I can only imagine what would have been the reaction to Obama saying this.

I don't know what's up with Trump and Russia, but it's damned unhealthy for the nation.

Reminds me a bit of the Manchuria Candidate scenario but replace China with Russia.

Trump acting like theres now “bad people“ getting in that up and decided they would on the drop off a hat is absolutely insane and a fucking shame that aparently people will believe that.

Its also telling every employee involved his work has been shit.

Things are getting weird...

The rumors that the phone call with Putin was overseen by handlers of Trumps and that it was awkward, now this?

I feel like he's trying to trade Iran for Russia while no one's looking.

Just so strange at the moment.

I can't help but feel like we've already been through the "activist judges" phase of our political history recently, and I really don't want to go through it again.

(In quotes to indicate both sides of the issue -- that is, those people who believe activist judges are a thing and those who believe they're just people who imagine it's a thing so they've got something to complain about.)

But then someone is going to remind me that this phase was all the way back in the Clinton presidency, which means that I'm just getting old.

Well they had a meltdown when he said America wasn't perfect and Romney wrote a book in response.

McCarthy as Spicer on SNL was fkn amazing.

Just cannot believe a judge would put our country in such peril. If something happens blame him and court system. People pouring in. Bad!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 5, 2017

When the President creates a situation where he benefits from the murder of Americans.

"People pouring in" WTF, like we are being invaded by an occupying force. When something happens to an innocent American citizen that happens to be Muslim, because of the paranoia his McCarthy tactics inspire who do we blame?

Seriously. The only people coming in from those countries are already vetted. Unless ISIS suddenly built a tunnel under the Atlantic, through Mexico and into the states.

Kellyanne Conway Said "Bowling Green Massacre" in Another Interview

Guys, its true, the Mandela Effect is true. Kelly has just slipped through a crack in space-time.

It's odd to live in a world where legitimate political reporting is being done by Cosmo and Teen Vogue.

There's a good piece out there that looks at the Teen Vogue turn, and why they went down this path.

Always an interesting contrast. As much as people harp on Trump's favorability ratings, it doesn't seem like it ends well for those that try to jump into the mud-slinging against him either. In this case, Warren has taken a hit in what should be a very favorable state for Democrats.

http://www.wbur.org/politicker/2017/...ren-baker-poll

This is not at all a person who is mentally ill.

President Trump is now speculating that the media is covering up terrorist attacks - The Washington Post

Cmon Rainmaker did you read the article you posted? Trump is saying exactly what you and I and a few others have said in the past. The media takes a shooting like the Orlando one and clings to every possible outcome it can be like anti-gay to avoid saying it's radical Islam. Middle Eastern couple gun down san bernidino Christmas party: motive unknown.

Do you think the fact that the Trump Administration hasn't mentioned the Mosque in Quebec is because the shooter was a Trump supporter?

You can guarantee if the shooter was brown Trump would have been all over it because the timing would have been perfect for his ban. Instead he still hasn't publicly acknowledged it. He can't call out the media for doing the same thing his administration is doing. Well, he can, but it's hard to take him seriously when he does it.

I think there is a difference in creating false narratives and not reporting attacks at all. His remarks implied the media was not reporting terrorist attacks at all. I think terrorist attacks are covered heavily. Almost too much by the media.

Interesting spin. The article seems to indicate that Trump is saying the media doesn't cover terrorist attacks at all. Though I guess I can see where "it’s not even being reported" is confusing ;).

He wouldn't have made that mistake if there were more conservatives on the board.

It's obviously a defense of Conway and the Bowling Green Massacre. He's throwing out the narrative, and I bet by the end of Feb half or more of Trump voters will say the massacre happened.

Spicer says they will compile a list of terrorist attacks the media didn't cover.

Time well spent, i am sure.

I hope someones goes ahead and makes a list of Trump Tweets and/or protests "the media" did not cover. On a serious note, maybe make a list of natural disasters, murders or other violence "the media" does not cover but which he does not object to because it's not doing anything for his agenda. While someone is on it, make a list of all this for all US states to determine if there is a bias (hint: There is, as is the case with all news. There is always regional bias among others.)

