He’s very trying. I am no defender of liberals, but come on! (in the voice of that guy from Mad TV). What the heck are you trying to accomplish? Are you saying that it is better not to strive for peace in the Middle East, improve education, and eliminate poverty?
Are you patrolling the currents of political philosophy here? Are you controlling the level of disputation and intellectual ferment? Perhaps you are seeking a discussion of economic issues and the comptrolling of the public purse?
I swear, if this is conservativism, I’m going communist!
december, I realise that you’re toning things down in terms of strawmen and such, given the recent tendencies in your posts, and the attention this got from the administration.
It looks like you’ve come a long way. The OP doesn’t contain any strawmen, and is free of vulgarities. And it looks like a genuine attempt to bring some issues to the table, albeit a bit simplistically.
But all in all, good show. Why, this is verily good enough for Great Debates - which is where it’ll go now. The only possible downside I can think of is that you’ll be asked to substantiate your viewpoint a little more thoroughly than in the Pit, but I’m sure you’ll manage. Of we go!
<<Are you saying that it is better not to strive for peace in the Middle East, improve education, and eliminate poverty? >.
Yes, exactly. ** It is better not to strive for peace in the Middle East, improve education, and eliminate poverty.**
Instead of striving for these goals, we should accomplish them. We should ATTAIN peace in the middle east, adequate education for all, and the elimination of poverty.
Some of us feel good about striving.But, from the POV of those directly involved,
striving and failing = failing*
If you went through American schools and you’re illiterate, does it help you that some people supported approaches that didn’t work? I think not.
So how do you succeed without striving? If we could just fold our arms and blink our will into being like Barbara Eden on I Dream of Jeannie, life would be a lot easier. but that’s now how life works.
You try one approach; it fails. You try another; it fails, but you get a bit closer to your goal. You try yet a third solution; it fails, but you have gotten a bit closer to the goal.
Solving the problem of poverty has eluded the best minds from every corner of the political spectrum, so why single out the liberals? Should not conservatives also come under fire?
Well, I have heard a lot of accusations that Reagan hated the poor, because he cut spending on them, even though the poverty rate decreased under his tenure. And practically every discussion on funding for education has at least one group claiming that anyone who opposes spending increases does not love their children.
On the other hand, I have heard the same thing about military spending from the other side of the aisle. You tend to get ideological purity only from the more extreme ends of the spectrum, where socialists advocate government take overs of business and libertarians say every road should be a toll road.
Results are hard to measure; spending is easy. Those who favor activist government are going to be more likely to fall prey to the temptation of measuring compassion by intention. A Congressman is more likely to get re-elected by saying “I got $100 million funneled to my district” even if he has some one running against him who says, “Yeah, and it didn’t do a darn bit of good”.
As social service spending becomes a larger and larger share of government spending, those who support such things are more and more likely to want to be judged by intent.
I was being cute. You are right; one cannot succeed without really striving. However, one can do something that feels like striving, but which is guaranteed to not succeed, like the examples in the above post. I was using the word “striving” in that sense.
A closely related concept is the distinction between involvement and commitment. The term “striving” can describe either one, but there’s a big difference. As the joke goes, in the ham and egg brekfast, the hen is involved, but the pig is committed.
I’ll buy that, as long as the approaches move closer and closer to effectiveness. That’s not what’s happening in the Department of Education right now.
I must admit that this concept gets convoluted with the need to get started. There are situations where one ought to begin striving, even without a realistic plan, hoping that those who come later may eventually find effective approaches. The earliest civil rights workers didn’t know how to solve all the problems of Jim Crow, but they started a movement that has eventually more-or-less succeeded. I certainly wouldn’t fault them for merely striving. On the other hand, they were committed, not just involved.
I suppose it’s a judgment as to whether some particular effort is a step in the right direction or a distraction.
Yet another thread on the evils of liberalism by december, which, with all due respect to Coldie’s opinion, contains yet another straw man, unnamed “liberals” who are supposedly frantically apologizing for the ineffectiveness (itself debatable) of various unrelated social programs. Sir, it’s been asked many times, but I’ll ask again: from whence do you get the idea that trumping up imaginary opponents is a valid debating tactic? Who are you trying to convince of the rightness of your position? What do you think it means that nearly every single respondent to your posts objects to your de(bait)ing tactics?
Oh yeah, and about this:
My, such gorgeous, thrilling rhetoric. This is a bit like the myth of the 100-mpg carburetor, right? Conservatives, and presumably only conservatives that match december’s personal views, have perfectly formed, 100% guaranteed effective solutions for these problems, but those mean old liberals won’t let them swing into action. Except ** december** for some reason forgot to mention what these solutions actually are. Puh-leeze.
