Greatest Generation on Parenting

My goodness! Just a while at the pool, and Grampy and I get into an excellent conversation about gay marriage that turned into an intriguing conversation about parenting. We explored the ins and outs of good and bad parenting, mostly sharing exaples of bad parenting. He says he could come up with 10 good rules for parents. Personally I would love a few guidelines to keep to! His first two? 1. Don't ever threaten to do something you won't follow through on. That applies to both positive promises and punitive threats. 2. Be consistent and follow through on the punishments you set. Use the "If you do that one more time, then ___insert conesequence___," and be sure to actually follow through with the consequence. 3. A little smack on the bottom or swat to the hand is very useful to getting a quick stern message across to a child. This is especially useful when the child is doing something that could harm him or herself (such as reaching up to a hot stove). He understands that this is not widely accepted and that Dr. Spock changed the parenting in the US in the 70's so that nowadays parents rarely speak of spanking and certainly do not use spanking in public. These are his first three suggestions. It is as-of-yet unclear if he will come up with the next seven.