The Bet

I have a bet with my eighth grade son. If he wins he gets a small Lego set. If he loses he gets to read yet another book of my recommendation (how do you think he got to be so smart except for the occasional bad bet or two? ;)

The bet? That his history teacher will not allow him to distribute pocket Constitutions to the class. He thinks his teacher will allow it. Nothing against his teacher -- I've met him and he seems like a good guy. I told my son that he would have to have the teacher review the pocket Constitution before distributing them because I genuinely did not want to get him fired -- and my assessment is that he would be fired if he allowed them to be handed out.

Why?

Here's my first example of a long list. Watch for more in a continuing series.

Page 8 has a summary of the Ten Commandments and their importance to American jurisprudence and how there is a tablet signifying them directly above the Supreme Court Chief Justice's chair among other things. And the bottom section of page 8 has the contrasting summary of the plan from Marx' Communist Manifesto (which of course is more or less equivalent to the Democratic Party platform)!

Herewith the relevant section of the Manifesto presented for you to marvel at:

The Communist revolution is the most radical rupture with traditional property relations; no wonder that its development involved the most radical rupture with traditional ideas.

But let us have done with the bourgeois objections to Communism.

We have seen above, that the first step in the revolution by the working class is to raise the proletariat to the position of ruling class to win the battle of democracy.

The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by degree, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralise all instruments of production in the hands of the State, i.e., of the proletariat organised as the ruling class; and to increase the total productive forces as rapidly as possible.

Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois production; by means of measures, therefore, which appear economically insufficient and untenable, but which, in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionising the mode of production.

These measures will, of course, be different in different countries.

Communist Manifesto (Chapter 2): "Nevertheless, in most advanced countries, the following will be pretty generally applicable.

1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.
2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.
3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance.
4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.
5. Centralisation of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly."
6. Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State.
7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State; the bringing into cultivation of waste-lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.
8. Equal liability of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.
9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.
10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labour in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, &c, &c.

Ten Commandments: Religion not allowed in school. Communist Manifesto: Too much chance someone might recognize the Democrat Party agenda.

And did I mention that on the cover of this particular edition is 2 Corinthians 3:17 : "Where the spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty."

So even the cover fails!