The Wondering Mind

I first read about a Texas town which would allow teachers to carry concealed firearms into the classroom on the BBC website a while ago. And I had the usual reaction to such news.

“Those crazy Texans. What it’s the water over there?”

But the NY Times had an article which went into more detail on the story. And in all fairness, the lunacy appears to belong primarily to the school superintendent and the school board.

You can read the story for yourself to see all the threadbare arguments backing up the thinking of these individuals, so I won’t take apart the weaknesses of the individual justifications. They’re rather obvious, at least to me, but I doubt I would persuade anyone who thinks this is a good idea.

The thing is, the real issue in this case seems to be that the policy was the result of a paranoid individual who let what little power he had get to his head, and a school board looking for a raison d’être.

As the article points out, it’s not clear what threat this policy is supposed to counter.The sorts of criminal activities which blight some urban schools, such as gang violence, is not an issue in this district. In fact, incidents of criminality appear to be rare in general.

If the fear is of sociopathic incidents, such as Columbine or crazed individuals entering the school, there really is no practical way to counter such threats. More to the point, as horrific as such incidents are, they are rare enough (thankfully) that you really have to have nothing better to do before you would spend any amount of time thinking how to counter such an improbable occurrence.

This is a small school district in rural Texas. I don’t know how good this 2-building school is, but I will assume that they have educational needs for which they could have better spent the money than on this security policy. Unless all 100 students are going onto Ivy League schools or other top universities, they could probably stand to improve their educational achievements. Which is the sort of thing most school superintendents spend their energies on. It’s also the sort of thing most school boards want their superintendent to spend their time on.

Of course, improving the educational achievements of your school is much harder than sending some of your teachers off on a week of weapons training and arming them in the school for a threat you can’t define.

Something that really, really aggravates me is people in academia acting like idiots. Today, I have another example.

“Oxford targets poorest postcodes”

The title of this article in the Guardian caught my eye by being a little cryptic. (A postcode is the equivalent of a zip code in the U.S.)

Basically the article tells us that Oxford University will take into factors other than purely grades in deciding which applicants to interview for possible acceptance. This is an effort to try to take in more students who come from less privileged backgrounds, who one would expect to have overcome greater obstacles in reaching college.

As well as widening the demographic profile of the students, this makes sense if the university is interested in, among other things, the student’s potential for future achievement, both academic and professional. All other things being equal, you would expect students from less privileged backgrounds to have achieved more just to get the same academic scores as more privileged students. Such students may well have potential for greater achievement than their peers.

It’s the sort of thing that infuriates Republicans in the U.S., so I was interested to see what kind of criticism you might find in the U.K. Well, maybe because it’s the Guardian, they didn’t find any credible opposition.

But the move has infuriated critics who say it puts middle-class applicants at an unfair disadvantage. Professor Alan Smithers, director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at Buckingham University, said ‘the emphasis on social factors’ worried him. ‘Alex Ferguson needs to make judgments based on football ability and Oxford needs to make judgment on intellectual ability,’ said Smithers. ‘The only issue should be the talent of the person. The government is keen on social engineering and [Oxford] university seems to be bowing to that.’

This is a poorly argued criticism. While Alan Smithers makes the argument that students should be judged on talent, he completely fails to demonstrate that that is not happening here. Oxford is simply stating that they will use other measures as well as test scores to judge an applicant’s talents. The “emphasis on social factors”, as Smithers puts it, helps Oxford put the test scores in better perspective as a measure of talent.

For Alan Smithers to make his case, he has to demonstrate how test scores on their own give a better measure of a student’s talents than you would get by also taking into account other factors, such as social factors. You hardly have to be an expert in education to surmise that proposition is highly unlikely to be correct.

All this is not that hard to figure out, which is why it’s disappointing to hear from someone who is a “director” of a “Centre for Education and Employment Research”. Or it would be if you weren’t from the U.K.

Because if you are, you may know that Buckingham University is a “private university”. Unlike the U.S., all respectable universities in the U.K. are publicly funded. Places like Buckingham are where rich parents send children not smart enough to get into a real university.

So despite the semi-respectable looking bio on Buckingham’s website,  I wasn’t expecting too much from someone on the faculty of this school. But what really took the cake was the following information Alan Smithers offered up to the Guardian.

Smithers compared the move with his own experience when he claimed a university decided that it was ‘desirable’ to promote black professors for social reasons. ‘As a result, I was not fairly treated,’ said Smithers.

Clearly, this guy has an axe to grind and is carrying such a chip on his shoulder that he is blind to how silly that makes him sound.

Such a complete lack of objectivity is to break the first rule of good academic inquiry. That he so blithely displays his total disregard for any objectivity is a measure of his talent, or the lack of it.

