Very Interesting Time Capsule

Did you know about the big budget anti-federal debt commercial directed by Ridley Scott?

I certainly missed it.  The lovely Roxy discovered it recently.  (Please go see her to view the video; she has lots more info on the group behind it.)

Do you know what is so striking about the ad?  It was made in 1986.

Watching it now is rather nostalgic.  Two trillion dollars of debt.  Peanuts!  Ha ha ha, uh . . . hmm.  Yeah, it’s maybe not so funny.

Even more interesting is this old news clip about how the networks refused to air it:

It’s a powerful reminder that things may not be so bad as we fear today.  Sure, 14 trillion, yeah, scary.

But.

At least it’s not 1986.  There was no Rush.  No AM Conservative Talk Radio.  No FOX.  No internet.  No YouToobz.  No blogosphere.  No Tea Party.

The Big Three Networks had total control of the message.  The ad was “too controversial.”  Bwa ha ha!  They just didn’t agree with the message.  So the message didn’t get out.

No wonder the MSM has been going into apoplectic convulsions over “right-wing extremists.”  My goodness, it sucks to lose power.

So I’ll take the $14 trillion debt today over the $2 trillion in 1986, given this changing power dynamic.

I think.  Ask me again in a few months, will you?

Digital Existential Angst

Via The Looking Spoon is the Bill Whittle video, “The End of The Beginning.”  This video is the best I’ve seen from Mr. Whittle since Iconography.

Basically, he argues that only been three meta-changes have occurred in civilization’s entire history.  He says that we are witnessing the third meta-change right now, and that’s why everything seems so crazy.

I needed to hear that today.  Lemme tell you why, and then I’ll get back to the meta-change thing. 

I am a stress monkey. 

Virtually anything, and sometimes even nothing at all, can provoke anxiety.  No posting for a few days:  stress.  Being unable to get everything done in a day:  stress.  I’ll stress over the way I stress if I think about it much longer.  Is it rational?  No.  But I’m old enough to recognize that it’s not magically going away just because we declare it silly.

Today, reading Da Tech Guy’s “Wonkette Incident“ slightly horrified me.  The awful, awful comments.  What is wrong with people?   Then, I immediately walked into yet another awkward Facebook situation.

Facebook can be a minefield.  Frequent moving creates many long-distance friendships. Most of these people never heard boo from me on politics when we interacted face-to-face.  While no one has come out and said it, some of them probably think a body-snatcher now inhabits my body.  After all, one day–without explanation–I began vomiting political links and opinions onto the news feed.  Two years later, still vomiting.

The majority say nothing.  A few folks appreciate the links.  A few unfriended me.  Sometimes, there is sarcasm.  Worst of all:  the vague statements.  Was that sarcasm?  Do I respond?

I’m not trying to annoy all the people I’ve befriended over the course of my life.  I don’t want to upset anyone.   And I certainly don’t want digital swarms of angry leftists buzzing all over the ‘net about me and my blog, like they just did to Da Tech Guy.

What the hell am I doing this for?

Well, the video embedded below reminded me.  Oh, yeah.  This nation went totally crazy town while me and my family were overseas.  We get back home, turn on the radio, and I’m like, what?  The government owns GM?  Bailing out financial institutions?  Passing humongous bills without reading them?  Even crazier was the way no one seemed to notice.  They need to notice.  All the blogging, all the FB vomiting, started because no matter how much I hate the fray, I feel obliged to elbow my way into it. 

Thank goodness for the local Tea Party.  I am not the only one noticing the crazy train chugging to crazy town!  Whew! 

Back to Bill Whittle’s meta-change:

“We are now going from being ‘company men,’ to becoming dispersed, decentralized, independent, interconnected, free agents, because the industrial age is coming to a close, as the information age takes its place.  And all of our economic structure is once again going back to being horizontal, independent, light, fast, agile, decentralized, local, smaller, cheaper.  The old dinosaurs may totter for a while, but they will eventually fall.”

