For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for July 19, 2015

She had them at “no allowance next week” all right. (I thought Michael was just making funny faces at himself and Elizabeth accused him of the faces were made for her.)

Boy, is this strip timely. Too bad the current administration didn’t have a little more faith in them.

Right On!!

No, they are not reprints. She is retelling the story from the old strips, but the strips are new…especially the Sunday ones.

Lynn’s Notes:

My three-year-old granddaughter and her friends have learned the word “consequences.” When you do something bad…there are consequences. Recently, after a nice evening of playtime and stories, Laura decided she wasn’t going to go to sleep. She whined and cried and tried to wake her baby brother, with whom she shares a room. Her mother, Katie, said she would have to give up her favourite sleep toys if she didn’t end the strike. Laura whined and lost her teddy. She then lost her blankie, her pillow, her quilt and her sheets. The whining continued until she was lying on a stripped bed with nothing but her “pull-ups” to keep her warm. At this point she capitulated, stopped her bad behaviour, and decided to sleep.

Yes, they do. I apply the same system with my students. And if they argue, I’m happy to tell them that my classroom is NOT a democracy.

Side note for teachers: I also recently discovered the Hogwarts-house idea. They all play in groups for a prize and if someone messed up, the whole group gets points taken off. At age 11, that works quite nicely. I haven’t had to write a discipline slip in weeks :-)

I ran into a Cuban military officer in a bar in Mexico. He was convinced of the superiority of socialism, like just about everyone on the payroll of the Cuban government. We got to talking, and he said all the problems in Cuba were the fault of US sanctions. I replied that there are good reasons to lift the embargo, and he said “Indeed, we want Americans to visit Cuba”. I asked if Americans do go to Cuba and interact with Cubans, wouldn’t that mean the Cubans would be exposed to capitalism? He could not come up with a remark to that.

Too bad foreign nations/leaders aren’t preteen children….

Of course sanctions work! Look how quickly the Cubans capitulated!

Actually this technique worked great with my kids. Only had to do it once.

This strip isn’t being political

That is true, but it does apply to current situations.

agrestic: I saw that footage. They were chanting, “Death to no one, Long live life”, in English and Farsi both.

Wow…that’s a bit of a punishment overkill.

Don’t tell Iran or Cuba.

This has never ever helped on my older daughter. I could easily increase the withdrawal of allowance until she became 20 years and she would still not stop fighting.

The younger one it worked on, but she would be pissed of on me for at least two weeks.

Sanctions work. Naw, Obama knows best!