By Allan Wall
February 25, 2009
NewsWithViews.com
One
of the biggest social problems facing contemporary American society is
the skyrocketing illegitimacy rate. More and more babies are being born
out of wedlock, and it’s become more socially acceptable.
The overall illegitimacy rate is now approaching 40%. If you break it
down racially, it’s about 25% among the white English-speaking majority,
approaching 50% among Hispanics, and at a staggering 70% among Blacks.
The social consequences are enormous. Children raised without fathers
have many problems. All other things being equal, they display a greater
propensity toward crime and sexual promiscuity, which of course exacerbates
the problem. Illegitimacy is a major contributor to poverty.
Young men raised without fathers lack a positive masculine role model,
and often turn to gangs and crime, looking for the acceptance they didn’t
get from a father figure. The jails and morgues await many of them.
Libertarians and believers in limited-government take note – there
is a strong relationship between illegitimacy, family breakdown and the
growth of the welfare state. The more family breakdown there is, the more
demand there is for Big Government. The more demand for Big Government,
the farther we drift away from limited constitutional government. And
the more vulnerable we are to political demagogues (such as Bush, McCain
and Obama among many others) who claim to be able to solve our social
problems.
Widespread family breakdown, in other words, is a major factor in making
our society less, not more, free.
That’s why, among the white majority, happily-married women tend
to vote Republican, while divorcees and single mothers tend to vote for
the Democrats. It’s logical. For a single mother, the Government
is her Husband.
Do Republicans care about family disintegration? They used to. But there’s
not much evidence that today’s Republican elite care much about
it.
In a 1992 speech Republican Vice-President Dan Quayle, running for re-election,
attributed the violence in the recent LA riots to family values problems.
Quayle criticized the “Murphy Brown” TV program, which had
featured a single mother as the heroine of the show. Quayle stated that
it “doesn’t help matters when primetime TV has Murphy Brown
– a character who supposedly epitomizes today’s intelligent,
highly paid, professional woman – mocking the importance of fathers,
by bearing a child alone, and calling it just another ‘lifestyle
choice’.”
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That
speech earned Quayle lot of flak from the usual suspects. But Quayle was
right, and had guts to say what he did. Even Candice Bergen, the star
of “Murphy Brown,” agreed. She said that Quayle’s “speech
was a perfectly intelligent speech about fathers not being dispensable
and nobody agreed with that more than I did.”
Well, that was way back in 1992. How things have changed!
In 2008, Republican presidential candidate John McCain chose Sarah Palin
as his running mate. We were told Palin was a conservative because, well,
she was pro-life and could shoot a moose.
Just a few days after Sarah became the candidate, it was announced that
her daughter Bristol was pregnant, having been “knocked up”
by Levi Johnston, a fellow student in her public school.
In the old days such a thing would have been a scandal. But not in 2008.
In fact, the McCain Campaign made heroes of Bristol and Levi.
The whole family, along with Levi, flew down to meet John McCain, and
were celebrated on the podium of the Republican national convention.
So here was the GOP, the supposed family values party, celebrating Sarah
Palin, a state governor who obviously didn’t have a lot of time
to raise her family, and whose oldest daughter was un unwed mother.
Even longtime social conservatives such as Phyllis Schlafly and James
Dobson jumped on the bandwagon, in the rush to go ga-ga over Sarah. I
guess the bottom line was a GOP victory, right? Except that the Republicans
lost anyway, as they generally do when they pander.
Many pro-lifers were quick to defend the Palins. After all, neither Sarah
nor Bristol got an abortion, right ? That just shows us how low our standards
have sunk. Nowadays, if a woman doesn’t kill her own children, she
is automatically considered a good mother!
Besides,
we were assured during the campaign that Bristol and Levi were going to
get married. But they didn’t and they haven’t. The baby was
born in December. Still no wedding. Here it is February of 2009 and Bristol
and Levi are still not married.
But not to worry. Grandma Sarah assured Greta van Susteren in an interview
that “Bristol is a strong and bold young woman and she is an amazing
mom.” Oprah couldn’t have put it better!
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Let’s
see, Dan Quayle’s speech decrying illegitimacy was in 1992. But
by 2008 the Republicans were celebrating out-of-wedlock birth in their
national convention. That only took four election cycles !
What social trends do you suppose the GOP will be endorsing by 2024?
� 2009 Allan Wall - All Rights Reserved
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Allan Wall recently returned to the U.S. after residing many years in Mexico.
Website: www.allanwall.net
E-Mail:
allan39@provalue.net
