no child left behind?

I have had occasion to spend quite a bit of time with persons below the age of majority lately, and, using my keen powers of observation, have concluded that the means to great wealth in the future is not a Harvard MBA or a medical degree, but to become a practical artisan of some sort.

Plumber, carpenter, electrician, a person that actually produces something. Anybody can do work on a computer, or sell something, but the real secure money in the next few decades will be the man or woman who can actually get something done when it is needed. Most of us, or at least many, can do some things, light electrical or plumbing, carpentry or even masonry, but are really not up for the big jobs. These people will be in demand, even if they haven't completed a day of college.

Just a thought.

This brings me around to what inspired this post, the subject of the $100 laptop computer.

I am certain that it is feasible to actually produce such a device, and there is a movement that is dedicated to providing inexpensive computers to two billion children in the world to facilitate their education and therefore opportunity to improve their standing in life.

Nice idea, but I don't think it will fly. In the western world, the notion is more apt to be a portal for the parasitic commercial world to get even more of a foothold in the minds of the consuming public than it has now.

Not every child lives in the world we do. The developing world lacks the infrastructure to make a computer driven program work. A network? Nope. Not even rudimentary dialup.
A common language? Not everywhere. Reading skills? The list goes on.

How about a toolbox for every child? Perhaps $20 worth of inoculations and $80 worth of tools, including basic hand tools and possibly a few light farm implements? The idea is good, but if we are to have any positive impact, we are going to have to meet the people and work with them where they are.

How's that for education reform?

here it is, friday again

lots of thoughts, none really worth pontificating about. the bullshit in the air is as thick as molasses in January, owing to the high level (did not! - did so!) discourse being exchanged in our political process.

the tune this weekend is for leelee.

just because.

Damn the French!

Just when you think you can depend on them to burytheir heads in the sand they commit a verbal faux paus by telling the truth to the Russians no less about a little inconvenience like Iran.



What they, (in the person of the foreign minister), said was that the world needed to be prepared for the worst case scenario, which was war, (in the situation surrounding Iran's nuclear non-program), has been twisted and exaggerated by a few parties, significantly Russia and Iran, to an actual threat of war. These verbal gymnastics are far more telling than almost any other indicator available to the common observer.



In a situation rich with irony, the richest is that the man who plunged us into the morass of war in the region and squandered our influence is now trying to save his hide, (spell that L_E_G_A_C_Y), as well as his party, by pulling us out so that the meanies next door can do as they please. The term plausible deniability has never been stretched so far.



So, what does this mean for us, besides more economic chaos, gloom, doom and the like? The short answer here is I don't know, but that has never stopped me from having an opinion. As I alluded in my last post, there are, certain interests that are taking certain liberties with the overall interests of the republic and the American people with regard to the situation, (I used that term because I am not sure how tospell clusterf**k) in Iraq). This needs to be curtailed, right away. This is first and foremost a war zone, not a free trade area and it is to be treated as such. Privateers and corporate interests in the area should be heavily scrutinized and regulated, if for no other reason than homeland security. I am willing to bet that I as an individual cannot purchase ammunition to go hunting without making it onto a list maintained by who knows how many agencies. The fact that I am blogging may also make me a person of interest. Why not the act of exploiting a situation that puts our economic well-being at risk?



There is nothing wrong with doing business overseas, or in the mideast. But there is something wrong with supporting infrastructure that is routinely used to harm our own social and economic health. If that means abandoning the barrel over a few bad apples, well, then so be it. The profits will have to wait. We need to take heed the lessons that are only now, (and in the last 20 years or so) coming to light over the industrial ties that Nazi Germany had throughout World War II with the likes of Ford, Bayer Chemical, Standard Oil and IT&T. These companies had an ongoing and profitable relationship with the German government through offshore subsidiaries all through the war. Will our kids and grandkids look back at this era and wonder how we sat back and profited while the At&T's, Mobil's, BP's, GE's and Westinghouse's, (to name a few not necessarily guilty domestic candidates) of the world benignly sell their wares which (gasp!) are turned to mal-use by some hitherto unknown rogue regime like, for instance, Iran?



