Be afraid. Be very afraid. (A liberal view of education) -- updated

This is why liberalism is a very frightening philosophy.

My recent education column and post has drawn lots of liberal criticism, most of it irrelevant to the central issue. But sometimes if you keep questioning, avoid getting sucked into the world of innuendo and insult, a liberal will stumble into intellectual honesty. For example, this excerpt from a comment to my Wetterling fisk.

My point here is not about Social Security but about public education which I would say despite a lot of negative publicity and rhetoric is still well managed and meeting the needs of this state, as well as the country. The idea that parents could somehow choose in a diverse "marketplace" of schools to ensure that collectively our children could receive a better education has a facile attraction except I think this reasoning is based upon the fallacy of composition. You know, if it is good for me to stand up to see the game, it is good for everyone to stand up to see the game. In fact, everyone is collectively worse off if we leave education to the private decisions of parents, a great many of whom have no idea how a "good education" would be structured. I know I relied a great deal on the professional educators in my child's education which was at a public school.

So I guess that yes, I do lack a certain faith in individuals not in making decisions for themselves but in making decisions for their children which have enduring consequences. I think public schooling is a good way for society to safeguard its young and against the improvidential decisonmaking by their parents, just as I lack the confidence in individuals making providential decisions about their old age.

I won’t refute what is said here. It is a far more damning indictment of liberalism standing alone than any rebuttal would be. It expresses the fundamental notion of liberalism that unless you are among the intellectual elite you are incapable of taking care of yourself and it is the responsibility of liberals to do it for you. The words and ideas are all there -- “needs of the state and the country,” “collectivity,” reliance on “professional educators.”

It begs the questions of who will decide for the people and how the decision-makers will be chosen. Clearly, people can’t choose their leaders if they can’t make basic life decisions.

What can I say? Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Update: How quickly power liberals turn on their own.

why conservatives shouldn't be trusted with civil discourse

Because they get somebody you've never heard of to make a dumb statement. Then they immediately and hysterically extrapolate from that that EVEYONE THEY DISAGREE WITH AGREES WITH THAT STATEMENT AND MUST BE STOPPED.

If Smartie calls a comment coming from a professed liberal dumb, it must be dumb. I credited the commenter with holding a sincere belief that I thought was misguided and even dangerous, but not dumb. Obviously, Smartie concludes, I can’t be trusted with civil discourse. Civility demands that I call the idea dumb. That’s what Smartie says, and Smartie is a most civil man.