UNSTOPPABLE GLOBAL WARMING

An excerpt from the new book

UNSTOPPABLE GLOBAL WARMING
Every 1,500 Years
by S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery
Published by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
and reprinted here with permission

ISBN: 0742551172
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Unstoppable Global Warming is the winner of the April 2007 Lysander Spooner Award for Advancing
the Literature of Liberty. For more information about the Lysander
Spooner Awards, CLICK HERE.
To go to our full review, or to go to purchase the book, CLICK HERE.
The excerpt, below, is the first chapter of the book, Unstoppable Global Warming. Enjoy!

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UNSTOPPABLE GLOBAL WARMING
Every 1,500 Years



by S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery

CHAPTER 1:
IS HUMANITY LOSING THE GLOBAL WARMING DEBATE?

The Earth is warming but physical evidence from around the world tells us that human-emitted CO₂ (carbon dioxide) has played only a minor role in it. Instead, the mild warming seems to be part of a natural 1,500-year climate cycle (plus or minus 500 years) that goes back at least one million years.

The cycle has been too long and too moderate for primitive peoples lacking thermometers to recount in their oral histories. But written evidence of climatic change does exist. The Romans had recorded a warming from about 200 B.C. to A.D. 600, registered mainly in the northward advance of grape growing in both Italy and Britain. Histories from both Europe and Asia tell us there was a Medieval Warming that lasted from about 900 to 1300; this period was also known as the Medieval Climate Optimum because of its mild winters, stable seasons, and lack of severe storms. Human histories also record the Little Ice Age, which lasted from about 1300 to 1850. But people thought each of these climatic shifts was a distinct event and not part of a continuing pattern.

This began to change in 1984 when Willi Dansgaard of Denmark and Hans Oeschger of Switzerland published their analysis of the oxygen isotopes in the first ice cores extracted from Greenland. These cores provided 250,000 years of the Earth's climate history in one set of "documents." The scientists compared the ratio of "heavy" oxygen-18 isotopes to the "lighter" oxygen-16 isotopes, which indicated the temperature at the time the snow had fallen. They expected to find evidence of the known 90,000-year ice ages and the mild interglacial periods recorded in the ice, and they did. However, they did not expect to find anything in between. To their surprise, they found a clear cycle—moderate, albeit abrupt—occurring about every 2,550 years running persistently through both. (This period would soon be reassessed at 1,500 years, plus or minus 500 years.)

By the mid-1980s, however, the First World had already convinced itself of the Greenhouse Theory and believed that puny human industries had grown powerful enough to change the planet's climate. There was little media interest in the frozen findings of obscure, parka-clad Ph.D.s in far-off Greenland.

A wealth of other evidence has emerged since 1984, however, corroborating Dansgaard and Oeschger's natural 1,500-year climate cycle:

• An ice core from the Antarctic's Vostok Glacier—at the other end of the world from Iceland—was brought up in 1987 and showed the same 1,500-year climate cycle throughout its 400,000-year length.

• The ice-core findings correlate with known advances and retreats in the glaciers of the Arctic, Europe, Asia, North America, Latin America, New Zealand, and the Antarctic.

• The 1,500-year cycle has been revealed in seabed sediment cores brought up from the floors of such far-flung waters as the North Atlantic Ocean and the Sargasso Sea, the South Atlantic Ocean and the Arabian Sea.

• Cave stalagmites from Ireland and Germany in the Northern Hemisphere to South Africa and New Zealand in the Southern Hemisphere show evidence of the Modern Warming, the Little Ice Age, the Medieval Warming, the Dark Ages, the Roman Warming, and the unnamed cold period before the Roman Warming.

• Fossilized pollen from across North America shows nine complete reorganizations of our trees and plants in the last 14,000 years, or one every 1,650 years.

• In both Europe and South America, archaeologists have evidence that prehistoric humans moved their homes and farms up mountainsides during the warming centuries and retreated back down during the cold ones.

The Earth continually warms and cools. The cycle is undeniable, ancient, often abrupt, and global. It is also unstoppable. Isotopes in the ice and sediment cores, ancient tree rings, and stalagmites tell us it is linked to small changes in the irradiance of the sun.

The temperature change is moderate. Temperatures at the latitude of New York and Paris moved about 2 degrees Celsius above the long-term mean during warmings, with increases of 3 degrees or more in the polar latitudes. During the cold phases of the cycle, temperatures dropped by similar amounts below the mean. Temperatures change little in lands at the equator, but rainfall often does.

The cycle shifts have occurred roughly on schedule whether CO₂ levels were high or low. Based on this 1,500-year cycle, the Earth is about 150 years into a moderate Modern Warming that will last for centuries longer. It will essentially restore the fine climate of the Medieval Climate Optimum.

The climate has been most stable during the warming phases. The "little ice ages" have been beset by more floods, droughts, famines, and storminess. Yet, despite all of this evidence, millions of well-educated people, many scientists, many respected organizations—even the national governments of major First World nations—are telling us that the Earth's current warming phase is caused by human-emitted CO₂and deadly dangerous. They ask society to renounce most of its use of fossil fuel-generated energy and accept radical reductions in food production, health technologies, and standards of living to "save the planet."

We have missed the predictive power of the 1,500-year climate cycle.

Will the fear of dangerous global warming lead society to accept draconian restrictions on the use of fertilizers, cars, and air conditioners?

Will people give up the scientific and technological advances that have added thirty years to life expectancies all over the globe in the last century?

Massive human sacrifices would be required to meet the CO₂ stabilization goals of the Kyoto Protocol. The treaty's "introductory offer" is a tiny 5 percent reduction in fossil fuel emissions from 1990 levels, but that would do almost nothing to forestall greenhouse warming of the planet. Saving the planet from man-made global warming was supposed to wait on Kyoto's yet-unspecified second stage, scheduled to begin in 2012.

In 1995, one U.S. environmentalist assessed the outlook: "According to the [United Nations] Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, an immediate 60 to 80 percent reduction in emissions is necessary just to stabilize atmospheric concentrations of CO₂—the minimum scientifically defensible goal for any climate strategy. Less-developed nations, with their relatively low emissions, will inevitably increase their use of fossil fuels as they industrialize and their populations expand. Thus heavily polluting regions like the [United States] will have to reduce their emissions even more [than 60 to 80 percent] for the world as a whole to meet this goal."

Humans use eighty million tons per year of nitrogen fertilizer to nourish their crops. The nitrogen is taken from the air (which is 78 percent N₂) through an industrial process generally fueled by natural gas. In 1900, before industrial nitrogen fertilizer, the world could support only 1.5 billion people, at a far lower standard of living, and was clearing huge tracts of forest to get more cropland.

Suppose the world went all-organic in its farming, gave up the man-made fertilizer, and cleared half of the world's remaining forests for more low-yield crops. It's reasonable to expect that half the world's wildlife species would be lost in the land clearing and one-fourth of the world's people would succumb to malnutrition. What if research then confirmed that the climate was warming due to the natural cycle instead of CO₂? Is that a no-regrets climate insurance policy?

What if the Kyoto treaty or some similar arrangement prevented the Third World from moving away from using wood for heating and cooking? How much additional forest would then be sacrificed for firewood in the developing countries over the next fifty years?

The stakes in the global warming debate are huge. Humanity and wildlife may both be losing the debate.

DOES A 1,500-YEAR CLIMATE CYCLE RULE OUR EARTH?

Greenhouse Warming Advocates Say:

"Nineteen ninety-nine was the most violent year in the modern history of weather. So was 1998. So was 1997. And 1996.... A nine-hundred-year-long cooling trend has been suddenly and decisively reversed in the past fifty years.... Scientists predicted that the Earth will shortly be warmer than it has been in millions of years. A climatological nightmare is upon us. It is almost certainly the most dangerous thing that has ever happened in our history."

"Climate extremes would trigger meteorological chaos—raging hurricanes such as we have never seen, capable of killing millions of people; uncommonly long, record-breaking heat waves; and profound drought that could drive Africa and the entire Indian subcontinent over the edge into mass starvation."

"From sweltering heat to rising sea levels, global warming's effects have already begun.... We know where most heat-trapping gases come from: power plants and vehicles. And we know how to limit their emissions."

"Such policies like cutting energy use by more than 50 percent can contribute powerfully to the material salvation of the planet from mankind's greed and indifference."

"No matter if the science of global warming is all phony ... climate change [provides] the greatest opportunity to bring about justice and equality in the world."

Reality-Based Skeptics Say:

"The study, appearing in the March 21 issue of the journal Science, analyzed ancient tree rings from 14 sites on three continents in the northern hemisphere and concluded that temperatures in an era known as the Medieval Warm Period some 800 to 1,000 years ago closely matched the warming trend of the 20th century."

"I want to encourage the committee to be suspicious of media reports in which weather extremes are given as proof of human-induced climate change. Weather extremes occur somewhere all the time. For example, in the year 2000 in the 48 coterminous states, the U.S. experienced the coldest combined November and December in 106 years.... The intensity and frequency of hurricanes have not increased. The intensity and frequency of tornados have not increased.... Droughts and wet spells have not statistically increased or decreased."

"Hurricanes, brutal cold fronts and heat waves, ice storms and tornadoes, cycles of flood and drought, and earthquakes and volcanic eruptions are not unforeseeable interruptions of normality. Rather, these extremes are the way that the planet we live on does its business. Hurricanes, in some parts of the world, provide a third of the average annual rainfall. What we call "climate" is really an average of extremes of heat and cold, precipitation and drought.... [A]ll the evidence from paleoclimatology and geology suggests that over the long haul, the extremes we face will be substantially greater than even the strongest in our brief historical record."

"[T]he number of major [Chinese] floods averaged fewer than four per century in the warm period of the ninth through eleventh centuries, while the average number was more than double that figure in the fourteenth through seventeenth centuries of the Mini Ice Age."

The Purpose of This Book

The purpose of this book is to offer the relatively new but already convincing evidence of a moderate, irregular 1,500-year sun-driven cycle that governs most of the Earth's almost-constant climate fluctuations.

The Earth has recently been warming. This is beyond doubt. It has warmed slowly and erratically—for a total of about 0.8 degrees Celsius—since 1850. It had one surge of warming from 1850 to 1870 and another from 1920 to 1940. However, when we correct the thermometer records for the effects of growing urban heat islands and widespread intensification of land use, and for the recently documented cooling of the Antarctic continent over the past thirty years, overall world temperatures today are only modestly warmer than they were in 1940, despite a major increase in human CO₂ emissions.

The real question is not whether the Earth is warming but why and by how much.

We have a large faction of intensely interested persons who say the warming is man-made, and dangerous. They say it is driven by releases of greenhouse gases such as CO₂ from power plants and autos, and methane from rice paddies and cattle herds. The activists tell us that modern society will destroy the planet; that unless we radically change human energy production and consumption, the globe will become too warm for farming and the survival of wild species. They warn that the polar ice caps could melt, raising sea levels and flooding many of the world's most important cities and farming regions.

However, they don't have much evidence to support their position—only (1) the fact that the Earth is warming, (2) a theory that doesn't explain the warming of the past 150 years very well, and (3) some unverified computer models. Moreover, their credibility is seriously weakened by the fact that many of them have long believed modern technology should be discarded whether the Earth is warming too fast or not at all.

Many scientists—though by no means all—agree that increased CO₂emissions could be dangerous. However, polls of climate-qualified scientist show that many doubt the scary predictions of the global computer models.

This book cites the work of many hundreds of researchers, authors, and coauthors whose work testifies to the 1,500-year cycle. There is no "scientific consensus," as global warming advocates often claim. Nor is consensus important to science. Galileo may have been the only man of his day who believed the Earth revolved around the sun, but he was right! Science is the process of developing theories and testing them against observations until they are proven true or false.

If we can find proof, not just that the Earth is warming, but that it is warming to dangerous levels due to human-emitted greenhouse gases, public policy will then have to evaluate such potential remedies as banning autos and air conditioners. So far, we have no such evidence.

