We previously discussed the lowering of admission standards at Virginia’s elite Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology to achieve diversity goals. Now the school is again under fire for waiting roughly a month to distribute National Merit certificates in the name of equity. The decision meant that students could not report the awards on their college applications before the passage of the October 31 deadline.
Journalist and advocate Asra Nomani alleges that the delay was due to Thomas Jefferson’s equity efforts, and its new “equal outcomes for every student, without exception” strategy. She also alleges that the most impacted (due to their higher percentage among recipients) were Asian students — an analogous claim to the alleged anti-Asian discrimination in the two Supreme Court admissions cases now pending.
Nomani’s report appeared in the New York Post.
Nomani claims that Thomas Jefferson’s principal, Ann Bonitaibus, told a concerned parent in an email that the school had received the National Merit certificates in mid-October, and that she had signed them within 48 hours.
However, the awards were not distributed by teachers until November 14. She claims that Brandon Kosatka, the director of student services, admitted on a call with another parent that the delay was based on a desire “to recognize students for who they are as individuals, not focus on their achievements.”
Nomani revealed emails from parents objecting to equity concerns overriding academic achievement when these students needed to include the recognition in their college applications. Whatever the reason for the delay, these students missed an important credential for inclusion in applications to highly competitive colleges.
Bonitatibus has pushed for equity-based policies at Thomas Jefferson and to move away from its tradition of focusing solely on academic achievement. That tradition had made the school the number one ranked high school in the nation.
The new policies have led to an effort to limit the number of Asian Americans to achieve “racial diversity.”
It is possible to achieve diversity in these programs without racial discrimination or criteria, but it is not as easy — or as fast — as just leveling down entry standards or delaying recognitions. We can focus on underperforming public schools to better prepare minority students. However, with continuing dismal performances of public educators in major cities, that’s not a welcomed approach for many in education. It’s easier to reduce entry standards than it is to elevate performance rates.
What is striking about these controversies is that neither parents nor the public appear to support the new policies. Thomas Jefferson has always been a point of pride for many of us in Fairfax County, even if your kids did not go to the school. It was meant to be a school that was reserved for brilliant students who are able to take extremely advanced courses and perform university-level research.
The policies under Bonitatibus should be the subject of outside review in how they are impacting a school that has long been the gold standard nationally. Public schools are subject to public standards set with the input of the board and the parents. The parental input has clearly not carried much weight with Bonitatibus. It is time for a more public debate over the future of “TJ.”
“It is possible to achieve diversity in these programs without racial discrimination or criteria ….”
******************************
Not really given the disparity in culture, child rearing priorities, socio-economic achievement and that pesky, unspoken bugaboo, IQ demographics.
“Oh no, no, no affirmative action won’t mean cutting down the tall trees to elevate the short ones,” they all said. We told you what the jackals would do and now they’ve come to exact exactly that.
Since Svelaz has no issue with the school withholding this information from the students let’s refrain from telling him that about 90% of us on this site think he is either an FBI plant, a paid Democrat or an idiot.
hullbobby:
‘ … about 90% of us on this site think he is either an FBI plant, a paid Democrat or an idiot.”
******************************
Put me down for B & C. The FBI has some standards, I think.
Mespo: “The FBI has some standards, I think.”
+++
This isn’t the season for rash optimism.
Around and Around we go, where we stop no one knows. Is this insanity going to go full circle back to where sanity prevails? The fools who follow some bizarre theory that a minor element of society should rule the roost, because of some perceived wrong that was committed, is untenable, we all are floating in the same boat with equal rights to sink or swim. Life is not a bowl of cherries, nor forgiving to those with a chip on their shoulders always looking for grievances to assuage what, I’m not sure? Their continued assaults on those who hold counter positions to theirs, must be sued, ridiculed, and generally made a joke of, being the fools and clowns, they are.
Someone is not reading things closely, but it isn’t JT.
Exactly, George.
“Svelaz says:
December 28, 2022 at 3:12 PM
What is painfully obvious is the majority of posters did not read the emails which are at the heart of the problem. Turley falsely made this into an issue about a principal withholding these awards because “he believes diversity and inclusivity is more important than achievement” which is not true at all. ”
You should read a little more about the issue. I recommend Asra Nomani’s article at City Journal. Professor Turley did not falsely “make this into an issue” as it has apparently been going on for years. Nomani cites what happened to her son in 2020.
Asra Nomani is reporting what allegedly transpired. Her accounts are mostly hearsay and the only way to verify it is by those emails which ARE the relevant source of the story.
The awards issue has nothing to do with DEI policies. This issue is about the lack of communication regarding the awards.
I thought they all got awards anyway. What? Now only the underachievers get awards?
What is painfully obvious is the majority of posters did not read the emails which are at the heart of the problem. Turley falsely made this into an issue about a principal withholding these awards because “he believes diversity and inclusivity is more important than achievement” which is not true at all.
This is about a lackadaisical attitude towards these awards by the school who has a LOT of overachievers and bright kids. Even the students don’t seem to care that much about it as shown in the emails.
Again you make yourself into an apologist for the misconduct of the left.
Absolutely – you, the administrators – just like the FBI have all kinds of excuses for failing to do their job, or for outright doing evil.
You ask why you are immoral ?
ONE of many reasons, is because you will find any possible excuse to do the wrong or avoid doing right.
You are happy to screw voters, screw students. Screw anyone to acheive your ideological objectives.
John B. Say,
Your reactionary response is predictable. Rather than bloviate about “leftist apologists” and rant nonsense you would be better served by reading the emails linked in the column.
Turley is making this into something other than what it really is. Yes, it is THAT obvious. All you have to do is read other sources regarding this story and the primary source which are these emails in the column. It has NOTHING to do with DEI. It’s about a parent complaint regarding the timing of awards to a school full of overachievers who don’t seem to care that much about them. I’m sure there are some who take it more seriously than others. Turley is taking this opportunity to use this story to push a narrative that is completely detached from reality and making it into something that his gullible readers can get enraged about.
“You are happy to screw voters, screw students. Screw anyone to acheive your ideological objectives.”
False. Making assumptions based on your own flawed perceptions and animosity towards anything from the left is blinding you to the truth. You’re as emotional as Witherspoon it seems.
Svelaz, I have yet to find a single instance ever in which you have accurately reported your own sources.
I am tired of embarrassing you further.
It serves no purpose.
Your leftist apologism is just annoying. Reread your own sources a couple of times.
If you have not changed your mind – reread them again. It that does not work – either you ned reading comprehension classes or some basic morals education. Though another poster was correct, the Authors I cited are beyond your ability to comprehend.
So lets start simply. Morality is not about words, it is not about thoughts, it is about actions.
Acts that infringe on the liberty of others without justification are immoral – ALWAYS. Justification is Narrow. Self defense justifies killing, winning an election does not justify infringing on the liberty of another. Acting to silence someone else to win an election is immoral ALWAYS.
It is immoral even if they are lying. Morality requires acting rightly even when the outcome may be bad for you.
You keep saying that there was no conspiracy to rig the election, that nothing that was done was immoral, or that morality had nothing to do with it.
Of course it did. Silencing another infringes on their rights. It is rarely justified. Winning an election is NEVER an acceptable justification for infringing on a right.
You are immoral, All the hedging and obfuscation in the world does not change that.
And as Adam’s noted – you are incapable of self government.
Only a moral people can govern themselves.
You are not a moral person.
You can not be trusted.
“”You are happy to screw voters, screw students. Screw anyone to acheive your ideological objectives.”
False. Making assumptions based on your own flawed perceptions and animosity towards anything from the left is blinding you to the truth. You’re as emotional as Witherspoon it seems.”
I judge you based on the facts, based on your acts, and based on the acts you condone. I judge you based on your fruit.
Voters were screwed,
Students were screwed,
You condone those things, you support them.
My words are obviously true.
My animosity towards the left is well founded.
It is based on a fundamental lack of morality – you do not seem to understand how damning your vast conspiracy to silence the truth is.
I do not presume all republicans are moral. But the GOP has done nothing this immoral and this large EVER.
This was not some Roger Stone or Paul Manafort dirty Trick. This was the whole Biden campaign, the DNC, the Democratic leaders,
This was the FBI, various other government agencies, this was you defending it.
Still dwelling on the immorality thing? Wow. You are seriously obsessed with this immorality issue despite the fact that it has nothing to do with any of the issues we have been debating on.
Slev : you have been a beacon of tainted light since you showed up. You espouse big brother-ism gleefully . You remind me of the kind of person that would have handily and proudly carried a jingling johnny on parade in a european country in the late 1930’s. Your belief structure is that of bigger more oppressive govt is somehow better and utopian. Do you ever read your posts to see how much of a statist cog you most assuredly come across as ?. Most here would agree you do not…and simply because you drink the koolaide ….yes its that obvious.
All unjustified infringements on liberty are immoral.
I am not obsessed with morality.
You have just so completely and clearly acted immorally.
This is not a small thing – many thousands of people participated in this.
This is not Karl Rove and some political dirty trick.
John, you keep moving the goalposts regarding immorality. You are looking for ways to justify that flawed argument 7 ways from Sunday.
Clearly you are too emotionally invested in the concept to recognize the facts before you. It’s simple willful denial of the facts. I can’t help you with that except to keep pointing out your shortcomings and inability to grasp what is presented to you.
You cite in incomplete John Adams quote out of context as your reasoning behind this morality slant you’ve attached yourself to without bothering to read the entire quote which does NOT mean what you think it means. The fact that you cherry picked the wording from a larger quote shows the dishonesty and jaundiced perception. Here’s the entirety of John Adams quote which does not infer what you think it does,
“But should the people of America once become capable of that deep simulation towards one another, and towards foreign nations, which assumes the language of justice and moderation, while it is practising iniquity and extravagance, and displays in the most captivating manner the charming pictures of candour, frankness, and sincerity, while it is rioting in the rapine and insolence, this country will be the most miserable habitation in the world. Because we have no government armed with the power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, and licentiousness would break the strongest cords of our Constitution, as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
He’s using religion as a synonym for moral thinking opposing greed, revenge and other motives that make democracy difficult. The very things republicans are today. Greed and revenge as in “stick it to the libs” attitudes that pervade the party and your own. You’re suffering from exactly what Adams was referring to in his quote and you are oblivious to it. Take that gigantic plank from your eye so you can see clearly before you try to remove the speck from someone else’s.
No moving goalposts.
Restricting the liberty of others without clear justification is immoral.
And nearly all restrictions on the liberty of others are immoral.
Proving your immorality multiple different ways does not change the goalposts.
But it does make it harder for you to escape blame for your immorality.
You are immoral 7 ways from Sunday.
Are we allowed to punish those who act immorally ?
There is nothing wrong with “stik it to the libs” – so long as the actions of the libs were immoral and the means of “stiking it to them is moral.
We sent murders to jail.
BTW you inherently accept this – Cancel culture is YOUR invention – not that of republicans.
I have no problems with progressive “playing to win” I have no problems with conservatives “playing to win”.
My problems occur when either side is willing to act immorally in order to win.
Both sides have had their dirty tricksters in the past.
But the left is past a few dirty tricksters.
The entire party aparatus, the entire campaign, the media, social media, and government agencies are all acting immorally in order to “win”
There is nothing even close to equivalence on the right.
Svelaz’s remark reflects an utter blindness to the concept of morality.
Dumb people should not be allowed to dumb down the smart people or negatively impact their rise to greatness.
I am so tired of hearing how equity and diversity make the world better. True equity and fairness comes from honesty. Any individual can achieve greatness depending on their innate abilities and the goal should be focused on achieving “your”highest level of greatness, not the highest level possible which of course only a few can achieve.
“Be all that YOU CAN be”
The basic, and demonstrably false, premise of equity is that the demographics of all achievements, endeavors, professions, etc. will always reflect that of the population when there is no selection bias. No one in the equity camp has bothered to attempt that case. Unfortunately for the equity believers, to prove its falsity only requires a single example and there are many of these including professional sports team membership as well as criminal convictions.
Then once one recognizes that the premise does not hold, what does an equity believer do with knowledge of achievement through personal effort? This has to be quashed. Here again there is a demonstrably false premise lurking. That is that competitiveness among people is bad and can be suppressed. Highschool kids know who is smart and who is not. It is impossible for the administrators and teachers to suppress this understanding. So celebrating achievement is only recognizing what, for the most part, everyone knows. Work produces results. In 1948, three scientists at Bell Labs announced the discovery of a working solid state transistor – a point contact transistor. After William Shockley discovered that the other two had intended to file a patent claim without him, his competitive spirit was activated. In a few weeks, Shockley invented the Bipolar Junction Transistor – a better, much more enduring and powerful device. Competition is a powerful motivator and should not be suppressed by the equity believers.
Ultimately, we have to fall back on to inculcating into students a different set of “e” concepts: excellence, engagement, and ethics.
Here’s another important factor not considered by Turley or the Post reporter.
“Some of these kid are ony 16 years old. They may not appreciate the importance of the honor and perhaps not showed the cad to thei families. 1 knowJl id not—he did’t even show me the card uni yesterday. He felt like it didn’t mean much because he was a semifinalist. I have since assured him that this is indeed an impressive accomplishment. We are quite proud of him.”
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23466063-national-merit-tjhsst-emails
What is notable about this is the email is dated November 21. Her son received the award Nov 14. She learned about it the day before from her son who kept it LONG after without telling her parents. How many other students did the same or worse?
The exact dates when the awards arrived at the principals office are never mentioned and only “mid-October” is mentioned which makes it more likely that it was more towards late in October. Signing 240 letters of commendations within 48 hrs is doable but was it really done within 48 hrs? I don’t think they were and it may explain the delay. Principals don’t always do everything by the book.
