As we approach financial armageddon, with the imminent breaching of the federal debt limit, we would like to say two things.
One: President Obama needs to take control of this situation. Many have suggested that Obama invoke the 14th Amendment, which has a clause stating that "The validity of the public debt of the United States . . .shall not be questioned." Others have suggested Obama could simply declare a sort of financial emergency to unilaterally raise the debt ceiling--akin to Abraham Lincoln suspending habeas corpus during the Civil War. Either approach may run afoul of constitutional law, something of which President Obama, a constitutional scholar is well aware. Nevertheless, in times of crisis, leaders lead. Obama could (and probably should) seize the initiative and then dare Republicans in Congress to defy him. He might lose in the courts, but at least for the meantime, a crisis could be averted.
Still, if we hit the debt ceiling, and no solution is found, then the Treasury Department will have to decide which bills get paid. We have a simple suggestion: Those federal payments earmarked for people and projects in the districts of those Republicans (and any Democrats) opposed to rasing the debt limit should simply not be made. We're sure their constituents will applaud their financial rectitude and ideological purity, while they wait for their social security checks that never show up.
Once again, you're welcome, America.
Saturday, July 30, 2011
Friday, July 29, 2011
A Modest Proposal to Speed Up the Arrival of Superman
In the spring of 1992, the not-yet-Solipsist reached a decision: He was going to start teaching. This decision was not some response to a noble calling; indeed, it was something of an admission of defeat. At the time, we were hustling daily from one end of Manhattan to another, shuttling among three different part-time jobs, all to scrape together enough money to pay half the rent on a one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn. We were also taking night classes towards our masters, which we would finish the following fall. The plan had always been to complete the masters degree before beginning our teaching career, but we were, frankly, tired of the daily scramble and wanted the security and relative simplicity of a single full-time job. So one lovely morning, we made our way to the Board of Education's hiring hall.
Theoretically, we were more than ready. In New York, at the time, all one needed to begin teaching was a bachelor's degree. Other requirements had to be satisfied within a short timeframe, but we had actually completed most of them: We had taken all required education classes; we had passed our licensing exams in both general pedagogy and subject area; we had displayed a pulse. The only thing lacking was the masters degree, but, as mentioned, we would complete that within a few months. The Board of Ed was all too happy to grab us up and assign us to a junior high school on East New York.
As it happened, we received another job offer and avoided that particular teaching assignment. All for the best, really, because here's the thing: While we were, on paper, more-than-qualified to stand in front of a classroom of hormone-crazed seventh-graders and explain the finer points of English grammar and the symbolism of Steinbeck's The Pearl, had we actually tried it, we have no doubt the results would have been disastrous. We were not ready to teach: How could we be? The only experience we had was tutoring college students and one semester of student-teaching, under the supervision of an experienced instructor. And the scary thing is, we probably had more experience than some other people who would begin teaching that September.
It occured to us, while watching "Waiting for Superman" and listening to its laments about the horrendous teachers being protected by union intransigence, that one of the major problems with teaching in the United States is its relatively low barriers to entry. Think about teaching in comparison to other white-collar professions: Prospective doctors have to go through college, be accepted to medical school, stay there for four years, then go through an internship (two years?) before finally being allowed to treat patients on their own. Prospective lawyers have to go through a similar undergraduate program, be accepted into law school and pass the bar exam. Because these people overcome such well-known obstacles, society rewards them with respected titles and at least the possibility of high earnings from a fairly early stage in their careers. To be a teacher, though, you generally just need a bachelors' degree and a satisfactory score on a (fairly simple) licensing exam. Is it any wonder people question our abilities?
We unequivocally support teachers' unions. We would like to propose a grand bargain that would allow unions to continue their mission of protecting teachers while at the same time improving education for all. Teachers should continue to receive tenure to protect them from administrative whims. However, teachers, like other professionals, should receive extensive training and supervision before receiving this tenure. We would advocate that teachers, like doctors, should spend the first two or three years of their careers as interns, mentored closely by experienced teachers. They might then serve a kind of residency, before finally being hired on as "full" teachers--and only at that point, when they have proven themselves to be qualified, would they receive full union rights and protections.
Onerous? Sure. Why would anyone put themselves through this? Same reason people decide to be teachers now: They feel a sense of mission, they like working with kids, they want to make a difference in people's lives, they want a sense of job security. If prospective teachers had to go through greater requirements to secure their positions, they might even be afforded the same prestige that society now affords to doctors and lawyers. Well, doctors anyway. This would also minimize the likelihood of an incompetent teacher being allowed to hang around long enough to reach an "unfirable" position. Everybody wins.
Oh, one more thing: You need to pay teachers like doctors and lawyers, too.