I sure hope he’s right.  If you’ve got the nine minutes, the whole thing is well worth it:

Thanks, Mr. Whittle.  I feel much better.  Now I remember the other reason to blog.  Essay writing is terrible fun.

He produces these videos over at Declaration Entertainment.  Support ‘em if ya can.

Reality Checks

Ever catch yourself assuming that someone will have roughly the same perspective or knowledge as you? 

I do. 

Here are recent examples for your enjoyment.

Case #1:  We bloggers love to beat up on The New York Times.  After all, shooting fish in a barrel is both easy and fun.

The other day provided a reminder, however, of the way many folks view stuff like The New York Times.

While I was checking-out at the Walgreens, a lady breezes in and asks my cashier, “Do you sell the New York Times here?”

“No, I’m sorry but we don’t.”

The lady looked mildly annoyed and breezed on past us.

What does she want with the New York Times anyway? I scoffed to the cashier.

“I know,” she agreed.  “What is that anyway, some kind of a magazine?”

Hah.

Case #2:  My older (now nine!) son is preparing a speech for school, about a historical black person.  He chose Lee Archer, a name I would not know without my son’s influence. 

His practice version had very little background but loads of details, something like this: 

LT Archer was one of the Tuskegee Airmen, and the only ace, and once he was in a major dogfight between the 332nd Redtails and a swarm of ME-109s over Lake Balaton, and he and his leader were known as the Gruesome Twosome because they were so deadly, and they had six successful downs that day . . . .

Wait a minute, kid.  Do you think anybody in your class has heard of the Tuskegee Airmen, or ME-109s, or Lee Archer?

No, he responded.

You have to explain some of the basics first, kid.  It’s not like your speech is about someone everybody knows, like President Obama or Oprah Winfrey (two of many choices offered on a helpful list his teacher provided).

He wrinkled his brow and looked puzzled.  Who is Oprah Winfrey?

Hah.  Nevermind son.  She ain’t important.  And neither is the New York Times.

Maybe The Stuff In That Third Grade Textbook Isn’t So Interesting, After All

This post is fourth in a series that started with ”Interesting Stuff In Third Grade Textbook.”  In that post, I describe my concern over a social studies book the teacher sent home for make-up work.

My second post contains some online information about the first seven persons listed as authors:  “The Authors of The Interesting Stuff In My Third-Grader’s Textbook.”

Then, my kind readers educated me on the whole textbook authoring process.  Turns out, the word “author” doesn’t mean they actually wrote the thing.  I mean, as if.

So I had to write “Textbook Post #3.”

Over the holidays, I took the next natural step in this little book investigation.  I tried to read it.

What a total Lunesta-fest.

I digested over one-third of the book, and I gotta call it quits.  The holiday is over, and the textbook has gotta go back to school.

Out of the roughly 170 pages I read, the six-page assignment that started this whole affair is among the most controversial.

The rest is mostly boring.  Look up the word “banal” in your dictionary, and you’ll see a picture of this textbook.  The definition says it all:  “something so lacking in originality as to be obvious and boring.”

Yep.  That about sums it up.

They use this book regularly in class.  I asked my son whether he could remember anything, absolutely anything at all, from this book.

“I remember about Jane Addams, and I learned that we are not a nation of immigrants, we are descended from immigrants.”

What else?

Nothing.  He couldn’t remember anything but the stuff I critiqued.

A lot of the information is rudimentary to the extreme.  For example, one page is devoted to answering the question:  what is a globe?  Another page is a critical look at why islands communities are different from other communities.  (Can you guess why?  Huh?  Can ya?)  The book thoroughly addresses that complex process of separating things into different groups. 

To be fair, sometimes it is the more basic questions which stump us:

One positive thing I can say is, the textbook is aptly named (“Communities”).  That term was repeated over and over and over.  The pages are chock-a-block with comically obvious or empty statements like:

A community is a place where people live, work, and have fun together.

