Oh, Terrence, don't you think you are being a bit reactionary or something? The new daycare proposals do use tax dollars, but they have absolutely nothing to do with putting children into camps. It's just a fact in America that most mothers work. Of course, few of the mothers here at SI do, but most of the women in America who work and have children love them very much, but because of economic necessity must work outside the home. You are not going to put the genie back into the bottle, or return America to the idealized fifties, when, incidentally, many women were trapped in abusive marriages, and felt stifled and miserable. Sure, there are things wrong with our society, but there always have been. Daycare is something that can be improved.
Unfortunately, daycare facilities in America are horrendously varied in quality, and child neglect and abuse are rampant there. You can idealize things all you want, but the realities are different. A whole lot of evidence shows that children in QUALITY daycare, particularly very poor children, have much improved chances. The cost to the society is huge if children don't turn out well.
Some people here think before they post, and think for themselves brilliantly, sorting through information and then deciding what is relevant, and they are good writers (and spellers), and even if I totally disagree with their ideas or philosphies, like I do with Freddy's most of the time, I have tremendous respect for their intellectual breadth and depth, and love to read their posts. And then there are some people--weren't you just talking about parrots--who just spew forth the latest hateful claptrap that caught their extremely limited imaginations.
Anyway, as an example of what I'm talking about--the bias that just oozes out as ignorance, stupidity, deliberate misrepresentation the facts and just plain hatred--here is the recent news report about the daycare proposals from the Myrtle Beach News, and then what the Libertarians have to say about them.
By Tony Pugh
SUN NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU
WASHINGTON - The child-care
concerns of working families took center
stage Thursday when President Clinton
announced plans to train and keep more
day-care teachers and weed out unfit
caregivers.
In one of his major initiatives this year,
Clinton, with first lady Hillary Rodham
Clinton, vowed to work with businesses
and state governments to make all child
care safe, affordable and accessible.
Calling child care a ''silent crisis,''
Hillary Clinton said, ''The federal
government has a role to play but so does
state government, business and labor, the
nonprofit and religious community, school
systems, individual citizens and especially
parents.''
Clinton also said he will use his 1998
State of the Union address in January to
outline further improvements in child care.
The plan could include proposals
increasing the primary $3.1 billion federal
outlay for child care for the poor,
expanding tax credits for adults with
children, and expanding the Family
Medical Leave Act to allow for doctors'
appointments and visits with school and
child-care teachers.
Numerous studies have shown that
many of America's 93,200 child-care
facilities provide poor or mediocre care
that, in some cases, threatens the health
and safety of young children.
Because of this, working parents from
all economic backgrounds face a daunting
task when seeking care for their children,
Clinton said.
''Especially in a day and age when most
parents work, nothing is more important
than finding child care that is affordable,
accessible and safe,'' Clinton said. ''It is
America's next great frontier in
strengthening our families and our future.''
To address the high turnover and low
pay of day-care workers, Clinton
proposed a $300 million scholarship fund
to train up to 250,000 workers. The fund
would make $1,500 available to educate
any provider who agrees to remain in the
field at least a year after completing
coursework.
These workers also would receive a
cash bonus paid for by the fund and their
employers. The proposal is meant to curb
the estimated 36 percent turnover rate
among day-care workers each year.
Under the plan, which would require
approval by Congress, the federal
government would contribute at least $250
million toward the fund. The rest would
come from private or state or local
government funds.
Another proposal, requiring
congressional and state ratification, would
make it easier to check the criminal
backgrounds of prospective child-care
workers.
Under that crime compact, which
Clinton submitted to Congress on
Thursday, states would agree to share any
criminal records of child-care applicants.
Such a law would make it easier to
weed out unfit providers and cut reliance
on FBI criminal records, which are often
incomplete and can take months to get.
After-school care programs will also
get a boost under Clinton's plan. A federal
volunteer agency, the Corporation for
National Service, has offered to help train
staff at these programs.
Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin will
oversee a committee of mostly business
leaders to explore ways that companies
can provide more child-care centers or
help employees pay for care.
Marcy Whitebook, co-director of the
National Center for the Early Childhood
Work Force, a resource and advocacy
group for child-care workers, said the
proposals are a good first step.
''I definitely think we're moving in the
right direction,'' Whitebook said.
''Together, these are the kinds of pieces we
need to assure that we have a top-notch
work force taking care of our young
children.''
----------------------------------------------------------------------
NEWS FROM THE LIBERTARIAN PARTY
2600 Virginia Avenue, NW, Suite 100
Washington DC 20037
Hillary Clinton's new federal child-care program
is "Big Mother" government, charge Libertarians
WASHINGTON, DC -- Hillary Clinton wants more children. Specifically, she wants your children, the Libertarian
Party warned today.
"Forget about Big Brother watching you -- it's time to start worrying about Big Mother watching your kids," charged
Steve Dasbach, national chairman of the Libertarian Party.
"The First Lady wants to be the nation's Babysitter-In-Chief -- and she's not going to stop until she gets an army of
government-paid, government-trained day-care bureaucrats taking care of America's children."
At last week's White House conference on child care, Bill and Hillary Clinton unveiled a new $250 million federal
program to "solve" the problem of day-care. It included taxpayer-financed scholarships for day-care workers and
day-care subsidies for low-income parents.
While Hillary stopped short of endorsing a large-scale federal child care program, at least one of her guest experts at
the conference advocated a $100-billion-a-year, tax-subsidized federal day-care program.
"The 'Village' people are back," said Dasbach, referring to the coercive communitarianism espoused in Hillary's
book, It Takes a Village. "Hillary and her friends seem to believe that a parent's love can be replaced by an army of
government-trained day-care bureaucrats -- paid for with our tax dollars."
The White House conference was called to discuss possible solutions to the problem of affordable day-care.
According to a 1994 Census report, 13% of preschool children are cared for in day-care centers.
Dasbach acknowledged that child care costs -- which average $74 per week -- can pose a hardship for many
working parents.
"But it's simply not fair for politicians to punish parents who stay at home with their kids by saddling them with other
people's babysitting bills," he said. "And getting the federal government more involved in raising our children is not a
responsible solution.
"After all, do we want government day-care centers that have the efficiency of the Department of Motor Vehicles;
the compassion of the BATF; the reliability of the Post Office; and the customer service of the IRS?" he asked.
Ironically, government can play a role in making child care more affordable, Dasbach said -- but not the way Hillary
thinks.
"Politicians can make day-care bills disappear overnight for millions of American families simply by lowering our tax
burden," he said. "If the government quit seizing half of the average American family's income, millions of mothers or
fathers who wanted to stay home to care for their children could afford to do so, instead of having to work.
"It's perverse for the same government that caused this problem in the first place to offer to solve it by sending our
children off to government day-care warehouses -- and making us pay for the privilege."
Dasbach acknowledged that despite his criticism, Hillary was right about one thing.
"Raising children sometimes does take a village," he said. "But it's the kind of village that we have already: Voluntary
villages of families, friends, and neighbors who care for each others' children. In America's village, we don't need
tax-subsidized compassion, federal baby-sitting diplomas, or Big Mother watching our kids."
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