This story was used to exploit a different agenda about equity and diversity policies that have nothing to do with this issue about the awards. It’s being used as fodder for the rage-a-holics Turley frowns upon.
More apologism for the idiots on the left.
The administration of the school admitted that THEY supressed the disemination of this information.
That THEY sought to diminish its value.
Why would a student beleive that something was important when the school treated it as meaningless ?
MY HS announced the names of the finalists and semi finalists every single year, we were featured in the school newspaper, called in front of assemblies. The School made it very clear this was an important accomplishment – That the students should be proud, and that the school was proud.
The school did the same for distinguished athletes, Dramatists, musicians, science fair participants.
Every single way in which any student demonstrated that they were exceptional was recognized by the school.
Further this is exactly what ALL parents want. Those whose students are good in sports want excellent sports programs.
Those who are good in academics want excellent academic programs.
Even parents whose children are not among the best at anything, still want their children to have the best education they can.
My kids were cyber chartered. They were and in college continue to be at the top of their classes in everything.
But their classes included large numbers of poor minority kids from broken families in $hitty school districts.
Their mothers had crappy jobs and a crappy future but univerally shared ONE thing.
THEIR CHILD was going to do better.
THEIR CHILD was not going to get pregnant at 13 or go to jail for selling drugs.
If THEIR CHILD could not be a Merit Finalist, they were going to graduate being able to read and write.
Universal to american history has been the tremendous value that Americans – particularly immigrants and minorities placed on education.
Catholic parishes build Schools before churches, and hold services in the Gym.
Everyone not on the left know the road to success is through the best education you can get.
If you have the ability to be a Merit Scholar – work your ass off for that.
If you have to work your ass off to pass – doing so will give you a better future.
On of the great benefits of freedom is that we each have the freedom to succeed to the greatest of our individual ability.
The extent to which each and everyone of us does better than expectations is directly reflected in rising standard of living.
“The administration of the school admitted that THEY supressed the disemination of this information.
That THEY sought to diminish its value.”
Nope. Did you read the emails that are linked in the column?
They didn’t admit anything of the sort the you allege. There were 240 students who were awarded. The parent complaining admitted that part of the delay was due to a postage issue AND also that her own son didn’t tell her about his award until the 20th of November long after the school actually gave him the award. The parent noted he didn’t care and didn’t think much of it and as a 16yr old who is semi-finalist he sure shows that responsibility of being a recipient of such a prestigious award by not making an effort on his part to ensure his own parents knew he got it.
This had nothing to do with any DEI policy at all. Even the parent complaining never mentioned it.
What is more likely is that due to the large number of students getting this award and the prestigious nature of the school this is not deemed as “glorious” as others may see it. Some may, but with a whole bunch of overachievers who are always at the top of their game who know this is only about semi-finalists who are still required to apply as a finalist and many won’t go that far since finalists are a tiny minority of students who really want it.
This is just a bad decision or a series of bad decisions regarding timing and who is supposed to notify students. Not an intentional suppression. Your tendency to go right into conspiracy theory mode was obvious. Read the emails and pay attention to the context of the exchange. The principal does not say exactly when they awards got to his desk and I’m willing to bet that it was much later than the parent thinks it happened because she acknowledges that there was an issue about postage on all those awards by a third party vendor.
The results of the awards are announced nationally on November 14th. The same date the students got theirs at Jefferson high school.
You own remarks do not make any sense or correspond tot he actual facts.
Parents can “admit” anything – this is more of the typical nonsense you come up with.
The parent was TOLD this was the reason. That does not make it true.
It is also a very stupid reason. A postage stamp costs $0.62
The Average VA teacher makes 54K or $50/hr for a 180day year with 6hr days.
That is less than the cost for 3hrs of a teacher.
Virginia spends about $13K/year on each student.
That is $72/day – and they can not afford a $0.62 postage stamp ?
The claim is BS.
John B. Say, did you read the emails? Yes or no?
“Parents can “admit” anything – this is more of the typical nonsense you come up with.”. John READ the emails. This parent admitted that there WAS a valid issue about the awards being delayed by a third party vendor.
“It is also a very stupid reason. A postage stamp costs $0.62”
Yeah, for a letter. Not a package containing multiple documents which obviously are not going to weight the same amount of of a single letter requiring just 62 cents. The VENDOR, A THIRD PARTY VENDOR did not affix the correct postage to ALL of the awards to 240 students. That is a significant delay in any case.
It’s obvious that you did NOT read the emails which explain a LOT about the issue AND given it proper context.
I’ll say it again so you don’t feel as stupid as you did the first time. A THIRD PARTY VENDOR DID NOT PROVIDE THE PROPER POSTAGE FOR THE AWARDS BEING SENT TO THE SCHOOL.
Read. The . Emails. It will save you a lot of frustration.
I am not going to go back and reread what I read before based on the claims of someone who admits he is reading between the lines and has a well established reputation for immorality and lying.
I do not trust you.
No one should.
Regardless your argument is stupid.
And you do not know how to use the word “admit”.
Nor is it relevant.
I was a Merit finalist. Somewhere I have the certificate.
It can be mailed for standard first class Rates.
Next, you do not need a third party vendor to send 240 certificates.
I have posted over 1000 sales packets in a bit more than an hour.
When you hire a third party – a process that took longer than doing the job.
You are responsible.
This is typical of left wing nuts. Nothing is your fault ever.
I am sure the left wing nut third part vendor has all kinds of excuses too.
You F#$k up elections – that is OK, it is not your fault,
You disenfranchised voters – that’s ok its not your voters.
You supressed the truth – that’s ok it enabled you to win an election.
Grow up, Moral people take responsibility for their own failures.
John it’s obvious you have not read the emails.
“Next, you do not need a third party vendor to send 240 certificates.”
The emails confirm that a third party vendor WAS USED by the national merit awards organization to send the packets with the awards. THEY did that. How are you not able to comprehend the basic fact that they are SAYING. A third party vendor made a mistake on postage and delayed the awards.
You didn’t read the emails.
“A third party vendor made a mistake on postage and delayed the awards.”
Yet again, you are evading and deflecting, in an attempt to excuse an evil policy.
The Principal acknowledged that she received the notifications in *mid-October*.
She received the cerificates in Mid October.
She received notification from NMQST of honorees in Mid September.
Svelaz tries to make the tiniest error on anyone else’s part responsible for the whole problem.
The mail problem with the certificates delayed students getting certificates by 2-3 weeks NOT 2 months.
NOTHING delayed students being notified that they had won.
Almost the entirety of FCPS was notified of winners by Sept 22 EXCEPT TJ
Sevvy:
And Sevvy you didn’t read what Brandon Kosatka said. Quit excusing evil. It kinda puts you in the middle of it.
amen
I read the emails AGAIN -= AGAIN – you have not.
TJ was notified approx Sept. 14 by NMQST via email of all the winners.
The same time all other HS’s were.
Every single other HS in FCPS notified the students and parents of the award by Sept. 22.
Nearly all had delivered certificates to Students by Oct. 1.
TJ received certificates late – early Oct. They did not deliver them until Nov. 15. more than a month after receiving certificates.
More than 2 months after being notified which students won.
The Certificates are important. I still have mine.
But the only thing necescary for a college application is to be notified – which all other HS’s in FCPS had done by Sept. 22.
Almost 2 full months before TJ.
Further TJ like all HS’s know that Colleges have EA application deadlines of Oct 15, and Nov 1.
And many colleges will not allow you to supliment applications once sent.
If you follow the emails, TJ was being pressed to independently notify the colleges that Students applied to, because they MIGHT be the only way to reflect this award in their Applications.
Aparently you do not recall this, but this is a very big deal. Colleges make EA decisions through December and notify students starting in January.
EA is the primary way that top students in the US end up at the top schools.
Whatever TJ’s motive in this, they are potentially facing a tort law suit by as many as 240 parents.
If TJ was a private school – they would lose, and very badly. They could be facing awards of lifetime loss of income from students who did not get into top schools.
Unless you are so stupid that you do not understand that a degree from Stanford or CMU or MIT means a significant lifetime earnings increase.
“This is typical of left wing nuts. Nothing is your fault ever.
I am sure the left wing nut third part vendor has all kinds of excuses too.”
John, getting all hissy about it doesn’t help your clear inability to understand what the emails were saying and the important facts that shed light on its proper context.
You’re the only one saying “nothing is your fault”. That speaks volumes about what your slant is when you argue regarding the left. You WANT it to be their fault. I’m can ONLY be their fault. Anything else is a mere error or mistake. That’s pretty arrogant of you.
“Regardless your argument is stupid.
And you do not know how to use the word “admit”.
“October 2022 — TJHSST received their package of Letters of Commendation (late). The package was large because ~240 students received the award and the printing service vendor hired by National Merit Scholarship Corporation failed to put adequate postage on the package. “
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23466063-national-merit-tjhsst-emails
Here she admitted an obvious factor regarding the delay.
Given how slow the mail is. It’s very plausible that the delay was much longer than they stated. We don’t know exactly when yet were actually delivered to the school. The vendor would have had to resend the large package adding more time.
The mother admitted in her email that her son didn’t give her the award until the 20th of November. Six days after getting it. That’s another factor.
Back to idiocy about emails you CLEARLY have not read.
“You’re the only one saying” Are you capable of an argument that is not fallacy ?
Typical left wing nut – in Svelaz world, what is true depends on who says it.
Ten people can make ten different arguments as to why something is false.
The fact that each makes a different argument does NOT speak volumes about each argument.
It DOES speak volumes as to the scope of flaws in what they argue against.
Regardless, My claim is correct – it is a common theme among those on the left to never take responsibility for their own errors.
Judge Thompson has settled for the moment whether Hobbes and Maricopa counties massive F#$K up in 2022 (and 2020, and aparently 2018) altered the outcome of the election. I beleive the actual evidence demonstrates he resolved that in error. But that is irrelevant to my point.
NO one has apologized for the disaster. Hobbs and the Maricpoa EB continue to lie about the scope of a problem that by their own admission required hand counting nearly 100,000 ballots.
There has been no apology for the F#$K up in Afghanistan.
No Apology for the screwed up policies that lead to Russia invading Ukraine.
No apology for creating the worst inflation since Jimmy Carter.
No apology for putting the country through the collusion delusion nonsense.
No apology for the mess at the southern border.
No apology for the increase in violence and crime.
No apology for the increase in suicides.
No apology for the increase in drug overdoes.
No apology for ….
In Loudon County VA a fathr was drug out of a school board by police for demanding an explanation from board members for the rape of his daughter by a MTF trans in the Girls restroom. The School Board denied the event occured – this despite moving ghe perpitrator to another school where he raped another teen.
This event is central to the efforts by the Whitehouse to get parents labeled as domestic terrorists. Drove the NSBA letter that resulted in the DOJ/FBI targeting parents – before the NSBO withdrew their letter because of the outrage that parents and other school boards had over its nonsense.
No apology.
Candidate Joe Biden lied about his involvement in his sons businesses – a FACT that is critical as whether those affairs are merely legal but cringeworthy influence pedaling or potentially criminal political corruption and abuse of office.
No apology.
Candidate Joe Biden lied about the authenticity of the evidence against him claiming is was Russian disinformation.
No apology.
Candidate Joe Biden lied about his past remarks on Fracking, Lied about what his current position was, and then as president did exactly what he lied and said he would not.
No apology.
51 members of the Intelligence community staked their reputation on the claim that the Hunter Biden laptop was “russian disinformation”
No apology.
You have personally misrepresented facts, lied, and engaged in numerous other immoral conduct.
You said you read the twitter files – yet obviously you have not.
You said you read the TJ emails – yet obviously you have not.
No apology.
Those on the left NEVER take responsibility for their own failures.
Yes, I near universally oppose the left.
I also universally oppose communists – which the modenr progressive left is near synonymous with.
I also oppose Nazi’s
I oppose actual white supremecists – in the rare instances you can find one.
Do you have a problem with that ?
The left is near universally wrong.
That is not an accident, it is a consequence of its values, and its lack of moral foundations.
Just as white supremacists are near universally wrong – because their values ensure that.
It takes only a small amount of critical thinking to foresee that – and often even how, nearly every leftist policy, or value will go wrong.
I am predisposed to assume that child sacrifice will not work out – is that wisdom or Bias ?
I would further note – I have not opposed absolutely everything the left has ever done.
I fully support equal rights for LGBTQ+ – where equal rights means just that. The same rights under the law, not special rights to force others to do as you wish. Not the right to sexualize children. Not the right to destroy the meaning of Woman.
Even when the left starts out right, they go way too far.
“You WANT it to be their fault.”
More abysmally bad mind reading.
It is hard for me to say “I would be happy if the left was right” – because the left is such a self contradictory disaster it is just not possible.
But putting blinders on, and pretending logic does not exist and we live in a world of magic.
I would be happy to see most left wing nut policies actually work.
I do not WANT them to be wrong.
I am just not stupid enough to think that wishing an idea was not bad will make it work.
“I’m can ONLY be their fault.”
Not what I have Ever said.
As an example
But For multiple horrific policy decisions by Biden, Putin would not have invaded Ukraine
There is absolutely blame that belongs to Biden for the Ukraine War, and for the death and destruction that has resulted.
That does not alter the fact that Putin invaded a Sovereign Country.
Putin’s criminal misconduct does not left Biden off the hook for his blunders.
But the primary fault for the war rests with Biden.
Another
Current inflation is the result of the Fed monetizing US Debt.
That started in 2008. That increased under Trump.
Trump’s Covid spending was a huge mistake.
Biden doubling down on the Spending of Trump was a bigger one.
Current inflation is not ONLY Biden’s fault.
