Category: Education

Thanks a bunch, Pogie

I am linking to a site I rarely visit, The Montana Post, run by award-winning high school English teacher Don Pogreba. “Pogie,” as he is known, is famous for the following exemplary form of argumentation … this a conversation I am making up but have experienced nonetheless:

Anyone anywhere: “But Pogie, I’ve got it right here that you’re wrong.”
Pogie: “What’s your source?”
AA: “It’s some research done from a book that was cited on a blog, Piece of Mindful.”
Pogie: That’s not reliable. I want the New York Times, Washington Post, CBS News, otherwise I don’t believe it.”
AA: But Pogie, that’s not the point. You’ve got to look at the material and judge it using your own brain.”
Pogie: “Get real. Give me a reliable source.”

This has long been my beef with Pogie, and maybe with modern education in general – he does not teach thinking. He teaches students to use other people’s brains instead of their own. The result is seen all around us, the masked masses, clueless as to why they are in such garb.

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My Beef with Elmo: Elmo’s World Order?

Today is the 51st birthday of Sesame Street. The show first aired on November 10, 1969.

As a child growing up in the 1970s, I occasionally watched Sesame Street (produced by Sesame Workshop). The Electric Company captured my interest much more, as did Captain Kangaroo, Land of the Lost, and re-runs of Lost in Space. I didn’t watch much TV though. 

Before I proceed with my general grievances with Sesame Street, I just want to air my personal beef with the show — and with Elmo, in particular.

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Monday morning ramble

I’ve decided to chuck the gym, as I have some things to discuss, seemingly connected, but I am not sure about that. Endure if you can.

Years ago my youngest daughter got a part-time job in a “gum shoe” movie theater, one that charged a buck for entrance and showed only shelf-worn pictures. She ran the projector, and so I was allowed upstairs to watch the machines flicker away. What I saw up there was a whole new movie experience. Down below in the theater, the movie is the thing, and I was totally absorbed in it. Up above it was a flickering light show, much like a light behind a fan, and I suddenly realized that when we watched movies, we are put in a trance.

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Trojan horse here, Trojan horse there, Trojan horses everywhere

Nearly everyone knows the epic tale of the Trojan horse. As I grew up without a classical education, I did not learn about this tale of deception until I was an adult. In fact, I experienced and observed this phenomenon in my own life . . . LONG before I ever knew the literary reference. 

Switching to more recent and relevant context, from malwarebytes.com, Trojans are defined as “programs that claim to perform one function but actually do another, typically malicious. Trojans can take the form of attachments, downloads and fake videos/programs.” 

The Coronavirus paradigm reflects the iconic Trojan horse tale, but has been inverted. It’s a virus of paradox — a Trojan virus, if you will. So, whereas Trojan computer viruses are seemingly benign programs that hide more malicious intent, this novel virus has been portrayed as malicious, but may be more of an exaggeration, and potentially even a misrepresentation of a threat. Whether or not you believe that there is a manufactured pandemic, or subscribe to the notion, “Never let a crisis go to waste,” both perspectives are consistent with a Trojan virus, as it has hacked the minds of nearly the entire global population. It’s the epitome of malware, whether conceived in a computer lab, or as a thought-form, or otherwise. It has been brought to life, and has brought the world to its knees — at the behest of the “scientific” elite. It has even affected those of us who seem immune to its mind-altering impact. 

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Me and Chainsaw Bob

I am a little bit spooked right now, seeing that Covid-denial is reason for shutting down a podcast. Can I be far behind? Why am I even here now? I can only think I fly under the radar. Nonetheless, If this were my last post, this would be my last post. I sincerely hope to be around for a long time. I do not know our future.

If still around, I will introduce a new fallacy to add to the list in the post after this. I also have a piece, a good piece, by Stephers ready to go. Sorry to make you wait, Steph. Ty, Steve, Faux, Maarten, throw in.
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Absurdity

491D9741-7120-4A1B-B38F-9F64C0723362Dear little Greta Thunberg being Time Magazine’s “Person of the Year” is testament to the bankruptcy of our news media, left with only a false front of supposed credibility in place of any honor or diligence. It’s like Barack Obama or Al Gore being given Nobel Peace prizes (I suppose Greta is in line for this too) for either doing nothing or for lying to the public … it shows us just how corrupt our major institutions are. If there is a prize to be had for honor and integrity, it is Diogenes and his lantern in search of an honest man. He is still searching.

Climate Change and Dunning-Kruger

I’m currently immersed in a book called The Deliberate Corruption of Climate Science by Tim Ball, PhD. Ball is a Canadian climatologist who was sued by Michael Mann, the SLAPP-happy climatologist whose pseudo scientific masterpiece, the Hockey Stick, was featured in IPCC publications and Al Gore’s movie. It took several years, but Ball won the lawsuit and Mann (or the forces behind him) was forced to pay all legal costs. The reason why the Canadian court ruled in Ball’s favor was simple: Mann was not genuinely pursuing the matter, and was apparently only suing Ball to make his life difficult. Ball is featured in a post-ruling interview here.

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My college experience

I just got done (mercifully) doing a double-delete on a post I was writing about higher education. I was out of my depth. The post was completely derivative and based on a book I am reading called The Culture of Narcissism: American Life in An Age of Diminishing Expectations by Christopher Lasch, first published in 1979 and said to be a “national bestseller.” It is a fun book, in fact, even exciting for me is it mentions so many names, movements, perversions and attitudes that I grew up in, through and around. (Just to name one, there is the mythical female orgasm. Trust me, it doesn’t happen.)

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A second emancipation

This story caught my eye as I stood in line at the coffee shop this morning. We had just attended a ceremony for 800 graduates of York High School, Elmhurst, Illinois, among them our grandson. College tuition costs have (unreasonably) skyrocketed these past decades, and new graduates are, if fortunate enough to find employment, chained to their desks for most of their careers. Their student loans are permanent, cannot be discharged in any circumstances except perhaps death. I think the system is deliberate and abusive, a form of tyranny.

Read on for an affirmation of humanity.

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