I THINK … I think a minor overreaction by a person should not cause a major overreaction by government.

Francis Hajosy (pictured left) is a 54-year-old high school teacher in Stafford, Connecticut. He threatened an unruly female student with taking her over his knee for an old fashion spanking for refusing to take her feet of the desk and sit properly. She raised the ante by taking a can of spray glue and defiantly shooting it to the air. When he grabbed her, she starting kicking at him. There was a bit of a scuffle, but Hajosy apparently managed to get her over his knee at least long enough to apply three or four slaps on her butt.

I think we could all agree that his handling of the situation was a bit extreme … things escalated. Minimally, he needed to be sent to the principal’s office, as they say. Assuming that this was an exceptional situation in an otherwise exemplary teaching career, I see this as something to be handled by school administrators, with apologies and punishment all around.

There are still a lot of well educated people alive today who can remember corporal punishment as a routine part of school discipline – especially in the Catholic school system I attended. The criminalization of academic corporal punishment and the decline of quality education are pretty much similar chronological charts. I am not sure that this is an unrelated coincidence. Lack of classroom discipline is a major factor in failed educational systems. However, I will leave that argument for others.

Instead of some administrative discipline, Hajosy was arrested and charged with second-degree breach of the peace (whatever in Hell that is) and fourth-degree sexual assault. A judge issued a protective order against Hajosy. He was suspended from his job indefinitely. Out on $5000 bond, he faces years in jail and a life of a registered sex offender – not to mention thousands of dollars in legal fees from criminal charges and a possible civil suit. Right or wrong, win or lose, this case can screw up his life for years to come.

Frankly, I don’t see sexual motivation in his actions. This is just another example of the neo-puritanical component of political correctness that runs in conflict with the flagrantly liberalized sexual mores of our times. Without further evidence, his motivation seemed to be punishment, and his flaw was an anger that blew away his common sense and good judgment at the moment. Happens to us all, at times.

I know all the anal retentive, politically correct libs are going to be outraged over my opinion on this matter. They will produce a litany of “what ifs.” They will wax on about some imaginary psychological scar that will doom this young lady to a life of therapy. They will elevate her humiliation to the level of trauma when, in fact, punishment and humiliation are Siamese twins. You cannot have one without the other. The strident left-wing feminists will call Hajosy’s actions a form of rape (which is a cruel disservice to anyone who really has been raped), and declare both Hajosy and me as insensitive male pigs.

Let me stress, I am not endorsing his actions, but think the punishment should fit the crime – or in my opinion the non-crime, in this case.

What we really have here is another small example of an overreaching government. Every problem in our lawyer-ruled society must be handled by the lawyer-run legislative, juridical or enforcement communities. I wonder if we will close the loop with a civil suit filed by parents against Hajosy, the school, the local board of education and whoever else some opportunistic attorney wishes to put on the list -- and on behalf of parents who are more motivated by money than justice.

With a sex component, Hajosy may well be placed into some government sex counseling program – which is intended to bring his thinking around to what he most likely already knows and embraces. These thought adjustment programs scare me. While seeming innocent enough at first glance, they smack of the thought control agencies depicted in futuristic sci-fi movies and novels and, for real, in the old Cold War Communist regimes in Russia and China.

When we are not allowed to settle difference between ourselves, or with minimal civic involvement, we are succumbing, inch by inch, to the oppression of a police state. One of the common retorts of yore was, “don’t make a federal case out of it.” In other words, don’t make it more than it is. Today, we seem to see government involvement as the first and only option.

As a parent, what would I do if this had happened to my daughter? First, I would want to know what behavior on her part caused the confrontation in the first place. I would want to know why she was unruly, disobedient and disruptive. I would talk to Hajosy and the principal in private to have them explain the behavior. I would demand an apology, BUT without absolving my daughter’s culpability.

In other words, I would have both Hajosy and my daughter sitting in the corner with the proverbial dunce cap. My fear is that Hajosy will be made a perverted criminal, and the girl’s bad behavior is not dealt with. I can almost see the smug look on her face. That would not be a good outcome for anyone.