I should have known better.

It's not like I'm unaware that Nickelodeon, the cable kid's network, is run by the typical media cabal of leftist social engineers. You don't need to watch it for very long to see how it indoctrinates kids to Hillary's global village agenda items.

Check it out: They've got Linda Ellerbee talking to kids about gun control; child stars from staple shows like Amanda, All That and Keenan and Kel cajoling kids to get out there and do community volunteer work for politically correct causes; and even a chilling mirror of our current political process called Kids Pick the President. Two of their frequent adult role model guests are Rosie O'Donnell, who thinks if you're not her bodyguard and have a gun you should be arrested, and rap artist Coolio, who had a gun and was...ummm...arrested.

But I have to confess, I like some of their cartoons. For instance, I think The Angry Beavers is one of the funniest, most cleverly written shows in recent memory, cartoon or otherwise. And a favorite with my kids, and kids everywhere judging by its successful transition into two feature films, is Rugrats.

The basic premise of this show revolves around the Walter Mitty-like exploits of the toddler Tommy Pickles and his circle of pals, including the neurotic Chuckie, the omnivorous fraternal twins Phil and Lil, and the series heavy, Tommy's diabolical older cousin Angelica. Supervised by possibly the most inept parents on the planet, the story line and humor generally are built around infant body functions and the kids wandering totally outside the sphere of adult control in public places.

And while, thank goodness, Tommy's negligent parents, Stu and Deedee, don't have a swimming pool, it's a miracle that Baby Dill hasn't been found face down in one of those 5-gallon buckets that kill more infants each year than handguns. It's also no wonder that the liberal mentality that produces such programs doesn't trust adults to behave responsibly, and demands laws mandating stupid responsibility substitutes like trigger locks and "smart" guns.

Still, its "progressive" origins and bent notwithstanding, Rugrats manages at times to amuse and engage, and it strikes a chord with my kids. So I figured, as long as we confine their television viewing to selected programs and limited hours each week, their mother and I can keep them grounded well enough to where the experience should be, at worst, a trivial diversion, certainly nothing that is harmful.

Stupid me.

Y'see, while we can familiarize ourselves with the content of the programs the kids watch to the point where we're comfortable letting them view certain ones, we have absolutely no control over the commercial messages that fill the frequent gaps between shows and their segments.

I first got burned on this years ago, while letting my older boy, then three, watch a cloying Australian series called Bananas in Pajamas. Perfectly geared toward preschoolers, the Bananas were every bit as saccharine as Teletubbies or Barney, guaranteeing a rapt child and a teeth-on-edge adult who would prefer to hear nails on a chalkboard than another second of syrupy drivel. So it took me a second or two to focus, register disbelief, and then anger when I saw the station air a commercial for the R-rated film Jade, a dark exploration of sadomasochistic sex. This was followed with a trailer for The Scarlet Letter, replete with a close up of Demi Moore's anything but Puritanical face registering a look of orgasmic bliss. The anger turned to fury, when the next spot, a local production for a new wave clothing outlet, showed a raw-boned, mini-skirted blonde remove her wig to reveal that she was a bald, cross-dressing man. I called the cable company, blistered the rep on the other end of the line, and threatened to take a tape of the outrage to the next city council meeting unless they began to correlate appropriateness of their ads with the content of their programming.

It must have had some effect; after that, Banana sponsors appeared tame and under control. But flash forward to the present, and the aforementioned Rugrats, and once more we have some ad fare that I consider to be totally inappropriate, and this time, it has the fingerprints of the U.S. Government all over it.

Essentially, these are "war on drugs" propaganda pieces, explaining that a sixth-grader thinks a pipe is a metal cylinder and a roach is an insect, while a seventh-grader knows them to be marijuana delivery systems. Well, I'm sorry, and maybe with government schools there is now a preponderance of junior high school kids watching Rugrats, but my 5 and 9-year-olds don't know anything about getting high, and excuse me if I decide that this is not the right stage in their lives to introduce them to the concept.

Thanks a lot, government. If my kids weren't thinking about drugs before your intervention, they are now. It's not like there are no programs available with demographics mostly comprised of young teenagers. It's not like you could place your stupid PSAs (public service announcements) in a suitable venue, assuming, of course, you can point to the enumerated power in the Constitution authorizing your lawful involvement in this business in the first place.

But then, isn't this typical for much of what our government does, and how they so often achieve the exact opposite outcome from their stated purpose? They protect the forest by burning down half of New Mexico. They safeguard national security by giving China multiple warhead guidance technology. They fight inflation by printing more money and then raising its cost. They promote world peace by bombing other countries. They champion rule of law by ignoring it, foster religious freedom by burning churches, and fight lawlessness by disarming only those citizens who don't commit crimes.

Still, in a way, we should take heart that they are so ineffectual at accomplishing their goals. Maybe we've been taking the wrong tack in resisting them. Maybe instead we ought to be lobbying for more gun control, more privacy invasions, and ever more intrusive regulations and restrictions on our lives, liberty and happiness. Maybe, if left to their own devices, these corrupt, tyrannical boobs will, through their own incompetence, at last secure the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity.

Epilog:

It's half-time on Rugrats. A spot appears for Barbie, another for Super Soakers, those popular, socially acceptable squirt gun assault weapons. Then a locally-produced commercial comes on, advertising an upcoming performance of The Los Angeles Gay Men's Choir.

"Mo-om," calls the five-year-old, "what's a gay man?"

"Stupid!" bellows his belligerent and worldly nine-year-old brother, "It means you like to kiss girls."

"Ewww!" shrieks the five-year-old, repulsed. "Dad kisses Mom. Dad's gay!"

That does it. I'm pulling the cable.