Comment Re:"African tech hubs" - an oxymoron... (Score 1) 61
What have Africans done for the world?
Humanity likely came into existence in Africa.
What have Africans done for the world?
Humanity likely came into existence in Africa.
It's possible that this program will produce some enthusiastic and talented programmers in Africa... but when those programmers realise that it's frustrating writing programs when there's only a few hours of power a day, internet access is flaky, corrupt and predatory government frustrates their efforts to set up a business, and some big company overseas beckons them to work, they probably won't remain in Africa for very long.
Not all of Africa is impossible to do business in. Kenya's government, while not good, is at least stable and mostly functional. Botswana has seen very dramatic economic growth and is starting to emerge in the global markets as a viable place to do business.
Sure, Somalia's too unstable, Nigeria's too factional and Zimbabwe is too corrupt, but there are parts of Africa that could potentially benefit from better tech in schools.
Why not bring back BeOS?
Because nobody ever used BeOS. Not that it wasn't a nice system, it was just that nobody ever used it.
Right now they are so desperate that they are trying to milk Windows 8 as much while the going is still good.
And when, pray tell, will the going for Windows 8 actually be good?
Also AMD has better free software drivers.
Yeah, but their proprietary Linux drivers are simply atrocious. Performance isn't so bad but stability is awful.
Wouldn't a better example be Norway or other N European first world countries? Using Venezuela as a typical socialist country is like using Somalia as a typical capitalist country. I'd guess there are more large screen TVs available in Scandinavia then in Somalia.
Norway, Sweden, et al actually have lower corporate income tax rates than the USA does. Not sure about Norway but Sweden, under the center-right Moderate Party, has actually worked to trim its safety nets and curb tax rates in recent years.
At least the Soviets had bread lines. Today's Republicans would simply let the lower classes starve because the rich need yet another tax break.
Soviet citizens did starve. I don't know if you've looked at our figures for obesity rates but Americans aren't exactly starving. Our poor are actually the most likely to be obese so they're not starving either. As for our tax rates, the top 10% of income earners pay about 70% of all income taxes so the rich are hardly getting away scott-free on taxes.
Perhaps some budding Michael Moore might want to contrast the technology available to the President's kids at the $35,288-a-year Sidwell Friends School ("The number one blessing for this [iMovie] project was the delivery of noise-cancelling headphones for each child") to the tech available at rural Appalachia schools (avg. family income $40,000). Sidwell Friends is also living-the-cyberlife as a charter member of the elite Global Online Academy, which boasts that "classmates in Washington, D.C. $35,288, and San Francisco $38,900 work on projects with peers in Madaba-Manja, Jordan $38,272, and Portland, Oregon $25,850. Students in Hawaii $19,950 (President Obama's alma mater) and Chicago $29,985 discuss global health issues with students in New York $40,220, Seattle $28,500 (Bill Gates' alma mater), Boston $46,700, and Jakarta, Indonesia $30,200."
And what would the message of this movie be? "America has expensive but fancy private schools"? I think we already knew that. Yeah, if you're willing to shell out some coin, you can indeed buy a great education for your kid. So what? With more money you can also buy better healthcare, go to better colleges, eat at better restaurants, drive safer cars and live in better houses located in better neighborhoods.
Technology is a solution that liberals love to apply to education for three reasons. First, it's high tech and anything tech related in education makes the person who suggested it look smart. Second, it distracts attention from the unholy alliance that exists between the teachers' unions and the Democratic Party by suggesting that the problem is not poor teaching but rather "low technology" in the classroom. Third and finally, it provides a target at which to throw money which is a favorite liberal "solution" to any problem, never mind the outcomes because it's the good thoughts and intentions, not results, that count.
Actually, most teacher's unions would just prefer the money be spent on hiring more teachers. Regardless of what class sizes actually are (and regardless of all the evidence that suggest class size isn't all that important relative to other factors), a union's top priority will generally be to ensure more money is spent on its rank and file.
While unions are a huge problem in our public education system, they are far from being the only problem.
Technology is not going to fix the problem of parents not being involved in their children's education.
There is no public policy remedy for a lack of parental involvement. Public policy can change the way in which we hire and fire teachers. Public policy can set curriculum and determine what sort of things we test for. The sort of technology schools purchase can be set by public policy. You can blame the parents all you want, but that will never accomplish anything since it is outside the realm of problems that are solvable.
The Iraq war was a gigantic subsidy to the oil industry.
The Iraqi oil fields are owned and operated by the Iraqi Government. Occasionally they lease production to American drilling firms but Iraq's oil industry is largely a competitor to America's.
If the US and the EU decide to leave their renewable energy sector to the whims of the free market, while allowing China to subsidizes the hell out of it- we might as well just hand the entire industry over to them.
And if Chinese taxpayers foot our bill, what's the problem with that exactly? I'm not bothered by some foreign country subsidizing my lifestyle.
you mean like coal, gas and oil pay their own way? They get hundreds of billions of dollars worth of subsidies every year.
Not really. They pretty much get standard equipment depreciation schedules, present in virtually all heavy industry. They also get to deduct dry wells and other losses, also pretty standard stuff. Ethanol is a racket and basically just exist so that we may sacrifice to the corn gods, but oil and gas don't really get many subsidies that aren't standard for all industries. Per kilowatt hour, renewables get far more in the way of subsidies than oil or coal.
This is the ultimate example of the failure of capitalism. The wealthy and closed mided are able to push their agenda and beliefs, no matter how preposterous, to the masses because they buy the most while greedy publishers are willing to forgo fact over profit.
In other words, capitalism fails because it is exactly like every other system. I don't recall people praising Mao or Stalin for their open-mindedness.
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