Why is media about "good education"ONLY about firing teachers?

Today's Wash Post has an interesting piece about Rhee resignation as DC School Chancellor and her interim replacement by her own number 2 -- who apparently shares her zeal for reform but -- unlike Rhee -- is considered an honest negotiator by the teachers.

All I've ever read about Rhee has made me think she and  the "all we have to do is fire bad teachers" school of public school reformers are more arrogant and contentious than they are real change-makers.

And then the article went on to report something I DO NOT THINK I HAD EVER READ BEFORE about the work Rhee did to improve early education, especially pre-K preparation  for "high risk" kids or "wrap-around" services for middle-schoolers not doing well.  Until now, I have only heard Rhee -- and other articles pro-and-con about her -- talk about firing; not about these "outside K-12 school" support systems.

"Rhee also dramatically expanded the number of spaces in preschool, pre-K and Head Start, and opened the Early Stages diagnostic center to help flag learning disabilities in children ages 2 to 5. She piloted a program of "wrap-around" support services for at-risk middle school kids and launched a program of "themed" schools focusing on science and technology, world cultures and the arts."

Why don't we want to discuss both bad teachers and neglected children?  Why won't Americans -- and propagandists like the makers of WAITING FOR SUPERMAN -- admit that not all the problems inner-city kids have can be solved by one teacher in their classroom?  



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Let's have a "Print a Koran" day

Would it be wonderful to have an Espresso Machine printing copies of the Koran near the site of the horrible book burning planned in Florida?

Shouldn't Korans be donated to all Public Libraries in the US on that day?

How better can we show our revulsion at the bigots among us than by publishing what they wish to destroy,  and drowning out the words of hate with tolerance and respect?

Progressive politics works!

Read today’s Washington Post recommending Michael Pertschuk’s new book:

THE DeMARCO FACTOR: TRANSFORMING PUBLIC WILL INTO POLITICAL POWER

A coalition builder's lesson for progressives

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Mike has been a friend since I worked with him on REVOLT AGAINST REGULATION, which he wrote while standing firm as Liberal on Regan’s FTC.

He has been a life-long anti-smoking advocate, someone dedicated more to improving public health and saving lives rather than scoring ideological points, but he has no illusions about the obstacles to common sense changes that progressives continue to face.

You cannot learn from a better consumer advocate who walks the walk as well as talking the talk, and one of his heroes is Maryland’s Vincent DeMarco.  As Katrina vanden Heuvel says:

Consider DeMarco's successful fight against the tobacco industry. After building strong health and faith coalitions in many states for the national Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, he and his colleagues mobilized the national Faith United Against Tobacco coalition to press for federal legislation to give the FDA expansive powers to regulate tobacco products and their marketing -- legislation that had languished for more than a decade.

The coalition spanned the religious and political spectrum, from the liberal United Methodists to the conservative Southern Baptists. And despite heavy opposition from all but one tobacco company (New York's Altria, formerly Philip Morris), it is the only major legislation on Obama's agenda that garnered close to a majority of Republican votes, even from conservative tobacco states.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/06/AR2010070602145.html?wpisrc=nl_opinions

Gun death statistics

Here's an overview of the statistics related to firearm violence in the United. All numbers derived from the Centers for Disease Control Fatal and Non-Fatal Injury Database for 2004, the most recent year available. All rates indicate the crude per capita firearm death rate per 100,000 people.


From http://www.washingtonceasefire.org/


General Numbers


* Total Number of Firearm Injuries: 64,389 / Rate: 21.93 / 100,000


* Total Number of Firearm Fatalities: 29,569 / Rate: 9.94 / 100,000


How Are Victims Killed?


* Homicide: 11,624 / 39% of All Fatalities

* Suicide: 16,750 / 57% of All Fatalities

* Unintentional Death (Accidental): 649 / 2% of All Fatalities

How Are Victims Injured?