People make communities special places to live.

There are many kinds of communities in the United States.

Communities are located in special places.

There are communities all over the world.

Communities around the world are alike and different.

Communities are alike in some ways and different in other ways.

When you compare communities, you can understand more about the people who live in them.

Suburban communities have grown and changed over the years.

People form communities because they want to be safe and comfortable.

Each community has its own special culture.

Each community is special in its own way.

People in a community may come from different places.

Celebrations are important to every culture.

Communities have celebrations.

A community’s location, climate, and natural resources affect the people who live there.

Have I tortured you enough?  No?  Then let me share my personal favorite:

Children are very important in Africa.  Children are the future of the continent.

Well, yeah.  Okay.  Hopefully, children are the future of all the continents, though.  Except maybe for Antarctica.

Some of the more objectionable tidbits were located in Chapter Three:  People Move From Place To Place, A Progressive Primer For Training Children To Accept Illegal Immigration When They Grow Up.

Like this one:

Laws help make a community a good place to live.

Because all laws are helpful, dontcha know.

The idea of private property gets an interesting treatment in Chapter Seven:  Communities and Their Histories, Like The European Community That Believes In Ownership, and The Native American Community That Believes In Sharing Just Like John Lennon’s Beautiful Song Imagine.

I can’t write much more.  I tried to muster up a little more alarm, but the tedious verbiage has hoovered all concern right out.  I’ll conclude with a confession:  I did learn something.  I had never heard of William Levitt before encountering his biography in Chapter Two.

The Authors of the Interesting Stuff in my Third Grader’s Textbook

A company called Pearson publishes the Scott Foresman textbook used in my third-grader’s class, “Communities.”

I posted about this textbook recently, and I mentioned research on the authors of this book.  Here are the results of this research:

Valerie Ooka Pang has written a book about the unmet needs of Asian Pacific American children.  She teach courses in multicultural education, social studies methods, curriculum & instruction, and social foundations.  She is interested in culturally meaningful teaching.

Rita Geiger is currently a trainer for lessons on the First Amendment.  She recently spoke at an event entitled, “Mean Speech:  Emotion + Words and the First Amendment.”  At this event, attendees discussed whether a lack of civility in our political discourse is eroding our First Amendment values.

(Huh.  What does civility have to do with freedom of speech?)

Sara Miranda Sanchez is a specialist in early childhood education.  She is recognized as a national leader in multicultural education teacher training.

Dr. James B. Kracht serves as Director of the Texas Social Studies Center for Educator Development.  He has recently written about educators moving in a new direction, towards “authentic assessment,” as an addition to traditional testing.

No, I do not know what “authentic assessment” is, even after reading the article.  Follow the link and see if you can suss it out.

Candy Boyd is an educator, activist, and novelist.  Educating people about their positive potential is her priority. As a high school student, she tried to stop blockbusting in her native Chicago by convincing an African American, a Jew, and a Protestant to join her in personal visits to two hundred white families.  She worked as an organizer for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. When she earned her degree she became known, in her own words, as a “militant teacher.”

C. Frederick Risinger is a Director of the School of Education at Indiana University.  One of his publications is entitled, “Women’s Issues in an Era of Inclusion.”

Finally, Geneva Gay is a Professor of Education at the University of Washington, where she teaches multicultural education and general curriculum theory.

(What’s General Curriculum Theory?  A degree that proves you have spent considerable time and money to demonstrate you know how to teach and you understand current educational theory.  What’s Current Educational Theory?  Oh, I dunno, I give up.)

Geneva Gay has some very interesting quotes on the webz.  Unfortunately, these quotes are not backed up by verifiable sources.  Flippin’ hearsay. 

