Anarcissie….  You must have struck a nerve with
ITW…...she a cussin bad now.

Anarcissie:
You are so dogmatic that you sound like an irrational idiot.  I’ll bet it you found yourself in a small-town Texas jail, like that head nurse who’s up on charges for whistle-blowing on an incompetent doctor, you’d be HOWLING for a “Johnny Fuckin’ Cochran” to represent you! Lawyers serve a needed function, as do real-estate agents.

You LEAP at the word “chauffeur” as if it means hiring a guy in livery and a cap to drive the “young Master” to and from his polo matches in the back-up Rolls-Royce.  And THAT is pure f***in’ BULLSHIT—and you know it!.

EVERY mother and father who is above the poverty line in America has to “chauffeur” their kids around.  All that means is drive them to their activities so they are safe.  And that’s all Ms. Marcus means—and you know it!  All you are doing is phony-bull-ony moralizing.

So stop trying to “Sarah Palin” us with bullshit you know is bullshit.  It’s just propaganda and not even very good propaganda.

Inherit The Wind, February 5 at 2:29 am:
‘I love this moralistic do-gooders.

Didn’t it EVER occur to you that two parents working at GOOD jobs is better for our entire society than one
“bread-winner” going out while wifey stays home and plays homemaker and “Mommie”?

Think about it: A woman capable of earning a PhD does far more for society socially and economically by USING her talents and skills. ...’

Not necessarily.  A lot of jobs are highly destructive, like say being a real estate developer, a lawyer, or a propaganda writer for The Washington Post.

But putting aside the question of Right Livelihood, what you seem to be missing and I found remarkable was not that our author had a job, but that she and her spouse constructed a life in which a 12- and a 14-year-old had to be chauffeured around by another woman, who herself had children who had to be babysat by yet someone else; and that she doesn’t question this way of life other than to point out that she wants to demand the kind of reliable performance she herself would prefer not to have to meet.  Why are they way out in car country?  Why are they dependent on fading Detroit and the whims of oil sheiks?

It could be an accident, I suppose; I’ve been in similar situations.  But then I’m not paid to write articles for the Washington Post about how the world should be ordered.

People on the Continental 48 states are now experiencing what the people in the state of Hawaii have had to do for quite some time now. Working 2 to 3 jobs to make ends meet, if and when jobs are available. Many times the trade off comes with child care. I know there should be no trade off, but there is because you have to depend on others and you can’t where your children are concerned. To compound the problem, judgement of the parents when things go wrong with that childcare is cruel. They are admonished as bad parents incapable of proper parenting among other things. Want to know frustration? Try add this to your list of problems on top of all else. Outside people telling parents that they don’t care about their children.
Just consider this as well, no matter where one lives.

I love this moralistic do-gooders.

Didn’t it EVER occur to you that two parents working at GOOD jobs is better for our entire society than one
“bread-winner” going out while wifey stays home and plays homemaker and “Mommie”?

Think about it: A woman capable of earning a PhD does far more for society socially and economically by USING her talents and skills.

Then, she and her husband also offer employment where there would be none, creating a job for someone for whom THIS is the best opportunity.

Or, someone ELSE creates a day-care center, employs 6-10 people, rents a space, and creates all that economic activity.

But let’s go the OTHER way.  Let’s say women SHOULD stay home.
1) Half the population no longer actively engages in economically productive activity.
2) If you are going to replace day-care and nursery school with home care, now you must, by the same logic, replace public school with home-schooling.  That’s a GREAT way to educate our youth….NOT!
3) The “S” word (which home-schoolers hate)—SOCIALIZATION.  Kids learn about society by being in a society.  Sometimes it’s rough, sometimes cruel, which I, as a father hate, but understand that WITHIN CONTROLLED LIMITS it is necessary.

Most of the women I know who work do it because they want THEIR kids to have a good life, at least as good as their own, but, for most, hopefully better.  They work so their kids can go to college, or to have a safety net when their husbands lose THEIR jobs (like happened to me this past spring—thankfully I’ve been working again since Labor Day).

But mainly women work because THEY HAVE SOMETHING TO CONTRIBUTE of GREAT VALUE!  Something besides their vaginas for mens’ pleasure, besides their wombs for mens’ offspring, and besides their arms and legs to cook mens’ food and clean mens’ houses.

This stay-at-home argument is anti-feminist and belongs in the 19th century, not the 21st century.

I know it’s hard to understand, but no one is responsibile for your children but you.

No one should pay you to take care of your own children, or provide for them, or take tax dollars to care for your children, there your responsibility.

