Come for the Politics, Stay for the Pathologies



Thursday, December 18, 2008

SKEPTICISM: ALL THAT’S RIGHT WITH THE WORLD

It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so.”

Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please.” – Mark Twain

Ah yes, Mr. Twain’s observations on the truth and consequences of various forms of intellectual inquiry.In two brief thoughts he demonstrates why we need to be skeptical.

And make no mistake: these are dangerous times to be intellectually lazy, which is what foregoing skeptical evaluation  is. If you rely on the media, or the intelligentsia, to do the heavy lifting to rut out the truth you’re  delusional as well as lazy. If we allow half-truths and outright lies to dictate public policy and establish new law the world your children and grandchildren inhabit will suffer a severe reduction in freedom and liberty as well as the diminished prosperity that accompanies them.

Read no further if you believe that the United States doesn’t deserve it’s global preeminence; that we should equalize the status of all nations not by raising the bar – nor even by leveling the playing field – but by putting speed bumps on America’s turf. For you people, I don’t believe any degree of healthy skepticism will be adequate. The rest of you might wish to listen up.

We’re surrounded by Chicken Littles: emotional alarmists who simplistically misinterpret data, either accidentally or on purpose. There are a few true Cassandras out there who warn us of real, unanswered threats but their warnings fall on deaf ears. Unless it’s concern voiced by all the 24/7 broadcasts ex-politicians looking for a new multi-million gig and the enlightened Hollywood elite, the majority doesn’t pay attention.

History is littered with Chicken Littles, still clucking about the sky falling. Let it be noted however that the Trojans were actually destroyed by Greeks bearing gifts, as Cassandra warned. Learning to differentiate between real and imagined threats is worth the price of being accused of being a skeptic.

Skeptics are the pariahs of the 21st century: unwilling to quietly sign on to all the prevailing beliefs and theories so carefully thought out by the A-list illuminati. They’ve come to be lumped together with the old-school pariahs – the cynics – who indeed took a somewhat grim (although not altogether unfounded) view of human nature. It’s a bum wrap: skepticism is simply a method of obtaining knowledge through systematic doubt and continual testing. In short, rational thinking – a habit, along with scientific method, very much out of style, but still quite valuable.

We are barraged with drivel from mainstream print and broadcast media 24 hours a day. Aside from “breaking news” such as car chases, hostage takings, and school shootings much of what they would have us accept as gospel has been picked up from press releases (can you say “vested interests?”) or from “major studies” (can you say “other vested interests?”). Instead of presenting facts, news has become a portal for talking heads to present arguments based on “facts” selectively gathered by like-thinking activists. If you’re not skeptical, then you’re either not paying attention, you don’t care, or you are one of the “vested interests”.

To the degree people are skeptical at all, it’s likely to be regarding viewpoints that they are predisposed to distrust. If they are inclined to test their skepticism, they might go to the Internet. But with the incomprehensible amount of data available, it’s likely they will self-select the sites that support their predisposition. So at the end of the day they wind up knowing for sure  exactly what they knew for sure at the beginning of the day, only now they are confident that a preponderance of data supports their belief. It’s a bit like the age-worn anecdote about Pauline Kael’s reaction when told that Richard Nixon had won the 1972 election: “He couldn’t have!” she allegedly proclaimed, “I don’t know one person who voted for him!” I don’t even know if that story is true, but at the time Ms. Kael was the film critic for the New York Times. I believe that sufficiently explains the conceit.

If you hear something often enough, even if it’s from like-minded bobble heads, you are apt to believe it to be true. I know this is shocking, but people with agendas have tapped into the fact that people with overbooked lives and minimal intellectual curiosity turn to the MSM outlets daily to download their opinions on everything from political candidates to recycling. Special interest groups (included in this category are politicians, all government agencies and any organization - corporate or “non-profit” - that has a lobbyist) are keenly aware of this phenomenon. Many have found a special bond with the MSM, both right and left. Their like-mindedness on many issues such as politics and the environment, has created a symbiotic relationship in which the MSM vets stories, data, and studies provided by a labyrinth of government agencies, university studies and think tanks. People who do not sign on to the proscribed script (skeptics and cynics) are given, at best, token time to state their position before they are derided for their mean spiritedness and hit over the head with the “preponderance of evidence” argument. In the process, the repeated retelling of “facts”, myths and stories turn into immutable truths. Before you know it, the debate is over.

Don’t think so? Take a look at a few of the incontrovertible truths that have been established over the past few decades.. At one time you might have believed (or may still believe) that these were true:

1962: DDT is killing the bald eagle – our national symbol! With all due respect to the sainted Rachael Carson, this was never true, but the US ban led to a world-wide ban that has since resulted in a resurgence of malaria that has killed millions of people in underdeveloped countries. It has been debunked repeatedly, but if you ask anyone they will tell you that DDT kills birds by making their eggs fragile.

1969: Cyclamates are killing dieters! It wasn’t, the study that determined it to be a carcinogen was questioned by many scientists, including the one who headed up the study. and although it has remained in the European and Canadian food chain for the past 35 years, it’s still banned in the USA.

1976: Red dye # 2 is killing strawberry soda fans and those that favor a maraschino cherry in their Manhattan. It wasn’t, but numerous, more expensive, replacements were developed and you’ll never see# 2 again in the US, although it, too, is still in use in Canada and Europe.

1977: Saccharin is now killing the diet conscious, if they were lucky enough to have survived the ingestion of cyclamates in the 1969 calamity. It wasn’t killing anyone either, and although the FDA proposed a ban, Congress soon learned that you just don’t mess with women on diets. They settled for a printed warning, later withdrawn when no reputable study could demonstrate harm. But in order to save face, it remains classified by the EPA as a “hazardous substance. (update 1/11: Saccharine removed from EPA’s toxic chemical list)

1977: Hair dye is killing the prematurely gray. It wasn’t, to the vast relief of the baby boomers.

1978, Love Canal is killing its residents. It wasn’t, but that didn’t prevent the US government from establishing the Super Fund for toxic cleanup – $10 billion and growing annually – and spending $55 million to relocate 400 families and clean up the site. Apparently dioxins aren’t as deadly as we thought.

1979, Three Mile Island –nuclear energy - will kill us all ! It didn’t, but it did provide the plot for a great movie, and destroy the nuclear power industry in the US – the best source of non-polluting power yet discovered, if you’re worried about Co2 emissions – and who isn’t?

