Month: August 2003

Yep, it’s true. Society doesn’t like boys. It’s provable too. USA Today knows it. Just look at studies in education.
Now 56% of college freshmen are women. 76% of National Honor Society members are girls.
USA Today mentions a major factor in this imbalance. Boys learn differently than girls (surprise! boys and girls are different) and curricula are now designed more for the manner is which girls learn. Result, girls are doing better at the expense of boys.

Educators don’t want to do anything about it though. USA Today pointed out, “Female education researchers…questioned whether helping boys would mean hurting girls.” In fact, when the question is raised, advocates for girls cry foul. Jacequline Woods claims that ” the implicit solution sounds disturbingly close to advocating rolling back gains for girls to address our concerns about boys.” Her statement acknowledges there is no calls to roll back gains for girls. Those who are concerned are just “close” to it. Her statements show a disturbing lack of concern for a problem that will effect all of society, even women when there are fewer qualified mates. Intelligent, responsible people know that dragging one group down does not elevate another.

My solution? Single sex classrooms. Separate boys and girls. Then each can taught in the manner in which they learn best without having to compromise to accommodate the other sex. An added advantage is neither boys or girls are distracted by trying to impress the other. It really is win/win.

Society needs to stop penalizing boys of today because others in prior years had an advantage. So what if men have quickly slipping edge in federal math and science scores?

Society has changed. Women now have a historically unprecedented choice in careers. Men won’t have that choice if we don’t educate them as boys.

The social decay that is MTV marches on. Last night the MTV Music Awards show stopper was Madonna giving an onstage kiss to Britney Spears. Great.

At this point, I’m not sure why this is such a big deal. There have been plenty of lesbian kisses on TV. Madonna published her sex book over ten years ago. What is the significance? I suppose it may be that as rich as booth Britney and Madonna are, they will still do anything for money and a little public attention.

Why is the media so friendly to terrorists. In reading today’s Reuters’ story about Israel killing a Palestinian terrorist, the recap recent events leads one to think Israel broke the cease fire. Amazing how they can state the facts but still mislead:

“Islamic militants renounced a seven-week-old truce a week ago after Israel assassinated Hamas’s second-ranking political leader, Ismail Abu Shanab, by destroying his car with a missile. That followed a suicide bombing that killed 21 in Jerusalem.”

Reuters reports the events, but not chrnologically. The result is to make Israel look like the rogue state. So this is the real order of events:

1. Terrorist kills 21 Israelis. Notice Reuters does not mention that 21 Israeli civilians were killed. Just that “21” were killed. Whatever that means.

2. Israel retaliates by killing a terrorist leader. Notice Reuters paints him as a “political leader”.

3. The terrorists renounce the cease-fire. Notice again, Reuters calls them “militants”. How are they militants when they target civilians? Their bombings have no military connection.

Beware when you read an article. They may state the facts, but not present them accurately.

If you haven’t noticed, I have updated my layout today. It took hours and hours of design, and code writing. OK, I installed a new template and figured out how to add my own colors. Ingenius.

I disagree with Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore and his supporters. I understand where his frustration comes from though. Our right to freely practice our religion has come under attack. The majority of the country believes in God, yet suits are filed to prohibit children from saying the pledge of allegiance because it acknowledges God. Student led prayer is now against the law.

The Roy Moore does not have the authority to arbitrarily decide which laws to follow and which to ignore. That leads to anarchy. I agree with the position Judge Moore’s two options were to follow the judgement of the higher court, or to resign in protest. Ignoring the law as interpreted by a higher court undermines his own authority as Chief Justice when he makes a ruling.

Finally, someone on the national level has put out the idea I’ve been thinking of for years. USA Today has weighed in on the issue of cable companies not allowing their customers to choose which channels they want to buy. Today nearly every basic cable package includes MTV and ESPN whether or not you actually want to watch either channel. Don’t like the debauchery MTV tells young people is normal? Tough. If you want FoxNews you have to pay for MTV as well. Like Discovery Channel but hate sports? Bite the bullet because you are paying for ESPN even if you don’t know a field goal (NFL) from a field goal (NBA).