No. You weren’t. Your statement was ugly; the type of ugly only stone, stubborn ignorance causes.
But since you’re in GD now, please illustrate your ignorance by providing an argument that the efforts cited in your OP (World Bank & IMF, Middle East Peace Process, US Dept. of Education, “War on Poverty”, election reform and the Bureau of Indian Affairs) are all controlled somehow by liberals, and are also “guaranteed to not succeed” because we liberals are so incompetent.
Please include in your argument a description of what “success” would look like in all those efforts, why it is that liberal efforts to attain success are such losers, and which particular conservative plans would work so much better in each case… I’m particularly interested in your brilliant analyses showing Indian Affairs* and election reform as liberal-run issues.
Lessee. december gets “cute”, drawing a reference to Barbara Eden in “I Dream of Jeannie” and Coldfire blinks, wiggles convenient body part{s} and everything is whisked off to GD.
This is a strange place.
December, I’m just writing to warn you that the Wall Street Journal editorial on the Bureau of Indian Affairs to which you obliquely make reference in your OP contains several glaring errors of fact and grotesque ignorance of the law. If the WSJ has a lick of integrity left, you can expect either a harshly-worded rebuttal or a retraction within the next few days.
If you want a first hand account of how compassionate conservatism has reversed eight years of progress within the Bureau of Indian Affairs in a mere eighteen months, I will be happy to bluster at length. For now, I simply recommend that you don’t go there, 'cause I will f%^& you up if you rely upon that screed for your information.
I didn’t mean to to compare the BIA under Clinton vs. the BIA under Bush. I know nothing about either one. The point I intended to make is that despite, or because of, decades and decades of support from the BIA, Native Americans are one of the poorest minorities around. Other minority groups not helped, or not burdened, by such support have sailed past them. This is an example of a policy that hasn’t worked, but which never got fundamentally changed, either.
However, if you know that the BIA was significantly improved under Clinton, I’d be interested to learn about it.
This isn’t fair. I put that OP into the Pit. Can’t I just call liberals nasty names?
OK, I’ll take a pass at your questions. Note that the I do not mean to criticize all liberals. I will try to put the word “some” before each usage of "liberal’. If it’s not there, please take it as read.
First of all, it’s not that somes liberals are incompetent; it’s that many of them aren’t committed to succeeding. E.g., how does the Department of Education evaluate employees? It’s not on the basis of some measure of overall educational achievement. Their goals are not tied to educational success; that’s why they don’t produce it. (However, in their case, I would say that many educrats are also incompetent. It takes a special mind to be willing to swallow the baloney that constitutes much of their curriculum. They are trained in fuzzy thinking.)
As far as liberals controlling the programs I listed, it’s hard to believe that point would be controversial. They are big, expensive government programs, typically supported by the left and opposed by the right.
What would success look like?
In education, every child in America would reach some reasonable minimum. We’re nowhere near adquate education for all. We’ve been moving backward during the last 40 years as federal involvement has increased.
In election reform, the goal is to eliminate the influence of corruption and special interest money. The previous election reform laws were a product of liberal Democrats, and they didn’t work. Of course, the most recent law included input from McCain, so it’s not purely liberal. I expect the law to fail, but time will tell.
Well, I haven’t answered all your questions, xenophon41, but I did answer some.
That was this board, my post, and I was referring to their attempts at keeping the conference green. It’s times like this that I wish my status as Staff wasn’t in limbo.
Once again, from December, a serving of one of my favorite conservative canards: to witless, conservatives favor limited government, liberals favor door to door bureaucrats performing on-the-spot proctology.
Except when it comes to some good ol’ fashioned saber rattling, of course. Must have a strong defense, a defense capable of gong places that don’t belong to us to make people do what they’d rather not.
And how, pray, does a small government option work in foreign relations? Let’s suppose someone wanted our protection and help, lets say, oh, pick at random, Israel. How exactly would the N0. 17 School Board of Paytuskee, Alabama, effect this resolution?
And to whom do I turn if the asshole upriver from me dumps monosodium malignate, or phosphate of tumoral, into my water. Shall I complain to my local Water Board?
Mostly, when the right begins to bloviate about small government, they mean getting government off the backs of business. Release the holy entreprenuerial spirit, and the Invisible Fickle Finger will sort it all out. Back away from all this sociological meddling, and let the natural, divinely ordained forces of Social Darwinism have their way.
Property rights are thier Holy Grail, once God has put something in thier pocket, let no man put it asunder, as was put forth in the PowerPoint Presentation on the Mount. They are wracked with grief that thier money, their very money, shall be dragged away to the undeserving. And there is great weeping, and gnashing of teeth.
