While reading Niall Ferguson’s The Ascent of Money, I came across evidence of a pervasive ignorance about economic matters among 2008 high school seniors. It didn’t strike me as surprising. I suspect the economic illiteracy transcends ’08 high school seniors. I don’t recall my parents’ generation showing any dazzling financial acumen either. I wouldn’t be shocked at discovering the paucity of understanding extending to the bulk of today’s college graduates. The only difference between the older generations and our youngsters is the mountains of cash poured into our schools to get the same outcome.
First, the evidence. In 2008, the University of Buffalo’s School of Management surveyed a typical group of high school seniors on basic personal finance and economic matters. They discovered, among other things:
* an average grade of “F” (52%) to a set of basic economic questions.
* only 14% grasped the fact that stocks earn a greater rate of return than a US government bond over an 18-year period.
* 23% knew that the income tax is assessed on interest earned from a savings account if personal income is high enough.
* 59% didn’t know the difference between a company pension, Social Security, and a 401(k).
Another 2008 survey of over-all Americans showed that two-thirds didn’t know how compound interest worked. Good luck in getting these people to invest for the golden years.
The mental disability on financial matters isn’t limited to America. According to Ferguson, similar results are available for the U.K.
Before we rush out to ignite another progressive heaven-on-earth crusade to correct life’s foibles, we need to ask ourselves a simple question: Would it do any good?
Currently, as of 2016, we average $156,000 per child on K-12 schooling. If the 1984-2004 period is any indication, real (inflation adjusted) spending per pupil has increased 49%. Still, by 2008, Ferguson and the University of Buffalo are unmasking massive numbers of economic ignoramuses in spite of the avalanche of cash.
The situation isn’t any better on basic Civics. Civics, you know, is about our government and political traditions. The federal Dept. of Education tries to ascertain the state of things, including basic knowledge of our political institutions, with its National Assessment of Education Progress. As of 2010, the trillions of dollars bought us … nothing. Whatever Civics progress has been made, it quickly disappears by the 12th grade. The 2014 scores showed only a quarter of seniors scored “proficient”. Be careful with man-on-the-street interviews. You could trip up a person with real stumpers like, “What is the supreme law of the land?”
I’ll leave the disappointments in Language Arts, Math, and Science to those more involved in the disciplines; though, I suspect the weather doesn’t get any sunnier.
Could it be that “no child left behind” or “every student succeeds” (the titles of our most recent efforts to “immanentize the eschaton”, as Eric Voegelin would say) violate truth-in-labeling laws? Despite the best efforts of man and woman, and much infusion of money, some kids will be left behind and some won’t succeed. So many dynamics are at work outside the purview of academic bubbles, political demagoguery, and the education Borg. Try chaotic homes; an epidemic of single parenthood; youthful expectations that don’t comport with white-collar aspirations; a decline of civil society; parental and peer influences; and the simple fact that some kids don’t care and you can’t make them care.
What we end up doing is throwing more money and government employees at the problem. Government gets bigger and more expensive … and the kids still don’t know much of anything. Adding preschool and free college to the line of matriculation just stretches out the failure.
All is not lost, though. Here’s some suggestions: return to a classical education, reboot vocational ed with an eye to internships and apprenticeships, and leave open the opportunity for the transition back to formal education for those with a change of heart later in life. And, above all, if you insist on compulsory education for all youngsters, off to boot-camp for the threatening and disruptive.
Mull it over.
RogerG
Sources:
The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World, Niall Ferguson
“Does Spending More on Education Improve Academic Achievement?”, Dan Lips and Shanea Watkins, Heritage Foundation, Sept. 8, 2008, http://www.heritage.org/education/report/does-spending-more-education-improve-academic-achievement
“Fast Facts: Ependitures”, National Center for Education Statistics, https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=66
“The Nation’s Report Card: Civics 2010”, National Center for Education Statistics, https://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/pubs/main2010/2011466.asp#section1
“Why Civics Is About More Than Citizenship”, Alia Wong, The Atlantic, Sept. 7, 2015, https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/09/civic-education-citizenship-test/405889/
Could this be a typical PolitiFact.com newsroom cubicle as well?
