Things that were important in the development of our nation.
one of those things was education. I'm very passionate about education
because it's made such a big difference in my life. But here we are at a
time in the world, the information age, the age of technology, and yet
30% of people who enter high school in this country do not graduate. 44%
of people who start a four-year college program do not finish it in
four years. What is that about? Think back to a darker time in this our
history. Two hundred years ago when slavery was going on it was illegal
to educate a slave, particularly to teach them to read. Why do you think
that was? Because when you educate a man, you liberate a man. And there
I was as a youngster placing myself in the same situation that a
horrible institution did because I wasn't taking advantage of the
education. I was a horrible student. Most of my classmates thought I was
the stupidest person in the world. They called me dummy. I was the butt
of all the jokes. Now, admittedly, it was a bad environment.
single-parent home, you know, my mother and father had gotten divorced
early on.
My mother got married when she was
13. She was one of 24 children. Had a horrible life. Discovered that her
husband was a bigamist, had another family. And she only had a third
grade education. She had to take care of us. Dire poverty. I had a
horrible temper, poor self-esteem. All the things that you think would
preclude success. But I had something very important, I had a mother who
believed in me, and I had a mother who would never allow herself to be a
victim no matter what happened. Never made excuses, and she never
accepted an excuse from us. And if we ever came up with an excuse, she
always said do you have a brain? And if the answer was, yes, then she
said then you could have thought your way out of it. It doesn't matter
what John or Susan or Mary or anybody else did or said. And it was the
most important thing she did for my brother and myself. Because if you
don't accept excuse, pretty soon people stop giving them, and they start
looking for solutions. And that is a critical issue when it comes to
success.
Well, you know, we did live in dire
poverty, and one of the things that I hated was poverty. you know, some
people hate spiders, some people hate snakes, I hated poverty. I
couldn't stand it. [laughter] But, you know, my mother couldn't stand
the fact that we were doing poorly in school, and she prayed and asked
god to give her wisdom, what could she do to to to make her sons
understand the importance of wisdom? God gave her wisdom. At least in
her opinion. It was to turn off the tv, let us watch only two or three
programs during the week, and read two books apiece and submit to her
written book reports which she couldn't read, but we didn't know that.
[laughter] She put check marks and highlights and stuff -- [laughter]
But, you know, I just hated this. And my friends were out having a good
time. her friends would criticize her. they would say you can't make
boys stay in the house reading books, they'll grow up and hate you. and i
would overhear them and say, you know, mother, they're right. but she
didn't care.
You know. [laughter]
after a while, I actually began to enjoy reading those books because we
were very poor, but between the covers of those books I could go
anywhere, I could be anybody, i could do anything. I began to read about
people of great accomplishment, and as I read those stories, I began to
see a connecting thread. I began to see that the person who has the
most to do with you and what happens to you in life is you. You make
decisions. You decide how much energy you want to put behind that
decision. And I came to understand that I had control of my own destiny.
And at that point I didn't hate poverty anymore, because I knew it was
only temporary. I knew I could change that. it was incredibly liberating
for me, made all the difference.
To continue
on that theme of education, in 1831 Alexis de Toqueville came to study
America. The Europeans were fascinated. How could a fledgling Nation,
barely 50 years old already be competing with them on virtually every
level. This was impossible. De Toqueville was going to sort it out and
he looked at our government and he was duly impressed by the three
branches of government - four now because now we have special interest
groups, but it was only three back in those days. He said, WOW, this is
really something, but then he said, but let me look at their educational
system and he was blown away. See, anybody who had finished the second
grade was completely literate. He could find a mountain man on the
outskirts of society who could read the newspaper and have a political
discussion, could tell him how the government worked.
If
you really want to be impressed, take a look at the chapter on
education in my latest book, America the Beautiful, which I wrote with
my wife - it came out last year, and in that education chapter you will
see questions extracted from a sixth grade exit exam from the 1800′s - a
test you had to pass to get your sixth grade certificate. I doubt most
college graduates today could pass that test. We have dumbed things down
to that level and the reason that is so dangerous is because the people
who founded this Nation said that our system of government was designed
for a well-informed and educated populace, and when they become less
informed, they become vulnerable. Think about that. That is why
education is so vitally important.
Now some
people say, ahhh, you're over blowing it, things aren't that bad, and
you're a doctor, a neurosurgeon. Why are you concerned about these
things? Got news for you. FIVE doctors signed the Declaration of
Independence. Doctors were involved in the framing of the Constitution,
the Bill of Rights, in a whole bunch of things. It's only been since
recent decades that we've extracted ourselves, which I think is a big
mistake.
We need doctors, we needs
scientists, engineers. We need all those people involved in government,
not just lawyers...I don't have anything against lawyers, but you know,
here's the thing about lawyers...I'm sorry, but I got to be
truthful...got to be truthful - what do lawyers learn in law school? To
win, by hook or by crook. You gotta win, so you got all these Democrat
lawyers, and you got all these Republican lawyers and their sides want
to win. We need to get rid of that. What we need to start thinking about
is, how do we solve problems?
