First Blog

  All people want to feel good about themselves. Many are poor and many are rich, but all want that same feeling or sense of value, importance, independence, and well-being. These are the “highs” of life. Hard work, even if not well paid, gives these senses. Achievement gives the same. They allow the natural down turns and down days everyone has. Achievement modulates depression. Achievement stimulates well-being. Drugs give an artificial high without work, achievement, or anything else. It’s temporary and chemical. It ends quickly, but more drugs boost the spirits high again. A cycle. Welfare is similar. It gives the illusion of value simply because you can pay for food or other needs. Like a drug, you can become addicted to this easy cash*. Your sense of value disappears, and you become dependent on your provider. As you need more, you are re-cycled. *You may see this all around your world. My first experience was in grad school with Teaching Assistants, grad students teachin

A tectonic shift in America concerning education has occurred. It seems the new independent intelligence in America includes blue-collar workers, while the new college grads seems as Manchurian candidates, programmed with what to do and say but not how to think. Except for skills training, the new college grad seems to have receded intellectually. Many college students prefer formulas for thought, not a broad intellectual framework to determine thought. With some colleges offering safe spaces and pet goats, these campuses now have the overtones of preschool. In the old days, one might walk into a bar where the customers all thought about the same. These were union people.   Now the union folks have opinions sweeping across all persuasions. They think.   It is the college grads and student that seem to think the same, no deviants allowed. The educational tectonic fissures began  emerging in middle America and are now spreading.