This is one of the reasons why this country is so screwed up, is that people no longer want to take responsibility, for their responsibilites especially when they are inconvienient.

Rearing children often involves sacrifise, as many a good parent knows. Most grown ups understand this, but others, would rather send their kids to a therapist instead of parenting them, fast food instead of feeding them,or a psychiatrist for medication instead of disciplining them.

And when they fail to produce academic excellence, or are no longer cute, they dispose of them to long term residential care.

But never do they take a look in the mirror.

Narcissistic people produce dependent adults, and we are a culture of narcissim.

You’re right, Bird48, I did.  Sometimes I read too fast and miss things.

I think you mostly complained about the class issues, which are valid but are observed so commonly that there is not much to add any more.  Marcus herself wouldn’t bother reading what we write here because we’re not significant, that is, rich or powerful, so there is not much use asking her to change her ways; but it would be interesting to now how she managed to construct a life in which a 14-year-old has to be chauffeured.

Anarcissie, you seem to have missed reading my post.

You all seem to have missed the real key to this article, which was “chauffeur”.

Hulk, your post is troubling on many levels. Israel’s right idea? Ask a Palestinian
that one. Case closed Israel is a religious state, atheists to Somalia…
Lastly, I work in an urban school in a neighborhood in need of many resources,
yes, but I invite you to make your claim about parents priorities being meth and
booze at our next PTA meeting. I think not, perhaps you a Mrs Marcus can discuss
the difficulty in finding good help and maybe count the silverware the babysitter
probably stole.

Author gets no sympathy. Its articles like this that allow the conservative
canard about elitist out of touch liberals. Unfortunately, one could imagine this
lament while waiting on line for a latte or buying organic broccoli at
wholefoods. I imagine because I boycott starbucks, wholefoods.
I premise that the author will take umbrage that she cant be given a fair
hearing to have a career as jet setting reporter and mom. And this will get
interpreted into an anti-professional woman screed. Mothering is work too,
very special work, perhaps to call it work is to degrade it, call it loving work,
perhaps both cannot be done by one person- professional commercial work
and loving work. Luckily , there is an army of people mostly women that can
work for low wages that enable the author to indulge her good nature to serve
the public with her reportage. This is the third Marcus article Ive read on
truthdig and none have been agreeable with me.
Anyway, something tells me Marcus’s children will be just fine, regardless of
mom’s woes. Whats that french word for middle class!!

Considering all the real problems many people have caring for their children because they have to work, such as the baby-sitter referenced in this article, I find it astonishing that the author would expect, or in any way ask for, sympathy or understanding of her situation. I really have to ask where she lives that there is no transportation available for her two pitiful children. At ages of 12 and 14 how do they get to school? No buses? No bicycles? No sidewalks? Give everyone a break and quit whining about perfectly healthy children obviously from a well-to-do family, needing a chauffeuer. If that is your biggest social concern then perhaps you need to stick your head outside your bubble and wake up to the real problems around this country. Your elitist attitude and article do nothing to advance the cause about which you seem so concerned—decent, affordable child care for those who truly need it for making a living, not for convenience.

The Israelis have the right idea - organized kibutzes:  Herd all the tikes into high-quality faith-based camps where care is given by skilled staff and instruction is included.  (Atheists can move to Somalia.) 

Instead, US moms rely on working grannies, unemployed questionable neighbors, and teens whose most accurate statements include the word “Whatever”. 

Most US “parents” these days regard schools are glorified day care sites anyway. In fact, in at-risk schools, it’s the schools sending food home over weekends because “parents” no longer can be relied upon to feed their progeny.  Such “parents” prefer cigarettes, joints, and meth to children any old day. 

Liberty should first be couched in personal responsibility; it’s not merely license to do ANYthing one wants.

Since most full-time baby-sitters and nannies are struggling to make ends meet themselves, you’d think they would bust their butts to keep THEIR jobs.  Yet many don’t. Lots of sitters do this because they really aren’t qualified to do much else, and, if they are lucky (and you are), they love and enjoy kids. 

That’s just the way it is. Very rarely does a legal secretary decide to quit to become a nanny. And when you find a bright, educated professional, she gets to pick and choose who she works for because SHE is what everyone wants but can’t get.

So here you are: Trusting your kids and your house to someone you HOPE
a) will show up, on time, sober.
b) will stay as long as needed
c) won’t take stuff.
d) won’t bring a boyfriend near your house.
e) will get along with your kids.

You’d think there’d be better ways to hook up the women who are good and reliable (and therefore the hot “properties”) with the families willing to pay for them.  But there isn’t.

WOW…...Poor Washingon Post….