By Nathan Barton
The land is filled with them. According to what data source you look, there are at least 4,000, and perhaps more than 5,000 in the Fifty States (Some, like the WaPo, claim that there are 5,300 “fiefdoms” in the American Academic Archipelago ™.) And this does not include technical institutes and specialized “higher education” institutions. That is, beyond high-school. Nor does it include various academies and military and bureaucratic and police schools, nor trade schools (like beauty and barbers schools and corporate “universities,” such as Caterpillar has to provide equipment training, nor apparently very specialized schools, such as music conservatories.
About sixty percent of the Fifty States’ institutions of higher education are “public” – government-owned, and tax-funded. Many of the remaining forty percent are highly dependent on direct or indirect tax funding: grants and contracts directly, and student scholarships and loans indirectly. Supposedly enrollment in all these institutions was over 17 MILLION people in 2014. Of course, about two-thirds of those are part-time; so there are ONLY about 6 million actual full-time students.
They are as ubiquitous in 21st Century America and the rest of Western Civilization as monasteries and convents were in 13th or 14th Century Europe, and all of Western Civilization then. According to the people of the era, and the historians, these huge institutions provided an invaluable and essential service. Yet, today, 95 percent of those are gone; often not even ruins mark their location. And very few people miss them. Continue reading
The Price of Liberty 
Why are you waiting? Get them out!
By Nathan Barton
You have children (or grandchildren) of school age in your family, your home, your church, or your neighborhood. They probably go to “public schools” (that is, government-run, tax-supported schools). Ninety percent of American children do.
Let us look at some very recent events at these schools.
From Edgewood Ohio, we have this tale of a thirteen-year-old male student and criminal. According to AOL News his crime was clicking “like” on a photo on Instagram. His crime was a ten day suspension from school for this anti-social act. The reason? The photo was of a “gun” – an AirSoft pistol. Bowlin’s parents received a note that cited the reason for the suspension as, ‘Liking a post on social media that indicated potential school violence.’
Welcome to Tyranny in Schools ™ in the Fifty States of 2017. It isn’t just the suspension for a harmless act, in a kind of Thought Crime that fits well in the 1984 universe. It is that this school apparently has the time and technology to constantly monitor their students’ social interactions – and in close to real time. (Or deploy a network of informers.) Continue reading →