Of Those Who Can't Failing to Teach

A family asked me yesterday for a book that would teach their son–for homework that night I learned–the similarities between the branches of government. "Branches" being a word I supplied; they went with "sections" and "parts."

Keep in mind, they also did not understand when I explained thrice that there was nothing in the store and it would have to be ordered, taking longer than 20 minutes to arrive.

The branches are, for those who don't remember 7th grade history class, the Legislative branch (Congress), the Executive branch (the President), and the Judicial branch (the courts). When these two wunderelterns attempted to list them, mom got "Parliamentary" and "Prime Ministreal," which isn't even a word. Dad fared no better with "Communist" in place of Congress and "President," which is actually more horrifying, because in between his wife's attempt and his own, I said them all. To them. They were there. And still, neither one of them even remotely got "Judiciary." I would have taken any variation on "courts." Nothin'.

God help that poor child. If his parents teach him that "Communist" is a branch of American government, we're going to have a little Young Republican on our hands fairly quickly.