If it were´t so serious, it´d be funny :(

It's so comforting that the Trump administration desperately wants a terrorist attack.

Sen. Cotton is introducing a bill to restrict who can sponsor people for green cards.


But don't call it white nationalism.

Interesting read. It seems like Democrats have always had their vote focused in certain areas, but it seems to be getting worse.

Democrats May Be On The Verge Of Becoming A 'Permanent Minority' Party | The Daily Caller

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/02/07/po...ck-list-trump/

White House releases Trump's list of terror attacks 'media ignored' despite widespread international coverage

The White House included some curious incidents on its list of 'undercovered' terror attacks - Business Insider Nordic

why yes, of course the list of attacks does not specify which and how were under-reported and of course it omits terror attacks not fitting with the agenda while listing others that have no place there ...

Then again, it gets people and the media to mention those attacks again and link to their old reports. So yeah, mission accomplished in a way ...

This is at least the third time in my adulthood that one party was destined to be a permanent minority. Just as before, it's very unlikely that will happen.

In TrumpWorld, the media outlets aren't doing their jobs if they don't devote at least 95% of their air time to Radical Islamic Terror Attacks.

The other 5% should be spent on how big the crowds were at the inauguration

I think you need to flip those numbers.

Yep. The administration needs people to be sufficiently afraid to implement many of their policies. Also, attacks to try to discredit the press as a whole make it easier to just blatantly lie about anything and everything to get stuff done. I still don't know what is incompetence vs evil here, but both are pretty fucking scary.

Uggh...Devos made it

Costs too much to educate people anyways. Besides, people get book learnin', they start voting Democrat.

Trump himself said he loves the poorly educated.

If you have kids, and can afford it, homeschool/unschool them now. The SoE position has been inadequately staffed nearly every time, but none has been nearly as antagonistic to research based educational truths as this idiot.

Sheriff tells Trump that state senator is doing something he doesn't like

Trump: "Do you want to give his name? We'll destroy his career." pic.twitter.com/75y3t9zc54

— Steve Kopack (@SteveKopack) February 7, 2017

I'm just as shocked by the fact that the sheriff is angry about a law requiring a conviction before asset forfeiture.

Yep, thats totally a joke.

1979: Let's create an agency to help oversee federal education policy. Typical big government supporter thought... What harm can it possibly do? More government is great!

2003: Who could have foresaw a massive waste of a program like NCLB? Oh well big government still is great! At least we have homeland security and other programs that won't ever grow past their intended purposes.

2017: OMG! Homeschool your children! You mean these government programs always grow into giant bureaucracies and can sometimes fall into the wrong hands and actually have unforeseen consequences? You don't say?

It's not like state bureaucracies are much better. They often to fall in equally crazy and often worse hands. See Oklahoma and AP classes for just one example.

SNL it's time. Cast Rosie O'Donnell as Bannon, the world needs this. We will never ask for another thing again. pic.twitter.com/54jj62ZFni

— Shop Politics (@Shop_Politics) February 7, 2017

I don't know the source, and I'm not really a fan of hers, but... just sayin'...

I would commit several crimes to obtain video of Trump watching this.

The reason for people wanting Rosie playing Bannon...

Yeah and Rosie just makes it extra bad since he hates her so much. Also, the sketch would probably revolve around Bannon really being the person in charge, which is something else that is reportedly bothering Trump.

Usually I can find some people on both sides of the aisle but since her name was originally brought up I have not found a single person happy with DeVos.

"When I'm President, the people will love me. LOVE ME!" Must be a rude awakening for him.

I have a cousin who likes her, but he's pro-christian schools and vehemently anti common core, though I'm not actually convinced he knows what it is.

About 95% of the people who are against Common Core don't know what it is. They just read one of those stupid memes where the father, who took differential equations in college, didn't know how to do his 3rd grade son's math homework.

Yes I completely agree the state education agencies often suck as well. Then it goes local and unfortunately some local school districts suck as well. But I mean at some point people have chosen where to live and if they have children the schools are hopefully a large part of that decision. Don't get me wrong here in St. Louis we have a transfer program that allows kids from failing districts to attend the better schools in the area and while there is definitely a lot of waste (and it is a state program) it is definitely a more accountable program than the 100 billion dollar budget of the federal department.

