Obama Kisses 200,000 Potential Jobs Good-bye

What is the motivation behind not approving this Keystone XL pipeline? If the argument is "green", consider this: that oil is going to be drilled, transported, and refined, and it will be refined either in the United States or in China. It will be refined. If your argument is environmental, wouldn't you prefer to have the refining done in the United States, which has much stricter environmental standards than does China?

I just don't get this guy.

Update: Canadian Ezra Levant says that Obama chose Venezuela and Saudi Arabia over Canada, and notes that Venezuelan "heavy oil" has a higher carbon footprint than does Canadian oil sands oil.

And why should it matter that he chose Saudi Arabia over our closest ally and biggest trading partner?

After improving with the election of Barack Obama in 2008, U.S. favorable ratings across the Arab world have plummeted. In most countries they are lower than at the end of the Bush Administration, and lower than Iran's favorable ratings (except in Saudi Arabia)...

While many Arabs were hopeful that the election of Barack Obama would improve U.S.-Arab relations, that hope has evaporated. Today, President Obama's favorable ratings across the Arab World are 10% or less.

Obama's performance ratings are lowest on the two issues to which he has devoted the most energy: Palestine and engagement with the Muslim world.

And that's not me saying that, boys and girls. It's from a Zogby poll taken for the Arab American Institute in 2011. Usually I wouldn't care if people in those countries love us or not, but if you're going to bash President Bush and say that as President you'd do a better job of getting them to love us, and as President one of the first things you do is go on the Great American Apology Tour, and then you fail and they hate us even more, your failure should count against you--and I'm happy to point it out.

This president is a buffoon.

Why Capitalism Is A Good Thing

From page 63 of the January 14th-20th 2012 issue of The Economist:

Strange to recall, Kodak was the Google of its day. Founded in 1880, it was known for its pioneering technology and innovative marketing. "You press the button, we do the rest," was its slogan in 1888.

By 1976 Kodak accounted for 90% of film and 85% of camera sales in America. Until the 1990s it was regularly rated one of the world's five most valuable brands.

Then came digital photography....

They didn't/couldn't compete, and now they're ready for bankruptcy. Other companies have stepped in to fill the breach.

Is this "bad"? Should we lament the loss of jobs? Should government somehow step in and "save" this company, like it did with Sears or Circuit City? Oh, wait....

Sometimes, companies need to close their doors. Times change, the market changes, and those that cannot compete will be replaced by those that can. Always remember that this is a good thing; sadly, that seems to be only a conservative viewpoint anymore, not a common sense viewpoint.

(Yes, it sucks when people don't have jobs anymore. Are we going to lament the loss of all those whale oil and/or buggy whip jobs, too, while we're at it?)

Income Disparity

Ah, the things you can do with statistics:

Inconvenient truth: the distribution of income in the U.S. is basically the same as it was a quarter-century ago—and the middle class has gained ground over the last decade...

In other words, most of the reported rise in income disparity since 1979 had already occurred by 1986, and there has been no significant trend since then.

There’s more. From 2000 to 2009, tax filers with adjusted gross income of at least $500,000, who represented the top 0.5 percent of all returns in both years (similar in spirit to the CBO report, which looks at the top 1 percent of households), saw their average adjusted gross income decline by 15 percent and their average after-tax income decline by 11 percent. All other filers—the 99.5 percent—saw average increases of 15 percent in AGI and 17 percent in after-tax income. The middle class has not “lost ground” over the last decade.

If this is true, why might some want to make claims about income disparity--claims that are unsupported by data? I wonder....

Spring Semester Starts Today

Monday was the Dr. King holiday, and yesterday was a teacher work day to grade all the final exams we gave late last week. Today, everything resets.

Oftentimes, Mockery Is Deserved

The TSA thinks a cupcake is a security threat? Well, behold the new "TSA-compliant" cupcake!

They are buffoons, and deserved to be mocked as such.

One Of My Favorite Commercials Of All Time

I don't know why, but I remember finding this commercial absolutely hilarious when it aired.

And no, I've never purchased the product.

Today's Holiday

Happy Dr. King Birthday (holiday). We're a better people for his having been among us.

A Social Media First For Me

At some ungodly hour last night or early this morning, I was checking "the Facebook" on my Kindle Fire and, since I've "liked" Carnival Cruise Lines, I saw a cryptic message expressing sympathy for those on the Costa Concordia. What the heck? So I came into my library and got on the "big screen"--gotta love my 24" swivel monitor!--and did a search. Holy crap! I'll be cruising off the coast of Italy for a few days this summer so I'm quite familiar with Costa, and to see a story of a modern cruise ship run aground is almost otherworldly.

This is the first time I can recall first learning about a major event from so-called social media.

Why Not Just Admit It's A Failure

Everyone loves Head Start. After all, those poor, unfortunate children shouldn't have to suffer educationally because their parents can't afford to send them to boarding school.

But it's a flop. It provides no lasting benefits to students. I mean, does it matter if Head Start kids are "with the pack" in 1st grade if they're again trailing the pack in 3rd grade and beyond?

“Head Start” has been the poster child of federal aid to education ever since the Lyndon Johnson administration introduced it as part of the Great Society. And for decades liberals have pointed to it as one of the great advances that the federal government has brought to education, and as evidence that creative social engineering by smart professional interventionists can change the world.

But a long-suppressed government report finally released by the Obama administration report is shaking the foundations of Head Start, and the news isn’t coming from right wing conservatives but from Joe Klein at Time magazine.

But let someone suggest cutting funding for Head Start....

Want More Proof Of How Screwed Up California's School Budgeting Is?

Go read EIA's latest, which starts thusly:

Last June in the dead of night the California legislature passed AB 114, which required school districts to assume they would receive the same amount of money from the state in the 2011-12 school year as in 2010-11, and to budget accordingly. Gov. Jerry Brown quickly signed it into law.

Any guesses how that's turned out? You can find out at the link, but I don't think it'll be too much of a surprise to learn that "hope", "smoke", and "mirrors" are involved.

Really? In The 21st Century?

How could anyone think this would fly in this day and age?

A Cincinnati landlord who claimed a black girl's hair products clouded an apartment complex's swimming pool discriminated against the child by posting a poolside "White Only" sign, an Ohio civil rights panel said Thursday in upholding a previous finding.

OK, so her hair products clouded the pool. I get that. Forbid the hair products. But to ban a class of people from the pool--a protected class, no less--well, that's just stupid.

Freedom From Forced Unionism

"A Right to Work law secures the right of employees to decide for themselves whether or not to join or financially support a union." See which states are Right To Work states here.

Update, 1/12/12: In ‘Right to Work’ Battle, Narrative Trumps Fact on NPR.
Some helpful numbers you'll never hear from government-funded radio.

More California Lunacy

You really can't make up something this bizarre:

Days after a landmark law went into effect requiring California schools to teach about gay historical figures, a new piece of proposed legislation is likely to spark even more controversy.

Sponsored by Assemblyman Tom Ammiano (D-San Francisco), AB 266 would require schools to allow students to play on sports teams according to their “gender identity” and not their biological sex...

However, revised language in the proposed bill would mandate that students “shall be permitted to participate in sex-segregated school programs, activities, and facilities, including athletic teams and competitions, consistent with his or her gender identity, irrespective of the gender listed on the pupil’s records”.

Under the proposal, a boy who claims a female “gender identity”, for example, would have the right to try out for a girls sports team.

In addition, the bill would also require opposite-sex access to “sex-segregated facilities” that could possible include locker rooms.

Anyone foresee any interesting "difficulties" with such a stupid law?

How Our Country Has Changed

Via Instapundit:

A SOCIETY DOES NOT SURVIVE, UNLESS IT HAS A REASON TO SURVIVE: Video of Dennis Prager telling University of Denver students, “I believe the greatest threat facing America – I’ve believed this my entire adult life — is that we have not passed on what it means to be an American to this generation.”

St.-Exupery said that a society is built on what is expected of men, not what is provided for them. Contrast “ask not what your country can do for you” with the Occupy Wall Street, anti-capitalist/socialist rants we hear today.

Where Does Your NEA Dues Money Go?

EIA has the details, including this caveat: "Here is an alphabetic list of the 121 recipients of NEA's contributions, with relevant web links. All of these were paid for with members' dues money (the union's federal PAC is a separate entity funded through voluntary means)". Do you notice any political slant to those donations?

