The Wreck Center

Today, the dinosaur media gleefully reported that Boy Scouts could now earn merit badges for mastering video games. This is a far cry and quite a step away from collecting an award for assimilating a skill so frivolous as life saving. The erosion of values and common sense certainly did not start and will not end with a zany decision by a scouting organization. I would say one early hallmark of the rising idiocy was the creation of midnight basketball under Bill Clinton. This program continues (almost exclusively in the inner-cities) in rec centers but seems racist to its core with an opportunity directed largely at young black men who face record unemployment, not to attend midnight job fairs, visit a twenty-four hour job bank, learn valuable, marketable skills at an all-night computer lab, or even visit an extended hours library (with those resources actually pared down as cities shorten library hours or close them due to tight budgets and constraints on spending worsened by the Obama recession), but they can line up a three pointer or try a flashy dunk- no doubt impressive athletic feats but unlikely to garner a good job with lifetime security which tends to come from developing brain as opposed to brawn. If you are playing a basketball game until two (2) a.m., it is highly unlikely that you will be up and at a productive job at eight in the morning. Boy Scouts playing Grand Theft Auto or young urban unemployed perfecting their jump shots tend not to do much to enhance our nation.