If the warming is natural and unstoppable, then public policy must focus instead on adaptations—such as more efficient air conditioning and building dikes around low-lying areas like Bangladesh. We have the warming. Now we must ascertain its cause.

THE STORY OF THE 1,500-YEAR CLIMATE CYCLE

Carefully retrieved ice cores now reveal 900,000 years of the planet's climate changes. The information in the ice layers is being supplemented by such scientific breakthroughs as solar-monitoring satellites and mass spectrometer measurements of oxygen and carbon isotopes. These are allowing the Earth itself to tell us about its own climate history.

The ice cores say the newly understood 1,500-year cycle has dominated Earth's climate during the 11,000 years since the last ice age. Moreover, its fingerprints are being found all over the world, stretching through previous ice ages and interglacials.

We'll cover the evidence that past climate cycles such as the Medieval Warming and the Little Ice Age were truly global, not just Europe-only events as some man-made warming advocates have suggested. Our search for evidence will carry us from European castles to Chinese orange groves to Japanese cherry blossom viewings, from Saharan lakes to Andean glaciers and a South African cave.

No single climate proxy is totally equal to having thermometer records from the Middle Ages or ancient Rome. Tree rings reflect not only temperature and sunlight but also other factors that affect the tree, including rainfall, the number of competing trees, tree insects, and diseases. Borehole temperature signals become fainter as they go deeper.

Individually, each piece of proxy evidence could be questioned. That's why we'll examine a broad array of them, widespread in their geography, and almost dizzying in their variety.

We'll examine lots of tree rings, ice cores, and seabed sediments because they're the most important long-record proxies and among the most accurate, if properly treated. We'll also look at peat bogs full of antique organic residues; stalagmites from caves where varying amounts of moisture and minerals from the surface have dripped for century after century; coral reefs whose tiny creators have left behind clues to the sea temperatures while they were working; and ancient iron dust that betrays huge droughts.

We'll check out the reasons why many people today fear global warming. This fear of warm weather comes in dramatic contrast to our forebears—who loved warming climates and hated the mini-ice ages.

After all, it was during the cooling Dark Ages that the Roman and Mayan empires collapsed, after they had thrived during a warming that was hotter than it is today. And, it was during the cold of the Little Ice Age that Europe had its worst-ever floods and famines.

EARTH'S CLIMATE LINK TO THE SUN

Humans have known about a link between Earth's climate cycles and solar variability for more than four hundred years because of sunspot variations. Most dramatically, the Maunder Sunspot Minimum occurred from 1640 to 1710, when there were virtually no sunspots at all for some seventy years. That marked the sun's weakest recent moment—and that was the very coldest point in the Little Ice Age. Observers have also known that sunspot cycles that lasted longer than the average eleven years (the variation is eight to fourteen years) produce warmer temperatures on Earth. What our ancestors didn't know was how the solar-Earth climate link functioned.

Until the age of satellites, we didn't even know that tiny cycles of variation in the sun's irradiance existed. Until recently, scientists spoke of the "solar constant." Now, measuring from outside the clouds and gases of the Earth's atmosphere, we find that the sun's intensity varies by fractions of a percentage point.

Until 2001, the global warming debate was what a lawyer would call a "he-said/she-said" controversy. The science for man-made global warming looked weak. The science for solar-driven climate cycles on Earth looked more plausible, but was inconclusive.

But on 16 November 2001, the journal Science published a report on elegant research, done by unimpeachable scientists, giving us the Earth's climate history for the past 32,000 years—along with our climate's linkage to the sun. The late Gerard Bond and a team from the Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory published "Persistent Solar Influence on North Atlantic Climate during the Holocene."

Science's Richard Kerr wrote:

Paleo-oceanographer Gerard Bond and his colleagues report that the climate of the northern North Atlantic has warmed and cooled nine times in the past 12,000 years in step with the waxing and waning of the sun.

"It really looks like the sun has mattered to climate," says glaciologist Richard Alley of Pennsylvania State University.... "The Bond et al., data are sufficiently convincing that [solar variability] is now the leading hypothesis to explain the roughly 1,500-year oscillation of the climate seen since the last ice age, including the Little Ice Age of the 17th century," says Alley.

Bond's sun-climate correlation rests on a rare combination of long, continuous, and highly detailed records of both climate change and solar activity. The climate record is Bond's well-known and laborious accounting of the microscopic bits of rock dropped by melting icebergs onto the floor of the northern North Atlantic over thousands of years.

Bond and his team found that the amounts of debris increased in abundance every 1,500 years (give or take 500) as the ice was carried farther out into a temporarily colder Atlantic. During the last Ice Age's coldest spells, huge amounts of ice were carried clear across the Atlantic's polar region and south as far as Ireland.

Bond's linkages to solar activity are the carbon-14 isotopes in tree rings and beryllium-10 isotopes in the Greenland ice cores. The carbon and beryllium isotopes are linked to solar activity through the intensity of solar-modulated cosmic rays, and are produced when cosmic rays strike the upper atmosphere. (Oxygen isotopes found in ice cores reveal past temperatures.)

The startling element of Bond's results is the close correlation found when the global temperatures and solar-strength records are laid next to each other.

How Does the Sun Change Our Climate?

How does a tiny change in the sun's irradiance make a big difference in the Earth's climate? First of all, we know that the linkage exists and is powerful, which puts the solar cycle far ahead of the Greenhouse Theory.

We now have strong, new scientific evidence of how the linkage works. The key amplifier is cosmic rays. The sun sends out a "solar wind" that protects the Earth from some of the cosmic rays bombarding the rest of the universe. When the sun is weak, however, more of the cosmic rays get through to the Earth's atmosphere. There, they ionize air molecules and create cloud nuclei. These nuclei then produce low, wet clouds that reflect solar radiation back into outer space. This cools the Earth.

Researchers using neutron chambers to measure the cosmic rays have recently found that changes in Earth's cosmic ray levels are correlated with the number and size of such cooling clouds.

The second amplifier is ozone chemistry in the atmosphere. When the sun is more active, more of its ultraviolet rays hit the Earth's atmosphere, shattering more oxygen (O₂) molecules—some of which reform into ozone (O₃). The additional ozone molecules absorb more of the near-UV radiation from the sun, increasing temperatures in the atmosphere. Computer models indicate that a 0.1 percent change in the sun's radiation could cause a 2 percent change in the Earth's ozone concentration, affecting atmospheric heat and circulation.

INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON

CLIMATE CHANGE CHARGES MAN-MADE WARMING

What about the claim of the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC): that they've found a "human fingerprint" in the current global warming?

That statement was inserted in the executive summary of the IPCC's 1996 report for political, not scientific, reasons. Then the "science volume" was edited to take out five different statements—all of which had been approved by the panel's scientific consultants—specifically saying no such "human fingerprint" had been found.

The author of the IPCC science chapter, a U.S. government employee, publicly admitted making the scientifically indefensible "back room" changes. He was under pressure from top U.S. government officials to do so.

THE FAILURES OF THE GREENHOUSE THEORY

Let's quickly review the shortcomings of the Greenhouse Theory for explaining known realities.

First, and most obvious, CO₂ changes do not account for the highly variable climate we know the Earth has recently had, including the Roman Warming, the Dark Ages, the Medieval Warming, and the Little Ice Age. However, these variations fit into the 1,500-year cycle very well.

Second, the Greenhouse Theory does not explain recent temperature changes. Most of the current warming occurred before 1940, before there was much human-generated CO₂in the air. After 1940, temperatures declined until 1975 or so, despite a huge surge in industrial CO₂during that period. These events run counter to the CO₂theory, but they are in accord with the 1,500-year cycle.

Third, the early and supposedly most powerful increases in atmospheric CO₂ have not produced the frightening planetary overheating that the theory and climate models told us to expect. We must discount future increments of CO₂ in the atmosphere, because each increment of CO₂ increase produces less warming than the unit before it. The amounts of CO₂ already added to the atmosphere must already have "used up" much—and perhaps most—of CO₂'s forcing capability.

Fourth, we must discount the "official" temperature record to reflect the increased size and intensity of today's urban heat islands, where most of the official thermometers are located. We must take account of the changes in rural land use (forests cleared for farming and pastures, more intensive row-crop and irrigated farming) that affect soil moisture and temperatures. When meteorological experts reconstructed U.S. official temperatures "without cities and crops"—using more accurate data from satellites and high-altitude weather balloons—about half of the recent "official" warming disappeared.

Fifth, the Earth's surface thermometers have recently warmed faster than the temperature readings in the lower atmosphere up to 30,000 feet. Yet the Greenhouse Theory says that CO₂will warm the lower atmosphere first, and then the atmospheric heat will radiate to the Earth's surface. This is not happening.

Figure 1.1 [not shown in excerpt] shows the very moderate trend in the satellite readings over the past two decades, totaling 0.125 degrees Celsius per decade. The short-term temperature spike in 1998 was one of the strongest El Niño events in recent centuries, but its effect quickly dissipated, as always happens with El Niños.

A reconstruction of weather-balloon temperature readings at two meters above the Earth's surface (1979-1996) shows a trend increase of only 0.015 degree Celsius per decade. Nor can we project even that slow increase over the coming centuries, since the 1,500-year cycles have often achieved half of their total warming in their first few decades, followed by erratic warmings and coolings like those we've recorded since 1920.

Sixth, CO₂ for at least 240,000 years has been a lagging indicator of global warming, not a causal factor. Within the last 15 years, the ice cores have revealed that temperatures and CO₂ levels have tracked closely together during the warmings after each of Earth's last three ice age glaciations. However, the CO₂ changes have lagged about 800 years behind the temperature changes. Global warming has produced more CO₂, rather than more CO₂ producing global warming. This accords with the reality that the oceans hold the vast majority of the planet's carbon, and the laws of physics let cold oceans hold more CO₂ gas than warm oceans.

Seventh, the Greenhouse Theory predicts that CO₂-driven warming of the Earth's surface will start, and be strongest, in the North and South Polar regions. This is not happening either. A broadly scattered set of meteorological stations and ocean buoys show that temperature readings in the Arctic, Greenland, and the seas around them are colder today than in the 1930s. Alaska has been warming, but researchers say this is due to the recent warming of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), not a broader Arctic warming pattern. The twenty to thirty year cycle of the PDO seems to have recently reversed again, so Alaska may now cool with the rest of the Arctic.

In the Antarctic, only the thin finger of the Antarctic Peninsula, which juts up toward Argentina (and the equator) has been warming. Temperatures over the other 98 percent of the Antarctic continent have been declining slowly since the 1960s, according to a broad array of Antarctic surface stations and satellite measurements.

Eighth, the scary predictions of planetary overheating require that the warming effect of additional CO₂ be amplified by increased water vapor in the atmosphere. Warming will indeed lift more moisture from the oceans into the air. But what if the moister, warmer air increases the efficiency of rainfall, and leaves the upper atmosphere as dry, or even dryer, than it was before? We have absolutely no evidence to demonstrate that the upper atmosphere is retaining more water vapor to amplify the CO₂.

To the contrary, a team of researchers from NASA and MIT recently discovered a huge vertical heat vent in the Earth's atmosphere. It apparently increases the efficiency of rainfall when sea surface temperatures rise above 28¡ C. This effect seems to be big enough to vent all the heat the models predict would be generated by a doubling of CO₂.

In 2001, NASA issued a press release about the heat vent discovery and the failure of the climate models to duplicate it but it attracted little media attention.