Theoretically, we were more than ready. In New York, at the time, all one needed to begin teaching was a bachelor's degree. Other requirements had to be satisfied within a short timeframe, but we had actually completed most of them: We had taken all required education classes; we had passed our licensing exams in both general pedagogy and subject area; we had displayed a pulse. The only thing lacking was the masters degree, but, as mentioned, we would complete that within a few months. The Board of Ed was all too happy to grab us up and assign us to a junior high school on East New York.
As it happened, we received another job offer and avoided that particular teaching assignment. All for the best, really, because here's the thing: While we were, on paper, more-than-qualified to stand in front of a classroom of hormone-crazed seventh-graders and explain the finer points of English grammar and the symbolism of Steinbeck's The Pearl, had we actually tried it, we have no doubt the results would have been disastrous. We were not ready to teach: How could we be? The only experience we had was tutoring college students and one semester of student-teaching, under the supervision of an experienced instructor. And the scary thing is, we probably had more experience than some other people who would begin teaching that September.
It occured to us, while watching "Waiting for Superman" and listening to its laments about the horrendous teachers being protected by union intransigence, that one of the major problems with teaching in the United States is its relatively low barriers to entry. Think about teaching in comparison to other white-collar professions: Prospective doctors have to go through college, be accepted to medical school, stay there for four years, then go through an internship (two years?) before finally being allowed to treat patients on their own. Prospective lawyers have to go through a similar undergraduate program, be accepted into law school and pass the bar exam. Because these people overcome such well-known obstacles, society rewards them with respected titles and at least the possibility of high earnings from a fairly early stage in their careers. To be a teacher, though, you generally just need a bachelors' degree and a satisfactory score on a (fairly simple) licensing exam. Is it any wonder people question our abilities?
We unequivocally support teachers' unions. We would like to propose a grand bargain that would allow unions to continue their mission of protecting teachers while at the same time improving education for all. Teachers should continue to receive tenure to protect them from administrative whims. However, teachers, like other professionals, should receive extensive training and supervision before receiving this tenure. We would advocate that teachers, like doctors, should spend the first two or three years of their careers as interns, mentored closely by experienced teachers. They might then serve a kind of residency, before finally being hired on as "full" teachers--and only at that point, when they have proven themselves to be qualified, would they receive full union rights and protections.
Onerous? Sure. Why would anyone put themselves through this? Same reason people decide to be teachers now: They feel a sense of mission, they like working with kids, they want to make a difference in people's lives, they want a sense of job security. If prospective teachers had to go through greater requirements to secure their positions, they might even be afforded the same prestige that society now affords to doctors and lawyers. Well, doctors anyway. This would also minimize the likelihood of an incompetent teacher being allowed to hang around long enough to reach an "unfirable" position. Everybody wins.
Oh, one more thing: You need to pay teachers like doctors and lawyers, too.
Thursday, July 28, 2011
More Powerful than Anti-Union Propaganda
Davis Guggenheim's documentary "Waiting for Superman" takes an hour and forty minutes to make two rather obvious and seemingly uncontroversial points. One, all children are capable of learning. Two, the most important variable in determining whether a child receives a sufficient education is teacher quality. A good teacher inspires children to great heights of achievement; a poor teacher condemns children to educational oblivion.
As a teacher, the Solipsist agrees that good teachers are a vital component--perhaps the most vital component--in a child's education. The problem with Guggenheim's film is that it says nothing about what makes a teacher "good." The examples he chooses to present, though, are telling: All the good teachers he shows work for charter schools: schools that receive public financing but are allowed to try different approaches to providing education. These may include special curricula focusing on things like arts or vocations; extended school days (or, indeed, years); and different instructional methodologies. The not-so-subtle point: If you want your child to receive a quality education from a talented teacher, you need to look beyond your regular public school.
But why are standard public schools so deficient? Well, based on Guggenheim's film, the culprit is clear: Teachers' unions. Indeed, one reason charters are so "successful" is that they are not bound by union regulations. You know, those pesky rules that require teachers to be paid a living wage and prevent school authorities from arbitrarily firing people.
Guggenheim's film makes some valid points about unions, most emphatically that union contracts make it difficult for schools to fire incompetent (or even criminal) instructors. He implies, however, that this is the PRIMARY mission of the United Federation of Teachers. And here is where his film goes off the proverbial rails.
We would say it goes without saying--but it apparently doesn't--that the main concern of the teachers' unions (indeed, any unions) is NOT to protect the incompetent or dangerous: It is to protect the interests of its members--ALL its members, the vast majority of whom are skillful professionals (and a minority of whom are just as if not more skilled than those superteachers at the charter schools). We can of course roll our eyes at the protections afforded those who have no business being teachers, and we imagine that the union would be open to reform of its system for allowing such teachers to be dismissed. But to focus on unions as the cause of failing schools is to utterly miss the point.
