Where the Boys Are

My niece has come up against a formidable foe -- her 12-year-old daughter. She, the daughter, pushes and pushes, all to be with one boy after another. Today's 12 is the '50s 15.

First, my niece discovered a 13-year-old boy at their house, with her daughter, when no one else was home. She and her husband kicked him out, grounded their daughter and took away all of her electronics for a week or two. As far as they know (and that's always debatable), the daughter hasn't been with the boy since that episode.

Next, a boy in her seventh-grade class was sending what my niece described as inappropriate texts to her daughter. The police got involved with that one and his numbers were blocked at a cost to my niece's phone bill. More grounding, more withholding electronics.

The latest episode -- all have occurred since the beginning of this school year -- involves a 15-year-old boy sniffing around, telling her to meet him at his house, which she did. They were found out only because my niece's husband went to pick up the girl at school and she hadn't made it back in time. Now she is grounded and without her electronics for two months. A call to the police officer who helped with the last case provided information about the teenage boy, all negative and he's well-known to law enforcement for using drugs.

Grounding or electronics deprivation, neither is going to work on this girl. I believe she can wait it out, no matter how long the punishment. She's very patient. My niece has also been patient, but she's losing this war. She was desperate enough to ask me for advice. I suggested that she consider doing two things immediately:

1) Talk with the school counselor to get a referral to someone who can work with the daughter on a regular basis, to help her see that she's making bad choices and that she must change her way of thinking to protect herself. Yes, I know, her hormones are raging, she wants to be popular, etc., etc. Yes, I know, her parents should be the people counseling her. But what would you do? Things are going from bad to worse. The father has always wanted to be a friend to his children instead of assuming a parental role that calls for really hard work in keeping children in line. To keep doing the same thing and hoping for a better result the next time is pure folly and possibly dangerous.

2) Threaten the daughter with taking on the boys. Tell her that you've tried what you can to get her to see how this is destructive behavior for herself and all she has done is to be manipulative and wait for the punishment to end so she can continue making her bad decisions. Tell her what my grandfather told me. He said if I decided to be with a boy who was a cur, who tried to mess with me, he wouldn't do anything to me. But he would take care of the boy, even to the point of killing him. I was so scared after hearing that, knowing full well that Grandpa would do exactly what he said, that I was very, very careful about who I chose to be around, let alone date. I tried to think about what was best for me -- and others -- as I made my decisions. Of course, there were the frogs, but none treated me badly or gave my grandfather a reason to carry out his threat.

Unfortunately, these days most fathers and grandfathers have fallen into the trap of thinking that they can talk with their children and eventually they'll come around to knowing what's best for themselves. There are those children, of course. However, my thinking is that most of them, like children have done forever, learn to lie to get their way, learn to maneuver their parents in all directions, and, perhaps worst of all, think they're invincible. Parents must be forever vigilant and do what's best for their children, always being aware that the children rarely know what's in their own best interest.

Any ideas? No corporal punishment suggestions for the girl, please. My opinion is that it's not a safe disciplinary method and ultimately it can cause more harm than you might think.

Cooking the Books

With the wide variation in climate over the Earth's long history (the Earth has warmed and cooled many times), cooler heads (ahem) should look at any specific claims about climate trends and their causes with healthy skepticism. Given the computer models used to predict warming, the United States should be unwilling to commit any significant resources based solely on those predictions. We simply don't know enough about climate mechanics to create credible models, and that is demonstrated by the inability of the models in use to "predict" observed behavior.

Given that the proposed actions to thwart the questionably predicted climate changes are expensive (and unlikely to be effective, even if we know where the climate is going), it makes no sense to take any action at this time. And if we do begin to find credible evidence that the climate will change in a predictable manner, we might then consider whether it makes more sense to attempt to change the climate dynamics or, instead, to adapt to the change.

There are degrees of scientific credibility that can be demonstrated through good practice with full public disclosure. Global warming alarmists haven't met that standard. In fact, they've demonstrated a disdain for good science, and we didnt need the leaked e-mails to prove it.

The consensus among global warming activists is that we must coercively reduce the production of greenhouse gases. The proposed actions will have little effect on the concentration of carbon dioxide, compared with natural causes and the emissions of developing nations. Think of all the strato-volcanoes throughout time that have erupted, throwing trillions of cubic tons of carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, hydrogen sulfide, hydrogen chloride, carbon monoxide, metal chlorides, and ash into the atmosphere. The effect on climate from volcanoes over the past several billion years dwarfs the effects people wreak from burning fossil fuels. The global warming activists fail to make a prima facie case for applying their proposed remedies. Even if I accept all they say as fact, their conclusions don't logically follow.

Coercive proposals are floating through Congress (stalled, fortunately) as we speak, and many "evironmental" groups and a large percentage of the Democratic Party advocate coercive measures to limit greenhouse gas emissions. Al Gore traffics in deception and the duped call him a prophet.