Attorney generals trying to shut down usenet?

[James Arthur]

I'm a product of our piss-poor public school system

I am too, but it was NOT piss poor, it was superb.

and teach in it,

My sympathies. It's my impression, though, that pockets of
excellence persist, far away from the population centers,
in places where Vogons have yet to tread.

Best regards,
James Arthur

 

[James Arthur]

[...]
Before a kid is graduated from 6th grade,
he should be required to understand the steps in the process.http://www.google.com/search?q=Scientific.Method+State.the.Problem+Fo...
Kids are natural scientists.
It's when their curiosity is squashed by unquestionable dogma
that their minds switch off and we're left with
another generation of I-don't-WANT-to know-the-truth types.
Yes but remember that republicans run for and get elected to school
boards too. The best we can hope for is to prevent the republicans
from turning the schools into mindless drone factories.

Democrats have already done exactly that ! That's one of my
greatest laments.

I would say that it is one of your delusions. It is always the
republicans that want to remove courses other than reading and writing
and put in tests that are multiple choice.

Tests are not the problem--that's an excuse. The problem is
multi-faceted, much stemming from bogus new-age theories
about education.

The "new math," for example. And "the new reading" where
young kids aren't taught how to sound out or spell words,
but to recognize whole words by outline and shape. I know
a college kid today who struggles mightily as a result...

Huge diversion of classroom time to "diversity," use of
schools as social service counseling / labor enforcement /
centers; letting them get into the restaurant business
(serving dreadful, harmful fare)...advertisements on campus (!),
forced showing of commercial videos in exchange for commercial
sponsorship,...a thousand pet projects diverting the schools'
time to every purpose _except_ educating; teaching tiny
kids computer use--as if this were somehow indispensable
to 7-year olds--rather than reading...

All these predate the testing, which merely exposes the schools'
failings, which is in turn why the teachers' unions oppose it.

In fact they oppose anything that might subject them to review,
examination, or require performance.

These are just a few of the hare-brained, non-science adjustments
made to the time-honored methods that work by people who don't
know what they're doing, and who continue to make more and more
such changes without ever checking their results.

IOW, it's been completely overrun, mismanaged, and screwed up
at every level. The above is just a partial list.

The places where the republicans have been in charge are uniformly
worse so it isn't the democrats that are doing it.


I seriously doubt that the teachers union have ever pushed the
standardized testing etc that is the core of the problem.

Testing people is not a problem. We have the technology.

The teachers' unions oppose change, assessment, accountability,
anything that might help. Look to reform attempts all over the
country--check out some of the PBS stories, e.g. in Washington
D.C., New York, L.A., San Diego--describing how recues were
attempted of failing schools, and how bitterly these were
opposed.


That's what I mean.

Best regards,
James Arthur

 

[James Arthur]

Again, you are conflating *beliefs* and *science*.
"Obligations" means just what it says.
There's no need to interpolate it or parse it.
Every society has them.
A society has a baseline. It's called "The Law".
In the typical case, that is derived via a *what works* analysis.

That's circular, and makes no sense.

It's too bad some of these yuppies and know-nothings
haven't found themselves in an infected 3rd World village
where a modern health infrastructure ISN'T the norm
(to include simple things like sewers and clean water),
so they can experience what CAN happen.

Pathologists have worked for over 100 years
to determine *what works*.
"Herd immunity* depends on EVERYBODY getting vaccinated;
that way, one or two deviations from outside is tolerated.
If everybody starts to think of himself as *special*,
the science becomes useless and **public** health fails.

...and the problem with the anti-vaccine movement
is that is is based on junk science.
The wacko who is promoting it has been thoroughly discredited.
http://www.google.com/search?q=cach...rippled-*-*-*-*-*+*-British-*+*-money&strip=1

You keep defending junk science and ANTI-science.
It's as though you don't know what Science *is*.
It's clear that the loonie frindge we are talking about doesn't.

This digression started with you blaming boogeymen
for everything wrong in the world.

Specifically when you opined that a conspiracy of
conservative prudes were to blame for curtailing
USENET service in New York.

I gave evidence you might be wrong.

You extrapolated into other imagined harms done to
us all by this same lunatic, multi-headed fringe.

