Hillary: You know what will stop bullying? $500 million in federal spending!

It has to be one of the greatest conceits of the political class in recent years that you can stop bullying with "anti-bullying programs." If you have a teenage son or daughter, ask them about how these programs work. It usually involves a schoolwide assembly that happens once or twice a year. When my son was in public school they called it "Be Nice." I'm serious. All the kids who already were nice would take a well-meaning and earnest role in the whole thing, while the bullies stood around watching for someone whose face they could slam into a locker. You don't stop bullying with education programs of whatever else you try. Kids don't bully because it was never explained to them how wrong it is. They bully because they don't care, and because they have anger and insecurity issues. And because what should happen to them when they're caught - they're kicked out of school for good - never will happen and they know it. The way to stop a bully is to kick his #. I always told my son when he would be in big trouble if he ever started a fight, but if someone ever tried to bully him and he let the guy have it, I didn't care what the school said, I would back him up 100 percent. Fortunately it never happened, but he felt confident knowing he could stand up for himself if he needed to.

Anyway, you know what's really not going to stop bullying? Half a billion dollars in federal spending, what's what. But predictably, that's the very thing Hillary wants us to think we need. And oh, by the way: Any bullying that goes on in America is now the fault of Donald Trump:

Even under the best case scenario, the $500 million, 10-year program that Mrs. Clinton is proposing would not kick in until the 2016 election is long over. But the campaign was keen to use the announcement as a way to highlight comments from Republican presidential rival Donald Trump that many find offensive. The campaign also cited reports from some educators of a spike in bullying of children that appears tied to his comments about immigrants and others. “My really strong belief is that Donald Trump has brought hate back,” former Democratic Rep. Tony Coelho, who chaired a presidential panel on employment for people with disabilities, said on the campaign’s conference call. The proposed program would provide federal matching dollars to states that develop comprehensive anti-bullying laws or policies. States would get $4 for every $1 they spend on the programs, which could include money for guidance counselors and social workers in schools, teacher training on how to deal with bullying or suicide-prevention and mental health programs in high schools. Campaign officials said the new spending would be paid for by tax increases that Mrs. Clinton has already proposed.

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That Tony Coelho quote is really something. All hate had been eradicated from America - which will come as news to the left-wingers who were constantly yammering on about "hate crimes" and "hate groups" and whatever else - but Donald Trump brought it back all by himself. Now all the bullying that goes on everywhere is because Donald Trump "brought back hate." The things politicians say boggle the mind at times. Now I'm not saying there's nothing more schools could do, or do better, in response to bullying. But it doesn't start with guidance or money from the federal government, and the last person we need developing any sort of "anti-bullying" policy is the person who calls half the country a "basket of deplorables." For the most part, schools need to let go of denial and admit that kids are being bullied and crack down on those who are doing it. I have served on a school board and it does get complicated to expel a kid because of rights and hearings and so forth. But most of the time it really just comes down to the will of the decision-makers to take a real stand against what's wrong. School officials tend not to have the stomach for that because they understandably don't want to give up on kids. But if kids understand that one incident of bullying means you're out, they'll think a lot harder about whether to actually act on their angry impulses. As it stands right now, most know they will pay little or no price, no matter how many "Be Nice" assemblies the school has. And more money from Hillary to pay for this nonsense, paid for with tax increases, is not going to help. If anything, it will give schools the opportunity to claim they're doing something when they're really not.