With all the controversy surrounding the current Olympics, you would think the IOC would refrain from doing anything to embarrass itself. But no.

Apparently, when they decided to discipline a Swedish wrestler for “violating the spirit of fair play of the Games”, they felt no sense of irony or sheepishness.

The I.O.C. accused him of violating rules of the Olympic Charter that ban demonstrations in official Olympic areas and prohibit the showing of disrespect for other Olympic athletes.

“The awards ceremony is a highly symbolic ritual,” the I.O.C. said in a statement. “Any disruption by any athlete, in particular a medalist, is in itself an insult to the other athletes and to the Olympic movement.”

You would think with their history, the IOC would just penalise the guy for bad sportsmanship and leave it at that. But no. They had to bring up the ban on demonstrations in an official Olympic area.

This is something that was already a source of criticism during the Beijing games, where protesters have to petition the Chinese government for a permit to protest in designated areas, miles away from the games. And we all remember the last time this clause was infamously invoked by the IOC.

Tommie Smith and John Carlos were expelled from the 1968 Mexico City Games after their glove-fisted salute during the awards ceremony for the 200-meter race. The expulsions have since come under immense criticism, and Smith and Carlos have drawn widespread praise for their nonviolent protest of social and racial inequality.

IOC and George W. Bush: separated at birth?

The other day, I read this commentary I found on the current conflict in Georgia. It is a different, non-Western perspective from a former Indian ambassador, sort of thing that’s not easy to find in mainstream media. I wanted to hear a different perspective which I may have missed, but which wasn’t some sophomoric rant of a barely disguised Russian nationalist.

Well, a different perspective it certainly is. What it doesn’t appear to be, is to be in touch with reality. Aside from including some statements as fact which have not been independently verified, the author’s analysis just makes no sense.

Several commentators have observed that Washington may have encouraged Georgia to behave rashly by creating a sense that the U.S. would support Georgia militarily in any conflict with Russia. That most people, at least in the West, did not think that this was ever a realistic possibility is beside the point. Even these people do not believe that Washington ever had, or would have thought they had, any reason to want such a conflict to arise in Georgia.

More to the point, Ambassador Bhadrakumar contends that this is all a grand scheme by Washington to get Georgia into NATO. This is patently absurd. As many Western commentator have already pointed out, this conflict is actually more likely to turn many European nations away from accepting Georgian accession to NATO.

Nobody in NATO wants to get dragged into a potential conflict with Russia. Many of the NATO members are paper tigers, with small militaries and almost no expeditionary forces to speak of. The U.S., Britain, and France are the only countries with a demonstrated capability in that department, and they are already overstretched. Even if they wanted to get in the middle of this fight, existing NATO members realise that to do so will be a military mistake.

It seems to me that far too many critics of this uni-polar perspective often miss the point of their criticism. The uniformity of opinion is only a symptom of the real problem, not the actual problem itself. The real problem is the poor standard of what passes for journalism these days.

Journalists are people too and they will inevitably have opinions. But good journalists are aware of their own biases and try to present all sides of the story, along with critiques of them all. Simply having access to bad arguments from different perspectives does not help us become better informed.

And for what it’s worth, the most “balanced” commentary I’ve read so far on the current conflict has been by a Republican former political operative, from the Nixon White House, no less.

When Russia and Georgia have been dominating the news, even with the Olympics propaganda machine in full swing, it’s no wonder that two nations make the news for not fighting.

From the accounts, it seems that the reason that Nigeria and Cameroon did not go to war over the territory was financial which, at least in this instance, supports the theory that greater trade among nations encourages countries not to war with each other. As long as the two nations were squaring off against one another, neither would be able to develop the natural resources thought to exist in this region. And the two countries appear to have compromised somewhat so that they will both benefit from the region’s development.

Coming from a continent where we only ever seem to hear bad news, it’s encouraging to hear of two nations setting an example for other nations who really should know better.

We only ever seem to hear about science in the news when bad things happen, like the Challenger space shuttle blowing up. Or in negative controversy, like religious zealots wanting to teach children that God creating the universe in 6 days is science. You also hear about science being used in terrible policy decisions, such as greater surveillance of ordinary people.

So I wish mainstream media would make more a deal when there is good news, like this, or this. Both developments in water purification technology, if they can be developed to commercial levels, are , or should be, huge news. So many of the most serious and virulent diseases in poor nations, are related to lack clean drinking water. In addition to the direct cost of the illnesses caused, diseases often have a serious negative impact on the economic development of the affected countries.

When policy makers are seriously talking about possible future conflicts over access to water, these inventions may be some of the most important developments of today.

A recent article in the NY Times on an issue I’ve been aware of for a while got me thinking about political science. The article noted that death and serious injury to motorcycle riders appeared to be rising, even as death and injury for motorists are falling. The fall appears to be due not only to better safety design of cars, but also less driving nationwide this past year as the price of petrol has skyrocketed.

