Jump to content

US Politics: The Accountability Problem


Fragile Bird

Recommended Posts

4 hours ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

Education is probably seen by many in power as a pernicious luxury driving people away from Jesus (science!) and promoting radical ideas like equality.

While the plebs need some basia reading and arithmatic skills, do they really need to know about literature and logarithms to ask f you want fries with that, or clean toilets?

Also gives them dangerous idea about further education and opportunity.

Our university system is very good...if you can afford it.

IMO part of the lack of investment in education is the hatred and fear of globalism. We still act as though our kids are competing with the kid in the next desk for a job in a steel mill. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

Education is probably seen by many in power as a pernicious luxury driving people away from Jesus (science!) and promoting radical ideas like equality.

While the plebs need some basia reading and arithmatic skills, do they really need to know about literature and logarithms to ask f you want fries with that, or clean toilets?

Also gives them dangerous idea about further education and opportunity.

Well, it seems the "libertarian" overlords are in a bit of a pickle. You need the education system to be good enough to close the "skills gap", but if it's too good, then the peasants might start getting their own ideas about stuff.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I thought the biggest problem with education in the US is the inequality (how American!), namely the funding of public schools. Which is down to the counties (iirc, if I am wrong, somebody please correct me on that). The result is, richer counties (also higher rent (well property value)) unsurprisingly have a higher tax revenue, which is linked to the school funding. You got poor parents, tough luck, you lost out on the life lottery, your public school is very likely underfunded and in desperate need for repairs. On the other hand, you are born into an (upper) middle class family, which lives in a wealthier county, way to go, chances are you attend a very well funded school. I think Bourdieu's transformation of economic capital into cultural capital comes to mind (well, cultural capital into economic capital into cultural capital and so on and so forth). Anyway, the result is a pretty unfair education system. In a way you inherit a sub-par education from your parents, which your children will (probably) inherit.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, DMC said:

Sounds like someone published an earlier draft that was supposed to be embargoed.  Kinda surprised it was NPR, but so fucking what?

I thought the issue is that she and her team attempted to gaslight the public by claiming that the 'unwilling to work' version was not something they created but was a fake, although maybe I'm wrong.  Also, pretty sure we're not talking about some version given to the media only under embargo, but the FAQ that was published on her own web site, then taken down.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Anyway, I think it is rather interesting that we got Sgt. Shultz reasonable centrist guy running around the country telling everyone that the deficit is our biggest issue. 

I don't think so. Climate change is a bigger one. The effects of climate change are likely to last a lot longer, than a sovereign debt default. Just sayin'.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

31 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

I thought the issue is that she and her team attempted to gaslight the public by claiming that the 'unwilling to work' version was not something they created but was a fake,



That's not what gaslighting means. It might be lying, although it might also just be different people on different pages, but gaslighting would be making out that 'unwilling to work' was never out there and what are you talking about you fool.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

laws requiring the education of special needs children has bumped up cost and dropped average class size from 20 to 12, also an astonishing figure.

 

I knew there was something wrong with that figure. The Vox article does NOT say "average class size" dropped from 20 to 12. It says there are now 12 students for every teacher employed, which is NOT the same thing. Here are a couple of paragraphs from an NEA report about 2014 statistics pointing this out:

Quote

 

Changes in the number of staff employed in education institutions as well as their levels of compensation reflect trends in enrollment; changes in the economy; and specific state, local, and national program priorities. There were 3,121,926 teachers in 2013-14 (Table C-5). The average number of students per teacher increased from 15.8 in 2012-13 to 15.9 in 2013-14.

This ratio of students to teachers must not be confused with “Average Class Size,” which is the number of students assigned to a classroom for instructional purposes. Class size and student-teacher ratios are very different concepts and cannot be used interchangeably. According to recent studies, the difference between student-teacher ratio and average class size in K-3 is 9 or 10 students (Sharp 2002). Therefore, an elementary school with a schoolwide student-teacher ratio of 16:1 in kindergarten through third grade would typically have an average class size of 25 or 26 students in those same grades.

 

http://www.nea.org/home/rankings-and-estimates-2014-2015.html

The above doesn't explain why this is so, but the main factor I am sure is simply that there are many teachers employed in American schools who are not "classroom" teachers.  Back when I was a child in elementary school 50 years ago, there were teachers of physical education, art, and music that covered those subjects for all the students in the school and moved from classroom to classroom. I would suppose that the idea that laws relating to "special needs" kids have helped push the ratio down must mean that many schools also have teachers who focus on helping students with learning disabilities or other problems and who do not have charge of individual classrooms.

The NEA stats above are for K-3. If you had a small elementary school with 2 classrooms per grade at that level, with an average of 26 students per class, you'd have a total of 208 students. If you added four more teachers for physical education, art, music, and "special education", that would be 12 total teachers and you'd have 17 students per teacher in the school, not far off from the 16:1 figure in the NEA article. 

It may very well be that there are other employees of schools these days who are designated as "teachers" who are not the main teacher assigned to the classroom. People who work in elementary education would know more about that than I do.

But in any event, the student teacher ratio is not the same thing as "average class size."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, polishgenius said:



That's not what gaslighting means. It might be lying, although it might also just be different people on different pages, but gaslighting would be making out that 'unwilling to work' was never out there and what are you talking about you fool.

“We never would, right, and AOC has never said anything like that,” Hockett responded. “I think you’re referring to some sort of document that some – I think some doctored document that somebody other than us has been circulating.”

Later in the interview, Carlson returned to this issue and said, “The ‘unwilling to work’ thing was in her backgrounder. That has been absolutely confirmed.”

