Blog 3 Columns

Blame Terrorism On Engineers and Conservatives?0
- Politics
- March 25, 2016
Apparently, we’ve been missing the secret decoder ring that would reveal the true psychological profile of Islamic terrorists. It’s not really Islam, or even a propensity for mayhem. It’s the need for “cognitive closure.” That habit of mind, along with others that psychologists closely associate with it, gives us the key clue—at least according to
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Tyrion Lannister for Supreme Court!0
- Education
- March 24, 2016
The routine is old. We’ve seen it before. A television host holds a mic in front of a passerby who willfully displays how clueless he or she is about general knowledge. It was funny when Leno was doing it 20 years ago. And I found Jimmy Kimmel’s recent “Lie Witness News” segment that aired last
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The Last Supper 0
- Culture
- March 24, 2016
One of the world’s most recognized art pieces is probably Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper. The mural was commissioned by Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, who was a patron of da Vinci. Today it can be found covering a wall at the monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, Italy. Since it was
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The ‘Maundy’ Thursday Story 0
- Culture
- March 24, 2016
Today is Maundy Thursday of the Christian Holy Week in the West. Traditionally, the day remembers the Last Supper, Christ’s washing of the disciples’ feet, and the great mandate, which is where the name Maundy is derived. To begin, the name ‘Maundy’ is derived from the Latin word ‘mandatum’, which means ‘commandment’. From the
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If Parents Stopped Enabling Their Kids, Maybe There Wouldn’t be as much Student Loan Debt 0
- Economics
- March 24, 2016
A recent Star Tribune article nails a major issue in the student debt crisis: Too many parents are enabling their children by helping them take out massive loans for colleges they can’t afford. This has caused a lot of young people to cripple their financial futures in pursuit of a goal many later discover was
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How SpellCheck and AutoCorrect are Destroying Kids’ Grammar 0
- Education
- March 24, 2016
One thing school-aged parents can agree upon is their dissatisfaction with the lack of writing instruction their children receive in grade school. Writing rules, language arts, essay composition, sentence structure, punctuation, style—all of these things have come up in casual conversations with parents you bump into at the store, in the parking lot, and on
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Handel’s ‘Messiah,’ and the Decline of Knowledge in the West 0
- Culture
- March 24, 2016
The other day, I heard an announcer on a local classical radio station gently chide his listeners, saying, “It’s almost Easter, and I haven’t had one request from our audience for selections from Handel’s Messiah!” For those who think of the Messiah as a Christmas tradition, this announcer’s request seems a bit odd. But historically
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Frog and Toad: Arnold Lobel’s Little Gems 0
- Culture
- March 24, 2016
Every child should read Arnold Lobel’s stories of Frog and Toad. These stories are pure, unashamed delight. Once upon a time, all children’s stories were a pleasant romp, an indulgence in something lovely. Think of Mother Goose, The Wind in the Willows, The Tale of the Pie and the Patty Pan. As our times have
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Former Teacher: 7 Ways Schools are Creating ‘Empty’ Children 2
- Culture
- March 24, 2016
In the early 1990s, New York Teacher of the Year, John Taylor Gatto, threw in the towel on teaching with his famous I Quit, I Think letter to the Wall Street Journal. Gatto’s reason for quitting was simple. He could no longer justify teaching “a curriculum of confusion, class position, arbitrary justice, vulgarity, rudeness, disrespect
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Blame Terrorism On Engineers and Conservatives?0