Epic Classic Drumspot: Weckl, Gadd, Colaiuta

A Discussion Worthy Comment, please excuse the rant.

Bradley:

"Nice post.
I'd like to question the conventional wisdom about higher education subsidies. What I mean is, does America really need cheaper higher education? Everybody and their mother already goes to college, and many college students are apathetic trust-fund twats that get legitimately little out of their education. All this says is that the private school system is healthy and proper as a money-making venture. If anything, private schools should be more authoritarian and selective in order to ensure that only people who are ready get into college. High-school minded slacker non-contributors should get acquainted with life beforehand.
The only conclusion is obvious: we need aid for those that need aid. The government provides some but could provide more. As you pointed out, gov intervention in private higher education would handicap the positive economic impact.
One last point: The fact that the income gap in the US has grown over the last 3 decades and that its higher than almost any other large industrialized country indicates that our higher-education saturation strategy is not effective."

You raise some interesting points. I would tend to agree with you in that I understand your point to be that higher education should not be cheaper on a wholesale level but for the people who are ready to take on the challenge and responsibility of their education. What I think you perhaps need to think of or at least express if you have thought of it is that, while higher education is a privilege and a responsibility, education, period, is a basic right in a developed country such as ours (and something to strive for elsewhere). Thus, yes, people who don't get anything out of their education probably are at too high a level of education and money should not be wasted subsidizing their attending college. However, this says something about our elementary and secondary level educational system and how little it prepares so many people for the higher education they want (perhaps for the wrong reasons - they see a degree as only a means to an increased paycheck, and see it as a chore, something they just have to do without thinking of why they have to do it.) to pursue. This problem exists, not only in the culture of "trust fund twats," as you put it, but in and due to insufficient inner city and even other public schools and due to parents who are too unconcerned or uninvolved with their childrens's education. In fact, I think that the parenting probably plays the largest role in the matter, in that parents should raise their kids to have a good attitude towards learning. Parents need to have high standards for their children and, an often neglected point, for themselves. A child with intellectual parents are more likely to be intellectual themselves just by virtue of the nature and the amount of discussions and language they hear in the home. Parents who simply demand their kids get high grades don't even do enough; they need to instill values in their children that will mark them as people who will appreciate the opportunities afforded them, enjoy reflection and creativity, and honor, in themselves and in others, the pursuit of knowledge and skills. One of the the teachers I most respected and enjoyed in high school, Mr. Thurber, hated "grade grubbing." He understood that, too much, grades have become a measure unto themselves instead of what they should be - a means to evaluation. In effect, people who care more about a grade than what the grade evaluates defeat the true purpose of their education.
One thing that strikes me about government intervention in higher education is that they could be infringing upon the competitiveness of colleges and crippling these institutions' ability to find and recruit the best possible student bodies they can based on intellectualism, skills, individuality and differing perspectives. I say to the government: leave higher education alone, get your hands dirty working to improve elementary and secondary education. And an aside, if you look at the video I posted in my first post (not the drum one) it mentions that Nintendo spends much more on marketing and research than we spend on education. That simple fact tells me that our government's spending priorities are seriously askew. I won't get into how much the government should and should not spend in total but it needs to change the direction they're sending their cash. Ultimately, my response to your intial question, Bradley, is not that we need to prevent the expansion of the population that pursues a higher education but that we need to prepare more of the people who pursue one.

Cheers!

Some Politics

From a George Will article

"Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) and Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) recently convened a discussion of how colleges and universities should be spending their endowments. Grassley, who says more than 135 institutions each have endowments of more than $500 million, says perhaps they should be required to spend 5 percent of those endowments each year. Welch has introduced legislation to require that percentage to be spent to reduce tuition and other student expenses.

This government reach for control of private resources comes even though last year colleges and universities spent, on average, 4.6 percent of their endowments. Furthermore, most endowments are too small to be a significant source of captured money.

...

So the frequently cited $700 billion sum is but a small fraction of the cost, over coming decades, of today's financial crisis. The desire of governments to extend their control over endowments and foundations is a manifestation of the metastasizing statism driven by the crisis. For now, its costs, monetary and moral, are, strictly speaking, incalculable."

While I'm not wholly against the bailout as Will seems to be - I think it's probably a necessary means on the whole - it seems to me that Will has a point. Should the government really be sticking their noses into private higher education? Lowering tuition and student costs is certainly an amiable cause but should that be a forcibly mandated burden on private educational institutions? If the government really wishes to help students in this way, shouldn't the money at least come from some other tax source instead of crippling the freedom of educational institutions to spend their endowments at a pace and aim of their own choice. Further, if the wealthy alumni of these institutions (and any other donors for that matter) are aware that their donations aren't being controlled by the college or university but by the government, they might just be less likely to give as much.


Cheers!

Just Got Stumbleupon...

And my first stumbled upon website is...

http://www.worldometers.info/

always startling to find stats like these...more startling to see them develop in real time.


cheers

Zogby poll

http://www.zogby.com/news/ReadNews1604.html

Pollster John Zogby: “Three big days for Obama. Anything can happen, but time is running short for McCain. These numbers, if they hold, are blowout numbers. They fit the 1980 model with Reagan's victory over Carter -- but they are happening 12 days before Reagan blasted ahead. If Obama wins like this we can be talking not only victory but realignment: he leads by 27 points among Independents, 27 points among those who have already voted, 16 among newly registered voters, 31 among Hispanics, 93%-2% among African Americans, 16 among women, 27 among those 18-29, 5 among 30-49 year olds, 8 among 50-64s, 4 among those over 65, 25 among Moderates, and 12 among Catholics (which is better than Bill Clinton's 10-point victory among Catholics in 1996). He leads with men by 2 points, and is down among whites by only 6 points, down 2 in armed forces households, 3 among investors, and is tied among NASCAR fans.”

Nascar fans? guess my vote really does make a difference... In all seriousness though, I'm glad my vote counts. Swing state bitches.

Cheers.

Dolla Dolla Bill Ya'll

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/dollar_bill_on_floor_sends_wall

very funny. I particularly like this part:

"I bet it smells like rose petals," mutual funds specialist Ken Stoute said. "My friend's friend Tim Formato? He's on the board at Westminster Securities and he says he touched it. He said it was warm and soft and wonderful. He said he knows where it is now, and I can put in an option on seeing it tomorrow for only $85."

Man Enough

Very funny comic my cousin Will sent me a little while ago: http://www.philintheblanks.com/comics/manenough.html

First Post!

I believe that a place to reflect and write on politics/news/philosophy, write and post the occasional story or poem, post articles/pictures/videos that I enjoy or find interesting will enrich me and hopefully open up dialogue with others. This blog will not largely be about anything to do with my personal life although it is not impossible that something will slip through the cracks and so be it if it does. I encourage anyone who reads this to respond to anything i write, no matter the type of response; I welcome criticism, argument, agreement, disagreement, rants, raves, etc...

I'll start things off with a couple youtube videos:

Drumspot: Steve Gadd grooving (like no one else can) with a percussionist



And some astonishing stats/facts with dramatic music behind it





cheers