Coming Soon To A Socialist Country Near You

What is it about socialist countries that causes them to do things that normal people would consider bat-crap insane?

Greek disability groups expressed anger Monday at a government decision to expand a list of state-recognized disability categories to include pedophiles, exhibitionists and kleptomaniacs.

The National Confederation of Disabled People called the action "incomprehensible," and said pedophiles are now awarded a higher government disability pay than some people who have received organ transplants.

The Labor Ministry said categories added to the expanded list — that also includes pyromaniacs, compulsive gamblers, fetishists and sadomasochists — were included for purposes of medical assessment and used as a gauge for allocating financial assistance.

At least some of the Greek citizens are questioning the move.

Could you see something like this happening in the US? How about just here in California? Sadly, to ask the question is pretty much to answer it.

Hat tip to reader Mark Perry.

Choose Your Major Wisely

“Get a useful education, a job, and a hobby in that order,” Rubin concludes. “And don’t expect the hardworking people, who have had to make compromises in their own lives, to pay for you to do whatever you want.”

Hear hear!

Did They Buckle? Was I Right All Along? Or Is Something Else Going On?

Two years ago, my local Walmart stopped providing shopping bags--customers were to bring their own. It was Walmart's "green" initiative, but I have to believe that part of the calculus involved the money they'd save on bags. My local store did an "experiment" without bags--which was no experiment at all--and then all Northern California stores were to go bagless. I wasn't pleased, wrote several posts about it (one's here), and decided that Walmart didn't much want me as a customer. I estimate that the money I spent at Walmart has dropped off 90% since then, with Safeway and a couple other places picking up the slack.

Today, though, I went to Walmart (it's still close by and cheap, if not entirely convenient) to pick up a few items--and what did I see at the checkouts? Why, clean, white, pretty Walmart bags! Did they learn the lessons that I saw coming a mile away? I asked the checker, and she didn't know why the bags had returned, but suspected that they'd be reintroduced for the Christmas shopping season (why, one might wonder) and they were just using up the stock.

I hope this is a permanent change. I don't want to carry bags around whenever I go to shop.

On a side note, while there I was looking in the $5 video box, and found Antwone Fisher. I'd never seen the movie, remember hearing good things about it, so I bought it. Impressive movie. I recommend it. Have Kleenex on hand.

What Constitutes An "Appropriate" Yearbook Picture?

The students editors thought the one shown in this story wasn't:

A Colorado teenager whose yearbook picture was rejected for being too revealing is vowing to fight the ban with her high school’s administration, but the editors of the yearbook insist it was their decision alone on the photo.

The five student editors of the Durango High School yearbook in Durango, Col., told the Durango Herald they were the ones who made the call not to publish a picture of senior Sydney Spies posing in a short yellow skirt midriff and shoulder-exposing black shawl as her senior portrait.

“We are an award-winning yearbook. We don’t want to diminish the quality with something that can be seen as unprofessional,” student Brian Jaramillo told the paper on Thursday.

Her attire wouldn't pass my school's dress code.

When I was in high school, we all went to thie same portrait studio, put on similar-looking coats and ties (for boys) and gowns (for girls), and those were our yearbook pictures. But that was then, this is now.

Then, now, what about the future? Perhaps in the future she'll be thankful that her skank-pic wasn't saved for posterity in the yearbook.

A Little Difficulty Tying Math And Social Studies Together

I can see the problem here:

Several Gwinnett parents contacted Channel 2 Action News in outrage after their children brought home a math assignment that referenced slavery and beatings.

Christopher Braxton talked with Channel 2's Kerry Kavanaugh and said he couldn't believe it when he read his 8-year-old son's math homework Wednesday.

"It kind of blew me away," Braxton said. "Do you see what I see? Do you really see what I see? He's not answering this question."

The question was a word problem that said, "Each tree had 56 oranges. If eight slaves pick them equally, then how much would each slave pick?"

Another math problem said, "If Frederick got two beatings per day, how many beatings did he get in one week?"...

(District spokeswoman) Roach explained the teachers were trying to incorporate social studies lessons into the math problems, which is something the school district encourages. But the problem with the questions is there is no historical context.

I guess it would have been OK if the students had also been studying the antebellum South?

Update, 1/8/12: Curmudgeon weighs in on the topic with his usual grace, wit, and style :-)

An Interesting Silver Lining

If you've been reading this blog for more than a couple weeks you probably know that last April I was in a fairly traumatic skiing accident. The accident itself wasn't horrible, but having a ski slice a knee tendon was extremely damaging physically, mentally, and emotionally. This weekend I will get on a treadmill at the gym and run--first time since the doctor approved me to do so almost 2 weeks ago.

Before spring break last year I bought a season pass deal at a ski resort--it was good for the remainder of last season (which extended into the 4th of July weekend with that long winter we had!) and all of this season. I spent several months before finally getting official word from the resort that they'd cancel the pass for this season and would reissue it for next season.

Winter hasn't started yet in Northern California. Last month was the 4th driest December on record. There is no snow up in the mountains; the resorts are open and running but with only a couple of inches of man-made snow.

Today a friend said to me, aren't you glad your season pass isn't for *this* season? You'd feel cheated!

You know, that's one way of looking at it!

Campus Speech Codes

No one knows more about them than the folks at FIRE:

Activists embarked on a campaign in the 1980s to eradicate hurtful, bigoted and politically incorrect speech by enacting speech codes at universities across the country. Although the movement presented itself as a forward-thinking way to make campuses welcoming, the initiative stood in stark contrast to the celebrated “free speech movement” of the 1960s, whose proponents understood that vague exceptions to free speech were inevitably used by those in power to punish opinions they dislike or disagree with. And unfortunately the effort gained momentum as prestigious institutions passed speech codes...

Overly broad harassment codes remain the weapon of choice on campus to punish speech that administrators dislike.

Do you think the originators of these speech codes knew what they were doing, or did they genuinely have good intentions?

The Apple Didn't Fall Far From The Tree

I like Matt Damon's acting, but as a person I find him to be, well, not a very intelligent person. Yes, I know he was accepted to some big Ivy League school but didn't go, but last year's foul-mouthed Save Our Schools rant should disavow anyone of the notion that he's a deep thinker. If you disagree, point me to some links demonstrating that he is a deep thinker. I'll wait while the crickets chirp.

Gotta give him points for insisting on ideological purity, though. Remember this the next time he (or any other leftie) talks about reaching out to people with differing viewpoints, finding common ground, etc.:

The actor Matt Damon and his mother, a professor of education, on Wednesday turned down an award from the country’s largest teachers union after reading an opinion article that the union’s president had co-authored with the founder of Teach for America.

Writing that she was “confused by your collaboration” with Teach for America, Dr. Nancy Carlsson-Paige said she and her son, Mr. Damon, no longer desired to be nominated for the National Education Association’s Friend of Education Award.

Hat tip to EIA.

Dam-med If He Does, Dam-med If He Doesn't

My congressman has a great idea, and it syncs with the generally-left-leaning view out here in the West that we need to tear down dams and restore rivers to a more natural setting:

Dan Lungren, a Republican member of Congress from Sacramento County, wants to give the world "a second Yosemite Valley." The valley already exists, in Yosemite National Park - buried under 300 feet of water in the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, which provides San Franciscans and 1.7 million other Bay Area residents with pristine water straight from the Sierra.

All that would be needed would be to blow up the dam, which Yosemite godfather John Muir fought to his dying breath in 1914. The Schwarzenegger administration in 2006 estimated the cost at $3 billion to $10 billion.

Lungren said Yosemite holds a special spot in his heart, as it is where he met his wife. But his critics, pointing to his zero rating from the League of Conservation Voters, say Lungren's environmental record is anything but romantic.

They suspect that Lungren is taunting San Francisco liberals or positioning himself for a re-election race in a competitive district against Democratic challenger Ami Bera, who touts a " 'smart' and 'green' relationship with the earth"...

The battle over restoring the Hetch Hetchy dates back to the Reagan administration. Democrats have always smelled a GOP stunt that forces Democrats to defend a dam in a national park and lets Republicans quote John Muir about the splendor of mountains...

Harrington (general manager of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission) said he can't debate Lungren's personal attachment to the park. "But let's face it," he said. "Everybody who has ever talked about going after Hetch Hetchy has been conservative Republicans who love to push it in San Francisco's face."

