would agrue he was well educated. While he was a senator, he gained the reputation of being very honest and very ethical. It must be true -- he died broke!
We have become a banana republic - with our prez not elected on the basis of them being "well rounded" individuals with a great combo of strength of character and knowledge - but on madison ave trial tested slogans and campaigns used on us by "marketable" candidates. Some of the "marketable" candidates have better educations than others; some have more strength of character.
We are sorely lacking an informed electorate who can demand (and get) better candidates.
Some of us need to start rewarding good behaviors and ignore (no celebrity, no soap box) to people acting badly....
Shorter version: There are 2 kinds of people who run for president. Those who want to DO something and those who want to BE something. IMO, the DO somethings can be counted on one hand---Washington, Lincoln, FDR, and Reagan. Everybody else was, or is, a BE something.
Pamela Anderson is Canadian and hence already has a seat in Parliament if she wants to stand for election. She also qualifies for free healthcare...
To add to the previous comment and attach the current response in spirit to the "Sarah Palin is a f#ing idiot" I have to repeat something that I've said before. The people we call idiots (George W. Bush, Rick Perry, Sarah Palin, et al) are not idiots. They are intellectually average. What's putting off most us is the absolute pride they have in being average. History has seen quite the opposite. Most of our leaders have been among the intellectual elite and if they weren't they pretended to be.
The fact that someone is not well read, versed in history, or in world events should not be a source of pride. The great communicators are able to simplify our problems for the rest of us (at least those that need simplification) but when they get in private and discuss they should have a grasp of the complicated and the obvious.
The other thing that puts me off is the great quote from Thomas Jefferson, "You should not seek the office, the office should seek you." Now, we are all grownups here and know that most politicians are ambitious people. They want more than they have. They also have the good sense to pretend they don't. What irks me about some of the folks mentioned is that they unabashed about their ambition.
Believe I know the retort that will come from our conservative friends about Obama or Hillary. The phrase my wife uses is that some of these people's campaign slogan seems to be, "It's my turn."
Well, I never considered breaking any records as I tried to tow the middle of the line. This is where we get into the debate of style vs. substance. This is a conundrum as you could argue that the candidate with the best style has won every election at least back to 1968. Personal appearance may be only a small portion of that style and I think a minority of the population considers it. I would say that the truly undesireables (appearance wise) get weeded out well before the general election.
Don't get me wrong, I think Obama has substance to him even if our conservative friends disagree. However, I don't think it was the substance that drove the middle of the road voter. That isn't to say the most substantive candidate always lost before Obama, but style is the predominant trait. Gore had substance and Bush had style. The same is true of Kerry. The same is true of Monedale and Carter vs. Reagan.
The question that I cannot answer is how much television has changed this dynamic. As a historian I've heard the tale of the Nixon/Kennedy debate, but not being alive to see the difference is handicapping. Before television there was the advent of radio which none of us can comment directly on the pre-radio days. This comment is getting long, so I'll add an addendum.
Scott: You're really askin' for it. Attempting to break your record of 44 postsd from a couple of weeks ago?
But, since I am already here, let's look at what we gotwhilst I've been around.
Kennedy, better looking for sure, beat Nixon
Johnson v Goldwater was a draw (looks wise)
Nixon over Humprey, looks seemed a moot point
Carter won over Ford 'cuz of the pardon issue IMO
Reagan beat Carter on the hostage mess. Looks moot.
Clinton's looks didn't have anything to do with his victory, IMO
And I also don't think looks had anything to do with the past three elections either.
I will say, I don't think a downright ugly, homely person would likely even get a chance with the local party establishment.
I'm not saying you have to be Pierce Brosnan-ish to be successful in politics. But you can;t look like Jeff Bagwell either.