Month: June 2006

I am not a number!

One news item that probably escaped your attention — and who could blame you as many things as are going on in the world — is that a coalition of industry, government, and academic experts are forming a center whose purpose is to study and come up with ways to prevent identity theft. Identity theft is a serious problem. Here’s what the federal government has to say about it. As we speak, legislation is circulating around the Senate and House that — although it would not prevent identity theft at all — would at least attempt to create uniform guidelines about what financial institutions would have to do in the event that consumer data is compromised. Some experts opine that many problems could be avoided if common sense were more common.

Here’s a radical thought: let’s start preventing identity theft by agreeing not to pass financial information around like mashed potatoes at Sunday Dinner!

We can start by not putting Social Security Numbers on documents such as health insurance cards and school ID cards. We can continue by not putting Social Security Numbers in state driver’s license records. Let’s limit access to Social Security Numbers to entities who have a legitimate tax, credit, or financial reason to know. Your boss needs your Social Security Number so he can pay the taxes associated with your employment. Your High School has no legitimate reason to know your Social Security Number. Your college might need it if you receive student aid, but your professors don’t need it.

Then let’s have a long hard look at the sorts of data corporate America has. Some of it they have — legitimately — because of doing business with you. Some of it they have because they bought or “shared” it with another business. And some of that data is in turn bought or shared from yet a third or fourth or fiftieth business. Company A might know you own a microwave oven made by Company B, purchased at Company C, through a data purchased from Company D, but what business is it of theirs? I mean really. Why do they need to know? And are the big data warehouses of aggregated consumer information really a benefit to real people? Or are they just a way for corporate America to sell us more stuff and have more information about us? Such databases are already being used by law enforcement to get around petty little things like search warrants. Not surprisingly, they are also being used by criminals to find targets.

Maybe then we can deal with computer security, and seriously ask companies why Social Security Numbers would ever be kept on a laptop computer, and why a computer with such information would ever be allowed off the premises. Yes, those are all different instances. I guess it’s hard to learn from the mistakes of others.

In closing, The President calls the press a tattle-tale for daring to say things that are unflattering but true. Wisely, he doesn’t look in his own back yard.

Single White Shorties

Open Letter to the new CIA director.

A little book for kids (or maybe not for kids!) about file sharing from Defective Yeti and Goopy called Files Are Not for Sharing. Can you say satire? Sure you can!

From the world of healthcare we have three completely unrelated items: Jim Hightower’s 4 Big Lies About Universal Healthcare; a new book about “medical tourism”; and a missive from the Duhpartment of Research, “People who can walk to shops and services in their neighborhoods are more fit and less likely to die in car crashes.”

I am the mommy, I am the internet filtering software. ‘Nuff said.

Follow up on John Stossel and his views regarding the American educational system. You may recal my discussing him way back in January.

A few items on the minimum wage. If Alternet strikes you as being too “progressive” for you, here’s the Christian Science Monitor. They discuss people having to hold down multiple jobs to make ends meet. I wonder if raising the minimum wage to a “living wage” would have the net effect of job growth as those people pare down to one job (leaving job openings for the currently unemployed). This is a completely unsubstantiated theory, but worth thinking about. The people at Let Justice Roll have been campaigning for a “living wage” on a state-by-state, non-partisan basis for some time now. I became familiar with their work last week, and was impressed by the stark common sense of “A job should keep you out of poverty, not keep you in it.”

Of course the Senate has blocked legislation raising the minimum wage. Indeed, Congress has spent most of the week doing things that are against the wishes of the people who elected them but good for the deep pocket big business interests that keep them in golf money. Two things to watch for in the coming months are the so-called “analog hole” and Net Neutrality.

And a couple of science items. Scientists have found a giant underwater volcano that is bigger than Washington D.C.! Elsewhere, a completely different groupf of scientists say the earth is warmer now than it has been in 400 years, and yes it is the fault of humans.

Things I Have Learned Recently About Education

The two most misused phrases in the education world today are “developmentally appropriate” and “kinesthetic learner.” In that order. When I was in school “peer group relations” and “self-esteem” were the most misused buzz-terms. But in real life, kids can do much more than most adults give them credit for, regardless of age; and the vast majority of kids called “kinesthetic learners” would be a whole lot less kinesthetic if somebody took away their sugar fix.

When it comes to standardized testing, there is a fine line between not enough and too much.

Most (accredited) private schools are better than bad public schools, but a startling number are really only as good as good public schools. Any private school that does not have a waiting list can’t really afford to let students get too far ahead of “good public school” levels, because it will hurt recruiting. If your 5th graders are doing 7th grade work, how do you get more 5th graders, and what do you do with them if they come? Put them in 3rd grade?

You can learn a lot about a teacher or school administrator by what they think about “drill and kill” versus “practice makes perfect.”

Remember when I said that if I were education czar I would compile standards of what kids should know and be able to do at what grade? It turns out that Washington is doing just that, albeit with less community input than I think would be optimal. Also, these are state standards, not national ones. The national standard under NCLB is still “better.”

A some point parents need to let kids develop responsibility for themselves. Preferably, this should be before college. It’s one thing to stand up for your kid, it’s another thing to do everything for your kid.

Dyslexia may be overrated.

Not new information to me, but it still bears mentioning that “educational flavor of the year” is not a good way to run a school. Wouldn’t it be simpler to use tried-and-true things that are proven to work? Sometimes I think the idea is that the teachers get bored with the old-fashioned way of doing things.

It has not been my imagination that textbooks are getting dumber. I first noticed this in 4th grade, and things have only gotten worse since then. If I may paraphrase Bart Simpson, “Now let me get this straight. We are behind, so we are going to catch up by going slower? Cuckoo! Cuckoo!”

