DOWN TO THE DOCTOR’S: Gore’s gaffe, guns and government battery-schools

In which Libertarianz  leader Dr Richard McGrath takes his regularly irreverent look at some of the past week’s headlines.

1. “Schools set sights too low” – Even the government has had to admit that its holding pens are dumbing down the children held captive within. The government-created ERO, another bureaucratic black hole for taxpayer money, is biting the state hand by admitting that some schools are setting the bar at ground level. Some principals are hiding the abysmal results of testing done on students from the boards of trustees to whom they are supposed to be responsible. The only shock in this story is that Miseducation Minister Anne Tolley is shocked to learn about it. Others had been observing and predicting this state of affairs for years.

The report noted that many (one in three!) teachers have no idea of the importance of literacy (numeracy doesn’t warrant a mention). Could this have anything to do with the teachers’ training factories that churn out graduates who themselves went through the same intellectually crippling school system before entering university?

One sentence in the ERO report sums up the situation nicely: “In these classrooms, learning opportunities to motivate, engage or extend children were limited.” This is the legacy of nine years of teacher-friendly Labour Party rule, and good reason to end state interference in the education industry.

2. “Gore’s ice-cap claims disputed “– The man who says he invented the internet told the world yesterday that the Arctic polar ice could be gone in five years. Clearly, this useful idiot is becoming an embarrassment to the warmist movement as he tries to outdo everyone else’s doomsday predictions. Even scientists who back the AGW hypothesis are calling his pronouncement an exaggeration, and admit that the Goracle’s dire prediction has no basis in reality. Of course, when the polar ice doesn’t melt, as seems likely, Goracle will no doubt hail this as victory for the Copenhagen climate warriors. Sheesh.

3. “Gun lobby shoots holes in US laws” – Anything that strengthens the Second Amendment’s constitutional protection of individual rights has got to be good. Unfortunately, the NRA persists in cuddling up to the state by accepting the concept of government-issued permits to law-abiding people. The anti-self-defence lobby protests in its usual hysterical manner, its representatives shutting their minds to the evidence presented years ago by John Lott that gun law liberalization leads to less violent crime. Pity the media always look to the NRA as the defenders of gun ownership rights, when the JPFO and GOA do it so much better.

See y’all in two weeks! I’m taking leave next week.
Doc McGrath