Published on: Wednesday, March 03, 2010

By Brian J. Karem

As I looked out my sliding glass backdoor yesterday I saw the glaciers in the yard slowly receding.

The flora and fauna are starting to respond and it gave me hope for Spring.

Of course that only has to do with the weather.

The mental acumen of this country has receded far faster than the glaciers in my backyard and as intelligence has receded it hasn't left behind a rich loam in which the birds, the bees and the trees can flourish.

It has left a brown, stained mess instead.

So, don't read this. Seriously. If you don't want to hear this, you might as well end it now, dismiss me as a lunatic liberal, or a fringe moron and get on with your sleepwalking.

I must admit I am constantly amazed by the lack of intelligence I see every day. Whether it's an idiot driving slow in the fast lane and giving the finger to everyone who has to go around him, or the moron who wonders why his low-to-the-ground two-seat sports car gets stuck in two feet of snow, or more importantly those who claim to have a deep abiding love for this country but can't support or understand what it is this country actually stands for.

I've written often about these individual topics, but two recent occurrences in the county have me really questioning whether people in this great land of ours want the land of the free and the home of the brave, or if they'd rather live in a police state dominated by a benevolent tyrant.

The first, a story about a 23-year-old who was tased by a police officer after he accused the cop of "haranguing" a 90-year-old lady would've been hilarious if it was in the movie "Hangover" but it was just sad and scary on so many fronts when we heard about it actually happening to a local man.

Then last week we had a child who refused to stand during the pledge of allegiance. Far from thinking this a controversial story, we covered it thinking there would be little argument from the populace with what seems like a young woman exercising her basic civil rights.

Yet, the letters to the editor and the comments posted on The Sentinel's website - many of them which I would not approve because of their vile, threatening and libelous content - actually threw a shock into my system.

Perhaps this is because as a young man growing up I had a little old lady first grade teacher whose name was Mrs. Simms. Mrs. Simms seemed ancient to me then, for she was in her late 60s. She wore pearls to school every day along with a nice, plain dress. When we acted up she didn't paddle us or send us to the office. She stuck us in a chair at the front of the class facing a small table with a plaque on it. The plaque read, "Think". Many a recalcitrant student, forced to sit in Mrs. Simms "Thinking" chair never wanted to repeat the performance.

Mrs. Simms would start each day with the Pledge of Allegiance and taught us all how to put our hand over our heart. One day a kid I knew didn't feel well. He didn't want to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance and far from being upset with the boy, Mrs. Simms told him it was okay not to stand for the pledge, "whatever the reason." Her reasoning seemed sound and I had to admit I never even considered the words I would repeat each day.

She told us it was silly to pledge an allegiance to a flag, when what we really should pledge was allegiance to each other. Mrs. Simms told us if we really valued ourselves as Americans we even had to support those who didn't think the same way we did - so if they didn't want to stand and take the pledge, they were good Americans too.

I never looked at the Pledge of Allegiance in the same way again.

Mrs. Simms was a very intelligent woman who had taught school since the late 1920s when I had her for first grade in 1967.

She told us that the Great Depression taught her tolerance and discipline.

It is a discipline and a logic which escapes us today. When readers call the young lady in question a “brat” or suggest she move to another country, or dismiss her parentage and can’t even write a coherent sentence when denouncing the young lady, one has to wonder.

Maybe the Great Recession will teach all of us those same things, but as I watch the snow recede from my yard I'm still convinced our lack of intelligence is outpacing it.

I think we need Mrs. Simms "Thinking" chair.