And while I do lean to the Libertarian side (at least over the current choices) on a lot of issues involving government spending I don't think the EPA, USDA, CDC type agencies need to go by the wayside. I just think if they hire 500 employees as part of a stimulus package that shouldn't automatically guarantee we can't ever get rid of the 500 jobs especially if they are found to be redundant.

And to cycle back to my main point... Betsy DeVos should have a pretty powerless position. The only power she has is what the state and local governments let her have and what the Congress has chosen to cede to her agency over the years. So I kind of have to laugh that some senators and congressmen thought Arnie Duncan was a good guy and have him more power and are now realizing the unintended consequences when a fool like Trump rises to power.

That argument makes no sense. Why have government at all if a bad person can one day be in charge of a part of it?

Either she has a lot of power (which I don't think she does) or she doesn't. If she doesn't it's a lot to do about nothing. If she does than they created this monster themselves.

But in theory I actually agree with what you probably don't think I would agree with. Large unchecked government executive power is a really bad thing because of exactly what happens when a bad person/unqualified person is in charge.

Donald J. Trump on Twitter: "I don't know Putin, have no deals in Russia, and the haters are going crazy - yet Obama can make a deal with Iran, #1 in terror, no problem!"

AJ Joshi on Twitter: "Trump talks about his relationship with Putin back in 2013 🤔 #Confused #1in https://t.co/nDdzldE1gf"

does lukewarm about her count?

She may/may not be _the_ right person for the job, but she's definitely the right _sort_ of person for it.

Anyone that upsets the education cabal this much certainly gets the benefit of a doubt with me.

Jill Stein is an idiot. Just because she's a "progressive" idiot doesn't make it okay.

NCLB was a Bush introduction, by the way, and ushered in the testing culture that's wreaked such havoc on our pre-university educational system (the effects of which I see every.fucking.day. in so many bad ways).

There's problems with the system, obviously. But DeVos will leave the system a complete smoldering ruin. Those of you teaching in public schools right now think it's bad? The corporatization of the higher education system that created a serf class of faculty and a wealthy class of administrators is coming for you. That means poverty, job insecurity, lack of support, etc. But wait, there's more! There's going to be a flight of students from public education as well - those who can afford it will go private. Those who can't, will try their damnedest to homeschool.

Oh, and control to the states? Say hello to even greater disparity in educational quality. The Mississippis, Louisianas, and the public system of Las Vegases of the world (among others) will be even worse, and you'd better fucking pray that you're lucky enough to be born in a state that still has the last vestiges of a respectable education system. If you don't and your parents can't afford private school, or lack the ability to homeschool you, you're fucked for life - you'll be born poor or working class, you'll live poor or working class, and you'll die poor or working class.

Got to hand it to Trump and Co. - they're doing an excellent job of recreating feudalism - much of the population is going to end up shackled in poverty or working poor, with little way out. A modest group of middle class, and the top dominated by the wealthy, who will control everything.

The United States is no longer a meritocracy, if ever it was one. It's a moneytocracy.

This. Every single word of this.

She's running a scam in conjunction with Putin. Everything is about siphoning off Dem voters and turning them into cash.

In particular rural schools will get hosed if charters/vouchers take off nationwide. I think about where I went to school in Southern Ohio, and there's no profit to be had there. There's one school for the community, a community with a serious drug and poverty problem. No charter school is going to be interested in that district, and there are thousands of those districts around the country.

What will happen is that the charter/voucher folks will siphon off money from the public system, but city public schools are still going to get their share. So rural schools get no possible benefits from charters, but do end up with less funding.

I'm ambivalent at best on charters, but even if they achieve what their supporters say they can achieve, that still leaves thousands of school districts with nothing but a funding cut and a cheap hat.

So the GOP just silenced Elizabeth Warren on the Senate floor for reading the letter Coretta Scott King wrote in 1986 opposing Sessions' nomination to a federal judgeship.

