There. Now it’s really fixed.

The problem, Suzy, is that any “audience that can do something about it” is not going to be persuaded by Kleiman’s ad hominem attacks, his failure to address substantive criticisms, his failure to provide evidence or explanations for his non-obvious claims, nor his “clarifications” that are based on errors of fact or law.

He’ll face the same credibility problems with another audience if he chooses to use the same techniques with them as he did here at the VC.

Richard Aubrey: Laura.
I think the remark about conservatives hating the S-chip is because the dems, having sold it as an aid to impoverished children, have expanded it to prosperous young adults.
None of us saw this coming, of course.
But opposing the expansion means consevatives hate S-Chip, and naturally, hate poor children.

Sure, Richard. But I wanted to see if Andrew could say, without sarcasm, that conservatives are concerned about expanding s-chip into the middle class where it’s not necessary, pulling health insurance out of the free market (to the extent that it’s even in it), and giving over more responsibility that individuals should shoulder if they can, to the nanny state. I don’t think he can do it, I think he’s constitutionally unable to admit that people who disagree with him might not have evil motives. It’s either that, or he is genuinely unaware that there might be arguments other than the ones that support his side.

traveler496: If any of us was faced with deciding among several plausible strategies for treating a loved one’s brain tumor, we would ask lots of non-rhetorical questions, carefully consider diverse opinions and data, maintain an open (but not indiscriminate) mind, give differing degrees of credence to various beliefs based on the evidence, and the like; and our perspective would probably evolve considerably in the process. We would do these things, of course, because our overriding priority would be to find the best strategy for our loved one.I don’t see much of that kind of behavior in threads posts such as this.

Fixed it for you.

I don’t see much of that kind of behavior in threads such as this.

96.Andrew Lazarus says:
Um, Laura, one point of the program was to bring the nurse and the scale to the home?! (And if it weren’t for that S-CHIP program the conservatives so hate, maybe there’s no pediatrician in the picture?)

Andrew, why did you need a baby scale in your home? I never had one and had no need for it. Why did you need one?

Also, I suggest that you enlarge your reading material a bit. Branch out from the hard-left screeds that you apparently vary only with VC. When you do, you won’t make stupid statements like the one about conservatives hating s-chip. To enlarge upon this – can you, without sarcasm, explain the problem that conservatives have with it? Bet you can’t.

Anatid:

Notably, the types of maternal behavior that most predispose a developing child toward a life of low resilience and crime do not, to most observers, appear in any way to resemble abuse. These mothers can appear to be the most attentive, the most dedicated. Their children can appear to be the best-behaved. It often takes a trained specialist coding for certain behaviors to make the distinctions.

So you think it’s feasible for “trained specialists” to be available to assess EVERY first-time mother in the country to see whether she’s doing it right?

Come on. We’ve all seen those families in public that just scream pointlessly at their ill-behaved kids. If it’s possible to believe that someone else might not naturally be a good parent, why is it so hard to believe that any of us might not be, either?

Backing up my point here that the trained army of nurses that we’d have to have, to do house-calls on every new mother, is going to include clueless people who possibly will do damage. Because the pool from which the nurses will be drawn will be the same pool from which the bad parents are, i.e., fallible human beings.

Grow up, argue the substantive parts, and IGNORE THE TROLLS. Welcome to the internet.

Lazarus, you claimed:

Oddly, visiting nurses (like doctor house calls) were a lot more common a generation ago than now. But you see, back then, they were pure as the driven snow nurses. Now who knows what you’ll get: probably evil immigrants carrying Obama-indoctrination drugs in their stethoscopes. I mean, seriously: neo-natal checkups are totalitarian?!

If you can’t substantiate this claim (which you appear chronically unable to do), the honorable course would be for you to retract it, not double down on the smears and insults.

And your link to the NY nurses’ organization indicate that their client base is growing, so it refutes, rather than supports, your assertion.

In Kleiman’s post with his list, I made a comment in which I attempted a basic explanation of attachment. It’s an area of study in developmental psychology that offers a specific mechanism by which certain types of behavior are transmitted from generation to generation. It has also identified a number of factors that contribute to a child breaking this cycle as an adult.

Notably, the types of maternal behavior that most predispose a developing child toward a life of low resilience and crime do not, to most observers, appear in any way to resemble abuse. These mothers can appear to be the most attentive, the most dedicated. Their children can appear to be the best-behaved. It often takes a trained specialist coding for certain behaviors to make the distinctions.

There is currently a program for foster parents to teach them to emulate the microbehaviors that will influence a child’s pattern of attachment for the better. The longitudinal studies won’t be bearing fruit for a decade or three, but the preliminary results look promising. Offering similar training to the highest-risk mothers wouldn’t be a bad idea.

The problem with making it optional is that the type of adult attachment – called ‘dimissive’ – which most predisposes a person towards crime is the type who exists in denial of his problems. There’s nothing to see here, nothing’s ever gone wrong, everything is wonderful. These are the people least likely to seek help on their own, even if only for the sake of their child.