Now, before I
get shot, let me finish. I don't like to bring up problems without
coming up with solutions. My wife and I started the Carson Scholars Fund
16 years ago after we heard about an international survey looking at
the ability of eight graders in 22 countries to solve math and science
problems, and we came out No. 21 out of 22. We only barely beat out
Number 22 - very concerning.
We went to
these schools and we'd see all these trophies: State Basketball, State
Wrestling, this, that and the other. The Quarterback was the Big Man on
Campus. What about the intellectual Superstar? What did they get? A
National Honor Society pin? A pat on the head, there, there little Nerd?
Nobody cared about them. And is it any wonder that sometimes the smart
kids try to hide? They don't want anybody to know they are smart? This
is not helping us or our Nation, so we started giving out scholarships
from all backgrounds for superior academic performance and demonstration
of humanitarian qualities. Unless you cared about other people, it
didn't matter how smart you were. We've got plenty of people like that.
We don't need smart people who don't care about other people.
We
would give them money. The money would go into a Trust. They would get
interest on it. When they would go to college they would get the money,
but also the school gets a trophy, every bit as impressive as a sports
trophy - right out there with the others. They get a medal. They get to
go t a banquet. We try to put them on a pedestal as impressive as we do
the All-State athletes. I have nothing against athletics or
entertainment. I'm from Baltimore. The Ravens won. This is great - okay.
But, but - what will maintain our position in the world? The ability to
shoot a 25 foot jump shot or the ability to solve a quadratic equation?
We need to put the things into proper perspective.
Many
teachers have told us that when we put a Carson Scholar in their
classroom, the GPA of the whole classroom goes up over the next year.
It's been very gratifying. We started 16 years ago with 25 scholarships
in Maryland, now we've given out more than 5,000 and we are in all 50
states, but we've also put in Reading Rooms. These are fascinating
places that no little kid could possibly pass up. And uh, they get
points for the amount of time they spend reading, and the number of
books they read. They can trade the points for prizes. In the beginning
they do it for the prizes, but it doesn't take long before their
academic performance begins to improve.
And we
particularly target Title One schools where the kids come from homes
with no books and they go to schools with no libraries. Those are the
ones who drop out. We need to truncate that process early on because we
can't afford to waste any of those young people. You know, for every one
of those people we keep from going down that path - that path of
self-destruction and mediocrity, that's one less person you have to
protect yourself and your family from. One less person you have to pay
for in the penal or welfare system. One more taxpaying productive member
of society who may invent a new energy source or come up with a cure
for cancer. They are all important to us and we need every single one of
them it makes a difference. And when you go home tonight read about it,
carsonscholars, carsonscholars.org
Why
is it so important that we educate our people? Because we don't want to
go down the pathway as so many pinnacle nations that have preceded us. I
think particularly about ancient Rome. Very powerful. Nobody could even
challenge them militarily, but what happened to them? They destroyed
themselves from within. Moral decay, fiscal irresponsibility. They
destroyed themselves. If you don't think that can happen to America, you
get out your books and you start reading, but you know, we can fix it.
Why
can we fix it because we're smart. We have some of the most
intellectually gifted people leading our Nation. All we need to do is
remember what our real responsibilities are so that we can solve the
problems. I think about these problems all the time, and my role, you
know, model was Jesus. He used parables to help people understand
things. And one of our big problems right now, and like I said, I'm not
politically correct, so I'm sorry, but you know - our deficit is a big
problem. Think about it. And our National Debt - $16.5 Trillion dollars -
you think that's not a lot of money? I'll tell you what! Count one
number per second, which you can't even do because once you get to a
thousand it will take you longer than a second, but...one number per
second. You know how long it would take you to count to 16 Trillion?
507,000 years - more than a half a million years to get there. We have
to deal with this.
Here's a parable: A family
falls on hard times. Dad loses his job or is demoted to part time work.
He has 5 children. He comes to the 5 children, he says we're going to
have to reduce your allowance. Well, they're not happy about it but - he
says, except for John and Susan. They're, they're special. They get to
keep their allowance. In fact, we'll give them more. How do you think
that's going to go down? Not too well. Same thing happens. Enough said.
What
about our taxation system? So complex there is no one who can possibly
comply with every jot and tittle of our tax system. If I wanted to get
you, I could get you on a tax issue. That doesn't make any sense. What
we need to do is come up with something that is simple.
When
I pick up my Bible, you know what I see? I see the fairest individual
in the Universe, God, and he's given us a system. It's called tithe. Now
we don't necessarily have to do it 10% but it's principle. He didn't
say, if your crops fail, don't give me any tithes. He didn't say, if you
have a bumper crop, give me triple tithes. So there must be something
inherently fair about proportionality. You make $10 Billion dollars you
put in a Billion. You make $10 you put in $1 - of course, you gotta get
rid of the loopholes, but now now some people say, that's not fair
because it doesn't hurt the guy who made $10 Billion dollars as much as
the guy who made $10. Where does it say you have to hurt the guy. He's
just put in a billion in the pot. We don't need to hurt him.