THE INHERENT DANGERS OF THE KYOTO PROTOCOL

Early in my career, I served as a missionary in Africa. I lived upcountry with people who did not have access to useful energy.... I watched as women walked in the early morning to the forest edge, often several miles away, to chop wet green wood for fuel.... They became beasts of burden as they carried the wood on their backs on the return trip home.... Burning wood and dung inside the homes for cooking and heat created a dangerously polluted indoor atmosphere for the family. I always thought that if each home could be fitted with an electric light bulb and a microwave oven electrified by a coal-fired power plant, several good things would happen. The women would be freed to work on other, more productive, pursuits. The indoor air would be much cleaner so health would improve. Food could be prepared more safely. There would be light for reading and advancement. Information through television or radio would be received. And the forest with its beautiful ecosystem could be saved.

The Kyoto Protocol will likely cost at least $150 billion a year, and possibly much more. UNICEF estimates that just $70-80 billion a year could give all Third World inhabitants access to the basics like health, education, water and sanitation.

The Kyoto Protocol would probably double First World energy costs before 2012, and might quadruple them after that year. Kyoto would thus impair or even cancel out the enormous beneficial effects of technology in people's lives.

The myths of "free" wind and solar power continue to fascinate journalists and activists. Kyoto proponents assert that "renewable" energy sources will not only be adequate for the needs of modern society, but the shift from fossil fuels to solar and wind will "create jobs." This is like claiming that repairing a broken window makes us richer; instead, it just gets us back to where we had been. A shift to renewable fuels would certainly create jobs, but it would also require time and talents that could have produced additional well-being.

Energy experts note that wind and solar power are not very reliable; they are only generated when the wind is right or the sun is shining, and they are difficult to store. Backup nonrenewable power plants are needed in "spinning reserve" so the traffic lights and hospital operating theaters don't go dark. Despite decades of heavy subsidies, solar and wind power provide only about 0.5 percent of current U.S. electricity, and almost none of our transport energy.

Solar and wind are still four to ten times as expensive as fossil and nuclear energy sources. Shifting to "renewables" would also force us to convert hundreds of millions of forest and wildlands acres to windmill farms, solar panel arrays, biofuel crops, and the like.

In fact, a team of energy experts from various academic, government, and private sector research units said in a 2002 "Science Compass" article for the journal Science, that it would be a Herculean task to replace the fossil energy supplies any time soon.

The biggest problem is that the world's current 12 trillion watt-hours of energy used per year (85 percent of it fossil-fueled) will need to be expanded to 22-42 trillion over the next fifty years in order to accommodate the world's growing population and provide economic growth for developing countries.

Energy experts say that even nuclear power will not be enough, due to a shortage of uranium ore. We will need safe nuclear breeder reactors and, ultimately, fusion power. That means developing very expensive energy technology we don't yet have.

Modern technology has also been humanity's strongest environmental conservation tool. For thousands of years, humans lived by preying on wildlife. Then we invented farming, and took most of the world's good land away from Nature for crops and pastures. Only in the past half-century has most of the world adopted the high-yield farming that permits more food to be grown per farming acre. That high-yield farming has forestalled the need to plow down millions more square miles of forests. Without the nitrogen captured from the air by fertilizer factories powered by natural gas, we'd have to clear the world's remaining forests for low-yield crops—tomorrow.

The rural half of India's population is scouring its forests daily for scarce firewood, and cutting trees it doesn't replant. India's demand for firewood is likely to double again by 2020.

Most of the Third World is already in the most polluting phase of industrial development, with grimy cities burning huge amounts of coal and smelting lots of iron for heavy machinery. The Third World needs economic growth, not another Great Depression, to move up to the cleaner industries and technologies used by the First World.

World Bank researchers have now concluded that, while the early stages of economic growth are harmful to the environment, the later stages of economic growth are environmentally constructive. Incomes above $5,000 to $8,000 per capita, where Brazil and Malaysia are today, trigger more investments in air and water cleanup and high-yield farming. They also bring massive reductions in industrial emissions, and the creation of more parks and wildlife preserves that are actually policed to protect the wildlife.

Bjorn Lomborg, author of The Skeptical Environmentalist, recently convened a panel of leading economists to propose the most effective ways the world could use $50 billion to benefit humankind. The panel was cosponsored by the Danish government and The Economist. This "Copenhagen Consensus" recommended that the money be spent, first, on combatting new cases of AIDS ($27 billion); second, on reducing iron deficiency anemia in women and children through food supplements ($12 billion); third, on controlling the malaria ($13 billion) that afflicts 300 million people and kills 2.7 million annually. (The malaria control will necessarily involve the indoor use of DDT as a mosquito insecticide.) The Copenhagen panel's fourth spending priority was on agricultural research to sustainably raise crop yields and ease the competition for land between people and wildlife.

The Copenhagen Consensus ranked the Kyoto Protocol sixteenth out of seventeen proposed ways to use the money. The panelists said Kyoto's costs would outweigh its benefits—even though they assumed significant warming driven by CO₂. If they had been aware of the physical evidence endorsing the 1,500-year climate cycle, they might have ranked Kyoto even lower.

"The panel's findings are a reproach to many European leaders and to left-wing environmentalists, health activists, and anti-globalists, whose sloganeering has dominated much of the discussion of global welfare issues," wrote syndicated columnist James Glassman. "This report—sober, nonpartisan, and compassionate, with an emphasis on sound science and economic cost-benefit analysis—makes the noisy radicals look foolish."

We don't necessarily subscribe to the rankings of the Copenhagen Consensus but agree that the Kyoto Protocol should be near the bottom.

WHY FEAR GLOBAL WARMING?

History, science, and our own instincts tell us that cold is more frightening than warmth. It is a psychological mystery why comfortable First World residents, armed for the first time in all of history's warmings with air conditioning, have chosen to fear "global warming."

Of course, the advocates of man-made warming have attempted to bolster a scientifically weak case with a number of essentially baseless scary scenarios.

Rising Sea Levels Will Flood Cities and Cropland, and Submerge Islands

Judging from measurements made on corals, sea levels have been rising steadily since the peak of the last Ice Age about 18,000 years ago. The total rise since then has been four hundred feet. The sea levels rose fastest during the Holocene Climate Optimum, when the major ice sheets covering Eurasia and North America melted away. For the last 5,000 years or so, the rate of rise has been about seven inches per century. Tide gauge data from the past century show a rise of about six inches—even after the strong warming between period 1920 and 1940.

When the climate warms, ocean waters expand and glaciers melt, so sea levels rise. But a warmer ocean evaporates more water, some of which ends up as snow and ice on Greenland and on the Antarctic continent, and that makes sea levels fall. More warming and more evaporation are adding ice to the Antarctic ice cap. Thus, there is no reason to expect any big acceleration of sea level increase in the twenty-first century. Researchers say it would take another 7,000 years to melt the West Antarctic Ice Sheet—a small fraction of all the ice—and we're almost sure to get another ice age before then.

More than a Million of the World's Wild Species Will Go Extinct in the Next Century

We know that species can adapt to abrupt global warming because the climate shifts in the 1,500-year cycle have often been abrupt. Moreover, the world's species have already survived at least six hundred such warmings and coolings in the past million years.

The major effect of global warming will be more biodiversity in our forests, as most trees, plants, birds, and animals extend their ranges. This is already happening. Some biologists claim that a further warming of 0.8 degrees Celsius will destroy thousands of species. However, the Earth warmed much more than that during the Holocene Climate Optimum, which occurred 8,000 to 5,000 years ago, and no known species were driven extinct by the temperature increase.

There Will Be More Hunger and Famine as Fields Become Too Hot to Grow Crops

High-tech farming, not climate, has governed the world's overall food production since the seventeenth century. There will be little temperature change in the tropics, where food production is still inadequate. The northern plains in Canada and in Russia will become warmer, and will produce more food. Modern society can help make tropical farming high-tech, or transport more food from Siberia to people with new nonfarm jobs in India or Nigeria. Any famines will be humanity's fault, not the fault of the climate.

There Will Be More Storms and Worse Storms with Global Warming

There has been no increase in the frequency or severity of hurricanes, blizzards, cyclones, tornadoes, or any other kind of storms during the warming of the past 150 years. That makes sense, because storms are driven by the temperature differential between the equator and the polar regions. Since greenhouse warming should boost the temperatures at the poles much more than at the equator, warming will reduce the differential and moderate the storms. History and paleontology tell us the warmings have experienced better, more stable weather than the coolings.

Global Warming Will Trigger Abrupt Global Cooling

The warming activists claim that increased meltwater due to higher temperatures could overwhelm the Great Atlantic Conveyor, the huge ocean current that distributes heat from the equator to the poles. The Gulf Stream would then shut down, and we would all be covered in ice before you can say "carbon dioxide." It happened once before—but then the world had trillions of additional tons of ice in Canadian and Siberian ice sheets for the warming to melt. The climate models—surprise!—tell us that it won't happen during the Modern Warming, because the Earth doesn't have enough ice left.

Human Death Tolls Will Rise with the Heat, Insects, and Disease of Global Warming

Freezing weather kills far more people than hot weather, and there'll be less freezing winter weather during the Modern Warming. As for mosquito-borne diseases, window screens and insecticides wiped out most of the world's malaria and yellow fever, not cold weather. The world's biggest malaria outbreak was in Russia in the 1920s.

Coral Reefs Will Die Out with Warming

Many coral reefs have "bleached" (lost the algae that live in symbiotic partnership with them) when sea temperatures rose. But they also bleach when temperatures fall. That's because the corals partner with the algae varieties best adapted to their current temperature. When the water warms, they eject their cold-water partners and welcome warmer-weather friends, and vice versa. That's how they have survived for millions of climate-varied years.

FEAR THE NEXT ICE AGE

The climate event that deserves real concern is the next Big Ice Age. That is inevitably approaching, though it may still be thousands of years away. When it comes, temperatures may plummet 15 degrees Celsius, with the high latitudes getting up to 40 degrees colder. Humanity and food production will be forced closer to the equator, as huge ice sheets expand in Canada, Scandinavia, Russia, and Argentina. Even Ohio and Indiana may gradually be encased in mile-thick ice, while California and the Great Plains could suffer century-long drought.

Keeping warm will become the critical issue, both night and day. Getting enough food for eight or nine billion people from the relatively small amount of arable land left unfrozen will be a potentially desperate effort. The broad, fertile plains of Alberta and the Ukraine will become sub-Arctic wastes. Wildlife species will be extremely challenged, even though they've survived such cold before—because this time there will be more humans competing for the ice-free land.

That's when human knowledge and high-tech farming will be truly needed.

In contrast, none of the scary scenarios posited by today's global warming advocates took place during the Earth's past warm periods.

Why have humans chosen to panic about the planet returning to what is very probably the finest climate the planet has known in all its millions of years? Is it simply guilt because climate alarmists told us we humans were causing the change?

If so, then it becomes all the more important to check their evidence.


[Footnotes have been omitted.]

_____________________________________________


To go to our full review, or to go to purchase the book, CLICK HERE.

__________________________________________________


From Unstoppable Global Warming by S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery. Copyright © 2007 by the authors and reprinted here by permission of the publisher.


CLICK HERE TO GO NOW TO PURCHASE BOOK

A slap in the face

That's right. The administration took a new policy - the Literacy Selection Process - and turned the policy against district taxpayers.

Like a child trying to prove a point after being reprimanded, the district creates a new reading list full of nonsense and non-selections. In fact, they once again choose one of the controversial books that caused this whole mess in the first place. Why? To prove something; to prove that they know best. The parents and community standards be damned.

What is the end goal for the book selections? Is it to challenge students, or is it to indoctrinate? Based on the rationale given, the goal of the selection process is indoctrination. The selection committee bases its decisions on its own curriculum; a curriculum based on social engineering, not achievement. See if you can find the selection rationale in the district's approved curriculum.

The end result? 37% of Olentangy graduates require remediation at state colleges and universities. Don't believe me? Read the reports put out by the Ohio Board of Regents.

Go ahead; complain to your board of education. They will sit dumbfounded, waiting for the superintendent to respond for them. [1] Your only hope is to contact the superintendent and ask why the slap in the face? Why the change in stance from last year?