1981, Coffee is causing pancreatic cancer (It wasn’t, nor did it cause breast cancer, colon cancer, heart disease, or infertility as claimed at various times – and oh, by the way, now it’s good for you.

1989, Alar on apples is killing our children! “When are we going to stop killing our children!” Meryl Streep demanded from a Congressional panel that she testified before. Perhaps the point at which celebrities with a cause and very little brains were given a pulpit to spread their junk science beliefs via a very compliant media. Al Gore was paying attention. By the way, Alar was later proved to be harmless, but not until after it bankrupted many apple growers as fear of apples spread like malaria without DDT.

1989, Electric Blankets are causing cancer. They weren’t, unless perhaps they were powered by nuclear generated electricity.

1990, Amalgam (mercury) dental fillings are killing us. They weren’t, but maybe giving up that healthy apple-a-day habit wasn’t such a good idea for our teeth. (update 07/09: Mercury based fillings pose no real health risk)

1998, Vaccines are causing huge increases in Autism (They aren’t, even the CDC – reluctantly – admits: ”The weight of currently available scientific evidence does not support the hypothesis that vaccines cause autism.” While nobody knows what causes classic autism, research indicates genetics play a large role. The huge recent increase is at least partially due to the reclassification of children diagnosed with ADD and ADHD as falling within the “Autism spectrum disorder” – but that’s another story.

2002, Hormone Replacement Therapy is causing increased heart attack risks in women. It wasn’t, in fact it actually improved heart health in women taking hormones at the time of menopause. Whoops! Sorry about that ladies- hope none of you committed a felony while estrogen deprived.

Each of these health scares, and numerous others, has been debunked. Yes that’s right, debunked – by real science. Not the junk science that launched the original hysteria. Bad scientific methodology, such as force-feeding lab rodents huge doses of a suspected substance and using the results to extrapolate results “proving” the substance causes cancer in humans (ignoring the basic principle of toxicology that “the dose makes the poison”) led to many of the scares in the past.

Rather than eliminating bad science, the scientific community has allowed bad methodologies to proliferate. Now in order to induce mass panic you can dispense with scientific method all together; now all you need is a scary movie (e.g. An Inconvenient Truth) and a “concensus.”

But just because these health scares have been exposed as false, that doesn’t mean that the debate is over. Why? Several reasons, not the least of which is the MSM, along with vested special interest groups continue to propagate these debunked myths as though they were true. Again you may ask, “why?” I can’t say for sure. Maybe they’re ignorant. Or lazy. Maybe promoting a certain agenda gives them access to power or influence or money, or all of the above. Or maybe they’ve just heard it so often they know it to be true.

Scientific “research” no longer starts with a clean slate. Every study is funded and/or conducted by someone with a dog in the fight. I’m not saying that’s necessarily a non-starter, but you should be aware of who owns the dog, how the dog’s been trained and which ones are just there for a fight. Likewise, the fact that the majority of journalists are, by their own admission, liberals, doesn’t matter unless you are unaware that liberals have specific beliefs and positions. I’m sure there was a time when “objective journalist” was not an oxymoron, but you and I probably weren’t alive, so be wary (i.e. skeptical) of anything you see or hear. And on the outside chance that you were unaware of the left-leaning proclivity of most research scientists in major universities, be aware that they too may have predetermined notions. Don’t believe me? Good! You’re well on your way to becoming a skeptic. Do your own research.

And while we’re on the topic of research, where do you think all the money for major university funding comes from? Yes, that’s right, you and me – in the form of government research grants. And since research academics are pressured to maintain or increase the amount of grants flowing to their departments there is pressure to research things that someone is interested in funding. Those “some ones” would be members of Congress, who spend more time meeting with lobbyists than they do with either their constituents or on the floor of their respective houses. The best way to get legislators to fund a study is to: a) lobby for it with meaningful dollars and/or a large constituency of potential voters (anything teachers want qualifies on both fronts), or, b) research anything that will scare the crap out of millions of people, and be discussed all day on CNN (global warming so obviously fits this category it makes my teeth hurt, but there are hundreds of other examples as well).

If you want to know what’s driving the results of “major studies,” always, repeat, always follow the money (it’s usually your money anyway.) Who’s providing the funding (directly or indirectly), and what is their agenda? (Extra credit homework assignment: see if you can figure out who/what was behind the original release of data related to the use of hormones for menopause. Hint: Feminists don’t think Menopause is a disease. You shouldn’t have to take medication for a natural phenomenon.)

If you still don’t think “desirable outcomes” can be achieved in a “scientific” study, you, my friend, need to do some remedial work before you take Skepticism 101.

No matter how many embarrassing reversals, the mass health/environmental hysteria will continue unabated. It’s fueled by huge government funding programs, aided by research scientists using questionable methodologies (tune in later for more on epidemiological studies and their inherent errors), and abetted by the useful idiots looking for the next 24/7 news cycle: a combustible pile of hazardous waste if ever there was one.

As noted by H.L. Mencken early in the last century: “the whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety), by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.” Dead for over 50 years, this man has rightly earned the first posthumous Cassandra award.

UPDATE: You may find my American Thinker post: Postmodernism: A Unified Theory of All the Trouble in the World on Post-normal science interesting as well.

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Responsibility Free Zones

 

Have you driven through a parking lot lately: specifically the traffic lane rimming the perimeter? Then no doubt you’ve noticed the idiots (some with small children in tow) who wander into the lane without so much as a glance to see if there’s any oncoming traffic. Hello! You’re in a PARKING LOT there are likely to be CARS here; not all of which are going to be PARKED!

At first, I thought this was simply a variation on the urban game of chicken. In the original version, urban pedestrians in a state of perpetual purposefulness hurry across busy streets, consciously refusing to raise their heads or make eye contact with any driver in an approaching vehicle. Acknowledgment of the vehicle automatically makes the pedestrian responsible for his own safety. By willfully refusing to recognize the vehicle’s existence, he tosses responsibility to the driver, thus eliminating the need to slow his march to the other side of the street. It’s a game of chance that, oddly, usually works to the pedestrian’s advantage as drivers are always in a hurry too and certainly don’t have time to fill out accident reports. While I confess to having played this game – regularly – in my youth, I would strongly advise against it in the current milieu of multi-tasking. I know every second counts: you’re on your way to an important meeting (lunch), your assistant is calling to tell you who you’re having lunch with and why, and you’re texting your broker on the Blackberry to see if you can afford to have lunch. Unfortunately, so is the guy in the car. He might be distracted from noticing you, not noticing him.