One of the more important shifts in the sociology of professional employment is the increasing prevalence of college journalism graduates in the newsroom. And they seem to be pushing the profession to the left. Some undoubtedly will disagree but others have noticed, such as George Mason University’s Center for Media and Public Affairs. See this 2013 article from US News & World Report, “Who’s Checking the Fact Checkers?”(https://www.usnews.com/…/study-finds-fact-checkers-biased-a…).
Allison Graves, rookie PolitiFact reporter
An example of the trend is the background of the youthful Allison Graves, the rookie PolitiFact journalist who branded “false” Hugh Hewitt’s claim that the Obamacare exchanges are in a death spiral. She’s a creature of the University of Missouri-Columbia school of journalism – a 2016 graduate with a BA in journalism. She credits experience as city editor/reporter for the Journalism Department’s newspaper and padded her resume’ with “Copy editor/Nightside news editor” at “Fangirl the Magazine” (according to her LinkedIn page).
21-year-old rookies are now in charge of “acceptable” political discourse. Her involvement with PolitiFact is no act of serendipity. The school of journalism has a direct umbilical cord to PolitiFact. The school partners with PolitiFact in training young gatekeepers (see “How Mizzou Journalism Students Help Fact-Check for PolitiFact” on the mediashift.org website).
Prof. Mike Jenner and U. Of Missouri School of Journalism partnering with PolitiFact in a class session. (Stephanie Mueller/Columbia Missourian/AP)
This brings me back to my central assertion: the absence of a rich classical education among most college graduates is hampering their maturity of judgment. Therefore, their faddish leftism runs unchecked to the manifest disservice of the American public.
A contentious interview between Hugh Hewitt and Aaron Sharockman (3/28/17), executive director of PolitiFact.com, caught my attention. Apparently, differences between supportable points of view are shoe-horned into true/false judgments by PolitiFact. By so doing, sites like PolitiFact can distort the nature of the dispute and mislead the public.
Aaron Sharockman, executive director of PolitiFact.comHugh Hewitt, host of the Hugh Hewitt Show, Chapman University law professor
At issue was PolitiFact’s slapping of “false” on Hewitt’s claim that the Obamacare exchanges are experiencing a “death spiral”. In fact, it’s an easily supportable point of view. Sources can be cited in support of it. Instead, the PolitiFact journalist quickly labeled it “false” after cursory digging.
Understanding a “death spiral” requires knowing the difference between “collapse” and “collapsing”. In regards to the Obamacare exchanges, the high deductibles, costly premiums, shrinking involvement by medical practitioners, and withdrawal of insurance providers from many markets has discouraged the younger and healthier to opt out of the pool making them unsustainable — thus, a death spiral. It is collapsing, but hasn’t collapsed yet. The death spiral describes a collapsing insurance market. PolitiFact’s journalist doesn’t know the difference, nor the fact that it is a defensible position.
The simplistic approach may have much to do with an inadequate educational preparation for our younger wave of journalists: people who inherently have a predilection for quick, snappy judgments.
The impetuousness of their youth isn’t tempered by a deeper understanding of the major issues of life – something a better education could offset. Instead, having never grappled with the major battles of ideas throughout history, and in many cases unaware of their existence, leads them into premature judgments.
35-year-old Aaron Sharockman, himself, is a case in point. Exploratory questions into his background and preparation would lead one to believe that he isn’t well-read in the literary classics pertinent to his college major: Political Science/Journalism. Other than “1984” – something that could have been read in high school – he’s had no exposure to anything else that might enlighten him of the totalitarian mindset.
“1984”, Big Brother, and Ingsoc (abbreviation for “English Socialism”)
The totalitarian mindset, as described in books like “Darkness at Noon”, seeks to control thought by forestalling the presence of other points of view from space in public discussion by branding them “false”, “not preferable”, “wrong”. Is PolitiFact performing the function of Gletkin in “Darkness at Noon” or the Ministry of Truth in “1984”?