Let's say the unionbusters had their way and teachers' unions were abolished immediately. What would happen? Sure, the incompetents could be dismissed. And then what? Do these anti-union crusaders imagine there's some vast reserve of eager young instructors just waiting to take the place of the losers? Because, y'know, if there is this vast pool, really no one is stopping them from coming forward right now. In fact, we imagine the immediate effect of mass layoffs would simply be to increase the already heavy workload of the skilled teachers currently employed (thus causing a decrease in their effectiveness, but that's a whole 'nother story).
So just hire better teachers? Well, OK. But how many of the best and the brightest would clamor to join a profession so often villified and whose starting salary is little more than that of a typical cubicle-dwelling office drone? Some will say that we need to increase teachers' salaries. We agree. But that's just a starting point.
(TO BE CONTINUED)
As a teacher, the Solipsist agrees that good teachers are a vital component--perhaps the most vital component--in a child's education. The problem with Guggenheim's film is that it says nothing about what makes a teacher "good." The examples he chooses to present, though, are telling: All the good teachers he shows work for charter schools: schools that receive public financing but are allowed to try different approaches to providing education. These may include special curricula focusing on things like arts or vocations; extended school days (or, indeed, years); and different instructional methodologies. The not-so-subtle point: If you want your child to receive a quality education from a talented teacher, you need to look beyond your regular public school.
But why are standard public schools so deficient? Well, based on Guggenheim's film, the culprit is clear: Teachers' unions. Indeed, one reason charters are so "successful" is that they are not bound by union regulations. You know, those pesky rules that require teachers to be paid a living wage and prevent school authorities from arbitrarily firing people.
Guggenheim's film makes some valid points about unions, most emphatically that union contracts make it difficult for schools to fire incompetent (or even criminal) instructors. He implies, however, that this is the PRIMARY mission of the United Federation of Teachers. And here is where his film goes off the proverbial rails.
We would say it goes without saying--but it apparently doesn't--that the main concern of the teachers' unions (indeed, any unions) is NOT to protect the incompetent or dangerous: It is to protect the interests of its members--ALL its members, the vast majority of whom are skillful professionals (and a minority of whom are just as if not more skilled than those superteachers at the charter schools). We can of course roll our eyes at the protections afforded those who have no business being teachers, and we imagine that the union would be open to reform of its system for allowing such teachers to be dismissed. But to focus on unions as the cause of failing schools is to utterly miss the point.
Let's say the unionbusters had their way and teachers' unions were abolished immediately. What would happen? Sure, the incompetents could be dismissed. And then what? Do these anti-union crusaders imagine there's some vast reserve of eager young instructors just waiting to take the place of the losers? Because, y'know, if there is this vast pool, really no one is stopping them from coming forward right now. In fact, we imagine the immediate effect of mass layoffs would simply be to increase the already heavy workload of the skilled teachers currently employed (thus causing a decrease in their effectiveness, but that's a whole 'nother story).
So just hire better teachers? Well, OK. But how many of the best and the brightest would clamor to join a profession so often villified and whose starting salary is little more than that of a typical cubicle-dwelling office drone? Some will say that we need to increase teachers' salaries. We agree. But that's just a starting point.
(TO BE CONTINUED)
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Well, So Much for THAT
A group of physicists in Hong Kong has conclusively concluded that time travel is impossible. This has something to do with the fact that a photon can not travel faster than the speed of light. Somehow, the fact that nothing (or "nothing") can travel faster than the speed of light (or "warp one") eradicates the very possibility of time travel.
We don't pretend to understand any of this. Frankly, we still can't understand why it is physically impossible for anything to travel faster than the speed of light, 186,000 miles per second (give or take). Why can there NOT be something that travels at, say, 186,001 miles per second (give or take). What if someone strapped a teeny tiny rocket to the back of a photon? Wouldn't THAT make it go faster?
And check out the approval rating of Congress: THAT's certainly streaking downward at faster than lightspeed! (Ba-dum-bump!)
Here at Solipsist HQ, we refuse to throw up our hands and despair at the possibility of time travel. As for the physicists' declaration, just remember: The world was flat until it wasn't. The atom couldn't be split until it was. We'll see you in the future.
Solipsistography
"Great Scott! Time Travel Appears to Be Impossible"
We don't pretend to understand any of this. Frankly, we still can't understand why it is physically impossible for anything to travel faster than the speed of light, 186,000 miles per second (give or take). Why can there NOT be something that travels at, say, 186,001 miles per second (give or take). What if someone strapped a teeny tiny rocket to the back of a photon? Wouldn't THAT make it go faster?
And check out the approval rating of Congress: THAT's certainly streaking downward at faster than lightspeed! (Ba-dum-bump!)
Here at Solipsist HQ, we refuse to throw up our hands and despair at the possibility of time travel. As for the physicists' declaration, just remember: The world was flat until it wasn't. The atom couldn't be split until it was. We'll see you in the future.