He says that like it's a bad thing :)

On a serious note, I would ask our leftie friends the following: when is it acceptable to tear down a dam, and when is it not?

From links in the article, here's what Hetch Hetchy looks like now, and here's what it looked like before it was dammed (although I assume it appeared in color in real life!).

Where Non-Discrimination Principles And Aiding Students Conflict

You can tell by the title where the post is headed--go read it over at Rhymes With Right.

If You Don't Go To College, You Won't Be Successful In Life

That's the message conveyed by idiotic laws like this one:

D.C. Council Chairman Kwame R. Brown will introduce a bill Wednesday that would require all city high school students to apply to at least one college before graduating.

He's wasting the time of colleges as well as of students who have no need or desire to attend a college. Paternalism run amok--what a shock it's occurring in the nation's capital.

Mandating Techonology In Classrooms

This doesn't sound right:

Ann Rosenbaum, a former military police officer in the Marines, does not shrink from a fight, having even survived a close encounter with a car bomb in Iraq. Her latest conflict is quite different: She is now a high school teacher, and she and many of her peers in Idaho are resisting a statewide plan that dictates how computers should be used in classrooms.

Last year, the state legislature overwhelmingly passed a law that requires all high school students to take some online classes to graduate, and that the students and their teachers be given laptops or tablets. The idea was to establish Idaho's schools as a high-tech vanguard.

To help pay for these programs, the state may have to shift tens of millions of dollars away from salaries for teachers and administrators. And the plan envisions a fundamental change in the role of teachers, making them less a lecturer at the front of the room and more of a guide helping students through lessons delivered on computers.

This change is part of a broader transformation that is creating tension – a tension that is especially visible in Idaho but is playing out across the country. Some teachers, even though they may embrace classroom technology, feel policymakers are thrusting computers into classrooms without their input or proper training. And some say they are opposed to shifting money to online classes and other teaching methods whose benefits remain unproven.

Do legislators know enough about education that they should mandate things like this, or might they be responding to a, uh, "special interest", or might they just be sticking their nose where it doesn't belong? There are valid arguments both for and against having technology in some classes, but to mandate it willy-nilly is just plain foolish.

You're Kidding!

Someone's figuring out that this isn't going to work:

A state-appointed panel said Tuesday that California's plan to build a high-speed rail system in the state is not financially feasible and should be placed on hold.

The report by the California High-Speed Rail Peer Review Group said the state should not authorize $2.7 billion in bonds to build the initial section of the system.

It's not time for a "Hallelujah!" yet, but we're getting closer.

Update, 1/13/12: Closer still:

The CEO of a California High-Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA) that is now described as "embattled" even by the establishment media has announced his resignation less than two years after taking office.

It's not dead yet, but I hope we're in the twitching stage.

It Must Be A New Year

Tonight the gym was much more crowded than is usual for a Tuesday night. Must be all the "resolutioners"--they'll be gone by the end of February.

Indoctrinating 3rd Graders

Anyone out there want to support this?

Virginia Elementary School Indoctrinating Third-Graders With Occupy Sing-Along: “They Want More Money, They’re The 1%. . . I’m Happy To Be Part Of The 99%”…

There's a teacher out there who needs some remedial instruction about how to treat other people's children....

Update, 1/3/12: The school district defends the performance of this song, claiming it was written and performed by students.

“They’re actually claiming third-grade children wrote these lyrics and chose the topic as well,” Weasel Zippers wrote. “Because what eight-year-old child isn’t obsessed with class warfare?”

Seriously.

ADA Taken Too Far?

I understand, and support, the principles behind the Americans with Disabilities Act. Sometimes, though, people stretch that law beyond all bounds of reason:

Employers are facing more uncertainty in the wake of a letter from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission warning them that requiring a high school diploma from a job applicant might violate the Americans with Disabilities Act.

The development also has some wondering whether the agency’s advice will result in an educational backlash by creating less of an incentive for some high school students to graduate.

Hat tip to reader MikeAT for the link.

Happy New Year, Everyone!

Thanks for reading my blog.

Posts and Quotes of the Year

I've never done this before but will give it a try: here are the blog posts and statements I think represent some of my best or favorite work from 2011.

Posts
Cheating
OK, So You Voted For Obama 2 1/2 Years Ago...
Terror
Filter Bubbles

Statements
If government-run programs were the answer to every problem, we wouldn't always hear about funding them by eliminating "waste, fraud, and abuse" in some other government program. link

It's one thing to get frustrated about my situation sometimes, but completely another to get into "woe is me" mode. I do not want to go there, but it's one of the few places I can get to easily given my current lack of mobility. link

No one should have a "right" to anything I have to pay for. If someone is entitled to have me pay for something, then what they have is an "entitlement", not a right, and an entitlement can be altered or abolished by the same government that grants it. link

Government Spending Is Out of Control

Spending, 1990-2010

Recent US Federal Deficit Numbers

Obama Deficits	Bush Deficits
FY 2012: $1,101 billion	FY 2009: $1,413 billion
FY 2011: $1,299 billion	FY 2008: $248 billion
FY 2010: $1,293 billion	FY 2007: $161 billion

And remember, Obamacare costs aren't yet included above.

Was all this caused by the Iraq War? Not if these charts on defense spending are correct.

Welfare and other programs for the poor?

We're in deep kimchee.

Grading Update

I randomly picked 8--I graded 8 tests a day until they were done. I finished them a few days ago, and then chose 5--5 stats projects a day to grade. That ended up taking too long, so I cut it down to 3. Yesterday I counted; at 3 a day, I finish grading on Monday. We go back to school on Tuesday.

Nice!

Why Obamacare's Individual Mandate Is Wrong (Not Just Unconstitutional)

Government exists first and foremost for the sake of our protection. Without it, our lives and our property would not effectively be our own. Government exists also to promote our well-being. For its support, however, taxation is necessary, and we have tacitly agreed that, to be legitimate, these taxes must be passed by our elected representatives. By our own consent, we give up a certain proportion of our earnings for these purposes.

The money left in our possession, however, is our own -- to do with as we please. It is in this that our liberty largely lies. Romneycare and Obamacare, with the individual mandate, changes radically our relationship vis-a-vis the government. The former presupposes that state governments have the right to tell us how we are to spend our own money, and the latter presupposes that the federal government has that right as well. Both measures are tyrannical. They blur the distinction between public and private and extend the authority of the public over the disposition of that which is primordially private. Once this principle is accepted as legitimate, there is no limit to the authority of the government over us, and mandates of this sort will multiply -- as do-gooders interested in improving our lives by directing them encroach further and further into the one sphere in which we have been left free hitherto...

Raising taxes to reward free riders is, of course, objectionable. We should oppose it on principle. But it does not in and of itself narrow in any significant fashion the sphere of our liberty. It is a question of the proper use of the public purse. The individual mandate sets a new precedent. It extends government control to the private purse. link

When people want to discuss or debate politics with me, the first question I usually ask them is, what is the purpose of government? Anyone who cannot answer that question, who hasn't thought about that basic idea, is just spouting talking points without even knowing why they think what they do. My beliefs on the purpose of government are worded differently than in the first paragraph above, but the end result is effectively the same.

We Want A New Performing Arts Center!

I like that these people aren't asking the taxpayers to foot the bill:

A determined group of parents, educators, students and alumni will begin the new year by kicking off a search for corporate sponsors to help them build a state-of-the art performing arts center at El Camino Fundamental High School.

The organization – ecARTS – wants to build a 600-seat theater with an orchestra pit, backstage facilities and professional lighting and sound at the campus in north Sacramento. A large lobby would serve as a gallery for student art.

As I stated in the comments on that article:

As long as the taxpayers aren't on the line for the cost, why should anyone object to this project? Donors can pay for whatever they like.

What they're seeking is more than the taxpayer should have to pay for, and they're seeking money for this project the right way. Kudos.

Open Source College Textbooks, And The Cost of College In General

I see this as an interesting way to help mitigate the high costs of tuition, but that doesn't relieve our state government of providing a university education at a reasonable price--a reasonable price for the student and for the taxpayers.

Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg wants to create a digital library of free course materials for California college students.

The proposal, unveiled earlier this month, is bound to be popular with students grappling with rising tuition and fees at California's public colleges and universities.