First and foremost responsibility lies with the Fed.
But after that Obama, Trump, Democrats, Republicans have a share of the blame.
But atleast 50% of the blame goes to Biden and current democrats.
And that is a big deal. Inflation peaking at 4% – which is likely what would have happened had Biden not spent Trillions
Is not the same as inflation peaking at more than 9%.
The negative impact of inflation is exponentially greater the higher the inflation.
The twitter files include claims that the Trump WH participated in some of the Twitter censorship.
I have not seen and the Twitter files have not provided evidence of that.
But if that was done – it was WRONG, it was MORALLY WRONG.
Trump as president repeatedly made WRONG remarks that somebody should censor others.
Those remarks were WRONG.
Todate there is no evidence that anything ever came of the remarks. That does not make them right.
But ultimately Actions are far more important than words. The WRONG things Trump said, do not compare the the Wrong things the left DOES.
“Anything else is a mere error or mistake.”
I do not recall saying anything at all like that.
I do not consider error or mistakes insignificant – especially foreseeable ones.
While it is worse if the outcome of an election is altered by deliberate wrong acts,
It is not excusable if it was altered by mere errors or mistakes.
I expect the law to be followed – not manufactured to suit.
I expect near perfection from elections – because mistakes are not excusable, and worse provide cover for Fraud.
I know – because it happens in Business all the time, that error rates of 3.4:1000000 are acheivable.
I expect government to perform to the same standards that industry manages – especially on critical tasks like elections.
One of the many reasons for limited govenrment, is that Government can not F#$K up what it does not do.
“That’s pretty arrogant of you.”
False, and irrelevant.
If it is arrogant to expect competence and morality from government – then I offer no apologies.
I will correct my mistakes.
I owe you no apologies for criticizing yours.
Svelaz – Do you know what a red herring is ? Because you are chasing one like no tomorow.
The parent in questions email that reference mailing issues, is repeating what she was told.
She has no first hand knowledge. She did not mail or receive the mail.
Nor is she holding TJ responsible for the NMQST mail delay.
But it still toook TJ a full month after requipt of certificates to hand them out.
And TJ failed to notify students who achieved honors for 2 months after the School knew.
While all other FCSP schools notified students within two days of receipt of the NMQST email, and BEFORE receiving Certificates.
In fact They all made public announcements, held assemblies or breakfasts with parents to honor their students acheivements.
TJ did NOTHING. No public announcement,. no assemblies, and it failed to even notify students until after all EA deadlines had passed.
This is all FACTS that with TJ admitted or that NMQST provided to the parent directly.
The mail issue you fixate on only justified not providing Students with Certificates prior to Oct. 14th.
It does not justify an aditional month delay in providing certificates.
It does not justify 2 months delay in notifying students.
“Given how slow the mail is. It’s very plausible that the delay was much longer than they stated. We don’t know exactly when yet were actually delivered to the school. The vendor would have had to resend the large package adding more time.”
Please read the email chain the actual date TJ received certificates is in there.
Speculating about established FACTS does nto alter the FACTS.
The student in question did not appreciate the importance of this because he was a teen, and because the adults who are supposed to know better treated it as inconsequential.
You want to blame everyone else for the Left’s mistakes.
Quit F#$King around with Kids.
I honestly am surprised that TJ is still standing. 70% of the students are Asian. In the 240 NMQST honorees I would immaging that this parent is not the only or most vigorous “Tiger Mom”.
As I told you repeatedly the Consequences of left wing nut F#$Kups is predictable.
You do not get to blame this on the kids.
You do not get to blame this on the mail.
TJ Knew whop the Honorees were in Mid September. Deliberately or incompetently they failed to notify students for 2 months.
And from start to end TJ treated a significant accomplishment as meaningless.
And idiots like you think that is OK.
It is not.
This is the reason that our schools MUST be accountable to parents.
But those of you on the left only beleive in accountablity for those on the right.
Not yourself.
As the parent in question that you keep referring too, yes, students did not appreciate the significance, but ask yourself why that is. Is it because parents don’t understand the honor? Could it be that a school with a majority immigrant community might not appreciate the significance of a particular award especially if the school dismisses it as being not a big deal? The school made a big announcement for semi-finalists. It would certainly be understandable that a child who received the second tier award unceremoniously in homeroom 2 months after the semi-finalist celebration subsided would be lead to think the honor wasn’t really an honor but more of a “participation trophy” which it most assuredly is not.
Second, not reflected in the email exchange is the fact that the school actually received the list of award recipients in April. So while the paper certificates might have gotten “lost in the mail” there was no excuse to delay notifying students and families.
Corporate scholarships are tied to this award and students/families are required to reach out to those corporations on their own to be eligible.
Initially when I complained about this, I thought it might have been an innocent mistake. But after multiple long discussions with administrators, I realized it wasn’t. This was purposeful. Purposefully withholding property from children is not ok. This award was not the school’s property to hold for any amount of time.
Thank you Professor Turley for your interest in the story. As a GW law alum, I am especially humbled by your interest in what happened to my son and his classmates.
Of course the kid did not care – no one left him with the impression that his accomplishment meant anything.
This is typical BS from left wing nuts like you
When you teach people stupid things – and then they act stupid because of what you have taught them – You blame them.
My HS took every possible opportunity to congratulate any student that demonstrated accomplishment in ANYTHING.
The school was proud. The students were proud. The Parents were proud.
Whether it was Merit Scholarships, or Wrestling Trophies. Science fair wins, or 4H awards.
DEI is one of the most destructive ideas to hit this country.
NO two people are equal. There is no way to acheive equality. Trying to is harmful in multiple ways.
People who are not bat$hit crazy understand that.
“Of course the kid did not care – no one left him with the impression that his accomplishment meant anything.
This is typical BS from left wing nuts like you”
John, this is a kid from a school that is populated with the vest and brightest. He was well aware of the significance of the award. He didn’t care enough to give it ti his mom when he got it from the school. He KNEW that it wasn’t as important to him. He goes to a school where he’s expected to be responsible enough to understand. He’s no simp.
This had NOTHING to do with DEI. The rest of your diatribe about your school is completely irrelevant.
READ THE EMAILS.
“John, this is a kid from a school that is populated with the vest and brightest.”
Also the most competitive who are most likely to be well aware of even small distinctions between themselves and others.
“He was well aware of the significance of the award. He didn’t care enough to give it ti his mom when he got it from the school. He KNEW that it wasn’t as important to him. He goes to a school where he’s expected to be responsible enough to understand. He’s no simp.”
What part of this is mind reading. BTW I thought the problem was these were being mailed ?
Yet here you are claiming it was sent home with him. Which is it ?
And you claim he was aware – was this in an envelope ? How is he aware ?
Why is he supposed to beleive this is important, if his school sends him the clear message that it is not, that it has no more consequence than next months lunch schedule ?
“This had NOTHING to do with DEI.”
DEI specifically – with near certainty. The collection of bad values that DEI reflects with absolutely no doubt.
Your very claim that the student did not care – if true is PROOF that you have indictrinated the kid to his own detriment.
BTW there are nearly 2000 student at TJ, That means a Merit Finalist is in the top 10% of a top school.
This is NOT just the same as the kid in class next to him.
I would further note this is not about ONE Kid, it is about 240.
“READ THE EMAILS.”
Yes, Read emails NOT MINDS.
You have already said to get to your conclusions you have to read between the lines.
And you do not know the difference between repeating what you are told and an admission.
An admission requires first hand knowledge Giving others some latitude to save face based on their own represenations is not an admission.
Clearly YOU did not READ THE EMAILS. NMQST Notified TJ and all other schools in Mid Sepember. Other Schools in the same school District notified Students by Sept 22. Actual Certificates were received shortly after and Students were given Certificates within a day or so of receipt everywhere but TJ. TJ received Certificates later than other schools – possibly because of mail delays do to the large number of certificates.
Regardless, TJ is not responsible for the 2 week delay due to the Mail. But students throughout the school district had All been notified by their school BEFORE they received certificiates. TJ did not. Next, TJ sat on the certificates after receipt for over a month. Failing to provide them to Students until Nov. 14, This despite the fact that Colleges have KNOW deadlines for applications in Oct 15, and Nov 1 respectively.
As a result of TJ’s errors many TJ students were no able to include a significant award in their college applications.
The Emails make it clear students did not received Certificates until Nov. 14, and that on receiving them Students immediately updated their Personal Profiles to add the acheivement.
The school claims they assumed that NMQST notifed students by mail or email “as they had done in prior years”. The emails confirm this was a LIE, That NMQST has never notified students and that the information NMQST provides to schools States in Bold, that this information should be distributed quickly because the ONLY notice students will recieve will be from the school.
Next the Emails CONFIRM that TJ was more concerned about DEI – i.e the Feelings of students that did not win, then the accomplishments of those that did.
Lets presume as you claim that despite the emails From TJ to the contrary that DEI had nothing to do with this.
It is still a failure on the part of TJ and a Tort for which students can receive damages.
Frankly I think the evidence of Bad motive in the emails YOU demanded is more than sufficient to demonstrate this was deliberate and DEI driven. But in the end that does not matter. It was a failure for which TJ is responsible.
This also confirms what I have said about you and the left in the past.
You do not give a Schiff about the harm you cause others.
F#$K up a students chances of getting into the college they want – you do not care.
Screw up an Election – you do not care.
So long as you get the outcome you want, all is fine.
Is your misconduct deliberate ? I think so, and I think the evidence supports that.
Regardless, of whether your misconduct is deliberate or negligent those on the left should obviously never have any position of responsibility anywhere.
Because contra their high oppinion of themselves – THEY DO NOT CARE.
YOU DO NOT CARE.
And you OBVIOUSLY did not READ THE EMAILS – They are far more damning than I remembered.
John, some may not realize that merit scholarships are applied for. They are not given only for academic reasons. Many are for sports and other things.
Yours was probably for academics.
There are separate issues here.
The first is that NMQST recognizes students for their excellent performance on PSAT’s. Different levels of performance get different recognition, and also qualify you for both NMQST and thrid part benefits.
But the debate here is NOT about “the next step”.
The Debate is two fold.
First it is TJ’s choice to treat NMQST recognition as insignificant. That is an evil reflection of the values of those on the left, and it is societally destructive. If you do not recognize and reward excellence – you will not get it.
The 2nd issue is that NMQST honors substantially improve ones chanced of getting into a college, getting into a better college, getting scholarships from that college, and on and on.
There is a significant potential tort – a class action lawsuit against TJ.
There is zero doubt that their actions harmed students.
If TJ were private the loss could be large.
But I would guess this is another instance in which QI may come into play and TJ nor its administrators can be sued.
I have tried to get you to understand how big a problem QI is.
“I have tried to get you to understand how big a problem QI is.”
I didn’t know that I lacked understanding of QI. You are wrong. Maybe it is that I understand the problem better than you.
“I didn’t know that I lacked understanding of QI.”
I know that you do not know.
You are wrong. Maybe it is that I understand the problem better than you. Reality trumps ideology.
I really do not wish to keep trying to beat your head with a brick. but our debate is about reality not ideology.
You are ignorant of the reality of QI.
This is obvious whenever we debate it.
You think it is different than it is
and you think it is necessary when it is not.
QI is something the courts created out of thin air.
It was never necescary.
“I really do not wish to keep trying to beat your head with a brick. “
.
If you don’t wish to beat my head with a brick, stop using your head. 🙂
What you call ignorance is enlightenment. You draw your conclusions based on theory. I draw them based on reality with a response based on what exists and what is possible. That requires a little more thought than one based solely on a rigid ideology
Again this is not at all about theory.
The most important problem with QI is not ideological. It is practical.
QI is simply moral hazard. That is what occurs when you transfer the cost of actions to someone other than the actor.
Moral hazard always results in failure.
Despite your rants, my argument against QI is fact based, reality based, pragmatic. It is not theoretical or ideological.
Though QI fails those too.
It is unnecescary and serves only to protect bad actors and to encourage both bad acts and the recklessness that comes when one is not accountable for their actions.
While government is not exactly like free markets.
it is similar in that it needs regulation.
I oppose government regulation – of itself or others.
I want market regulation – torts, and lawsuits.
These are not perfect, but they are much better than government regulation.
One of the important was to regulate govenrment is to be able to sue it when rights are violated.
That is preferable to takig up pitchforks and arms.
“Again this is not at all about theory.”
Too much of it is, is, at least in your mind.
I know what you want, but the imperfections are so great that some of the solutions have to be imperfect. We got into a similar argument with immigration and then you added a few things to your dialogue. In this instance they won’t be the same things but exist.
SM – none of what we are debating regarding QI is theory.
This is not about imperfect solutions – torts as a means of regulating is imperfect,
It is just better than a priori government regulation.
QI inarguably creates significant moral hazard.
You have not even bothered to claim that getting rid of it would result in net harm.
Because it would not.
QI is symptomatic of many right left issues.
“Something is not working perfectly, so lets really F it up”
I do not expect perfection, eliminating QI will not result in perfection, just move us a few steps in the right direction.
We have the left going – we have a problem with criminal justice – lets blow away bail, and not prosecute a raft of “petty crimes” – and they wonder when crime explodes.
We have the right going crimes is bad, so lets make shoplifting subject to capital punishment.
QI is a solution to a problem that does not exist, while like zero bail, or converting everything to capital offenses, makes things worse not better.
We are now seeing police officers going to jail for essentially mistakes – if that.
Why ? Because we can not fire them, and we can not sue them.
But QI does not prevent us from sending them to prison.
Regardless, engage in an actual argument, please.
“SM – none of what we are debating regarding QI is theory.
This is not about imperfect solutions – torts as a means of regulating is imperfect,”
If it is not theory, what is it?