The modern fact-checker seems to be stepping into the role of truth-controller.
Speaker Paul Ryan after pulling the healthcare bill.
The following is my comment to Byron York’s piece in the Washington Examiner of March 24, 2017, “14 Lessons from the GOP Obamacare Debacle”, (http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/byron-york-14-lessons-from-the-gop-obamacare-debacle/article/2618439?fb_action_ids=427872760895604&fb_action_types=og.comments)
Byron York of the Washington Examiner is correct in his post-mortem of the failure of the House Republican healthcare bill. He is most insightful in his last “lesson” to be gleaned from the debacle: it’s still way too early to write off the Trump presidency. It certainly isn’t a great start, but this too will fade as the unexpected comes to the fore.
Here are my “lessons”:
1) All large organizations have factions, particularly narrow, purist factions. I call the Freedom Caucus the seppuku clique among Republicans. With a small congressional majority, their influence looms much too large in the GOP tent. The arts of working with others not so inclined in their tenets isn’t in their DNA. Self-critiques of their behavior and beliefs are nowhere evident. They would be more comfortable in Mohammed’s legions than learning the ropes of governing with others of divergent views. Ways must be found to diminish their ranks. At least primary them!
2) “Insurance” and “healthcare” has been allowed to be bollixed together. Nothing can be further from the truth. One can have “health insurance” without “healthcare”(as Obamacare shows), and vice versa. So, the public discussion takes place on the Democrat’s favorite collectivist grounds. “Insurance” cements the idea in the public that somebody else will take care of their medical needs and wants. It’s the natural playground for socialists/progressives/collectivists of all stripes. Anything based on somebody else paying will produce a mess. Before venturing into the swamp again, much greater efforts must be made to reduce this opening for Democrat demogoguery.
3) This is more about what to do. Put the issue behind you. Obamacare is imploding. Spare no opportunity to point fingers at the Dem-Mensheviks for foisting the thing on us, as well as those purist zealots in the Republican ranks who won’t accept any other choice than between Valhalla and suicide. These are the dominoes: implode first; primary the purist fusspots second; and thirdly present a Marshall Plan rescue package in the wake of the ruins. The only problem is that the Republicans may not be in a position to do much by the time we get to rescue. To avoid that unhappy fate, create a record of success elsewhere, like with infrastructure, tax reform, rolling back the commissariats, etc. On this, you’re right Byron York.
I can’t help but come back to the baleful influence of the maniacal diehards. With a small Republican majority, they hold too many trump cards. They won’t get their libertarian heaven. Instead, we’ll most likely get Dem majorities and full-blown Castro-care. Querulous perfectionists are liabilities to their own side as they are assets for the opposition.
I was led to this book after listening to a podcast of an interview with a scholar who uses “1984”, “Brave New World”, “Darkness at Noon”, and this book in teaching the nature of 20th century totalitarianism. Originating back in 1945, the book sheds light on the frame of mind leading to statism, particularly of the progressive variety.
It explores, through fantasy, the smothering materialist dogmas that dominate academia and excuse the attempted expansion of the state into every crevice of life. Materialism reduces all of existence to material factors. It is activated in the social engineering of a cadre of all-knowing “experts”, the seed of totalitarianism.
The conflict that erupts in the book between the reigning materialism and traditional metaphysics is the essence of the current division of America into “red” and “blue” precincts. The state religion of blue-America is materialism. Any space left for “spirituality” is of the undemanding sort, and conveniently fashioned for personal eccentricities.
In the parlance of the book, the N.I.C.E. (National Institute of Coordinated Experiments) and the progressive bloc at Bracton College are synonymous with the bastions of blue-America. Art imitates life, eh?
The fight over pulling the plug on Obamacare presents two lessons. First, government projections – like those of the CBO – are proof that hallucinations don’t have to be artificially induced. Give an agency a crystal ball and they will proclaim the future. Hilariously, the pseudo-visions of agencies like the CBO will be treated as fact in the debate over appropriating trillions of dollars. The tactic has the life of a vampire. Partisans, after sundown, will open up the crypt and let out the rhetorical monster of treating illusory numbers as reality.