Solipsistography
"Great Scott! Time Travel Appears to Be Impossible"
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Where Kids Are Kids, and Sheep Are Nervous! (Oh, Get Your Mind out of the Gutter)
The question arises from time to time when we watch sports or other displays of physical skill. Ski-jumping, for example. We "Oooh" and "Aaah" as much as anyone when we see those feats of aerial grace, but then we wonder how one begins a ski-jumping career. Ski-jumping just seems like the kind of thing one either does very well or not--but since "not" will very likely lead to, um, death, we don't see how people work their way up to Olympic form. Ski-jumpers must be born, not made, and so, too, must bull riders.
Not so! Thanks to a hard-hitting report on the front page of today's Times, we learned how aspiring rodeo riders get their start: Mutton-busting. No, we did not make that up. In more and more places along the rodeo circuit, tiny tots can experience all the thrills and spills of bucking broncos without quite so much risk of broken bones by riding. . . sheep. While some cry child abuse (and others presumably cry sheep abuse), parents claim that mutton-busting builds character and teaches kids resilience.
Personally, as long as the kids enjoy themselves and the sheep don't get hurt, we have no problem with mutton-busting. At least it keeps the kids from riding the cat. And it does obviously provide an entree into the world of professional rodeo riding for those who are so inclined.
Now if only we knew how people began training to be sword-swallowers. We understand NAMBLA has a training program.
Sorry.
Solipsistography
"Little Lambs, Not the Sheep, Get Early Lessons in the Rodeo Life"
Monday, July 25, 2011
Brevity Is the Soul of Wit
While reading about the horrific events in Norway over the weekend, we were taken aback by the following:
We understand that Norwegian contains words like "Dampskipsundervannsstyrkeprøvemaskinerikonstruksjonsvanskeligheter," which means either something relating to the difficulties one might encounter when testing underwater machinery or "penguin." But still, 1,500 pages seems like a hell of a lot of dead trees just to say, "I hate Muslims."
Our point is simply this: Beware of reclusive weirdos who have an obsessive, possibly compulsive, need to write and write and write, whether they truly have anything to say or not.
This is the Solipsist, concluding his 951st post.
Solipsistography
"Killings in Norway Spotlight Anti-Muslim Thought in U.S."
My Little Norway
"The man accused of the killing spree in Norway was deeply influenced by a small group of American bloggers and writers who have warned for years about the threat from Islam, lacing his 1,500-page manifesto with quotations from them, as well as copying multiple passages from the tract of the Unabomber."We had to read that twice: not 1,500 words; 1,500 pages. That's longer than War and Peace. That's longer than Moby-Dick. That's not quite as long as Remembrance of Things Past, but, then again, Proust's book was seven volumes, and rather a lot of it was about cake.
We understand that Norwegian contains words like "Dampskipsundervannsstyrkeprøvemaskinerikonstruksjonsvanskeligheter," which means either something relating to the difficulties one might encounter when testing underwater machinery or "penguin." But still, 1,500 pages seems like a hell of a lot of dead trees just to say, "I hate Muslims."
Our point is simply this: Beware of reclusive weirdos who have an obsessive, possibly compulsive, need to write and write and write, whether they truly have anything to say or not.
This is the Solipsist, concluding his 951st post.
Solipsistography
"Killings in Norway Spotlight Anti-Muslim Thought in U.S."
My Little Norway
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Lace Collars
In Australia and Austria (which we have just learned are NOT the same country), as well as in the United States, numerous Catholic priests, risking excommunication, have openly challenged Vatican doctrine on the non-ordination of women as priests. Their actions arise in response to the dwindling numbers of priests worldwide. Without a rethinking of the attitudes towards female ordination--as well as toward the ordination of married and/or non-celibate men--these rebels with a cause fear a looming demograpinc crisis in the priesthood.
We can understand the hidebound, sexist attitude of this hidebound, sexist organization, but we urge them to reconsider in the face of reality. In fact, in an effort to help the Vatican make the move, we took it upon ourselves to speak to some of the leading figures in the women's ordination movement. They assured us that women can perform all clerical duties just as skillfully as their male counterparts, and, if it helps to seal the deal, they will promise to carry on the proud priestly tradition of molesting children.
That should settle that.
Solipsistography
"In 3 Countries, Challenging the Vatican on Female Priests"
We can understand the hidebound, sexist attitude of this hidebound, sexist organization, but we urge them to reconsider in the face of reality. In fact, in an effort to help the Vatican make the move, we took it upon ourselves to speak to some of the leading figures in the women's ordination movement. They assured us that women can perform all clerical duties just as skillfully as their male counterparts, and, if it helps to seal the deal, they will promise to carry on the proud priestly tradition of molesting children.
That should settle that.
Solipsistography
"In 3 Countries, Challenging the Vatican on Female Priests"
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