I came across two ostensibly scientific studies by academically credentialed researchers that piqued my interest. One was the web site "What is a Red State" Verification of Bush State Stereotypes, by Associate Professor of Cognitive Science Benjamin K. Bergen, and the other was a more dubious ALEC 'Report card on American education. K-12" by a Dr. Matthew Ladner, which had a very dubious ideological premise for awarding high ALEC marks in education.
I had been thinking about returning to writing about the differences between red states and blue states after the passage and signing in Wisconsin of more of the failed abstinence only; ignorance only sex ed that seems to characterize conservatives repressive attitudes towards sex. That dovetails with the trend to educated Republicans (and other conservatives) distrusting science and experts.
States with abstinence only Sex ed have double the rate of unplanned teen pregnancies of states with real education.
Researchers at the University of Washington in Seattle found that teenagers who received some type of comprehensive sex education were 60 percent less likely to get pregnant or get someone else pregnant. And in 2007, a federal report showed that abstinence-only programs had “no impacts on rates of sexual abstinence.”So clearly, when conservatives push so very strongly for ignorance only sex ed, it's because they think that if you don't tell kids how sex happens, and if you don't tell them about how to prevent pregnancy, they just won't have sex...........never mind how much evidence that is not true accumulates. Conservatives are repressive prudes about sex, they want to control people's sexuality and they demand that the rest of the world thinks it is bad, disgusting, and dirty like they do (apparently).
The criteria in the ALEC 'report card' on education reform was not higher graduation rates, better test scores in standardized testing or SAT/ACTs, or achieving a higher level of education. The standard that was being measured by the ALEC grade was a disturbing dog whistle term of responsiveness to "parental choice in education". In looking at what ALEC rewards with high marks, the real measurement is how well conservative parents are doing in taking control of the education of children away from teachers and experts and standardized criteria of education, and instead putting a priority on teaching subjects like creationism instead of evolution, an anti-science, anti-education, pro-conservative measure. This is an attempt to exalt the idiot conservatives on the Texas School board who tried to politicize their text books in ways which were fact averse, and to encourage the dumbing down of our education nation wide by the terrifyingly ill-educated Tea Partiers of Tennessee who wanted to require the worst kinds of revisionist history (and science, economics, literature, ad infinitum) to their curricula. This is not about REAL ACADEMIC achievement. This is entirely about promoting the anti-education policies of the far right. Policies like those espoused by Mr. Potatohead wannabe Rick Santorum who believed that we shouldn't encourage students to go to college because they might learn things which contradict conservatism - no surprise, given how fact-averse conservatism so often is - and because it might cause students to QUESTION THEIR BELIEF IN GOD. So........the far right conservatives, notably including those in the Tea Party, would much prefer the American public to be dumb, ignorant, ill educated but GOD FEARING sheep who do not learn facts which are inconvenient, and who do not question, ever, what they are told to believe. This is the classic Right Wing Authoritarianism which is defined by three things:
Right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) is a personality and ideological variable studied in political, social, and personality psychology. It is defined by three attitudinal and behavioral clusters which correlate together:[1][2]
- Authoritarian submission — a high degree of submissiveness to the authorities who are perceived to be established and legitimate in the society in which one lives.
- Authoritarian aggression — a general aggressiveness directed against deviants, outgroups, and other people that are perceived to be targets according to established authorities.
- Conventionalism — a high degree of adherence to the traditions and social norms that are perceived to be endorsed by society and its established authorities, and a belief that others in one's society should also be required to adhere to these norms.[3]
Buesgens, a former math teacher, must have only learned Republican math, where the numbers don't relate in any meaningful way to objective reality or accepted academic or functional practice. It is not surprising to find that schools in Jordan, the district that Buesgens represents, ranked in the bottom half of Minnesota schools in performance, as indicated here, and here, and here.
It is shocking to me that anyone - even a Republican - would have such a poor understanding of mathematics when assessing public policy and legislative decisions. Given the poor performance of his own school district, one has to wonder at this. (The only explanation I can come up with involves excessive use of alcohol....) [It is worth noting here that financial investment in education does not appear a significant part of right wing evaluations. In the case of ALEC, their focus appears to be on privatization so as to make money for their member corporations off of education, not providing a competitive high quality education.] Dumbing down our state and national education to maximize conformity and to advance conservative propaganda seems to be the only goal.
From MNPublius:
Buesgens (R-Jordan) proposes 20 percent cut to schools [UPDATED]
Mark Buesgens, a leading conservative and one-time chair of the Tom Emmer campaign, has made a budget proposal that would be absolutely devastating to Minnesota’s public schools. His proposal would make a 20 percent cut to school funding, and would not pay back the $1.4 billion we owe our schools to pay back last biennium’s school shift.