This appears to have had the opposite effect on safety of motorcycle riders, as some drivers have switched to motorcycles to save on petrol. But the article notes that the rise in death and injury to motorcyclists is probably also due to repealing of mandatory helmet laws in most states.

This is just bad policy. There is no way that this can result in anything other than increased risk of serious injury and mortality to motorcyclists. While some people may not object to silly motorcyclists making bad personal choices, such death or serious injury has a social cost to the rest of us, as much car accident do. Nobody can make credible arguments that mandatory seat-belt laws are bad policy and society has a similar public policy interest in mandatory helmet laws for motorcyclists.

What puzzled me was how such a small, small interest group (those motorcyclists who think it right to risk life and limb for the right to ride motorcycles without proper safety gear) managed to wield so much power to get their proposed policies enacted.

They must be so small in number that they cannot pose any credible threat, either in terms of the number of votes of their members or the size of their political fund, to sufficiently large enough group of politicians in so many states to get the laws changed. With shrewd tactics, they could make their money go a long way, but the effect still seems quite disproportionate.

Until I remembered logrolling. For those not familiar with the term, it basically describes the practice of politicians bargaining with each other. In return for you supporting my pet project, I will support your pet project, and we can both get what we want. If the anti-helmet lobby can get a few politicians beholden to them, these politicians can bargain with other politicians to push their helmet agenda through. This might sound crazy, but this is how bridges to nowhere get funded.

If logrolling can result in such crazy policies, why is it allowed? Well, like most things in life, it’s not all bad. It can allow politicians with opposing priorities to compromise and gives them a way out of political gridlocks. Policies crafted from such compromises may not be perfect, but they can still make for good policy.

That’s the headline I expect to read in any and every respectable newspaper in the U.S., if the press were actually doing their job any more.

I just sat through watching some old guy, who I can only imagine has gone senile, presenting what he thought was some touching hommage to the “Olympic spirit”, while Bob Costas sat there with that perennial smug grin on his face. What a load of bollocks.

This guy (not going to call him a “reporter”) presented a piece about how the Olympics represented peace and harmony throughout history, which ironically spent most of the opening part of the film on scenes of the German Olympic team during the Berlin games opening ceremony, goose-stepping into the stadium and presenting the Nazi salute to Hitler.

Unless that was the work of some subversive editor, it illustrated the complete selling out long ago of any Olympic ideals the event may have had at one point and exposed the naked hypocrisy and condescension of NBC in presenting something so obsequious to the games and to China.

For those who actually watched this travesty of reporting, the Russian and Georgian pistol shooters, whose actions are indeed admirable, have been friends for years, as they started competing together while Georgia and Russia were still part of the U.S.S.R. Granted, in this day and age when neighbours turn on neighbour and friends denounce each other at times of conflict, that these women refused to abandon their friendship is heart warming. But there’s no reason to think that the Olympics had any positive role to play here.

In the same BBC report of this scene, we get two examples of other members of the Olympics squads, from both countries, engaging in bellicose rhetoric. And today we hear reports of the spat between the Russian and Georgian teams in women’s beach volleyball.

The one thing that Bob Costas and friend did point out, in a clearly snide remark (I have no idea why these men were so miffed about it), is that the Georgian team do appear to have obtained Georgian passports primarily to compete in the games. And in what must count as the most crass comment to be uttered by anyone at an Olympic game, one of the Russian players taunted the winning Georgian team by saying,

“If they are Georgian they would certainly have been influenced (by world events), but certainly they are not.”

Forget good sportsmanship. How about not being possibly the worst sore loser in history?

No doubt NBC is anxious to get their pound of flesh from having bought the rights to the games and do not want the coverage spoiled with negative stories. GE, the parent company of NBC, probably doesn’t want to broadcast overly negative coverage of the games so that they don’t complicate or jeopardise any existing and future business in China. It helps to have in their employ Costas and friend, who are clearly prostitutes in all but name. Either that or they are both high on drugs to believe the manure they’re shoveling.

But the way to keep the coverage relevant and worth watching isn’t to ignore inconvenient truths. No one will be convinced by such transparent and ham-fisted propaganda for commercial interests. People will have noticed the ridiculous attempt to play down the pollution before the major outdoor endurance events, even as we see the smog on television almost everyday. There are reports of human rights (in particular, rights which China specifically promised to the IOC would be respected, in order to win the games) being oppressed during the games if people look for them.

So people won’t fall for this kind of nonsense from NBC or China, right? Well, unless the people are all too busy doping too.