With that caveat in mind, here is the first statement:

In 1996, Geneva Gay of the University of Washington said at a National Association for Multicultural Education (NAME) conference workshop that multiculturalist education demands the destruction of the American political and economic system.  She urged educators to be cautious about revealing their goals to the public, however.

Finally, Geneva Gay is claimed to have said:

“That a core problem is we don’t have a language to critique the social structures that bind us.  ‘English,’ she continued, ‘is the enemy of social justice and equality.’“

Wow.  Makes me feel like Glenn Beck, finding statements like these.  Remember, however, that these quotes are unconfirmed hearsay.

Still.

A crack team of multiculturalists, aren’t they?  No wonder my kid is learning about the immigrant who painted a depiction of Washington crossing the Delaware, instead of actually learning about Washington crossing the Delaware.

UPDATE:  The heavens have parted, and the sun’s rays have shone down on my little bitty blog while an angel chorus sings softly, “Innn-staaah-laaaaaaaaache . . . .”

Thank you, Glenn Reynolds.

Gosh, do Instalanches make anyone else nervous?

UPDATE #2:  A personal defense of one author has served as a reminder that I do not know these people personally, and thus I should keep snark to a minimum.  Consequently, I have removed a joke about the name “Texas Social Studies Center for Educator Development.”

Interesting Stuff In Third Grade Textbook

My third grader’s social studies book, “Communities,”  is rather interesting. 

The boys have been sick, so the textbook got sent home for some make-up work.

Whee.

My son’s assignment was in Chapter 3, People Move From Place To Place.  (Ha.  He’s kinda familiar with that concept, being a military brat and all . . . )

The first page highlighted one of the book’s many “Citizen Heroes.”

Jane Addams.

Yep. 

Jane Addams.

I knew I had heard that name before, and the Hull House she started.  The dates were a dead giveaway:  the Progressive Era.

A consultation with Jonah Goldberg’s Liberal Fascism confirmed it.  There she was, in all her progressive socialist communist collectivist glory:

“[W]e must demand that the individual shall be willing to lose the sense of personal achievement, and shall be content to realize his activity only in connection to the activity of the many.”  (page 87)

Of course, the third grade Social Studies textbook does not delve into the specifics of political ideology.  It merely highlights Addams’s upbringing (her father taught her to treat everyone fairly), her good work (opening a special place for immigrants), and her accomplishments (being the first American female to win the Nobel Peace Prize because she worked hard to help world peace).

In the corner of one page is a helpful List Of Citizenship Traits:  Caring, Respect, Responsibility, Fairness, Honesty, and Courage.

While Addams is specifically listed as an example of fairness, I have to assume she was both honest and courageous when she declared the Bolshevik endeavor:

“the greatest social experiment in history.” (page 102)

Fantastic.

Further into the lesson came the paragraph titled, “A Nation of Immigrants.” 

Super-mega-fantastic. 

Michelle Malkin says it best:

“[A]s I’ve noted many times over the years when debating both Democrats and Republicans who fall back on empty phrases to justify putting the amnesty cart before the enforcement horse, we are not a ‘nation of immigrants.’  This is both a factual error and a warm-and-fuzzy non sequitur.  Eighty-five percent of the residents currently in the United States were born here.

Yes, we are almost all descendants of immigrants.  But we are not a ‘nation of immigrants.’”

Finally, the lesson (mercifully) concluded with some examples of Nice Immigrants Who Did Things, like Mary Antin and the guy who painted the famous Washington Crossing the Delaware.

Let me just say. 

Explaining to a mostly disinterested eight-year-old why I have a problem with the Nice Lady Who Opened A Nice Place For Immigrants is . . . challenging.

I did it anyway.  In the car on the way to the vet to pick up Sussie (again).  My son read his assigned pages aloud, and I stopped him whenever I had an issue.

Which was frequent.

I can’t remember everything I said, but I remember getting riled up.  Spittle may have hit the windshield.

