Barack Obama Will Surrender to Mexico!

Or so says the ever-growing anti-Obama lunatics. Apparently it's not enough anymore to claim that you disagree with someone. For instance, I am not showing proper involvement in the political process by saying something like, "I can not support John McCain for president. While there are many reasons for this, chief among them are his stated inclination to continue American aggression in the Middle East, his unwillingness to address serious economic concerns, and a belief that the Supreme Court should not be shifted any further to the right." Instead, I need to up the ante to be competitive. For instance, I could say, "John McCain is a secret bastard grandchild of Adolph Hitler, bent on carrying out his grandsire's plan for world domination. He drinks the blood of non-Christians to maintain his vigor, and plans to force all young Americans to spend two years as prisoners in a POW camp to 'build character'." Isn't that better? Isn't that good, rational politics?

Anyway, here's the video clip that came through my e-mail with a lot of bluster attached.



The general message attached to this video was, "See? Obama is a Muslim, because he wants your children to learn Spanish, and Spain was once a Muslim country! And it means he thinks all Americans should speak Spanish instead of English! English is the language of the World, but not once Obama becomes president!" There is no apparent recognition of the irony involved, as Obama's more general point about American education is underscored by the proud display, intentional or otherwise, of poor aural comprehension.

The worst part about this is that such bullshit is always perpetuated by exactly the people who stand to gain the most through educational improvement. There is no doubt that education is a mark of class in this country. The wealthiest send their children to private schools, where their children will learn Latin and at least one other language. The upper-middle class send their children to well-funded public schools where numerous language classes are available, some starting as early as third grade. Knowing a foreign language in America is a class marker; like foreign travel and an understanding of world history, the wealthiest Americans instill it in their children while underhanded nationalistic marketing targeted to the middle and lower classes convinces them that such endeavors are useless and unamerican. Anyone who thinks that America is a classless society has been fooled into thinking so by those who want to maintain their position.

Dusty Books

A brand new study by the National Endowment for the Arts presents three troubling, completely unpredictable conclusions:

• Americans are spending less time reading.
• Reading comprehension skills are eroding.
• These declines have serious civic, social, cultural, and economic implications.


No shit.

This hasn't been established yet? We needed this study because the results were uncertain for even five seconds? Not that I don't see the value of hammering the point home, but could we maybe take some of that research money and put it towards, oh, I don't know... fucking doing something about it?

Oh well. Some of the more troubling findings:

• 57% of adult Americans read even one book they were not required to read in 2002, down from 61% in 1992. Even more troubling is the dramatic change in the 18-24 age group: 52% in 2002 from 59% in 1992, a 12% rate of decline. It is reasonable to believe, given this trend, that less than half of college-aged adults have read a book voluntarily in the last year.

• Young people are reading significantly less than before. Percentage of children who read daily for enjoyment has always decreased with age, but not as dramatically as it currently does. In 1984, 53% of 9-year-olds read for enjoyment, dropping to 31% at age 17. In 2004, that change was far more pronounced, as 54% of 9-year olds read for fun, dropping to 22% at age 17.

• In 2004, almost 20% of 17-year-olds say the 'never or almost never' read for enjoyment. That's one out of every five teenagers who are basically voluntarily illiterate.

Of course, as is to be expected, the response to this report is full of migraine-inducing folly.

Gioia called the decline in reading "perhaps the most important socio-economic issue in the United States,

Okay, yeah, I'm with you so far. This is definitely an arguable position.

and called for changes "in the way we're educating kids, especially in high school and college. We need to reconnect reading with pleasure and enlightenment."

No. No, no, no. This 'changing the way we're educating kids' bullshit never does any good at all. Educational trends are 90% crackpot nonsense. Back when I was an elementary ed major, the focus was on 'integrative education', which was professional jargon for sticking one profoundly autistic child into a classroom full of mainstream students. Failure to see the value of this practice was a major contributing factor to my leaving the program. Apparently, since then, others have realized what I said back then: all that system got you was a group of twenty-four students whose education was interrupted by constant disruption and one heartbreakingly confused autistic child.

The problem is not in the schools, except for the extent to which schools are an extension of our culture. Any educator with a lick of experience will tell you which children tend to read for enjoyment: children who see their parents reading for enjoyment. These are the same parents who take an active role in their children's education, and promote the value of gaining knowledge. This is not to be confused with parents who promote the value of good grades... 'helicopter parents' create entitled children, not educated children. When children are brought up in an environment that values knowledge and education as a lifelong pursuit, those children are infinitely more likely to carry those values on. We can not continue to blame schools for the problems caused by our own culture of anti-intellectualism.

Want your child to read more? Stop calling his teacher, turn off Desperate Housewives, crack a book, and create a positive example. If you're too busy to read, you're too busy to raise an educated child.