Various Thoughts

1. Whatever happened to the disappearing ozone layer? After the liberal doomsday idiots gave up on the coming ice age (back in the 70s) which would devastate life as we know it and before today's hyperventilation about global warming, there was the great concern with a disappearing ozone layer. Maybe the chicken-little fanatics can't focus on more than one catastrophe at a time.

2. There is probably no greater scandal in America than the inner-city schools in America. When Oprah Winfrey decided she wants to spend her own money to improve education in South Africa rather than give it to the losers (the education establishment) who got us into this sad state of affairs, there is an outpouring of criticism about how misguided she is and how they should be listened to prior to her spending decisions. I think much of the opposition to Oprah's efforts is based on her highly selective admission process which made it clear that entrants to her school would be highly qualified, highly motivated and most applicants would be denied admission. Liberals do not like this at all.

3. Charles Murray, in the 3rd of his essays in the Wall Street Journal, makes another valid series of points which also reflect on the failures of our education system in the U.S. Even though the vast majority of our success and advancement in this country is accomplished by the top 10% of our population in terms of I.Q., we have not devised a way to take advantage of this in our schools. Our future depends on how we educate the next generation of people who are gifted with a high level of intelligence. Instead, we construct our educational endeavors in such a way as to deny that there is such a thing as intellectual giftedness and subsequent responsibility to take advantage of that gift. Instead, we ignore the fact that there is such a thing as intellectual gifts since this implies there is an inequality of ability which is considered elitist. The result of this failure is a sense of superiority which develops in the gifted with respect to others in their classes. Murray argues that some humility should be brought to this group by placing them in situations where they can't excel and they have to simply face the fact that they can't do something----like I had to in advanced mathematics. These students need classes where they are neither bored nor coddled, but instead have their feet held to the fire.

4. A corollary to the education deficiency noted above is found in the absolute fury with which teachers and their unions fight to avoid any recognition that some teachers are simply better and more effective than others....especially with salary. At the same time, they don't want parents to have any freedom to take tax-payer money and their children to a school which might succeed where others have repeatedly failed. Teachers know that their past failures will be apparent to even the most casual observer if competition is permitted.

5. An aversion to competition is also evident in the black culture. It is well known that black students who are inclined to study, do their homework and try to succeed in the classroom are subjected to immense pressure from black classmates who accuse them of "acting white". These same students have no such aversion to competition with whites in non-academic endeavors, e.g. athletics.

5. The dems have a brilliant strategy with respect to the so-called war on terror. The left is currently disparaging all efforts Bush has invoked to prevent another attack. Their mantra is that all of these efforts are over-the-top, unnecessary, an infringement on our rights, blah, blah, blah. They want no talk about another terrorist attack. What if there is an attack? Well, regardless of when it occurs, it will be blamed on some Bush deficiency. This will be especially true if there is a dem President at the time.

6. The dems also have a great strategy with respect to the fiasco in Iraq. Whatever Bush wants to do will not work and we will do whatever we can short of actually offering an alternative or jeopardizing our political future to see that it doesn't succeed.