Tag: Conrad; Philosophy; Capitalism; Fox News; socialism; Economics

Posted on in Current, Fiction, Philosophy

Necessary Condition

Texas GOP’s 2012 Platform Opposes Teaching “Critical Thinking Skills”

by ANDREW ROSENTHAL”

The Republican Party of Texas’s 2012 platform has a plank on “Knowledge-Based Education” that reads:

We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the student’s fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.

It also says, “[e]very Republican is responsible for implementing this platform.” They say it was a mistake, but it will remain in place until 2014

Isn’t prohibiting dissent a necessary condition of Totalitarianism?

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Posted on in Current, Fiction, Philosophy

The Heart of Darkness

‘To tear treasure out of the bowels of the land was their desire, with no more moral purpose at the back of it than there is in burglars breaking into a safe.’ – Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness, 1902

Absolute privatization (Freedom) is as Dark as absolute tyrranny (Control)

The village digs a well for the general welfare

Buraucracies expand

Slavery didn’t end with the Emancipation Proclamation.

Unions overeach

The free market didn’t desegregate the schools

Corporations are selfish

The free market didn’t incentivize the Interstate Highway System

The ship of state turns slowly

The response to 9-11 wasn’t to privatize airport security

We have proven poor students of History

An excess of Courage is Recklessness; A deficiency of Courage is Cowardice- Aristotle

Treat others as if you were in their place- Kant

The Founding Fathers settled on a system of Checks and Balances

Respect is Wiser than Ideology