* Assault Injury: 43,592 / 68% of All Injuries

* Unsuccessful Suicide Attempt: 3,352 (may be incorrect -- actual number may be larger, see CDC website) / 5% of All Injuries


* Accidental Injury: 16,555 / 26% of All Injuries

THE FREEDOM TO NOT BE SHOT SHOT DOWN

The NRA may pretend to be disappointed that AK47s have not been made as easy to buy as rat poison, but Supreme Court Justice Alito just handed them a reason to bankrupt cities with suits over gun laws.  Alito  loves to chisel and narrow laws without seeming to "overturn" them,  as long as corporations as individuals and individuals and individuals as vigilantes are protected. Who is the activist judge now?

In his reasoning he claims:

The Founders wrote the 2nd Amendment to protect state and local militias. After the Civil War, it protected freed slaves in the South during Reconstruction. Therefore, the right to a handgun has grown since the original intent of the Founders, and both rights apply now.

Individuals deserve handguns in their homes because they cannot expect law enforcement that makes them unnecessary. The Founders intended no constitutional right to personal safety except to own a handgun.

Voters can regulate some guns and some uses of guns, but gun owners can sue and sue FOR THE RIGHT TO SHOOT SOMEONE WITH A LEGAL HANDGUN MORE EASILY THAN I CAN SUE FOR THE RIGHT NOT TO BE SHOT.

The NRA calls a wrong number

It’s a scary world out there.

First the woman who identified herself on the phone as “an NRA member” insisted on asking for and calling me “Mr.” – even after I said I was “Amanda” – not a man’s name in any English-speaking country I know of.

She said she has a taped message to play me before she asked me to answer her poll.

Then I was subject to a 45 second warning that the UN – with Secretary Clinton’s and Iran’s help – were trying to “ban guns worldwide.” The worst case scenario: we would end up just like “Australia or England.” Horrors!

“Did I think North Korea should have a say in my right to own a gun?” she asked. I said she was phrasing the question in a way that was hard for me to answer accurately. I told her, “I do believe there were International Laws protecting Human Rights which all countries should support.”

Not surprisingly she quickly said goodbye, since she probably believes that the Nuremberg trials was about protecting good capitalists like BP from extortion from “Hitler-like” President Obama, not about universal individual human rights and the rule of law even in wartime – pinko propaganda if you ever heard any!

I want to ask the “moderate independent” NRA members who protest they just want to “hunt legally:” “Why do you give money to a group who uses it to tell people any UN effort for “arms control” is a ploy to take over America?

These NRA lobbyists “birthers,” and “English-only” xenophobes may hunt, but rifles are not the guns they believe all Americans (felons and terrorists alike) need to be able to buy at Gun Shows, with no background checks. In fact, these are the same people fighting the laws to keep terrorists on the “watch list” from being denied machine guns at Wal Mart – not just Gun Shows.

If you agree with the Supreme Court that the Second Amendment does allow for “reasonable” restrictions on gun ownership (as even the majority did when they overturned the DC ban), how can you call yourself a “moderate” when you chose to vote with WELL FINANCED-EXTREMISTS who spread this vile bull****?"

The 1964-era John Birch Society (some of whom I grew up living next to) couldn’t be more dangerous! Do they think we didn’t really defeat the commies when we won the Cold War? Isn’t that an insult to Saint Ronald Reagan?

You can’t make this stuff up – because some other American nutcase already has!

When consumers can't afford to buy

The worker / owner dichotomy of the beginning of twentieth century has been replaced in America with an equally unequal consumer / investor split.

A combination we once thought had defeated communism forever -- mutual funds and cheap luxury goods -- is now disappearing, taking with it our own economic miracle only decades after the Fall of the Berlin Wall.

Will we simply revert to a world of citizens with capital and those without? Will those without (i.e. those we used to call workers) be able to continue to consume what those we used to call owners can profit from?

Or will only those that have continue to get?

The people who work to keep us driving

The recent tragedies in West Virginia coal mines (including two more men dead this week) and on the BP Oil Rig in the Gulf should remind us that there is a human cost to our relentless energy consumption that goes well beyond the ground war in the Middle East and the economic damage of pollution.

