A proposal for yet another massive waste of Federal taxpayer funds

New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez (D-Nanny State) wants to take up to 35 million of our hard-earned dollars yearly right out of our pockets in order for the Department of Justice to establish a grant program to "research and educate children about Internet safety" and to combat the phenomenon of "sexting", in which teens send nude or suggestive photos to each other via text message.

Which, of course, ignores the fact that these supposedly "uneducated" and "naive" children are the very ones that are programming their family's computers and cell phones because no one else in the house knows how to do it, and who are living more and more of their normal everyday lives online. These "kids" know exactly what they're doing, which is nothing more than what teens have been doing forever, except that they now have new tools in order to do it with. Good luck with attempting to control those raging teenage hormones, Sen. Menendez. Societies have been trying for millennia without any success. Somehow we think throwing more and more of our tax money at the problem isn't going to solve it, either.

We realize that we at the Muckraker are rapidly getting over the hill in age, but we can dimly remember a program from our youth that taught children how to behave in public (which today includes one's online activities), and it didn't cost a dime. It was known as "parenting", and it seemed to work quite well at preparing the youth of this country to conduct themselves properly.

After seeing some cringe-worthy examples of today's clueless parents (such as the horde of nail-biting nanny-state parents on the"Mommy Files" blog at the San Francisco Chronicle's Web site who are furiously debating each other over what age is proper for their precious little snowflakes to first view the movie Star Wars), we can certainly see how the Feds self-importantly think that they need (and, more importantly, somehow have the right) to take over parenting duties for everyone.

They're wrong, of course. We fail to where the "teaching kids to behave themselves" clause appears in the Constitution.