But that’s not what I’m talking about. No, the behavior I’m referring to is not the skillful aversion of acknowledgment, but rather a complete unawareness of all other life forms. It’s played out daily in every Wal-Mart, Rite Aid and Costco parking lot in the country. While the practice might have roots in the hustle of the New York minute, in its march west it has completely evolved away from the gonzo game of calculated risk and control. Now it’s simply an act of complete and total self-absorption – a natural outgrowth of the self-esteem movement and a societal entitlement mentality. Throw in iPods and cell phones and every parking lot becomes an obstacle course for drivers.

But let’s return to the roots of this menace. New York pedestrians have always been strident. While you might notice motorists in the Midwest revving their engines at a stoplight to get a jump-start on the green light, only in New York do pedestrians, in anticipation of a light change, lunge off the curb in a swell. But when this urban survival game landed on the left coast, pedestrians were handicapped in order to even the odds. Somehow this morphed into a human rights issue and foot traffic took on the mantle of the oppressed, in need of special treatment. Here in the verdant valleys of liberalism, activists and legislators joined forces to level the playing field between weak, impotent pedestrians and powerful, gas guzzling behemoths: The mighty beast will be brought to its knees, and the gentle creatures shall pass before them. And thus, the birth of the mid-block cross walk. To be clear, these cross walks give the pedestrian the right of way, requiring all vehicular traffic to cease and desist. This is a good thing to teach your kid: If you’re too lazy to walk to the end of the block and wait for the light, don’t worry. You can cross here in the middle and traffic will come to a standstill until you are safely transported to the other side. Yeah, that’ll prepare them for the real world. (Note for the record: In olden times crossing in the middle of the block was called jay-walking, and was grounds for a ticket or at least a stern lecture from the beat cop regarding the inherent danger.)

You will now find responsibility free zones (RFZ) across the face of America, clearly marked as cross walks. You’ll find them in major cities, on college campuses, in villages, and –yes- parking lots. (In fact, the RFZ’s in parking lots have expanded beyond the marked crossings and now encompass, well, the entire parking lot.) Some RFZ’s even provide the foot participants with brightly colored flags to transport from one side of the street to the other – a low impact version of Sisyphus’ fitness program.

I’m sure the notion of pedestrian right-of-way crosswalks seemed harmless enough at their inception. But when added to the dozens of other little things that insidiously encourage people to abrogate responsibility for their own welfare you wind up with parking lots littered with Zombies and Spicoli’s.

I don’t know how to fight this debilitating trend. I will continue to be suspect of the conceit that strangers hold my life as dear as I do. Therefore, I will continue to look both ways at all crossings: marked and unmarked. I’ll wave you through if you look like you’re in the middle of a metaphysical discussion with your accountant. But, in the interest of public awareness, if you wander in front of my car without so much as a glance out of the corner of your eye, I will lay on my horn. Just to let you know who’s looking out for you.

Monday, December 1, 2008

DEWEY'S FAMILY OF FINE PRODUCTS

These fine products will soon be available exclusively online


Dewey’s Sensitivity credits:

Purchase these in advance of the inevitable faux pas that lands you in hot water with your employer, client, spouse, significant other or the media – in the event you are a public figure. They work in the same way carbon credits do. You can continue to be as insensitive as you like, but when called out by the politically correct coalition, you can redeem yourself by presenting these reasonably priced “credits” that prove you care but are just too darned important to change your ways.

Dewey’s “Pre-hab” programs:

Like Re-hab, only you complete the program in advance of the offense that will ultimately turn you into a social pariah. Attend around your schedule, instead of the media’s! Complete in advance of potentially hazardous duty, (i.e. appearing on “The View”) for added insurance against the wrath of the PC Squad. Note: You will automatically receive 100 Sensitivity Credits with enrollment in any of the Pre-hab programs.


Dewey’s 12 Step Programs:

Help for any number of intransigent conditions. See previous post.

Government-Education Complex: AGITPROP 101, PART 2: Curricula and Social Engineering

It’s 9:00 am. Do you know what your children are learning?

In this day of solicitous, competitive parenting, can you conceive of parents willingly turning their child over to a school with a curriculum geared to the least common denominator? One that’s designed to systematically indoctrinate him with socialist, anti-capitalist concepts? Yet nearly 90% of American families send their children off to the local public schools for just such and education.

Between the embedded social engineering/indoctrination and the dumbing down of the academic curriculum, public education today hosts serious and systemic problems. Despite a multitude to cries to the contrary, none of these problems are due to inadequate funding. The dumbing-down of academic subjects springs from a combination of anti-intellectualism, political correctness and emphasis on self-esteem. The indoctrination program springs from an overarching doctrine of “social justice” that has been embraced and taught in many education programs across the country. It’s been incorporated in textbooks and spoon fed to children by teachers -- many of whom themselves have been indoctrinated. Aside from the obvious concerns this raises for freedom and democracy, this educational milieu does not bode well for the United States place in an increasingly competitive world.

Dumb and Dumber: Self-esteem and Political Correctness

Self-Esteem

The self-esteem movement is a misguided 1980’s concept that held that self-esteem was at the root of all mental health and therefore more important than any other aspect of child rearing. Having glommed onto this without any hard scientific evidence (another touchstone of current education trends), all subsequent education theory held that praise, self esteem and performance would rise and fall together.

It turns out that was just plain wrong: in fact, after conducting repeated studies, it seems now the only scientifically established correlation between performance and self-esteem proves to be negative: http://www.albertmohler.com/blog_read.php?id=876 as many dismayed parents have suspected all along.

Not surprisingly, given the disconnect between self-esteem and performance, average student performance deteriorated. In order to avoid the child’s dreaded loss of self-esteem, less challenging course work was introduced so as not to leave any child behind. This ushered in a raft of textbooks of stultifying, embarrassingly inane content. History books have, according to the American Textbook Council, “lost a lot of literary quality as we’ve replaced the core text with pictures, white space and all sorts of glossy graphics.” The visuals did not enhance what used to be a careful explanation of the causality of events in history – they replaced them. Minus the causality, history is a meaningless list of dates.