Lives are lost in giving us what we can't live without.We owe these people respect for risking their lives to keep us on the road and able to read in the dark.

It's not enough to say "they get paid well enough" when you look at the salaries. But do the math and figure in the hours these workers put in under dismal conditions. Witness the poor housing and family separations they endure, as described in the NYT article about North Dakota oil workers living in dilapidated RVs without sewers or water. They sacrifice to keep us from having to make any sacrifices.

These men and women who died digging coal and pumping oil are every bit as much involved of America's defense against terrorism as the military. They may not be on the battlefield or in as much danger as combat troops, but they are as important as the long supply chain which runs from Camp Pendelton to Kabul and Baghdad.

Who is your client?

For an excellent take on the ethics of Goldman Sachs' view of market-making, see the article in Wharton's free Knowledge newsletter:

http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=2481

Protest or Pity-Party?

It is hard not to think that the tea party protestors want to use the power of the checkbook to starve government programs which benefit anyone but themselves. I don’t believe they only want to reign in government excess and debt.

They target as discretionary spending "benefits" paid to people not like them. Benefits paid to them -- Social Security, Medicare, the unlimited mortgage tax deduction, -- these are justified entitlements, not waste or pork or socialism. The other exception to any “financial controls” is Military Defense. They see themselves as so very threatened by the rest of the world, it seems as they don’t believe Reagan won the Cold War and defeated communism.

These 18 percent of Americans think they are entitled to more of a voice than others or they wouldn't be complaining that nobody is listening to them. They have comfortable middle class lives, yet they are angry about everything.

And then there are the gun lovers who say we can trust them not to kill us (if we behave), but we can’t trust anyone else not to try to kill us, all the time.

Richard Clark Non-fiction on Cyberwarfare

If you liked Clark's bestselling, reality-based thrillers, you'll want to read his new book warning about the Cyber attacks that have already been tested by countries like North Korea as well as all the ways both states and freelance terrorists can undermine every thing we use that touches a computer or the Internet (from banking to Air Defense Radar).

Terry Gross had a fascinating interview with Clark on "Fresh Air" today, if you want to know more.

In the good news department

The Economist reports success in growing forests around the world:

Slowing the losses
Some good news from the second differential

Apr 7th 2010 | From The Economist print edition

FOR the first time since the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) started making decade-by-decade surveys of the world’s forests, it says it has evidence that efforts to slow the world’s rate of deforestation are working. The total area of forest on the planet is about 4 billion hectares (10 billion acres). In the “key findings” of its Global Forest Resources Assessment 2010 (the full report is not out for a few months) the FAO estimates that, during each of the past ten years, an average of roughly 13m hectares of forest (an area twice the size of Latvia) were either converted to other uses or lost through natural causes such as drought and fire. In the 1990s the figure was 16m hectares.

Reduced rates of deforestation in Brazil and Indonesia form a large part of the story, but the reduction was more broadly based. It was seen on all continents apart from Oceania and forest-free Antarctica—and the increased loss of forest in Oceania was caused largely by drought and fire, rather than by extra logging.

go Butler!

If you're watching the Basketball NCAA Final tonight, I hope you'll be rooting for Butler. I have a personal reason -- beyond their miracle underdog status -- I taught Freshman English at UCLA with Butler University President, Bobby Fong.

Although we haven't kept in touch since grad school, I have always remembered him for his ethics as a teacher. At a time when tenure track jobs at universities required you to love theory and Derrida above all else, he chose, instead, to teach undergraduates at Berea College in Appalachia. When I saw the announcement of his becoming president of Butler a few years ago, I was not surprised to learn it was a school that valued "The Butler Way" of combining academics and athletics.

With stars who go to class on the day of a tournament game, and Butler's 90% graduation rate for all athletes, it certainly seems they are for real.

Palin's target practise

If Sarah Palin is really only using rifle scopes and phrases like "reload" as metaphors for fighting back with votes against Democrats, can we all agree that the 2nd Amendment refers only to the right to "metaphorical" guns as well?