What a waste of student potential! What a waste of tax dollars! What a shame!



Note:

Attend a board meeting and note where the superintendent sits. Not off to the side as a policy advisor, but right up front next to the board president.

Education vs. Democracy, and a MS Principal

The Foundation for Economics Education (FEE) is a wonderful source of insightful articles. They publish a daily email newsletter In Brief that addresses current issues with reasoned counter arguments.

Today's In Brief included the FEE Timely Classic, Education vs. Democracy by Sheldon Richman.

Two quotes from the article are worthy of reflection:

Government schools, in other words, are not the agents of parents and their children. Others besides them pay and therefore help call the tune. That inevitably turns the schools into laboratories for social engineering. No parent would want children's shoe stores run that way. It is hard to believe that's the education system parents would choose, given a free choice.

Democratic control of schools, then, necessarily usurps parents' child-raising authority. The big decisions—such as the selection of schools and curricula—are made by others. Whatever the intentions, government schools rob families of essential freedom and responsibility. From any standpoint, it cannot be good for parents to bring children into the world expecting someone else to educate them. Considering that the most critical factor in the success or failure of children's education is the family, a school system that devitalizes families would seem a particularly self-defeating institution.

And ...

Since a majority vote of school-board members decides those controversies, parents represented by members voting in the minority are effectively disfranchised. They must abide by the majority decision. Even if they take their children out of the schools, they must go on paying for a system they abhor.

The first quote is timely given the recent incident involving an Olentangy principal.[1] As a fallen people, no one is immune from such behaviors. Though, it is important to stress the fact the school employees are not experts in raising children; no one is. We are all struggling and praying that our decisions lead to happy, healthy adult children.

Though they portray themselves as experts on raising your children, administrators and staff have simply fallen for the conceit of omniscience; a malady that befalls many in public service. The person sitting across the table or desk, discussing your child, is nothing other than a neighbor or fellow resident. They do not possess any more knowledge of your child than you do. For any administrator or teacher to imply otherwise is as foolish as it is harmful.

note:

[1] I personally pray that the ills that have grabbed the aforementioned principal are healed. And, that he can make amends where amends are due. I have great compassion for the failings of men and women. However, I have no compassion for one who is awakened daily by the desire to push nonsense into the minds of children. The principal in his current state is the man on the road to Jericho, while the staff member inculcating nonsense is the one whose dust you shake off your shoes.

Austrian Micro and Macro

The Ludwig von Mises Institute recently posted two interesting working papers - academic papers not in final form and not ready for publication, yet available for review.

Sean Corrigan provides a lively Austrian overview of macroeconomics, concentrating on the Austrian Business Cycle Theory. Corrigan is Chief Investment Strategist for Diapason Commodities Management, Lausanne & London. Read and enjoy.

Professor John Egger of Towson University tackles Austrian microeconomics in another lively read.

Mises.org has many working papers that provide insights into Austrian Economics. These papers are alway interesting.

How income tax works?

The following expanation of how income tax works comes from Manuel Lora over at Vangardist.org

Sometimes politicians, journalists and others exclaim; "It's just a tax cut for the rich!" and it is just accepted to be fact. But what does that really mean? Just in case you are not completely clear on this issue, I hope the following will help. Please read it carefully.

Let's put tax cuts in terms everyone can understand. Suppose that every day, ten men go out for dinner and the bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:

The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay $1.
The sixth would pay $3.
The seventh would pay $7.
The eighth would pay $12.
The ninth would pay $18.
The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.

So, that's what they decided to do. The ten men ate dinner in the restaurant every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve.

"Since you are all such good customers," he said, "I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily meal by $20." Dinner for the ten now cost just $80.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected. They would still eat for free. But what about the other six men; the paying customers? How could they divide the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his 'fair share?' They realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to eat their meal. So the restaurant owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.

And so:
The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).
The sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33% savings).
The seventh now paid $5 instead of $7 (28% savings).
The eighth now paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings).
The ninth now paid $14 instead of $18 (22% savings).
The tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).

Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to eat for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings.

"I only got a dollar out of the $20," declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man, "but he got $10!"

"Yeah, that's right," exclaimed the fifth man. "I only saved a dollar, too. It's unfair that he got ten times more than me!"

"That's true!!" shouted the seventh man. "Why should he get $10 back when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!"

"Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison. "We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!"

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.

The next night the tenth man didn't show up for dinner, so the nine sat down and ate without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn't have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill!

And that, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start eating overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.

EIA Video Intercept - April 2007

Mike Antonucci of the Education Intellegence Agency covers the education beat like no other reporter, especially concentrating on the foibles of the local, state, and national teachers' unions for over a decade. And just recently, Mike has discovered YouTube.

Mike writes for anyone interested in the political machinations and hypocrisies that are the NEA and AFT at every level. His weekly Communiqué is worthwhile reading for anyone interested in this aspect of public education; union members included. Simply subscribe and enjoy.

This month's EIA Video Intercept exposes the salaries of the nation's union heads - note that the NEA head is paid the highest of any national union leader.

Free movie from Libertarian Party of Delaware County, Ohio

The movie sounds interesting. Though, at this point, I have to say that I do not agree with its legal conclusions. Regardless, it would be interesting to see what Russo has to offer. And, its free!

- Jim Fedako

News Release
March 28, 2007
For Immediate Distribution

Contact: Robert Butler
O:(740) 204-3036 C:(614) 805-8292
Libertarian Party of Delaware County
3982 Powell Rd. Suite 136
Powell OH 43065
http://lpdel.org
http://www.freedomtofascism.com/

Income Taxes Are Voluntary Say Prominent Officials in Aaron Russo's America:
Freedom to Fascism

When
Thursday, April 12, 2007
7:00 PM - 10:00 PM

Where
The Strand Theatre
28 E Winter St
Delaware, Ohio 43015

In Aaron Russo's America: Freedom to Fascism, Presidential candidate and current US Congressman Ron Paul (R-TX), FBI agents, and even the IRS admit that there is no law enforcing mandatory filing of income taxes for American wage-earners.

The film will be shown on Thursday, April 12, 7PM at the Strand Theatre in downtown Delaware by the Libertarian Party of Delaware County.

Russo, who has won an Oscar, Emmy, and Tony over the last 30 years working with actors like Dustin Hoffman, Eddie Murphy, and Bette Midler, presents interviews with an impressive range of government officials, IRS special agents , FBI officers, politicians, and tax attorneys who have researched and subsequently campaigned against the Federal Reserve Act and thus reveals why the IRS is an illegal foundation.

According to the movie, the income tax does not meet either criteria of Constitutionally legal taxation in America, that is direct apportioned tax or indirect uniform tax. The IRS claims that the 16th Amendment allowed for a third form of taxation, however, the Supreme Court ruling on the amendment states that it allows for no new forms of taxation. More Supreme Court cases in the same period confirm the same conclusion. The 16th Amendment did not allow the Federal Government to levy a new tax, thus there is no Constitutional basis for the income tax.

"I wouldn't have believed it myself if I hadn't seen the movie," remarks LP Del Chair Robert Butler. "Even the Commissioner of the IRS can't point to a law that authorizes the income tax for individual workers."

This event is free, sponsored by the Libertarian Party of Delaware County.

http://www.freedomtofascism.com/

How to improve Amtrak?

How would you go about improving Amtrak? To believe some, the solution is as simple as paying the unionized employees of Amtrak more. Sure, you couch the salary increases in talk of additional resources to address deficiencies, but the end result is the same; higher wages for those who are currently not performing.

We all recognize that the government cannot run a railroad; never could, never will. Yet, many somehow believe that government can run a monopolized system of education. Hey, if government can't run a railroad, what makes you think it can run schools? Well, of course government can't; never could - as evident, and never will.

To believe the spin, the solution to public education is the same as the solution to Amtrak; pay the current employees more. Simple solution, yet it is as ineffective as it is expensive.

There is no market for teachers with 15+ years of experience. Why? Their salary exceeds their value product. If you think I'm not correct, then find some job postings for someone with 15 years of teaching experience. In fact, other school districts are not in the market for that very same skill set.

At contract negotiations time, a school district will generate salary comparisons between itself and other local districts. District A will note that District B is paying its teachers with 20 years of experience a higher wage. So, District A will state that it has to increase salaries to match the local market for teachers with such experience. The point of this exercise is to justify salary increases in a monopolized system. But, by its own actions, District A shows that it does not even respect its own salary structure.

You see, District A would never hire a teacher with 20 years of experience at the district's negotiated rate for 20 years of experience. District A may hire the teacher and credit him or her with only ten years of experience. The reason: The district recognizes that the teacher's value product - that which he or she will produce - in not worth the salary earned by current teachers with 20 years of experience. The district recognizes that there is no additional benefit for those ten years of experience; yet the district has a salary structure that says otherwise. And, the district negotiates otherwise.

Remember, the teacher with five years of experience teaches the same 19 or so students as the teacher with 15+ years of experience. The teacher with greater experience is not producing more, he or she is simply costing more. Certainly, some reader will cite studies that show experience equals greater academic outcomes. While that is true for the first five years of a teacher's career, it is not true beyond year five. The teacher with 30 years of experience is no more productive than the teacher with six years experience; same number of students, same academic outcomes.

Now, don't get me started on the bogus claims that additional post-graduate credits improves educational outcomes. Paying a teacher more for taking multiple online post-graduate courses that are only tangentially associated with the subject matter he or she teaches is an absolute waste of tax dollars.

And, let's not to forget, administrators negotiate with the unions and benefit from any increase since administrative salary increases are usually tied to the teachers' negotiated agreement. The more that the teachers get, the more that the taxpayers' representatives in the negotiations - the administrators - receive. Hmmm, conflict of interest?!?

Improve Amtrak by raising salaries is as nutty as raising teacher salaries - and requisite property taxes - in order to improve public education. Both are bad ideas. Expensive and bad.

Former US Secretary of Education Speaks

Interesting book by Rod Paige, former US Secretary of Education. While I don't agree with much coming out of the federal education bureaucracy, it's obvious that Paige correctly understands this key issue.

Of course, for those of us who no longer support public education, the teachers' unions may be our best ally. Can you image another entity that will finally undo itself so wondrously? Very Hegelian - the unions create the contradiction that negates the public education system. Quite appealing.


The review is from The Center for Education Reform:

The War Against Hope: How Teachers' Unions Hurt Children, Hinder Teachers, and Endanger Public Education (Hardcover)
by Rod Paige (Author)

Everyone remembers - some with more fondness than others - writing those research reports that demonstrate what it is you learned from a project or activity. Well Rod Paige has just handed in his biggest research project from his tenure as Education Secretary. It deserves high marks for its candor, veracity and boldness on a subject that is prevalent in policy circles but almost non-existent in kitchen table conversations.

The War Against Hope: How Teachers' Unions Hurt Children, Hinder Teachers, and Endanger Public Education thoroughly and eloquently lays out the history of the teachers' union and how it has evolved into a political juggernaut that upholds the status quo and stands in the way of vital education reform. The book outlines education reformers' plan for change, saying that "accountability, transparency, and choice are the keys to excellence in American education," and subsequently describes how the unions have stood in the way of all three goals. From shocking education statistics to anecdotes of union atrocities (not firing teachers accused of sexual harassment and ineptitude), this book is a clarion call for the public to recognize that the teachers' unions do not have children's best interest in mind. Look for more on the book on our website and post your own opinion.

Proud to pay taxes?

Here's the legal gift for those who like to puff their chests and declare, "I proudly pay my taxes." Simply ask your state legislators to sponsor a Tax Me More Fund bill in your statehouse. This will allow anyone who is so disposed to pay extra on their returns. Americans for Tax Reform has sample legislation available on their website.

See how many self-declared, tax-flagellating fools really opt to tax themselves at a higher rate. You know who I'm talking about: Those who claim that since it is all for the public good, they should be taxed more.