And check out what passes for “literature” at the 8th grade level in some schools. Not Hemmingway, Shakespeare, Burns or Browning. Not even Homer. They’ve been replaced by drivel the likes of which children should not be exposed to beyond the second grade. “Stories” that sound more like reading lessons than literature. Nothing that could conceivably be interesting enough to get youngsters thinking and wondering about the world they live in. They contain no concepts that would challenge a 13 year-old’s view of the world, or stretch his intellectual ability to apply abstract concepts to unknown situations.

Despite a barrage of articles, research and adult observations about the failure and sheer foolhardiness of the self-esteem dogma, it has become deeply embedded into every aspect of child rearing and education and continues to dumb down the curriculum along the way. To date, education programs and school curriculums have done away with competition, goal scoring, red pencil marks, criticism, and even right and wrong answers. Unfortunately, in the quest to establish and maintain children’s self esteem, failure has ceased to be an option (we’ve effectively eliminated it) and true achievement has been replaced with exercises that don’t include right or wrong answers, or any real winners or losers. School districts have ensured that everyone gets a trophy or award for simply showing up. Over half of the students are on the honor roll, and the majority of them get straight A’s.(this might have been considered a red flag in an earlier era.) In fact, all A’s isn’t good enough anymore to ensure high school valedictorian status. For that you need extra credit all four years and even then you’ll have to share the honor with 4-8 of your classmates with equal scores. (God forbid that one is chosen from this “equally” rated group based on something more discretional than their scores. Heavens no. Let’s not expose Kristen and Justin to the real world yet! By simply adding up the scores, common sense and the pariah of “judgment” are removed from the equation all together. Just as they are with “zero tolerance” policies.) Course work in the basics – reading, writing and arithmetic – no longer involves right and wrong answers, but a sliding scale of correctness. The aspiration of an entire generation will be to aim “close enough for government work.”

Political Correctness

The other well documented trend, with roots in the 70’s but fully formed in the 80’s, that has assaulted the quality of public education is political correctness. The constraints and censorship required in the name of avoiding anything that might conceivably be considered offensive, and to include any group previously left out or slighted, has contributed significantly to brain dead textbooks and lessons. Hand in hand with self-esteem, political correctness requires teachers and textbooks to jump through hoops to avoid even the slightest whiff of offense. Is anyone surprised that the more headstands and backward somersaults we go through to be inoffensive, the more offense everyone takes at everything?

How exactly has political correctness impacted course content? It began with textbook companies bowing to the pressure of “bias and sensitivity” panels that were established by school boards to ensure that all forms of racism and sexism were excised (i.e., censored) from texts used in their district. But once textbook companies succumbed to these demands they opened themselves up to every special interest group on earth with an agenda to promote ; and they are legion. Under the guise of not committing one of the seven deadly sins of “bias”, i.e. invisibility, stereotyping, imbalance/selectivity, unreality, fragmentation/ isolation, linguistic bias, and cosmetic bias, special interest groups came out of the woodwork to demand either inclusion or exclusion. It’s no longer sufficient to eliminate offensive references, now we must practice politically correct inclusion as well. The Gay/Lesbian/Transgendered Alliance wanted texts that show that Bobby might have two mommies, or two daddies, or mommy and daddy are one and the same. History books must include accomplishments of Native Americans and African Americans. Great – If they stick to the facts. But now we have history texts that put forth the “fact” that the American Constitution is based on Iroquois tribal law, not the Magna Carta. This is “pressure-group” history; in which historical events are altered in order to reflect the “sensitivities” of various interest groups: women, blacks, native Americans, homosexuals, etc.. Not only does it skew reality, but it obscures it.

In The Language Police: How Pressure Groups Restrict What Students Learn, http://www.amazon.com/Language-Police-Pressure-Restrict-Students/dp/1400030641 Diane Ravitch, a distinguished historian of education points out among other things how censorship affects "readers" (books that are used in teaching youngsters how to read), literature anthologies, and history books:

“The language police force the writers and editors of textbooks to avoid so many topics that the books are disconnected from the real world that students experience every day. The characters in schoolbook stories must not speak in dialects, ponder suicide, face fire hazards or have poor eating habits. No one is allowed to encounter scorpions, rats, roaches or any other animals that anyone, anywhere might regard as scary or dirty. No one ever exhibits disrespectful or illegal behavior. No one steals, smokes, drinks alcohol, gets into fights, or tells lies. No one talks about politics, religion, unemployment, weapons, violence, child abuse, or animal abuse. Real life doesn't intrude.”

In the name of producing inoffensive textbooks that don’t infer “right” and “wrong” answers or behaviors, textbook publishers are turning out some of the most inane, bland copy ever conceived. They clearly don’t offend, but they don’t do much by way of informing either. Dumb, dumb, dumb. Imagine Plato, Shakespeare, Twain, Fitzgerald or Hemmingway ”scrubbed” in order to avoid the language police’s 7 deadly sins. Even the Bible would fail to meet the tests (not that a Bible would ever be allowed on the premises of a public school. Although the Koran has apparently been scrubbed well enough to be deemed acceptable, as it appears regularly in classes intended to sensitize children to the multiculturalism of Muslims.)

And as bad as this dumbed-down, politically correct world is, that’s not even the bad news. What’s worse is the social agenda that has been injected into every aspect of education, indoctrinating your children every hour they sit in a classroom. Doubt this? Check out the agenda supported by the public school teachers union – National Education Association (NEA). They are one of the largest lobbies in Washington and in recent years have lobbied for the following:

· Abortion
· Student access to teaching about the use of birth control
·
Coordination with liberal or pro-abortion community agencies, such as Planned
Parenthood
· The normalization of homosexuality
· Increased gun
regulations
· Federal childcare, birth through age eight
· Free access
of children to all media and material, including internet pornography and
age-inappropriate printed material
· Increased federalism in education
·
Federal, state and local hate crimes legislation
· Total federal assumption
of welfare
· Environmentalism
· United Nations, including the
ratification of the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child
·
Comprehensive school based health care, including access to birth control and
“family planning” services.

Fairly light on “education”, heavy on “social agenda”. Some might call this a “liberal” agenda with a tilt to the left. Even if you personally believe in this entire agenda, do you believe that it’s the State’s place to instill these decidedly political principals in your offspring?

“Social Justice”


If this leftist tilt doesn’t disturb you, hang on, there’s more. The “social justice” platform doesn’t just lean left, it takes a hard left turn head-on into the wall of socialism. The philosophy of “social justice” has become firmly entrenched in the Education schools of most colleges and universities. This philosophy teaches the subjection of the individual will for the benefit of the masses. This patently communist theory is fueling the whole contemporary education platform. What exactly is social justice? For the liberal interpretation it is a radical philosophy that is opposed to such basic American traditions as individual justice and free market economy. Nothing critical mind you, just the basis of the political system upon which our republic was founded. It supports a major redistribution of wealth through exorbitant taxation, and isn’t fond of personal property rights either. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_justice
.

