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This
week's column is being written from a rental computer at Kinko's
in Boston, Massachusetts. I have been traveling all over
God's green Earth for my 'day job' and I could really use a
laptop. Unfortunately, there are no Kinko's in rural
Wisconsin, where I spent last week, so I did not submit a
column. Several of you have e-shouted at me for this, and
I do apologize-and will accept donations toward a laptop
computer!
Anyway, back to New England--I spent Monday afternoon listening
to a particularly entertaining local radio show out of
Providence, Rhode Island. The topic of lively conversation
was Massachusetts Governor Jane Swift's (R-in-name-only) recent
legislation concerning welfare mothers and their young children.
To date, welfare mothers have been permitted to raise their
children at home with a government check until the children are
aged six or in kindergarten, before they are put on the 'fast
track' job training program to get off welfare. The
reasoning behind that regulation is to allow the mothers to stay
home with their children until they start school, so that there
is no need for day care during Mom's training and work hours.
Jane Swift's proposal would make two years the age limit for
such allowances. Under her plan, the state of
Massachusetts would pay for state-run childcare from ages 2-6
for children affected by the new regulations. Mothers
would be forced into the job training program as soon as their
youngest children are 'old enough' for day care.
Not that I have ever been a huge fan of welfare or welfare
mothers, but this plan is really despicable. The cost to
the state for the day-care program is essentially equal to the
cost of the welfare checks for these children and their mothers
from age 2-6. If the money has to be spent, it would
definitely be better used to let poor children spend early
childhood at home with their mommies than used to let them rot
in government day care facilities.
Do not get me wrong-I would rather the money not be spent at
all, but my biggest issue with this plan is that it further
legitimizes the idea of state-run day care as an alternative to
parenting. With all of the recent studies confirming what
smart parents have known all along-namely, that day care is bad
for kids-it is a wonder that Jane Swift would bring up this sick
legislation now. It has recently been proven that day care
kids are both more aggressive and more depressed than their
cared-for-by-mom counterparts. Day care is definitely not
the best place for already at-risk children.
Dan
Yorke, the host of the Providence radio show where I heard about
this, thinks that the whole plan is an egomaniacal conspiracy by
Governor Swift to make her own questionable parenting seem
acceptable. You see, Swift herself had a two-year-old in
day care until the citizens of Massachusetts made a big stink
about it. Her husband has since quit his job to 'be with
the kids,' but the family retains a full-time nanny despite his
being there. Swift is also currently pregnant with twins (who will no doubt hardly know the governor). I
don't know that I agree with Mr. Yorke's theory, simply because
it is hard for me to believe that anyone could be so
calculatingly evil. But the case against Swift can
certainly be made, and Yorke made it quite well on Monday
afternoon.
Day care is not the only evil threatening our kids. I am
loath to use too much bandwidth discussing celebrities because,
as a group, I find them detestable. However, the divas of
detestability-Calista Flockhart, Camryn Manheim, Rosie
O'Donnell, and Jodie Foster, to name a few-have forced me to
speak out. I call them such because they have done the
unthinkable: they willingly and knowingly became single working
mothers.
I say 'working' mothers, of course, with tongue planted firmly
in cheek, because I would never call what these women do for a
living 'work.' But they are technically employed, and at
any rate spend a lot of time jetting around the continent to do
the Late Show, and have pictures taken, and go to parties, and
shop, and whatever else those show business types do while the
rest of us toil away. In other words, they are busy--far
too busy for their new babies, apparently, as each has one (or
more) full time nanny to do the real childcare. Babies, to
these spoiled brats, are accessories to be cuddled and cooed
over, not human beings to be cleaned when dirty, comforted when
wailing, and taught right from wrong. Somehow I just
cannot picture Calista Flockhart changing a diaper, hugging a
screaming infant, or telling anyone or anything 'No!'
Though I feel very sorry for these bought-and-paid-for children,
these four 'families' alone are not the problem The
problem lies in the fact that at least two major news magazines
had front-cover, multi-page spreads celebrating these four women
and their decisions to adopt or birth children without benefit
of husbands or daddies. This travesty, coupled with people
like Jane Swift and their anti-family agenda, is warping the
moral fabric of our society. Children are worth less today
than ever before. Over the next three weeks, I will give
you a series of articles about the ever-dwindling sanctity of
children's lives, and what we as Americans can do about it.
I only hope we are up to the challenge.
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