Since Robert Bork’s failed bid for the Supreme Court, no justice has been completely honest when answering questions in a confirmation hearing, but more liberal (or moderate) justices had less reason to hide their views. Alito and Roberts’ answers should be considered an outright fraud.
Now that the president has scolded the Chief Justice, I hope that Justice Roberts remembers that he too operates within the political system. He should have recognized this going in.
NPR: James Sherk(ph) is a senior analyst at the Heritage Foundation. He says the jobless benefit system isn’t working … because it’s too generous. With the maximum number of extensions, workers … can collect nearly two years of benefits and that’s not helpful he says.
Mr. JAMES SHERK (Senior Analyst, Heritage Foundation): The jobs that have been lost are not coming back and workers need to change the new industries, move to new sectors of the country. And having two years of UI benefits allows those who are unemployed to sort of – to put off making those very difficult and very painful decisions, to keep imagining that the jobs that they used to have will come back.
I went to the Heritage website to look up more about this person. I also trolled the web to see how old he is, how he was educated and if he is a serious scholar. It turns out he is just a kid, educated at a right wing college, one that decided to refuse federal dollars as a means to avoid federal standards and monitoring on racial discrimination. He is not a respected scholar.
Can’t figure out why NPR gave this hack airtime.
Nonetheless, since Heritage also give this guy space to vent his absurdities, an excerpt from a recent posting to their website is a useful window into right wing thought. So note the following:
- The consequences of extended unemployment benefits are some of the most conclusively established results in labor economic research. Extending either the amount or the duration of UI benefits increases the length of time that workers remain unemployed.
- UI benefits subsidize unemployment. They reduce the need to search for new work and to make difficult choices–such as moving or switching industries–to begin a new job.
- Roughly one-third of workers receiving UI benefits find work immediately once their benefits expire. This happens both when unemployment is high and when unemployment is low.
- Economic research shows that each 13 week extension of UI benefits increases the average length of time workers receiving benefits stay unemployed by approximately two weeks.
By the way, any fair-minded discussion of unemployment will acknowledge that, yes, unemployment benefits do allow the unemployed person to keep looking a bit longer than he or she might without them. But that might mean the difference between a panicked decision and a successful transition to a new job.
*Regaring Mr. Sherk’s Heritage posting, referred to four articles, 2 of his own, and 2 from 2003 and 2000. Since the current downturn is an outlier, optimistic extrapolations average downturns just don’t apply to the current disaster.
I also was amused by Mr. Sherk’s comment in the radio interview that jobs are not coming back. That may have been true in during the job losses of the 70’s where old time factory jobs did disappear forever, but the jobs lost in the current downturn came from construction and the financial services sector. And if these aren’t coming back, we are in even deeper shit than we know!
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Oh, regarding the right wing conspiracy, it’s just a throwaway line, but you have to admit, it’s a catchy title. And at its core, NCLB demonstrates the typical attributes of right wing policy – its name is more slogan than description, and it shows a great distrust of public institutions.
Wherever the ideas were developed, NCLB is a curious law. It forces states to measure lots of facets but doesn’t use the data to find causes or to develop best practices (solutions). If the data suggest that a school has a problem, the school receives no guidance regarding how to change the outcome, nor are additional resources (funding) provided.
This is completely different from how enterprises normally operate.
In the financial services arena, we typically do our business via mail or phone call, so we measure the volumes of both, the speed of our response, and whether there are any timing cycles (and there are, typically, Monday call volume is higher that average, and financial sector businesses receive both more calls and letters during the weeks following the mailing of tax forms). On the sales side, businesses also measure dollars and profitability (and for underwritten products, a few additional factors). In addition to responding to the volume of work, managers look to the data to see where errors are made (or complaints arise). Based upon the trends that add more resources (or cut back) – and train or retrain (or fire).
Education is not quite like the financial sector, still, we don’t need complex testing data to identify success or failure. Successful schools systems are ones that move most of their kids from kindergarten through High School, and almost everyone graduates. 10 years after graduation, these kids will be found generally thriving. The school systems are primarily in middle class areas and demographically, are mostly white or white and Asian. We will say more on that later.
For the failed schools, almost all we need to know is that many don’t graduate, and after school, the next 10 years promises little but failure. Most of the failing schools are predominantly poor, and demographically, largely African Americans and Hispanics.
