[Lục Tuyết Kỳ]

The Compass Carved by Love, Steadied Through Storms ✍️

If you asked me what the toughest job I’ve ever had is, I’d probably just smile and let you wonder. Was it stepping into cold, windowless rooms where the tension could cut glass and the people across the table weren’t exactly friendly? Was it grinding through 48-hour storms where the stakes were higher than the paychecks? Or maybe going head-to-head with opposing counsel in legal brawls where every word was a weapon, just so I could tell them to take a long walk off a short pier? I’ve worn more hats than I can count, none of them came with instructions, and every single one came with a fight. But the hardest, most demanding, and most rewarding job I’ve ever taken on is being a mom to my kids.

Raising them isn’t just about keeping them fed and under a safe roof. It’s about shaping them into decent, solid human beings who know right from wrong, who can stand on their own, and who don’t flinch when life throws the first punch—and who are ready for a world that’ll challenge them every step of the way.

So when people hear me say the DOE needs to go, and they clutch their pearls with, “You just want to take the country backward!”—I can’t help but roll my eyes and shake my head. No! I want to stop wasting time and taxpayer money on a system that’s been failing for decades.

The Department of Education has been around since 1979. Billions spent, and what do we have? Flat test scores, struggling rural and poor schools, and achievement gaps big enough to drive a truck through them. That’s not progress—it’s spinning tires in the mud.

The answer isn’t to keep pouring more money into a system that’s clearly broken. If something’s busted, you don’t patch it with duct tape and hope for the best. You gut it, tear it down, rebuild it, and put it back in the hands of people who actually know what they’re doing. Before the DOE, local communities and parents handled education—and yes, they supported kids with disabilities too. Helen Keller didn’t need D.C. to succeed and make history, and neither did generations of kids raised by people who knew them by their names, not just their file numbers.

Even President Reagan saw this mess in the ‘80s. He wanted to shut the whole thing down because he knew education belonged closer to home, not to some distant federal agency bloated with paperwork and power trips. Congress didn’t have the backbone to do it then, but fast forward, and President Trump just picked up where Reagan left off—he did what needed doing, long overdue. Finally moving education back to where it belongs: parents, communities, and states.

Let’s cut the nonsense and stop pretending the folks sitting behind desks in D.C. know your kids better than you do. They don’t. The idea that parents and local schools need a federal agency to hold their hand is downright insulting. Families, teachers, and local leaders know what’s best for their kids. They don’t need to ask D.C. for permission to do what’s right.

And the school choice scare tactics? Get over it. In Florida, Arizona, and other states, it’s working-class and minority families using vouchers to get their kids out of dead-end schools—not just the rich.

Conservatives aren’t ignoring kids with disabilities. We’re just done trusting a bloated system that’s been failing them for decades. We believe in fixing it where it matters—with local control, real accountability, and giving families the power to choose what’s best for their kids.

And as a mom, I’ll be damned if I let some politician in Washington dictate how I raise or educate my children—or worse, funnel their agendas into my home under the guise of “education.” My kids aren’t theirs to shape, they are mine.

As President Reagan said, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: ‘I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.’”

Motherhood didn’t come with a manual, but it came with instincts, grit, and a mission. And no government office will ever do my job for me. 🤨

Lanney - March, 2025







** Hoa mận hoa đào nở đón người ở xa về trong một ngày nắng trong xanh mát mẻ. 😆😂