Welcome to the Third World educational system. :) Please have a seat.

and then she recorded herself reading it and posted it on facebook.

and then the letter itself was posted on facebook by someone else.

and then one of her colleague's read the letter to congress anyway.

and mitch continues to look like a bully all the time.

Trump is telling the courts that "even a bad high school student" would reinstate his travel ban. Good to know that is what he feels is the bar to become a federal judge.

Which energizes the right wing base as much as Warren energizes the left.

Replace "even" with "only" and he might be on to something.

My predictions:

Dems will get some seats in the mid-terms, but not enough to overcome the unfavorable map and GOP structural advantages. GOP continues to hold both houses of Congress after 2018.

Trump will morph into celebrity President in chief. Pence and a few others will take over the actual day to day running of the government. Trump will keep the fun parts of the job. And he keeps saying and doing things to stay newsworthy.

Once serious folks get a sense that Trump's finger is not hovering over the button, they relax a bit. The Women's March type protests continue, but they do not make inroads into Trump's base, and the establishment GOP continues to support Trump and push legislation.

Trump's popularity continues to hover in that 40-50% range.

The 2020 election is a toss up with a slight lean GOP based on structural advantages in the EC.

I would actually be more comfortable with Trump running things than Bannon.

Based on things I've seen over time, I'd say he's probably expecting too much of them.

I don't think it will stay in this range for four years. If the economy booms or there's a major external event he could jump into the fifties, but if things stay relatively quiet and status quo I'd expect him to slowly drop until he's in the thirties.

The economy is pretty good despite what we've been told. And I'm not sure he's going to be much help since he doesn't know whether a strong or weak dollar is good for the economy. Basic economic stuff.

Donald Trump is unsure if strong or weak US dollar is best for the economy | The Independent

Did I miss an Islamic terror attack in Atlanta?

Or are we revising who committed the 1996 bombings? Spicer is a piece of work.

I said before the election that I think it's fairly likely that we'll be in a recession at some point over the next four years as we've had a pretty long period of expansion.

Trump also has a problem because research shows people respond less to absolute conditions and more to changes in condition. Keeping the economy as is won't sway a lot of voters. He needs to show obvious improvement, and that's tough, because you're right, things are pretty good now.

Eh... Christian fundamentalist, Islamic fundamentalist, what's the difference? Oh wait...

Disastrous football game...

...and now slamming a company on Twitter re: them dropping his daughter's clothing line, 21 mins into his daily intelligence briefing, causing their stock to take a hit. No conflict of interest there.

If your philosophy was implemented in Dept. of Education starting tomorrow, what are the top three things that you think it should be doing at a national level?

I get the objections to Devos, though to the points others have raised I know plenty of people supporting her so I guess we just know different kinds of people. I'm not looking for 'run the other way from Devos' though. I just haven't heard much on this in recent years. What I have heard, maybe from reading the wrong places, is more funding(nobody says from where), vouchers are bad, mandatory testing is bad, etc. I'm interested in practical solutions here. How do we improve the performance of public education, from your point of view?

We don't have a schools problem, we have a poverty problem. Middle class and wealthy school districts do well compared to other nations. I have no idea how to fix poverty, but that's what we need to work on. Too much education policy is about schools that are already successful.

Of course, lead remediation would help a lot of poor people academically and socially, so I'd start there.

It took a hit, but bounced right back up and is back at the same level the stock was at closing, up 4%. My guess is an automated trading system got the PRESIDENT SAID BAD input and did a sell off, and then other automated systems pounced on that to drive it back up.

And right there is why I'm hopeful for DeVos.

If she's upsetting people who say those two things then that's a feather in her cap right off the bat.

So the decades of evidence showing that testing has little to no predictive ability for either college or career success is wrong?

It goes without saying that heavy focus on testing leads to teachers teaching the test. It becomes their only option because that's what they're rated on.

Kids taught that way aren't prepared for college or the real world.

Vouchers are good for those who can afford private school

It illuminates what you do/don't know about subject X. Which, you know, IS rather important ... contrary to the "I'm okay, you're okay" bullshit that swirls around it.

I'd like to see every single anti-testing advocate in the education cabal barred from ever drawing a taxpayer check again frankly.

It's not testing they hate, it's accountability.

