b.cognosco
Where leaping to conclusions is my primary form of forward motion.
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Thursday, July 10, 2003
Homeland Security - Not Just For Terrorists Anymore
The rise of the American Police State continues as the Department of Homeland Security searches out new menaces, new threats, and new causes to justify its existence, its budget, and its ever-increasing intrusions into our lives.Like every good Government program, the first line of growth is "TO SAVE THE CHILDREN" -- the all-purpose wooing call for the simple-minded. People will blindly agree to the stupidest, most egregious laws and programs if you tell them it will SAVE JUST ONE CHILD. In the last 20 years SAVING THE CHILDREN has become the blanket justification for any and every imaginable usurpation of liberty, coercion, and boondoggled bureaucracy. Got an idea that no rational person would support? Tell 'em it's FOR THE CHILDREN and you'll have no trouble at all.
Really, what cold-hearted bastard could be against any program that could save a child from the clutches of a predator? Of course, we don't want to put any responsibility on parents to actually watch their children, exercise due diligence in securing care for them, or maybe even (God forbid) not give them open access to the Internet. Why, some of those things might make it seem like we really didn't need the most massive government agency in history to snoop in every facet of our lives and then, well, what *would* we do?
Child pornography is despicable, predatory, and malicious. But it is not terrorism. It is not the domain of DHS, and it is not justification for throwing away the liberties of millions of Americans while hiding behind the American flag and distorting the meaning of patriotism in a way even the Nazis would envy.
WASHINGTON -- The Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday launched an operation to help protect children from pornographers, child prostitution rings, Internet predators and human traffickers.The initiative will use the Internet more effectively to track sex offenders who prey on young people and build a central database of child pornography images to help rescue the children involved and arrest those who exploit them.
"Harming a child in any manner or form is a despicable, despicable thing," said Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge as he announced "Operation Predator," which will be run by the department's Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.[More...] [Wired News]
Maybe you're like my Mom, and you think I'm just a little bit wigged-out over all this American mullah/DHS/John Ashcroft/police-state business. Maybe you think we can trust these folks because they're the GOOD GUYS, or because they have our best interests at heart, or just because you don't know any better. You should read Cringely's tale of CALEA. It's a disturbing expose' on how those who are supposed to protect us already abuse and misuse the tools they have, quite possibly creating a greater threat than they were supposed to solve at the outset.
I'm not suggesting that we don't need law enforcement, or that they don't need modern tools. Certainly we do, and certainly Islamic Jihadists pose a threat worth watching. But *we* need to be watching the watchers, with more scrutiny than they can stand. For only then will we know for sure who the GOOD GUYS are. We should send copies of Cringely's article to our government representatives, mayor, and local newspapers and see if anyone knows anything about CALEA. Because only when know the secret uses and abuses of the watchers will we be able to protect our own liberties as law-abiding citizens of a free Republic.
Tuesday, July 8, 2003
Five Key Questions About Business Blogs
E-mail marketing outfit MarketingProfs.com has published an article on business blogging geared to the e-mail marketer. Little new here to those who are well-versed in the blogoshpere, but it is an interesting look into the minds of those who have, until now, relied on e-newsletters and other e-communications as their primary communications vehicles.
[...] Put it this way: scarcely 10 years ago you might have asked, Will email replace the phone, fax and postal mail as the preferred means of business communication? Of course, we exclaim in hindsight.So might it go with blogs. [More...]
Monday, July 7, 2003
Vin Suprynowicz on Why Johnny Can't Read
Goes pretty well with the graphic below. Well worth reading.
In the Review-Journal's June 23 editorial, "The kids can't read," after summarizing Nevada's dismal, worst-in-the-nation eighth-grade reading scores, we stated: "Whatever Nevada's public school systems are doing in an attempt to teach our children to read is not working. Teaching kids to read English is a skill that was perfected by folks without college degrees, centuries ago. Hiring scores of folks with advanced degrees to glom up the system with trendy new methods of 'pedagogy' has not only been no help, it has been demonstrably counterproductive." [More...] [Las Vegas Review-Journal]
We're From The Government. We're Here To Help.
Over the weekend I watched a little bit of a CSPAN program that had Bill O'Reilly, Molly Ivins, and Al Franken on a panel. It was a rerun of some political meeting. I don't remember what.At one point O'Reilly and Ivins were arguing about taxes, government programs, etc. Franken, that font of economic knowledge and all-around supporter of spending other people's money, made the statement, "The idea that government programs don't help anybody is just BS!"
Of course, it's true. Government programs generally DO help someone, just usually not who they were designed to help, and not in the way they were supposed to help them. Here's a little graphic from the US Department of Education introduction to the "No Child Left Behind" program.
Here's the roll-over text for the graphic:
"Chart shows that since 1965, when Congress passed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), through 2003, the federal government has spent more than $242 billion to help educate disadvantaged children. Yet, according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), the average reading score for 9-year-olds across the nation in 1975 is not significantly different from the 1999 score. During those years, the annual appropriation for ESEA increased six-fold -- from $2.3 billion in 1975 to $13.8 billion in 1999 -- while the average reading score for 9-year-olds was 210 in 1975 and 212 in 1999. ESEA appropriations for 1966-1974 and for 2000-03 are provided in the chart, but average reading scores for 9-year-olds are not shown because they are not available for all of those years. The president's 2004 budget request of $22.5 billion for ESEA is shown."
"No Child Left Behind" may be a terrible program. Testing students to see if they can actually *do* anything at certain points in school may be a terrible idea. But it's also pretty clear that pouring billions into federal education programs is about as helpful as tits on a bull. If I were the Dept. of Education this is not a graphic I would display proudly. It is an indictment of every tax dollar spent on federal education mandates since 1965.
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