Category Archives: Other Columns

Columns concerning any and everything. Enjoy!

Of Summer Jobs, Economic Woe, and Academic Pursuits, Etc.

23 Friday Jun 2017

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So much in one AP story about teens and summer and changes: the Disappearing Summer Job.

As summer 2017 begins, America’s teenagers are far less likely to be acquiring the kinds of experiences Doyle found so useful. Once a teenage rite of passage, the summer job is vanishing.

Instead of baling hay, scooping ice cream or stocking supermarket shelves in July and August, today’s teens are more likely to be enrolled in summer school, doing volunteer work to burnish their college credentials or just hanging out with friends.

For many, not working is a choice. For some others, it reflects a lack of opportunities where they live, often in lower-income urban areas: They sometimes find that older workers hold the low-skill jobs that once would have been available to them.

In July 1986, 57 percent of Americans ages 16 to 19 were employed. The proportion stayed over 50 percent until 2002 when it began dropping steadily. By last July, only 36 percent were working.

So much about modern America in one article. I was going to dissect this, almost line by line, but I have not the time – working my summer jobs.

My first summer job, of real employment, was conning people into helping people obtain gym memberships. Some 27 years later, I’m kind of still at it. I’m under contract for a fitness chapter in a new book (should be drafted and in next week) and writing a stand-alone book on the subject for the same publisher (later this summer). This is in no way typical.

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Gone like Pee Wee? Sinking liner.

There are:

Fewer jobs;

Massive competition for them;

Illegals and other immigrant inflation;

Pressures for college (for what that’s worth);

And the looming threat of total automation.

Please make of this material what you will. Did you have a summer job? Your kids? Food for thought in a changed nation. Where are we?

We’re Number 18!!: Progress: Another Global Survey

22 Thursday Jun 2017

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This one measures social progress – health, wellbeing, and opportunity.

The U.S. came in 18th place, in the High (but missing Very High) category.

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As with most of these things, I’m a little dubious of some of the metrics. Others though are spot on. And the findings are pretty consistent with other surveys and rankings we’ve looked at recently.

The FULL REPORT.

Not in the U.S.? Many of you are not. In the U.S.? Most of you are. Regardless, check the charts and see how you and yours did. Hats off to the “very highs.” The full study may be accessed:

HERE.

Valediction 2017

20 Tuesday Jun 2017

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The news from government schools and the standardized “education” industry grows worse by the month.

“Valediction,” as used above, means saying farewell.

Valedictoria: a student, typically having the highest academic achievements of the class, who delivers the valedictory at a graduation ceremony.

The Valedictorian, with the highest academic achievement, gets to say farewell to the school on behalf of the graduating class. And we now bid farewell to valedictorians in American government high schools.

Unfortunately, as the AP points out today, that is exactly what seems to be happening at high schools all around the country as the title of “valedictorian” is being eliminated and/or bestowed upon so many kids in each graduating class that it’s rendered meaningless.

“More and more schools are moving toward a more holistic process. They look deeper into the transcript,” Gottlieb said.

Wisconsin’s Elmbrook School District has for several years ranked only the valedictorian and salutatorian, and only then because the state awards scholarships to schools’ top two graduates, according to Assistant Superintendent Dana Monogue. The change has been accepted by colleges and community alike, Monogue said.

“We are encouraged by any movement that helps students understand that they’re more than a score, that they’re more than a rank,” she said.

One school in Tennessee awarded the “valedictorian” title to 48 kids or roughly 25% of the entire graduating class.

Tennessee’s Rutherford County schools give the valedictorian title to every student who meets requirements that include a 4.0 grade-point average and at least 12 honors courses. Its highly ranked Central Magnet School had 48 valedictorians this year, about a quarter of its graduating class.

At another school in Maryland, the AP highlights the woes of a concerned mother who wonders how ranking might affect her teenager’s confidence.

The day rankings came out at Hammond High School in Columbia, Maryland, students were privately told their number — but things didn’t stay private for long.

“That was the only thing everyone was talking about,” said Mikey Peterson, 18, who shrugged off his bottom-third finish and will attend West Virginia University in the fall.

A spokesman for the Howard County, Maryland, district said schools recognize their top 5 percent so students can include it on college applications and hasn’t considered changing.

“There was a big emphasis on where you landed,” said Peterson’s classmate Vicki Howard, 18. “It made everything 10 times more competitive.”

Peterson’s mother, Elizabeth Goshorn, said she can’t walk into his school without hearing good things about her affable son, but worries about how rankings can affect a teenager’s confidence.

“It has such an impact on them as to how they perceive themselves if you’re putting rankings on them,” she said.

Try as you might, ignoring the principles of basic mathematics does not mean that they cease to exist. And while your enabling parents, high schools and colleges may share your view that ranking people on the basis achievement is racist, sexist and/or any other number of adjectives you may wish to throw out there….again, we assure you that the real world does not care.

Life is competitive and your relative performance versus your peers will ultimately determine your success in life irrespective of how “triggering” that fact may be. The sooner you realize that fact, the sooner you’ll be able to move out of mom’s basement.

