April, 2013 archive
Get an Education or Learn a Trade? 4
In the Roanoke Times, Tom Arcaro has a thoughtful piece on the purpose of education.
Buried in it is a statement that helps explain why technocrats and wingnuts seem so determined to rip the charter from public education and give it over to profiteers for-profit charter schools (emphasis added).
Are these two ends of higher education — to serve democracy or serve the economic system — mutually exclusive? No, not literally, but I have never in my three decades teaching in higher education had a parent ask how majoring in sociology will make his daughter a better global citizen.
Institutions of education “create the public” more than just teach it.
. . . and an informed polity is inimical to conservative dogma.
Read the rest.
Scamateur Athletics, Reprise 0
Bob Molinaro, sports writer extraordinaire at my local rag, introduces his column on the prospects of a local kid who has been demoted to third-string quarterback at Virginia’s always-a-bridesmaid-never-a-bride football factory with this bit:
Following the Blue-Orange spring game, Sims said that sometimes he has to shake free from the feeling that football is “more of a job than anything,” though it really is for a college player.
“You’re so focused on studying film and doing everything on the practice field so perfectly,” he said, “you forget that this should be fun.”
He uses the quotation to lead into a nicely-done human interest story about the player.
He could just as easily have led into a story on the overall state of college sports and entertainment factories.
For a few of the fans, it’s obsession. For others, it’s a source of income (a bracket bucket shop). For most, it’s still a game.
For the college sports and entertainment cartel and its members, though, it’s all business.
Facebook Frolics 4
At the Guardian, Steven Poole explains how the Faceborg’s “Home” is a glass house.
Video via Delaware Liberal.
One Thing on the Mind 0
Have you noticed that Republicans and Bible-thumpers are preoccupied with sex?
Establishmentarians Disre-established . . . for Now 0
Excerpt:
The sponsors of this legislation are not just some random bowl of mixed nuts. . . .
Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Nuts, yes. Just not random.
Via Raw Story.
Up on the Roof . . . . 0
Some Cubs fans aren’t happy.
They fear the loss of their cottage industry cottages.
Rattling a legal saber they’ve unsheathed before, the rooftop owners reiterated their belief that an agreement allowing signs that block their bird’s-eye views would violate not only their contract with the Cubs but also the city’s landmark rules for the 99-year-old stadium.
As the Chicago Cubs and Mayor Rahm Emanuel near a deal on rehabbing Wrigley Field, the owners of the lucrative rooftop clubs overlooking the venerable ballpark yesterday displayed fear of the results.As many times as I’ve been to Chicago, I never got to Wrigley, though I did once take in a game at the old Comiskey Park, the one with the picnic tables behind screens in the outfield.
Must be fun cleaning those when it snows.
Droning On 0
No exit.
I predict an influx of jellyfish at nude beaches.
Pick-Up Artist 0
It looks as if the house finch whose picture I posted a while ago has found a girlfriend.
Admittedly, it’s not a great shot–the morning sun was glaring on the glass, but I knew that, if I tried to open the door, it would startle them away.
But I think it’s a neat moment.
Airing Dirty Electrons 0
The new paper trail, described by William D. Cohen at Bloomberg:
Even though the U.S. public has had exactly zero satisfaction when it comes to holding Wall Street accountable for the financial crisis that started in 2007, some degree of solace can be found in the stream of embarrassing e-mails and documents that those with subpoena power have kindly made available to the rest of us in recent years.
Follow the bread crumbs through the forest with Mr. Cohen.
Read the rest.
Our Failed Schools 0
I give you the evidence.
Facebook Frolics 0
The whole she-bang is run by teenaged boys (and immature ones, at that).
Dustbiters 0
Whenever I start to think I should retire this title, another master of the universe bites the dust:
is no more.
Have you noticed that the flashier the name, the more ephemeral the bank?
Afterthought:
We have our own bank drama going on in these parts, where it belongs: in criminal court.
Facebook Frolics 0
Pandora wonders whether the Faceborg is on the way to the Myspace space.