The boy thought my spirited reaction was funny, and that is absolutely okay.  We had a great talk.  We discussed which is more important, the group or the individual.  I explained that it’s not his teacher’s fault, because she doesn’t know there is a progressive/liberal bias in her textbooks.

She probably thinks it’s filled with standard, basic, what-a-3rd-grader-needs-to-know facts.

We even talked about why so many people don’t realize this textbook is providing the building blocks for Standard Leftist Lies.  This was my favorite part of the conversation, because my son finished a sentence for me in a completely accurate way.

You see, he’s been learning multiplication tables, which of course involves drills.  So I pointed out the fact that, if I had wanted to, I could have told him that 4 times 7 equals 29, over and over and over.

I continued, “You would have believed that 4 times 7 equals 29, because . . . “

I wasn’t sure what came next.  As a parent, the only thing that came to mind is:  because I said so.

But he knew why he would become convinced that 4 times 7 equals 29:

“Because you get used to it.”

Drills.  Repetition.

Repeat the lie often enough, and it becomes truth.

We talked about the “fairness” thing too, and that was easy.  All kids like to protest that “it’s not fair!”  Mine never get away with it without hearing me say:  “Life’s not fair.  Get used to it.”

There is no such thing as fair.

There is liberty, justice, and there is the rule of law.

There is no fair.

I explained to my third grader about how the left’s need for “fairness” might be the reason for the “nation of immigrants” lie.

After all, our Founding Fathers were immigrants who got a chance for a new life in America.  If our Founders got such a chance, it’s only fair we give all of today’s immigrants the same chance for a new life, too, right? 

So we can’t say no to anyone who wants a new life in America, because that wouldn’t be fair.  If everyone on the planet wanted to come, we’d have to let them.

“Then we’d have to leave and start a new America,” my son remarked.

Exactly, my brilliant child.

By the way, I’m just bragging now.

It’s late.  I’ve got research on the authors of this lovely textbook.  They will have to be the subject of my next post.  Yep, you guessed it.  The authors’ backgrounds are . . . interesting.

Happy Thanksgiving! A Day Late

Cuz that’s how I roll.

Most of my blog brethren (blethren?) took time out of their day to wish us all a Happy Thanksgiving, which is really nice.

Me?  Whoops.  Too focused on the cooking and the eating.  No multitasker am I.

Still, I have a lot for which to be thankful.  Foremost on my mind today are Mom and Dad, who drove all the way from Florida to spend Thanksgiving with us.

It was great, because my folks are freakin’ awesome.  Let me introduce you to my Dad, Ernie.

 

Well, no, not that Ernie.  Actually, my Dad was named after a family friend, Ernest, who had helped Grandpa find employment at the Ford factory in Dearborn, Michigan.  If you think that naming your son after the guy who helped you get a job is a bit overboard, keep in mind the year my dad was born:  1935.

The family was grateful for that factory job indeed.

A few years later, though, my Grandpa decided to make his living off the land, on a farm in rural Romulus, Michigan.  They had a couple of cows, some pigs, chickens.  Dad longed to drive the tractor, but he was not allowed.  He would follow the dang thing as Grandpa worked the crops, so exciting was that machine. 

Dad has fond memories of a particular Thanksgiving when he was nine or ten years old.  Grandpa had bought a couple hundred turkeys to fatten up and sell during the holiday season.  Unfortunately, the bottom fell out of the turkey market that year, so they didn’t make any profit from those birds. 

Dad, however, got to enjoy the singular pride of going to school with blood on his shoes.  “I loved it; I was so proud,” he chuckled.

Must be a guy thing.

You see, his morning chores included decapitating the turkeys needed to fill that day’s orders, and bringing the carcasses to his mom for cleaning.

At Dad’s school, a favorite pastime involved chasing the girls and kissing the captured ones against their will.  Apparently, that Georgie Porgie rhyme is about a real game.  Who knew?

I doubt it would be allowed on my kids’ school playground.  These days, a lawsuit might even be involved.

