Politics:
SOPA and PIPA Are Only a Skirmish
Harper and Chiefs to Hold Summit: Expectations are Low
Education:
Teach for America: Doing More Harm Than Good?
Equal is Better: What’s Missing from the Debate on Education Reform
Environment:
Tag Archives: politics
The Burzynski Clinic
If you haven’t heard of it recently, this is a medical scam where the proprietors claim to have effective cancer treatments, for which claims, nevertheless, they are unable to marshal any real evidence. Desperate sick people and their loved ones shell out hundreds of thousands of dollars for this bogus treatment.
Recently they’ve engaged a lawyer for the purposes of threatening everybody who’s ever said anything bad about the clinic, hoping to scare them into taking down articles, blog posts, and the like which expose their dishonesty.
After all, what is a lawyer for if not to bully the little guy on behalf of those with deep pockets? The Western legal system is essentially ritualized rhetorical combat, the goal being triumph and plunder; not justice, truth, or reconciliation.
Some more details, from the perspective of one of their (17-year-old) victims, is collected on his blog. Read the full story on the fraudulent Burzynski Clinic.
Billions and Billions
I’ve just finished the final chapter of Carl Sagan’s final book, “In the Valley of the Shadow”, in Billions and Billions. He died shortly after completing it. What a remarkable human being he was. Isaac Asimov, the prolific writer who was also (briefly) a Ph.D chemist famously said that Carl Sagan was one of only two people he had ever met who was clearly smarter than himself (the other was Marvin Minsky). However, it’s not his intelligence that I most admire, but he was remarkable ability to understand and empathize with other people.
Only Carl Sagan could bring together people from both ends of both the political and religious spectra, by being, apparently sincerely, genuinely able to understand all points of view in a largely non-judgemental way. Things have been so divisive in both American and Canadian politics the last 10 years, I think we really feel the loss of someone like him.
Back to School
It’s already back to school time yet again. Rhett Allain at Dot Physics has a nice post with advice to students, faculty, and administrators. Believe it or not, this will be the first time in 25 years that September has not meant a return to the classroom for me (this includes four years as a teacher and 21 years as a student — counting preschool). Other than a major relocation, September will be just another month of work as a writer.
But even if I never teach again, education will always be a major interest of mine. Making education work for everyone seems like it should be simple, but somehow it isn’t. There are students dealing with poverty, abuse, English as a new language, medical issues, learning disorders, or simply a teacher whose style doesn’t match with their own. Yet with few exceptions, they have more say over their own educational path than their teachers, parents, national leaders, or anyone else. Like Dorothy in Oz, the ones that beat the odds realize at the end, they had the power all along.
Indepedence, determination, initiative, stamina . . . this is all it takes. But no one develops these qualities overnight, and it’s a much tougher challenge to try to develop these qualities in someone else. This is where it gets complicated. And this is where I call bull on those pundits and politicians who claim a single, Magic Bullet solution to a “broken” educational system (e.g., charter schools, standardized testing). If there were any single thing that worked consistently to turn out committed, independent learners, absolutely everyone would be doing it.
Warren Buffett Doesn’t Think He’s Paying Enough Taxes
And good for him. Sometimes it takes someone with a forensic accounting
degree to pick up on someone not paying enough taxes, but not this
time. His New York Times op-ed is a breath of fresh air.
OUR leaders have asked for “shared sacrifice.” But when they did the asking, they spared me. I checked with my mega-rich friends to learn what pain they were expecting. They, too, were left untouched.
The point is often made that the majority of American, working-class conservatives consistently vote against their own interests. I don’t think the point is made enough that we ought to vote for what’s right for our fellow citizens as a whole, rather than thinking only of our own interest*. (As an environmentally-minded inividual, I would also include future citizens in that consideration.) If nothing else, we’re all dependent on each other, and economic collapse is bad for everyone in the long run.
Link via Scalzi, whose take on this is worth a read.
*Just so we’re clear, I am indeed Canadian, but like many of my countrymen, I follow US politics as carefully as my own.
Sometimes it takes someone with a <a
href=’http://www.forensicaccountingdegree.org/’>forensic accounting
degree</a> to pick up on someone not paying enough taxes, but not this
time.