It's
that kind of thinking - it's that kind of thinking that has resulted in
602 banks in the Cayman Islands. That money needs to be back here,
building our infrastructure and creating jobs - and we're smart enough -
we're smart enough to figure out how to do that.
We've
already started down the path to solving one of the other big problems,
health care. We need to have good health care for everybody. It's the
most important thing that a person can have. Money means nothing, titles
mean nothing when you don't have your health, but we've got to figure
out efficient ways to do it. We spend a lot of money on health care,
twice as much per capita as anybody in else in the world, and yet not
very efficient. What can we do?
Here's
my solution. When a person is born, give him a birth certificate, an
electronic medical record and a health savings account [HSA], to which
money can be contributed, pre-tax from the time you are born, to the
time you die. When you die, you can pass it on to your family members so
that when you're 85 years old and you've got 6 diseases, you're not
trying to spend up everything. You're happy to pass it on and nobody is
talking about death panels. That's number one. Also -
For
the people who are indigent, who don't have any money, we can make
contributions to their HSA each month because we already have this huge
pot of money instead of sending it to bureaucracy - let's put it into
HSAs. Now they have some control over their own health care and what do
you think they're going to do? They're going to learn very quickly how
to be responsible. When Mr. Jones gets that diabetic foot ulcer, he's
not going to the Emergency Room and blowing a big chunk of it. He's
going to go to the Clinic. He learns that very quickly - gets the same
treatment. In the Emergency Room they send him out. In the Clinic they
say, now let's get your diabetes under control so that you're not back
here in three weeks with another problem. That's how we begin to solve
these kinds of problems. It's much more complex than that, and I don't
have time to go into it all, but we can do all these things because we
are smart people.
And let me begin to close
here - another parable: Sea Captain, and he's out on the sea near the
area where the Titanic went down. And they look ahead and there's a
bright light right there - another ship he figures. He tells
his signaler to signal that ship: deviate 10 degrees to the South. Back
comes the message, no you deviate 10 degrees to the North. Well, he's a
little bit incensed you know. He says, send a message, this is Captain
Johnson, deviate 10 degrees to the South. Back comes the message, this
is Ensign 4th Class Reilly. Deviate 10 degrees to the North. Now Captain
Johnson is really upset. He says send him a message, this is a Naval
Destroyer. Back comes the message, this is a Lighthouse. Enough said.
Now,
what about the symbol of our Nation? The Eagle. The Bald Eagle. It's
an interesting story how we chose that but a lot of people think we call
it the bald eagle because it looks like it has a bald head. That's not
the reason It comes from the Old English word Piebald, which means
crowned with white. And we just shortened it to bald. Now, use that the
next time you see somebody who thinks they know everything. You'll get
'em on that one.
But, why is that eagle able to fly, high, forward? Because it has two wings: a left wing and a right wing. Enough said.
And
I wanna close with this story: two hundred years ago this Nation was
involved in a war, the war of 1812. The British, who are now our good
friends thought that we were young whippersnappers. It was time for us
to become a colony again. They were winning that war and marching up the
Eastern Seaboard, destroying city after city, destroying Washington
D.C., burned down the White House. Next stop Baltimore. As they came
into the Chesapeake Bay, there were armadas of war ships as far as the
eye could see. It was looking grim. Fort. McHenry standing right there.
General Armisted, who was in charge of Fort. McHenry, had a large
American flag commissioned to fly in front of the Fort. The Admiral in
charge of the British Fleet was offended, said take that flag down. You
have until dusk to take that Flag down. If you don't take it down, we
will reduce you to ashes.
There was a young
amateur poet on board by the name of Francis Scott Key, sent by
President Madison to try to obtain the release of an American physician
who was being held captive. He overheard the British plans. They were
not going to let him off the ship. He mourned. As dusk approached he
mourned for his fledgling young Nation, and as the sun fell, the
bombardment started. Bombs bursting in air. Missiles, so much debris He
strained, trying to see, was the flag still there? Couldn't see a
thing. All night long it continued. At the crack of dawn he ran out to
the banister He looked straining his eyes all he could only see dust
and debris.
Then there was a clearing and
he beheld the most beautiful sight he had ever seen - the torn and
tattered Stars and Stripes still waving. And many historians say that
was the turning point in the war of 1812. We went on to win that war and
to retain our freedom and if you had gone onto the grounds of Fort.
McHenry that day, you would have seen at the base of that flag, the
bodies of soldiers who took turns. Propping up that flag, they would not
let that flag go down because they believed in what that flag
symbolized. And what did it symbolize? One Nation, under God, [applause]
indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. God Bless.
