RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/10/the-great-society-and-opportunity-lost/

Lyndon Johnson’s 1960s spending initiatives have not paid off with any improvement in education.

In 1964, most people would have been excited to receive a signed picture from the president. But a woman known to history as “Mrs. Marlow” did not want Lyndon Johnson’s autograph.

She wanted clothes for her family. And food. “All we want is a decent chance for our children,” Marlow wrote to Johnson. Marlow felt she deserved as much because Johnson made a much-publicized visit to her family earlier that year, using the Marlows as an example of an impoverished family that Johnson’s “Great Society” programs could help.

If money was the answer, she was in luck. Johnson was about to open the spigots of federal spending like never before in the areas of education, health care, and welfare, promising that Washington would improve schools and lift families out of poverty.

Today, decades and trillions of dollars later, parents like Mrs. Marlow are still waiting for results. Johnson’s programs and their legacy have proved to be a curse on taxpayers and low-income families.

Head Start, the federal pre-kindergarten program for low-income children launched under Johnson, has had no lasting learning gains for enrolled students. What’s more, a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found Head Start centers inflating enrollment numbers by doctoring student applications. Taxpayers have spent more than $240 billion on the initiative since its launch in 1965.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/10/the_developing_dystopia_of_dumbeddown_america.html

A song called “Lost My Marbles” by Pixie Lower & Friends (British, I believe, current around 1987), was a hint of the condition of the mainstream, approaching the turn of the century. It was a cute number with the line “Too much confusion in my brain” and begged out from making sense out of anything. A propos of that sentiment, a young man at that time told me that he didn’t like to think. Of the shocks I’ve had in life, this new one flew off the chart. Was choosing to think now something like choosing a flavor of ice cream?

It set me thinking. A scenario of the future spun in my head . . .

The 21st Century will make confusion a thing of the past. Hey, what are think tanks and the Internet for? Why sweat it when all the ideas and opinions you need are ready-made and delivered to your TV, computer, tablet or phone “for about a dollar a day” (a refrain in commercials, years ago)?

“Thinking syndrome” (TS) is what this disorder would be called, a vestigial malfunction of the brain still prevalent in some lines of evolution. While there are mitigating drugs for TS, none overcomes entirely an inherent resistance of the thinking tendency to act up in some individuals, causing confusion, indecision, bad decision, and sometimes violence, and worse, crime. But that will change when a non-invasive procedure permanently alters certain synaptic centers of the brain with a tiny implanted interactive chip that will cause rogue paths of thought to cancel out and be redirected to specified centers of cognition and confidence.

The Best and Worst Schools for Free Speech and Viewpoint Diversity

https://www.realcleareducation.com/articles/2019/10/24/2019_survey_of_campus_speech_experts.html

Controversies over free speech on college campuses are in the news seemingly every week, whether it’s an unpopular guest speaker being shouted down, a voluntary student group being banned from campus, or a professor losing his job over something he said in the classroom. While most Americans consider open inquiry and academic freedom essential to the mission of a university, the debate over what can or cannot be said on campus is far from settled at most schools today.

How serious is the speech problem in higher education? Is the problem widespread or just relegated to a small group of campuses? Which colleges and universities are doing a good job of protecting speech? RealClearEducation conducted a survey of experts on the campus speech climate in order to explore these questions.

About This Survey

This survey is designed to show how schools stack up in the opinions of experts who are concerned about free speech on campus. It’s a small sample of opinions and is not, to be clear, a scientific poll. If you look closely at our survey respondents, it’s evident that conservatives outnumber liberals. We originally invited 70 academics, pundits, and policy experts to participate. About half were recognizably on the left end of the political spectrum. Some of them accepted. Panelists such as Jonathan Haidt, Gregory Lukianoff, and Jeffrey A. Sachs, for instance, are certainly not political conservatives.

Nevertheless, a majority of the 22 invitees who ultimately completed our survey are recognizably on the right side of the political spectrum. This imbalance is itself instructive. A recent Pew Research Center study showed that Republicans are far more likely than Democrats to be worried about professors bringing their political and social views into the classroom (79% to 17%). Republicans are also far more likely than Democrats to believe that colleges are too concerned with protecting students from views they might find offensive (75% to 31%). The greater number of conservatives who agreed to participate in our panel reflects the greater concern conservatives have about campus speech. There are several identifiable libertarians on our panel as well.

There is an obvious reason for the special concern about the campus speech climate among conservatives. They are often outnumbered and underrepresented among the faculty and administration, particularly at elite schools. However, political liberals are increasingly raising concerns about censure on campus as well. On the other hand, there are those who say the entire notion of a campus speech crisis is overblown.

To gain more insight into this issue, we asked our panelists for their opinions on which U.S. colleges and universities have the best climate for free speech, viewpoint diversity, and open inquiry. We also asked them to tell us which schools they think have the most room for improvement in these areas. Finally, we asked panelists to share their thoughts on how free speech, viewpoint diversity, and open inquiry relate to the proper mission of a university. (Click here to download a full report on the survey in PDF format.)

Best Schools for Campus Speech

We conducted the survey in September 2019. Panelists were asked to name up to five schools that serve as positive role models in the areas of free speech, viewpoint diversity, and open inquiry.

University of Chicago – Best school with respect to campus speech climate according to RealClear’s 2019 survey of campus speech experts. (RealClearEducation)

• The University of Chicago was the clear winner for best speech climate, according to our survey. With its famous “Chicago Statement” guaranteeing students and faculty broad latitude for speech and strong protection of academic freedom, the vast majority of our panelists chose the University of Chicago as one of their top five picks.

• Next were Purdue University, Princeton University, the University of Virginia, Arizona State University, and Claremont McKenna College. These schools stood out to our panelists as positive role models with respect to campus speech climate.

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/10/mathematics_a_tool_of_racial_oppression_seattle_public_schools_committee_says.html

Something called the “K–12 Math Ethnic Studies Framework,” created by a Seattle Public Schools “Ethnic Studies Advisory Committee,” is intended to instruct students that math is intimately connected to racial oppression.  Students will be taught “how technology and/or science have been and continues [sic] to be used to oppress and marginalize people and communities of color.”  The framework, the final draft of which is scheduled to be completed by September 2020, will also attempt to “explain how math dictates economic oppression.”  That’s correct: math.

Tracy Castro-Gill, the ethnic studies program manager at Seattle Public Schools, noted that the framework is intended to redress the fact that the district has not been properly serving minority students.  Castro-Gill said, “The goal is to disrupt the status quo and do something different.”  Disrupting the status quo is the goal — and sacred quest — of all progressives.  She added, “It’s important to break down barriers while valuing our differences.”  Those of her ilk love breaking down barriers.  And fences.  And standards.

The framework curriculum will consist of four themes: Origins, Identity, and Agency; Power and Oppression; History of Resistance and Liberation; and Reflection and Action.  Riddle me this: how is telling minorities that mathematical concepts have historically enslaved them providing them with a great service?  Resist those integers!  Free yourselves from the bonds of multiplication!