If they so wish, let them give to their heart's content. But leave me out of their deluded world of tax benefits. I am much happier in the reality of coerced taxes wasted on unconstitutional interventions and transfers. At least I can fight and argue against additional taxes, the deluded salivate like a Pavlovian dog at the sound of proposed additional tax legislation. Classical conditioning indeed!

But, hurry up! Six states already have similar legislation, and you don't want to have your state behind the curve on this issue.

Can you trust the third-party any more than the first-party?

From the Olentangy School District news dispatch Board Approves Policy on Literature Selections:

Most of the information populating the document is from third-party external sources and reviews such as the School Library Journal, Publisher’s Weekly or the National Secondary Library Association. Other information, such as the relationship to the district’s curriculum maps, will be linked to district resources.

The School Library Journal is whacked out. Really whacked out.

I would expect to find the miscreants from that journal lurking in alleys dressed in trench coats. Yet, there they are, right out on the frontline of public policy, looking downright respectable under their seemingly professional masthead.

There was a time - not that long ago - when peddling perverse material to children was an offense; if not a legal offense, certainly a moral one. Yet, now it appears that the world has flipped and the defenders of morals are the evil ones.

The miscreants run free as they slowly chip away at the foundations of society - family, church, etc., and their misdeeds are supported by the public school system. Why? Your guess is as good as mine (though I do have a couple of pretty good guesses.)

The Olentangy School District uses the School Library Journal in place of common sense. Why? Laziness, maybe. Some other reason? Possibly. Regardless, the district allows the nuts at the Journal to set age appropriateness for school reading lists. Wow.

A while ago, someone sent me a compilation of bizarre books along with excerpts and associated School Library Journal reviews and grade levels. Amazing stuff; most of which would bring down this blog if I posted them here.

Here is a sample posted on Amazon.com. Please note that this is one of the least offensive reviews I could find. And remember, the district uses the crazies at the Journal as their authoritative source for reasonableness. Hey, Olentangy! Is there even one adult under your roof?

from Its Perfectly Normal at Amazon - because you want your fourth grader reading this stuff, well they do anyway:

From School Library Journal
Grade 4-8-A wonderful guide for young adolescents setting sail on the stormy seas of puberty. Packed with the vital information they need to quell fears and make wise decisions, this "sex manual" uses of clever cartoons to enliven and expand the text. Frank yet playful, they portray a reassuring array of body types and ethnic groups and illuminate the richly informative, yet compact text, allowing readers to come away with a healthy respect for their bodies and a better understanding of the role that sexuality plays in the human experience. Birth control, abortion, and homosexuality are given an honest, evenhanded treatment, noting differing views and recommending further discussion with a trusted adult. The dangers of STDs, teen parenthood, and sexual abuse are examined. The inventive use of a bird and a bee that react to the topics throughout artfully contrasts the differing views of early and late bloomers. Like any book that depicts naked bodies and sexual activity, this one is sure to inspire a few giggles in the stacks and be likely to disappear. But what it offers in scope, currency, and a cheerfully engaging format is quite special. An ideal introduction to "coming of age."-Virginia E. Jeschelnig, Willoughby-Eastlake Public Library, Willowick, OH
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

First you need a Constitution

The Future of Freedom Foundation publishes its daily Email Update, full of interesting articles and other tidbits. Subscribe today.

From today's Email Update:

I love when they say this is a constitutional crisis. Oh, please. We haven't used the Constitution in years.

— Jay Leno, The Tonight Show

Happy birthday Olentangy State Standards Analysis

I am revisiting the series of posts I did on the Olentangy State Standard Analysis report - now one year old and one month old.

If the proposed state funding formula passes both Ohio houses, the Olentangy School District gains more than $4 million in state aid over the projections contained in the district's October Five Year Forecast. That means the district needs to find only $10 million in expenses over the next 27 months - a 4% reduction - in order to go another year before asking for another operating levy. If the district holds the line on salary increases in the upcoming teachers contract negotiations, the $10 million deficit is almost zero.

The Olentangy State Standard Analysis report identified well over $10 million in yearly savings, savings that could have been applied starting last year. But, for some reason - there are many reasons I can think of - neither the board nor the administration want to discuss this report in public. I imagine that time flies when you're spending someone else's money.

This report should be serving as the basis for understanding rising costs and requisite soon-to-be-proposed property tax increases. But the report is obviously being kept from the sunshine of public debate. The reason? I guess you will have to ask your board members why the public should not be given the opportunity to hear debate on this important report; a report funded by local tax dollars.

You'd think that with possible levies on the horizon, the board would want to get a handle on costs ... you'd think anyway ...

note: click to read installments one, two, three, four, five, six, and seven

Central planning and higher education

Gov. Strickland has set the goal of increasing Ohioans with colleges degrees by 230,000 within the next decade. An ambitious goal, but you would expect nothing less from a public servant.

Is it really that easy? Simply raise taxes in order to make college universal and watch the economic ills of Ohio disappear overnight; over the next decade anyway. Well, it's not that straight forward, as life is much more complex than populist statists imagine; sorry Strickand.

In order to achieve his arbitrary goal, Strickland would have to raise taxes, enroll more students - praying that they will all graduate at some point in time, and close the state's borders. You see, there is no reason to assume that the new college students will remain in Ohio once they have degree in hand. A degree is worthless without a substantial job offer.

The Ohio tax structure is already anti-business. Any additional taxes would only further discourage companies from moving to, or expanding in, Ohio. We have no mountain, sun, or sand, so we must foster a tax environment that is positive to business; a tax environment where all taxes are lower than other states within the US.

Increase taxes for higher education and watch the graduates leave the rustbelt for areas of business expansion. Remember, it's graduates moving to business, not the other way around.

Ma Kettle and Bugs Bunny in China

Latest Mises.org blog post by Jim Fedako


Seems the Communist Chinese have a better grasp of the sanctity of property rights than many US municipalities. The International Herald Tribune is reporting that Ma Kettle of Chongqing, China, actually beat city hall. The photo accompanying the story is truly worth a thousand words - a scene reminiscent of the Bugs Bunny episode Homeless Hare.

The Big Three of the Austrian School

The three most important books of the Austrian School of Economics are: Human Action by Ludwig von Mises; Man, Economy, and State by Murray Rothbard; and, The Economics and Ethic of Private Property by Hans-Hermann Hoppe.

Human Action is the basis of the modern Austrian School. In 956 pages, Mises establishes the principals of praxeology; the science of human action. Thus established, Mises then logically creates a school of economic thought through one central axiom; man uses means to obtains ends. Simple, and clear.

In Man, Economy, and State, Rothbard rewrites Human Action as a very readable college-level textbook. In addition, Rothbard extends some of Mises' concepts, most notably the harm resulting from government interventions in the economy.

Hoppe, in Ethic of Private Property, wraps the previous two texts into an unassailable case for freedom.













These books are available at The Store on Mises.org. In addition, The Ludwig von Mises Institute offers Human Action and Man, Economy, and State as free PDF downloads. Enjoy all three, and understand the wonders of Liberty through private property.

The Fairness of "Unequal" Exchange

A Mises.org article

The Fairness of "Unequal" Exchange
By Jim Fedako


Market exchange is not based on the requirement that both parties appraise the goods about to be exchanged at equal value. Instead, market exchange is based on both parties benefiting from a two-way, unequal valuation of the goods to be exchanged.

An example from my youth: During my high school years in the early 1980's, I had purchased a double-live album of the rock group Rush for $15. Teenagers can be a fickle lot and I was no different. My musical tastes changed during my junior year and I morphed from a Rush fan into someone who felt that Fly By Night was simply noise — vulgar noise at that. Not only did I no longer listen to the album, I wanted to get rid of it since I felt that the album reduced the quality of my record collection.

Along comes a fellow student who was fast becoming an ardent Rush fan. We agreed to an exchange: I would trade my album for his $5. Fair enough. Right after the exchange, as I held the $5 and he held the album, the new Rush fan said something along the lines of, "I just ripped you off. I would have paid $10 for that album." I replied, "No, I just ripped you off since I was about to toss the album into the garbage anyway."

continue reading ...

Reacting to a challenge

It is always interesting to read about the reactions of different organizations to challenges. In the free market, a slight change in consumer preference is enough for companies, large or small, to reorganize in order to better address the future. In the public sector, the same response never seems to occur. Witness the Olentangy Local School Distict.

The educational outcomes of district middle schools have suffered over the years. In real terms, students are being shortchanged with regard to their education while the staff gets to implement whatever programs they choose.

While serving on the board, I fought for years to see improvements, being met each time by administrators operating as roadblocks. After badgering fellow board members long enough about the fact that living in the achievement cellar is no place for a district with strong demographics, I was finally able to get the board to instruct the administration to study the district's middle school program. Given the energy I expended over the years to have the administration review its lagging scores, I still have a very personal interest in the results of this study.

Well, the Middle School Study Update was delivered to the board in January. Where you would find reorganization in the private sector, you simply find re-entrenchment in the public schools. This should not be shocking, as re-entrenchment is the standard government response to any challenge.

Read the study and you will find no mention of any review of core curricular programs, such as math. In fact, you won’t see the word math anywhere in the report. Sure, math scores are well below similar districts, yet the Olentangy response is to embrace the mishmash that is public education in the US. Instead of concentrating on the areas of weakness and advocating for improvements, the study simply calls for more game clubs, service learning, etc., all in an environment that includes a “fully integrated, exploratory curriculum” – whatever that bit of edu-speak means.

Remember, it is the core subjects like math that are lagging, yet the district concentrates on providing “a variety of course offerings including accelerated content courses and exploratory courses in Physical Education and Health, World Languages, Technology, Music, Art, and Family/Consumer Sciences.”

Instead of facilitating maximum learning, the district seeks to “(e)ngage students in the ownership and decision-making of the curricular experiences” and to “(f)ocus on experiential, tangible activities that engage students.”

Can’t they simply teach math, and teach it right? Maybe they could, just maybe, if they got out of the business of indoctrinating and into the business of educating.

So, the district taxpayers are forced to pay for the programs that satisfy the staff, while students suffer and taxes rise. Not much of a solution. But, then, what else would you expect?

What educators read

Why, Educational Leadership from the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development of course. ASCD is highly respected by public educators; in fact your local schools have most likely implemented a number of programs that ASCD promotes.

OK, but what are they reading? Note the quote below from an article written by Richard Hanzelka, ASCD president:

"Regardless of international differences, we should all take heed of China's concern for the development of a whole child who is capable of being part of a harmonious society."

In an article reminiscent of John Dewey's excited report written soon after seeing his educational concepts incorporated in the schools of Soviet Russia, ASCD trumpets China's embrace of the "whole child."

For those new to such terminology, the "whole child" is the Progressive utopian child that is self-actualized, yet devoid of knowledge. Educators appeal to the concept of the "whole child" since it frees public schools from having to teach the three R's.

Parents, when you hear "whole child" mentioned at your child's school, think of the article below - the goal of this type of education - and you will understand why Olentangy college remediation rates are so high.

And people wonder why the education profession gets branded a socialist cartel, especially when the educationists want us to pursue the harmonious society that is Communist China.

Note: Your tax dollars pay for this rot. You simply cannot make up stuff this bizarre.

from a recent ASCD daily email:

Harmonious Learning for the Whole Child: Education Perspectives from China

Message from the President


Richard Hanzelka

As educators in the United States struggle to expand their view of learning to embrace the whole child and not just achievement test scores, it is encouraging to know that other nations are engaged in similar processes. China, a country I have been fortunate enough to visit twice in the last two years, is also challenging itself to build a system that addresses the whole child.

This summer I traveled to China to participate in the first China-U.S. Education Leadership Conference. What I learned and experienced expanded and clarified the impressions I formed during the ASCD Board of Directors trip to China in November 2005.

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Who to Believe: Labor or the house spouse?