Secondly, and more importantly, one part of the House Republicans’ AHCA blueprint is the block-granting and cap on the Medicaid entitlement. Have we unknowingly hit upon the antidote to our runaway spending addiction? The federal budget – surprise, surprise – is being inexorably swamped by cruise-control (entitlement/mandatory) spending. An obvious response might be to tie program spending to a set amount as every working adult does with a paycheck.
The AHCA block grants Medicaid to the states.
The problem with loosely connecting program funding to a kind of social inertia is the near impossibility of accurately predicting year-to-year money levels. These programs are called “entitlements”, and the spending is “mandatory”, with total amounts determined by beneficiaries and not by a predetermined, legislated figure. The formula is simple: legally qualify and a person gets benefits; no qualifier is turned away for lack of money. Spending is on cruise-control … and people in the out-years feign shock as to how wrong the projections were.
PolitiFact’s 2015 estimate for federal mandatory and discretionary spending. Notice the two biggest slices are of the “cruise-control”, mandatory variety. Defense, the first purpose of government, is “discretionary”, tied to a fixed amount, and frequently relegated to begging for more when things blow up in the world. Ironically, transferring money from one person to another is a guaranteed draw on the public purse, while defense must fend off the world’s crazies with a straitjacketed budget. Should “discretionary” be “mandatory”, and “mandatory” be “discretionary”?
The projections were always guesses based on faulty assumptions. The near impossibility of predicting the effects of incentives and disincentives that are unleashed by the programs is a chronic problem. And, of course, “crap happens” to throw the best prognostications awry.
Look at the CBO’s guesswork for the number of enrollees in Obamacare’s exchanges. The exchanges are where individuals, unaffiliated to any employer, get their health insurance. The CBO is all over the place in their numbers.
Freopp.org’s display of CBO yearly projections for the number of enrollees on Obamacare’s exchanges.
The upper lines are the predictions in the rosy glow of Obamacare’s initial passage. 20+ millions were expected but then lowered in the 2016 red line. The green line is reality. They over-calculated the positive effects of the subsidies and individual mandate. In the end, Obamacare’s death spiral continues apace.
The CBO, OMB, or any number-crunching bureau can’t produce a firm bottom line for any program while an open checking account exists to cover anyone qualifying for a draw on the public treasury. Those programs deemed “mandatory/entitlement” should be treated as “discretionary”. In fact, all spending should be “discretionary”. The best thing about the proposed AHCA is the chance to move a program from the “mandatory” to the “discretionary” side of the federal ledger. It’s a tactic that should be repeated throughout the federal budget, thus depopulating and eliminating the “mandatory” category.
All federal spending should be “discretionary”. Fixed amounts would be appropriated for everything. If more is needed, Congress would have to approve it. It’s called the power of the purse, and that purse wasn’t meant to be latchless and permanently wide open .
“Pie chart of ‘federal spending’ circulating on the Internet is misleading”, Politifact, 8/17/15, http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/aug/17/facebook-posts/pie-chart-federal-spending-circulating-internet-mi/
“Medicaid and the American Health Care Act”, Medicaid and the Law, 3/9/17, http://www.medicaidandthelaw.com/2017/03/09/medicaid-the-american-health-care-act/
“Problems with the CBO Analysis of the American Health Care Act”, Avik Roy, National Review online, 3/14/17, http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/445742/problems-cbos-analysis-house-republicans-obamacare-replacement
Book recommendation: “Luther: Man between God and the Devil” by Heiko A. Oberman. The book may be out of print but used copies are available.
It is unique among contemporary biographies. Modern biographies emphasize external and objectified circumstances to define their subject. Personal background, psychology, social, and economic factors are treated as all-determinative. The ideas of the person get lost in the shuffle. Yet, the ideas are the catalyst for shattering the preeminence of the Catholic Church in Western Europe, and in much of Christendom.
By objectifying a person with an over-emphasis on such attributes, we get to avoid the difficult task of grappling with their ideas. Run-of-the-mill biographies cheapen the subjects by stripping away that which made them famous – their ideas.