I'm currently reading Change.edu, and the insights in that book regarding the goals, and the costs, of higher education are remarkable. I recommend it wholeheartedly. This, from the "Book Description" on the linked Amazon page:

While low-income students can’t find a spot in their local community colleges for lack of funding, public four-year universities are spending staggering sums on luxurious residence halls, ever-bigger football stadiums, and obscure research institutes. We have cosseted our most advantaged students even as we deny access to the working adults who urgently need higher education to advance their careers and our economy. In Change.edu: Rebooting for the New Talent Economy, Andrew S. Rosen clearly and entertainingly details how far the American higher education system has strayed from the goals of access, quality, affordability, and accountability that should characterize our system, and offers a prescription to restore American educational pre-eminence.

You see, it's not that I think today's college students should sit idly by and pay whatever the universities see fit to charge. It's just that, having accepted the cost upon admission, they cannot then protest and raise hell and ask me, the taxpayer, to pay that cost for them. They chose that option; perhaps they should have read Change.edu and explored less costly options.

If you choose the resort lifestyle, don't expect me to pay for it. And if you choose the resort lifestyle whilst getting a bachelor's degree in "communications" or in Neo-classical Polish Music and Dance or in psychology or in Aggrieved Victim Studies, definitely don't expect me to pay for it.

Illegal Classes at School

I'm glad the ruling went this way:

An administrative law judge ruled Tuesday that a Tucson school district's ethnic studies program violates state law, agreeing with the findings of Arizona's public schools chief...

Kowal's ruling, first reported by The Arizona Daily Star, said the district's Mexican-American Studies program violated state law by having one or more classes designed primarily for one ethnic group, promoting racial resentment and advocating ethnic solidarity instead of treating students as individuals.

What was going on in those classes was quite different from what one might consider a "reasonable" ethnic studies class. Do we really need our schools promoting racial resentment and victimhood? I think there are plenty of other organizations out there willing to perform that socially corrosive "service", we don't need that kind of crap in schools.

What's My Status?

Several months ago, when walking still was a distant prospect, I set a goal of being able to kneel by Christmas so that I could put presents under the tree and retrieve them. Thankfully, yesterday I was able to do so. It still felt strange, but at least it wasn't excruciating or impossible. My injured leg still appears atrophied, but progress obviously continues. As of Christmas Day I'm cleared by the doctor to begin running, which I'll probably do on a treadmill, and I feel on track to run that mile on the 1-year anniversary of my accident.

My cold from the week before break started morphed into bronchitis, which antibiotics seem to be whipping. I may go to the gym tomorrow for the first time in over 2 weeks. It's been forever since I've been sick for so long; as I've said so many times recently, 2011 was not my year for health!

While I usually don't bring work home, I did bring a large stack of statistics tests and projects to grade. Grading fewer than 10 a day, so I don't get bored with grading, I've now knocked out all the tests. Tomorrow I start the projects.

Why Math Is Important

Especially if you're trying to get people to vote for your guy.

Why Capitalism Is So Important

It's important because it works:

One of the central dynamics that made Britain great for so long still seems to be working. Financial and economic crises recur in healthy capitalist economies. When these crises come, some countries that have only reluctantly embraced a capitalist system (and usually done so poorly and half heartedly), see the crisis as proof that capitalism is a flop, and lurch toward “alternative models” that generally lead to stagnation and the capture of the state by rent-seeking elites spouting empty populist slogans. Think Argentina. Think Greece.

Britain is one of the countries that historically responds to crises of capitalism by doubling down: seeking reforms that make capitalism work more effectively rather than trying to hobble and block it. Between World War Two and Maggie Thatcher Britain lost its way, bumbling through decades of decline and well intentioned but hopeless efforts to find some other way to grow.

I defy anyone to find a better economic system for creating general prosperity, especially when it is coupled with a democratic-style government.

Communism

There are lefties out there who talk like this:

On Monday I noted Vaclav Havel’s death; there was an interesting article on Havel at The Guardian by Neil Clark:

No one questions that Havel, who went to prison twice, was a brave man who had the courage to stand up for his views. Yet the question which needs to be asked is whether his political campaigning made his country, and the world, a better place.

Havel’s anti-communist critique contained little if any acknowledgement of the positive achievements of the regimes of eastern Europe in the fields of employment, welfare provision, education and women’s rights. Or the fact that communism, for all its faults, was still a system which put the economic needs of the majority first.

What's worse is that they actually think like this, although I admit to using the word "think" loosely in this case.

Occupy This Nativity Scene

These are the people lefties support:

I hope the disinfectant of sunlight is enough to make "occupy" supporters ashamed of their stupidity. Have any of them done anything right yet? Have they accomplished anything positive?

Their movement has petered out, but I'm not going to stop pointing out its flaws. I will ensure they serve as a warning to the next utopians who come along.

Merry Christmas

May you experience happiness and health on this most revered of holidays.

Eating The Whale One Bite At A Time

As a rule, I don't bring work home with me.

I try to do all my correcting at school. I'm pretty efficient when correcting, and can often get it done during my prep period and in "free time" during class. I don't want to bring work home with me. I don't balance my checkbook at work, and I don't grade papers at home.

Sometimes, though, I have to give in. Over the break I've brought home 2 classes' worth of stats tests as well as the stats project write-ups. That's a lot of grading to be done. And of course, the best time to do that is during the holidays, right? (sarcastic voice on) It's not like there's anything else going on. (sarcastic voice off)

I hate grading papers at home, but these need to be done with my usual attention to detail. I've decided to grade 8 tests a day. It doesn't take me that long at all to do 8, so it doesn't seem like a major imposition on my time. When the tests are all graded, I'll do maybe 4 or 5 survey write-ups a day. I may be grading a few extra the last night before we go back to school, but other than that I won't feel like I spent so much of my time grading because I nickel-and-dimed it over two weeks.

I've Been Recommending This For Years

If you want a university degree, you should have knowledge of more than just your chosen field of study. I'm not saying that a modern dance major needs to know particle physics in order to get a degree, but said major should know at least Algebra 2 (the requirement for admission to California state universities) and how to write a term paper. Darren's rule, which I know rubs some people the wrong way: those who need remedial math or English should get such help before stepping foot onto a university campus, most likely at a junior college:

Wracked with frustration over the state's legions of unprepared high school graduates, the California State University system next summer will force freshmen with remedial needs to brush up on math or English before arriving on campus...

"I'm not at all optimistic that it's going to help," said Sally Murphy, a communications professor who directs general education at Cal State East Bay, where 73 percent of this year's freshmen were not ready for college math. Nearly 60 percent were not prepared for college English.

Yes, it's that bad. And while we can point the fingers at the local East Bay K-12 system and say they're not doing their job, that's not reason enough to compel taxpayers like me to foot the bill for these unprepared students to attend a university.

Sadly, though, CSU isn't even considering requiring students to go learn what they failed in 13 years of K-12 education to learn. No, they're only requiring a 15-hr online intervention that conceivably will give students enough knowledge, for just enough time, to pass a test which, miraculously, says they're now OK for the university. I would send them to JC and tell them to learn the material.

We're talking about getting a university degree here. Shouldn't that mean something? I got a math degree, but I can also talk intelligently about history, about (some of) the classics, about philosophy, about geography, about the military. I can write coherently. A well-rounded education should be the standard, not the pipe-dream, but we'll never get there as long as we continue to accept underqualified students into our universities and then allow them to earn degrees in narrow fields without the benefits of a liberal arts education.

I often hear about universities or courses that are "impacted", meaning there are too many students for the seats available. Getting rid of un(der)qualified students should solve that problem nicely.

Gotta Love Stories Like This One

And to think he was almost yanked from life support:

Sam Schmid, an Arizona college student believed to be brain dead and poised to be an organ donor, miraculously recovered just hours before doctors were considering taking him off life support.

As his mother said, what a great Christmas gift.

Anyone Not Remember This Story?

Anyone curious how it turned out?

Back in the spring of 1988, they’d all been friends at Seat Pleasant Elementary, part of a class of fifth-graders from some of Prince George’s County’s poorest neighborhoods.

Then, on a May afternoon, they received an unexpected gift that would alter their lives: the promise of a college education, paid for by two wealthy businessmen. Suddenly, the 11-year-olds were part of an ambitious social experiment being tried across the country, one that brought together rich benefactors and needy kids in a largely untested but intimate style of philanthropy aimed at lifting entire families out of poverty.