Latest post on the Mises.org blog by Jim Fedako


According to the Associated Press, "The Labor Department reported Friday that the Consumer Price Index rose by 0.4 percent last month, double the January increase, as energy prices shot up and adverse winter weather in Florida and California sent citrus prices soaring."

When the federal bureaucracy speaks, I am supposed to take notice. Yet in Human Action, Mises wrote:

A judicious housewife knows much more about price changes as far as they affect her own household than the statistical averages can tell.

Mises was right. Though, to be politically correct, and more in-line with the current concept of the helpmate, I would extend the judicious observer of price changes to include the house spouse.

My wife and I are amazed at the increases in food prices over the last few years. While the Labor Department is the supposed authorative source of the rate of price increases, our experience says prices are increasing at a rate much higher than the politically-influenced Labor value.

The CPI has no real meaning in our lives. Mises in Human Action:

In practical life nobody lets himself be fooled by index numbers. Nobody agrees with the fiction that they are to be considered as measurements.

Just looking at the price of our favorite bread and cookies - the few prices we track over the years, it's obvious that my family's CPI far exceeds the reported value. For those who claim our small sample is invalid, let's go back to Mises and Human Action once more. Mises, writing about my wife:

If she 'measures' the changes for her personal appreciation by taking the prices of only two or three commodities as a yardstick, she is no less "scientific" and no more arbitrary than the sophisticated mathematicians in choosing their methods for the manipulation of the data of the market.

The Austrian School sees price increases as a result of inflationary monetary policies, so I'm not truly shocked that our grocery bill has been rising over the years. Moreover, I don't need the Keynesian econometricians at the Labor Department to affirm our reality. Nor do I need them to obfuscate the extent. Prices are indeed rising fast, regardless of what the blob in DC is reporting.

Former punk rock guitarist smells a rat in Everyday Math

Wise words from a fellow LewRockwell.com writer.

Tom Chartier, lead guitarist in the legendary Los Angeles punk band The Rotters for 26 years until the band's final appearance in 2004, writes about the rot that is Everyday Mathematics for LewRockwell.com in, Is Your Child a Math Moron?

Tom's words:

Is Your Child a Math Moron?

One such program is Everyday Mathematics created and published by the University of Chicago Mathematics Project. Due to its confusing nature, within the teaching world E.M. is also known as "fuzzy math." And fuzzy it is, but not the warm, snuggly kind.

Everyday Mathematics boasts a "spiraling system" (hey if they don’t get it the first time, maybe they won’t get it the second either… or the third, fourth, fifth, etc.). E.M. also uses bizarre terminology unfamiliar to most parents. That means that busy parents must master Everyday Mathematics in order translate that which they already know how to do into E.M.’s new-fangled lingo for the purpose of explaining it to their children… if they can. Confused? You ain’t seen nothin’ yet! It’s kind of like learning how to "speak" a foreign language… without having a clue what you’re saying.

E.M. even has geography lessons (I don’t get that either… unless they are to help find Middle Eastern oil deposits)! I suppose counting states is math. Unfortunately for the students, there are more than twenty.

It gets better. Everyday Mathematics is chock full of alternative algorithms. What, you ask, are those? For those of you out there who suffer from "mathematics deprivation syndrome" (MDS, the new plague replacing bird flu), an algorithm is a "method to solve problems." Your basic method of adding two-digit numbers through "carrying" is an example of an algorithm. E.M.’s program is brimming over with "alternative methods" giving children a miasma of choices from which to be baffled further.

Well, if it ain’t broke… better fix it. Traditional methods are passé. Unfortunately, the old-fashioned methods only offered one way to solve a problem and another way to check it. Everyday Mathematics makes attaining a lucrative career as the Village Idiot all that more challenging. Too much competition.

Everyday Mathematics ensures that it will be nearly impossible for parents to help their perplexed offspring. Will there be federal funding for No Parent Left Behind? I sure hope so! Additionally, continued use of Everyday Mathematics is a sure fire method to hardwire children with indelible hostility towards math.

It makes me long for the good old days of Tom Lehrer and New Math.

Not convinced? Here’s an explanatory video.

For education officials who have to buy a program, there are alternatives such as Saxon Math, Progress in Mathematics and Singapore Math, all of them highly effective in actually teaching… math.

I suggest concerned parents raise a full-blown, bovine stink to get Everyday Mathematics tossed out of their children’s classrooms and into the dumpster where it belongs. Or… we can look forward to longer lines at the Chum Bucket Sea Food Buffet waiting for our change.

And remember this. Your children will be the ones to pick out your rest home and pay for it! It might help if they can add up the bill correctly.

I absolutely agree. Sadly, Olentangy parents, your administrators are sold on the hogwash that is fuzzy math. Why? Programs such as Everyday Math meet the goals of Progressive education and the worldview of most educators. It has become less about learning and more about indoctrination.

A comment worthy of reflection

Anonymous left the following comment that bridges the subjects of Bush in Venezuela and The Beacon articles from the Olentangy High School:

Bush is just trying to appeal to the socialistic (in)sensibilities of these Bolivarian dolts in a desperate attempt to keep CAFTA alive. Yes, what he was saying was jibberish; but it's jibberish Latino peasants react favorably to. If he'd spoken of "market forces" or "globalization" the crowds would have melted away on their donkeys or taken siesta.

More than 1 million Venezuelans have left their homeland in the last four years: more than half have emigrated to Spain or Miami--and the exodus is only increasing. The entrepreneurial capital that is draining from Venezuela is enormous, as it's largely the wealthy, business class that can afford to leave. What was the #1 reason why they're leaving? Because Chavez is changing state school curricula to a regime of socialist indoctrination, and parents are fearful for their children.

I ask you...how is it that Venezuelan parents have the fortitude to uproot and relocate their families 1,400 miles to Miami or 4,300 miles to Madrid to ensure their children are being educated properly, but Olentangy parents don't have the interest to travel a few miles twice a month to school board meetings to see just how badly their children are served by the administration?
!Viva la Administracion!
!Viva Desde Mi Cielo!

Is High School Football a Public Good?

Article published at Mises.org

Is High School Football a Public Good?
By Jim Fedako

Most of us would never think of asking our neighbors to foot a personal bill. We accept responsibility for car and roof repairs as ours alone. In addition, we don't bang on the door across the street in order to demand a contribution towards our children's figure skating lessons, taekwondo classes, etc. That which is consumed or used by our families is to be paid from our pockets — the definition of personal responsibility.


Now let's change the situation slightly. Instead of a figure skating lesson — the realm of the private good, consider the local public high school football team — the realm of the supposed public good.[1] The technical definition of a public good — a good that is nonexcludable, nonrivalrous, subject to free riders, and hence will only be provided by government through coerced tax dollars — has been corrupted in the modern lexicon to mean anything that is perceived to benefit society in general, no matter how specious the benefit argument.

Based on the technical definition, football is not a public good as teams are excludable and rivalrous since each team is limited to 11 players on the field without penalty. But no one really applies the technical definition to derive public goods. For if they did, the concept of public goods would disappear from economic textbooks and from debates over the need for government interventions in the market.

Instead, the collectivist definition — the vacuous, yet now standard, definition — applies the general welfare argument to elevate football from a private activity to that of a public good. The argument goes something along these lines: football is beneficial because it prepares boys for adulthood, keeps them off the streets after school, and provides them with a place where they can excel.

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Another selection from Laissez Faire Books

An interesting book to consider -- Jim Fedako

LEVIATHAN ON THE RIGHT
How Big-Government Conservatism Brought Down the Republican Revolution
by Michael D. Tanner
Cato Institute, 2007, hardcover





According to Laissez Faire Books:

March 2007 Lysander Spooner Award Winner!

What's happened to conservatism and what can true conservatives do to change it? Leviathan on the Right, the latest from Cato Institute's Michael Tanner, seeks to answer those questions.

Tanner looks at how some modern conservatives have given the term a bad name by backing the welfare state, moving towards national health care, allowing the president to seize more and more power, and "spending like drunken Democrats." He also details the roots of the Neo-Conservative movement (which just might surprise you) and proposes ideas on how to return conservatism to its small government ways.

Though this isn't the first book to condemn the modern perversion of conservatism, Tanner's thorough research and excellent writing might just make it the best.

Has Bush become Che?

"In the slums of Brazil, in the impoverished villages of Guatemala and finally here in Mexico, President Bush promised this week to deliver 'social justice' to poor and struggling Latin Americans left behind by the global economy. Mr. Bush's striking use of the revolutionary language of the left reflected an urgent attempt to stave off the growing regional influence of populist leaders like President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, who have used the discontent of the poor to push an anti-American agenda." (New York Times, Wednesday)

"Social justice"?!? Frank Chodorov (see below) would have been flabbergasted by a supposed conservative speaking such drivel. Conservativism has come a long way from its noble beginnings. Today's conservative is just as likely to be a socialist sympathizers as an adherent to the ideals of the Old Right.

Bush, though, is obviously suffering from a Che Guevara complex. Bush the Younger is simply Bush the Social Democrat.

Reagan said, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" Bush said it was time to deliver "social justice." Where have we gone wrong?

Out of Step by Frank Chodorov

Journalist, Frank Chodorov, wrote this excellent autobiography in 1962 at a time when the Old Right still spoke for the conservatives. In a very readable text, he summons the essence of America to smash the ideas and ideals of the statists and the New Deal.

As the power and the pull of statism and the New Deal live on, this book is as timely today as when it was written.

I found this book to be a fascinating read. It is available in PFD format at Mises.org, or you can get a hardcopy through the Ludwig von Mises Institute's on-demand publisher.

The Freedom to Reject the Best

Ludwig von Mises Institute article by Jim Fedako

A new study suggests that private schools are not inherently better than public schools. Surprised? Enough people were such that the study, funded by the US Department of Education, has created a stir in the education arena, as well as in the national news. But I want to argue that the results are meaningless, and for reasons not having to do with the methodology employed in the study.

The authors of Comparing Private Schools and Public Schools Using Hierarchical Linear Modeling analyzed math and reading scores of nearly 7,000 public schools and more than 500 private schools on the 2003 National Assessment of Educational Progress at the fourth and eighth grades. NAEP was the chosen assessment tool since it is considered to be the national achievement test and is used to assess student academic performance against national standards.

Though the title sounds impressive, the findings simply suggest a conclusion. Nothing has really been proven and no new truths exposed. I could begin by questioning the whole concept of empirical studies that suggest this or suggest that. I could ask, "What truths have been brought to light by any study that is couched in such a vague qualifier?" I could attack all the assumptions that went into the model and then list those that did not. Had I gone that route, I hopefully would have raised enough doubt in the reader that the study would be discarded as worthless.

But the real error here is more philosophical than empirical. Studies such as these simply show that a deeper ill exists, a malaise caused by government interventionism.

Consider Consumer Reports

The popular magazine reviews consumer goods based on a proprietary set of standards. They test, analyze, test, analyze, etc., until they are satisfied as to the quality of the products under review. CR then assigns individual product ratings and notes one product as a best buy. Though most Americans accept CR's results as being of excellent quality, the noted best buy is not usually the market best-seller. Yes, I will occasionally look at CR prior to purchasing a good, but I almost never buy the best buy. I agree that the CR results are scientifically valid based on their standards, but that doesn't mean I am in the market for the scientifically valid, CR best-buy product.

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Government Laws Are Not Contracts

Latest Ludwig von Mises Institute article by Jim Fedako

Despite what you were taught in school, governance is ugly; in all forms, and at all times. Don't believe me? Attend a meeting of a local governing entity. You will find the council — omnipotent by vote, omniscient by delusion — seated before you at the table. All night long, they'll bicker and battle all the while proposing and dissecting plans and schemes with shouts and pounding shoes; Khrushchev moments indeed.

This is the reality of man lording over man, and it's been that way for eons. Ugly, just plain ugly. And it doesn't matter the span or purpose of the governing entity. This ugly reality holds equally true for the fist-fighting Taiwanese legislator as for the insult-hurling band booster. Power corrupts at all levels.