Classic non-fiction

I've just read two history books relevant to current events:

THE WAR THAT KILLED ACHILLES by Caroline Alexander

You'll want to reread Homer after reading this, but you'll also probably find yourself reading first-hand accounts of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan too because of the author's analysis of the anti-heroic and anti-war aspects of this epic.

BATTLE OF WITS: The Complete Story of Codebreaking in World War II
by Stephen Budiansky

Ever since I worked on William Stephenson's book about the secret history of Enigma and Ultra in WWII, I have been fascinated by books on the subject. Every decade brings new revelations, and this book (unfortunately out of print but available used) is a marvelous overview of both American and British, Japanese and German codebreaking.

Don't worry tha the math is complex and detailed. Frankly, I skim these parts, since I only understand how hard the problem is, not how it is solved. The individuals profiled are even more interesting, and the section about the pre-war efforts of Poles to break Nazi codes and Enigma machines is far more heroic -- and vital to winning the war -- as told here than any I have read before.

The complete story of events on both sides of the Atlantic is simply amazing. It required an extraordinary combination of ingenuity, courage, innovation, physical and mental endurance, patriotism, and sheer luck in the face of a formidable military enemy and the usual bureacratic resistance to change.

Health insurance

For obvious reasons that Healthcare and Health insurance reform is not optional,

See Google News today:

About 1 in 4 in California lack health insurance, a UCLA study finds
Los Angeles Times - ‎21 hours ago‎
The jump in 2009 to 8.2 million adults and children from 6.4 million in 2007 stems largely from job cuts and the loss of employer-sponsored coverage amid the recession.
Workers paying more toward insurance premiums San Francisco Chronicle

You say potato-e

David Brooks had an column about Obama yesterday in the NYT comparing hippie protesters from the sixties with Tea Baggers as equally bad for democracy.

I agree with him, but I give less credit (for benefit over harm) to conservative foot-draggers and more to liberal anarchists:

Democrats believe all human beings are intrinsically “good,” and that government can enhance that “goodness,” by protecting individuals from the suffering can make them do evil things. Free markets are more likely to reward bad behavior and increase suffering without good (possibly but not necessarily large) government at local, state, and federal levels.

Republicans believe all humans are flawed, if not outright sinners, and that individual suffering is necessary to bring about good from evil. Suffering under Free Markets is good for the soul. Paying taxes never is, unless -- and only as long as -- you have an expensive house and kids in a good school system.

Cross Country Skiing for the rest of us after Vancouver

THE BEST CROSS-COUNTRY SKIING SNOW IN NEW ENGLAND

If watching the Olympics has made you curious about cross-country skiing, you should know about Prospect Mountain, on the edge of Woodford State Park, just over the border from Massachusetts, on Route 9 in southwestern Vermont. Yes, as you have seen on TV’s Olympic coverage this year, it’s a beautiful sport, and you don’t have to be Jimmy Spillane to enjoy it any more than you have to be Bode Miller to go downhill.

Ten miles north of Bennington, just past Williams College, Prospect (adjacent to Woodford State Forest) is the perfect place to have fun learning to cross country ski. In Nordic skiing you have to work hard climb hills rather than ride up on chairs or gondolas, but when you reach the flats and get into your “classic” glide, you will have a quiet yet invigorating journey into a winter wonderland. Like mountain biking without the bumps, like hiking without the bugs, cross-country skiing is “a good walk unspoiled.”

That’s where my spouse and I headed on Sunday from our house in Litchfield, CT. On the 2 ½ hour drive on Route 7 from the Northwest corner through the length of the Berkshires, we saw no more than a few remaining patches of snow. Even Bennington was mostly bare ground.

But because we’ve skied at Prospect for over 15 years, we knew that their web site wasn’t lying when they said their conditions were “perfect.” As we pulled into the parking lot we saw fresh snow and had a picture perfect view of solid white runs and snow-coated evergreens.

