Duh

Today's post concerns our future as a nation. Much political hay is about to be made about the Common Core State Standards Initiative which is aimed at developing a national framework for core curriculum in our schools.

We're not talking about political indoctrination here (that's probably why Texas isn't interested). We're talking about national standards of achievement in math, reading, science; core skills that ALL children will need to be effective in our future. Alaska (and Texas, of course) have already refused to sign on, on the pretext that this is an attempt to federalize education.

This is why we are failing and why other nations are surpassing us intellectually and economically. Our hubris will not protect us, although it might advance the careers and agendas of various demagogues in America.

This fits in well with a conversation with John Sexton on Bill Moyer's Journal this last week. One of the things that he said strikes me as particularly pertinent.

And I quote..................

"This is a pattern that I see: an allergy to thought, to complexity [and] nuance - a kind of collapse into an intellectual relativism where opinions become fact... It's a dangerous thing... I think there's a growing hostility to knowledge in this country... Our national progress is being retarded because we have fallen into this discourse by slogan. We have fallen into this relativism where it's a conversation to stop and say, "Well, that's your opinion."

I remember that someone, somewhere once said, "And so goes a great nation."