P.S. – The Olympic truce that Costas and friend talk about, and other “reporters” keep trotting out faithfully from the IOC propaganda packets, refers to the ancient Greek games, when the participating Greek nations would observe a truce. That was actually due to the fact that the Olympic games were a sacred religious event as well as a sporting one, primarily honouring Zeus.

For many, if not most, Greeks of various nations, to engage in war during that time would have been sacrilege. It had nothing to do with any desire for peace. Greeks, especially Spartans, were famous for actually refusing to engage in battle during religious periods, only to resume fighting when the festivals were over.

I stumbled across this article on Reuters about an “academic” in England who is arguing that universities should simply accommodate the most common spelling mistakes among its students. This statement coming from someone who teaches at a university seemed so ludicrous, I was beside myself. I didn’t know where to begin to lay into this cretin and his idiocy.

But then I thought, maybe I’m not being fair to the guy. He may have been misreported. So I read another article, this time by the BBC, and it said pretty much the same thing.

Just to be sure, I found the original piece Ken Smith wrote in the Times Higher Education, where incidentally, he identifies himself as a “senior lecturer in criminology, Bucks New University”. (Bucks is short for Buckinghamshire.) Reading the entire piece, I found that the news article had not misrepresented Ken Smith.

What a shame.

You can read the reader comments at the end of the Times Higher Education piece for all the ways Smith makes an ass of himself with the factual inaccuracies and logical inconsistencies of his arguments. That someone who claims to be a senior lecturer in criminology is silly enough to present such shoddy writing for publication is disappointing enough.

(If nothing else, you would think professional pride would prevent him from holding himself up to such unnecessary and very public ridicule.)

You can also make some very unkind observations about the institution he teaches at. You can hardly be overwhelmed by the academic credentials of an institution which has a link on its homepage to a website which claims to promote interest in tertiary education among 11 to 16 year old school children, by using bad spelling. In its own name no less.

“Be Coz U Can“

Way to drum up interest in education by lowering standards!

If you think I’m just being elitist, I would like to point out that this “university” offers a “degree” in “the management of selling beds”. I’m not even kidding. You can’t make this stuff up. See for yourself.

So things are not looking that impressive for Ken Smith. He seems to be a silly man working at an institution that appears mediocre at best. Even knowing this, it is distressing to hear such tripe coming from a supposed educator.

But why must we suffer? Instead of complaining about the state of the education system as we correct the same mistakes year after year, I’ve got a better idea. University teachers should simply accept as variant spelling those words our students most commonly misspell.

Why must you “suffer”? How about the fact that you are drawing a salary to educate these young people? If you are suffering from having to teach these kids spelling, perhaps you should speak with your university’s administration about entrance standards and accepting students who cannot even spell. Instead, Ken Smith would have other educators and institutions lower their standards to the level he has set for himself and his institution.

Ken Smith himself acknowledges that these “variant spellings” are actually mistakes. They aren’t “variant spellings”. That implies knowledge on the part of the student of the correct spelling of words, and an intentional use of a different variation of spelling for those words. There is no such intent here.

Students who misspell words do so because they are poorly educated and don’t know any better. No doubt they were ill served by other educators as equally dedicated to low standards as Ken Smith.

The op-ed in the Times Higher Education is not just the muddled thinking of a silly man. It is the work of a clearly mediocre and lazy educator, and the solution to poor student standards is not to lower standards, but to rid the education system of “academics” like Ken Smith.

We all know the age when politicians and public servants took responsibility for anything is long gone. But when you read about the blatant lack of accountability these days, it’s like watching a bunch of 5 year olds running the country.

While I’m not an attorney, and I don’t know for sure if what the Republicans did in hiring unqualified candidates for positions in the federal government was a crime, I know it should be. The actions of the individuals involved was a reckless and selfish disregard of the public good not just for crazy political ideals. It was also for private gain, as these party operatives will cycle through the party political machinery and gain rich personal rewards for the party fealty. That is, or should be, criminal misuse of public funds for private gain.

If these acts are not currently criminal, as the nation’s top law official Mukasey should be urging Congress to make them criminal as quickly as possible and taking steps for the Justice Department to file civil suits pursuing those individuals to make an example out of them.

And if unqualified candidates were hired, they should be reviewed and fired as being unfit for their jobs. At the very least, they should be made to reapply for those jobs, along with any qualified candidates who may now wish to apply. There is nothing unfair about demanding people who got the jobs on unqualified grounds justify their continued employment in the face of real competition.

With all the double-talk and excuses coming out of the Attorney General’s mouth, you wonder what constitutes a crime in his world.

I think George Bush could wander out onto the White House lawn with a bloody knife, screaming, “I’m glad I killed the bitch with my own two hands,” in front of a crowd of tourists, have the Secret Service find the bloody corpse of some female staff member in the Oval Office, and still have the Attorney General declare,

“…not every wrong, or even every violation of the law, is a crime.”