At Seat Pleasant, the promise generated a wave of publicity and excitement, transforming the fifth-graders into symbols of hope in their own neighborhoods and well beyond. The scholarships gave them a chance to achieve a kind of success that had eluded most of their parents. Yet their good fortune also became a burden that would endure long after they reached adulthood. The questions followed them: What would become of William Smith, Darone Robinson and the rest of the Seat Pleasant 59?

Would they graduate from high school?

Would they make it to college?

What would they make of their gift?

The Stats Teacher In Me Loves This

Gotta love how we can use stats to demolish a modern myth:

Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Brian Jones and Amy Winehouse all passed away at age 27, leading some to believe this is a particularly risky and unlucky age for musicians.

Not so, says a study that finds that the "27 Club," as it's been named, may just be a coincidence. Research debunking the theory was released Tuesday in the Christmas edition of the British Journal of Medicine, because apparently nothing says the holidays like studies about dead musicians.

Click on the link to learn how the study was done.

College Entrance Exams in Korea

This article from The Economist is all about the social and personal costs of this particular high stakes test, but I'm somewhat enamored of a country that values education so highly that its people act this way:

ON NOVEMBER 10th South Korea went silent. Aircraft were grounded. Offices opened late. Commuters stayed off the roads. The police stood by to deal with emergencies among the students who were taking their university entrance exams that day.

That's impressive, so let's read on:

Every year the country comes to a halt on the day of the exams, for it is the most important day in most South Koreans’ lives. The single set of multiple-choice tests that students take that day determines their future. Those who score well can enter one of Korea’s best universities, which has traditionally guaranteed them a job-for-life as a high-flying bureaucrat or desk warrior at a chaebol (conglomerate). Those who score poorly are doomed to attend a lesser university, or no university at all. They will then have to join a less prestigious firm and, since switching employers is frowned upon, may be stuck there for the rest of their lives. Ticking a few wrong boxes, then, may mean that they are permanently locked out of the upper tier of Korean society.
In this section

Making so much depend on an exam has several advantages for Korea. It is efficient: a single set of tests identifies intelligent and diligent teenagers, and launches them into society’s fast stream. It is meritocratic: poor but clever Koreans can rise to the top by studying very, very hard. The exam’s importance prompts children to pay attention in class and parents to hound them about their homework; and that, in turn, ensures that Korea’s educational results are the envy of the world. The country is pretty much the leading nation in the scoring system run by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). In 2009 it came fourth after Shanghai, Singapore and Hong Kong, but those are cities rather than full-sized countries.

Korea’s well-educated, hard-working population has powered its economic miracle. The country has risen from barefoot to broadband since 1960, and last year, despite the global slowdown, its economy grew by 6.2%. In the age of the knowledge economy, education is economic destiny. So the system has had far-reaching and beneficial consequences.

Kids care when the tests have personal meaning--unlike California's annual standardized testing, that has no direct meaning for students at all.

Update, 12/21/11: This comment (why can't I link to a specific comment on this post?) is so awesome that I'm reproducing part of it here. While I support a free K-12 system in this country, I see the value in the following:

For example, textbooks are not issued by the schools. The textbooks are typically paperback books, printed on cheap paper, printed in two or three colors, and bought in local bookstores for $10-$15 each.

When I taught in a public high school here in the states, the students were issued books by the school, and since folks tend not to value things they don't pay for, the campus lost thousands of dollars per year in texts that were not returned, for one reason or another.

Korean texts-- at least the high school math texts which I have, from about ten years ago-- aren't larded with photos that show diverse groups of students sitting around and smiling as they use graphing calculators, or other such fluff. They are pretty much all business.

He Gave A "D" To The Wrong Person

Was he fired because of it?

James Franco’s tired James Dean act got an NYU professor booted from the school last year — after the teacher dared to give the overhyped Hollywood hunk a “D” for blowing off class, a lawsuit charges.

José Angel Santana said he slapped the “127 Hours’’ star with the bad grade because he missed 12 of his 14 “Directing the Actor II” classes while pursuing a master’s in fine arts...

Santana, who is suing NYU in Manhattan Supreme Court for his job back, asserts that Franco, whose career took off after a 2001 portrayal of James Dean, acted like a rebel without a clue in his other courses, too, blowing off just as many classes. But the star’s other professors at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts still gave him good grades, Santana said.

Big names such as Franco’s typically translate into big bucks for universities.

Is Franco a cash cow for the school, a prima donna, a victim, or a straw at which a fired professor can grasp? I don't deny he's pretty, but that doesn't earn you a grade.

Will I Live Or Not

Just got up a little bit ago after 12 hrs in bed--most of that asleep! I feel alive but, like yesterday, have no voice at all. It'll be interesting trying to work with the bank today, since what I need to do is something they require be done over the phone!

This is a heck of a way to be spending a break.

I Know Blogging's Been Light Lately

Usually when I post a "why blogging's been light lately" post, I include pictures from Reno or Las Vegas or the ski slope. Sadly, I have no such pictures this time.

For the first time in forever, I'm really sick. Usually a cold will get me for a day or two, but this is the 6th consecutive day and while I'm no longer dying, I don't seem to be healing. I feel like I've coughed up entire city blocks from my chest, and as the old saying goes, There's more where that came from.

So I stay at home, drinking green tea, eating sparingly, snacking not-so-sparingly, and trying to will this illness away. Until it goes, though, I'm just having a hard time getting motivated to comment on events in the blogosphere.

Keep coming back, though, as I'm bound to get fired up about something eventually!

Making Ourselves Look Like Idiots

We're teaching children when we do stupid stuff like this, but it isn't what we think we're teaching them, and it isn't anything good:

For the rest of the semester, a Rutherford County elementary student has to eat lunch at the "silent table" for allegedly waving around a slice of pizza some say resembled a gun.

Nicholas Taylor attends David Youree Elementary School in Smyrna, about 30 miles southeast of Nashville.

School leaders say the 10-year-old threatened other students at his lunch table with a piece of pizza with bites out of it so it looked like a gun and when asked about it was initially not truthful.

I'm embarrassed to work in the same field as these idiots.

I'm Worried About My Grade

According To My Page-A-Day Calendar...

...Happy Boston Tea Party Day!

Health Update

I made it back to work today. When people asked how I was feeling, about the best reply I could come up with was that my chances of dying today were lower than they were two days ago :)

I made it back and found everything in its place--my substitute was a friend who retired last June, so she knew how to run everything. I participated in our after-school snackie social, and now I need to make cornbread for tomorrow's luncheon in our staff lounge.

Yesterday, while hobbling around the house, I noticed that the odd feelings in my injured knee are significantly less noticeable than they've been in the past. I can still feel something "not quite right" in there, but it's not near as obvious as it has been. I'm taking this to mean that improvement is still occurring, and that come next April I will be able to run that mile on the anniversary of my accident.

Right now, though, I need to go lie down and rest a bit. I so despise feeling ill....

Dodging One Bullet In A Hail Of Machine Gun Fire

Many of California's teachers cheered last summer when the state budget required school districts to maintain the same staffing as they had last year, even if budgets were cut. "At least we won't lose any jobs", was the prevailing thought. And since California was projecting wine and ambrosia in its budget, it was thought that there would be no reason to have midyear cuts.

Sober minds knew better.

We've been waiting for the "trigger", the amount of budget shortfall that could trigger midyear budget cuts, and it's been reached:

The Democratic governor said Tuesday he expects California to fall $2.2 billion shy of its optimistic summer revenue forecast for the current fiscal year, triggering the $980 million in cuts.

Because of how Brown and lawmakers drafted the June budget, K-12 school districts could have lost as much as $1.5 billion in general-purpose funding – the equivalent of seven instructional days.

But Brown's latest revenue snapshot was robust enough that schools will instead face a smaller $79.6 million reduction in general funding and a $248 million elimination of bus transportation money. That should avert massive reductions in the school calendar or other drastic measures for most districts...

Still, districts remain nervous because Brown threatened Tuesday to impose deeper cuts next fall if voters reject his $7 billion plan to raise sales taxes, as well as income taxes on the wealthy.

Brown said he will propose "far more than a billion" in new cuts when he releases his budget in January. It is unclear how large his fiscal office believes the deficit will be, but the Legislative Analyst's Office pegged the figure last month at $12.8 billion.