If the test covers the material that the course is responsible* for then where exactly in the supposed problem with "teaching the test"?

*work with that supposition m'kay, I acknowledge that the tests are not always aligned with the course adequately. But that's a coordination issue, not a methodology issue

Ironic that the guy who campaigned on helping American businesses spends half his time trying to hurt American businesses on Twitter. Sorry no one wanted to buy your kid's shitty clothing line.

It literally does not do that at all. The typical multiple choice test is the cheapest, and least effective, means of assessment.

I went through a language school twice that moves at a ridiculous pace (fluency expected in 1 year). The first time I went through we were taught the language but there was heavy focus on testing. We had quizzes every other day and a major test every 1-2 weeks. Fail 2 in a row and you're out of the course. Tons of pressure on the instructors because they were rated on student. performance.

Our class ended up doing below expectations and I know a couple of instructors lost their jobs.

The 2nd time I went through for a different language we had the same pace and heavy focus on testing. Most of the teaching was geared directly toward the tests we were given and the last 3 months were practice finals over and over. Nearly everything we did the last quarter was geared toward that final.

In the end our class did well and I didn't feel I learned anywhere near as much as I did with the first course. It took a 1 month follow on class to get me where I felt I needed to be.

My personal experience and speaking with teachers in this area tells me that in a perfect world heavy testing focus would be great. In reality, it leads to huge gaps in learning because it's impossible to test knowledge as widely as needed and with teacher's jobs relying on test scores they're naturally going to find the most efficient way to get their students their scores.

I understand the other options aren't perfect either, but experiencing a heavy testing curriculum myself I'd rather put the learning on myself and the teacher and not the test writera.

Tests don't show what you can do, at all. They're nothing more than a way to regurgitate information one time and then move on. There's ample evidence showing the same student can take the same test several days in a row and their scores will follow no pattern. Test scores can be affected by sleep issues, stress at home, illness that isn't even felt yet, and a myriad of other things that aren't remotely related to the subject matter the test is supposedly assessing.

The SAT and other standardized tests have been studied for decades. They have been shown, over and over again, to have no predictive ability related to college or career success. The only reason they're still in use, and are actually increasing, is because of the massive testing and test preparation industry in the US (which grossed more than both every movie in 2014 and the NFL in 2014). Most of the people who think the tests have value are either making money off of them or have never delved into the research about them.

I should say that this is one issue that I totally agree with JIMGA on, though I do acknowledge it's possible I'm just not familiar enough with the counterarguments. I mean, what's the purpose of education if not to master the material(whatever subject it is?) What better way aside from testing is there to determine whether or not a student has, in fact, mastered said material?


Honest question here: what does this decades of evidence you mention indicate does have predictive ability for success? What things can primary education reasonably achieve if actual knowledge and mastery of material is not among them? It seems your statement here leads to either of two admittedly absurd conclusions:

1. Testing can't tell us anything about what a student knows.

2. You don't need to know anything to succeed in college/career.

Which of these(or both) is reflected in the evidence you cite?

Edit:


This leads me to a couple more questions.

** Is there a better way to determine and measure student knowledge?

** How is the home life/illness/stress situation anything different than what a student will face when they become an adult? Is not job performance(whatever said job is) also impacted by those things?

Jon, you are over romanticizing the education system. And I get it. I used to side with you. I have countless times credited our free public education system for opening the doors for me from a foster kid, projects reject to a successful business owner. And no doubt without the education I received Id have never made that transition.

But the abomination that is current school melt down is stupid. Its not what you and I went through, and certainly not even akin to the education your son got.

My daughter is in the 8th grade. Public school. She is smart. Very Smart. Duke TIP program etc. Never made a B on an interim or report card, can tell you off hand the number of tests or quizes she has made a B on in her life. You get the picture. Lots of us here have these kids. They are teaching the kids for the upcoming progress test. A special district teacher is going around prepping the kids. The take home sheet has an error on it. Its not debateable it is an error.
The problem is 4x=12. X = ?
Choices are 1,2,4,8
My daughter wrote in 3.
She got it wrong on her sheet and came home pissed. After reviewing I couldn't blame her. I went to the school and met with the guidance counselor who doubles as the G&T (whatever we call that today) program admin. I nearly lost my shit. While we know the answer is wrong it is a known issue with the state test. The teacher explained to the students in class that it is an error and they need to select 4 in order for it to be counted right on next weeks test. Kylie lost points on this assignment because she didnt follow direction and select 4. Even though her answer is mathematically correct, it is incorrect because of the classroom instruction.