You then said conservative loonies were behind the
resistance to vaccinations.

Which proves not to be true.

You keep imputing to me certain views, but I've neither
expressed nor defended those views, just peoples' right to
have them, to have their beliefs.

Your constant remedy is to coerce everyone--them, and me--
to your point of view through force of law.

That's scary.

It's the New-Agers and their *belief* systems
who are disassembling the public health paradigm
which has been established over the last century or more.

The danger is in treating ignorance as equal with knowledge;
in treating belief as equal with fact.
I don't understand you defending that.

Tolerating a belief that something is true
when the science clearly says it is nonsense
exceeds the limits of Liberalism.
When that is able to impact the health of EVERYONE,
that becomes a common concern.

A clueless New-Ager, having drunk the tainted Kool-Aid,
is not able to determine what is proper public health policy.

If it was only *himself* he was endangering,
that would be one thing; this is another circumstance.
If you want to endanger the herd, go find a self-destructive herd;
we don't want you.

That stuff is scarier still.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[Jim Yanik]

I am too, but it was NOT piss poor, it was superb.

"was"....I think it may have changed a lot since *I* was in school.
At least from what I've been reading.

My sympathies. It's my impression, though, that pockets of
excellence persist, far away from the population centers,
in places where Vogons have yet to tread.

where Political Correctness and socialism haven't yet gotten entrenched.

I had to Wiki the Vogon reference! ;-)

 

[James Arthur]

James Arthur wrote

Societies MUST impose "values" on their members.

Of course. The point being that he cries foul & breach
of liberty where others would propose theirs, yet himself
would impose far worse.

Pot, kettle, etc.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[krw]

On Sun, 15 Jun 2008 21:05:20 -0700 (PDT), MooseFET

[snip]

Maybe you really are and just don't know it. You may even be a Neocon
and not actually be aware of it.

A quick test is to see if you realize that both "Fox News" and Rush
Limbaugh are oxymorons.

I agree with you on Rush, but you clearly don't watch (or listen to)
Fox News.

If you don't see why that is true, you just
might be a Neocon.

I think I could make a nice Foxworthesk list of "You might be a
Neocon" jokes if I worked at it.

Won't you have a problem with no one laughing ?

[snip]

...Jim Thompson

have you ever read any of Rush's -brother's- work?
David Limbaugh,a frequent NRO columnist. Good stuff.

I wasn't aware of him, I'll look him up.

Townhall.com too.

 

[JosephKK]

Joerg wrote:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-9964895-38.html

:"N.Y. attorney general forces ISPs to curb Usenet access"
:
:Cuomo announced[...]that Verizon Communications,
:Time Warner Cable, and Sprint would
:"shut down major sources of online child pornography."
:[. . .]
:Time Warner Cable said it will cease to offer customers access
:to any Usenet newsgroups,
:a decision that will affect customers nationwide.
:
It's not clear if they will just take their own NNTP servers offline
or will if they will block Port 119.

:Sprint is cutting off the alt.* hierarchy, Usenet's largest[...]
:
:A Verizon spokesman said he didn't know details,
:saying "newsgroups that deal with scientific endeavors"
:will stick around but admitted that
:all of the alt.* hierarchy could be toast.
:
Between the OMG-kiddie-porn hand-wringers
and Google Groups (whatever their motives are),
Usenet sure has been taking a beating.

:The Internet service providers should not be blocking
:whole sections of the Internet, all Usenet groups
:said Barry Steinhardt,
:director of the ACLU's technology and liberty program.
:
aka "The Voice of Sanity".

:"That's taking a sledgehammer to an ant."
:
The USA is doomed. Stupidity has taken over.

Leftist weenies :-(

Rightist ass-wipes more likely.

At least we're not queer ;-)

...Jim Thompson

Who was that Senator that was harassing the pages?

 

[MooseFET]

MooseFET wrote:
[...]
Before a kid is graduated from 6th grade,
he should be required to understand the steps in the process.http://www.google.com/search?q=Scientific.Method+State.the.Problem+Fo...
Kids are natural scientists.
It's when their curiosity is squashed by unquestionable dogma
that their minds switch off and we're left with
another generation of I-don't-WANT-to know-the-truth types.
Yes but remember that republicans run for and get elected to school
boards too. The best we can hope for is to prevent the republicans
from turning the schools into mindless drone factories.
Democrats have already done exactly that ! That's one of my
greatest laments.

