Academic Failure and the Loss of Discourse

A post from seven years ago floated up in my FB memories this morning. It was a rant from a former student about the loss of discourse and discussion in the classroom. At the time, this student was in a grad class and had raised a differing point of view only to be greeted with gasps of astonishment. I had copied the rant and posted it as Reason #47 for why I teach. In reality, rants like this, demonstrating the critical thinking skills of my students, remain Reason #1 for why I taught. Yes, I’ve left that world, and the inability to have constructive discussions and arguments in the classroom is my primary reason for leaving.

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Is Florida Really Forbidding African-American Studies?

For the last several days I’ve been seeing breathless articles describing the “racist” actions of Ron DeSantis, governor of Florida. DeSantis announced that African-American studies classes will not be taught in public schools. Of course, the left went absolutely ballistic over this announcement. But what, exactly, did DeSantis do? Let’s look at this latest kerfuffle.

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Friday Thoughts: Disagreement vs. Misinformation

I know I’m likely preaching to the choir here, but I wanted to take a few minutes and examine the issue of disagreement vs. misinformation. “Misinformation” is flying about a lot lately and in most cases it is mildly to egregiously misapplied. “Misinformation” is a word that conjures up images of propagandizing evil dictators. People think “Soviet propaganda” or similar when they hear that term. Characterizing statements as “misinformation” conveys to the listener that the statement is not only false, but deliberately misleading and therefore dangerous. Put your hands over your ears immediately before you become contaminated!

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Fear of Money

Earlier today I saw something about Elon Musk and one of the first comments was something to the effect that it was obscene that Musk was worth as much as he is. Combined with the release of the Twitter files and other things, this got me thinking again. It’s not news to anybody who’s been paying attention that a huge number of people who consider themselves “liberal” or on the left, absolutely hate money. And as the saying goes – we hate what we fear. They hate people who make money, people who try to make money, people who want to keep their own money, people who build wealth, people whose parents are wealthy, people who spend more than they do… whatever. If money is involved, they hate it.

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Why No Red Wave? Or A Labor of Love

What happened? We were promised an almost unstoppable red wave in yesterday’s election. What we got was one or two upset races and it was business as usual for the rest. Fetterman – Fetterman! – won in Pennsylvania for God’s sake. The corrupt, criminal-loving, now cognitively impaired candidate won over a TV famous medical doc who actually had some good ideas. In Georgia, it looks like the corrupt, racist slum lord will win over the former football player, who yes, has some gaffe issues, but far less than Biden. In other races (check out Real Clear Politics for more results) what should have been clear Republican wins became nail biters and I don’t think it was all fraud.

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Demonization and Segregation

It’s a thing among hard-core political partisans to demonize and “other” (to use the language of the left… ostracize, unperson) their opponents and anyone who even hesitates to go along with their ideas. The left, with their capture of the major news outlets, is very good at demonizing, othering, ostracizing, unpersoning, and segregating all those with whom they disagree, dislike, and otherwise want/need to silence and do away with.

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Laughing at Arrogance

I have to laugh when people attempt to remind me that they are superior to me now that they “know” what my politics are. The arrogant condescension of “I don’t expect to see conspiracy theories coming from you” followed by a link to FactCheck “debunking” some minor semantic part of the linked article is the preferred method. Because total burn on me doncha know. A post on FB about the Los Angeles DA charging the CEO of Kennoch for storing election worker data on PRC servers brought that response from a former colleague and once friend. (We’re still mostly friends, but s/he strays into attempts at public shaming a bit too often these days.)

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Toddlers In Charge

Watching the Biden Administration announce, retract, modify, announce, let Joe speak, retract… and on and on is like watching a toddler on a sugar high. Think about it. Anybody who’s ever raised or dealt with small children knows that within the limits of their understanding, toddlers don’t necessarily lie. Tell outrageous stories about why or how something happened, yes. Understand that those stories are what adults often consider to be lies, no.

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Defining Terms

With the election of Giorgia Meloni as Italy’s new prime minister, the terms “fascist” and “fascism” are being tossed around even more than they were when Trump was president. In almost every case these terms are wrongly defined. Reading all the ignorant garbage “reporting” about Meloni and her “far right-wing” party with its “fascist” ideology, has brought out the political science professor in me. For those who don’t know… yes, I have a Ph.D. in political science. I spent over twenty years teaching college students about not only the American political system, but about political systems throughout the world and over the last two hundred years or so. I worked hard to be this pedantic and sarcastic.

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