This radical doctrine holds that America is an oppressive society that is systemically racist, sexist and classist and therefore institutionally discriminates against women, non-whites, working Americans and the poor. One of the leaders of this educational philosophy is William Ayers – yes, that William Ayers: former leader of the terrorist Weather Underground, self proclaimed “ street fighting communist” and a friend of Obama’s (although we’re not allowed to talk about that). Mr.. Ayers is distinguished Professor of Education and Senior University Scholar at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He’s also editor of the Columbia Teachers College 12 volume series “Teaching for Social Justice” which is used in numerous education programs across the country. An analysis of the curriculum reveals a radical philosophical belief that free-market capitalism – which is defined by Lee Anne Belle, director of the education program at Columbia’s Barnard College, as an “economic system that structures and requires” poverty – is the most oppressive practice amongst a sea of oppressive practices. And this belief is why she and others think it is necessary to teach social justice. What future teachers are taught is that in order to understand the magnitude of American evil, we must illuminate America’s callous oppression and exploitation of numerous groups through course offerings that focus on racism, classism, sexism, heterosexism, and ableism (a term to describe discrimination against people with disabilities).

The “Isms” of Liberalism

And if the social justice political agenda is being taught to the next generation of teachers, you can be assured that it’s also been embedded in textbooks and disseminated along with the rest of the social engineering curriculum K-12. It plays hand in glove with all of the other “isms” that comprise modern liberalism, and are likewise promulgated in the curriculum. Here are some of them:

· Relativism: white Europeans imperially, arrogantly (and incorrectly)
assumed their culture to be superior to that of other cultures and imposed their
ways on all the gentle indigenous peoples. Our enlightened position now is that
all things can be equally correct and good. How can we possibly make judgments
concerning the morals, values or cultural proclivities of others? Being
judgmental only indicates your deeply held biases.
· Multiculturalism: every
culture is equally valuable. There is no way you can effectively compare the
value of aboriginal lifestyle and contributions to civilization to Western
culture. It’s all good. But as Saul Bellow famously challenged: “Show me the
Zulu Tolstoy.”

· Collectivism: thought to be superior to individualism since it takes a
village and we all need to work together and share everything so that no one is
left behind, disadvantaged or taken advantage of, and no one is better, smarter
or richer. (This philosophy is also known as socialism, but few will cop to that
term).

· Sexism/Feminism : recognizes that white men have oppressed women for ever,
continue to do so to this day, and the playing field must be leveled. No, make
that women must be given special rules and rights in order to atone for past
sins.

· Racism: recognizes that white men have also oppressed people of color for
ever, continue to do so to this day, and the playing field must be leveled. No,
make that people of color (black first, brown second, red third and yellow a
distant forth) must be given special rules and rights in order to atone for past
sins.

· Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual/Transgenderism: there is no such thing as a “normal”
sexual orientation. All orientations are equally valid. Recognizes that
heterosexuals (generally white, male heterosexuals) have systematically
discriminated against all other sexual orientations, continue to do so to this
day, and therefore the playing field must be leveled. No make that
gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgendered individuals must be given special rules and
privileges in order to atone for past sins.

· Naturalism: Nature rules! If it’s “natural” it’s good and good for you, and
nature knows best. Therefore we must replace our belief in and worship of God
with a belief in and worship of Nature.

· Environmentalism: the “religion” of naturalism: we worship the earth,
sacrifice to it and blindly believe that recycling our plastic bags will save us
from destruction because we are good and humble servants of the living,
breathing, cognizant EARTH. Oh yeah, and global warming is killing the planet,
but every moron knows that.

These “positive” isms are promoted and promulgated on all fronts, but there are likewise a few “negative” isms that, if discussed at all, must be portrayed unfavorably:

·

Conservatism: an unenlightened political philosophy that doesn’t care about
the poor, hungry and oppressed masses.

· Capitalism: an inherently “unfair” economic system that oppresses the poor,
the disadvantaged and the disenfranchised.

· Individualism: an unholy cult of personal achievement that ignores the
superior principal of collectivism: off-the-ranch thinkers who contribute in no
positive way to the well being of the village. (Kind of makes you wonder why all
the “self-esteem” crap is so important to these educators.)

· Rationalism (including the dreaded judgmentalism): applying logic to a
social, political or economic problem is an unenlightened (see “conservatism”)
way to reach a solution. It is far superior to get in touch with your inner self
and just see what feels right.

We have the unfortunate convergence of the self-esteem movement, political correctness and social engineering movements. By imposing themselves on the public school curriculum we wind up with ideological content incorporated into every subject either blatantly or subtlety. This is the very definition of propaganda. Yet few perceive this as a threat to life, liberty or the pursuit of happiness. The power that is wielded by this system is awesome and frightening. What enters the classroom in one decade emerges as mainstream 15 years later.

Real-life Curriculum: Sins of Commission and Omission

Are you still curious as to how these trends and beliefs translate to actual curriculum?

Since math should consist of a series of concepts, building on themselves, that teach children to think logically you might think it exempt from such nonsense found in other disciplines. But of course it isn’t, as anyone even vaguely familiar with the new math and the new, new math can attest. The new, new math is referred to, not incorrectly, as fuzzy math. http://michellemalkin.com/2007/11/28/fuzzy-math-a-nationwide-epidem
Here we have 3rd grade problems in math such as “if math were a color, it would be___, because___”. Need I remind you that in China by the time a kid is eight he’s mastered the abacus? It has probably not crossed their minds what color math might be because they already understand it to be an abstract concept that has no color, but does have multiple practical applications. Also in the math classrooms across America we find such texts as the Addison-Wesley “Secondary Math: An Integrated Approach”. This text promotes “team math” in which several children are given one part of a problem to work on and then the team must agree on a solution by consensus. The approach rejects objectively correct answers developed by individual students in favor of a groupthink process that arbitrarily guesses at the answers. End result: not only can your child not make change without the benefit of a computerized cash register, but he has learned to behave like a sheep; to cave in to the loudest, most assertive member/s of a group – whether they are correct or not. That, my friends, is a two-fer: social engineering and dumbing down.

