Preliminary political thoughts.

Hey Kim, I pretty much agree with you on a lot of these issues mentioned above. I also worry that health care won’t be quality care anymore. I mean, Canada has universal health care, but if you need an MRI, you have to wait 2 months and travel 3 hours away. You’d better hope it’s not life threatening. If the government decides to take control over health care, then we won’t have the quality machines and instruments in each individual hospital without our taxes going up to maintain these costs.
As for Iraq, let’s just say that I agree with you.
And small businesses, well are we trying to deter Americans from living the American Dream and creating jobs for themselves? I guess the idea of me starting my own studio is pretty much out the window.
Also have you read either candidate’s policy on education or heard them speak? I think neither of them know what they’re talking about. Their policy is way too vague. They do want to increase federal funding for early childhood education program, but again, this is going to limit the types of programs and the quality of instruction. And as for Mr. Obama’s ideas on NCLB, he wants to start testing a wider range of subject matter on the tests. At least this is according to what I heard when he spoke somewhere in PA. Did he mention changing HOW we are testing? No. The problem with NCLB isn’t that we are testing children and expect high standards, it’s that we’re testing every child of the same grade at the same level. That means if you have a disability of any sort (even ESL), you’re required to be able to test at the same level as all of your peers. This is absolutely ridiculous to imagine a person of severe mental retardation to test at the same capacity as a "normal" functioning child. And it’s also ridiculous to imagine that teachers will accomplish this task. So there are some schools out there which had more resources to assist specific disabilities, but they end up being punished for their good work. Or they can’t take the risk of low test scores and eventually being shut down. Obviously it’s more than just the tests, which make NCLB not work. I just wanted to say that after hearing Mr. Obama speak, he isn’t likely to fix the situation because he doesn’t thoroughly understand it. This is something he really needs to hand off to a committee of educators...CURRENT EDUCATORS from various types of schools; private, public, suburbia, urban, magnet, charter, montessori, East coast, West Coast, Midwest, etc. and have THEM draw up the policies regulating education.
And as for early childhood education, this is going to take away so many opportunities for small businesses to provide quality instruction for the pre-k group. It also means the government is only going to think about getting children ready for school in black and white terms. They think that by teaching children the alphabet when they’re 3 will really help them become better readers at 6. Children need to work on motor skills first, gross motor and then fine motor skills. They need to work on cross-lateral movements to get the corpus callosum working and making sure that each side of the brain is talking to the other. They need to work on visual tracking, which does require reading aloud to children along with other activities, such as scarf play. But getting a child used to moving their eyes from left to right is going to certainly help them with reading readiness. Vocal play will help them with reading readiness along with increasing their vocabulary or just the muscles used to create sounds to say the words. You’ll get this kind of exposure during silly songs or rhymes. Something I’m guessing would not necessarily be incorporated in government controlled education.
I am aware that there are great federally funded preschools out there. The thing is that they are not universally mandated or controlled. I can just see this going the way of NCLB. It just makes me want to go and get a Montessori degree and teach my own children (when I have them) from at least ages 2-14). Then they’re hopefully free thinkers and will still be able to function after they leave high school.
I could probably neaten this up and make a whole post on my ideas on education. I loved Mrs. Clinton’s website because I could actually post my ideas to her policies on her site. It made me feel good that someone in her campaign was reading it and maybe they thought I had some good ideas.
Anyway, Mr. McCain’s policies on education are very vague (I haven’t checked his site in a while, so I don’t know if they’ve been revised).
And I really like Sara Pallin as well. Too bad she’s not running for President. She’s charismatic and seems to be a good leader. And I don’t necessarily agree on everything she stands for, but I’m very intrigued by her and think she’ll make a great leader. And the thing with the McCain/Palin ticket, is there is a great risk for his health. So the chances of Mrs. Palin ending up in a position of more power or greater leadership, is stronger with this pick over Mr. Obama/Mr. Biden.
Oh one more thing, Mr. Obama, made another mention about Pennsylvanians and guns during his time in our state. A woman asked about his policy on gun control. He said he probably wouldn’t get anything done about it anyway with the amount of delegates against his policy on gun control. I would basically like to see guns not being sold in pieces or whole in mass merchandise stores, and of course, more stringent background checks. but my biggest thing is children being able to by parts of guns at stores like Kmart and Walmart and then stuff like Columbine happening.
I could really keep ranting about this stuff (especially education), and am also trying to become more aware of government and politics. It’s easier when it’s in a discussion as opposed to trying to read it or hear it in the news. It’s very dry to me.
Well I hope you had a good weekend1  I’ll talk to you later. Please don’t feel like you have to post this long rant of mine.
Love and miss you!

I completely agree with a "firm hand and loving heart" to guide children. They certainly need boundaries and rules in their lives...much more that most people think. All of us were built to live in groups, in societies, that is how we have flourished as a species. We have rules and guidelines for survival, and even though we’re not running from lions or anything like that, rules are still applicable in terms of how we function successfully.
I still think it should be mandatory that every person should at one time in their life be: a lifeguard, work in a restaurant, and work in retail. Working in a job like these shows a person how crappy others can treat employees. Maybe people would learn to pick up after themselves EVERYWHERE. Also it teaches them patience, manners, and why the lifeguards tell you not to dive in 3 1/2 feet of water even though you’re an adult with full control of your gross motor skills. And there are certainly many other reasons but my brain has been fried from the sun and I can’t think of anything else right now.
As for guns, yes, I know that most guns in crimes are stolen guns or ones found in an unlocked cabinet. Some are stolen out of hidden and locked safes. Certainly people who can use them responsibly should be able to acquire them. I just don’t think they should be made so readily available. I don’t like the idea that you could buy all the parts to a gun and then put it together yourself without a background check from the nearest Walmart.
Children are certainly more desensitized now than when we were children, even without more parental control, they’re getting it through the media. You’ve got more tv shows about teenage pregnancy, or just sex in general. And then you have schools with classes like "Sex Up Close". I don’t really know what to say about that one except a girl told me she was taking a class with that title in middle school. I was really left speechless. I still really don’t know what to say about it. But there used to be a time when more risque shows were shown around 10 pm or later. Now they’re in prime time. Also the FCC has allowed more swear words to be allowed during any hour of tv and in PG13 movies. I remember when even during those movies it was rare that you heard very many of those.
Alright, I can’t think of anything else because my brain is really fried from all that sun today and yesterday. I’ve had enough fun in the sun for a while. I’ll tell you that lifeguarding in NC is not nearly as fun as in PA. It’s humid here like you wouldn’t believe. I miss days when I’d be stuck in my sweat pants at work with towels wrapped around me. Here we try and stay in the water as often as possible. I just sit and end up with sweat where I had no idea there were sweat glands.
Okay, I hope all is well. Talk to you soon.
Love you!