Now USA Today brings this issue to light. Why can’t we pay for and get only the channels we want? Can you imagine going to the store and wanting to get a Coke, only to be told you have to buy a Sprite, Dr. Pepper, and a Vanilla Coke as well? Cable does it to you every month. They are saying, since we sell the channels together, you are getting more channels at less cost. So really, you are saving money.

Don’t forget a law of economics. You are not saving money you spend. When you spend $40, you have not just saved $20 – even though the item may be on sale from $60. That $40 is gone. Add that to the fact that you may not even want some of the products you just bought for $40. Cable is exactly like this. You won’t use half the channels you are paying for in the current system.

Fine, I’ll pay more per channel. I’ll still spend less money in the long run giving me a better value. So what is the better value for the consumer? 40 Channels for 40 dollars (most of which will never be viewed), or 15 Channels for $20.00 – all of which are viewed sometime during the month?

I first found this at littlegreenfootballs.com who tracks terrorism at his blog.

AP published this photograph picturing three Palestinian terrorists (four counting the AP photographer) planting a bomb. Look at the caption. Notice how AP generously avoids the term terrorist when talking about the bombings which specifically target children as young as 5 months old.

Two debutantes, Paris Hilton and Nicole Ritchie, are starring in an upcoming series The Simple Life. The premise is the two rich girls leave their life of luxury to work on a farm for five weeks. MSN’s article provides a number of quotes from the women that are none too flattering.

Here is a sample:
Paris on proper rural attire: “We don’t have, like, farm clothes. We just sort of, we just wore our own clothes, and I don’t know. It was cute.”

Nicole on higher education: “I went to University of Arizona and I stopped going there because I went there for two years. I felt like I experienced the college life, or whatever, but I know … I’m over it.”

Clearly these two women are morons – probably because of, rather than in spite of, their fortunes. A life of every want being met does not develop the self-reliance one needs to lead a meaningful life. Is it fair these two manufactured idiots will have hundreds of millions at their disposal? No it isn’t fair these two can buy $1,500.00 bags for their dogs. It also isn’t fair they don’t have the necessary tools to find happiness in their lives either. Life isn’t fair.

Yes they are spoiled little rich girls. The thing to remember is you really can’t judge your happiness by the material possessions of others. Right now my biggest want is a $3000 camera set. These two could by it and not make any adjustment in their spending while I would have to save for at least a year.

Still what I have, they can’t buy – a spouse who I love and returns my commitment to her. It may sound cliche, but I know I’m richer. These two brats do prove the adage. Money can’t buy happiness, er sum junk.

Our society routinely tells little girls they can be anything they want to be, but should there be a limit on that? Do we need women acting like men? The latest example is boxing.

Christy Martin is coming out of retirement to fight Laila Ali. During their first press conference, the two boxers got into an onstage scuffle like Mike Tyson and Lennox Lewis (and others). I don’t understand the desire to masculinize women. How does it help society to turn women into entertainment fighters? It robs women of the mystery of femininity when you turn them into inferior versions of men.

Yes, I said it. Women will never compete effectively with men in the boxing ring or any other athletic (not performance) sport. As a result, their athletic performance is inferior to men.

Women have many wonderful gifts. Their creativity, intellect and femininity should be emphasized – not suborned.

Meanwhile, the neutering of the U.S. male continues. People are trying to convince men they can be just like women. Stay-at-home Dad’s are they new cultural phenomena. Do women really want their husbands to be the nurturer? I doubt it.

I was reading an article about John Mack the CEO of CSFB (a very large bank) in the September 1 issue of Fortune magazine. Mr. Mack was brought into the company to turn it around after a series of bad business decisions and corporate scandals.

The article shows him as being an ethical man, seemingly rare in today’s evironment of regulatory investigations. He is directing employees to cooperate fully with investigators. When an issue comes up that may be of interest to regulatory agencies, he is proactive in notifying them of any problems. He has been able to get top executives to actually give up hundreds of millions of dollars in guaranteed cash payments – a marked contrast to other firms that are giving executives over priced salary packages.

That is all well and good, but you know what makes this man qualified to be an ethical leader? It turns out he has been married to one woman for 30 years. Doesn’t this indicate how important a person’s family life is when judging his character? If he can keep his commitments to his wife, surely he is much more likely to keep his promises to coworkers, employees, and shareholders.