And still, there’s more. David Horowitz identifies a Northeastern University’s Master of Education program that offers a course for K-12 teachers called “Teaching Mathematics for Social Justice.” Graduate teachers might use a textbook titled “Rethinking Mathematics: Teaching Social Justice by the Numbers.” The authors of this swell text include “teaching suggestions” in the book which include exercises that calculate the cost of the Iraq war, a “math project about racial profiling” and a lesson on reading graphs that detail corporate control of U.S. media.

Meanwhile, in Massachusetts, they adopted a curriculum for Math class – that listed as the number one objective anti-racism! See for yourself here: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,146684,00.html

How about Geography? Geography no longer concerns itself with spatial aspects of human settlement (i.e. maps), but has achieved a higher calling:

“An explicit objective of critical geography is to contribute to egalitarian social
transformation and justice through activism that supports and contributes to
relevant political struggles” (Desbiens & Smith 1999: 381).

English literature? It’s been dumbed down to the level of Dick and Jane right through the eighth grade. Charles Dickens, Wordsworth, et al have been replaced with stories rife with leftist sentiments of egalitarianism, peaceful resolution of conflicts and other politically correct interactions. How do such devices as sentence structure and diagramming, gerunds, nouns, verbs, adverbs, adjectives, dangling participles fare? Not so well. Who needs them for text messaging anyway?

History? Our founding fathers were all morally, financially or sexually corrupt. Abraham Lincoln was a hypocrite who really didn’t care about the black man. http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=Mjc4NGQ3NTQxNDQ3MTI2YzkxY2I4ODRmMTU4MzgwOTQ= and so on and so forth. We hate ourselves so much we might as well be French.

But just as important as what is taught, is what’s not taught: capitalism (in any positive way) for example. Dr. Sanity has this observation on her blog http://drsanity.blogspot.com/2007/06/corruption-of-curriculum.html “ The moral case for capitalism is not taught in our schools, nor is it argued much in our culture. In fact it has been more or less universally accepted by the intellectual elites that systems such as communism and socialism are "morally superior" to capitalism (hence more "socially just")--even though in practice such systems have led to the death and enslavement of millions, and to those unlucky enough not to die from them, they have led to the most horrible shrinking and wasting of the human soul.”

She continues: “One very harmful result of this sorry educational situation is that there are few people – even among those who stalwartly defend the free market, who understand and appreciate the essential morality of capitalism. Certainly our children, taught by ideological purists…who are leftover from the 20th century debacle of socialist/communist tyranny -- never even have a chance to rationally consider any ideas not approved by their aggressively collectivist teachers, so intent at quashing those aspects of human nature they don’t like.”

We’re raising a generation that disdains the very foundation on which their past has been built and their future resides. We are in the process of extinguishing our way of life by our own hand because the academic intelligentsia have deemed it hollow and wanting. Most nations would call that cultural suicide. We call it public education.

SKEPTICISM: ALL THAT’S RIGHT WITH THE WORLD

SKEPTICISM: ALL THAT’S RIGHT WITH THE WORLD

“It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so.”

“Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please.” – Mark Twain


Mr. Twain’s comments contain truth, and imply consequence. Make no mistake: you need to be skeptical. These are dangerous times to be intellectually lazy. If the truth is not rutted out, if half-truths and outright lies are allowed to proliferate, the world inhabited by the next generation will be greatly impoverished by reduced freedoms and its accompaniment: diminished prosperity. Read no further if you believe that the United States doesn’t deserve it’s global preeminence; that we should equalize the status of all nations not by raising the bar – nor even by leveling the playing field – but by putting speed bumps on America’s turf. For you people, I don’t believe any degree of healthy skepticism will be adequate. For the rest of you, listen up. We’re surrounded by Chicken Littles: emotional alarmists who simplistically misinterpret available data. There are a few true prophets out there; Cassandras who warn us of unanswered threats that bid our doom, but their counsel falls on deaf ears. Just for the record: the sky has yet to fall, but the Trojans were destroyed by Greeks bearing gifts.

Skeptics have become the neo-pariahs of the 21st century: unwilling to quietly sign on to all the prevailing beliefs and theories so carefully thought out by the A-list illuminati. They’ve come to be lumped together with the old-school pariahs, the cynics, who indeed take a somewhat grim (and not altogether unfounded) view of human nature. Yet skepticism is simply a method of obtaining knowledge through systematic doubt and continual testing: in short rational thinking – a habit very much out of style, but always appropriate. Any intelligent person should be proud to be considered a skeptic.

We are barraged with drivel from mainstream print and broadcast media 24 hours a day. Aside from “breaking news” such as car chases and hostage takings, much of what they would have us accept as gospel has been picked up from press releases (can you say “vested interests?”) or from “major studies” (can you say “ other vested interests?”). Instead of presenting facts, news has become a portal for talking heads to present arguments based on “facts” selectively gathered by like thinking activists. If you’re not skeptical, then you’re just not paying attention, you don’t care, or you are one of the “vested interests”.

To the degree most people are skeptical at all, they do so with a superficial questioning of viewpoints that they do not agree with before dismissing them. An honest pursuit of countervailing viewpoints prior to reaching a conclusion is rare. If they are inclined to test their skepticism, they might go to the Web. But faced with the incomprehensible amount of data available, most choose to visit the sites they’ve found to be, well, familiar. As in like-minded. So at the end of the day what they know for sure is exactly what they knew for sure at the beginning of the day. Not a very good use of their time, but since this type of selection tends to reinforce what they already believe, they are confident in declaring that a preponderance of data supports their belief. It’s not unlike the age-worn anecdote about Pauline Kael’s reaction when told that Richard Nixon had won the 1972 election: “He couldn’t have! I don’t know one person who voted for him!” At the time, Ms. Kael was the film critic for the New York Times. I believe that sufficiently explains the conceit.

If you hear something often enough, even if it’s from like-minded bobble heads, you are apt to believe it to be true. I know this is shocking, but people with agendas have tapped into the fact that people with overbooked lives and minimal intellectual curiosity turn to the mainstream media (MSM) daily to download their opinions on everything from political candidates to recycling. Special interest groups (included in this category are all politicians, all government agencies and any organization that has a lobbyist – did I leave anyone out?) are keenly aware of this phenomenon. Many have found a special bond with MSM. Their like-mindedness on many issues (politics and the environment, just to name a couple of inconsequential ones) has created a symbiotic relationship in which MSM vets stories, data, and studies provided by a labyrinth of government agencies, university studies and think tanks. People who do not sign on to the proscribed script (skeptics and cynics) are given, at best, token time to state their position before they are derided for their mean spiritedness and hit over the head with the “preponderance of evidence.” In the repeated retelling, “facts”, myths and stories assume the mantel of immutable truth. Repeating something often enough is as good as making it so.