QI is a stupid legal theory.
That it is a failure is a fact.
My arguments regarding QI are not at all theoretical.
I honestly have not heard an actual argument in favor of QI from you.
You keep repeating “the perfect is the enemy of the good enough” – which has nothing at all to do with this discussion.
We have an imperfect solution – torts, that works in every single other aspect of our lives.
But without QI we would still not be dropping back to a pure torts solution.
In actually relevant instances government and government employees have absolute immunity.
So long as the officer was following the law – he can not be sued. QI only applies when someone in government violates a persons rights outside of what the law allows.
Beyond absolute immunity – all awards will be covered by insurance. and that insurance will be paid for by the taxes that members of the jury pay.
So jurors will have far more natural reluctance to grant awards to plantiff’s because they will come from their own pockets.
You have STILL not addressed the fact that QI only applies when someone in government Actually violates a persons rights.
All QI does is say – “Whoops, your screwed” in 99% of cases that your rights are violated.
There is nothing else it is useful for.
“What is more likely ” is that you are a moron who thinks you can read peoples minds.
Less than 1% of College bound HS Juniors are Merit Finalists. That is highly prestigious. PERIOD.
It means that you have an IQ of atleast 130 – probably significantly higher.
There are 16,000 semi finalists a year. There are 15,000 finalist a year. and 7,000 people who receive money.
If you are a semi finalists the odds of being a finalist are excellent. The odds of getting some money are almost 50:50
I would be thoroughly shocked to find that you were a Merit Scholar, or that you had an IQ above room temperature.
John, nobody is questioning the prestigious entire of the award. Just pointing out the fact that many of those semi-finalists are not really interested in going further a few are committed to going all the way.
“John, nobody is questioning the prestigious entire of the award. Just pointing out the fact that many of those semi-finalists are not really interested in going further a few are committed to going all the way.”
I have no idea what you mean, nor do I think you do either.
Going where ?
Here is their website.
https://tjhsst.fcps.edu/
These students are going places. This was the number one rated High School in the US in 2022.
It is a magnet HS. You have to apply to get in – just like College, only the best students in VA manage to get it.
This is the MIT of US High Schools.
I have no idea what “all the way” means – but pretty much no matter what it means – these students are committed to “Going all the way”.
They would not be here but for being bother extremely capable and extremely competitive.
Here is their wikipedia page – only about 15% of applicants to TJ get in.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Jefferson_High_School_for_Science_and_Technology
I can not find the percent that go on to college – but I would bet it is near 100%.
I would bet the few who do not go to college are jumping straight into tech startups and skipping college because it is a loss of 4 years in perusing their goals.
It’s been a long time and things may have changed, but when I was a National Merit Semifinalist, I was notified by the organization and not my school. Then there was another process and submission to become a National Merit finalist. Not only did I know, hundreds of colleges and universities knew of my status and i got letters and brochures every day for months. I am not seeing how all these students didn’t know their status or how they were denied the chance to tell schools on their applications.
I am not seeing how all these students didn’t know their status or how they were denied the chance to tell schools on their applications.
What you are not seeing is that you have no integrity. This isnt that difficult.
Enigma, there was an issue about postage from the third party vendor which caused delays in sending the awards to Jefferson. I noticed that of all the schools in Virginia Jefferson. Got a LOT more than any other school and this is just for semi-finalists. As the emails show some of the students didn’t seem to care that much since it was only for semi-finalists and it is more likely than not that a lot of these students simply didn’t care or ignored it. This is a school full of a lot of smart kids and given the sheer number of awards to their one school it don’t think they put much emphasis on the awards. Only the few serious ones will make the effort to apply for as a finalist. That would explain somewhat the “delay”. I don’t think this was because of equity or diversity vs achievement. The emails don’t mention anything about it at all. The only people menionting DEI as the reason are those not involved in the dispute.
To those on the left anything is sufficient excuse for failing to do a job you do not wish to do anyway.
John you would do yourself a big favor if read the emails before you embarrass yourself further. You’re a smart guy surely you can read between the lines on what is really the issue on this topic.
Back to the mind reading. The fact that you are reading between the lines makes my point.
Regardless, you have already embarrassed yourself.
BTW I did read the emails. I found nothing in them that conflicted with Turley’s column.
I did not memorize them – because they supported Turley’s column.
I have found only one significant problem with Turley over the years.
Turley still beleives the left is not all bad. He still believes in the alleged good intentions of those on the left.
But he is learning slowly.
People like you are teaching him.
The left LIES – ALWAYS
The Left is immoral – ALWAYS.
“Back to the mind reading. The fact that you are reading between the lines makes my point.”
No. Reading between the lines is what clarifies the context of the emails. It doesn’t take much to determine what is really going on. It’s part of reading comprehension.
“BTW I did read the emails. I found nothing in them that conflicted with Turley’s column.”
Obviously you skimmed over them because they contradict Turley’s column.
They had nothing to do with DEI or supressing information.
“Reading between the lines is what clarifies the context of the emails.”
It is called mind reading. It is not “clarifying the context”
Regardless that is something you are self evidently bad at.
“It doesn’t take much to determine what is really going on.”
I would agree, but that does not explain why you have both the facts, the context, and the mind reading wrong. \
“It’s part of reading comprehension.”
Nope.
“Obviously you skimmed over them because they contradict Turley’s column.”
No I read over them quite painstakingly. I did so particularly because in my expereince with YOU
You do not actually read what you claim to read.
“They had nothing to do with DEI”
That does not come from the emails.
It is from other sources.
“supressing information.”
You can chose between gross incompetence or suppressing information.
Either way, these people need fired.
I would further note that the Administration repeatedly lied.
That is what is called a “bad fact”
When you lie, after you are caught it is reasonable to presume that you lied to hide something bad.
It is not necescary to know what.
We conclude bad intent from lies.
John, plz stop feeding the trolls, e.g. Svelaz
Covetousness is a sin.
Merit matters.
Diversity is bias and prejudice.
Equity is the absence of bias and favoritism.
___________________________________
Merriam-Webster
equity
noun
eq·ui·ty ˈe-kwə-tē
plural equities
1
a : justice according to natural law or right
specifically : freedom from bias or favoritism
___________________________________
Thou Shalt Not Covet.
That one covets does not bear.
The American thesis is freedom and self-reliance.
People must adapt to the outcomes of freedom.
Freedom does not adapt to people, dictatorship does.
This will come a shock to you but dictionaries do not determine meaning. Surprised? Don’t be. Dictionaries are based on – wait for it – PAST usage. So, what determines meaning? USAGE! How equity is used NOW is what matters. And, it is not used in any way shape. or form to your cited “meaning” in social situations. BTW, M-W is leftist trash. Jus’ sayin’
Glad to finally discover who the real authority is in proper language usage—obviously not the traditional, thoroughly researched and documented dictionaries, but actually you, dammad. Thanks so much for clearing that up. Now, how can I contact you whenever I want consultation on meanings etc.?
Ok, lets dissect this column for what it really is. A cheap shot against the ideas of equity and inclusion. It has nothing to do with discrimination against Asians either. Turley is being dishonest with what happed in regards with the commendation awards for these students. This had nothing to do with focusing on diversity equity and inclusion as he alleges. It’s obvious that Turley didn’t read the emails linked in his column and that he missed a LOT of relevant facts on this story. It’s safe to say that it’s a deliberate mischaracterizing the context.
First the parent complaining about the problem is admitting a lot of things that Turley didn’t bother to mention that are relevant to what happened. Jefferson High school the top school in the district had 240 students earn the national merit award. That is a LOT of students and most are 16yr olds. A LOT of these students are already overachievers and at the top of their class. Meaning these awards are pretty common at this school and the process of awarding them could be described as too routine compared to other schools in the district. It’s evident from the emails that these awards are not seen as THAT important to these students since the parent complaining admitted that her own child neglected to tell her a day after receiving it in class and telling her that they didn’t think it was that important. It’s the PARENTS who seem to be more concerned about the awards than the students themselves.
The dispute revolves around the timing of the distribution of these awards vs other schools in the district which caused a lot of them to be unable to put that award on their college applications. They were not held back because the principal was focused more on equity than achievement. That claim by Turley is pure BS.
The parent even admitted that she discovered that a lot of the awards were not delivered on a timely manner due to a postage issue by the senders and it involved a LOT of students, 240.
“ October 2022 — TJHSST received their package of Letters of Commendation (late). The package was large because ~240 students received the award and the printing service vendor hired by National Merit Scholarship Corporation failed to put adequate postage on the package. Within 48 hours of Dr. Bonatabitus receiving the package of Letters of Commendation, she had signed them all and gave them to Mr. Kosatka to distribute.”
The parent further noted the delay as a significant issue,
“ November 14, 2022 — Mr. Kosataka provided the letters to the Advisory Period teachers who distributed them in class. I appreciate that the delay from the shipping vendor was unforeseen and certainly delayed the entire process. I have requested that the National Merit Scholarship Corporation email the list of commended student recipients to the principals prior to the packages with the physical certificates being sent so that such delays based on mail delivery don’t happen. However, setting aside the mail delay, TJHSST had the award information in hand well before the November 1, 2022 deadline for most college applications. You should have provided that information to students immediately as instructed by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation. Because you did not, for whatever reason, FCPS should be looking for a way to mitigate the situation to avoid any adverse effect on a student’s college admission decision.”
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23466063-national-merit-tjhsst-emails
Other schools got their awards in a timely manner because the number of students earning these awards was tiny compared too Jefferson high school.
Another fact is that these awards have been awarded late for a few years before this event. It was not an uncommon occurrence and surely the applications of Some students were amended accordingly as it was for this parent who is complaining.
“ For my son in particular, we were able to update a number of his college applications to include this supplemental information. But for some schools that he applied to, like the University of Illinois, the University of Maryland, and the University of Michigan, he has no way to provide the information. He has tried calling the admissions offices of these schools but has not been successful.”
Her son had applied to multiple colleges meaning plenty of choices still remained.
This whole issue had nothing to do with choosing equity and diversity over achievement. It was all about a problem of handing awards to 240 students at a school where nearly every student is an overachiever. Where many students, 16yr olds, don’t particularly are about this award except their parents. Many students didn’t bother telling their parents about this award once they got it as this one parent admitted in her emails to school staff. It seems like the equivalent of a parent complaining her son/daughter didn’t get a “Honors Student” bumper sticker i in a timely manner and making big deal about it at a school that has a lot of honor students.
The parent goes on to complain that they didn’t get a ceremony while other schools did. That is not including the problematic fact that we are talking about 240 students not 5 or 10 at other schools.
Anyone really wanting to understand why this column is deceiving in it’s subject should read the emails which give a lot of context about what the problem really is. Turley just created this column as chum for his more gullible readers to chew on and rage over.
No one is buying what you’re selling.
You should read the emails that are included in the column. They are at the heart of the problem. None mention anything about diversity or equity policies.
“Ok, lets” evade, deflect, and carpet bomb.
Now your comment’s honest.
As several have pointed out, The only way to make all equal, to make all, equally miserable.
From Robert Heinlein
“Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded — here and there, now and then — are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.
This is known as “bad luck.”
People like these administrators not only pander to the racism (anti-Asian, anti-Semitic, anti-“white” heritage) of the progressive lefties, they are part of its creation. How hateful of them to deny or minimize the scholastic achievements of the National Merit scholars – all in the name of a trophy for every student.
The “equity movement” is nothing but cover for an anti-white agenda. And we all know who the culprits are, but are afraid to call them out. I am noticing.
I posted this in the other education discussion.
There’s a reason cancel culture is growing, especially within the education system. JT is the right person, with the right credentials, to be in this fight. I believe he needs to shift his attention to the root cause, instead of the symptoms. Think Klaus Schwab and the WEF.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1607929430164516864
Education Reimagined.
https://education-reimagined.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/A-Transformational-Vision-for-Education-in-the-US.pdf
Pabulum.
Learning 2025. At least 1 of the Commission members want to eliminate elected school boards, destroying self-governance and further instituting corporatism.
https://aasacentral.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/CommissionReportFINAL_040821.pdf
Combined, they are 45 pages of progressive word salad. Who conjures up this trash. There is a good reason they provided their vision for Equity on the last page. Had they led with this, it would have saved a lot of time.
We as Learning 2025 Commissioners assert that in order to enable education that is truly responsive to racism, racial/ethnic injustice, or discrimination of any kind, the definition of educational equity must expand to include: 1) the revision of practices and processes to root out systemic disproportionalities and replace them with trackable plans that promote and protect equitable access to the highest possible levels of learning and support services for ALL learners; and 2) equitable representation of ALL learners’ cultures and backgrounds in the school’s staff, curriculum, learning opportunities, and decision-making processes.
Olly,
“Combined, they are 45 pages of progressive word salad. Who conjures up this trash.”
Grable Foundation
Lego
John’s Hopkins
Brookings Institution
DC Public Schools
Nellie Mae
National Education Association
American Federation of Teachers
Walt Disney Corporation
Knowledge works
Getting Smart
MacArthur Foundation
Samsung
NY City Public School
KIPP
Arizona Department of Education (among others)
Education Reimagined
Etc.
It was rhetorical, but the list is worth noting.
That’s why I included it–and that is just a short list of all the players with their hands in the cookie jar.
Lego gets a shout-out by the WEF:
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/05/future-of-education-playful-learning/
So does the Grable Foundation:
https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_EGW_Whitepaper.pdf
Fixing education is trivial.
End public education.
If it is essential that government must pay for it – fine.
Provide funds for each student and let parents find the school that best fits their kids
We do not need elected school boards.
We do not need school boards.
We need schools and teachers answerable to parents.
