From the Rodney Dangerfield School of Public Policy

(c) by Mark Dempsey

Reading some of the commentaries about how we've dumbed-down America, how kids nowadays are all over our lawns, how we can't get no respect--you know, the Rodney Dangerfield line of talk--is a commonplace. Archaeologists have even found similar complaints on the walls of the ancient Egyptian tombs--yep, even ancient Egyptian younger generations were disrespectful. 

Are (young) people actually dumber, or is something making them dumber? For example, pulling an all-nighter reduces IQ, and poverty does that too. Being bombarded with problems that are unsolveable without money doesn't make poor people confident, or smart.

It turns out, the dumbing down also appears in the public policy apparatus. In Newt Gingrich's congress, Speaker Gingrich cut funding for congress's technology advisors--and no subsequent congress, regardless of the party in power, has reinstated that expert advice. That's why Congressmen and Senators asked the CEO of Facebook about whether he was monitoring phone calls.

Poverty is at least part of what impairs our thinking, and artificial poverty--the "we're running out of money" excuse--is a lie, but it's typically the excuse for public policy austerity. Sabotage is part of warfare, and the war on poor people has been unrelenting. Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich conspired to turn AFDC (Aid for Dependent Children) into TANF (Temporary Aid for Needy Families), a much more restrictive type of welfare. Of those needing public assistance, 76% got AFDC, only 26% got TANF. 

Incidentally, there's good evidence that better welfare prevents crime more effectively and cheaper than policing or punishment, but as US population increased 42% between 1982 and 2017, spending on policing and incarceration increased 187%. One other fact of interest: The US has more than a half million medical bankruptcies annually, Canada has none. Canadian per-capita incarceration is roughly one seventh the US rate, yet their crime rate is lower. Could taking better care of people make them smarter too?

Part of the problem with such complaints is that they are a response to what the Buddhists call "mental formations." Everyone know Artificial Intelligence hallucinates, but natural intelligence does too. Optical illusions, plausible explanations, hypnosis and especially nostalgia--yearning for better days that seldom really existed--are all part of the human condition. 

Human minds formulate self-preservation tactics based on past experience. Yet experience something new, and all bets are off--and our minds will tell us whatever we confront threatens our survival, and wouldn't it be nice if things were like they used to be. This is the basis of "Make America Great Again." And even that slogan was a reboot of a Reagan-era campaign saying.

But we're not just confronted with the same old circumstances. Keeping your head when all about you are losing theirs is a part of life's lessons. Making mistakes is to be expected.

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For those needing the ultimate in Rodney Dangerfield lament about the fate of modern culture, here are the Four Yorkshiremen.