It is an old strategy.  Divide and conquer.  Statesmen and generals do not seek to destroy opponents arrayed mass formations.  Instead they try to tear enemy forces apart and destroy them piecemeal.  Ideally, they split allies apart, turn them against each other, watch the debacle unfold, and then arrive to make “peace”. 

Similarly, tyrants will divide a People into various interest groups by race, creed, sex, language, income, nationality, vocation, geography or anything else.  Tyrants have no honor.  Any excuse for division will serve their purpose.  What matters to a tyrant is that he retains the power to “resolve” the dispute he cleverly agitates.

Here is an example.  Note carefully that this dispute is about income and geography.  What is it? 

In Virginia, much of our public school funding comes from local property taxes.  Because areas with higher property values have a larger and wealthier base from which to obtain the funds for public education (and other local services) the state developed an index, the Local Composite Index (LCI), which allocates more state education funds to districts with lower property values than to districts with higher property values. (from here)

What is the problem with is this LCI?  Is it not right and proper that the rich should assist the poor to become educated?  The answer to that question is, of course, “yes”.  Nevertheless, do we really want politicians to decide when we have provided enough assistance to the “poor”?   How can we trust ambitious men and women to decide such things?

Under the guise of protecting children, our state officials have divided us.  They pit the rich against poor and the “rich” suburbs against other parts of the state.  So the amount of this LCI has become a source of friction.   Even now we are fighting over the LCI.  With the drop in housing prices, it seems “rich” Northern Virginia suburbs have become less “rich” and have less to contribute.  Yet there is no sympathy for the “rich”.   The politicians still want our money.  

Gov. Bob McDonnell has not decided whether he will support a freeze in the adjustment to the local composite index, a change left behind by Gov. Tim Kaine in his final two-year budget that would prove costly to Northern Virginia’s school systems.

That’s the word from McDonnell’s office this afternoon, after an article circulated around the General Assembly Building this week in which his office is cited as saying he would uphold the budget cut.  (from here)

See the following for other views:

• Fairfax: Lawsuit over school funding is ‘last resort’
• State to Take $20 Million From PWC Kids?
• State briefs
• Governor still considering school funding freeze
• Kaine and McDonnell Axe NoVA Schools
• McDonnell: No decisions yet on school funding factor

Keep in mind that government exists solely to protect our rights.  When government leaders pit us against each other, they jeopardize our unity.   Then they make us each appear to each other as potential tyrants.  They use our strife to disguise their own tyrannical schemes. They then violate the purpose of government.

Let’s step back a moment.  Let’s consider what we have done.   To ensure that every child receives an education, we have put our government in charge of the education of every child. To make sure that every child receives an education, our political masters regiment the education of every child.   We should ask:

• What purpose is served by creating a government monopoly?
• Whose purpose is served by creating a government monopoly?

Do the parents of every child actually require the assistance of a government monopoly?   Many, particularly those who can afford it, disdain and refuse government interference.  How many politicians, for example, choose to educate their own children in government-run schools?

We know for a fact putting government in charge of almost anything will add to the costs. Because government costs our nation too much, we are going broke.  When private schools and even home schooling work better and do not cost as much, why do we need to put our government in charge of educating every child?  We cannot figure out how help poor children get an education any other way?  That is a question to which only a numbskull or a socialist idiot would have to answer “Yes”.

Please contact your legislators.  See Who is my legislator?  Let them know you oppose being parasitized.