Buesgens’ plan claims to “freeze” spending at the current levels. In reality, it ignores shifts that were made and Federal money the state received, and actually drastically reduces school funding. Buesgens’ proposal will result in schools getting$1.9 $2.4 billion* less this biennium than last, at a time when enrollment is increasing and they’re actually due to get a $1 billion $500 million increase in funding. This cut of nearly $3 billion is approximately 20 percent of the forecast school funding [PDF].
Before the session even started, I warned that the MNGOP might do this, and explained why it would mean real pain for our schools. Here’s a short summary of the problem:
Along comes Mark Buesgens. He looks at the budget, ignoring the school shift, and says to himself okay, we spent $11.4 billion on schools in the last biennium. Let’s freeze it there. In reality, that’s $2.4 billion too low. Plus, it doesn’t consider the extra $500 million schools are expecting because of an expected influx of 15,000 new students. This would be an absolute disaster for our schools.
So when I read Professor Bergen's web site which identified Red States as Bush States, which had a correlation to four factors, I was intrigued, as one of the factor he correlated was education.Buesgens’ plan claims to “freeze” spending at the current levels. In reality, it ignores shifts that were made and Federal money the state received, and actually drastically reduces school funding. Buesgens’ proposal will result in schools getting
Before the session even started, I warned that the MNGOP might do this, and explained why it would mean real pain for our schools. Here’s a short summary of the problem:
School funding in the last biennium was temporarily reduced by $1.9 billion as part of the school funding “shift.” In addition, we took $500 million from Federal stimulus aid. This made our spending look artificially low in FY2010-11. We promised schools $13.8 billion in spending, but we only spent $11.9 billion immediately counting the Federal aid. But that was never real savings — it was just a postponement. School funding was still supposed to be $13.8 billion, and schools have been taking out loans waiting for the rest of the money ever since.
Along comes Mark Buesgens. He looks at the budget, ignoring the school shift, and says to himself okay, we spent $11.4 billion on schools in the last biennium. Let’s freeze it there. In reality, that’s $2.4 billion too low. Plus, it doesn’t consider the extra $500 million schools are expecting because of an expected influx of 15,000 new students. This would be an absolute disaster for our schools.
What characterizes states that vote for George W. Bush?
An analysis of voting patterns reveals that their populations tend to:- Lack a college education
- Be White
- Be obese
- Shop at Walmart
The more educated the population of a state, (as measured by the percentage of the population with a Bachelor's degree or higher), the less likely that state was to vote for George W. Bush in the 2000 Presidential Election (p<0.001).
In addition, the higher the rate of obesity in a state, the more likely that state was to vote for Bush (p<0.01).If education or obesity correlates with race, then it could be race, rather than education or obesity that is actually the strong predictor of voting behavior. What we see is that the more Caucasian a state is, the more likely it was to vote for Bush (p<0.01).
The number of Walmart stores per capita in a state also correlates with votes for Bush (p<0.0001). [It is worth noting that Walmart and the Walton family are core members of right wing unregistered lobbyist and government corruption entity ALEC, which expends obscene amounts of money to elect right wing politicians who will subsequently serve their financial interests - DG]
When racial makeup, education, obesity, and Walmarts are all included in a multiple regression, race (b=0.225; t(49)=2.118; p<0.05), education (b=-0.386; t(49)=-2.911; p<0.01), and Walmart concentration (b=0.331; t(49)=2.618; p<0.05) are all significant factors.
Sources for the numbers:
- Obesity data are from a report by the non-profit American Public Health Association, as reported here
- Education data are from a 2003 supplement to the 2000 U.S. census, as reported here
- Voting data are from the federal register
- Race data are from the 2000 U.S. census
- Walmart numbers are from the Walmart 2004 Annual Report
That it should be vehemently and aggressively opposed by thoughtful and principle conservatives, independents and those further left should be evident. It explains the punitive right wing culture war of coercion, it explains the deliberate efforts by the right to keep our population stupid and ill-educated in order to be more easily manipulated and exploited. Right wing thinking is simply not very good thinking.
I was struck by the following from the Jacksonvill Florida Times Union on the myths of right wing thinking, from last year:
Politics: Four big myths of right-wing thinking
Posted: March 28, 2011 - 12:00am
It seems there are four powerful myths that form the foundation for much of right-wing thought.
- Myth No. 1: Punishment.
Through the years the idea has been allowed to develop that asking the wealthy to pay a higher percentage in taxes is "punishment."
It seems that the days of President John F. Kennedy's "ask not what your country can do for you" has fallen completely out of fashion.
- Myth No. 2: Warfare.
Any attempt by the government to balance budgets by progressive taxation is "class warfare." Such speech seems to border on blasphemy.
Are we to take seriously a comparison between someone being asked to pay a few percentage points more in taxes to actual physical warfare endured by military members in the defense of their country?
