Math Forum Discussions

GS Chandy

Posts: 4,348
From: Hyderabad, Mumbai/Bangalore, India
Registered: 9/29/05

Re: Who Are The Education Mafia
Posted: Sep 9, 2012 11:30 AM

Plain Text

Further my post dated Sep 9, 2012 1:28 PM (copy pasted below my signature for reference):

TO: THE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF, 'EDUCATION MAFIA' HEADQUARTERS
Fm: GSC

Below my signature you will find a copy of the latest in a series of Internet messages that now definitively PROVE the essentiality of a major educational THRUST that MUST now be made by 'EDUCATION MAFIA' forces worldwide, in the current campaign to improve US education:

- -- Substitution of courses covering 'How To Think'; 'What is a Proof?'; 'Logic 101' - instead of Arithmetic (starting from 'counting numbers'), Algebra, etc. These courses should be taught to ALL adults, starting with the ones of the group 'Math-teach @ Drexel'.

GSC
a humble foot-soldier in this great war
("Still Shoveling Away!"
GSC posted Sep 9, 2012 1:28 PM:
> Haim posted Sep 9, 2012 7:02 AM:
> >
> > Kirby Urner Posted: Sep 8, 2012 4:50 PM
> >
> > >We agree the NEA exists. I had offices in the same
>
> > >building once, in DC (I've just returned from
> said
> > city,
> > >though I didn't get in to downtown, saw the
> > "Exorcist
> > >steps" in Georgetown at least -- near where my
> > friend
> > >EJA used to live). I confirm it exists.
> > >
> > >But does it follow that the rest of your analysis
> is
> >
> > >precise?
> >
> We always knew the 'NEA' (National Education
> Association) existed. That has never been denied.
> What's in doubt is that the NEA is isomorphic to
> Haim's malign 'Education Mafia'. Ahhh...THAT'S what
> Haim proposes to prove next...
> >
> > One step at a time, Kirby. Some people in this
> forum
> > m doubt the existence of the Education Mafia, or
> so
> > they say. So let us first establish existence.
> >
> Existence of NEA granted. Now comes the proof that
> the NEA is the 'Education Mafia' (or a major part of
> it)?
> >
> > Now, if the NEA were the only active ingredient in
> > American public education, I would not call them
> the
> > Education Mafia, I would call them the NEA. There
> are
> > a few other organizations, whose existence is just
> as
> > easily proved, who together constitute the
> Education
> > Mafia. But, the NEA is a good place to start.
> >
> >
> OK. I give you that. Anywhere is a good place to
> start. I had given various suggestions: President
> Barack Obama; First Lady Michelle Obama; their
> charming daughters; Haim; Wayne Bishop;....; Paul A.
> Tanner III; GSC; .... etc, etc, etc. OK, we've fixed
> on the NEA to start with...
> >
> > > Is the Education Mafia necessarily "leftist" and
> > what
> > >does that mean?
> >
> > Of course leftism does not necessarily follow from
> > existence. Existence is one issue, leftism
> another.
> >
> RIGHT! GOT THAT!
> >
> > >Then lets take Big Publishing. You talk out both
> > sides
> > >of your mouth saying leftists are stupid to think
> in
> >
> > >terms of Wall Street or Big Oil, but then invoke
> > >precisely these entities to bolster your
> Education
> > >Mafia idea.
> >
> > I said no such thing. I did not say leftists are
> > e stupid because they think in terms of Wall
> Street
> > or Big Oil. I always call leftists stupid.
> >
> RIGHT! GOT THAT!
> >
> >Even
> > stupid leftists will eat their vegetables and
> brush
> > their teeth before going to bed, so stupid people
> can
> > do right things, sometimes.
> >
> RIGHT! GOT THAT TOO!
> >
> >In this case, they
> > correctly recognize that whole industries, which
> are
> > otherwise comprised of competing entities, can
> have
> > certain, industry-wide, common interests.
> >
> RIGHT! AND THAT TOO!
> >
> > In this recognition, the leftists like to use
> > use pejorative terms to describe the industry
> > players.
> >
> And Haim, and 'Haimists' do not? I don't quite get
> that.
> .
> >Vaguely threatening terms like "Big Oil"
> > and "Big Pharma"---evocative of George Orwell's
> "Big
> > Brother". When I call the education industry "the
> > Education Mafia", I am just returning the favor.
> >
> OH? Okay.
> >
> > It seems that some of our leftist friends do not
> > not like the taste of their own medicine.
> \sarcasm
> > on Imagine my chagrin \sarcasm off.
> >
> OK. (Alternative form of "Okay").
> >
> > >I used to work in Rockefeller Center in downtown
> > >Manhattan for McGraw-Hill. Isn't that kind of
> close
> > >to Wall Street, even financially?
> >
> > Not by NYC standards,
> >
> http://bigthink.com/strange-maps/72-the-world-as-seen-
>
> > from-new-yorks-9th-avenue
> >
> OK, I leave such geographical issues to you.
> >
> > In the NYC cosmology, Rockefeller Center is in
> > midtown, which is a world apart from downtown
> > (downtown is congruent to "Wall Street").
> >
> > >Isn't public education a big business? Isn't the
> > private
> > >sector hugely invested in the future of public
> > >education? Look at Texas Instruments.
> >
> > Geez guy! That's what I have been trying to tell
> > ell you for 10 yrs! As I have stated many times,
> I
> > tend to focus on the ideologues (ed school
> > professoriate) and the unions, but there are many,
> > many other fingers in the education pie.
> >
> E.g., dat ol' evil 'UNICORN'! (a.k.a. de 'Education
> Mafia').
> >
> >There are a
> > whole lot of people out there with vested
> interests
> > in public education as it currently exists. They
> > make a lot of money off it, and they like things
> just
> > the way they are, and they are going to resist
> > change, if only through sheer inertia, of which
> there
> > is an enormous amount.
> >
> > Haim
> > Shovel ready? What shovel ready?
> >
> QED?
> And the above is what is supposed to constitute a
> "proof", by Haim?
>
> Well, let that put that to M/s Socrates; Pythagoras;
> Euclid; Poincare; (and others qualified to judge
> esoterica such as "a proof, by Haim").
>
> It doesn't pass, by GSC: Go to Logic 101.
>
> GSC
> ("Still Shoveling Away!")
>
>
> Message was edited by: GS Chandy
>
>
> Message was edited by: GS Chandy