A bunch of parents are starting to think that — since everybody says kids learn languages better and faster than grown-ups — Asian languages might be a better choice for schools to teach than Spanish in the coming century.

Good item on teacher recruiting here.

I hope you have enjoyed these admittedly random facts, and that you will be encouraged to think about education (among other things) for yourself.

In closing: How does this work? “Social Security numbers, names, and addresses, and were transmitted to an unknown hacker by the keylogger,” yet “No taxpayer financial data was lost to the keylogger.” Which is it? Krugman on the fear of fear itself. Star Trekking across American forests and Scottish Highlands. Apologies to Mel Brooks, but it must be good to be King. Coming soon to a news report near you, Crisis in Palestine. The West cut off the money to starve the “terrorists,” but the terrorists are the only ones with money. Muhammed Average gets caught in the middle. Norway is prepared for the End of the World as We Know It, but do they feel fine? And finally, the Duhpartment of Research shows that vegetables are good for you.

Security Theatre Act XIII and Cartoon Short Reel

Security Theatre XIII: I Know Who I Am, But Who Are You?

I have said before that ID cards may tell you who someone is, but they do not tell you whether or not he is a Bad Guy. In short, nobody has an ID card stamped with “Terrorist” or “Tax Cheat.” You are lucky if it is marked “organ donor.” That’s only one problem with using ID cards as a crime and terror fighting tool.

Notice, that the ID card only may tell you who someone is. It might also be fake. And as much as the Federal government wants to make sure people aren’t using fake identification, they seem to be having a hard time identifying fake IDs.* Since the people who make fake IDs will always come up with ways to continue counterfeiting them, fake IDs constitute a second problem with using ID cards as a crime and terror fighting tool.

The flipside of this issue is that it is possible to falsely use the identity of a real person: identity theft. It’s a huge problem that is growing bigger all the time, sometimes aided by the very offices we trust to keep our personal information private. Identity theft is yet a third reason why ID cards should not be used as a tool to fight crime and terror.

If you have not yet read Bruce Schneier’s essay on the fact that ID cards can’t make us safer, you really should.

Cartoon Short Reel: The Zany Adventures of Economy and Education!

Oh that wacky Economy! He seems to be slowing down, and he doesn’t know why! Inflation is continuing to rise, and as much as he says it’s just energy costs, the core is up too, and worse yet worker’s wages aren’t keeping up! It looks like the mean old FOMC is gonna have to raise interest rates again! I wonder how Economy is gonna hide from the FOMC this time. And as if that isn’t enough bad news for poor old Economy, he’s managed to lose $2 Million Million dollars of investors’ money. It’s enough to give poor Economy a heart attack, but hilarity continues at the hospital, since “the nation’s emergency-care system is overcrowded and overwhelmed, ‘at its breaking point,’ concludes a major investigation….”

Meanwhile, silly Education has managed to get herself wedged between a policy that won’t meet its goals and a system that refuses to measure how far from the goal they are in the first place! Oh Education, how do you get yourself into these messes?

Oh, and a follow up on the President’s upcoming visit to the Seattle area.

*Not to muddy the issue, but the ID in question was of the type issued by the Mexican Consulate to Mexican citizens for identification purposes. To the best of my knowledge CNN is wrong that they are only issued to “illegal” aliens; that may be the de facto use as legal aliens would have other forms of ID available to them. Furthermore it was a fake consular ID! But the article mentions that “The cards are not valid for entry into federal government buildings.” A lot of people think we need to provide a valid way for illegal aliens to find legal jobs, but if they can’t enter a Federal government building, how can they possibly apply for any kind of normalized status?

The Amityville Shorties

Nihon no Shashin (or, Japanese Pictures). Pictures of post-war Japan. Or maybe you prefer traditional Japanese crafts. Or lucky maneki-neko cats? Or wood-block prints by Hiroshige? No pictures, but there is always Gaijin Smash! and over on the right, Pureland Mountain.

Duh Filter. Girls approach video-games differently from boys and want different things from them. On a completely unrelated note, How To Guarantee Failure.

Stuff we didn’t learn in college but should have. Some colleges are actually teaching courses on stuff your mom and dad should have taught you, but that nowadays parents have a tendency to keep doing for their (ostensibly) adult children. And an overlap from “Duh Filter,” Employers take the time to Google you and read your public blog. Now might be a good time to go delete embarassing posts and maybe put up a nice thoughtful essay about something that interests you, mmkay?

How now brown cow? Moo! BLEAGH! Woogawooga!! More American cases of Mad Cow disease. And remember, we are still only testing a few hundred thousand of the millions of cows slaughtered in the United States. How does the old saying go, you can’t find a fever if you don’t take a temperature?

Traffic Friday Is Gonna Suck. President Bush is coming to my town at the end of the week. One local columnist has proposed a “to-do” list for him. I’ll add an 11th agenda item to consider: The UAW is calling for Universal Health Care. Funny how the CEOs of the Big Three have not caught on how their costs would be lowered if they didn’t have to worry about the health insurance expenses they are often whining about.

If it ain’t The Man keepin you down, it’s El Hombre! I’ve seen the argument before, but now it’s hitting the mainstream news that illegal immigrants may make it harder for (legal) black workers to get jobs. It could be worse, they could be moms.

Economic Indicators. Today the Cleveland Fed President said that current inflation numbers exceed her comfort level. Remember, she and other Fed officials are speaking of the official CPI number, which my readers know is manipulated to look as rosy as possible. A couple of major stock indices are officially in “correction” (a drop of at least 10%) and risk going into a “bear” market (a drop of at least 20%). The housing market isn’t looking so good, either. Keep all this in mind — and remember who controls Congress — come November.

Time-Waster In closing I bring you things so cute that diabetics better check their insulin levels before clicking! Don’t say I didn’t warn you! Cute Overload!