Oberman’s treatment is refreshing, as opposed to the more common loose speculation peddled to Oprah’s clientele.
Politics can exhibit “Eusociability”. The term refers to the highest level of community-building among some animals, such as the hives of the hymenoptera class of insects – wasps, bees, etc. Political eusociability is becoming increasingly evident among the Left since the election of Trump.
As in a wasps’ hive in an agitated state, the activists of the Left are swarming. The Left’s fury isn’t the spontaneous activity of scattered individuals – or “organic” as some would say – but behave as a horde neurally connected through the bio-chemicals of past activism and social media, triggered with the seed money of donors.
Consider the financial backers to be the “angel investors” of the hive. An example would be Democracy Alliance.
An example of today’s left-wing angel investors: the “Democracy Alliance”Prominent donors to the “Democracy Alliance” are George Soros (l) and Tom Steyer (r)
Hive-funding can go through a circuitous route, almost like money-laundering. One such example would be Alliance for Global Justice, headquartered in Tucson, Az. An examination of its 503(c) IRS form 990 reveals a list of wealthy donors that includes The Bridgewater Fund, The Tides Foundation, Ben & Jerry Foundation, etc. It, in turn, ladles the money out. Crowdrise’s page for a fundraiser for Alliance for Global Justice (AGJ) describes refusefascism.org as a project of AGJ. Money moves about.
The phenomena of hive-building can be traced back to the early labor organizing of the late 18th century into the more sophisticated 19th/20th century efforts of Eugene Debs, Big Bill Haywood, Samuel Gompers, John L. Lewis, and Marry Harris Jones (“Mother Jones”).
From “Solidarity”, publication of the IWW, 1917
Modern iterations of the activity include “Occupy….(fill in the blank)”, “the Resistance” (to Trump), “Fight Fascism”, and “Indivisible”.
“Occupy Wall Street” protest, Zuccotti Park, 2011“The Resistance”, a collection of groups for defeating Trump, 2017“Fight Fascism” in one of its forms, San Diego protest, 2017‘Indivisible’ movement grips St. Johns County, Fla., January 2017.
It’s simply hive activity, without splitting academic hairs over the fine distinctions between “community organizing”, mere “activism”, or “mobilizing”. It’s also not a conspiracy in the same vein as the Comintern (Communist International), which had a Moscow address. The organization’s constituent national communist parties were appendages of the Soviet Politburo.
No central commissariat exists for the hive. It is a web of scattered individuals and groups, united by compatible beliefs, a tendency to activism, most lacking permanence, and interconnected by social media and loose funding streams. They spring up as events warrant and vary to local circumstances. They can appear spasmodic, and frequently are.
The tie that binds is a remarkably consistent set of beliefs. You know, the litany of “isms” and “phobias” are prominent: racism, sexism, Islamaphobia, homophobia, etc., etc., etc. The list is notably fungible according to the fads-of-thought of the moment. For them, America is reduced to a collection of group victims. Their cure is Fabianism-with-an-edge.
Fabianism is a form of socialism without the violent overthrow of Marx and Lenin. It’s socialism with a human face – i.e., democracy. This form has been called “social democracy”. It favors human rights broadly defined and greater government control of the “commanding heights” of society, to borrow from Lenin. In Britain, it led to the formation of the Labour Party. In Europe, many national social democratic parties sprang up. In today’s America, it has found a home in the Democratic Party.
Early logo of Britain’s Fabian Society as a turtle. It displays the group’s desire for gradualism in bringing about a socialist country.Another common emblem of the Fabian Society as a wolf in sheep’s clothing, as seen in a stained glass window. It would later be dropped for its negative connotation.
The modern Democratic Party has given the movement an institutional form. However, the plodding nature of a national political party is ill-suited to a base agitated by immediate events. The desire for respectability of a national party restrains the emotional explosion which has led some partisans to break away seeking the “Bern”, or “StopFascism”, or “Black Lives Matter”, or “Occupy” (the universe?), or …….. That’s the “edge” part of Fabianism-with-an-edge. Yet, party activists are still littered throughout the constellation of groups.
MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow holding up a copy of Indivisible’s Practical Guide to organizing against Trump
Taking a closer look into one these groups, Indivisible, will bring to light the interconnected nature of the hive. From their “Practical Guide for Resisting the Trump Agenda”, the authors parrot the hive’s party line on the threat posed by Trump:
“…[Trump] will attempt to use his congressional majority to reshape America in his own racist, authoritarian, and corrupt image.”
Three of the four individuals listed as authors of the “Guide” – Ezra Levin, Adam Padilla, and Jeremy Haile – were ex-staffers of Democrat representatives. Levin and Haile were staffers for Lloyd Doggett (D-Tx). Padilla was a legislative assistant for Luis Gutierrez (D-IL). The fourth, Leah Greenberg, wife of Ezra Levin, is listed as the young policy director for the Tom Perriello gubernatorial campaign along with involvement in various “social justice” private and non-profit organizations according to her LinkedIn page.
Perriello is another interesting specimen. He served as representative in Virginia’s 5th congressional district from 2009-11, but was defeated in 2010 by Republican Robert Hurt. He is mentioned as the founder of Avaaz, ” a U.S. based civic organization launched in January 2007 that promotes global activism on issues such as climate change, human rights, animal rights, corruption, poverty, and conflict.” It’s a mission statement for the “social justice warrior” (SJW).
The “Guide” asserts that they are emulating the Tea Party circa 2009. But the Tea Party wasn’t organized by Hill staffers, or anyone representing the “establishment”. More believably, the kinship of the “the resistance” points to the “Occupy” factions of 2011 and the more recent campus SJW outbursts, not the Tea Party.
Below is an “Occupy Wall Street” demonstration from October 2011. It’s 6:46 in length.
Compare the above to the disruption of Charles Murray’s attempt to speak to students at Middlebury College.
When the above attempt at a lecture failed, Murray and Prof. Allison Stanger, professor of International Politics and Economics, went to a room to live stream their conversation. The disruptions continued in the auditorium, and when Murray and Prof. Stanger attempted to exit to her car, they were assaulted. Stanger required hospitalization.
Now, let’s take a look at a congressional townhall, the kind of thing that Greenberg, et al, are encouraging.
Or this one.
Or the harassment of Tom McClintock after leaving his townhall.
The townhall crowds appear to be older versions of the campus SJW’s . Five decades ago many of them might have been at home on Haight-Ashbury – at least spiritually.
The outbursts, cries, and incriminations aren’t spontaneous in the literal meaning of the word. I suspect that the swarms are people – local and transported – already active in the party, agitated by the election’s results, neurally connected by social media, loosely directed by certain websites, and reflective of blue-America, even if they might live in red-America. Rather than an inter-cultural phenomena spanning the cultural divide, quite the opposite, they emulate the deep cultural division in the country. The hive’s views have no home in red-America.
What does this portend for the country? Blue-America is still geographically stuck in blue-America. Their behavior has just become more rabid. The beliefs of identity politics, assaults on traditional Christianity, the blind faith in the omni-competent state, and hyper-environmentalism has no more credence today in “fly-over” country than it did before the election.
The danger for Republicans lies in the appearance of a groundswell. Such a thing could have an effect on impressionable “independents” and lukewarm Republicans. The Republicans could experience a dip in passion while independents fall away leaving the field open for the Fabians-with-an-edge in the Democratic Party.
If Republicans don’t counter-organize, the next couple of election cycles could pave the way for boys-in-dresses in the girls’ lockeroom and on the girls’ field hockey team. Be prepared for a sovietized EPA. The professions of Christian faith in the economy will be criminalized. Just take the California template and press it onto the country.
It’s time for red-America to get organized to challenge the hive. You might call it red-America’s “counter-swarm”.
