I believe that the answer lies in an unwillingness to punish hostile behavior in our Western society. If someone is uncivil at the head of a queue for a service or sales counter, the person behind the counter rarely refuses to deal with the offender, preferring the sale to the societal correction. Money wins.

Other societies (think the Japanese, for instance) are FAR more willing to ostracize an obnoxious person (or child, which is where it all starts) than ours. Tolerance, in the guise of 'freedom', only encourages the antisocial.

The fact that large US corporations are willing to hire poorly educated (has anyone tried to read a young person's scribble, lately?), poorly mannered slacker youth shows they have little choice.....

But, I guess if you want to wage a war AND give away huge tax cuts and corporate welfare, you are going to have to make cuts SOMEWHERE. So what if our kids get a substandard education? Our corporations would rather outsource their future jobs to foreign countries anyway, pay less wages anyway AND get a better educated worker to boot.

Who cares if our children are ill-mannered and ignorant? At least we don't get a tax hike!