I would say that it is one of your delusions. It is always the
republicans that want to remove courses other than reading and writing
and put in tests that are multiple choice.

Tests are not the problem--that's an excuse.

I disagree with that. Note that I said "multiple choice". Teaching
to the multiple choice test has removed what little real education was
left.

The problem is
multi-faceted,

I agree with this.

much stemming from bogus new-age theories
about education.

The "new math," for example.

The problem with the "new math" is that the teachers don't understand
math and thus can't really teach it. The "new math" was about
introducing subjects like modulo earlier in the schooling. This is a
good thing. Unfortunately neither the teachers nor most of the
parents understood what it was all about.

And "the new reading" where
young kids aren't taught how to sound out or spell words,
but to recognize whole words by outline and shape.

I agree with you on this but not completely. Many people do read
using th recognizing of whole words. There are some cute things
around on the internet where every word in it is horridly misspelled
but most people can read it without any trouble at all. Some hardly
even notice that anything is wrong with the words. I have trouble
reading at the best of times but was among those who hardly noticed.

I know
a college kid today who struggles mightily as a result...

I grew up with "sounding the words out" etc. Perhaps part of the
reason I struggle is because of that. It is a very slow way to
process a word.

Huge diversion of classroom time to "diversity,"

Do you mean teaching kids that there are others who are different from
them when you say "diversity"?

use of
schools as social service counseling / labor enforcement /
centers; letting them get into the restaurant business
(serving dreadful, harmful fare)

The idea of showing them how a real business works is to my view a
good thing.

...advertisements on campus (!),
forced showing of commercial videos in exchange for commercial
sponsorship,

Those are bad. They are a classic axample where "free market forces"
lead to a bad result.

...a thousand pet projects diverting the schools'
time to every purpose _except_ educating; teaching tiny
kids computer use--as if this were somehow indispensable
to 7-year olds--rather than reading...

Virtually everything we do involves computers today. This means that
yes, the kids need to know about them.

All these predate the testing, which merely exposes the schools'
failings, which is in turn why the teachers' unions oppose it.

In fact they oppose anything that might subject them to review,
examination, or require performance.

These are just a few of the hare-brained, non-science adjustments
made to the time-honored methods that work by people who don't
know what they're doing, and who continue to make more and more
such changes without ever checking their results.

IOW, it's been completely overrun, mismanaged, and screwed up
at every level. The above is just a partial list.




Testing people is not a problem. We have the technology.

The problem is not one of technology. It is a question of what is
taught. Today the children are taught to do multiple choice tests.
They are drilled on the answers to the questions on the test and learn
by rote. All the time spent on this is wasted. They could have been
learning something useful.

 

[Jim Yanik]

in
On Sun, 15 Jun 2008 21:05:20 -0700 (PDT), MooseFET

[snip]

Maybe you really are and just don't know it. You may even be a
Neocon and not actually be aware of it.

A quick test is to see if you realize that both "Fox News" and
Rush Limbaugh are oxymorons.

I agree with you on Rush, but you clearly don't watch (or listen
to) Fox News.

If you don't see why that is true, you just
might be a Neocon.

I think I could make a nice Foxworthesk list of "You might be a
Neocon" jokes if I worked at it.

Won't you have a problem with no one laughing ?

[snip]

...Jim Thompson

have you ever read any of Rush's -brother's- work?
David Limbaugh,a frequent NRO columnist. Good stuff.

I wasn't aware of him, I'll look him up.

Townhall.com too.

yes,I believe he's found more often on Townhall than NRO.
he also writes for the Washington Times.

 

[Jim Yanik]

On Sat, 14 Jun 2008 17:17:17 -0700, Jim Thompson

Joerg wrote:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-9964895-38.html

:"N.Y. attorney general forces ISPs to curb Usenet access"
:
:Cuomo announced[...]that Verizon Communications,
:Time Warner Cable, and Sprint would
:"shut down major sources of online child pornography."
:[. . .]
:Time Warner Cable said it will cease to offer customers access
:to any Usenet newsgroups,
:a decision that will affect customers nationwide.
:
It's not clear if they will just take their own NNTP servers offline
or will if they will block Port 119.