“Indivisible: A Practical Guide for Resisting the Trump Agenda – Former congressional staffers reveal best practices for making Congress listen.”, https://www.indivisibleguide.com/
“Soros, Steyer, and Democracy Alliance Work to Retake Colorado: Left-wing donor club returns to its birthplace to win back state senate for Dems”, Lachlan Markey, The Washington Free Beacon, 8/5/16, http://freebeacon.com/politics/soros-steyer-and-democracy-alliance-work-to-retake-colorado/
The following is a commentary to “Sessions: ‘I will recuse myself’ from investigations when appropriate”, Washington Examiner, 3/2/17, http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/sessions-i-will-recuse-myself-from-investigations-when-appropriate/article/2616229?fb_action_ids=416334178716129&fb_action_types=og.comments.
Tempest in a teapot: Sessions having 2 short encounters with Russia’s ambassador. If an ambassador doesn’t develop relationships with a country’s policy-makers, what’s the guy to do? As senator and senior member of the Armed Services Committee, is Sessions to run at the mere sight of an approaching Russian diplomat? Nonsense, nonsense.
Andrew Puzder
Tempest in a teapot: Andy Puzder “unacceptable” for Labor Secretary for a messy divorce, disproven accusations of spousal abuse, and hiring an “undocumented” person. Such allegations would automatically exclude anyone with the income to hire domestic help, and that means the Democrat senators pompously grilling Puzder. More nonsense.
Jerry Brown (l) and Meg Whitman (r) shake hands before 2010 debateIllegal immigrant maid and attorney Gloria Allred at press conference, Sept. 29, 2010
Tempest in a teapot: Meg Whitman, California Republican gubernatorial candidate, hiring an “undocumented” person for domestic help. This is smaller than a teapot. Try a thimble. More nonsense.
Kimba Wood, Pres. Clinton’s second nominee for Attorney General
Tempest in a teapot: Kimba Wood, Clinton’s Attorney General nominee, employing an “undocumented” nanny. Proof that dippiness is a bi-partisan sport. More thimble-scale nonsense on parade.
Zoe Baird, Pres. Clinton’s first nominee for Attorney General
Tempest in a teapot: Zoe Baird, Clinton’s first nominee for Attorney General, drug over the coals for similarly employing an “undocumented” nanny. Apparently there was a dragnet for “undocumented” nannies at the time. More partisan dippiness.
Were there other episodes in theatrical grandstanding, and are we likely to experience more? Probably. Our press and partisan inquisitors are more interested in chasing down the employment records of nannies, maids, and gardeners, while culling divorce records and chasing down chance encounters during years of service in the public eye, than a mature examination of a person for their policy preferences. Ideological biases will have a greater impact on whether a citizen can even operate a wedding cake business.
Macbeth murders King Duncan and takes the Scottish throne.
To borrow from Macbeth: “It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
The days when Bill Nye’s Ministry of Truth was led by Atty. Gen. Loretta Lynch.
I was fascinated when I realized that 3 seemingly disparate experiences – Tucker Carlson’s interview with Bill Nye, reading CS Lewis’s That Hideous Strength, and Martin Scorsese’s Silence – pointed to a common theme. Life requires us to juggle many things simultaneously. Usually, there’s no common thread. In this case, there is. The contemporary scene has a habit of producing popularizing zealots who then seek to amputate from public discussion any opposing views. Case in point: Bill Nye, The Science Guy.
Occasionally, I channel surf over to Fox News (like I do the other cable news channels). I happened to catch Tucker Carlson in an exchange with Bill Nye over Nye’s desire to prosecute climate change “deniers”.
Tucker Carlson (l) interviews Bill Nye (r).
Here’s Bill Nye calmly explaining the criminalization of alternative opinions in an earlier discussion.
Simultaneously, I’ve been reading C.S. Lewis’s That Hideous Strength with one of its early plot threads being a plot among “progressive” faculty to eliminate dissent.
C.S. Lewis
This, in turn, brought to mind Thomas Hibbs’s review of Martin Scorsese’s Silence. The film centers on the attempt of Japan’s powerful in the 17th century to exterminate Christianity from the land.
Liam Neeson in “Silence”.