Alas, country living did not pan out for Dad’s family.  After a couple of years, Grandpa failed to cover the mortgage.  The bank foreclosed and sent fellers to unceremoniously pile their belongings on the roadside.  Dad remembers his mom being pretty furious at his dad over this turn of events, but he also remembers that it was not particularly traumatizing for him or his siblings.  They just packed up and when to his Grandma Takacs (“TUH-kahtch”), who took them in.

The post-WWII boom had kicked in by this point.  Grandpa found another job before long, and they moved into a place of their own in Del Ray, Michigan.

Such places later became suburbs of Detroit (and maybe ghost towns at this point). 

Dad met my mom, Diane, at Wayne State University in downtown Detroit.  I’ll have to introduce her to you another time.  If you care to hear more of their story, that is.

Happy Thanksgiving, and enjoy some family time, if you are able.

Election Campaigns Have Gotten Too Vicious Today!

Via the Tertium Quids, this ReasonTV video is less than two minutes long and worth every second:

On the Road with the Boys

How about a nonpolitical post for a change?  I’ve been traveling since Thursday, first to Jax and then Pensacola, Florida.  Here are my two favorite exchanges with the eight year old.

First, there was a tremendous cumulus cloud building above the highway’s horizon. 

My son asks, “Do you know what that cloud looks exactly like?”  I appraise the massive formation carefully, but nothing familiar comes to mind.  No, I answer.  What?

“A cloud.”

Ha.  Got me on that one, boy.

Then Friday, we were listening to the car radio, and the newsperson mentioned that day marks the anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing.  I reminded my son how we saw the Enola Gay at the Natural Air and Space Museum in D.C.

He says, “No, Mom.  Boxcar.”

Huh?  What is boxcar?

“That’s the plane that bombed Hiroshima.  Enola Gay bombed that other city.”

Really?  I’ve never heard of that.  Where did you learn about that?

“I dunno.”

Boxcar?  Sometimes, kids say such oddball things.  Well of course I just had to google this “boxcar.”  Turns out, Bockscar is the B-29 that bombed Nagasaki.  The Enola Gay did indeed drop the bomb on Hiroshima.

Sometimes, a wrong answer is still impressive.  I mean, where in the world did he learn about Bockscar? 

Oh yeah, he has been watching the Military Channel lately.  How come I can’t remember details like that from documentaries?

Posts might be sparse in the coming days.  Enjoying the traveling and the family.

Presidential Birthdays

I have historically followed politics, at least nominally.  Other than Lincoln and Washington, I cannot remember even noticing a presidential birthday.

Honest question:  is it weird to get three different emails about President Obama’s birthday?

Michelle and someone named David Pluoffe want me to sign a birthday card for him.  Somebody named Jeremy Bird wants me to attend a local birthday party for him.

I signed up on the Organizing for America site, so I am not surprised to receive emails from this organization.

But.

Is this typical?

Did GW send emails like this out to folks on some kind of RNC list?

Did Clinton do something similar?

Any other president?

While I have never witnessed this kind of devotion to an American leader, that does not mean it has not yet occurred.  Maybe I just wasn’t involved enough in my civic duties to notice.

Anybody out there got an opinion, a tidbit of experience to offer?

I really am curious.

A couple of lazy google searches unearthed nothing more than a few scary Obama cake websites.

What?

Don’t believe that they are scary?  Judge for yourself, here, here, here, and here. 

I also googled presidential birthdays for Bush.  The highest viewed YouTube video I found involved parodies of Bush and how dumb he is.

By all means, enlighten me on the subject of presidential birthdays.  My default response to those OFA emails is, of course, blech.

Convince me I am wrong.

It may take awhile for me to reply.  Hittin’ the road tomorrow, to see some family before school starts for the boys.

Happy rest of the summer to you.

and Happy Birthday too, if it’s yours.