- Myth No. 3: Free market.
Markets must have rules and regulations; they must operate in an environment.
Some countries may allow toxic waste to be dumped in a nearby river; they may have no minimum wage and no concern for the health and welfare of their workers.
Other markets in more civilized and advanced societies are not going to allow these things to happen.
They will insist on a minimum wage, on safety and environmental regulations.
What is meant by "free market?" Does it mean companies have the right to seek out the cheapest labor, the most lax regulations?
If so, how are advanced countries like the United States supposed to compete?
- Myth No. 4: Laziness.
This is the idea that people who find themselves on the bottom of the economy simply deserve to be there.
This myth ties in nicely with the "free market" idea that everyone gets what they deserve.
Yet, it's clear many unemployed people are not lazy. They may have worked hard for many years only to fall on hard times.
And, once unemployed, they are excluded by many companies who have made a practice of not hiring people who do not currently have a job.
Finally, part of the "laziness" myth is the idea that those at the top deserve to be there; that they certainly got there by hard work.
Yet, it's a fact that two-thirds of all wealth is inherited.
We must break through the four powerful myths that have been allowed to grow strong in our society if we are to make the sort of political progress that will send us toward a future we can look forward to.
We have a choice in our politics, in our positive and constructive decision to be educated people who are fact based and who engage in critical thinking. Or, we can be conservative conformists, which appears to be a grim and dystopic alternative. I don't know if I will receive a reply, but I dashed off an email to Professor Bergen, suggesting he might want to correlate abstinence only / ignorance only sex ed policies, and numbers of NRA memberships into his existing data on red state patterns. We need to get rid of the dead wood of bad thinkers in our legislature. Mark Buesgens is far from the only, and may well not be the worst, by a considerable margin. Rather, he typifies the problem with poor thinkers who don't work well with facts and numbers. Otherwise just waiting for the old conservatives to die off, given their lack of success with conservative wedge issues like homophobia among younger people will not be sufficient --- not if the people who are approaching voting age are given a bad conservative-dictated education that ill prepares them for participation in a representative form of government, or any other aspect of life for that matter.
- Myth No. 1: Punishment.
Through the years the idea has been allowed to develop that asking the wealthy to pay a higher percentage in taxes is "punishment."
It seems that the days of President John F. Kennedy's "ask not what your country can do for you" has fallen completely out of fashion.
- Myth No. 2: Warfare.
Any attempt by the government to balance budgets by progressive taxation is "class warfare." Such speech seems to border on blasphemy.
Are we to take seriously a comparison between someone being asked to pay a few percentage points more in taxes to actual physical warfare endured by military members in the defense of their country?
- Myth No. 3: Free market.
Markets must have rules and regulations; they must operate in an environment.
Some countries may allow toxic waste to be dumped in a nearby river; they may have no minimum wage and no concern for the health and welfare of their workers.
Other markets in more civilized and advanced societies are not going to allow these things to happen.
They will insist on a minimum wage, on safety and environmental regulations.
What is meant by "free market?" Does it mean companies have the right to seek out the cheapest labor, the most lax regulations?
If so, how are advanced countries like the United States supposed to compete?
- Myth No. 4: Laziness.
This is the idea that people who find themselves on the bottom of the economy simply deserve to be there.
This myth ties in nicely with the "free market" idea that everyone gets what they deserve.
Yet, it's clear many unemployed people are not lazy. They may have worked hard for many years only to fall on hard times.
And, once unemployed, they are excluded by many companies who have made a practice of not hiring people who do not currently have a job.
Finally, part of the "laziness" myth is the idea that those at the top deserve to be there; that they certainly got there by hard work.
Yet, it's a fact that two-thirds of all wealth is inherited.
We must break through the four powerful myths that have been allowed to grow strong in our society if we are to make the sort of political progress that will send us toward a future we can look forward to.
We have a choice in our politics, in our positive and constructive decision to be educated people who are fact based and who engage in critical thinking. Or, we can be conservative conformists, which appears to be a grim and dystopic alternative. I don't know if I will receive a reply, but I dashed off an email to Professor Bergen, suggesting he might want to correlate abstinence only / ignorance only sex ed policies, and numbers of NRA memberships into his existing data on red state patterns. We need to get rid of the dead wood of bad thinkers in our legislature. Mark Buesgens is far from the only, and may well not be the worst, by a considerable margin. Rather, he typifies the problem with poor thinkers who don't work well with facts and numbers. Otherwise just waiting for the old conservatives to die off, given their lack of success with conservative wedge issues like homophobia among younger people will not be sufficient --- not if the people who are approaching voting age are given a bad conservative-dictated education that ill prepares them for participation in a representative form of government, or any other aspect of life for that matter.
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