:Sprint is cutting off the alt.* hierarchy, Usenet's largest[...]
:
:A Verizon spokesman said he didn't know details,
:saying "newsgroups that deal with scientific endeavors"
:will stick around but admitted that
:all of the alt.* hierarchy could be toast.
:
Between the OMG-kiddie-porn hand-wringers
and Google Groups (whatever their motives are),
Usenet sure has been taking a beating.

:The Internet service providers should not be blocking
:whole sections of the Internet, all Usenet groups
:said Barry Steinhardt,
:director of the ACLU's technology and liberty program.
:
aka "The Voice of Sanity".

:"That's taking a sledgehammer to an ant."
:
The USA is doomed. Stupidity has taken over.

Leftist weenies :-(


Rightist ass-wipes more likely.

At least we're not queer ;-)

...Jim Thompson

Who was that Senator that was harassing the pages?

IMO,it's not "harassment" until the person speaks up and lets the
"harasser" know that their behavior is not wanted nor acceptable.
If it then continues,then it's "harassment".

 

[James Arthur]

On Jun 16, 6:19 pm, James Arthur wrote:
[...privately or home schooled ...]
And it's not in the public interest to deny them. The
home-schoolers I've known have all been _lightyears_
ahead of their public (or private) school counterparts.
How many have you known?

Obviously a small percentage. What's the high-school graduation
rate in your neck of the woods?

Right here it is about 95%. The worst in the bay area is about 75%.

http://articles.latimes.com/2008/feb/22/local/me-dropout22

"Under existing requirements, Crenshaw High School in Los Angeles would
be allowed to take more than two centuries to bring its graduation rate
up to 82.9%, which is the current state standard, said Sen. Darrell
Steinberg (D-Sacramento)."

[...]

"Crenshaw High had a 56.9% graduation rate in the 2005-06 school year,
the last for which figures were available. L.A. Unified had a rate of
63.9% that year."


Best,
James Arthur

 

[James Arthur]

"government schools" have been taken over by liberal/ssocialists,and
neglect the important stuff for their politically correct
agenda.Troublemakers don't get expelled,and disrupt classes for those who
want to learn.

In my day (not all that long ago) teachers had more options to
deal with students.

I recall in 9th grade woodshop Mr. Anderson, a fine, tolerant,
and decent man, had a collection of paddles for the troublemakers.

"Louie," a troublemaker, was given the choice: "front office, or
three swats?"

Louie took the swats, red-faced. And was noticeably less
troublesome thereafter.

Today, Mr. Anderson would be fired, arrested, and convicted.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[James Arthur]

I disagree with that. Note that I said "multiple choice". Teaching
to the multiple choice test has removed what little real education was
left.

That's a corruption, of and by, and from the teachers.

The idea of testing is to make sure kids have learned, as
gaged by a representative sampling of the kids' knowledge.

"Teaching to the test" is gaming the system, trying to outwit,
to bias the outcome, to subvert its purpose. It's cheating.
The manipulators are to blame, not the tests.

People of integrity--like teachers once were and should
be--don't do that.

I agree with this.


The problem with the "new math" is that the teachers don't understand
math and thus can't really teach it. The "new math" was about
introducing subjects like modulo earlier in the schooling. This is a
good thing. Unfortunately neither the teachers nor most of the
parents understood what it was all about.



I agree with you on this but not completely. Many people do read
using th recognizing of whole words. There are some cute things
around on the internet where every word in it is horridly misspelled
but most people can read it without any trouble at all. Some hardly
even notice that anything is wrong with the words. I have trouble
reading at the best of times but was among those who hardly noticed.

This needs clarification. Traditionally young kids first learn the
alphabet, learn letters' sounds, then parse words letter- by-letter,
then learn pronunciation.

They learn this at an early age, when languages and certain skills
come easily, for whatever brain-developmental reason.

Later, with experience, we recognize whole words.

I grew up with "sounding the words out" etc. Perhaps part of the
reason I struggle is because of that. It is a very slow way to
process a word.