The base elevation of Prospect Mtn. X-C Ski Area is 2250'. The key to Prospect’s success is that this it has natural snow (you can’t make snow on long cross country trails) for at least 14 weeks from December – March, because it lays in a secret “snow pocket.” the first place in the Green Mountains storms hit coming off the Great Lakes. Before the precipitation gets to Killington or Stowe, it always drops some first at Prospect.

We got our lift tickets (a bargain at $20 for adults) and ate a grilled cheese sandwich in the very informal “Lodge Restaurant,” which has the comfy atmosphere of a campus snack bar. Then we started up the short hill leading to the main trails. We brought own equipment, but adults can rent for only $18 a day, much less than downhill. You do need to call ahead to reserve a spot in lessons, either group or private.

Since we hadn’t had a chance to get in shape, Mary Ann and I decide to take the “easy” trails and warm up before going up hills. The condition of the snow was wonderful, packed but not at all icy. There was one set of parallel tracks on the right, groomed for “classic” diagonal stride, with a large area for those (not us) who “skate ski” – what you see in the “freestyle” races at the Olympics. We are permanently intermediate skiers, with no aspirations to be fast or stylish, and we stay with to old-fashioned diagonal stride, but Prospect provides room for all levels, beginners to racers.

A few minutes of gentle up-and-down, and we reached a long flat stretch through the pine trees, and, eventually, the sign for “Beaver Pond Loop.” I was excited about this part of the trails, not only because it was more challenging but because I had read that this was where young Olympian Andy Newell had started his Nordic career at the age of four. He had probably skied faster than I do even then. Bill Koch ran a ski club here the 1976 Olympics, where he was the first American to medal in a Nordic race. There is a lot of inspiration on these trails.

The day we went to Prospect it was warm but not hot, alternating clouds and sun. Such weather is very good for cross country. Too much sunshine and rising temperatures will make the snow mushy, even when machines have carefully “groomed” it. Whistler certainly proved that in the 30K pursuit, if you watched the Olympics that day. Even state-of-the-art technology can’t make wet snow fast.

The grooming machines keep the snow from turning to ice, smoothing the skating surface and cutting tracks about 2-3 inches deep for diagonal stride. That makes it much safer and more pleasant than your local golf course. Nordic skis are thinner and lighter than Alpine, the boots are much more flexible, and the terrain much more forgiving.

If you are coming to cross-country from downhill skiing, you need to learn to trust your speed, because it isn’t overwhelming. You can always snow plow. Your skis won’t have metal edges for fancy turns and the trails are at to narrow for fast turns. You can’t expect to “schuss” to a smart stop.

Experienced downhill skiers may find it easy to skate ski rather than to do “diagonal stride,” since it is a familiar movement. In cross-country, however, you have to learn to keep your center of gravity over the middle of the skis, rather than to try to set your edges, and remember that your boot can move more because the heel isn’t attached to the binding (which helps you glide).

Aside from mushy snow, the other reason a having a day with the temperature hovering around freezing is good for cross-country skiing is that it is hard work, and you overheat very easily. The single most important key to enjoying your ski is DO NOT wear a down jacket. If you dress like an alpine skier you’ll roast within a few minutes.

What you want to wear are layers, a windbreaker, a vest, light gloves, and a hat you can stuff into a pocket. You don’t want your mother’s cotton long underwear, either, you want modern synthetics, with a turtle neck you can unzip. When you get going you’ll feel like you’re riding a bike in early summer. However, you need to put the layers back on while you have a drink or just enjoy the sights. Without zipping up your vest or pulling your shell back on, you will get cold in a minute when you are not moving. Unlike the Olympic racers, you will want to stop once and a while.

No matter how good the conditions at a cross country resort, chances are slim that the trails will be crowded. Many times we’ve been able to stop and be completely alone on the upper mountain at Prospect, surrounded by a landscape as pristine and wild as you would find in California or Colorado. The only thing the High Sierras and the Rocky Mountains have to offer for cross country that Vermont doesn’t is sweeping vistas. While backcountry skiing in Yellowstone Park was an amazing experience we got to do once, we have the same kind of fun at Prospect, and we can have it several weekends a year instead of once every two decades.