"Schools may have dodged a bullet in December," said education lobbyist Kevin Gordon. "But they may find that in the budget come January, their share of a $13 billion hole will add to the uncertainty they've lived with the last couple of years."

The governor wants to increase taxes. The one or two fiscal conservatives left in California aren't impressed:

Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, whom the governor has blamed for dousing the last Capitol tax negotiation, said Brown's tax plan would drive business out of state.

Wait, that can't be true!

This, ladies and gentlemen, is the Golden State.

Companies Still Leaving California

What is it that these lefties think--are things so bad in California that we need more regulation and higher taxes? If so, to what end? And when jobs leave to Texas they scream about "deregulation" or some other bugaboo, which is supposed to give us the idea that Texas is some lawless place, but I'm not reading about environmental nightmares coming out of Texas. When you read a story about a child born with an arm sticking out of his/her forehead, let me know.

So to these people who think that we need even more regulation and higher taxes, I have to ask how you respond to these two stories:

Waste Connections Inc., the Sacramento region's largest publicly traded company, said Monday it's moving to Texas.

The departure of the Folsom-based garbage hauling and landfill firm will cost the region just 100 or so jobs. But losing one of the area's few publicly traded companies carries symbolic significance for a region struggling to build a private-sector employment base to reduce its reliance on government...

The company's top executive also used the announcement to take a parting shot at California's business climate and political leadership. Waste Connections first warned state officials it was considering a move in August.

"This state has the highest state tax rates in the nation, and they're going higher," Waste Connections' CEO Ron Mittelstaedt said in a telephone interview Monday.

California, he said, is "structurally and fiscally broke." link

Then there's this one:

A California company that develops advanced superconducting wire said it plans to move most of its business and 135 jobs to Austin early next year...

"This is a good win for Austin," said Dave Porter, senior vice president of economic development for the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce, which collaborated with the Austin office of real estate firm CBRE in recruiting the company to Austin. "It continues the momentum we have seen out of California, with companies looking for a less-costly business environment."

The company's proposed average wage will be $75,000, Porter said, and most of its jobs are expected to be filled with local employees.

Superconductor Technologies did not seek local economic development incentives. The company also looked at locations in the Denver and Phoenix areas before deciding on Austin. link

Who will pay all these taxes when we run all the job producers out of the state?

Education Buzz

This week's is here, and I'm one of the host's 12 favorite education bloggers!

The Battle Does Not Go Well

I'm giving tests in 4 of my 5 classes tomorrow--I have to go to school today. I feel worse this morning than I did yesterday, and that's after a good night's sleep. Ugh.

I should plan on *not* going tomorrow, just in case. A sub can administer the tests if I die!

Update, 3:57 pm: I felt so bad in 1st period today that I called a retired teacher and asked if she could come in for me today. She couldn't, but she'll take over for me tomorrow. I gutted it out today but I'm home now, gonna crawl in bed....

No More Posting Today

Just got home from a long day at school. At the risk of providing too much information about my impending cold, I offer this:
If there were a way to convert snot to electricity, I could single-handedly power a small city.
Hope to be back tomorrow!

Rough Job Market For Recent Grads

It might be hard to notice from the even, detached tone in which I write this blog (hehe), but I have little sympathy for those who complain about not getting jobs when their degrees are in Aggrieved Victim Studies, communications, Sanskrit Literature, Film History, Psychology, and the like. Those are all perfectly valid majors, if you're seeking self-actualization and enjoyment. If you're seeking employment, these are not the majors you are looking for--and you don't need Obi Wan's handwave while saying it to make it true.

These people, on the other hand, I have genuine sympathy for, because we always hear about how important these fields are and how we need more graduates in such fields:

"I'm frustrated," said Sergey Savrasov, 21. Savrasov recently graduated from UC Santa Cruz with degrees in computational mathematics and business management economics. He now works for a Davis moving company.

"The response rate to applications is pretty slow," he said, "even though I'm a very qualified job candidate with two degrees"...

Savrasov speaks three languages and twice made the dean's honor list. But he's still hauling furniture out of recently sold homes...

Savrasov managed to complete his education without racking up huge debts – his parents picked up most of the costs. And he's still working.

Eduardo Salinas, 31, of Sacramento is not so fortunate.

A U.S. Marine Corps veteran, Salinas worked the last several years as a CAD drafter – he used computer software to create blueprints for construction projects.

Salinas believed that he could do more, though, and enrolled in the construction management program at ITT Technical Institute in Rancho Cordova. He went to school full time while working full time. In June, his employer laid him off.

Salinas graduated from ITT in September. Now he's struggling to find a job in the anemic construction industry. He owes $60,000 in student loans.

He still wants something more prestigious than his old job, which does not require a four-year degree, but he's worried that he may not find it. His backup plan is to start his own business.

"I just want to get my foot in the door," he said. "But that's impossible."

STEM is supposed to be the Promised Land....

Army-Navy Game

When the president and his entourage went to the center of the field for the coin toss, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army General Dempsey and Army Chief of Staff Ray Odierno got noticeably more applause than did the president or vice president. What they got was polite applause.

Updates later.

Later: turnovers are killing Army.

Later: now trailing 14-7 late in the 1st half. As is to be expected from these two teams, remarkably few penalties.

Later: tied at 14 at the half. My two favorite words this time of year are "Touchdown, Army!" Have been for 28 years....

Later: Not another Army fumble! And on a kickoff return, too. :(

Later: Army, down by 6, essentially loses the game on a bad offsides call with under 3 minutes left.

End: bad call, not a bad game. Army hurt itself in this one--but still played respectably.

Satirical Post From the Past

Just stumbled upon this one from a couple years ago and thought it entertaining enough to link to it--just in case you missed it the first time!

Professional Teachers, Practicing Tolerance With Open Minds

If this is how they act regarding a fellow adult, do you think they really allow students to express their views in class? Are the teachers truly impartial in their dealings?

Apparently there’s no room for free thought or disagreement within the Wisconsin Education Association Council.

We suppose that’s not terribly surprising for a group that has to force its members to join.

Still, it’s troubling to hear that Kristi LaCroix, the courageous public school teacher who had the guts to film a television ad supporting Gov. Scott Walker’s reforms, is being harassed by union zealots to the point where she wants to change careers...

“Going through and deleting my daily amount of hate mail that is sent to my work email. I have now been assured, by one of the emails (all of which I forward to my Principal) that there is an online movement called ‘Fire Kristi‘ where they are going to email, post and talk to everyone (telling) millions of stories to ruin my reputation, career and life."

There's something very, very wrong with teachers in Wisconsin. We've heard from this crowd before....

What To Do About The School Paper

I came across two stories today about college newspapers.

Sac State:

An inflammatory cartoon published last year in Sacramento State's student newspaper has prompted the university's provost to push for greater oversight by faculty.

Provost Joseph Sheley in September told the Publications Board – made up of faculty advisers and students – to make changes to The Hornet's policies or he would consider taking the newspaper out of the curriculum at California State University, Sacramento, so students would no longer earn credits for writing for it.

On Tuesday, Sheley told The Bee he doesn't want to censor the paper or break ethical rules. "I want the advisers and the editors to work a little harder," he said. "To discuss the issues and some of the pitfalls that might accompany certain kinds of stories, instead of dissecting them after the fact."

Self-censorship is still censorship.

Yeshiva University:

An online student newspaper at a private Jewish university in New York lost its funding after it refused to take down a literary column detailing a sexual encounter between two students...

Matt Yaniv, Yeshiva University’s associate director of media relations, said in a statement Thursday that the school did not pull funding from The Beacon.

“The Beacon received their funding from the school’s student government, who allocates funds to all student clubs,” he wrote in an email to FoxNews.com. “After posting an article that made many students uncomfortable, the student council president approached The Beacon editors on behalf of the students, asking them to take it down.

“After an amicable discussion between the two sides, The Beacon decided to part ways and become an independent publication.”

The university, Yaniv said, acted only as a “mediator” between the newspaper and student council.

He who pays the piper calls the tune?

No Holiday Luncheon? No way!

In years past at my school, the Friday before Christmas break included an extended lunch period and a staff potluck luncheon in the library (the biggest room that can hold all of us). However, many on staff could not attend because phones have to be manned, students at lunch need supervision, etc.