One other aspect of governance appears to be consistent at every level: the broader the scope of the proposed plan or idea, the further they reach beyond the stated bounds of the entity, the more receptive a hearing that the entity's council will give to the idea. Everyone dreams grandiose dreams, whether during solitary reflective moments or while monopolizing the public microphone. But it's the bully at the public mic, entertaining the media and sparse audience, whose dreams we must fear.

Given that these aspects are inherent in the essence of power, the issue is not how to improve systems of governance, but how to control their scope.

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Is that the end?

The Mardy Hanlon-Stolte apology appeared in the Delaware Gazette today, but is that the end? Does anyone really believe that a directional change has occurred; a realization that it's time to return to traditional education? And that it's time to quit using schools as the testing ground for deconstructionism, post-structuralism, and all the other -isms that are harming future generations?

Based on comments left on my blog - though not fit for print - the district is only reacting to public scrutiny.[1] The district has circled the wagons and put on its public face, but don't begin to think that anything has really changed. Even the board has never publicly addressed the issue, other than for one board member to say that she was not "bothered" by the articles.

Keep in mind the amount of pressure that was required for the singular admission of wrong; though actually only an admission that some in the district had concerns over the articles, not that the subject matter of the articles were horribly inappropriate.

I don't believe the issue of inappropriate subject matter has been put to rest. The Beacon articles are just the latest in a constant string of such incidents that never quite seem to go away. Why? The inherent root cause remains after the public face comes out to say that all is OK. Well, it's not.

As it is time to move from this topic, I will leave the readers of this blog with one last observation:

I have posted articles here for almost a year, and the issues that have created the most heat, incited the most district employees, were the issues of inappropriate books and articles in the student newspaper.

I have posted articles showing the district's lagging scores, and got a yawn. I sent a letter to the local papers a while back regarding district spending, and got next to nothing. Yet, when I question what teachers are putting into the heads of students, the board, administration, and staff go into fits.

I have to ask my self, "Why such a strong defense regarding inappropriate subject matter?" The only answer I can come up with is that such subject matter is the true curriculum of some administrators and teachers.

These district employees do not see themselves as subject matter educators, such as English teachers, etc. In fact, based on district college remediation rates, it's obvious that they simply do not teach their subjects at all.

Instead, these employees inculcate students with the ideas of relativism; ideas that say no rules apply. The result is a forty or fifty year-old teacher leading children - that's right, children - down the path of The Beacon articles, while the rest of the staff simply goes along for the ride. Creepy, to say the least. Something to think about.

Keep your eyes out for the next eruption of inappropriateness coming out of the district schools; I call them eruptions since we only get the occasional glimpse of what lies beneath the surface. And, even the little glimpses are scary.

Something to think about, indeed...

notes:

[1] Sitemeter provides the ISP address of visitors to my blog. So, I can tell if a district computer was used to post a comment.

What's going on here

Talk about spin.

In today's Delaware Gazette, Mardy Hanlon-Stolte states that neither she nor Mindy Farry received any complaints about The Beacon articles, yet they both recently issued a waffling apology about those very same articles in an email newsletter sent to high school parents.

In her email, Farry states, "The Valentine’s Day issue of our school newspaper, The Beacon, has created some concern with our students and parents."

OK, was there no concern - Gazette - or was there concern - her email? This spin is getting to me.

The Gazette further reports that “(Scott) Davis said the district does not engage in a 'prior review' when it comes to school newspapers and the district has no plans to institute any such policy in coming weeks spurred by Fedako's concerns."

Yet Farry states in her letter, "Soon, we will begin the process of reviewing our student journalism ethics and criteria for reporting. As a part of that, we will ask a group of community, staff, students, and board members to share ideas and develop a framework for decision-making on these issues. We look forward to initiating this group within the next few weeks and look forward to your input."

What's up here? Can’t they at least get their stories straight?

So, is it no review - Davis - or review - Farry? You never can tell.

Funny, these same people wonder why I questioned, and continue to question, what goes on inside the district. As this incident proves, you have to continually question the district as you rarely get a straight answer.

One final point, in the Gazette, Hanlon-Stolte also states, "As a staff, we then select the topics for the issue based on value of information, opinion and entertainment." It would appear that she selected the topic. As I have been saying, this is not an issue of the students, it's an issue of the staff and administration.

Oh, yeah, still no teacher willing to state that this whole mess is simply wrong. No teacher willing to step across the union line and defend children and decency. Sad ... but, true.

Teachers and compassion

Here's an interesting comment:

Mr. Fedako, Gee, why do you despise teachers and what they do? You seem to have it in for teachers. I have never read anything you have written that praises teachers for their sacrifice and hard work. Instead, you look for things to criticize.You profess to be a Christian. I do not sense a compassion that the Christians I know, including myself, have for others. Certainly, there is nothing wrong with having an opinion and stating it, but from the things you write, I see no compassion in your words. It is mostly hateful and sarcastic.My tone is not meant to be sarcastic..... I am merely curious to understand the motivation behind your strong dislike for teachers and their commitment.So many kids look up to their teachers and are positively influenced by them. Do you not see this aspect at all?

The writer brings up a valid point; some children do look up to their teachers.

I agree with that, which is why I am so shocked that not one - not one - teacher has publicly stated that the articles published in The Beacon were wrong.[1] In fact, the only public statements from teachers - including the one letter submitted by the spouse of a teacher - were those in strong support of The Beacon.

If students look up to their teachers - which some do - and teachers take that role seriously, why no defense of children from the greater mass of teachers? Why no defense from even one?

How could I possibly have compassion when the only voice emanating from the schools is that the perverse articles in The Beacon are more than appropriate; they are good, they were the right thing to have done? How could I say anything wonderful when no teacher makes a stand in protection of children – the comment writer included? Until individual teachers make a stand for the next generation, I can have no compassion.[2]

One question to the writer: If you are a Christian, why no disgust on your part? Is it your belief that the Bible and words of Jesus encourage such subject matter to be taught to young minds?

Some read only half the Bible, they see only the compassion. They choose to ignore the words of Jesus, such as:

Mt 18:6 But whoso shall cause one of these little ones that believe on me to stumble, it is profitable for him that a great millstone should be hanged about his neck, and that he should be sunk in the depth of the sea.

The Bible is about compassion, certainly. Yet the Bible is not compassionate to those who harm children or lead them astray.

Note:
[1] Read the platforms of the national teachers unions to see what the greater mass of teachers are supporting; changes that advocate the social engineering of future generations. These platforms are not aberrations, they are the voted voice of the majority of teachers.
[2] I'll make the comment writer a deal: When at least one dozen Olentangy teachers - representing only 2.5% of the total teaching staff - co-sign a letter stating that The Beacon articles were wrong and that they do not support such nonsense in the schools, I will write in-support of the efforts of individual teachers. Deal?

Gramsci in the schools

I have heard a few state that the content of The Beacon articles in question are not a reflection of the district schools. I find that interesting, as all of the public comments on The Beacon coming from the staff have been supportive; including the response to my Gazette letter that came from the husband of an OHS English teacher.

I have never heard, nor read, any administrator - other than the superintendent - publicly question the content of very public issues such as the OLMS assembly, the booklist, and now The Beacon. Never. Strong, vocal support has always centered on the side of the inappropriate.

If the teachers are upset at The Beacon articles, then Dave Maloney should say as much; he is their representative and voice. Additionally, teachers should write letters to the editor to add their voices to the debate. That has not happened yet. Nevertheless, let them shock me for once.

On other matters: Ohio State Operating Standards mandate stakeholder participation in curricular decisions, yet the book review committee going before the board has no parent members. "The school district’s curriculum shall be developed with input from and dialogue with parents, community members and other stakeholders. - 2006 Ohio Operating Standards"

In addition, I fought for years to have the middle school failures addressed. The result? More of the same nonsense. Math and the other essential subjects are struggling so the staff chooses to concentrate on teaming, collaboration, service learning, game clubs, and one of my all-time edu-speak favorites: authentic learning. The Middle School Study Update is the same recycled muddle that has ruined education. If the schools at least tried to address the root problems, I would turn my attention elsewhere.

Many of the actions we observe are guided by an underlying philosophy. Understanding the philosophic source helps in understanding problems with resulting actions. To this, I suggest that taxpayers read the absolute nuttiness coming from the prominent schools of education. Subscribe to the TCRecord This Week, a weekly update from the Teachers College Record published by the Teachers College of Columbia University. You will find the headwaters that form the brackish curriculum of most - if not all - public schools.

Funny, I have had people comment that some of my blog articles are idiosyncratic hokum. Yet the latest TCRecord This Week includes a featured article where the writer attacks “capitalist logics,” as if more than one logic can exist (the economist Ludwig von Mises called this Marxian belief polylogism). Who would believe such dribble? Yet, there it is, guiding the direction of a prestigious university. The same article celebrates the writer’s Gramscian views – Gramsci being the Italian socialist who believed that the way to bring about socialism was to slowly destroy the institutions of family and church.

Another fount of mishmash is Education Leadership from ASCD. I always said that if I read about a program in that magazine, I would soon find it in the schools. I cannot remember even one instance where that statement did not hold.

In the end, a government-run system of anything cannot be efficient. Nor can it satisfy the invalidated concept of public goods. Regardless of the economics involved, The Beacon incident shows that public education, as with all government programs, ends up being political in nature. The result is we all end up paying for that which we find reprehensible. I pay for the trash in The Beacon, while The Beacon supporters pay for the "capitalist logics" that I call traditional math.

And, most importantly, those who run the government system get to control future generations. The public voice of the district says the adherents of Gramsci have control.

Some comments speak for themselves

I can only assume this comment came from a district staff member. According to the writer, I am freed from supporting future levies since the supporters of The Beacon articles "prefer to have the open-minded on (their) side anyway."

I must admit, readers of this blog, that I am not "open-minded" to the morals of this writer, who I suspect speaks for many in the district schools. I believe that the implicit - if not open message - being conveyed in district schools from staff to student is that sex is simply "a part of growing and learning. It’s another experience."

The reality is outside the school walls, this same message from adult to child would be called into question for lack of appropriateness. Yet, if it occurs in the classroom, the message is convoluted to be part of the mission of facilitating learning.

The comment below is the product of much reflection and thought; it is not an off-the-cuff remark. The writer truly believes the ideas expressed. I simply offer it as evidence that there is a culture war, a war that appears to have already captured district schools.

Read and weep for our future, because this all has to be going somewhere, or in some direction, with no end it sight.



Comment:

Mr. Fedako,
I completely respect your opinion on the February issue of the Beacon, as you have the right to form your own opinions. However, I cannot agree with you.

As you stated to Esra Ozturk, there is a generation gap between the Beacon staff , its target audience and yourself. Although, I refuse to believe that is the problem here. I believe the problem is what values you believe everyone should hold, which are your own values. And because not everyone agrees with you, you feel a need to attack an entire school district.

The fact that you believe a high school student is not mature enough to read articles on the subject of sex makes you come off as quite naïve. Whether you choose to believe it or not, high school students do engage in sexual activity. It is a part of life. It is a part of growing and learning. It’s another experience. A good portion of the Beacon staff and its intended audience are 18 years of age: the age where they are old enough to vote for the leadership in this country, fight and die in a war and even marry the person they love. So to think they are handed all of that responsibility and yet are not mature enough to read a newsmagazine on sex is completely absurd.

And I do realize that a good portion of readers are under 18, but I can guarantee the subject is nothing new to students as they have been learning about it since the informational video they saw in middle school. I understand that the material in the Beacon was not introduced to students in the fashion it would be in a health class, but it tackles a different side of the matter: the emotional side.