This and similar situations are playing out daily around the country in our school system. The test is what is important not the process, not the education, not even the truth or accuracy just the test.

LOL. Keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better.

And most people who don't see the inherent value are too out of touch with reality for their opinion to have any relevance at all.

So you keep fucking that chicken, while some of us keep doing what we can to finally bring some sanity back into the education system.

GPA is several times more predictive of success than SAT/ACT score.

Tests do not test actionable knowledge. They test regurgitation. The most successful education systems in the world, like Finland and Singapore, do almost no testing.

Testing does not show any mastery at all. Mastery requires putting something into action and tests, by their very nature, cannot do that (at least at a massively standardized scale). Projects, especially real world projects, show actual mastery.

There are multiple ways to assess mastery of subject matter, but standardized tests are the least effective way to determine what someone actually knows. If you want to really dig into it, some great book length treatments exist and I would suggest you start with Sir Ken Robinson's Creative Schools: The Grassroots Revolution That's Transforming Education.

I've got an M.Ed. and will likely finish my PhD in the next 18 months. I'll take objective facts garnered from thousands of pages of reading academic studies over your opinion on anything.

The error, however, is a flaw with the test (as I cited earlier).
It's not a flaw inherent to "teaching the test" as an approach.

As a known issue, the common sense solution is to invalidate the question, don't score it, move on.

If that isn't happening then THAT is something that hopefully everyone should be able to agree needs to be remedied.

That's definitely ridiculous, and I'd be mad too. However, I'd see the problem here as being the test itself, and the failures involved in this error not being spotted, not testing per se. Similarly, regarding the comment on multiple-choice: I agree that those aren't effective. Solution: don't use multiple-choice tests.

On the above, a simple "4x = 12. Solve for x" would seem to be a lot more useful. If these are the kinds of tests and questions that are being produced, then somewhere along the line the education beauracracy is stunningly incompetent. That's where I'd like to see the energy focused, assuming this is an accurate reflection of the situation.

This statement really confuses me. Isn't GPA largely the sum of a greater number of tests? Virtually every class I was in, and from talking to people who are students now from time to time I get the impression the situation was the same, your grade was mostly the result of testing well. This sounds like more of a sample size issue than a problem with testing itself.

Is there a job where everything hinges on one test, or one set of tests, every year that require you to do nothing but answer those test questions correctly?

This all boils down to the purpose of the educational system. If it is to prepare people for the real world, then what we have is woefully inadequate and testing is the $13 billion cherry on top. There aren't many real world situations where you are grouped together by age, told to move around to a separate instructor for a separate topic every 55 minutes or so, and then tested to see how much of that unrelated information you can remember before taking a break for 2-3 months and doing it again with all new subjects where essentially none of the previous information is covered again. The system is built incorrectly from the ground up.

The other flaw with 'testing' being almighty is that it doesn't grade a teachers performance fairly - if a teacher lucks out with a class full of bright, motivated kids then they'll probably do alright with mediocre teaching ... however a fantastic teacher with a set of poorer students might only get 'average' grades and not be recognized because they managed to get the best possible out of their students.

The human element in teaching is hugely important - I put down my career to some teachers in High School and Sixth Form in England who didn't give up on me despite my lack of interest and general demeanor.

Not necessarily. Good teachers assess regularly, but not necessarily with tests. Also, the percentage of the grade should be heavily weighted towards growth in the subject and production of artifacts (like presentations, reports, physical items, etc that are relevant to the subject at hand).

We could also start with idea of classes themselves. Finland is one of the elite systems in the world and they're eliminating subjects to do a more holistic approach to learning. They're moving to doing things like studying the EU in which every aspect of it, history, economy, etc, is all woven into a single, comprehensive unit.