Don’t think so? Take a look at a few of the incontrovertible truths that have been established over the years. At one time you might have believed (or may still believe) that these were true:

· 1962, DDT is killing the bald eagle - our national symbol 1962, DDT is killing the bald eagle – our national symbol! (With all due respect to the sainted Rachael Carson, this was never true, but the US ban led to a world-wide ban that has since resulted in a resurgence of malaria that has killed millions of people in underdeveloped countries.)
· 1969, Cyclamates are killing the diet conscious (It wasn’t, and although it has remained in the European and Canadian food chain for the past 35 years, it’s still banned in the USA.)
· 1967, Red dye # 2 is killing red soda fans and those that favor a maraschino cherry in their Manhattan (It wasn’t, but numerous, more expensive, replacements were developed and you’ll never see it again, although it, too, is still in use in Canada and Europe
· 1977, Saccharin is killing the diet conscious , if they were lucky enough to have survived the ingestion of cyclamates in the 1969 calamity (It wasn’t either, and although the FDA proposed a ban, Congress soon learned that you just don’t mess with women on diets. They settled for a printed warning, later withdrawn when no reputable study could demonstrate harm.)
· 1977, Hair dye is killing the prematurely gray (It wasn’t, to the vast relief of the baby boomers.)
· 1978, Love Canal is killing its residents (It wasn’t, but that didn’t prevent the US government from establishing the Super Fund for toxic cleanup – $10 billion and growing annually – and spending $55 million to relocate 400 families and clean up the site.)
· 1979, Three Mile Island will kill us all (It didn’t, but it did provide the plot for a great movie, and destroy the nuclear power industry in the US – the best source of non-polluting power yet discovered, if you’re worried about Co2 emissions – and who isn’t?)
· 1981, Coffee is causing pancreatic cancer (It wasn’t, nor did it cause breast cancer, colon cancer, heart disease, or infertility as claimed at various times – and oh, by the way, now it’s good for you.)
· 1989, Alar on apples is killing our children (It wasn’t, but it temporarily killed the apple industry—you’d of thought they were coloring them with red dye # 2.)
· 1989, Electric Blankets are causing cancer (They weren’t, unless they were powered by nuclear generated power)
· 1990, Amalgam (mercury) dental fillings are killing us (They weren’t, but maybe giving up that healthy apple-a-day habit wasn’t such a good idea for our teeth.)
· 1993, Cell Phones are causing brain cancer (They weren’t, they just make you stupid)
· 1998, Vaccines are causing huge increases in Autism (They aren’t, even the CDC – reluctantly – admits: ”The weight of currently available scientific evidence does not support the hypothesis that vaccines cause autism.” While nobody knows what causes classic autism, the huge recent increase is primarily due to the reclassification of children diagnosed with ADD and ADHD as falling within the “Autism spectrum disorder” – but that’s another story.)
· 2002, Hormone Replacement Therapy is causing increased heart attack risks in women (it wasn’t, in fact it actually improved heart health in women taking hormones at the time of menopause. Whoops! Sorry about that ladies- hope nobody got killed.)
Each of these scares, and numerous others, has been debunked. Yes that’s right, debunked – by real science! Not the junk science that launched the original hysteria. Bad scientific methodology, such as force-feeding lab rodents huge doses of a suspected substance and using the results to extrapolate results stating the substance causes cancer in humans (ignoring the basic principle of toxicology that “the dose makes the poison”) led to many of the scares in the past. Rather than eliminating bad science, the scientific community has allowed bad methodologies to proliferate. Now in order to induce mass panic you can dispense with scientific method all together; now all you need is a scary movie.
But just because these health scares have been exposed as false, that doesn’t mean that the debate is over. Why? Several reasons, not the least of which is the MSM, along with vested special interest groups continue to propagate these debunked myths as though they were true. Again you may ask, “why?” I can’t say for sure, maybe because they’re ignorant, or lazy. Maybe promoting a certain agenda gives them access to power or influence. Or maybe they’ve just heard it so often they think it’s true.
Neither journalists nor researchers are tabulae rasae. Every study is funded and/or conducted by someone with a dog in the fight. I’m not saying that’s necessarily a non-starter, but you should be aware of who owns the dog, and which dogs have been trained to bite. Likewise, the fact that the majority of journalists are, by their own admission, liberals, doesn’t matter unless you are unaware that liberals have specific beliefs and positions. I’m sure there was a time when “objective journalist” was not an oxymoron, but you and I probably weren’t alive so be wary (i.e. skeptical). And on the outside chance that you were unaware of the left-leaning proclivity of most research scientists in major universities, be aware that they too may have predetermined notions. Don’t believe me? Good! You’re well on your way to becoming a skeptic. But you do the research.
And while we’re on the topic of research, where do you think all the money for major university funding comes from? Yes, that’s right, you and me – in the form of government research grants. And since research academics are pressured to maintain or increase the amount of grants coming into their departments there is pressure to research things that someone is interested in funding. Those “some ones” would be members of Congress, who spend more time meeting with lobbyists than they do on the floor of their respective houses. The best way to get legislators to fund a study is to: a) lobby for it with meaningful dollars and/or a large constituency of potential voters (anything teachers want qualifies on both fronts), or, b) research anything that will scare the crap out of millions of people, and be discussed all day on CNN (global warming so obviously fits this category it makes my teeth hurt, but there are hundreds of other candidates too). If you want to know what’s driving the results of “major studies,” always, repeat always follow the money (it’s usually your money anyway.) Who’s providing the funding (directly or indirectly through lobbying), and what is their agenda? Homework assignment: see if you can figure out who/what was behind the original release of data related to the use of hormones for menopause. Hint: Menopause is not a disease! If you still don’t think “desirable outcomes” can be achieved in a “scientific” study, you, my friend, need to do some remedial work before you move on to Skepticism 101.
No matter how many embarrassing reversals, the mass health/environmental hysteria will continue unabated. It’s fueled by huge government funding programs, aided by research scientists using questionable methodologies (tune in later for more on epidemiological studies and their inherent errors), and abetted by the useful idiots looking for the next 24/7 news cycle: a combustible pile of hazardous waste if ever there was one. As noted by H.L. Mencken early in the last century: “the whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety), by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.” Dead for over 50 years, this man rightly earns the first posthumous Cassandra award.

