Shake off the working blues and let the good times roll. . .
You can read here about how President Bush is angering conservatives with his criticisms of their criticism of the immigration bill. Seems everyone opposed to the immigration bill is a nativist, or worse, a racist. I am not sure what is so wrong with thinking of the United States as an exclusive private country club, where members are invited in for their skill. It shouldn't surprise anyone if members are upset when they find the golf course is full of guys wearing cut-off jean shorts and muscle shirts toting cases of beer.
Hillary Clinton has unveiled her new technology plan. Let me take a wild guess. It involves heave government participation. Read it here.
Obama apparently was a basketball star in Hawaii. Read about that here. I bet he is also and excellent cook, father, poet, etc.
Apparently the choice of college commencement speakers has veered left in this past year. That has got to be a hard thing to do. Liberal out numbered conservative 8-to-1. Read it here.
British education ministers are set to recommend that teachers stop asking kids to raise their hands in class. This is so the more timid children will have a chance to participate. Read it here. I couldn't be more strongly against this. What this will really do is squelch the enthusiasm of the eager learners. I fail to see how this de-motivation can be a good thing. This is part of a long trend of feminizing schools by taking away the competition. Kids (mainly boys) quit trying because what's the point. This is a massive problem, with colleges moving close to being populated by 60% women. Who are these girls going to marry? I could go on and on. Feel free to share your own experiences. I know there are a few educators reading this.
Let me conclude with some thoughts I had last night. After my softball game (our team has given up a total of 1 run the last three games, unheard of in softball), there was some chat about sports news. One of the stories discussed was the Alex Rodriguez controversy (general womanizing by a married man). The other story was Michael Vick's trouble for running a dog fighting ring. I had these thoughts. First, it shocks me that a sizable chunk of the population is more disturbed by dog fighting than by womanizing. In one, only dogs are involved, whereas in the other, people are. Secondly, in assigning moral blame to the two activities, it seems absurd to me that one can go to jail for dog fighting but face no criminal penalties for womanizing. I am not advocating such penalties, but only trying to point out where our criminal law sends what I think is the wrong moral lesson. If in 2525, future generations dust off the law books to get a sense of what was important to our society, they would conclude that dog fighting is very bad, and womanizing is not a big deal. Sadly, I fear this conclusion is right.
3 comments:
NT, love your comments on immigration. I'll never understand why people think everyone deserves the chance to live in this country, even those that cheat the system. It seems like washington is not at all looking out for our best national interest: secure borders. Do you think this has to do with politicians trying to please special intereset groups or big donors? or are they really so stupid? We all know that we could have a secure border within hours if we wanted to. Sending the armed forces to protect the border, until walls could be built would be a good start...
I don't quite understand the current policy, or even the new proposal. The only thing that can explain it is that big business likes the availability of cheap labor to push wages down.
That said, it makes no sense politically to please special interests at the expense of angering voters. Really, this goes beyond partisan lines. Democrats and Republicans are both upset about this.
We need to enforce the border, and then worry about dealing with who is here. I think the President would find that if he really clamped down on the border, the public would be much more willing to accept an "amnesty" or some type of arrangement for the people already here. We need a fence, and a tamperproof smart ID card first though.
-NT
Whether it is gender confusion, the indoctrination of liberal "idealogies" or No Child Left Behind (those amongst countless other problems), education in this country is in serious trouble.
I have been teaching in the public school for two years now, and though I teach in a small, conservative town, I still see the effects of these issues raised in my own experiences. I also know that in a middle school nearby, the teachers are actually told by administration that when a child answers incorrectly, the teacher can not tell the kids they are wrong.
I guess I really do not have a solution because it almost seems that it is in such a rut that it will be hard to get out of it.
I must think though, that is children have been raising their hands since the beginning of education, why all of a sudden is it now a problem?
Okay, maybe I do have a solution but I doubt it will ever happen...it seems as though education is being screwed up by lawmakers that haven't been in a classroom since they left high school. I don't think we should privatise education, but maybe a better solution would be to elect retired or highly experienced educators take over the dept. of ed?
If you owned a business crucial to the American economy, would you let a dairy farmer run it? Of course not...but yet the same thing is happening in the dept of ed...
-Mike Rue
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