OMG, these animals deserve to be expelled and ridiculed just like they did her. How did their parents raise them! That poor woman!

I wish I could listen to the show live, so I could call in from time to time, but alas, my schedule relegates me to the podcast. However, I had to respond to this video and the topic of bullying. If Dave wants to read this on the show, great. At the very least, I hope it leads to some discussion.

I live in Des Moines, Iowa, where a local columnist today declared 2012 The Year of the Bully as a result of this video following on the heels of all other bullying news that's been released, including the suicides of at least two gay teens, including one here in Des Moines, who were relentlessly bullied in the days leading up to their suicides. Those deaths came on the heels of the release of the documentary Bully. All of these events focus on the actions of the bullies. My question is: Why isn't there any focus on the actions of the parents of the bullies?

In my experience and my opinion, bullying starts at home. A kid doesn't just wake up one day and say, "I'm going to taunt and torment some kid at school, or some grandmother on a bus." I am the father of a 13-year-old boy, and I am fairly certain he will never bully a child or an adult. Why, because I've been an involved parent. I know who he texts. I know who he communicates with -- and what he says and does -- on Facebook. I meet and get to know his friends -- and their parents. I care about my son, and I invest the time to care for him. Today, too many parents don't do that. Children have become an inconvenience, not an investment. And it's sad.

I'll close with one small -- and admittedly isolated -- example, but I don't think it's uncommon. Four years ago, my son was being bullied by the neighborhood thug. A kid three years older than my son, and much larger. The bully decided to steal my son's basketball, which my son, who just happened to be taking martial arts lesson, decided was the final straw. He launched a roundhouse kick to the bully's head that bloodied his nose. My son came running home, crying, telling me he was sorry. A few minutes later, the bully's father -- a man covered in tattoos and piercings -- knocked at my door. I could tell when I opened the door he was ready to start a fight, until he saw a 6'7", 400-lb. behemoth standing in front of him. Instead, he immediately assumed that my son must be big too, and beat up his son. When my small boy came to the door, the man stared at him, and then immediately turned around and starting cussing out his own son for letting "a little run" beat him up. I've never felt worse for a child, and told the man what I thought of him and his parenting. He cussed me out and left. I called the police. There was nothing they could do, they said, but they knew how I felt. The man and his moved out a few weeks later when they were evicted from their house because the rent wasn't being paid.

My point is some of these bullies are likely victims themselves. But we don't know that because no one is asking their parents how their kids turned out this way.