Download 2007_hib_45641.pdf was introduced last week by Rep. Steil along with a 21 additional sponsors! That's right 21 additional sponsors! Those who have a vested interest in seeing children ripped apart from a loving and fit parent will be against this bill.
Excellent commentary on Michigan House Bill 4564: HB 4564
Michigan Bill Offers Solution to Family Ills HB 4564
James Semerad and Dr. Stephen Baskerville HB 4564
"We have too many children in poverty in this country," says Barack Obama. Hillary Clinton recently kicked off her own campaign by surrounding herself with her trademark visual: children. Nancy Pelosi took over the House Speakership also surrounded with children, and Barbara Boxer recently got into the act. Perhaps most provocative is a California assemblywoman’s recent proposal to criminalize spanking. HB 4564
What "children" are for the Democrats, "the family" is for Republicans. Senator Sam Brownback has perhaps the foremost claim to be the "family values" candidate. But so far Brownback’s idea of preserving the family appears limited to opposing same-sex marriage. Hardly a stance to set him apart from the Republican herd. Michigan House Bill 4564
There is nothing new about politicians kissing babies. But politicizing children is a newer development. Michigan House Bill 4564
Children and families have figured prominently in every election since the early 1990s. There is good reason for this; the decline of the family and the poverty of children continue unabated. The National Center for Health Statistics recently reported that, despite ten years of welfare reform, out-of-wedlock births are at a record high. A recent survey, The Changing Shape of the American Family, found that "Nearly nine in ten (88%) of U.S. adults say divorce has a negative impact on maintaining a stable American family life." (By contrast, only 53% feel that way about same-sex couples.) And a study just released by UNICEF ranked the top 21 wealthiest countries in the world on their children’s well being. The United States received the second worst ranking (20 out of 21), citing divorce and the number of children being raised in single-parent households as major risk factors.
While all candidates are willing to mouth platitudes that secure their base, none has shown the courage to tackle the difficult, perennial ills that afflict the family and children, like divorce and fatherlessness.
Some 24 million children in the United States now live without one of their biological parents. Virtually every social pathology of our time – from violent crime to substance abuse to truancy – correlates more strongly to fatherless homes than to any other single factor, surpassing poverty and race. According to the National Fatherhood Initiative, "Children who live absent their biological fathers are, on average, at least two to three times more likely to be poor, to use drugs, to experience educational, health, emotional, and behavioral problems, to be victims of child abuse, and to engage in criminal behavior than those who live with their married, biological (or adoptive) parents."
Yet the responses by both the Clinton and Bush administrations to this perennial dilemma have been weak. Questionable programs to "promote fatherhood" and "healthy marriage" have left both parties open to the charge of "throwing money at the problem."
A simpler and less costly alternative here in Michigan and other states offers a solution to this seemingly intractable problem. The bill costs taxpayers nothing and in fact will save billions that governments now spend on these social ills. HB 4564, introduced by Rep. Steil will provide for shared parenting in the event of divorce or parental separation. This would allow children to have the love and care of both parents in their lives, regardless of their marital status.
The ugly custody battles that now fill the newspapers and talk shows would become largely a thing of the past with a presumption of equal time between both parents. It is the adversarial litigation approach, with its winner-take-all mentality of resolving family disputes, that inflames the conflict and turns children into weapons. A rebuttal presumption of shared parenting will de-escalate the conflict and result in a win-win situation not only for parents but for children and society and taxpayers as well.
The vast majority of Americans favor such an approach. In Massachusetts, 85 percent of voters approved a non-binding shared parenting referendum in 2004. In the last election, North Dakota voters narrowly missed enacting a binding referendum only because of massive spending by bar associations, who profit from our belligerent, out-of-control divorce system. HB 4564
At a time when spending programs by both Republicans and Democrats have failed to reverse this destructive trend, a common-sense measure, supported by both parties and the people of Michigan and America, should at least be allowed a full debate and a vote by the people’s representatives.
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