On 01-09-98, ROBERT CRAFT declared to ROBERT PLETT:
RC> RP> Opportunity is one thing, mandates is another.  I said at
RC> RP> the outset that it's perfectly appropriate for government
RC> RP> to encourage education, and providing opportunity is a
RC> RP> reasonable way to do that.  My objections are to the
RC> RP> compulsory nature of the mandates you endorse.  No matter
RC> RP> how you slice it, dice it, or rationalize it, it is
RC> RP> government tyranny, the antithesis of what this nation's
RC> RP> founding and the creation of its Constitution were about,
RC> RP> and will *always* be abused, as the public school system in
RC> RP> this country has proven so magnificently.
RC>You're distorting the issue. Nowhere did I suggest that the
RC>goverment mandate education in the public school system. I
RC>specifically stated the mandate was simply that the child
RC>*be* educated. Whether that education be done in public,
RC>private, parochial or home school remains the choice of the
RC>parents.
C'mon, Robert, to mandate it, in whatever manner, is to involve
government in it with the force of law, backed by force of arms, prison
sentences and fines.  It doesn't matter where attendance is, any more
than it matters where government collects its taxes from you.
Bob     /\-/\   - proud Ilk   homebody@galstar.com
C.A.T. ( o o ) Chapter Ilks
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Green Country - Oklahoma      http://www.galstar.com/~homebody/
 * SLMR 2.1a * He who fails to learn from history is doomed to repeat it
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