The young gent I know was taught whole-word recognition right off.
Consequently, he couldn't process new words he hadn't seen before.
Even words he knew verbally mystified him in print: strange and new,
undecipherable, like hieroglyphics.

It's taken him years of hard work to learn, later in life, how
to painstakingly decode words by sounding them out. In college.

He covers the letters with his fingers, exposing one at
a time, as if he never developed the fine motor skills
needed to scan them visually.

It doesn't come easily; he still prefers a talking e-dictionary.

You could almost say he's functionally dyslexic, except he
isn't dyslexic. He's a hard-working, smart, great guy. Normal.
Proven, if nothing else, by his current mastery of the method
he wasn't taught.

The genius' teaching fad that so equipped him? That method
is no longer taught. Turns out...it doesn't work. Sigh.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[Richard The Dreaded Libertarian]

Principal, with the name of William Boyd no less... we called him
"Hopalong", confiscated my stash, but returned them to me at the end of
the day... admonishing me with, "Never bring 'em back" ;-)

Was it this "getting away with wrongding by sucking up to the
authoritarians" gambit that prompted you to become a neocon?

Thanks,
Rich

 

[Jim Yanik]

In my day (not all that long ago) teachers had more options to
deal with students.

I recall in 9th grade woodshop Mr. Anderson, a fine, tolerant,
and decent man, had a collection of paddles for the troublemakers.

"Louie," a troublemaker, was given the choice: "front office, or
three swats?"

Louie took the swats, red-faced. And was noticeably less
troublesome thereafter.

Today, Mr. Anderson would be fired, arrested, and convicted.

Cheers,
James Arthur

my parents told me that if any physical punishment was to be dealt,THEY
would do it,and that no teacher had any right to.
I STILL agree with that.

If they are Trouble,and the parents don't deal with it effectively,then
expel the kid.

Warning,suspension,expulsion. 3 strikes and you're OUT.

 

[MooseFET]

That's a corruption, of and by, and from the teachers.

It is also what the parents and the kids have said. As soon as the
testing came in, everything that wasn't going to be on the multiple
choice test went away.

The idea of testing is to make sure kids have learned, as
gaged by a representative sampling of the kids' knowledge.

Multiple choice testing only tests those things that can be done with
multiple choice. It favors rote learning over understanding the
method of the overall ideas.

"Teaching to the test" is gaming the system, trying to outwit,
to bias the outcome, to subvert its purpose. It's cheating.
The manipulators are to blame, not the tests.

You set up a system where peoples jobs and pay depend on the results
on the test and then you expect them not to respond to the market
forces you just created. The good teachers who don't game the system
get a lower rating and leave the classroom for other jobs. Those who
are best at gaming it stay and get promoted.

People of integrity--like teachers once were and should
be--don't do that.

Teaching a low paying job that gets nearly no respect. We are getting
the teacher we deserve.

This needs clarification. Traditionally young kids first learn the
alphabet, learn letters' sounds, then parse words letter- by-letter,
then learn pronunciation.

They learn this at an early age, when languages and certain skills
come easily, for whatever brain-developmental reason.

Unfortunately for me, it didn't/doesn't work that what way for my
brain. I learned to recognize whole words but only later could do it
letter by letter. I think it was when I started always carrying a
wallet in my right pocket that I was finally able to put the letters
in the right order most of the time. Before that there was a problem
with spacial symmetry. It is still true that if I look at what I've
typed it always looks misspelled. Google groups underlines the words
that are really misspelled so I can go look them up. So far I've
looked up about 5 words while typing this.

Later, with experience, we recognize whole words.



The young gent I know was taught whole-word recognition right off.
Consequently, he couldn't process new words he hadn't seen before.
Even words he knew verbally mystified him in print: strange and new,
undecipherable, like hieroglyphics.

It's taken him years of hard work to learn, later in life, how
to painstakingly decode words by sounding them out. In college.

He covers the letters with his fingers, exposing one at
a time, as if he never developed the fine motor skills
needed to scan them visually.

I think he has a more serious problem than the education. It is way
too late but he sounds like someone with a perceptual disability.

It doesn't come easily; he still prefers a talking e-dictionary.