If NCLB were in earnest, it would replace nationwide testing with a focus on the failed schools. It would also create a process that looked to identify causes or at least patterns – as well as solutions (tailored to causes). Instead, it offers nothing for failing schools, only for the students, and for them, it offers tutoring or a way out via a place in another school, whether public or private. Although not many parents have asked for this solution, it’s a far cry from assessing why the school is failing.
I have lived in the suburban monoculture, and seen the successful schools as consistent with the prosperous families that provided the students. Now I live in a poorer town that is heavily Hispanic. Some of our residents are here illegally, and the kids are less likely to remain in a school for a long time. Many need to learn English. It is no surprise that our town’s schools show achievement levels below the rest of the schools in our county. So far, none have “failed” in terms of NCLB – but if they did, it would have a lot more to do with the nature of educating a transient and poor population, than with a failure on the part of our teachers.
The issues with African Americans are more troubling. From all I have read, there are significant cultural factors that lead to poor achievement. Read Whatever It Takes, which describes on person’s efforts to improve educational outcomes in Harlem. Even middle class African American kids don’t do as well as their economic white peers. That’s too bad. Simply testing kids and closing schools it not an answer. Not is hoping that the private economy will find a better way.
A Good Time Was Had By All at the African Burial Ground (an NPS Site in New York City)
I had a mind changing experience yesterday when I visited the African Burial Ground – a National Park Service Site that recently opened a new visitor center. Their “grand re-opening” was yesterday.
The burial site was discovered some 19 years ago when human remains were found during the excavation of a building site in Manhattan. Unlike most of the US, lower Manhattan has enough layers of history that excavations can result in archeology. African American political figures lobbied for treating the remains with the solemnity we associate with modern gravesites. To be frank, at the time I was not very interested, but to the extent that I thought about it at all, I wondered what the fuss was all about.
The fuss is all about meaning. Within a diverse society, the exploration of meaning is also the consideration of what to do with the different meanings that events and artifacts will have for different communities within the larger community.
Meaning is a difficult concept. As a society our spokesmen invest events with singular meanings, but in fact, meaning vary with the observer. If you doubt that, go to the Appomattox national historic site. Outside the perimeter of the park, you will see a plaque placed by the state of Virginia, which memorialized the unconquered spirit of the army that surrendered. General Grant argued differently in his memoir, when he noted that the cause that the Confederates fought for was among the worst causes that were ever fought for. In their interpretation of the Surrender of General Lee, the National Park Service takes a centrist stance, somewhere to the left of Virginia’s self absorbed point of view, and to the right of the point of view of the average African American (my guess anyway).
In any case, for me, yesterday’s visit to the burial site forced me to reconsider my position. It finally dawned on me that African Americans have been in the US since early colonial days a yet we allowed their burial site to be treated as mere rubble for over two centuries until, finally, African Americans had a voice.
The remains were examined, catalogued and then reburied with dignity in coffins purpose built by current day African craftsman. A dignified stone memorial was also constructed, and now, the visitor’s center has been finished. There also is a gift shop! It is worth a visit.
And yes, I know that old graveyards are treated as rubble in Europe (at least in the UK) – but they have lots of old churches and churchyards. If we ever reach the point that African America sites are too numerous to mention, then we can consider a new site as just more rubble, but until then, let’s give ourselves over to the crime that was done when “we” brought slaves to our shores. Let’s also allow our black brothers and sisters a special place for their difficult history here.
In Woody Guthrie’s This Land is Your Land, note the following verse:
In the squares of the city – In the shadow of the steeple
Near the relief office – I see my people
And some are grumblin’ and some are wonderin’
If this land’s still made for you and me.
The very purpose of the memorial is to say to the world, and especially to African Americans, yes, this land is made for you (and me).
* Ok, my folks came here way after slaves were brought over from Africa, but to the extent that we have any community, and to the extent we take pride in our collective achievements, we also must express sorrow for our collective sins.
Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are they who mourn,
for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
for they shall possess the earth.
Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for justice,
for they shall be satisfied.
Blessed are the merciful,
for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the pure of heart,
for they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they shall be called sons of God.
Blessed are they who suffer persecution for justice sake,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
I am not religious, but I am an enthusiastic follow of Jesus, whoever he really was, whether a poor preacher or rebel.
Think of these when you hear some politicians tell us that ours is a Christian nation, and yet in the next breath applaud torturing prisoners (whether of war or not!). Think about them too when someone tells us that “WE” are better off as a nation by encouraging self-reliance rather than encouraging the reliance on social programs. Ok, yes I tip that way in my beliefs too, but where is our sympathy for the least of our brothers?