No part of the Beacon held graphic detail. Although, it did hold facts that had legitimate sources and opinions that no one should be able to mute. Two of the articles that you referenced as articles written in poor taste were satirical pieces, with the only intention being to make high school students laugh. They weren’t written with the intention of pleasing a grown man, let alone an ex-school board member. Once again, the Beacon is aimed at students in grades 9-12, which is why the Beacon staff doesn’t sell at office buildings.

The lowest blow of your rant came when you put down every educator at Olentangy High School, Mardy Hanlon-Stolte in particular. You stated that, “Given the subject matter of the school newspaper, it’s a wonder that there is any time left for reading, writing and math.” I don’t understand how that thought is even relevant seeing as how Olentangy was ranked 398 out of the top 1000 public high schools in the nation in May of 2006. Clearly the teachers make time to follow the curriculum.

Mardy Hanlon-Stolte is one of the greatest educators I have ever come to know. You’re personally attacking an outstanding teacher for doing her job. She inspires creativity in her students and provides for them an outlet. Hanlon-Stolte allows the Beacon staff to brainstorm ideas before beginning each issue, encouraging them to dig deep for topics other students can relate to. Hanlon-Stolte has motivated many students to pursue degrees in Journalism and also in education (Journalism specific). And I don’t see how anyone can attack her for motivating and inspiring her students to pursue something they love. You may think that her actions are irresponsible, but the irresponsible thing would be for her to forbid students to write about things they know are happening around them.

I find it fascinating that you can incite such controversy over this issue of the Beacon due to its sexual content, yet no one will ever hear your praise over their articles on volunteer projects or any other “appropriate” content.

No need for you to support our levies, we prefer to have the open-minded on our side anyway.
-Beacon Supporter

Response to Brown

Note: This letter was submitted, but never published.



Dear Editor:

In his March 5 Gazette response to my letter, David Brown says he's angered by the fact that I challenged the product of the school system that his is closely associated with. Well, I am also angered. Angered by the fact that my tax dollars went to pay for the raw content that Brown finds so excellent; angered by the fact that the district has moved from educating students to fostering a very questionable environment.

Brown certainly took me to task for my disgust with the subject matter printed in the Olentangy High School student newspaper, The Beacon. However, as I noted in my original letter, I expected responses. I simply asked those who support this "stuff" to find another way to fund their nonsense. Brown, showing his obvious lack of knowledge regarding the coercive nature of taxation, states that I can keep my money in my wallet. That's not the way taxes work. Unless, of course, Brown is going to proudly pay my school-related taxes along with his tax bill.

Brown goes astray with his application of simple English. I never stated that the articles appeared in the first few pages of The Beacon, only that it takes but a few page to realize that something is terribly wrong. His strong defense of the subject matters convinces me that I am indeed correct.

Additionally, Brown conveniently forgets to mention the other articles that appeared throughout the edition - one of which I detailed in my letter - implying instead that the one article he cited was the only article of concern. His failure to mention the other articles must be due to their subject matter; subject matter that the likes of even Brown cannot defend.

I suggest that the readers of this paper obtain a copy of The Beacon and see for themselves. There is no reason to expect that a letter-to-the-editor debate should be the final word. See the articles that Brown feels are appropriate for the young minds of this district, and wonder what has gone wrong.

Jim Fedako

Farm subsidies: thank a farmer for consuming your taxes

Burton Folsom, Jr., details the origin of farm subsidies in America in his article, The Origin of American Farm Subsidies.[1] Like a lot of government programs, it is easy to assume that farm subsidies have been with us from the day of the signing in Philadelphia during the summer of 1776. In actuality, farm subsidies have a relatively short history.

Folsom notes that President Coolidge fought one of the first subsidy programs with the words, "Such action would establish bureaucracy on such a scale as to dominate not only the economic life but the moral, social, and political future of our people."

This wise warning was ignored by the nation's next two presidents, Hoover and Roosevelt. And, exactly as Coolidge pronounced, farm aid subsidies were the beginning of our long, wretched history of redistributing wealth to those who can grab hold of the politician's elbow.

Some of us are taxpayers while others are tax-recipients. Ludwig von Mises long ago describe the real class structure of modern society: Two classes exist, those who pay the taxes, and those who receive them. This link takes you to some of the biggest tax-recipients of my county, Delaware County, Ohio. With a few clicks you can find the same for your county or state. And I'm not talking about the unemployed hucksters we normally read about.

Some of the farmers receiving federal subsidies have such a tough life. Imagine getting close to $100,000 per year from the federal government, almost $1 million over the last ten years. Not a bad way to make a living. We keep paying and they keep cashing.

Go to the Environmental Working Group's (EWG) Farm Subsidy Database to learn more.[2]

And, when given the opportunity, thank those who farm tax dollars for a living.


note:

[1]This article was published by The Foundation for Economic Education (FEE) in their monthly magazine, The Freeman.

[2] While I do not subscribe to the politics of EWG, they certainly do have a wealth of data to mine.

The Beacon: Four points to ponder

Point One: Yes, Esra Ozturk, there is a generation gap: it is the knowledge and experiences that separate the adult from the child. Sadly, the adult appears to be absent from district public schools. You and the rest of the student body are actually missing essential learning due to the absence of adults as teachers. For that, I apologize. I should have done a better job vetting administrators during my time on the board. You will better understand this when you begin to raise a family of your own.


Point Two: Julie Feasel proves that some people are not up to the task of being a board member. If she were fit to serve, she would have known about court decisions that define First Amendment Rights relative to student publications; decisions that leave the final judgment of appropriateness to the board of education. Had Feasel done a little research, she would have learned that reviewing the content of the student newspaper for appropriateness is not an issue of constitutional censorship; it's simply a function of her job as a board member. If Feasel feels that the articles are appropriate, have the newspaper posted on the district website for the community to read. Other districts publish their student newspapers on the web, why not do the same here. Let the community read that which does not bother her.


Point Three: Mardy Hanlon-Stolte shows that she alone defines the line of subject matter appropriateness. Those who claim the content of the student newspaper cannot be censored have never talked to Hanlon-Stolte. One can only wonder what level the Hanlon-Stolte's of the Olentangy staff feel is appropriate for someone else's children. She certainly failed in her self-described mission of teaching students how to make “decisions on journalistic content.” It appears the decisions were non-decisions; everything is fair game for the students to publish.


Point Four: Superintendent Davis is sorry “the articles came across as being in poor taste” to some in the community. That comment certainly implies Davis believes the articles are appropriate, but those, such as this writer, took them the wrong way. So, Davis, where is your line? You have certainly come a long way from the booklist incident of last summer. And you've taken quite a turn from the mission of facilitating learning. Unless, of course, this is the type of learning you intend to facilitate in the future.


Summary: There are your tax dollars at work. And, there is the professional stance of the Olentangy School District. A public good? Hardly.

Separating school and state

Regarding the separation of school and state, Jeff Jacoby of the Boston Globe makes a very cogent argument in his editorial, A call for separation of school and state.

A free market in education would allow those who seek knowledge the ability to find it; just as a free market would allow those who seek something else the ability to find that. And, most importantly, I would not have to pay for the nonsense that some call public school education; just as they would not have to pay for the basic education I seek for my children. What a wonderful way to live the ideals of the Declaration and Constitution.

Now we all live in a system where the most persistent pressure group owns the system and controls the direction without fear of competition. Currently, the system has been captured by the professional educatists.

Public education worked so well in Prussia that Marx considered it as one of the ten planks of the Communist Manifesto; right alongside a confiscatory progressive income tax. We have adopted both of those planks as our own. Isn't it about time to reread history in order to see how we started as the land of the free and brave, and ended up the land the public education and progressive income tax. We have certainly come a long way from "DON'T TREAD ON ME!"

Restoring dignity

Latest blog posting at Mises.org by Jim Fedako

How do you restore the dignity supposedly missing from our capitalist society? According to the socialists at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), you restore dignity by having one group of Americans thieve from another, and you have government arrange the transaction. Where is William Graham Sumner when you need him most?

According to EPI's latest briefing paper A New Social Contract: Restoring Dignity and Balance to the Economy:

The very role of government is to ensure that the prosperity of our economy is broadly shared among all hard working Americans and their families. Yet, in the past two decades, government has not only retrenched in its obligation to set rules in the economy that value all working Americans, but it has set rules that undermine everyday Americans. It is time for government to be on the side of working Americans.

The paper was presented at a recent EPI public forum where Paul Krugman, keynote speaker, provided the following words of wisdom:

So, if you say what would I really like if I went into a Rip Van Winkle sleep and woke up ten years from now, I’d like to wake up and discover that we have a national health care in some version with the necessary funding supplied in part by higher taxes on me, or actually, the top two percent of the income distribution. But people a lot richer than me, of course. But it’s not the whole story that the only thing you can do is taxes and social insurance. And the arc of history for the United States suggests that there’s actually a lot more that can happen.


And if you’re looking for a progressive agenda, certainly from my point of view, a large part of that ought to be straightforward orthodox stuff, which is still very hard to do politically. It would be essentially restoring progressivity of the tax system, and using the revenue to improve social insurance and, above all, health care.

But the amount of inequality in the United States is substantially less than it would be if we did not have still at least somewhat progressive taxation, and still a pretty extensive, though not nearly extensive enough, system of social insurance. And that makes a big difference. Certainly if you’re looking at say the United States versus Canada, a lot of the difference between the two countries is just that Canada has more of a better safety net financed by somewhat higher taxation.

Where is Bertrand de Jouvenel when you need his insights? Well, the ideas of Sumner and de Jouvenel are still with us; their reasoning simply remains lost to the Krugmans of the world. The Progressives and their government allies have had over a century to work out the kinks of their socialist utopia, yet it remains beyond their grasp.

Even Krugman notes that we don't want the level of redistribution found in Cuba, but a level just to the north would begin solve the nation's economic ills. How? By restoring dignity through repealing the tattered remnants of the concepts of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.

Sometimes it is as if the Soviet Union never imploded. I await the coming day when the New York Times finally changes its masthead to: Workers of the world, unite! That day won't be soon enough for Krugman and his minions at EPI.

Too many laws?

Many non-Christians look at the Bible as a book replete with laws, rules, and regulations. Yet, according to Rousas John Rushdoony - Christian writer and father-in-law of Gary North (see links) - rabbinical traditions have counted 613 separate laws in the Torah, our Old Testament. Six hundred thirteen. And, many of these laws were subsequently repealed by Jesus's blood.

According to Rushdoony, current local, state, and federal laws number in the millions. Millions! And, what have we gotten for all those laws, rules, regulations, etc? Certainly not Heaven on Earth.

Is Christianity heavy-handed with its number of laws? Not at all. Is government heavy-handed? Absolutely!

note: Thanks to Steve Scott at From the Pew for the Rushdoony count.

The gnawing rats

The reality is this: Socialism won the Cold War. Antonio Gramsci, the Italian socialist from early 20th century, realized that there was no way to fight a pitched battle against the industrialized societies of the west. The socialist instigators would not be able to sway the workers nor gain popular support for revolution. Yet, Gramsci believed that socialism could win the day if it supported a lengthy insurgency that slowly destroyed the bedrock institutions of our free societies: family, church, etc.

So while we stared-down the Evil Empire, the rats slowly gnawed holes in the concepts of liberty that founded the US and made England great. Gramsci never lived to see the dawn of the forthcoming new age (he died soon after Benito Mussolini released him from jail), but his like-minded minions proved that nuclear power is no match for an uncoordinated subversive attack against the mind.

A good source to understand our current mess is the classic treatise Theory and History, Ludwig von Mises. Mises exposed the flaws in the concepts of socialism and other strains of such thought.

A good source to view the current mess is your local public schools. Progressive socialist administrators and their minions - the unionized labor force - have gained control of the minds of our next generation - public school students. From my experience, many school employees are not people to be trusted with children.

Certainly all school employees are not evil, but, with the exception of a very small few, the good ones never seem to question the direction in which the schools are headed. The silence of good ones becomes tacit support for the evil ones. Sad, but true.

Jim Fedako