Headlines

These headlines are real ... they have all been discovered on Internet news sites.

New EU 'travel tax' ...

Obama and Merkel: Globalization is here to stay

Axelrod tells transition critics to chill ...

Thanksgiving meal much cheaper: Turkey prices drop ...

DNA breakthrough could 'fix broken genes in brain, delay aging' ...

Paris Hilton: 'I voted for Trump'

London's Muslim Mayor urges anti-Trump migrants to flock to UK

War on Christmas: Saudis ban international schools from observing non-Islamic holidays

Department of Education wasting money at an incredible rate ...

Switzerland considers banning Koran distributions

Obama sets new record for regulations, 527 pages in just one day

Apple may produce IPhones in USA ...

Teaching to the Test

Apparently the Lion of the Senate, Ted Kennedy, roared a little too loudly when he helped construct the "No Child Left Behind" legislation during the early Bush-43 years.  For now, about ten years later, another Democrat reformer, The Barry, has declared this law too draconian and granted ten states exemptions to its provisions (with 28 more states to follow) -- another of the many examples of executive ukase under this regime. (See: L.A. Times Story). In announcing this one of his many end-runs around Congress, Obama declared that this attempt to increase students' proficiencies across our nation was "teaching to the test."  This is precisely the same liberal canard that has been used in Massachusetts to deprecate the MCAS testing here (Massachusetts, of course, was one of the ten states granted a waver.)

And this is despite (or maybe "because of"?) the dramatic spending increases that Arne Duncan has enjoyed during his tenure aas head of the Department of Education -- $39.9 billion in his first year (fiscal 2009) with the President's budget calling for $68.0 billion in fiscal 2012 (see: Department of Education Spending and click on the Excel table).  And I seem to recall the hoopla surrounding Duncan's appointment where his credentials and rhetoric suggested that his entire raison d'être was to improve the testing results of United States students.  Apparently the air has gone out of this balloon ... to be replaced by a condom?

For more of my thoughts on this subject see: Duncan Donuts.

Duncan Donuts

Arne Duncan, our overly-lauded Secretary of Education, has requested that the educational standards that were put in place with "No Child Left Behind" now be left behind in all of our 50 (or is it 57?) states (see The Department of Non-Education).  This is after hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer money have been lavished on the Department of Education since 2009 ... including even on a SWAT team that is specific to this department (Arne's Army?).  If you don't believe me on this, please read Mark Styne's comments on this ridiculously spendthrift item ... Swat the SWAT Team.  Even The Barry's 2009 economic stimulus program allocated $100 billion to America's educational lushness (see Government Numbers).

Lest you forget, our Department of Education educates not one child.  All it does is create layers after layers of bureaucratic fluff that mollifies liberals into believing that we are serious about fixing our flawed educational system.  And this is despite the fact that we already are spending more money on educating our children that any other country ... and keep getting sub-par results (see: Spending and Results).  Perhaps the lesson of Atlanta (see: Atlanta Scandal ) should be taken seriously ... effective education cannot be a top-down process.  We must first re-learn how to teach our children and this is not a function of spending more money.  It may well require that we sweep out many of the educational administrators and focus instead on how we teach our teachers (the "what" they teach much more than the "how" they teach) ... and burn everything that Albert Shanker, the former head of the American Federation of Teachers, ever wrote.

Afterward: The reason I say this spiteful thing is that Albert Shanker, past president of the American Federation of Teachers (now deceased),  was once asked why he didn't pay more attention to the slipping educational results for our children. His response was, in effect, "When they start paying union dues." Yuck!!