The feelings of the snowflakes and the incessant demands of the SJWs destroy another tradition.

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I was not, if I recall ancient history correctly, valedictorian at “my” government high school. We had some very smart kids and very industrious. I’m confident my IQ placed at or very near the top. But my efforts*, while better than average, fell far short of the top slot. I can’t remember who received the honor, and honor it is (was), but I wasn’t the least bit upset about it. I’m happy when people succeed.

Now it’s gone – or going. Maybe it’s time to bid farewell to the schools. A class of valedictorians probably will require remedial education in college and, later, in life. What’s the point?

* My efforts continued to slide in college, as my IQ also surely declined… I rebounded in law school; still not top spot but with honors. I also got a shout out by name, from the faculty speaker, for my achievement. That, I think was rebel-rousing… Hmmm…

Perrin Lovett Coming to Patreon

19 Monday Jun 2017

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My Patreon page is under development. That, for those of you who don’t know, is a venue for the sharing of new and innovative information. Consider it the place (other than Amazon and B&N) where you’ll find the best of Old Perrin – all for a low, low price. Pricing structure and all else is being ironed out now.

So far, I’ve got this:

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I plan to use this as a launch pad for new ideas and projects. Some of those may be well outside my current wheelhouse. One word: “novel.” Maybe “novella.” Short story. Some kind of fiction. Something…

You will be invited soon (I hope) to join this exciting project. It’s an evolving concept. Developing… Stay tuned…

 

PS: I may also make a return to Twitter… Not so excited about that but it may be necessary…

Four More Good Reasons to Reconsider the College Experience

16 Friday Jun 2017

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And anymore, it’s an experience more than an education. I suppose the following does not apply to STEMs (maybe and for now), many professional tracks, and broad-spectrum education sought out by those with both the aptitude and the existing financial abilities. This is for the other 90% of students and potential applicants. It is time to think long and hard about paying (financing) a fortune for four, five, or ten years of increasingly useless drivel.

From Jonathan Newman at Mises:

Students are running out of reasons to pursue higher education. Here are four trends documented in recent articles:

[1] Graduates have little to no improvement in critical thinking skills

The Wall Street Journal reported on the troubling results of the College Learning Assessment Plus test (CLA+), administered in over 200 colleges across the US.

According to the WSJ, “At more than half of schools, at least a third of seniors were unable to make a cohesive argument, assess the quality of evidence in a document or interpret data in a table”. The outcomes were the worst in large, flagship schools: “At some of the most prestigious flagship universities, test results indicate the average graduate shows little or no improvement in critical thinking over four years.”

There is extensive literature on two mechanisms by which college graduates earn higher wages: actually learning new skills or by merely holding a degree for the world to see (signaling). The CLA+ results indicate that many students aren’t really learning valuable skills in college.

As these graduates enter the workforce and reveal that they do not have the required skills to excel in their jobs, employers are beginning to discount the degree signal as well. Google, for example, doesn’t care if potential hires have a college degree. They look past academic credentials for other characteristics that better predict job performance.

[2] Shouting matches have invaded campuses across the country [SJW mayhem]

It seems that developing critical thinking skills has taken a backseat to shouting matches in many US colleges. At Evergreen State College in Washington, student protests have hijacked classrooms and administration. Protesters took over the administration offices last month, and have disrupted classes as well. It has come to the point where enrollment has fallen so dramatically that government funding is now on the line.

The chaos at Evergreen resulted in “anonymous threats of mass murder, resulting in the campus being closed for three days.” One wonders if some of these students are just trying to get out of class work and studying by staging a campus takeover in the name of identity politics and thinly-veiled racism.

The shouting match epidemic hit Auburn University last semester when certain alt-right and Antifa groups (who are more similar than either side would admit) came from out of town to stir up trouble. Neither outside group offered anything of substance for discourse, just empty platitudes and shouting. I was happy to see that the general response from Auburn students was to mock both sides or to ignore the event altogether. Perhaps the Auburn Young Americans for Liberty group chose the best course of action: hosting a concert elsewhere on campus to pull attention and attendance away from both groups of loud but empty-headed out-of-towners. Of the students who chose not to ignore the event, my favorite Auburn student response was a guy dressed as a carrot holding a sign that read, “I Don’t CARROT ALL About Your Outrage.”

The other two reasons are:

[3] More efficient alternatives;

[4] Tuitions are Up; Incomes are Down.

All of these are telling and alarming. Any one by itself would be worrisome. For me, perhaps the worst is the lack of learning – especially considering the ridiculous costs imposed.

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Moon Prep.

What is the point of spending the better part of a decade (I think I was the last four-year degree man to actually finish in four years) at school, when there are no measurable increases in knowledge or critical thinking? To go through this, mortgaging ten to thirty years of one’s life in debt without the prospect of decent employment is ludicrous.

These are but four reasons. Look around and I’ll bet you can come up with another four – or forty. Google: “James Altucher college” for some extreme insight into better options.

