i told you i was uneducated

i'm going to go out on a limb here and give you my uneducated opinion on a news headline i heard in passing.

the spotsylvania county school board (i know, doesn't it already sound like a joke?) will vote sometime in the near future on repealing the rule that requires children to stand during the recitation of the pledge of allegiance. (now it _really_ sounds like a joke.)

for crying out loud. i feel bad for the pledge. i picture it as the bill sitting on the steps of capitol hill waiting to be passed into law ... you know, he's sitting there all alone with his elbows on his knees looking lost and forlorn. but we've all seen the cartoon and know that it ends with him being passed and getting the big gold presidential seal. what schoolhouse rock never showed us was what happened after the bill was passed. sure, it was a party for a while, but sooner or later, the bill suffered the same fate as the pledge and as a result they go to the bar every friday to vent about it. denise and i see them sometimes. they buy us drinks.

first, the atheists wanted to get rid of "under god," and i'm sure they're still fighting. those arguments never stop, and frankly, it's making the treasury department a little touchy. maybe it would just be easier for the atheists who (and here's more of my uneducation) are probably outnumbered to not say those words when they're pledging their allegiance. maybe they could just take a split-second breather and use that time to get over being sensitive to a prepositional phrase. or if they don't like that, they could replace the word "god" with something they do believe in.

it can't be anything ethereal that requires faith or the like ... how about "the ozone layer" ... but, no, that's are pretty intangible. i mean, how do we know for sure that it exists? and if we don't know that ... how could it possibly have a hole in it. that's preposterous. we're going to have to go with "orion." the greeks saw him. or maybe it was the romans. and i can see him. so he must exist. problem solved. money saved.

now, spotsylvanians don't want to stand. alright, that might be a little general. i haven't personally interviewed all of the spotsylvanians, so for the sake of uneducated specificity i'll just say that some spotsylvanian brat refuses to stand up during the pledge and instead of parenting him, his parents are bothering the government about it. sounds harsh, but it's the american way. besides, if i wanted to find out about spotsylvanian standing customs, i'd go to one of their wal-marts and see how many people are unnecessarily driving those little carts. i don't have the time or patience for that.

maybe what we should do is tell the parents to take a running jump and then ensure the child is attending his history, civics, and/or social studies classes rather than hanging out at mcdonald's. mcdonad's isn't going to teach him about patriotism and integrity. apparently neither are his parents. if my school had called my parents to tell them that i was refusing to stand up during the pledge, i'm guessing i'd show up to school the next day with no choice but to stand. for the whole day. (hi mom!) maybe mom should make a trip to spotsylvania.

ok, i just read the article. all the kid wants to do is sit quietly and respectfully ... but i think we all know he's just copying someone's homework.