Then, for those of you who hadn't noticed, there is a changing of the guard coming up, and we will have a new president in 2009. That person will need to hit the ground running. Indeed, it can be argued that at least some of the situation we find ourselves in now can be attributed to the lack of experience of a President in 2001, (not that he got any better as things went along, but....). This will be the time to watch candidates as they tread water on the campaign trail and carve out a presence for themselves on the foreign policy stage. As voters, we need to be watching and listening carefully to the questions that are asked and the answers given. It is just as important that questions be answered directly as danced around, and issues brought into a candidates sights so we can judge the temper with which they answer as much as how well they say what we want to hear.



Get focused. Stay focused.

just how the hell did we get here?

The President made a speech to the nation Thursday evening in which he announced that he would begin to bring home some of our troops from Iraq. It is a start, not a withdrawal to speak of, he just isn't replacing troops that are scheduled to be rotated back to the states, but it is something that most people seem to have sought for a while.



Why are we not happy? (OK, for the purposes of this post, you can say, why am I not happy?)



Well, for one, the President is coming away from this none the worse for wear, whereas the rest of the country, and specifically the armed services are really feeling the impact of his decisions, and will live with the ramifications for years, if not decades. Politically, he may emerge no more dented and bruised than his intellect and inherent abilities would have allowed otherwise...



Secondly, I have to wonder, what was the situation that led us into this particular morass, what is the situation today, and what was accomplished, and just as importantly, what is still in play?



We went in to Iraq in 2003 although the decision appears to have been made very shortly after the plans for the invasion of Afghanistan, and may even be leftovers from the first gulf war. the motivation is not clear, but it seems to have been, at least in part, because Iraq was perceived at the time to be 'low hanging fruit', an easy mark, a cakewalk, a quick easy score that would burnish the Presidents credentials, and in part because it was a huge opportunity for certain business interests to get in the door and rake in the money that appeared to be laying around like so much sand in the desert.

If you are a regular reader of this somewhat irregular page, you might think that I am completely opposed to this foray into the mideast. That is not so. I supported the invasion of Afghanistan and was only opposed to its apparent limitations at the time, as well as its apparent fastidious avoidance of any appearance of stepping on the toes of Pakistan. Pakistan is an ally of the US, but its government is not in control of the country or even its own facilities. A few days in the northwest corner of Pakistan might have taken care of the bin Laden issue from the get go, thus reducing our need to make a grander show of things while we were in the neighborhood.

So, as we begin to change direction in Iraq, what should our focus be? Who is the enemy? What war are we fighting? I intend to comment on these two questions over the next couple of days, but I ask you, the reader, what you think? What is our interest, and what is going to happen when we leave?

the mood I'm in

things just keep gettin' betterer and betterer....

How does this work? Sen. Larry Craig of Idaho is leaving the Senate and presumably public life this weekend in circumstances that could be referred to as questionable. Conveniently, in the same time frame, former Senator Fred Thompson is said to be declaring his candidacy for the GOP nomination for President.

Coincidence? You decide.

Is it just me or does Fred look a lot like Larry with contacts and after a couple of (mellowing) weeks at a spa?

UPDATE 1:

Appearing on Fox News Sunday, Sen Arlen Specter has said that Senator Craig should withdraw his guilty plea and his notification of intention to resign from the Senate, saying that he wouldn't be convicted of anything and without a conviction, all of this goes away.

What kind of a pinko liberal is this Specter guy? I mean, the Senator from Idaho was pinched in the same way that anyone else in the circumstances would be, and was given the same opportunities to avail himself of the legal system, and chose to plead guilty. If this was an inner city black youth who had been accused of soliciting a white police officer (male or female), and copped a plea to a lesser charge, you know, to get it all behind him, would the system be bending over backwards to assist him in the name of justice?

I don't know Larry Craig, or Arlen Specter, and neither has been in my bathroom, but this is an example of what I wrote briefly about in my last rather ineloquent post. There are rules that apply to them, and then there are rules that apply to the rest of us. The fact the Craig's and Specter's party may suffer at the polls because of this is no reason to do anything differently.