And the best way to acheive that is for parents to be able to move their kid and the tuition for that kid if they are not happy.
John,
I disagree with your “solution”.
School Boards are answerable to all the people who pay taxes to support local education. It isn’t just parents who pay in taxes.
We have a constitutional republic with representatives elected from amongst the people to make decisions about policies, use of tax funds, etc.
Without this structure, taxpayers have no recourse as to the use of their tax dollars. Unelected parents should not be deciding how to use their neighbors’ money.
Prairie, do you actually believe money is more important than the child?
“Unelected parents should not be deciding how to use their neighbors’ money.”
If you feel this way, you should not support the public school system. Why should anyone pay for those children? But if the child is of utmost importance, shouldn’t vouchers be provided to schools that meet objective standards based on student performance?
S. Meyer,
The current system of elected representation of a community’s citizens on a school board to direct education will work for all parties. It works best when all the adults are paying attention. Children are a community’s future. For a community to extend successfully into the future, the children need to be well-educated so they can continue, as adults, being successful participants in the community’s self-governance, successfully earning a living, and being whole in their own right as individuals so they can have healthy families and friendships and neighborliness. Taxpayers support this promise for a successful future by supporting the school with their money and by paying attention to how well their money is used–are the children receiving a top notch education that will sustain a free people?
Performance of what? More skills? To jump through hoops? To line up and stand for account? Not everything that really matters can be measured. Objective criteria isn’t the only important metric. Should wisdom or sound judgement be shoehorned into some standardized assessment?
I suspect our Founders would look at this testing, and assessment and objective standardization as the measures to determine “being educated” with some degree of confusion, if not horror. This “system” was mostly imposed by the Federal government with NCLB and has grown like some monster from Akira. A Nation At Risk back in the early 80s, along with the Federal Dept of Ed didn’t help.
“The current system of elected representation of a community’s citizens on a school board to direct education will work for all parties. It works best when all the adults are paying attention”
We have proof it is not working well as the adults are not paying attention or paying attention to the wrong things, such as equity.
Things are not working as the theory has failed, and continuous dabbling hasn’t proven any better.
“children need to be well-educated”
You have two choices, drop the theory or keep what has failed, which means that children grow up as uneducated adults.
“Should wisdom or sound judgement be shoehorned into some standardized assessment? ”
You are losing focus, forgetting that the starting point is knowledge essential for the developing intellect. Intellect, with the addition of experience, might produce wisdom. You can certainly see there is little wisdom in most of the school systems throughout the nation. You are stuck at knowledge gathering.
The Federal and State governments and related corporations have been quite busy at trying to stamp out wisdom with their mandates and sticks.
I had excellent teachers work to impart wisdom and build knowledge and thoughtful consideration in public school. It CAN be done. It was done. And, it can be reasserted!
“Things are not working as the theory has failed”
The theory has not failed. People lost focus, their will eroded or stripped by those entrusted with power. Propaganda and manipulation can do evil things to people distracted by other pressing legerdemain.
Saying the theory failed is sort of like blaming the Bible for the failures of humanity. We failed the system of self-governance entrusted to us by the Founders because we got soft, or lazy, or too trusting of those who desire power but are wolves in sheep’s clothing preaching “service to the people”.
Of course, schools can teach, but can public schools do the job without direct competition for funds? They cannot do so all over the country, so competition for the dollars is necessary. If public schools do the job intended, no one else will be able to compete.
“Saying the theory failed is sort of like blaming the Bible for the failures of humanity. We failed the system of self-governance entrusted to us by the Founders because we got soft, or lazy, or too trusting of those who desire power but are wolves in sheep’s clothing preaching “service to the people”.”
That is why competition for the dollars is needed.
“Of course, schools can teach, but can public schools do the job without direct competition for funds?”
Yes. Leave local public school districts alone. Remove stupid Federal and State mandates and laws.
“That is why competition for the dollars is needed.”
I disagree. Remove the shackles from the districts. The competition for taxpayer dollars is corporatism and treats taxpayers badly. I am so cynical that I would not be at all surprised if this was indeed the goal of people in government all along–destroy public education and republican self-governance so that corporatist power can perpetuate practically unimpeded. People will be fighting for scraps at the lowest level, so intent on the situation red in tooth and claw that they’ll miss they’re actually in a cock-fighting ring being bet upon by nasty power players who stuck them in the ring to begin with.
Prairie:
“Yes. Leave local public school districts alone. Remove stupid Federal and State mandates and laws.”
He who pays the piper calls the tune.
” Remove the shackles from the districts.”
If you wish to remove the shackles, you must change the system of payments.
He who pays the piper calls the tune.
S. Meyer,
How did it work in 1975? Before A Nation at Risk?
“He who pays the piper calls the tune.”
Bureaucrats, corporatists, and people far, far removed from education (State or Federal politicians) should not be calling the tune. Many of these laws were imposed. Local communities were not requesting NCLB and the other monstrosities.
“How did it work in 1975? Before A Nation at Risk?”
If we had used a voucher system in 1975 we would be talking about something else.
“Bureaucrats, corporatists, and people far, far removed from education (State or Federal politicians) should not be calling the tune. Many of these laws were imposed. Local communities were not requesting NCLB and the other monstrosities.”
End it with vouchers. You don’t know what anyone would or would not request. We have these laws because people created them. Your top-down approach doesn’t work.
S. Meyer,
“You have two choices, drop the theory or keep what has failed, which means that children grow up as uneducated adults.”
I choose Buzz Lightyear. The theory has not failed. Return people’s attention to what was almost lost due to inattention; reinvigorate a thirst for knowledge and wisdom.
Local people can effect change in their school districts if they pay attention, communicate, and work with the districts–their elected representatives on school boards and school administrators–to untangle the treacherous web of woke and corporatist influence and control coming from the state and federal governments (etc).
“Should wisdom or sound judgement be shoehorned into some standardized assessment? ”
“You are losing focus, forgetting that the starting point is knowledge essential for the developing intellect. Intellect, with the addition of experience, might produce wisdom. You can certainly see there is little wisdom in most of the school systems throughout the nation.”
You misunderstand me. I meant that wisdom and judgment are not things that can assessed by the darn standardized tests the Federal government essentially imposed on everyone. These things leave no room for the really important elements of education that cannot be measured or chopped into bitty pieces for accounting to TPTB.
I completely agree that knowledge is essential for developing intellect, along with experience and close observation.
“You can certainly see there is little wisdom in most of the school systems throughout the nation.””
Destroyed by the meddling of a political and corporatist agenda. School districts got their hands smacked by the Federal government and let slide those things that matter but cannot be measured for fear of losing funding. The Federal government has doubled down and doubled down for at minimum a good two decades, their interference and authoritarianism sucking the life and spirit out of education. Why would our corporatist government want a wise and spirited people? They want only cogs in the machine. Their own children go to excellent private schools while they (foolish, meddling politicians and their corporatist cohorts) kneecap local public education, bending it to their goals.
“I choose Buzz Lightyear. ”
In other words, you want to be King and choose fantasy. That might be what we have today.
“Local people can effect change… ”
True, but they haven’t. Let’s try using competitive forces. You keep spouting the same things that have failed. Do you know Einstein’s definition of insanity?
“wisdom and judgment are not things that can assessed by the darn standardized tests…”
The school does not teach wisdom. I am not against eliminating the Department of Education, but you can’t blame it for everything.
“Destroyed by the meddling of a political and corporatist agenda… ”
No. Among other things, the idea of top to bottom control destroys schools. You are adding to the problem.
“In other words, you want to be King and choose fantasy.”
Um, no. Have you ever watched Toy Story II? It means to refuse to pick between two false choices, to choose a third option. It means to refuse to pick between the soma-fueled false world and the reservations of Brave New World.
““In other words, you want to be King and choose fantasy.”
Um, no. Have you ever watched Toy Story II? It means to refuse to pick between two false choices, to choose a third option. It means to refuse to pick between the soma-fueled false world and the reservations of Brave New World.?
I’m choosing the best known and most possible choices.
You haven’t provided anything but top-down. Remember, Toy Story was fantasy. Provide another option and explain how it would work. [funding and basic curriculum]
There is political and corporatist meddling. Geez. Look at the Education Reimagined and WEF nonsense mentioned above, among other things.
Local control of education is NOT top down control! Meddling by the Feds (etc) sure is, though.
I will try to answer more thoroughly later. I have errands to run.
“There is political and corporatist meddling. Geez. Look at the Education Reimagined and WEF nonsense mentioned above, among other things.
Local control of education is NOT top down control! Meddling by the Feds (etc) sure is, though.
I will try to answer more thoroughly later. I have errands to run.”
What do you wish to replace politics and corporations with?
“Local control of education is NOT top down “
We can agree that meddling by the feds is, but you are advocating top down.
While I agree with you and disagree with Prairie
I would be careful with remarks like “Do you beleive money is more important than a child”
One of the more important purposes of money is that it is a form of ranked choice voting for wants and needs.
Most people can not afford everything they want and need. The wealth they have is what they utilize to choose what is important to them and what is not.
All parents will sacrifice for their children. No parent will sacrifice everything for the best possible education for their children.
Money is what helps us balance our choices.
Some for food, some for clothing, some for shelter, some for heat – what is left for educating a child ?
How much will we sacrifice in other areas to improve our children’s education ?
While Prarie has not raised this – one of the problems we have had with education, and will continue to have with vouchers,
Is that it is easy for govenrment to raise the amount spent to educate a child – the political pressure to do so will always be high.
The resistance will almost always be low.
One of the greatest problems with the US government at all levels, is that those of us who want government to provide some benefit either do not pay for it at all or do so at heavily discounted prices.
This ALWAYS results in continuously increasing prices, often with declining value.
John, I wasn’t writing a dissertation, but if I were I would have included everything that “I Pencil” had to offer and more. The child is our offspring and money is a vehicle to help the child.
One of the problems I have with some of the austrians that are incredibly anti-crypto is that the value of ALL money is what it can do for us.
Many on the right love silver and gold – these are purportedly “real” money. What use does gold have besides as money that justifies a value of $1300/oz ? The use value of purported “real money” is a fraction of its market value. The market value of gold is as an inflation hedge against the dollar. In the past we have used beads or shells as money. Money can be anything.
And the value of money is as a tool – as a unit of exchange, as a store of wealth prior to purchasing real wealth.
Money has no intrinsic value.
This is important to grasp when idiots rant about who has what money.
It is why the dotcom bust did little economic harm while the housing bubble was harmful, and why the financial crisis was mostly manufactured by bad government policies.
MOSTLY americans do not see significant harm from fluctuations in the value of the dollar. As long as we are not buying or selling foreign goods it does not matter.
MOSTLY the same is true of fluctuations in securities – the super wealthy get hurt, but not anywhere that matters, and most recover.
It is when financial fluctuations involve things that are parts of ordinary peoples lives that they are damaging.
This is because money is primarily a tool. It is just another security.
I can understand being against crypto, but I don’t think crypto is the problem, rather government control over crypto.
Crpto is fine if government stays out of it.
We are likely to get serious moves to Crypto in the US and developed world more slowly than the rest of the world, because we have existing entrenched systems that work. They are inferior, but they were not when they were created and they will fight to be displaced.
But in the undeveloped world or other places where state currency is untrustworthy Crypto is a really big deal.
Also missing from the public discussion of Crypto is that is solves a massive problem in much of the world – proof of ownership.
I would suggest reading Hernado De Soto’s The mystery of capital. Which is an explanation of why grass roots capitalism has thrived in the west, but encountered major problems elsewhere in the world.
One of the HUGE deals is that in most of the world no one can prove that they own anything.
This is not a big deal if we are talking about a bicycle keep it in your posession and lock it.
But it is huge if you are talking a house, or land. Real property is the primary way that people start businesses – they borrow against it.
In the US one can borrow against a home. In much of the world you can’t. They do not have titles, and title insurance and all our processes to verify that you own the asset you are borowing against. One of the big deals about crypto is that you have a massive global ledger that is unforgeable, that records who owns what. If you posess the correct crypto key you can prove you own something that was purchased on the block chain.
And all this is Free – as opposed the the western title system that is great, but from another era.
The next big crypto deal is Eliminating or radically reducing the need for credit for cashless transactions.
Today most people buy things with a card. If you buy with a credit card, some party – usually the credit card company provides a credit guarantee for that transaction until the transaction clears. That is why fees for credit card transactions are so high.
You swipe the credit card and walk out of the store with the goods. But actual payment does not occur until later. Someone has extended credit to cover the time delay between purchase and payment. In the US credit card companies typically have $2T in outstanding credit at any one time.
i.e They have $2t In capital or assets tied up to provide that credit.
Debit cards work faster – clearing in about a day. But someone is still providing credit, and they are being paid to provide that credit.
Crypto transactions clear in a few minutes to a few seconds. It is very close to a cash transaction. No credit is involved.
That is a REALLY good thing, it reduces the cost of transactions. This alone will eventually guarantee that some form of Crypto will be adopted in the west.
At the same time if you are Visa or MC this is a direct threat – so obviously the west will be slower to adopt.
I would note that the threat to Visa and MC is mostly note real. They are offering credit. That is their real product.
If Crypto eliminates the need for transaction credit – someone else will want that credit for something else.
Credit is a comodity to, and one that has supply and demand issues, and freeing transaction credit means we can use $2T of credit somewhere else/
Anyway those will eventually mean everyone in the world will use Crypto.
Right now we have a holy war over control of crypto.
Crypto is real money just as much as Dollars are, and frankly as much as Gold or Silver. Absent their use as money Gold and Silver would be worth far less. So this argument that Crypto is not worth anything and gold is, is bogus.