SUMMER IS HERE - DEWEY GEAR

HISTORIC PAPAL VISIT ENDS ON A HIGH NOTE

25 April 2008: Vatican City

Pope Benedict XVI returned to the Vatican today completing his historic visit to the U.S.

Vatican spokesman Father Guido Sardewey described the Pontiff 's trip as "... mostly real a'good ... especially the veal in'a the Senate cafeteria."

Father Sardewey reported that the Pope was "a'filled with audacious op'atimism" following his meeting with Dewey from Detroit: "His a'Holiness believes that'a Dewey represents hope, and a'change and'a the future too".

Father Sardewey said the Pope "is not really a hugging kinda guy", but following his meeting with Dewey, "the Pope he put'a his arm around'a my shoulder and gave a'me a big a'hug." Asked to describe his own impression of Dewey from Detroit, Father Sardewey said "That a'Dewey, quite a guy eh sport."

DEW POINT #1: THE ORIGINAL DYLAN

LUNAR NEWS

Lunatic Fringe: Red Rider



Lunatic-2


TROLL ALERT !!!

We won't let you kill the laughter !!!



Communications guru said...
“Power to the people?” Please. “sarah” is lining her pockets. She is not the stupidest “stupidest” woman on earth, but she no where near smart enough to be President, at least of the United States. By the way, the MSM is conservative, not liberal.


Let's ignore your foolish opinions and concentrate on the rules of grammar; something a "Communications guru" would be expected to know a little about. What does this tell us about you?
Anyone? Bueller? Anyone?
That "you nowhere near smart enough to comment on deweyfromdetroit.com"


So, "communications guru, buy a third person singular verb expressing a state of being and use it, or find a new bridge to sit under.




Lunatic-1

It’s almost unfair to include Al Gore in this update, as he could take top honors every week unless we practice some restraint. But this from Marc Shepard at The American Thinker is just too juicy to pass up. I especially liked Al’s dismissal of all of the global warming deniers:

"I think that those people are in such a tiny, tiny minority now with their point of view. They're almost like the ones who still believe that the moon landing was staged in a movie lot in Arizona and those who believe the earth is flat. That demeans them a little bit, but it's not that far off,"

Apparently he believes we are the lunatic fringe.But read the whole thing:

http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/04/al_gores_global_warming_therap.html

Also, the comment submitted by Jerome J. Schmitt is even better:

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/04/al_gores_syndrome.html

We’ll always have Al to keep us grounded.

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Government-Education Complex: AGITPROP 101, PART 1: The Monopoly of K-12 Education

The founding fathers wisely mandated a separation of church and state. Had the constitution envisioned compulsory education (which was initially legislated by the state of Massachusetts in 1852, with other states following suit) they would have also mandated a separation of school and state. And it would have been for the same reason: dogma and absolute power do not bode well for individual rights. State control of the education system would have been anathema to the founding fathers who harbored a healthy skepticism of government. Any system controlled and delivered by the state provides an opportunity for waste, high cost and inefficiency. But an education system additionally provides a platform for propaganda. Contrary to common belief, neither the Constitution nor the Bill of Rights provides a right to education. What they are really there for is to protect the citizens from the abuse of government. (Thanks to 150+ years of public education, few students emerging from high school today know this.) In this and subsequent posts, you will see why we need this protection reinstated with respect to public “education”

At the beginning of the 21st Century we find Big Education cozily snuggled up with Big Government. By pre-taxing citizens and then providing “free” education, government manages to hold a virtual monopoly on K-12 education. In most school districts the buildings are state owned, the facilities are state managed and the teachers are state hired. While neither teachers nor customers (parents) are happy, and kids get dumber by the decade, the education lobby – comprising one of the largest special interest groups in Washington –

http://www.opensecrets.org/lobbyists/overview.asp?showyear=2007&txtindextype=i

continues to clamor for ever more money and power to maintain the existing, failed system.

This de facto monopoly of public education (90% of all K-12 students) allows the government funded bureaucracy to control the vital aspects of education: process and agenda. As with other government endeavors, the Government-Education Complex has yielded an ineffective program costing billions of dollars that is rife with waste and inefficiency.

The process of Big-Education results in entrenched bureaucracies with extremely high administrative overhead and entrenched teachers unions that eschew meritocracy in favor of tenure. That private schools consistently deliver higher test scores for a fraction of the cost of public education is not due exclusively to the student base. Although that is the same tiresome excuse you will hear from public school administrators. And why not, they’ve been using it for years, and it consistently results in an increase in funding. Why change when you can whine?

The demand for more money to fix the problem continues unabated and is generally met by ever increasing federal, state and/or local taxes to fund the schools. As all other aspects of life grow more efficient through technology applications, schools continue to rely on union established teacher/student ratios set decades ago to churn out dumber and dumber kids.

Don’t exclusively blame the process for this miasma. The content that teachers are now required to teach emerges as a much greater concern. The basic skills of reading, writing, math and science are no longer viewed as the only – or even the most important – skills to be taught. And that’s the good news. In addition to not educating children, the public schools are actively mis-educating them. Programs and subjects that are tantamount to propaganda take up a disproportionate share of the education process. The bad news is that not only can Johnny not read, Johnny can’t even think.

Teacher’s time and school hours are spent on social engineering designed to mold future citizens to the ideals of a society determined not by parents, but enlightened administrators. And make no mistake about who’s in charge: in 2007 a Massachusetts US district Judge ruled unequivocally that

"The constitutional right of parents to raise their children does not include the right to restrict what a public school may teach their children…Under the Constitution public schools are entitled to teach anything that is reasonably related to the goals of preparing students to become engaged and productive citizens in our democracy."

(see complete article here:)

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/03/04/a_call_for_separation_of_school_and_state/

No, the state run school district administrators determine what your children are required to learn in state mandated education. To be clear, the curriculum for your children is set (largely) by state-educated, state-compensated bureaucrats who are motivated to pass on the type of thinking that will perpetuate the education/state partnership. In short, a monopoly that’s in a position to perpetuate itself through its very charter: education. And what they decide to teach your children ought to keep you up at night.

Watch for the next installment of Big Education, Curricula and Social Engineering coming soon.

.