You could almost say he's functionally dyslexic, except he
isn't dyslexic. He's a hard-working, smart, great guy.

Dyslexic people are usually hard-working, smart etc. Dyslexic people
have a problem with where the letters are. The reason your friend has
to uncover the letters one by one is because he is compensating for a
problem. His brain does not assign locations to the objects in his
vision. He knows which letters are there but doesn't know the order.
The finger is a mechanical way of forcing the issue on the order.

 

[MooseFET]

MooseFET wrote:
On Jun 16, 6:19 pm, James Arthur wrote:
[...privately or home schooled ...]
And it's not in the public interest to deny them. The
home-schoolers I've known have all been _lightyears_
ahead of their public (or private) school counterparts.
How many have you known?
Obviously a small percentage. What's the high-school graduation
rate in your neck of the woods?

Right here it is about 95%. The worst in the bay area is about 75%.

http://articles.latimes.com/2008/feb/22/local/me-dropout22

"Under existing requirements, Crenshaw High School in Los Angeles would
be allowed to take more than two centuries to bring its graduation rate
up to 82.9%, which is the current state standard, said Sen. Darrell
Steinberg (D-Sacramento)."

[...]

"Crenshaw High had a 56.9% graduation rate in the 2005-06 school year,
the last for which figures were available. L.A. Unified had a rate of
63.9% that year."

Wasn't Riordan on the school board before he got elected mayor? You
would think that he would take some action to improve the schools.
All I've ever heard about was some sort of dust up where he was taking
money out of the school budget.

I live in the northern California and we seldom hear anything about
the south unless they are trying to steal our water or something evil
like that.

 

[James Arthur]

James Arthur wrote

my parents told me that if any physical punishment was to be dealt,THEY
would do it,and that no teacher had any right to.
I STILL agree with that.

If they are Trouble,and the parents don't deal with it effectively,then
expel the kid.

Warning,suspension,expulsion. 3 strikes and you're OUT.

Depends on the situation.

Punishment delayed and severe is way less effective than
one that's milder, but swift and sure. Any delay between
behavior and conditioning drastically reduces the
conditioning's effect.

Louie had a rep and a rap sheet. He did not want to go
to the office, again. He got a chance to straighten up
and fly right and save himself. Which he did.

I think it was a great way to get maximum effect with
minimum force, for Louie, before things got
irretrievably out of hand.

Calmed the other kids a bit too !

When I was much younger, the teacher might threaten your
knuckles with a ruler. That got our attention--she never
had to use it.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[krw]

When I was a kid, school punishment meant duplication at home :-(
Eyup!

Except for those situations where I finished fist fights I didn't
start ;-)

The only time my parents got involved (other than to clean up blood)
was when it was one of the fathers coming after me, trying to run me
down with his car (cars don't outmaneuver bicycles). Dad wasn't a
happy camper that day. I don't believe I ever saw him that pissed.

 

[JosephKK]

Jim Thompson wrote:

I will celebrate my 50th high school reunion this summer. I believe
the educational system was far better back then. Kids around here now
in AZ can't do fractions nor make change :-(

...Jim Thompson
Besides the scoop from a family-member who IS a public school
teacher, I've had many recent dealings myself with the public
high schools.

I cannot begin to adequately convey my contempt, or disappointment
in what was once a fine system and a noble calling. They now
exist simply to perpetuate themselves, political-correctness,
and idiocracy.

There remain some brilliant, shining stars amongst them, but they
fight such hopeless odds, such a heavy burden of bureaucratic
self-important no-nothings...[1]

[1] bureaucrat-to-teacher ratio = 1:1, I kid you not.

And worse, nobody is doing anything to change that. They only whine for
ever higher taxes which will do nothing to improve our educational system.

You might appreciate my pain... I have 8 grandchildren ;-)

Fortunately they're all sharp as tacks (except for one who is
autistic, and he's beginning to spell); and can beat the system at its
own game.

Fortunately in the US people have the right to home-school. Which is
what a lot of people in our church do.

I would suspect that many college graduates could successfully home
school, but not all of them.

Many who choose to do so, are rejecting typical public education
environments as corrupting. That is their choice, and they must bear
the consequences of that choice. And that includes corrupt
"standards" testing.