I absolutely understand why people buy gold when they do not trust government. But that is NOT the same as because gold has a real intrinsic value. Its intrinsic value is a tiny part of its value as money. Paper dollars are worth $1 because everyone agrees to trade $1 in goods for $1 in dollars. No other reason.
SBF/FTX is not about Crypto, it is about fraud. I would note that SBF was one of the worlds biggest advocates for regulating Crypto.
Personally I think efforts to try to regulate crypto will ultimately fail. But that might take a decade or two and we will have a mess in the meantime.
Crypto is BTW Not as is often claimed untraceable.
It is more like Swiss numbered bank accounts, where no one but the account holder knows the number.
You can trace crypto transactions accross the world = but not to a person, unless they let you.
Though there are issues because “money laundering is trivial. I can trade $10K of my crypto for $10K of yours and leave no record.
We just exchange keys. There will be nothing in the blockchain that shows that.
There are also other means of money laundering.
Why does that matter – because it obliterates the ability of law enforcement to “go after the money”.
Trying to keep drugs illegal, or prostitution or myriads of other crimes that are just violations of government control becomes nearly impossible.
“Crpto is fine if government stays out of it.”
I think governments will try to take over crypto and if they do individual liberty will be vastly curtailed.
“They do not have titles”
I think you said you were Irish.
1)Land titles and ownership of land in the hands of the British.
2)Potatoes failed that year
3)Potatoes were plentiful enough in Ireland.
4)But because of 1 there was a potato famine.
I have no doubt at all government will try to take over crypto.
We already have problems with that. Government loves crypto exchanges and want to mandate them.
They are like banks and can be regulated.
But exchanges are a convenience not a necescity for crypto,
and if govenrment regulates out their value people will just not use them.
I would note that the FTX/SBF debacle – did not require Crypto.
But it did require the equivalent of a bank. Which is what FTX was a crypto bank
” if govenrment regulates out their value people will just not use them.”
Really?
Yes, did you read the whole remark ?
What people will not use is crypto exchanges – if government makes the cost for their convenience to high.
That BTW is a tautological argument.
If Government heavily regulates crypto exchanges and that does not drive people away, then the convenience must be worth the regulatory cost.
That is not what I expect to happen. But my argument is correct because it is tautology.
“Yes, did you read the whole remark ?”
Yes.
” if govenrment regulates out their value people will just not use them.”
I think the problem might be unclear because of your words “their value.” I am afraid, our government, the only one permitted to print money, will use crypto, forcing every purchase to be open for the government’s use and control over the individual.
The topic was crypto exchanges – as that is what FTX was.
Exchanges are a convenience to crypt, they are not a necessity.
Value is easy – at what point do people decide the convenience of a crypto exhange is not worth the govenrment hassles.
I need not address that further – when the inconvenience is sufficient people will stop using exchanges.
I suspect we are beyond the point at which government can destroy crypto.
They can only delay the inevitable.
“The topic was crypto exchanges”
That might have been your subject of interest, but you stated:
“I have no doubt at all government will try to take over crypto.”
That was my interest and the subject of my comment. I think the government will use crypto to strip us from all privacy.
“QI is a stupid legal theory.”
In terms of theory, my discussion of QI is more of a business/labor theory. My argument hinges on suits and how they affect everyone involved. I am not discounting what you say in the least because, on the surface, I tend to agree with you, but reality can change what things we need to do.
I have yet to draw any conclusions because I base them on need. If there is a need, solve it with the least invasive method, even if it isn’t perfect.
We don’t yet live in a libertarian world, so non-libertarian things affect the outcome. That was my argument against open borders, and since then, you added a rider to your discussion of open borders.
There is nothing theoretical about how things work with QI gone.
We see that everyday in other areas.
We know the worst that is possible.
If it was bad, we could not function.
I have no idea what your Business/labor market theory is.
Nor do I care much.
As I said – the world without QI is not theoretical. it already exists everywhere but govenrment.
The regulation of markets by individuals through torts is not perfect.
But it works far better than anything else we have ever come up with.
Regardless, it is real. Not theoretical.
I’ll go back to our discussion on open borders. There is nothing theoretical about that either, based on what I hear from you. Once again, I said we have a non-libertarian country with social programs and other things inducing people to come and not work.
Your theory was correct, but the practice of it negated reality. Eventually, instead of disagreeing with me, you agreed that social programs fouled up the purity you suggest with libertarianism.
You face the same unknowns with the police and QI. In the first discussion, you had to change what you said. Assume the same might happen in this discussion.
My position on the moral hazard associated with open borders is Not new. It is not something I dreamed up in the 4th or fifth round debate with you. It is not even my own idea. I believe Milton Friedman raised it 50 years ago.
It is also not an insoluble problem.
I would further note there is always the conflict between what the law is, and what it should be.
The rule of law is the foundation of the social contract.
Those in government must follow the law – even when the law is wrong – whether that is Obama, or Biden or Trump.
If the law is bad – we work legitimately to change it.
That is again something that separates libertarians from liberals, and the modern left.
The ends do not justify the means.
Until the law is changed – I want it enforced as it is. Not because it is good. But because lawlessness is only justified when government is beyond legitimacy.
To be clear the rule of law requirement is for those IN government, not those outside. It is for presidents, and the executive, and law enforcement and courts. Legislatures must follow the law – or change it.
Those of us outside government can follow or not, our choice. We can protest or not. But we must expect that the law will be enforced.
We are also entitled to expect that it will be enforced blindly. Without regard to race, creed, or politics. Otherwise we have lost the rule of law.
“It is also not an insoluble problem.”
Borders and immigration are not insoluble. There is an easy fix, but that requires removing the obstacles.
There are essentially 3 steps.
1)End attractive nuisances (welfare etc.)
2)create appropriate procedures
3) open borders.
The same three steps are needed to deal with QI.
“The same three steps are needed to deal with QI.”
Nope. Ending QI would just allow tort claims to procede – if they overcame Absolute immunity or numerous other procedural barriers.
There is nothing that needs to be done – or shoudl be done except flush the court created doctrine of QI down the toilet.
“Nope. Ending QI would just allow tort claims to procede ”
That is because telescopic vision impedes your ability to think about how human nature will react to those things you believe to be logical solutions. The solutions are logical, and something to strive for, but if you take human nature out of the equation, you will fail every time.
We know how human nature will work, because we have 200 years of torts.
This is no different than the law of supply and demand or many other actually robust laws of economics.
The fundimental difference between real economics – classical liberal economics and left economics,
if that classicial liberal economics observes human behavior in agregate and then formulates rules from the actual patterns of human conduct.
While leftist economics forms rules for an idealized society and then tries to force humans to conform their behavior to match those rules.
Regardless, tort law is ancient. We know how it works. We know how humans behave in that environment.
It is not perfect – and there will on occasions be egregious outcomes – both ways. But for the most part it gets it right.
And the egregious cases usually get fixed on appeal and do not alter the net beneficial operation.
And most importantly torts functions as an a posteriori system of self regulation. One that itself is dynamically changing as needed and also self regulating.
While statutory and executive regulation is not aand can not be dynamic, and is not and can not be self correcting.
“We know how human nature will work, because we have 200 years of torts.”
That is a very slim picture of human nature.
“This is no different than the law of supply and demand or many other actually robust laws of economics.”
Human nature is far more unpredictable.
Your fighting reality.
You are trying to pretend that something that exists that we have centuries of experience with
does not exist and we can not tell how it will operate.
“Your fighting reality. You are trying to pretend that something that exists that we have centuries of experience with does not exist and we can not tell how it will operate.”
Over the millennia human nature changes and adjusts. The adjustment might be slow but that makes what you say fall outside of reality. To make things more complex, under stress human nature can change much more rapidly.
Torts is not a “logical” solution – it is a pragmatic one.
It is one we have hundreds (actually thousands) of years experience with.
It is also rooted on a simple premise.
You break it. you fix it.
“Torts is not a “logical” solution – it is a pragmatic one. It is one we have hundreds (actually thousands) of years experience with. It is also rooted on a simple premise. You break it. you fix it.”
Just because torts is a pragmatic solution doesn’t mean there is no logic to it.
Least invasive is a requirement for the use of force – AKA government.
It is NOT a requirement for the elimination of force.
While we always need to be careful unwinding government mistakes – it is more often half steps and half measures that create disaster, not full steps.
We want the least invasive – when we expand govenrment power.
We want to revert to something that we can know works when undoing government power.
I am not even slightly interested in a half measure with QI.
You are far more likely to make things worse with a half measure.
“it is more often half steps and half measures that create disaster, not full steps.”
This type of statement gets us into another dispute we had over definitions. Without exacting definitions, I can’t learn if your belief is true. If we had those definitions, someone would have to do much research to prove either side.
No it does not. There is no definitional issue here.
We know what we have with QI.
We know what we have without it.
There is no certainty that an intermediate step may not be worse than QI.
I do not need to define terms to grasp that possibility.
One of the reasons that is possible is specifically because of things we likely can not know ahead of time.
We are all very good at hindsight, but quite poor at foresight.
Back to Bastiat and “That which is seen and that which is unseen.”
The safest route backwards is to undo entirely choices that proved mistakes.
We can with reasonable certainty know what the results will be.
Next best is to closely approximate something else that we know works
We know we do not need QI outside of government. We know that the rest of things work fine without QI.
We can expect that completely eliminating QI will leave is with the same thing as all the other domains where there is no QI.
Half steps are filled with unknowns.
“No it does not. There is no definitional issue here.”
Of course, definitional issues come into play. One always has to have an agreement as to the meaning of words. We had this discussion a long time ago, and when faced with forcing you to provide a definition, I utilized line drawing, and you had a problem fixating on the point where force would be necessary.
“We know what we have with QI. We know what we have without it”
No. We are not dealing with fixed numbers and equations. We are dealing with humans.
Yes, and with rare exceptions you remain wrong.
Facts are facts.
We use words to communicate. The accuracy of the words alters the clarity of our communication.
It does not change the FACTS.
“Yes, and with rare exceptions, you remain wrong. Facts are facts. We use words to communicate. The accuracy of the words alters the clarity of our communication. It does not change the FACTS.”
Words are words and require definitions that change. You have said that often when referring to the words used by leftists.
Facts are facts, but the definition of words can change the meaning of the recorded fact. Are the liberals today who run our country promoting liberal ideas that aren’t liberal in the classical liberal sense, liberal?
That is correct – leftist use word games to try to change reality.
My fundimental argument with leftists is the same as with you here.
Reality exists. You do not need words, or defintions to communicate when all parties can directly observe the same reality.
Let me use the southern border as an example.
Reality was one thing there during Obama, It was another During Trump, and another still during Biden.
All the words in the world from Obama, Trump or Biden does nto change the actual situation at the border with each of these presidents.
The law was the same for each. The funding for DHS, CBP/ICE was about the same.
Only the policies were different.
Without words, and without knowing what policies were in place, oir changes we can still KNOW that the differences between each was the differences in policies.
“Reality exists. You do not need words, or defintions to communicate “ … “My fundimental argument with leftists is the same as with you here.”
It is not a matter of reality. It is a matter of communication. My argument with you is the same as my arguments with leftists. They are not adequately communicating with themselves, much less anyone else.
“Only the policies were different.”
Three people might have completely different statements regarding the same policies.
“Are the liberals today who run our country promoting liberal ideas that aren’t liberal in the classical liberal sense, liberal?”
Without definitions
Clasical liberalism,
Liberalism
modern leftism
Are completely different.
We know that because they produce different results in practice,
Because classical liberals, liberals and progressives want different things.
What Orwell described is NOT specifically about definitions.
It is about the misuse of language to both alter people perception of reality – particularly reality that they did not themselves directly observe.
And it is about the alteration of languages to make the communication of select ideas difficult or impossible.
You are fighting about the definitions of words in a context here we both already share the same observed reality.
“Without definitions Clasical liberalism, Liberalism modern leftism Are completely different.”
That doesn’t answer the question, but the liberal of today is not the liberal of yesterday, yet both use the same word, ‘liberal’. Only the definition is different.
“It is about the misuse of language to both alter people perception of reality”
Thank you for showing why definitions are necessary.
“You are fighting about the definitions of words in a context here we both already share the same observed reality.”
Yes, we share the same observed reality but record it differently.
“We are not dealing with fixed numbers and equations. We are dealing with humans.”
Correct, but that does not change what I said.
We have hundreds of years of experience with Torts. It involves humans, and we know how it works, it is not perfect, but it is better than any other alternative.
I would further note that we can BOTH be dealing with humans AND be dealing with numbers and equations.
Psychology, sociology, and economics are all efforts to apply math and science to humans.
All have problems – particularly psychology.
That does not make the effort unworthwile.
Economics in particular, has been able to apply numbers and equations very successfully to human behavior in many instances.
Sometimes it over reaches.
But the laws of supply and demand are very nearly immuntable. They are more accurate than Newtons laws.
Keynes mathematics has a problem because he conflated an implication with an equation.
That has lead to all kinds of problems. But the error is not because we are dealing with humans.
It is because implications go only one way.
>>“We are not dealing with fixed numbers and equations. We are dealing with humans.”
>Correct, but that does not change what I said.”
Yes, it does.
“We have hundreds of years of experience with Torts. It involves humans, and we know how it works, it is not perfect, but it is better than any other alternative. ”
True. It is better than any other alternative I know of today.
” it is more often half steps and half measures that create disaster, not full steps. ”
What you call full steps are half steps to others. It is a matter of perception, something you avoid because it pierces your protective shield. You avoid those things that make you uncomfortable.
“We want to revert to something that we can know works when undoing government power.”