Thursdays are short days for students; the last 75 minutes of the work day is "collaboration time". An idea was floated that we could have our luncheon on Thursday at 1:50, after the students have gone, so that everyone could attend. Sounds like a plan, right?

Too many people couldn't eat a small enough lunch during the normal lunch period to tie them over until 1:50, so instead we'll have our normal lunch period and at 1:50 we'll have appetizers and snacks. It's nice, but it's not like the old staff luncheons.

Our campus is very spread out, enough so that we have 3 staff lounges. During lunch today those of us in the lounge where I eat were lamenting the loss of the staff luncheon, but since in our lounge we often have "try mines" (potlucks), we got to thinking. One lady suggested a "try mine" for next Friday, and another said she'd brings a crock pot of soup. I said I'd bring corn bread, others started offering, and after lunch today I sent out an email to the usual denizens of our lounge gauging interest--and interest is quite high.

So next Thursday after school we'll have our whole-staff "hors d'ouvres", and on Friday our lounge will have a soup and salad lunch. All in all, not a bad way to roll into Christmas break!

Supporting the Occupy Movement

Today after our staff meeting our union rep discussed a few things, including CTA's support of the Occupy movement. Someone has suggested our local union to support it, too.

They're a day late and a dollar short. The Occupy movement is done, stick a fork in it.

My Jacket

I have a friend who's very active in community theater, both as an actor and as a director.

A year or more ago, he bought a jacket at a thrift store. He needed it for a character in one of his plays. The jacket cost $5.

When the play was over the actor didn't want the jacket, and since it was my size my friend offered it to me. A fleece-type interior and a suede-type exterior? So warm and comfortable! I accepted. The sleeves are a little long for me, so I roll them up a few inches so they don't encompass my hands, but other than that it's a great jacket.

And it's the only article of clothing I wear that elicits comments at work, both from students and from staff. Everyone loves this coat! This week a vice principal told me that if I ever left that coat lying around somewhere, he'd make off with it.

To me it's just a very warm, comfortable coat. But to everyone else, it's the most stylish thing around. Who knew?

Update, 12/23/11: I finally got around to getting a picture of it, although the colors don't look perfect:

It's actually somewhat lighter in color, but you get the idea.

Making the Commitment

Today, after a couple years of "thinking about it" and a couple weeks of trying to get my district to approve it, I finally got my district to approve my participation in the University of Idaho's Engineering Outreach Program. Through this program I'll earn a Master of Arts in Teaching Mathematics after taking 8 math courses and 2 education courses via distance learning (which is someone different than an "online program"). I plan to start next September and finish in 2-2 1/2 years.

Until then I'll never see another pay raise since I'm "topped out" for my education level. I considered doing a 10-month program at a so-called diploma mill and getting a "Masters in Education with an emphasis on Curriculum and Instruction", but I view that as mere jumping through hoops. I'd rather spend 2 1/2 years and get a degree that's personally rewarding and fulfilling rather than just rushing through a program to get something, anything, just to get a pay raise.

The die is cast. The Rubicon will be crossed next fall. Watch out, Rome, here I come.

If They Knew More Math, Maybe They'd Have Jobs

Yes, I'm talking about the Occupy crowd:

As Occupy Wall Street turns its focus to D.C. this week, its long-term agenda seems to be higher taxes for the top 1% and firmer government support for everyone else.

If so, then what the protesters want — even if they aren't saying it and almost certainly don't even realize it — is higher taxes for the 99%.

Hat tip to Instapundit, from whom I paraphrased the title of this post.

What Do People Get Out Of Raising A Stink About Christmas?

I can understand not having creches in classrooms, and not emphasizing the religious components of the holiday known as Christmas, but some people go way too far:

Controversy is embroiling a California town over allegations that elementary school teachers have been told they cannot display poinsettias or Santa Claus in their classroom over fears that it might offend people.

“District office would like to remind everyone when displaying holiday decorations in and around school to be mindful no association to any religious affiliation i.e. Santa, poinsettias, Christmas trees, etc,” read a document obtained by News 10 in Sacramento that was reportedly sent to teachers at Claudia Landeen Elementary School in Stockton, CA.

Since when are poinsettias or Santa religious decorations? I don't recall reading about them in the Bible--or in any other religious text, for that matter.

Yes, Christmas has a Christian foundation, but it's also a secular holiday. If they want to forbid angels and "stars of Bethlehem" in classrooms, that's fine, but a poinsettia or a tree or Santa Claus? That's someone who's way too uptight, capable of making diamonds from the coal in their clenched buttocks.

The Latest Edition of Climategate

The latest release of emails is just as damning as the first:

New and explosive revelations continue to emerge from the Climategate 2 emails, two weeks after the 5,000-plus emails were first publicly unveiled. While Climategate 2 does not share the “novelty factor” of Climategate 1, the contents of the Climategate 2 emails are at least as appalling as Climategate 1. Most importantly, the Climategate 2 emails show scientists at the forefront of global warming activism acknowledging serious flaws in alarmist global warming theory, working together to hide data contradicting alarmist global warming theory, and taking concerted and nefarious action to ruin the careers of scientists and peer-reviewed science journal editors who publish studies and data that undermine alarmist global warming claims.

As one of the commenters said at the linked article:

The very young field of climate science has allowed itself to be politicized to the point where nothing coming from it can be trusted to shape government policies...especially economic policy.

If You Don't Like "Big Bankers", You Can't Like Barack Obama.

Do you want to listen to what he says, or note what he does?

Despite his occasional remarks that decry “fat cat”’ bankers, Obama has effectively serviced the financial bigwigs. Bank prosecutions have declined markedly under Obama — to levels not seen for more than 25 years. Obama has even tried to derail aggressive bank prosecutions pursued by state attorneys general, most of them liberal Democrats.

What do we call someone who says one thing and does another?

Firefly

Back in 2002, when Joss Whedon's Firefly was on, I was watching other shows and didn't want to commit to yet another. I heard it was good, but I always figured I'd watch it some day in the future.

That day came when my Kindle Fire, loaded with a month of Amazon Prime, arrived. With a free month of downloads I started watching Doctor Who, at the suggestion of a teacher at school, but after a few episodes just couldn't get into it. I tried Firefly, and was hooked in less than the first episode.

I was one of the relatively few who was hooked, though. Its broadcast life was short, airing only 11 of the 14 episodes that were shot. Amazon Prime has all 14 available for streaming, and last night I watched the last one.

I saw the movie, Serenity, when it came out, but since I didn't know the back story I'm sure I missed a lot of it. Tonight I'll stream Serenity.

Great series.

Update: Dang it! Serenity isn't on Amazon Prime, so I have to pay for it! I'll watch something else tonight (my one month of Prime that came with the Kindle runs out in less than 2 weeks) and watch Serenity after my freebies run out.

A More Dignified Way To Protest

You don't have to forego showers, bang on drums, block access to public or private property, or scream Marxist talking points to make your point. Sometimes, a little creativity and maturity can go a long way:

The most unusual aspect of Utah State's 67-54 loss to Denver on Wednesday night wasn't that the Aggies lost at the Spectrum after 33 consecutive home wins.

It was that maybe the nation's most creative, ear-splitting student section was eerily silent at the opening tipoff.

Already angered by the letter of apology their school president sent BYU regarding taunts aimed at forward Brandon Davies last month, Utah State students grew more irate when an usher warned them Wednesday not to lean over the railings or do certain traditional chants. As a result, the entire Utah State student section staged a silent protest, remaining dead quiet for the first three minutes of the game.

I can't say whether what they're protesting is reasonable or valid or not, I'm commenting only on the conduct of their protest.

No, This Doesn't Make Educators Look Like Idiots At All.

Sheesh.

A Gastonia mother says her son was suspended for calling a teacher "cute.”

Chiquita Lockett said her 9-year-old son, Emanyea, spent the last two days at home.

Lockett said the principal of Brookside Elementary called her Wednesday to say the incident was a form of “sexual harassment.”

Emanyea told Eyewitness News a substitute teacher overheard him tell another student a teacher was cute.

Then he was suspended.

Go read the whole thing--the district spokespeople don't appear to add any "missing" information to what's mentioned above.

Good job, PC police. You've now gotten a child suspended from school for telling someone that someone else is "cute". You must be so proud.

Hat tip to Hot Air.

