I Give Up!!

That's it! I give up...UNCLE!!

Newt Gingrich is proposing that we spend money on lunar exploration.

Is he out of his cotton pickin' mind!!?? (he is from Georgia, after all, so maybe that phrase is more apt than I knew...)

Now, don't get me wrong. I think that exploration in the Final Frontier would be a great thing.

It would boost the economies of the communities that either built the equipment or put it into space.

It would rejuvenate our sense of national pride as the Space Race did in the 60s.

It would cause more kids to see science as a wonderful thing and propel our moribund school boards into spending money on a meaningful curriculum rather than football.

But come on Man! There are SO many things that could be done for this country that would be more immediate and yield the same result. And in places with much prettier landscapes.

If we decided, as a people, to value excellence rather than mediocrity than maybe we would be able to compete in the global arena.

We think that we can dumb ourselves down, year after year, and still retain the edge in international business.

It's just not possible when the Chinese and the Indians and the Brazilians are spending such a comparatively large portion of their GDP on not only education but health care and infrastructure.

We are getting smoked by these people yet we continue to believe, in our inimitably delusional way, that we can keep fooling around and that somehow, by magic, we will stay on top.

It just ain't gonna happen.

The average American high school cares more about the success of its' football or basketball program than it does about the percentage of its' graduates who go on to, not only, top tier schools, but become doctors and engineers and scientists.

We see the athletes on the playing field signing multi-million dollar contracts and we think that our kid will become one of them.

We forget the fact that an infintessimal percentage of high school sports stars ever even get to try out for the NBA or the NFL let alone get a contract to play.

It's like we are playing the lottery with everything we do.

We think it will just fall out of the sky.

Well, if we elect Fig Newton and he funds a Moon Program and it is designed and built by the kids that we have, so far, failed to properly educate then maybe it just will.

Fall out of the sky that is...

HEADS UP!!!!