House of Eratosthenes

Recently, an aggressive media campaign has been launched by Let’s Move, a government-funded fitness initiative led by Michelle Obama.

As you will see in this TV spot that’s airing, one of many, the message of the Let’s Move campaign is quite simple: Lying to your children is fine because it’s good for them.

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This is a paradigm for how the Obama administration views and treats the American public. They are the all-knowing parents and we are the clueless children who will be herded and prodded, by any means necessary, into government mandated programs that are, they assure us, ultimately “good for us.”
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Under the guise of a smiley, benevolent state, Michelle Obama, Big Sister, is making a bid to lead the ignorant masses to a better life. And where have we seen that strategy before?

It’s the justification for Obamacare, a Byzantine universe of laws and regulations that is guaranteed to ratchet up the cost of health care, drive physicians out of business, destroy competiton [sic] in favor of a government monopoly, and ration medical care especially for the elderly and those afflicted with life threatening illnesses.

It’s also the fuel that sustains every murderous Socialist and Communist regime that’s ever existed, dictatorships whose morality is best summed up thusly: the ends justifies the means.

I actually like what Michelle Obama is trying to do. Of course, that’s the case with every plan that’s ever come out of the left for the last hundred years — the goals, as stated, are just fine. The problem is with the implementation, which always seems to have the side effect of making statist bureaucrats more powerful. Did I say side effect? Funny how, overall, that objective manages to get accomplished and the objectives that got the problem sold in the first place, don’t quite seem to ever be satisfactorily met. Someone remind me what the First Lady’s authorities are under Article II of the Constitution again?

Here’s how I would do it, assuming it is the responsibility of the Federal Government to make kids fit and thin, by means of putting messages on the airwaves and on YouTube…which I don’t accept…but anyway. You show someone moving around. Like Beyonce with the green leggings.

Except, instead of trying to get kids to like rap music — which they do, already, way too much — perform some feats. Out on the field. With measurements. A few years ago, before Michelle O even came along, I was doing my own “Let’s Move” program on Thanksgiving day. I was out riding my bike down the Jedediah Smith trail, a couple people were jogging out there and the man decided to use my moving bike as a benchmark, just to see if he could keep up. Or, maybe he was trying to rob me. But it looked more like he was using my speed as a benchmark…ten miles an hour. Rather pokey speed on a bike, but it’s really smoking when you’re on foot. You have to work your way up to that. Beyonce might be able to do it. Starting the training in childhood would probably help a lot.

Imagine the power of getting a bunch of kids talking about something like that. Kind of a Jerrod of Subway Sandwiches in reverse. My boss said once, in a meeting, whatever we measure gets improved, and whatever we don’t, doesn’t. Pugsley ran ten miles an hour in episode nine. He ran five miles in forty-five minutes in episode eight. Huh, I wonder if I could work my way up to that?

But there are two big problems with this. One, I don’t approve of the government managing people this way. If people draw inspiration from the government, receive their signals on how to prioritize the things in their lives and act on them — something is wrong, then. That’s not the way it’s supposed to work.

The other big problem is, and this is really the point: The Obama administration wouldn’t go for it. No leftist would. Measuring, and then celebrating, a human achievement? An individual human achievement? No can do, we’re all in this together! So start the music, get the rhythm going, ditch any scorekeeping…and get moving to that…a big massive-crowd grind-and-wiggle, in which individual identity is completely swallowed-up and lost in the crowd. That is not in harmony with Michelle Obama’s stated goal, since you can “harmonize” your body with a number like this, off in the background, without losing a single calorie. Just sorta move your arms around and you’re in.

Conclusion: Let’s Move is not about making kids fit, or stopping them from becoming fat. It’s just like gay marriage. It gets people to talk about inconsequential things, so that, like a deceived daughter running up & down stairs looking for a purse, we can’t & don’t concentrate on holding our so-called “leaders” to account, making sure they’re doing what they’re supposed to be doing.

Update: Completely off-topic comment, but I was noticing on New Years Eve, with that wretched Lady Gaga number, this dance format has been enjoying a resurgence of sorts for awhile now…the “lead” dancer moves around and then the “backup” dancers, as individually identifiable as Star Wars stormtroopers, move around in sync, wraith-like, in the background.

I know it’s been around for a long time. It got a big boost back when moving/talking pictures first achieved viability. But in this generation it is the way to choreograph things…again…I wonder…could 2012 be the year the insanity stops? Seems Britney Spears gave it a big boost which, with the benefit of hindsight and after repeated exposure, and rather underwhelmed with the lack of creativity, I see was not helpful.

Lying to your children is fine because it’s good for them.

I understand the sentiment, and I’m guilty as charged, as making my kids run around to find something when I know where it is is just too good a sport to pass up.
- pdwalker | 01/03/2012 @ 09:26

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“A Paradigm for How the Obama Administration Treats the American Public”Tuesday, January 3rd, 2012

“A Paradigm for How the Obama Administration Treats the American Public”
Tuesday, January 3rd, 2012