Then and Now: History for Today
March 4
1908 - The New York board of education banned the act of whipping students in school. Corporal punishment — typically swats with a wooden paddle on the backside of a student — is currently banned in most of the nation. As of 2012, 19 states still allow corporal punishment in schools.
1954 - Speaking before the 10th Inter-American Conference, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles warned that "international communism" was making inroads in the Western Hemisphere and asked the nations of Latin America to condemn the danger. Dulles' speech was part of a series of actions designed to put pressure on the leftist government of Guatemala, a nation in which U.S. policymakers feared communism had established a beachhead. Dulles was stern and direct as he declared that there was not "a single country in this hemisphere which has not been penetrated by the apparatus of international communism acting under orders from Moscow." Communism, he continued, was an "alien despotism," and he asked the nations of Latin America to "deny it the right to prey upon our hemisphere." "There is no place here," he concluded, "for political institutions which serve alien masters." Although he did not mention it by name, it was clear to most observers that Dulles was targeting Guatemala.
1917 - Jeanette Rankin of Montana took her seat as the first woman elected to the House of Representatives. Rankin, a Republican, was elected at a time when women could not legally vote in most states, although her home state of Montana did allow women to vote. Today, the 113th Congress includes a record number of women (101 across both chambers, counting three nonvoting members).
Mercury One Moment 
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Your Soapbox So Maybe if Government Would Cut Out Waste, Budget Cuts Wouldn’t Be So Scary. If you’re reading this, the world still hasn’t ended after the sequester went into effect on Friday. But if you’d believed the predictions of big government advocates who insist on the need for an expensive, expansive government, you might be surprised to find that all is relatively well. What many of these advocates of increasing levels of government spending often seem to avoid saying is that maybe these drastic budget cuts could be used to cut out unnecessary and wasteful government programs, like the $9 billion spent every year for Pentagon-run grocery stores, or the funding for a smart phone app that lets users know it’s time for a coffee break, or the funding for a study that found New York Twitter users use different words than California Twitter users. But don’t get your hopes up. Chances are, some obscure government office is working on a smart phone app that lets them know it’s time to lodge complaints about spending cuts affecting app production.
Sequester Demonstrates that Budget Cuts Really Aren’t So Terrible After All. After weeks of fear-mongering over the 2.3% cut in projected spending increases, on Friday it finally happened. One columnist argues that this event demonstrates that Washington may be dysfunctional, but every now and then it can make a worthwhile point. The budget cuts, for instance, will provide an opportunity to show that government spending isn’t necessarily good for the economy. “If borrowing and spending were the keys to economic growth, we would all be lighting cigars with $100 bills. . . And people would be fleeing Texas and North Dakota to seek opportunity in California and Illinois.” So there is apparently hope that maybe this sort of thing will wake people up to the idea that when government does less, we can do more.
If You Live in California, You May Want to Ask Your Count About This. Apparently California’s political, social, and economic climates have become so counterproductive that it has practically reverted into feudalism. At least, that’s what one observer has to say about it. Writing in the Washington Examiner on Saturday, Conn Carroll writes that “California is rapidly becoming a near-feudal society. On one side is an older, educated, landed, wealthy elite that lives on California's beautiful coasts. Then there is a much larger, younger, less-educated, indebted mass living inland, many of them working farm jobs at subsistence wages.” That this is largely the result of counterproductive government policies is no surprise, and it also helps explain why the Golden State is now a net exporter of U.S. citizens to other states. No wonder few Americans consider the state to be the beacon of hope they once did.
Among the Victims of Sequestration: Green Abuses of Taxpayer Dollars. One of the many items that must be cut due to sequestration is a Bureau of Labor Statistics program that tracks the statistics of U.S. “green” jobs. While advocates of so-called “green energy” say this is a “huge loss,” many are actually quite happy with the result. As one expert points out, “It is inherently subjective because there is no standard definition of what a green job is.” He continued: “When an employment survey starts from the premise that some jobs are better than others, it is propaganda.” One lawmaker said that all those who believe in a smaller, more accountable government should be particularly happy, “From its inception it was an abuse of taxpayer dollars and it’s unfortunate it took the sequester to make the Administration realize it.”
Why Are Tax Dollars Paying for Shrimp Treadmills and Helping Tyrants? Despite the government lecturing us on the impending doom of the sequestration that may result in our total annihilation as well as a fiscal house that is far from in order, the U.S. Government will be giving $250 million to the Muslim Brotherhood-led Egypt to help “in light of extreme needs,” as it takes “difficult steps to strengthen its economy.” It’s too bad the government doesn’t seem to be equally as willing to take “difficult steps” to strengthen the U.S. economy.
State Dept: Keystone XL Pipeline Is Environmentally Friendly, and We’re Sure of It. The State Department released a newly-drafted report regarding the new proposed route of the Keystone XL pipeline that stated it would not have any significant negative impacts on the environment. Environmental activists are quite upset, calling the report “nothing short of malpractice,” and requesting that any elected officials who are serious about combating the so-called “climate crisis” should nix the project entirely. However, one lawmaker found vindication in this report, saying that it “again makes clear there is no reason for this critical pipeline to be blocked one more day.” He went on to say he hopes that the report will bring an end to four years of delays, leading to approval of the pipeline, which would allow the government to move on behalf of “middle-class jobs and energy security.” But given government’s ability to louse things up, it doesn’t look like pipeline proponents can party just yet.
Survey Shows Dramatic Drop in Support for Affordable Care Act. Many voters are still bitter about the Affordable Care Act (also known as Obamacare) that was rushed without being read, and which passed despite the opposition of the majority. A recent Kaiser Family Foundation tracking survey shows that support for the law has waned significantly as more and more of the law is implemented. In fact, opponents currently outnumber supporters of the legislation. It is unclear whether or not the dissatisfaction comes from the continuing spike in insurance premiums or if some voters are just now getting to the end of the 2,000 page document that is The Affordable Care Act and have finally found out what’s inside.
Texas Navy Veteran Memorizes Names of 2,200 Slain Military Members. When most Americans say they will “never forget” those who gave the “last full measure of devotion” in service of their country, they usually mean that in a general way. For U.S. Navy Veteran Ron White, that commitment to “never forget” has taken on a whole new meaning. That’s because White has memorized the full names and ranks of 2,200 military members who died while serving in Afghanistan. He recently set up a white board in downtown Fort Worth, Texas and wrote all of those names on it. The mother of one slain soldier who saw White writing the names said, “It just did my heart good when I saw [White] writing his name. It just really made me feel like he really cared about these boys. He had respect for them.” And so do we.
Also In The News:
Doctors Say They Have Cured a Baby of HIV.
With Passover Approaching, it Seems Like a Fitting Time for a Locust Plague in Egypt.
The Vocabulary of The Sequester and The Arab Spring
Hack of ‘Evernote’ Exposes User Data of 50 Million Users
20 Things You Didn’t Know You Could Officially Celebrate in March
The Metaphorical Speed-Bumps for Google’s Self-Driving Cars
High School Student Arrested Over ‘Fresh Prince’ Ringtone.
Follow-Up: Dennis Rodman Wants Obama and Kim Jong-Un to Shoot Hoops.
Something to Ponder:
“The measure of success is not whether you have a tough problem to deal with, but whether it is the same problem you had last year.” - John Foster Dulles
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