I am not sure that Dakota Meyer understands parenting.

I was really only able to make it to the minute mark in the video.

If I had actually seen them strike that child I would have lost my shit.

They are hitting that young boy with a paddle. Do you have any idea the psychological damage an incident like this can cause?

Well I do, because that was done to me.

In fact I was not only spanked by a school principal, I was spanked by my mother, my grandmother, babysitters, and the men who were dating my mother before she remarried.

One time I had cuts on my legs where a guy had used an electrical cord to "punish" me for not falling asleep fast enough. That school principal used half of a baseball bat sanded down with the words "Louisville Slugger" on the handle.

Five strikes, I remember every one of them.

Do you want to know how that approach corrected my behaviors?

It didn't.

But it made me an angry and violent young man, who often engaged in physical confrontations with my peers to the point where I sent more than one of them to the hospital.

I trained up to four or five hours each day, so that I would be a more effective fighter, and then I looked for trouble virtually every day so that I could punish the world that at the time I felt had horribly abused me.

Don't get me wrong I was not a bully, at least not in the classical sense. I wanted to fight tough guys who bullied or intimidated others.  But I was a raging asshole, of that there is no doubt.

This lasted into my late teens.

After that I was able to gain some perspective. which came as the result of some very caring teachers and school administrators who did not want to kick me out of school and destroy my life because, thankfully, they felt I was worth saving.

I owe them everything.

Today I care for the children who have been brutalized, neglected, and psychologically damaged by parents and others without the education or intelligence to deal with challenging behaviors.

Apparently this child was paddled for spitting and aggressive behaviors.

I have dealt with spitters before. Do you know what you do?

You get a bucket and you ask them to fill it up with all of their extra spit.

After a little bit their mouth goes dry and they ask to stop, at which time you simply say "Are you all out of spit?"

They answer in the affirmative, and you tell them "Well I am going to keep this bucket handy and the next time you need to spit we will come right back here and you can try to fill it again."

I have never had a child spit again after that.

Somebody needs to let Dakota Meyer know that there are many, many, many effective methods for teaching a child that do not involve scarring them for life.

Five sheriff's deputies disciplined for failing to arrest man who struck protester at Donald Trump rally.

Image courtesy of Radar Online.

Courtesy of CNN: 

Five sheriff's deputies were disciplined Wednesday for failing to immediately arrest a man who elbowed a protester in the face at a Donald Trump rally last week in North Carolina. 

Three Cumberland County Sheriff's deputies were demoted and suspended for five days without pay and two more deputies were suspended for three days without pay in connection with the incident following a week-long internal investigation, the sheriff's office announced Wednesday. 

"The actions of the deputies and their failures to act in situations such as that which occurred during the Trump rally at the Crown Coliseum have never been and will not ever be tolerated under the policies of this office," Cumberland County Sheriff Earl Butler said in a press release, adding that his office regrets "that any of the circumstances at the Trump rally occurred." 

Sgt. Sean Swain, the county sheriff's office's public information officer, said the five officers were present for McGraw's alleged assault. 

"Those five officers saw or the sheriff felt they reasonably should have seen what took place and failed to take action," Swain told CNN on Wednesday.

Of course this does nothing to solve the actual problem, which is that Trump is inciting his supporters to target brown skinned people for violence. Though I guess it might send a message for other law enforcement agencies to not get caught up in the racist vibe and actually do their jobs.

(I mean in this case they actually manhandled and arrested the guy who got hit.)

The sheriff in this case actually considered charging Trump with inciting a riot, but he didn't probably because he realized it would incite another riot.

And as Donald Trump's influence increases it is that very fear which protect him from all sorts of legal challenges.

After all nobody tried to arrest Hitler after his arrest for the Beer Hall Putsch because by then he was much too powerful.

School to prison pipeline explained. This is chilling.

I have actually witnessed this happening in Anchorage schools

Ted Cruz suggests that Hillary Clinton should be "spanked" for not telling the truth. Because there is nothing misogynistic about that!

Courtesy of HuffPo:

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton lied to the American people about Benghazi, and now voters will "administer a spanking," which is how Cruz disciplines his 5-year-old daughter when she doesn't tell the truth. 

"What happened in Benghazi was a national disgrace," Cruz said, responding to a question from a voter on Friday asking how the Republican presidential hopeful would hold those accountable for the 2012 attack on a U.S. diplomatic compound in Libya that left four Americans dead, including Ambassador Chris Stevens. 

"In my house, if my daughter Catherine, the 5-year-old, says something she knows to be false, she gets a spanking," Cruz said, standing on the bar of a local shop here, looking into the crowd. 

In the Democratic primary, Cruz said voters have the opportunity to hold Clinton accountable. 

"In America, the voters have a way of administering a spanking," Cruz said with a smirk. "I can tell you this: As president ... there will be accountability for Benghazi."

So not only is Cruz using a sexually charge metaphor concerning Hillary Clinton but he also admits beating his five year old daughter.

Go ahead argue that spanking your child is not akin to a "beating," And then visualize a seven foot tall, 300 pound weightlifter, throwing you over their lap and laying into you as hard as they can.

That is about the equivalent.

ANY parent in 2016 who is still using corporal punishment to discipline their children should be forced to attend parenting and behavior modification classes. There are dozens and dozens of more effective alternatives to striking your children.

Hey, I popped my daughter on the butt as well, twice. And she remembers both of them. Trust me.

But that was a long time ago, and I certainly know better now.

In my job I work with children who come from homes where their behaviors, many of them the result of chemical imbalances in their brains or trauma they suffered as infants, are met with increasing levels of violence until finally the state steps in and takes them away.

By then the damage has been done, and it takes years of patience and therapy to partially undo the damage.

So for Ted Cruz to suggest that a one time Senator, former Secretary of State, and current presidential candidate should be struck as a powerful man might strike a young child, is disgusting.

By the way, who is actually surprised to learn that Cruz's daughter lies to him?

After all look who she has for a role model.