“No, definitely not. Definitely not,” Hockett said.

Carlson clarified, “So NBC and lots of other news outlets are saying that that was in the backgrounder and you’re saying it’s fraudulent.”

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

“We never would, right, and AOC has never said anything like that,” Hockett responded. “I think you’re referring to some sort of document that some – I think some doctored document that somebody other than us has been circulating.”

Later in the interview, Carlson returned to this issue and said, “The ‘unwilling to work’ thing was in her backgrounder. That has been absolutely confirmed.”

“No, definitely not. Definitely not,” Hockett said.

Carlson clarified, “So NBC and lots of other news outlets are saying that that was in the backgrounder and you’re saying it’s fraudulent.”


I'm not sure what you're trying to prove here? Like I said. He might be lying. Or he might be mistaken. But he's not gaslighting.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 minutes ago, polishgenius said:


I'm not sure what you're trying to prove here? Like I said. He might be lying. Or he might be mistaken. But he's not gaslighting.

Lying is kind of baked into gaslighting.  But, I frankly fail to see how he could go on a national news show and be 'mistaken' about the facts of what happened, so lying seems a given here.  The first line of defense was to claim that the document was doctored, a fake.  When it turned out the 'fake' had actually been sent out to the media and there were tons of screen captures from her web site, they changed the story to the idea that a draft FAQ was sent out to media and put on the web site.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

39 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

But, I frankly fail to see how he could go on a national news show and be 'mistaken' about the facts of what happened, so lying seems a given here.

It's more likely a case of the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing. As the MSN article ThinkerX posted above points out, the New Green Deal people have not done a great job of explaining what is and what is not part of their platform (perhaps because there is no coherent platform but rather several distinct groups fighting over what it should be). I suspect this guy simply wasn't told that they said whatever it was he said they didn't say. :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

7 minutes ago, Martell Spy said:

Wow, it really looks like AOC pisses conservatives off more than any politician since Obama. I wonder why that is? We did not see this level of vitriol over Sanders, who is also a Democratic-Socialist.

I still want to know from conservative sorts of people what they are going to do about climate change.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Cas Stark said:

I thought the issue is that she and her team attempted to gaslight the public by claiming that the 'unwilling to work' version was not something they created but was a fake, although maybe I'm wrong.  Also, pretty sure we're not talking about some version given to the media only under embargo, but the FAQ that was published on her own web site, then taken down.

Well, the link Thinker provided only mentioned the embargoed version as an issue, and that's all I had read on it.  Looking at the Drudge link to a site whining about this, yeah, it does appear they're whining about more than that.  Some takeaways:

First, yes, there does appear to be three things going on here - an embargoed backgrounder, doctored versions going around, AND indeed AOC putting up an unfinished draft on her website then taking it down.  And that is literally what AOC said when she responded to this yesterday:  "There are multiple doctored GND resolutions and FAQs floating around. There was also a draft version that got uploaded + taken down. There’s also draft versions floating out there."

Second, Bitchface McGee (Carlson) appears to be right that the "unwilling to work" thing was in the backgrounder that was supposed to be embargoed when he's talking to Hockett, who is mistaken.  This goes back to my so fucking what question.

Third, the whiny website article includes a tweet from this guy who admits to doctoring a draft and adding "Free massage chair" to the list of rights the GND would guarantee.  He says this is obviously a joke, and while you or I probably would have the same impression, I guarantee you there are plenty out there that read such a thing and interpret it as fact, then go out and repeat the falsehood.  And it's almost certain that was his intent. 

So, this example from the exact same write up whining about AOC lying provides clear proof that AOC is not lying when she says there are doctored versions out there.  And, that doctored version actually raises the question of who's gaslighting whom?  (BTW, I really hate the overuse of that term.)

This is quite obviously the right trying to create a story that doesn't exist mostly based on someone going on Bitchface McGee's show and making a mistake/not realizing that an unfinished draft was accidentally both posted on AOC's website and published by the press.  Which brings me back to, again, so fucking what?

1 hour ago, OldGimletEye said:

Anyway, I think it is rather interesting that we got Sgt. Shultz reasonable centrist guy running around the country telling everyone that the deficit is our biggest issue. 

I don't think so. Climate change is a bigger one. The effects of climate change are likely to last a lot longer, than a sovereign debt default. Just sayin'.

Not just climate change.  Like I said when Schultz made that ridiculous statement, the obvious biggest economic crisis isn't debt but the constantly rising inequality.  And anyone not running on that - left, right, or center - is very stupid politically.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, Simon Steele said:

These numbers seem so off (to me who is a teacher). I've never seen a class size of 12, and I visit schools all the time. Also, maybe teachers are paid better here, I don't know, but 10 years ago, I started at 29,000 a year, and ten years later, I'm at 39,000. If that's living, well fuck living. Vox is really swinging hard for neo-liberalism. Either way, a discussion about how much teachers make must be framed in the ridiculous cost of living, inflation, etc. that plagues the U.S.

Indeed. As a fellow teacher I earn quite less than you do, but the cost of living in Europe is all in all significantly lower than in the US. And I live in Paris with a child...
Moreover from what I understand 39,000 is actually below the average salary in the US, while my salary is slightly above the French average.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

34 minutes ago, OldGimletEye said:

I still want to know from conservative sorts of people what they are going to do about climate change.

Well, I would assume libertarian types believe it will be invented away by the Bezos penis. There is so much merit in the entire body, as evidenced by bank account, only part is needed

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...