All three illustrate what Jean Francois Revel identified as the “totalitarian temptation”. Zealots can feel so strong in their “truth” that they seek to extinguish disagreement. It matters not if the temptation is exhibited by the 17th-century Japanese shogunate, or a conspiring faculty member at Lewis’s fictional Bracton College, or an ex- Boeing engineer and comedy script writer masquerading as an expert on all things scientific (Nye).
Jean-Francois Revel, 1924-2006
The quality of Tucker Carlson’s interaction with Nye wasn’t the best. Yet, Nye’s inner totalitarian crept forth. He justified prosecution of dissenters because the evidence for “climate change” is asserted to be indisputable. Further, “deniers” are a threat to his quality of life. Thus, there you have it: he goes from evidence of climate change to its apocalyptic dimensions to filling up the jails with anyone with the temerity to question Al Gore. His logic – or lack thereof – is breathtaking in its sweep.
The whole thing reminds me of the 19th century’s shallow understanding of genetic inheritance and subsequent calls for euthanasia and the selective breeding of humans. The zealots didn’t stop at voluntary measures. They wanted to recruit the state into their fixation. It all didn’t work out so well for Carry Buck. The question of her forced sterilization reached all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1927. In a grotesque display of legal pretzel-logic unhinged from morality, writing for the majority of the Court, Oliver Wendell
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Holmes declared Carry Buck to be persona non grata and subject to forced sterilization by the state of Virginia. He announced, “Three generations of imbeciles are enough”. Maybe Holmes proved that a smidgen of science can indeed be dangerous.
Nye isn’t a scientist, as in a scholarly researcher of theoretical science. He’s got just enough exposure to the discipline to be dangerous, like Holmes. He’s most threatening as he mimics power-hungry adademics. They are an element all-too-familiar to C.S. Lewis as he walked the corridors of Oxford and Cambridge for almost 40 years. In That Hideous Strength, Lewis has a character with Nye’s predilections in the person of Lord Feverstone. Feverstone explains to his younger protege, Mark,
“Man has got to take charge of man. That means, remember, that some men have got to take charge of the rest – which is another reason for cashing in on it as soon as one can. You and I want to be the people who do the taking charge, not the ones who are taken charge of.”
Nye seems to be “cashing in” as his notoriety climbs. He also exemplifies the Feverstone complex of “man taking charge of man”. For Nye, and for the rest of us, that means a secular Inquisition of state attorney generals, civil forfeiture, and the placement of skeptics on the list for elimination with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi of ISIS fame.
Leader of ISIS, Abu al-Baghdadi
As for Scorsese’s Silence, how much does Nye parallel the 17th century Shogunate in its persecution of Christians? Only a matter of degree. Nye, it appears, would not sanction the water-boarding of “deniers”, but might be assuaged by confiscation of their personal wealth. But such is only speculation on my part.
Doubt, caution, humility, and modesty are not words to describe Nye. I suggest arrogant, self-anointed, and totalitarian is closer to the truth. He’s an example of the new man of public affairs, particularly of the Left. He’s got the minimal amount of scientific knowledge to take on the airs of a scientist, but not enough to avoid being reckless and imprudent.
RogerG
Sources:
“Religious Speech and Action Silenced”, Thomas Hibbs,
Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/445194/silence-movie-martin-scorsese-shusaku-endo-novel-christianity-japan-statism-review
The Totalitarian Temptation, Jean Francois Revel, 1978, https://www.amazon.com/Totalitarian-Temptation-Jean-Francois-Revel/dp/0140048413
“Attorney General Lynch Looks Into Prosecuting ‘Climate Change Deniers”, Hans von Spakovsky, The Daily Signal (a publication of the Heritage Foundation), 3/10/16, http://dailysignal.com/2016/03/10/attorney-general-lynch-looking-into-prosecuting-climate-change-deniers/
“Bill Nye, the science guy, is open to criminal charges and jail time for climate change dissenters”, Washington Times, 4/14/2016, http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/apr/14/bill-nye-open-criminal-charges-jail-time-climate-c/
“Buck V. Bell”, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buck_v._Bell
That Hideous Strength, C.S. Lewis, 2003 ed., p. 40.