How does the DoE evaluate employees? -You realize they’re not directly in charge of teachers, right? Here’s a web page you might find useful: Dept. of Ed. “What do we do” page
What is the “curriculum” produced by the DoE? Please specify which programs or directives constitute the “baloney” that so upsets you. Here’s another web page you might find useful: Dept. of Ed. “What we don’t do” page (From the web page: In creating the Department of Education, Congress made clear its intention that the secretary of education and other Department officials be prohibited from exercising “any direction, supervision, or control over the curriculum program of instruction, administration, or personnel of any educational institution, school, or school system.”)
Where do they receive that training in “fuzzy thinking”? Is it a degree program? PhD in FT? (I figure you’d be the guy to ask. I don’t have a cite for this.)
I wish there were a “disbelieving stare” smilie. You’re saying that, once a B.E.G.P. is created, it’s an eternal, independent entity with no direction from Congress and no leadership from the Executive branch?
Here’s some statistics which disagree with you: National Center for Education Statistics To provide a quick summary, the NCES has been recording academic achievement statistics since about 1971. During that time period, reading achievement in American public schools has stayed close to even; in mathematic average scores were higher in 1999 than in 1973, with a “pattern of overall progress” noted; science performance declined through the 70’s, increased during the 80’s and early 90’s and has held steady since then.
december, much as I’d like to agree that conservatives don’t want to “eliminate the influence of corruption and special interest money,” I’m going to have to disagree with you here. Feel free to try and provide cites which support your view, though.
Only you, I suspect, would describe the bipartisan effort as “not purely liberal”. However, I agree with you that the law will not successfully prevent corruption.
<<That was this board, my post, and I was referring to their attempts at keeping the conference green. It’s times like this that I wish my status as Staff wasn’t in limbo.>>
Good grief, Jeff. Yes, I should have written “another thread” instead of “another board.” A link was attached, so anyone who cared could check it out. The quote was merely a lead-in to this thread, in any event,
Does your last sentence mean that using the word “board” when I should have written “thread” is a serious infraction? GMAB
elucidator, you have raised some good points about difficulties with small government. I am not going to respond here, because they’re a bit off the topic of basing government actions on measures of effectiveness, which is already quite a broad topic.
xenophon41, thank you for the cites. Maybe I’m wrong, but I thought that the DOE supported various programs, such as certain ways to teach mathematics. The tenth amendment statement was most interesting, but it strikes me as CYA. Since the DOE is giving out a lot of money to schools and to education researchers, they are automatically exercising a great deal of control. “He who pays the piper calls the tune.”
Many years ago, I had friend at Berkeley who switched from science and complained that she had to learn to not answer the question as asked, but to write a longish essay related to the subject. It’s this experience that I had in mind. Also, let’s face it, the people who can’t cut it as education majors don’t drop down and major in physics.
Regardless of what the exact formal goal of the DOE is, their real goal obviously ought to have been to improve education. You can make a statistical case that the drop in educational achievement is less clear than I thought. There is data the other way, such as the drop in SAT scores. In any event, it has never been true that the NEA paid much attention to their actual impact on student success.
Cervaise – wait till you see my next OP: Liberals steal puns.
Well, I provided the link so that you could do some self-educating. (I guess that attempt was another failed liberal program, eh?) I really wish you’d have looked at the extent to each President’s administration has always influenced the direction of the Department. This time around, it’s G. W. Bush’s “No child left behind” program, if you’d like to bitch some more about educrats who have screwed up ideas.
Well, not only is this charge easily demonstrated as false, the reader is left wondering what direct connection it has with the Department of Education performance. Shall I provide a link to the NEA (National Education Association) for you? Or better yet, back to that huge library of statistical information that might indicate to the discerning surfer that the Dept. of Ed does pay some attention to their “actual impact on student success”?
From Literacy from 1870 to 1979: Illiteracy, Percentage of persons 14 years old and over who were illiterate (unable to read or write in any language), by race and nativity: 1870 to 1979
Year Total White, White, White, Black
Total Native Foreign-born and other
1870 20.0 11.5 - - 79.9
1880 17.0 9.4 8.7 12.0 70.0
1890 13.3 7.7 6.2 13.1 56.8
1900 10.7 6.2 4.6 12.9 44.5
1910 7.7 5.0 3.0 12.7 30.5
1920 6.0 4.0 2.0 13.1 23.0
1930 4.3 3.0 1.6 10.8 16.4
1940 2.9 2.0 1.1 9.0 11.5
1947 2.7 1.8 - - 11.0
1950 3.2 - - - -
1952 2.5 1.8 - - 10.2
1959 2.2 1.6 - - 7.5
1969 1.0 0.7 - - 3.6*
1979 0.6 0.4 - - 1.6*
*Based on black population only