Since man is unpredictable, we can never predict the outcome. I prefer thinking deeply about QI rather than relying on the ideological rules that can be things one strives for. That was proven when you advocated open borders. You didn’t bother mentioning the social and economic benefits that made open borders unacceptable. I brought them up. The rest of the discussion is history.
We are not ever going to live in a libertarian world.
But we have massive experience that tells us that steps in that direction pretty much ALWAYS bear net positive results.
There has been no perfect communism ever. But all half measures have proven bad.
There is no perfect libertarian govenrment ever. But inarguably accross the world more libertarain has been better than less.
“We are not ever going to live in a libertarian world. But we have massive experience that tells us that steps in that direction pretty much ALWAYS bear net positive results.”
Is that half steps or full steps?
I have not “added a rider” to discussions of open boarders.
I have been consistent on open borders and many other measures.
I am telling you now, that I am not interested in some Half QI compromise – that would easily prove worse than what we have now.
We have had open borders in this country in the past – though imperfect, they resulted in the greatest growth and progress in our history.
There will be losers for open borders today. But the net would be positive – but only if there is no moral hazard.
One of the dangers of unwinding government is that it is easy to create moral hazard.
I write of going to a vouchers system for education. That would be a vast improvement.
But the best solution is no government in education at all.
There is a moral hazard in vouchers. It is just not a new moral hazard. It is one we already have.
Open borders without some constraints on the welfare state is a NEW or atleast far larger moral hazard.
Anyone who wants to find their way from Venezuela or Guatamala to the US – I am happy to welcome.
We need more people willing to go through that to come here.
But they need to be coming to the land of freedom, not freebies.
That does nto however mean I do not want a souther border wall, and orderly and lawful entry.
I proposed before replacing our entire immigration law with a sponsorship system.
Anyone from anywhere in any numbers can come – so long as someone already a legal and productive resident GUARANTEES the new immigrant will not be a public burden.
Business, churches, left wing 501C3’s the YMCA – anyone who wishes to sponsor immigrants from anywhere can in any number.
If they do not find a job – sponsors problem.
If they have health needs – Sponsors problem.
If they need housing – sponsors problem.
1M a year, 10M a year – do not care.
From South america, shithols countries or Asia – sponsor’s choice.
“I have not “added a rider” to discussions of open boarders.”
Then, you must love Biden’s open borders policy of letting in illegals who can get welfare and free healthcare.
I seem to remember you saying that you don’t support those things, and I know that is true, but they exist. That is the problem. As I keep saying, we don’t live in a libertarian nation, so compromises are needed.
Your rider was you don’t support welfare or healthcare. That means no open borders if welfare and healthcare exist, or open borders giving illegals healthcare and welfare.
“But they need to be coming to the land of freedom, not freebies.”
Today we are a land of freebies. Therefore, IMO, we need secure borders. I too support a complete overhaul of our immigration policy and recognize that we need immigration.
I do not expect honest debate out of Svelaz, od DM or Gigi or ATS.
I do out of you.
I have stated my position on open borders, the rule of law and moral hazard.
Those positions have not “evolved” for several decades. Long before I started posting here.
I do not need to address every factor in every single post.
Your straw man is disingenous.
I do nto favor either Trump, Biden, or Obama on our borders.
But Trump did seek to follow the rule of law.
Lawless government is never legitimate – even perusing a good end.
And a century of left wing nut policies creates a mine field of moral hazard trying to undo mistakes.
“I do not expect honest debate out of Svelaz, od DM or Gigi or ATS. I do out of you.”
If that is the case, reread what I have written more slowly. We essentially agree on policy. Our disagreement lies in how we effectuate policy because other decisions interfere with what we both want.
You add a lot of other discussions that might add to the difficulties we face in understanding one another.
“Your straw man is disingenous.”
It is not. Biden has provided open borders on our southern border. Whether he is following the law doesn’t alter the problems. Those illegals get welfare and other social benefits. That is why I say that open borders today are impossible. Other problems must be solved first.
The same goes with QI which requires a lot of thinking since the problems we may face are not as apparent as the immigration problem.
You straw maned MY position. One that you actually know well, or atleast should as we have discussed it extensively.
And that is why I asked for your honesty.
My position is not Biden’s.
From what I can tell from Biden’s visit to the border – Biden’s position is not biden’s.
Having made a mess for 2 years, he appears to be suddenly talking about cleaning it up – and spending lots of money to do so.
Though some of his remarks were ambiguous, he sounded alot like Trump about the border all of a sudden – except as always he blames republicans.
Odd that Trump was able to do far better – with a hostile house of representatives.
I guess we are all supposed to forget that Trump reduced the flow of illegals by an order of magnitude – with less money and less resoruces than Biden has today.
The difference between Biden and Trump is policies. Not money.
Regardless, my position is NOT Biden’s. It is not that of the left, it is not close, and it is not something the left is ever going to agree to.
It is also not the same as that of the right.
“You straw maned MY position.”
No. I used logic.
“And that is why I asked for your honesty.
My position is not Biden’s.”
I have been honest, and your position is not Biden’s.
No you straw manned my position – it is not logic when you shift from my position to something else as if it was mine.
“My posiion is also not what you straw manded.”
John, you are adamant that only your position takes the high road, which is not a productive argument. That position led the discussion down an unnecessary path where you began focusing on others channeling left while using straw man arguments. Those assertions are not correct.
If one is moving in the so-called direction of the right, he is not channeling left. Instead, he is moving toward the right slower than you wish, perhaps with good reason.
Straw manned? No. I made that clear.
When you said, ” And that is why I asked for your honesty.
My position is not Biden’s.”
I agreed and stated, “I have been honest, and your position is not Biden’s.”
But let us take a step back.
I am telling you what I see and think. You are interpreting it as being straw manned. If that bothers you, why are you claiming another is channeling left when that argument is not correct?
The present immigration discussion is a proxy argument for QI since open border issues have more clarity than the issues surrounding QI.
Here is a previous discussion:
“It is not. Biden has provided open borders on our southern border. Whether he is following the law doesn’t alter the problems. Those illegals get welfare and other social benefits. That is why I say that open borders today are impossible. Other problems must be solved first.
The same goes with QI which requires a lot of thinking since the problems we may face are not as apparent as the immigration problem.”
You are jumping all over.
You have not only straw manned my positon but you are now blurring different arguments together.
I argue a given position multiple ways most times.
Logically,
morally.
pragmatically.
You can not attack the moral argument as ignoring reality, when I have made a pragmatic argument
Before you can attack the moral argument as immpractical, you have to address the practical argument where I demonstrate my position IS practical.
“You are jumping all over. You have not only straw manned my positon but you are now blurring different arguments together.”
It’s funny that you should say that when I find gaps in your rhetoric, and expressly call for more consideration, you respond with something similar to “the science is settled.” When I say I support more open borders, I don’t like to skip over the reality that they are impossible unless we fix the realities that make open borders impossible.
“I argue a given position multiple ways most times. Logically, morally. pragmatically.
If you are pragmatic you recognize open borders are not a good idea until the problems are fixed. If you are logical you will feel the same way, and if you are moral toward American families, you will see some of the immorality in that idea.
My posiion is also not what you straw manded.
You cannot pound your view into another person’s perspective. First, you have to understand their concerns and then proceed.
It is politically impossible to reach our respective goals unless the present realities are changed.
Correct – you can not legitimately transform my position into something else while continuing to represent it as man.
That is the esence of a straw man fallacy.
While You are wrong about your logical claims – that is irrelevant.
You are free to argue that my position as I expressed it can not work, and that logic requires specific changes.
But you can not ignore the argument and just change my position to suit your perceptions of reality.
“While You are wrong about your logical claims – that is irrelevant.”
Which logical claims are you talking about? “It is politically impossible to reach our respective goals unless the present realities are changed.” That statement represents a summary of the others which I called logical.
“But you can not ignore the argument and just change my position to suit your perceptions of reality.”
I didn’t ignore your argument. I exposed some the gaps in what you were saying.
Ireland is part of the west.
What I an De Soto were refering to is places like South america, Egypt, Africa, parts of India and china were you can not prove you own your home.
My discussion of the potato famine had to do with something slightly different.
That would be another of several responses, where it is not clear what you are talking about.
It was a small mistake for me to make an assumption when your reference was not perfectly clear.
But increasingly your responses are not clear.
If Ireland was in reference to something else – why couldn’t you have made that clear.
pragmatic arguments are not theoretical.
Vague references to past discussions are not helpful without more clarity.
You were talking about the title to land, property rights, and how that impacted development. I agree. I brought up the Iris famine because earlier, I believe you said you were Irish, and it was an effort of agreement.
Ownership is of great importance, so I pointed out why so many Irish died, even though Ireland, at the time, had a lot of potatoes.
If the State is going to fund education then the decisions as to how much to fund each student should be made by elected officials – like our state legislature. I do not know about your state, but in my state that is the case. The amount of actual financial control a local school board has over funding is small. They merely get to decide how to spend the money the state allows them to collect.
The decision how MUCH to fund education belongs to voters.
The decision how to spend the money to educate their child most effectively belongs to the parent.
Each child is unique. Their needs are different. One of the worst problems with out education system – beyond that it is overrun by marxists, is that it is one size fits all
I cyber schooled my kids – that is NOT for everyone. But it is exactly what my kids, particularly my daughter needed.
Other kids need different things.
These are not decisions school boards can or should make. It is not decisions voters can or should make.
Quite often parents are a poor choice too. But they are the best choice we have.
“One of the worst problems with out education system … is that it is one size fits all”
Some of this is necessary and important. As a nation, we need to have a unifying knowledge for effective communication and understanding of ourselves as a distinct nation (this goes for other nations, too). It is also helpful in a self-governing nation to be very broadly educated, for its people to be generally knowledgeable since we are the ones who must communicate our preferences for voting on a great many, disparate things. It helps to be generally knowledgeable and familiar with rhetoric and communication so you can try to guard against
those potentially feeding you garbage, as some politicians are wont to do.
Unique knowledge and unique interests are important, too. They can perhaps drive innovation, as some becomes fascinated with a particular thing. The diversity of interests can perhaps feed a diversity of good ideas. It builds up the individual. Great districts include opportunities for individual learning, free reading and individual reading assignments, and projects, to a reasonable extent. They encourage academic where necessary or appropriate. Below high school, they may use some test scores for some ability grouping sometimes. They encourage individual interests with clubs and at the high school level a wider array of classes, while still maintaining a balance with the important general learning necessary for building a free, self-governing people. More specialized learning can occur post-high school.
Some districts have an online option, just so you know. I think online can quite often be second tier to in-person learning, but there can be a place for it.
“Some of this is necessary and important. As a nation, we need to have a unifying knowledge for effective communication and understanding of ourselves as a distinct nation (this goes for other nations, too). It is also helpful in a self-governing nation to be very broadly educated, for its people to be generally knowledgeable since we are the ones who must communicate our preferences for voting on a great many, disparate things. It helps to be generally knowledgeable and familiar with rhetoric and communication so you can try to guard against
those potentially feeding you garbage, as some politicians are wont to do.”
All true and not what I was reffering to at all.
You are addressing WHAT is taught, I am talking about HOW people are taught.
We are each unique. We do not learn the same, or at the same rates.
“Unique knowledge and unique interests are important, too.”
I agree, but that is independent of what I was discussing.
“Great districts”
I want an end to “districts” – they are a bad idea.
I want lots of great schools each seeking to serve students with shared needs.
One of the problems with bigger – particularly government bigger, is much of what you describe as an asset of “great districts”.
All the wonderful things you describe are government policies, and was we see, they can be changed, often with little input for parents.
And little real regard for needs.
When you accomplish the same thing through free markets – these are no longer “policies” – they are the means by which schools serve their markets. That means they change – not by orders from on high, but as parents wants and needs change.
This is of fundimental importance and it goes way beyond schools.
Libertarains want all or nearly all decisions to be made by people acting on their own within free markets.
We trust the wisdom of individuals acting in their own lives. We grasp that what free markets have done for breakfast, or coffee, they can do for everything.
Bernie Sanders famously campaigned complaining that we had too many choices of sneakers and deoderant, that this was inefficient.
Sanders view is based on a false view of economics that presumes our needs are optimally met by a few big businesses competing each producing exactly the same thing. That is typical of all socialists everywhere all the time.
And I would warn those on the left today who are selling intersectionality and gender diversity, that all that will go out the window very quickly should their ideology gain the power they demand.
Government is inherently a homogenizing force. Government is inefficient and unable to deal with people with diverse needs well.
When government encounters diverse needs, the solution is to force people change their wants and needs to suit what government provides.
Markets do the opposite. Much of our govnerment regulation is based on a false understanding of economics and particularly markets.
Real efficiency is reflected in the breakfast cereal aisle of the grocery story – cost effectively delivering to each person what they want and need.
You will never get that our of traditional public education.
Government rarely delivers what diverse groups needs, and when it does only under great pressure and constant scrutiny.
“Some districts have an online option, just so you know. I think online can quite often be second tier to in-person learning, but there can be a place for it.”
I am very well aware of that. The pandemic exposed how abysmally bad government is at adapting.
Prior to 2020 there were myriads of online education programs throughout the country at various scales and qualities.
Over 2+ decades most online education providers learned how to deliver a better education at a lower cost.
I would note that we have been doing home learning in some form since my father was a child.
Ignoring the fact that is was a mistake to end inperson education in response tot he pandemic,
What we also learned rapidly is that while online education existed at scale prior to the pandemic and worked extremely well.
Traditional public schools FAILED miserably at educating kids online. This had nothing to do with online education.
And everythign to do with the inability of traditional public schools to adapt.
WORSE still – states actively moved to thwart parents from moving their kids from dysfunctional online traditional public schools to the cyber charters which knew what they were doing and had been educating kids online for decades.