Update, 10/8/11: The principal has been canned. Seems like a bit of overkill to me, but that's the decision that was made.

The Higher Education Bubble

Like tulip bulbs or tech or housing, higher education appears to be a ready-to-burst bubble, and Glenn Reynolds (a law professor) has been predicting it for years. Here are his current thoughts on the subject:

A couple of years back, I suggested in these pages that higher education was facing a bubble much like the housing bubble: An overpriced good, propped up by cheap government-subsidized credit, luring borrowers and lenders alike into a potentially disastrous mess.

Subsequent events have proved me right as students have begun to think twice about indebtedness and schools have begun to face pressure over tuition. For higher education, costs have skyrocketed even as the value of their product has been declining, and people are starting to notice.

Just last week, the New York Times, normally a big fan of higher education, ran an article on "The Dwindling Power of a College Degree." In our grandparents' day, a college diploma nearly guaranteed a decent job.

Now, not so much: "One of the greatest changes is that a college degree is no longer the guarantor of a middle-class existence. Until the early 1970s, less than 11 percent of the adult population graduated from college, and most of them could get a decent job. Today nearly a third have college degrees, and a higher percentage of them graduated from non-elite schools. A bachelor's degree on its own no longer conveys intelligence and capability."

This is a simple case of inflation: When you artificially pump up the supply of something (whether it's currency or diplomas), the value drops. The reason why a bachelor's degree on its own no longer conveys intelligence and capability is that the government decided that as many people as possible should have bachelor's degrees.

There's something of a pattern here. The government decides to try to increase the middle class by subsidizing things that middle class people have: If middle class people go to college and own homes, then surely if more people go to college and own homes, we'll have more middle class people.

But homeownership and college aren't causes of middle-class status, they're markers for possessing the kinds of traits -- self-discipline, the ability to defer gratification, etc. -- that let you enter, and stay in, the middle class.

Correlation is not causation. Go read the whole thing.

To My Austrian Readers

Enjoy Krampus Night!

I Guess It's Good I Didn't Put Down A Deposit

This is disappointing news, as I wanted to buy one--and not just for its environmental impact.

Keeping an HIV-Positive Student Out Of School?

It's a boarding school, so I guess the possibilities for, uh, "transmitting the disease" are a little higher than at a neighborhood public school:

The Hershey, Pa., boarding school that denied an HIV-positive 13-year-old boy entry said today that the school's residential setting and the risk of sexual activity made the teen too much of a "threat."

The AIDS Law Project filed suit on behalf of the unidentified boy Wednesday in Philadelphia District Court, alleging that the Milton Hershey School violated the Americans with Disabilities Act, which includes HIV in its scope.

"This young man is a motivated, intelligent kid who poses no health risk to other students, but is being denied an educational opportunity because of ignorance and fear about HIV and AIDS," said Ronda Goldfein, the boy's lawyer...

(School spokesperson) McNamara knows well that coughing, hugging, and public restrooms won't cause someone to get HIV.

She said the school was most worried the boy would have sex -- if not now, at some point in his future years at the school, where students in groups of 10-12 live together in on-campus housing.

"Our kids are no different than teenagers anywhere else," she said. "Despite encouraging abstinence, we can not be 100 percent certain our kids are not engaging in sexual activity."

Can they keep him out? Should they keep him out?

TSA--Too Stupid A-holes

Now the design of a gun on a purse gets you detained? Really?

It's not unusual for 17-year-old to find themselves in hot water with the fashion police. But on a flight from Virginia to Florida, Vanessa Gibbs found herself detained by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) over the appearance of her purse.

And just to be clear, it wasn't the content inside the purse that the TSA objected to. No, agency officials took exception with the design of a gun on Gibbs' handbag.

They really must be the stupidest people on the planet.

You Don't Like The Koch Brothers, Whoever They Are?

Then you must *really* not like the 78 organizations above Koch Industries on the influence and lobbying list--and I notice a lot more "leans heavily Democratic" than "leans heavily Republican" in those 78. In fact, you have to go to #19 on the list before you see a single elephant symbol. Five of the top ten donors are unions, and you know which way they lean.

Anyone Have Any Witty Titles For This Post?

Some people are just sick:

A third-grade teacher who resigned this week after parents accused her of dressing their daughters in lingerie and photographing them at a Christmas party was arrested on Thursday.

Crain had been an elementary teacher for six years in McLoud, Oklahoma, about 30 miles east of Oklahoma City, when she allegedly invited third- and fourth-grade girls to her home last month for a Christmas party. She is accused of having the girls dress in holiday-themed bras and panties and photographing them.

What could possibly be sexually appealing about 8 and 9-year-olds? Ew.

Willie Brown on California

From a column he wrote almost 2 years ago:

If we as a state want to make a New Year's resolution, I suggest taking a good look at the California we have created. From our out-of-sync tax system to our out-of-control civil service, it's time for politicians to begin an honest dialogue about what we've become.

Take the civil service.

The system was set up so politicians like me couldn't come in and fire the people (relatives) hired by the guy they beat and replace them with their own friends and relatives.

Over the years, however, the civil service system has changed from one that protects jobs to one that runs the show.

The deal used to be that civil servants were paid less than private sector workers in exchange for an understanding that they had job security for life.

But we politicians, pushed by our friends in labor, gradually expanded pay and benefits to private-sector levels while keeping the job protections and layering on incredibly generous retirement packages that pay ex-workers almost as much as current workers.

Talking about this is politically unpopular and potentially even career suicide for most officeholders. But at some point, someone is going to have to get honest about the fact that 80 percent of the state, county and city budget deficits are due to employee costs.

Either we do something about it at the ballot box, or a judge will do something about in Bankruptcy Court. And if you think I'm kidding, just look at Vallejo.

Hat tip to NewsAlert.

Does Everyone Have A Right To Be Respected

In an open letter to his school's new chancellor, professor and columnist Mike Adams says "no":

I hope you see the danger in granting a “right” to be respected. Once students begin to believe that respect is an entitlement they are granted - and not a privilege they must earn - the academic work product suffers.

I find his argument compelling. What do you think?

Some People Are Savages

What could possibly motivate people to act this way?

A teenage girl is battered and beaten inside a Detroit school restroom while other girls watch and record the whole thing. However, this isn't the first time this girl has been assaulted at school. Her family says administrators know about the fighting and chose to look the other way.

Sick.

If I Went To The Naval Academy...

...I'd be unhappy, too!

When Democrats Call For The Deaths of Republicans...

...is anyone truly surprised anymore? This from the civility crowd....

I Keep Telling You...

He who has eyes to see, let him see:

All one needs to do is to go over to OWS's official website. Under the very first article, entitled Who We Are, the group details their goals. Wade through some rambling craziness and you will come to a link, created and put there by the founders of the protests.

Simply follow that link and in big letters you will see this:

You know, I could swear that that says they want to stomp out capitalism... probably because they say they want to stomp out capitalism.

And under their declaration, it reads:

This is their official website. This is not some random guy rambling on the forum. This was put there by their founders. (boldface mine--Darren)

To those who say that many in the movement are believers, that they may just be young and impressionable and may not have enough experience in the world to know the "right" way to accomplish their goals, I say that we have a term for them: useful idiots, pawns of the people who posted the what's shown above.

And let's not forget that the California Teachers Association supports these people, enough to print signs for them with CTA's logo on the bottom.

What is it that these people have against capitalism? I'm reminded of something Milton Friedman once said on Phil Donahue's show:

Note how Donahue opens this clip, talking about the "maldistribution of wealth", in what could be ripped from today's headlines. Friedman has the perfect response, "In the only cases in which the masses have escaped from the kind of grinding poverty you're talking about, the only cases in recorded history, are where they have had capitalism and largely free trade. If you want to know where the masses are worse off, worst off, it's exactly in the kinds of societies that depart from that." Friedman also addresses so-called greed, commentary I find both hilarious and 100% correct.

If someone can show me that, historically, when wealth is "distributed" in a certain way, that the society collapses, and can show me that we're approaching that point, then I'll entertain discussion about higher tax rates for the rich and other such related issues. Until then I'll just consider such talk to be populist class warfare of the most base sort, conducted by the most base sort of people.

Update: What's causing this increased income disparity?

The Occupiers are right about American incomes: They've definitely grown more unequal. But this fact presents three inconvenient truths for the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Click and find out :-)