The scientific data are pretty clear on this point. Find a way to intercede with an entire generation, raise ‘em right, and it seems that 20 years later your crime rate will plummet. But the payoff wouldn’t be for two decades, and no one in the country wants to be told how to raise THEIR children.

Come on. We’ve all seen those families in public that just scream pointlessly at their ill-behaved kids. If it’s possible to believe that someone else might not naturally be a good parent, why is it so hard to believe that any of us might not be, either?

And I wasn’t talking about Obama. Please try to understand that people who don’t agree with you politically don’t necessarily think that Obama is the Anti-Christ, or even that he is behind everything they find disagreeable. I was talking about Mark Kleiman’s previous post, wherein he suggested “Provide a nurse as a “parenting coach” to every first-time mother.” Unless you think I think Obama is writing under a pseudonym, I don’t get how you think I think Obama is forcing nurses on mothers of newborns.

As for baby scales, as far as I know, every pediatrician’s office has one. That is a very, very poor attempt to explain why every first-time mother needs a taxpayer-provided nurse, if that’s what your point was.

I wonder if the guys who know mothers don’t want nurses have the slightest experience with newborns?!

If the mother wants the nurse, it’s no problem. If the program is actually mandatory, though, it isn’t going to matter whether the mother wants the nurse.

Concepts such as restorative justice and other extralegal approaches to the problems of criminal/antisocial behavior will never be accepted by the vast majority of the legal profession. It is in the status quo that they are invested.

Laura(southernxyl): My mother stayed with us for a week after my daughter was born. If the government had paid for a person, a stranger to me, to come into my household and assess how well I was doing at taking care of my child, that would have been a very poor use of taxpayers’ money. Maybe the “every first-time mother” part was not thought out and not intended.

I really don’t think Obama intends to open doors with sledgehammers to let nurses in—but my first-born didn’t arrive as scheduled and while my mother-in-law was great, the nurse didn’t need to find a flight. And my mother-in-law doesn’t keep a baby scale in her car.

Baby Number One arrived while I was a teacher on summer vacation. I was there when the nurse came to sing the Internationale with us. I wonder if the guys who know mothers don’t want nurses have the slightest experience with newborns?!

That would advance the interests of liberty and morality, too.

cubanbob: 3-The core function of the government as defined by the constitution and its preamble is provide for the common defense and for law and order

I’m looking in my copy and I can’t find “law and order” anywhere. General welfare, yes. Can you give us a link to your version?

1-The root of crime is the dysfunctional young male. The solution is to eliminate the welfare state, the great enabler of single motherhood. Study after study done has shown that children need fathers in their lives.

While I don’t disagree with you, I have to say that it may be too late. Too many young men have come up without fathers or father figures. They won’t know how to be parent, or why they would want to.

…Also, going back to the nurse issue, not sure how we got from the reference in the OP here, where nurses were assigned to mothers who were still in their teens, unmarried, or poor, to a nurse for every first-time mother as stated in the previous post. I had my daughter at age 26, having been married for 5 years (am still married to that person) and with the support of his family and mine. My mother stayed with us for a week after my daughter was born. If the government had paid for a person, a stranger to me, to come into my household and assess how well I was doing at taking care of my child, that would have been a very poor use of taxpayers’ money. Maybe the “every first-time mother” part was not thought out and not intended.

That substantive point about the “war on drugs” aside, this experience was rather cantankerous, but I have no apology for my role in that. We have to be subjected to the real life repercussions of the proposals of “policy experts” like Mr. Kleiman as long as he has the ear of government; so I have no qualms busting his virtual balls for the use (or as I would characterize it, misuse) of that power.

Eugene no doubt thought he was doing his readers a favor by offering them some reading that might challenge their precoceptions.

Have you considered the possibility that he thought he was doing YOU a favor, by offering you a forum to receive critiques that might challenge YOUR preconceptions?

1-The root of crime is the dysfunctional young male. The solution is to eliminate the welfare state, the great enabler of single motherhood. Study after study done has shown that children need fathers in their lives. While there are plenty of instances where children raised by single mothers turn out fine by and large those who are raised by single mothers are more prone to crime and other social dysfunctions. Prior to welfare was this level of dysfunction prevalent in the black community? Even among the poor blacks? No. Blacks are merely the canaries in the coal mine. They were the first to suffer the unintended consequences of good intentions with hispanics gaining up on them and whites gaining momentum as well. As for using the baseline of 1975 for the increase in incarceration rates perhaps it has escape Kleiman’s notice that year is ten years after the implementation of the Great Society and the rise of the welfare state, essentially the first generation that was partially raised by the welfare state.