Furthermore, for Boomers like us, Prospect is time-travel on snow. As Prospect says on its web site:

Prospect Mountain Ski Area was born in the late 1930's when the first rope tow pulled skiers up the mountain. Operations were interrupted by World War II, but then resumed in the 1960's when two T-bar lifts were installed. The first cross-country ski trails were built in 1980. Now the entire operation is devoted to cross-country skiing in the winter.

If you learned to ski before snowboarding, you will recognize the natural snow, the low key snack bar, inexpensive trail fees and equipment rentals (if not the spandex), and a full mix of generations who actually spend time together, from kids as young as three to Grandparents who remember Jean Claude Killy. What you won’t find is long lines, crowded slopes, loud music, or an après ski bar scene.

Originally logging roads, the cross-country trails on which the Williams College ski team trains are open to the public thanks to a lot of dedicated members of the local community. It is a treasure anyone living in New York or New England can be very grateful for.


IF YOU GO:

Prospect Mountain X-Country Ski Area is in Woodford, VT, on Route 9. By car it’s about 3 hours from Boston or 4 hours from New York City, 2.5 hours from Hartford, CT.

Woodford, Vermont
www.prospectmountain.com
(802) 442 - 2575

Winter is not tourist season, but if you spend time during the day in town, there is a wonderful – and rare – local bookstore on Main Street, and the Bennington Museum (only a mile from the center of Main Street) has priceless Grandma Moses paintings, including some that had been stolen but reappeared in a crate sent anonymously several years later.

There are many local motels and bed-and-breakfast places to stay in Bennington, and it isn’t usually hard to get reservations.

For a luxury weekend, there’s the South Shire Inn in the middle of town. It is a beautiful Art Deco house with marvelous wood panels in the living room and plaster ornamental carvings in the dinning room. We’ve stayed there several times over many different owners, and it has always been one of the best Inns we’ve ever visited. It has big rooms with antiques in the main house (we particularly like The Otto Room) or a modern room with hot tub in the remodeled carriage house.

124 Elm Street
Bennington, VT 05201
(802)447-3839
Fax: (802)442-3547

Also full of charm but a little further out of town, to the northwest, is The Eddington House Inn, which offers a cross-country ski package with Prospect and meals at Kevin’s Pub next door, convenient if you don’t want to go out again after a day of skiing.

21 Main Street
North Bennington Village
Bennington, VT 05257
http://www.eddingtonhouseinn.com/
802-442-1511
800-941-1857

If you have kids or are going with a group of friends, the Kirkside Motorlodge is right on Main Street, and a short drive from Prospect.

250 West Main Street • Bennington, Vermont
802-447-7596 | info@kirksidemotorlodge.com

Our personal favorite for eating dinner is Alldays & Onions, a few blocks from the intersection of Routes 7 and 9, on Main Street. Bennington is full of good restaurant choices, including the family-friendly.

Alldays & Onions
519 Main Street
Bennington, VT 05201
802-447-0043
www.alldaysandonions.

Isaac Newton's detective work

I have just caught up with the new book from Tom Levenson NEWTON AND THE COUNTERFEITER, and I'm experimenting with listening on audio and reading the Kindle version on my laptop (you can do that with the free KindleforPC software on Amazon).

I worked with Tom, who runs the MIT Masters Program in science writing, when he published EINSTEIN IN BERLIN, and he is one of the very best history of science writers around. He also has a background as a NOVA producer.

Why we need health care reform

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE58G6W520090917

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Nearly 45,000 people die in the United States each year -- one every 12 minutes -- in large part because they lack health insurance and can not get good care, Harvard Medical School researchers found in an analysis released on Thursday.

Overall, researchers said American adults age 64 and younger who lack health insurance have a 40 percent higher risk of death than those who have coverage.