by TAMMY, Alternate Reality Kidz News Service Life is so Unfair Writer
It's every kid's dream: school's out forever. Or, is it?
Jeremy Schlepticeclectic, a seven year-old from Gladiola Heights, Minnevada, thought so. "But then, I was...home schooled. Aaarggh! I couldn't get away from my sister, Benika - every time I turned around, she was there - being angelic all over the place! And I couldn't get revenge on her for being so innocent and stuff, because my mom knows all my tricks. It's a nightmare! Can I go back to school? Please? If I don't, I'll go mental!"
"I miss my friends," said 14 year-old Rebecca Simpflandkrabwigson of North Marshland, Illihio. "I miss hanging out in the cafeteria and making fun of what the losers were wearing. I miss getting revenge on losers for ratting me and my friends out for smoking under the bleachers on the field - revenge is a dish best served with nicotine! I miss passing notes in Miss Frontenactableu's Italian class speculating on which girls allowed boys to get to second base. Can I go back to school? Please? If I don't, my social life may never recover!"
"I miss the joy of learning," said 12 year-old Farnsworth Gregorsamsungite, from Dybuque, Idaconsin. I cut the four-eyed freak off there - my readers aren't ready for such a radical point of view!
The problem is that, no matter how great the yearning, the public education system isn't coming back. The federal government drove a stake into its heart and watched as it shrivelled to dust. Then, they used the dust to make Kool-Aid they fed to their devoted voters just to see if they would drink it.
And drink it they did. "School system? Ha! Commie indoctrination system more like!" Geraldo Simpflandkrabwigson (no relation - it's a common name) stated. "I'm happy to - < b>Donatella, leave your brother alone! He has microeconomics lessons to finish! - I'm happy to be home schooling my children. There's no nap time, here. No unstructured play time. Nthing that could get in the way of the transfer of knowl - Donatella, I'm not gonna tell you again! If you don't leave your brother alone, he won't get the grades to get into a good college, and then you'll have to support hi - don't start crying at me, young lady! Six is old enough to start selling matchsticks on the street!"
"Yeeeeeaaaaah," sighed token smart person Amy Sheshutshotshitbam, "Reduhblicans had been starving the public education system since at least the eighties - often with the silent complicity of the Dumboprats. Claiming that the entire system was broken and had to be abolished - it was like the thief whose defence consisted of, 'If the bank's security wasn't so pathetic, I never would have thought to rob it!'"
The McDruhitmumpf administration punted public education to the states. While most states were happy to set up curricula, they balked at the cost of public education and hot potatoed the issue to cities. Cities threw up their hands (letting the hot potato drop to the floor; only the most desperate would eat it under those circumstances - so, the bottom 99%, then) and said, "I'm going back into my hole. Talk to me next year about when the seasons will change!"
This was no skin off the ass (an old Yugoslavian saying that has stood the test of time) of wealthy parents, who had been paying to have their children go to private schools since before the wheel was invented. It was a serious shock, on the other hand, to parents who had to teach their children themselves.
"The capital of France?" complained Archibald Headedworkenmann. "How the hell would I know - I work in a death metal factory!" Headedworkenmann, who would have voted for President McDruhitmumpf if his conviction had been overturned, went on to list a wide variety of subjects his children needed to learn that he didn't know - including: "The three branches of government? What do I look like, a tree doctor‽; "How to conjugate the verb 'to be'? What the hell is a verb‽"; and, "angle of incidents? That's what got me arrested in the first place!"
"I'm doomed to a life working in Epsom salt mines, aren't I?" groaned Sylvania Headedworkenmann (a relation, but if you try to say so she'll deny it). "Swear to Gord, it's enough to make you seriously consider becoming a Commie!"
There may have been a time when school's out forever was a joyful shout; it ain't nothing but an ancient rock song now.