2-Incarceration rates: Have a large cohort of dysfunctional young thanks to our welfare scheme and what does one expect? So either they are incarcerated and not committing crimes or delude ourselves with more well intentioned foolishness. If prison does not deter them from a life of crime why would anyone believe for a second that men who are incapable of controlling their impulses and have no desire to even do so and indeed believe that only fools and the weak are law abiding are suddenly going to magically be transformed by some social program? Whether or not other countries have a lower incarceration rates than ours means nothing. Indeed some of those ‘advanced’ countries with lower incarceration rates have higher crime rates than ours. Perhaps they should implement higher incarceration rates.

3-The core function of the government as defined by the constitution and its preamble is provide for the common defense and for law and order. That is what taxes are for, to pay for the core required functions, not for social engineering and wealth re-distribution. Kleiman has it exactly backwards, what is needed is to discourage single motherhood and it’s deleterious social effects instead of trying to make a dysfunctional concept work. While it may indeed cost one million to imprison an eighteen year old for life without parole, unless I am wrong such a severe sentence would require the commission of a serious crime. Few criminals are one time and one time only offenders so his calculation fails to consider the other side of the ledger, the cost of the crimes committed by the criminal during the same period of time if he was not incarcerated.

Ken Arromdee: All you have to do is figure out a way to guarantee that the nurses would only look for crack addiction and such and cannot threaten to take away children based on problems like the one already described by David Chesler

I found Mr Chesler’s comment a little short on specifics, and a little long on exaggeration. Perhaps you can point to some evidence that the Obama-nurses are alien pod people coming to take away the babies. Until then, maybe you should switch to a different delusion.

Now, if you can explain why this would be better, or cheaper, than nurses trying to get expectant mothers off crack first, I’m all ears.

There’s nothing wrong with nurses trying to get expectant mothers off of crack. All you have to do is figure out a way to guarantee that the nurses would only look for crack addiction and such and cannot threaten to take away children based on problems like the one already described by David Chesler. Good luck coming up with the guarantee.

Ken Arromdee:
Because those aren’t the only things the state-mandated nurses are going to look for. They’ll end up micromanaging every aspect of the child’s life with the impliict threat “if you don’t obey, we’ll take your children. You may get them back in five years if you have a lot of money and you can convince a court.”

Do you have any evidence this will happen? My guess is that the answer is ‘no.’

If lead really is still a substantial environmental hazard, then ameliorative measures make sense. Still, why wasn’t crime vastly more rampant decades ago when lead paint, pipes, and gas additives were ubiquitous? How large can the effect of remaining lead be?

Visiting nurses? Fine. Let Kleiman contribute to charitable organizations that offer visiting nurses free or for reduced cost. Let him solicit contributions from others. Line up a movie star or NFL star to promote the project. Same with the hypothetical idea from way back in the thread, “If we could give every pregnant mom a pill and every infant a shot so that all infants would be neuro-healthy and resistant to the ill effects of their surroundings, and we knew this would end all criminality due to those kinds of factors, would you approve of that?” Sure. Set up a charitable organization to supply the pill/shot free or cheap to all those mothers who want it.

Ken Arromdee: Because those aren’t the only things the state-mandated nurses are going to look for. They’ll end up micromanaging every aspect of the child’s life with the impliict threat “if you don’t obey, we’ll take your children. You may get them back in five years if you have a lot of money and you can convince a court.”

Yes, with Obama-nurses, if Baby hasn’t been tattooed with the Mark of the Beast, the state will take them and do it anyway. Can you point to the onerous standards that the new mothers will have to meet? Are they going to require/prohibit cloth diapers? Organic strained carrots—or else? It’s really a pity that policy discussions have to revolve around bizarre Beck-fueled fantasies.

Incidentally, prenatal care is a pretty good example of what Kleiman is talking about. The “conservative” way is to prosecute crack-addicted mothers afterwards. Now, if you can explain why this would be better, or cheaper, than nurses trying to get expectant mothers off crack first, I’m all ears.

I did not say these visits were common; I said they were more common than they are now. Given your confusion between provided and mandated, I’m starting to wonder about Obama Derangement Syndrome attacking your retinas—you might want to get that checked if you have insurance.

Prenatal and neonatal care are associated with favorable outcomes, not concentration camps. Who could have guessed.

I took this to be, indeed, a list of all the possible means we might consider to reduce crime. Exploring all of them would require a book, at least. Offering only some might seem to invite criticisms of incompleteness, or lack of imagination, or bias. Not that anyone would respond in such ways.

Also, maybe “screamer” refers to such words as “f***” and “bulls***.” Just a guess.

Yup. When combined with poor or no argumentation, this qualifies as ‘screaming’ for me.

Ryann may have different standards for attributions of ‘screaming’ than I do; he certainly has very different standards for substantive argumentation. As he did not respond to my ascription of ‘foulmouthed,’ I take it we agree on that one.

Next you will be advocating the sterilization of poor people. After all “Three generations of imbeciles are enough.”

It wouldn’t be a bad idea to offer it to them on the taxpayer dime — save us a pretty penny.