Today's Doonesbury strip struck me as particularly apt today. There was a nice piece in the Parade about the effects of the economy on the Parker Public Library in Arizona, which, though depressing, showed that folks value the library. Except then there's the fact that hundreds of library aides in LAUSD elementary schools just had their last day of work on Friday, a horrific and barbaric situation on which Steve Lopez has done a good job reporting.
The powers that be, whether at LAUSD or in government, give lots of lip service to libraries (and to education and kids in general) - but all those things are the first to be cut. If we were to gift politicians and bureaucrats with Skulls of Truth, they'd all sound a lot like our Honest Man above. Who cares whether we have any educated or literate young adults 20 years from now? Let's slash libraries and education and health care to the poor right now, 'cause it's low-hanging fruit. After all, it'd be "class warfare" to pick on the poor rich people and apparently it's just useless to get anyone, Democrat or Republican, to understand that spending money on education today means spending less money on jails tomorrow (or rather, in 20 years - but that's science fiction to politicians) - not to mention that maybe, just maybe, it might be best to have citizens who are literate and well-educated and healthy and productive.
Grrr.
Adults with a high school diploma are eight times less likely to spend time in jail than those who didn't finish school.
ReplyDeleteOur 'leaders' are all corporatists whether they be Democrats or Republicans.
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