So much of the covid mess was driven by teachers unions. Cyber Charters are not unionized. The vast majority of cyber charter teachers like teaching in cyber charters BETTER than traditional schools. Like their students they work from home.
It is possible for cyber charter teachers to do the stay at home thing and the carreer thing concurrently.
Teachers unions were afraid if Cyber charters grew rapidly and successfully during the pandemic that this would disempower unions.
And it probably would have.
I would separately note that Teachers Unions have been actively working to destroy cyber charters for decades.
One of the great things about early cyber charters was no rules. One of the big attributes was “proceed at your own pace”.
That was fantastic for my daughter from 4th-9th grade. It is pretty much gone now. You must home school your kid to do “proceed at your own pace”. Cyber charters are forbiddne by regulation for doing that. Over time teachers unions have driven state regulations that have tried to make cyber charters as close as possible to regular education – which is EXACTLY the WRONG approach.
Regardless online education is NOT a one size fits all solution either – as I could have told our “experts” when they tried to force everyone into it during the pandemic.
I am NOT impressed by your “great districts” argument. I do not want massive school districts trying to be all things to all students.
I want lost so different schools with different structures focused on what THEY do best.
I doubt there is a “great district” in the country that does online education as well as the worst cyber charters who have been learning for decades. Nor do I expect they ever will – online education will always be a tangent for them, not what they are looking to do best.
Most every specialized area that a “great district” tries to excell at, will be a tangent – not what they are looking to do best.
But if you take that “great district” break it up into individual schools, each school will focus on something to distinguish it from others.
That is how markets work.
If you want each of us to have the sneakers or deoderant that suits us as an indivual best – you need free markets.
Not Sanders Scoialism, which is really what we have in public schools today. Better in some places than others.
People who receive social security should not be deciding how to use their neighbors money ?
Or those who receive welfare ?
What about those that received PPP money ?
In my perfect libertopia parents would pay to educate their own kids.
People would save on their own for their retirement or buy private insurance/pensions.
But we do not live in the best system.
Nor do we live in the system our constitution dictated.
We have to make what we have work.
Voters through legislators decide on taxes and the amounts per child.
Parents decide what school gets their money.
Why take power away from people at the local level?
The higher up the political food chain you go, the greater the chances for corruption.
Charter schools fail in a way that is more akin to private gain, public loss. Taxpayers cannot vote out those who are making poor use of their tax dollars; the school fails and their money is lost.
People receiving Social Security have pooled their money throughout their working lives as a meager form of retirement money. That pot of money has been used as a political cookie jar for so long it is practically insolvent, so I hear.
People on welfare have effectively said to the government that they cannot take care of themselves and need help. While there are some controls, or there were, on how that money gets spent, I do think there should be more control over how people on welfare can spend that money. There is a great deal of bureaucratic separation between voters, legislators, and the money for welfare. There’s probably wastefulness and corruption, too, since such things seem to grow with bureacracy.
That same separation does not exist with local school boards (I do not include gargantuan districts like NYC in this). The citizenry can call up their school directors and speak directly with them about their ideas on education, their votes and about the budget (voters can look through all that stuff easily themselves, too). Heck, they can talk to them at the grocery store or at church or at school functions–because they are known in their community.
Why not share that power with the lowest lever, the parents?
“Why not share that power with the lowest lever, the parents?”
It is, through republican elected representation. Parents can discuss the quality of the curriculum, discipline, and other things with teachers, administrators, and school directors. If they see deficiencies in the kids’ education–little history or geography, spelling, lack of the Great Works, poor writing development, and other things necessary for the building of a thoughtful, effective individual in a free society–then they need to speak up. Speaking to their fellow parents and neighbors about these problems and what needs to be rectified will help.
People need to be thoughtful about what kids really need to learn to be free self-governing members of our Western, American nation.
Prairie, I am sorry, but you are deluding yourself. Parents know more about their children than you do. Parents are screaming to get their children into charter schools in NYC, and you wish to deny them that opportunity to graduate with proficiency.
The state can control the quality and the cost. Why shouldn’t the parent choose which flavor works best for their child?
NYC is a gargantuan mess that is not reflective of most of the United States. That gigantic school district cannot be controlled by parents or taxpayers because the school board members are not really known by the people. It is not neighborly enough. It is too bureaucratic. That monstrosity ought to be broken up into like 400 – 500 smaller districts with only about 2000 – 4000 kids in each district. At that small size, people know one another, talk amongst each other, shop at more or less the same stores, etc. and can more directly influence school directors and administrators and the quality of their schools.
The state CANNOT control the quality and the cost–that is up to the people of the community and those they choose to elect to their school boards. The state can try to strong arm “quality” with assessments as a proxy for “quality”.
Parents are not elected to make decisions with their neighbors’ money.
Prairie:
“NYC is a gargantuan mess that is not reflective of most of the United States….”
The NYC inner school environment is the most problematic in the country. Yet charter schools and other methods of education reversed the flow. That accomplishment in the worst environment should tell you its efficacy and the probability of similar results elsewhere where the system follows the model.
In the post, you pointed out other charter schools that didn’t work as well as those in NYC. That is further evidence what you are saying is wrong. You do not permit schools to compete in a competitive environment. That is your failure.
“That gigantic school district cannot be controlled by parents or taxpayers because the school board members are not really known by the people. ”
You say, “cannot be controlled”, but the students are learning. Once again, you prove my point. Your top to bottom control doesn’t work. In more affluent rural areas where the parents are reasonably educated, they might be able to do better. If they do, then no charter school would try to compete. That makes your methodology a losing proposition and mine a winner.
“Parents are not elected to make decisions with their neighbors’ money.”
In the case of charter schools, the parents do not decide on the funding or the desired results. Government makes those decisions. The only remaining question is whether the child belongs to his parents or the state. You have chosen the state.
S. Meyer,
“You say, “cannot be controlled”, but the students are learning”
No, the people putting their money into the NYC district do not have effective representation. The district is too big and now you have private gain, public loss with essentially no elected representation for those charter schools. If they are bad, they fail you say–the loss of taxpayer dollars without recourse.
Why not break up that enormous district and put more power into taxpayer hands so they have a more direct connection to elected leadership?
“In the post, you pointed out other charter schools that didn’t work as well as those in NYC.”
I was pointing out the biased nature of that book, that it only highlighted whatever successes it wanted. It paints a rosy picture because it refused to present a balanced portrayal of charter schools.
They DO undermine republican self-governance.
Why do you not want to break the NYC school district into many smaller districts that are more manageable and more accountable to the people?
Prairie:
“No, the people putting their money into the NYC district do not have effective representation. “
Let’s get to specifics. Are you looking for 1,000, school districts for NYC? You talk about school boards, and now you are talking about districts. School boards do not control the money nor do they have substantial control over the curriculum.
Now what?
“Why not break up that enormous district and put more power into taxpayer hands so they have a more direct connection to elected leadership?”
Taxpayer hand would mean vouchers unless you are satisfied with ~1,000 different entities that control the funding and the underlying curriculum.
“I was pointing out the biased nature of that book, “
What book? If you are talking about Sowell’s book, it provides the data for each school. What bias? Proficiency is tested by the state. Provide examples of bias in the book, not in someone else’s mind.
I see very little in your response other than a top-down approach. You use words to talk about local control, but you don’t deal with funding and the basic curriculum.
“The only remaining question is whether the child belongs to his parents or the state. You have chosen the state.”
That is not so.
You are saying tax dollars belong to the corporatists. Parents and taxpayers have control over education if their school boards fear their power. The NYC school district does not fear voters or tax payers. They have too much power.
Prairie:
>>“The only remaining question is whether the child belongs to his parents or the state. You have chosen the state.”
>That is not so.
Of course, it is. Will you permit the school boards to manage funding and the basic curriculum?
No. If I am wrong, tell me how you intend to do that.
“You are saying tax dollars belong to the corporatists. Parents and taxpayers have control over education if their school boards fear their power. The NYC school district does not fear voters or tax payers. They have too much power.”
The way to strip power from the districts is to provide vouchers to the parents. If you have a better way, let us know and show how the dollars flow.
I don’t know why you brought the corporatists in unless you ran out of answers. Corporations supply the schools with desks, chairs, heat, A/C, and everything else. Teacher’s Unions are functioning in a similar capacity to corporations. Corporations are funded the same way as the public schools are today, and they will have to prove themselves class by class, area by area.
“The higher up the political food chain you go, the greater the chances for corruption.”
That is false. The greatest corruption has always been at the local level.
“Charter schools fail in a way that is more akin to private gain, public loss. Taxpayers cannot vote out those who are making poor use of their tax dollars; the school fails and their money is lost.”
???
My kids initially attended Agora. That turned out to be one of the most corrupt cyber charters in PA.
We changed cyber charters – not because Agora was corrupt, but because a different cyber charter had a program that was better for HS students.
Despite its corruption Agora delivered just about the best elementary program in the state at 75% of the cost of traditional public school.
So the most corrupt cyber charter in my state was also one of the best values.
Addressing your tax payers argument – the state took over local education long ago. Local tax payers have very very little actual control of tax dollars.
Different states are different, but mostly they are similar. In my state through some complex formula that is supposed to result in equity accross the state, each districts spending per student is fixed. The school board has very little to do with that other than voting yes as legally required.
There is some local control over school fascilities – buildings. But even those must conform to a narrow range of state dictates.
This is actually one of the areas that brick and mortar charters thrive – because they are not longer state controlled in their facilitaties
only their spending per student.
You claim that if a private charter fails that somehow public money is wasted.
Not so. Private Charters are funded privately by private investors. The State – usually through mandates to local districts pays a fixed sum for each student educated each year. The charters are required to meet the same acredidation requirements as other public schools.
At the end of the year students have received an education that is the same or better than traditional public schools.
Should a charter fail – its investors lose money. Should it succeed – the public gets kids educated for 3/4 the normal cost, and the investors make money.
There are lots of problems with this model. But it is still far better than the traditional public school model.
There are also many good things about this model.
Most charters have a specific focus. Some Charters focus on STEM, they look to be feeders for engineering schools.
They provide superior education for students pursuing Stem carreers.
Some focus on special needs kids – States pay 4-5 times as much per year to educate special needs students than they do for other students.
Some focus on inner city kids from crappy inner city public schools.
Some focus on being the best at elementary education.
Some focus on students that are discipline problems.
Some focus on HS.
Some focus one students with learning disabilities.
Very few charters attempt to do what public schools do badly and that is to be all things to all students.
If you do not think that is a good thing – go to the breakfast aisle in your grocery store.
Why is it that there are not only 2-3 different choices of corn flakes and no other choices ?
The answer is simple – we are not all the same. We do not have the same wants and needs.
My daughter would have failed in public school She would have graduated at the bottom of her class.
She is a very smart person, but she has a number of developmental disabilities resulting from 2yrs in a chinese orphanage.
She graduated from one of the best cyber charters in my state with a 3.96 GPA.
I do nto care all that much about her grades so much as that had she stayed in public school, she would have ended up with much fewer choices in life. Today she is working towards becoming a psychologist. That would not have been possible had she stayed in public school.
She will make an excellent psychologist.
I am not looking to defend social security or welfare.
Only to avoid repeating the same problems in education.
We “reformed Welfare in the 90’s” Those reforms actually worked incredibly well.
But Obama unwound most of those reforms by EO using the financial crisis as a justification and Biden has doubled down on that.
But that is a whole new domain to discus.
Regardless, the Clinton/Gingrich reforms very effectively moved people from welfare to work and more importantly to a better life.
Isn’t that really the goal ?
One of the universla problems with all federal programs is they become traps.
Your description of local school boards does not match anything I am familiar with in my state.
If you contact a local SB member in my state they may agree with everything you say, and then tell you there is nothing they can do.
State or federal rules dictate most of what they do.
A charter school is far more responsive to parents than a local school or school board.
A parent can move their kids taking alot of money with them.
Charter schools listen to parents.
As I noted there are flaws in the charter school/vouchers concept.
The largest one is that the amount of money spent per student is not decided by the market but politically.
That is a problem with both charter schools, vouchers and public schools.
I would be happy to hear your thoughs on correcting that problem.
But charters do an excellent job of destroying the 1 size fits all model of public schools.
They also very effectively reduce the overhead – charter schools have fixed revenue streams they can only afford so much administration.
BTW that is where most corruption in charters occurs, and yet the often highly corrupt charter school administration is still cheaper and more efficient than public schools
There are flaws in the charter/voucher system.
There are NOT flaws that are present ONLY in the charter/voucher system.
Evil, racist people
The government/union K-12 school system seems to be searching for new and ever more disgraceful ways to demonstrate that educating children is no longer their primary role or interest. Now it’s equity, pronoun use, environmental and social activism, transgender bathrooms, showers and sports, and who knows what else?
searching for new and ever more disgraceful ways to demonstrate that educating children is no longer their primary role or interest.
When a president of a teachers union was questioned about a union position that was at odds with educating students, The President of the union said, paraphrasing, ‘ I’ll care about the students when the students start paying dues.
Teacher Unions were NEVER about education. The covid response proved that, not that the union was ever anything but protecting bad teachers.
This isn’t coming from the locals, outside of maybe a few woke locales. This is coming from Departments of Education at the State and Federal level, from the Superintendents Association, yes, unions, NGOs, and corporations.
Local school boards and the citizenry isn’t cooking up this crap.
Could those intent on arguing “equity” possibly have it both backwards and upside down? With regard to the former, one does not achieve equity by “leveling” outcome, but “leveling” opportunity. As to the latter, one does not accomplish a goal by focusing on process to the exclusion of the goal.