Thursday, July 17, 2008

Nationalized Child Care? It Could Happen

I always considered staying home to raise our children to be a great privilege, and I'm so grateful that God enabled me to do so. Naturally, I want my children to have that option once they have children (no pressure for grandchildren yet, guys, I'm just sayin'....)

So, articles like this alarm me. One of the presidential candidates has an "education" plan that involves infants:

Sen. Obama's plan begins with a "Zero to Five Plan". That is not a plan for pre-kindergarten students; it is a plan for infants beginning just after birth. In fact, one of his "Success Through Education" header statements is "A Pre-School Agenda That Begins At Birth". Sen. Obama would plunk $10 billion a year in federal tax dollars down to provide "high-quality child care" for children, to expand access to Early Head Start (is this redundant?), Head Start, and pre-school, and create a council to the president (himself) which would coordinate these efforts nation-wide.

We know how this works. We've seen it before: first it's a goal, then it's an option, then it becomes "compulsory." Isn't that what happened with vaccines, and indeed, education itself? The fact that this expensive program is part of Senator Obama's plans when our country is in such bad financial shape tells you that he is really committed to it. I don't like the looks of this at all.

5 comments:

Amy said...

I don't like the sounds of it either. In fact, I find it quite scary!

Marasgma said...

There is a huge difference between national child care and Early Head Start - not at all redundant. Same with preK programs in the public schools and Head Start - not the same. Head Start and EHS provide a range of services to the entire family and comprehensive care to the total enrolled child. To be eligible for Head Start and EHS, a family of 4 must make less than $18,000 per year. Now that's poor. It's fine to want to offer universal child care, but poor kids really do need a Head Start!

Anonymous said...

It is scary and another reason not to vote for Obama. I don't trust him as far as I can throw him and I hope that people wake up to the fact that the country will go downhill if he becomes President. I have been praying hard against this happening and will continue to do so.

Thanks for sharing this Barbara!

Blessings,
Heather L.

Barbara Frank said...

Amy, you and I tend to agree on a lot of things :)

Marasgma, over 40 years of Head Start has not shown the kind of gains promised originally; in fact, the high school dropout rate has gone up since then. But the bottom line is that the fed. govt. has no business getting involved in creating sheeple, er, in education. The founding fathers must be spinning in their graves.

Heather, this battle goes beyond individual candidates to this principle: to whom do children belong, their families or the government? Still, we do need to pray about this election. I'm praying that we get the president we need, not the one we deserve :0

Thanks for stopping by, everyone.

Anonymous said...

Next thing we hear is a child being abused. In our local town a in home daycare was bused for children pronagraphy. How sad.