If you’re in college or thinking about it, or if you know someone who is: seriously consider the many and increasing downsides. One can watch football and drink beer for a lot less and without the increased stress.

Deep Thoughts on Imperial Decline

15 Thursday Jun 2017

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Charles Hugh Smith examines the decay of post-America, partly through the lens of the late Roman Empire.

To these lists I would add a few more that are especially visible in the current Global Empire of Debt that encircles the globe and encompasses nations of all sizes and political/cultural persuasions:

1. An absurdly heightened sense of refinement as the wealth of the top 5% has risen so mightily as a direct result of financialization and globalization that the top .1% has been forced to seek ever more extreme refinements to differentiate the Elite class (financial-political royalty) from financial nobility (top .5% or so), the technocrat class (top 5%), the aspirant class (next 15%) and everyone below (the bottom 80%).

Now that just about any technocrat/ member of the lower reaches of the financial nobility can afford a low-interest loan on a luxury auto, wealthy aspirants must own super-cars costing $250,000 and up.

A mere yacht no longer differentiates financial royalty from lower-caste financial Nobles, so super-yachts are de riguer, along with extremes such as private islands, private jets in the $80 million-each range, and so on.

Even mere technocrat aspirants routinely spend $150 per plate for refined dining out and take extreme vacations to ever more remote locales to advance their social status.

Examples abound of this hyper-inflation of refinement as the wealth of the top 5% has skyrocketed.

2. The belief in the permanence of the status quo has reached quasi-religious levels of faith. The possibility that the entire financialized, politicized circus of extremes might actually be nothing more than a sand castle that’s dissolving in the rising tides of history is not just heresy–it doesn’t enter the minds of those reveling in refinement or those demanding more Bread and Circuses (Universal Basic Income, etc.)

3. Luxury, not service, defines the financial-political Elites. As Turchin pointed out in his book on the decline of empires, in the expansionist, integrative eras of empires, Elites based their status on service to the Common Good and the defense (or expansion) of the Empire.

While there are still a few shreds of noblesse oblige in the tattered banners of the financial elites, the vast majority of the Elites classes are focused on scooping up as much wealth and power as they can in the shortest possible time, with the goal being not to serve society or the Common Good but to enter the status competition game with enough wealth to afford the refined dining, luxury travel to remote locales, second and third homes in exotic but safe hideaways, and so on.

4. An unquestioned faith in the unlimited power of the state and central bank.The idea that the mightiest governments and central banks might not be able to print their way of our harm’s way, that is, create as much money and credit as is needed to paper over any spot of bother, is unthinkable for the vast majority of the populace, Elites and debt-serfs alike.

That all this newly issued currency and credit is nothing but claims on future production of goods and services and rising productivity never enters the minds of the believers in unlimited state/bank powers. We have been inculcated with the financial equivalent of the Divine Powers of the Emperor: the government and central bank possess essentially divine powers to overcome any problem, any crisis and any conflict simply by creating more money, in whatever quantities are deemed necessary.

If $1 trillion in fresh currency will do the trick–no problem! $10 trillion? No problem! $100 trillion? No problem! there is no upper limit on how much new currency/credit the government and central bank can create.

I love comparing Empire to Empire though I don’t relish the implications. Declining morals, debased money, unending wars, foreign invasions, rank corruption, mass disparities between classes – all have been seen before. Gibbon’s work comes to mind. Luckily, we know America is the indispensable nation, completely immune to reality.

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Taki on Tacky: March of the Sunday Funnies

12 Monday Jun 2017

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A brilliant take on a highly visible sign of fallen times from Theodore Dalrymple and Taki’s Mag, perhaps the highest brow on the internet:

Ariana Grande, of whom I had not heard until Salman Abedi killed 22 people at her “concert” in Manchester, has had herself tattooed with a picture of a bee, a symbol of Manchester’s industrious industrial past, as a “permanent tribute” to the city. Apparently, the other performers in her vulgar act have done likewise. Could courage, compassion, sympathy, self-sacrifice, indeed virtue itself, go further?

This could be the start of something big: a movement called Tattoos Against Terrorism, or TAT for short. If anything could convince the Islamic suicide bombers of the superiority of the Western way of life, with its fundamental freedoms, surely this could. Alternatively, it will terrify them into giving up.

Nothing says “I’m unique” like a big old tattoo – or seven. And nothing says “decline of civilization” like half the population sporting all that uniqueness – each the same as all the rest. “Decline of Civilization” might make a great tattoo! Consult Reality Winner (Real Name?) on this point:

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“Cupping,” Molock, and a side of crabgrass??? Twitter.

Yes, I’m sure your tattoos (plural aren’t they) are very unique. Special. They mean something. Just like Ariana Grande’s new bumblebee tat. Everyone associates bees with tempered diversity in Manchester, UK after all…

Some very few are actually interesting – on men. Mostly soldiers, sailors, and bikers. I’ve never seen a woman I thought benefited by copious ink. And it’s usually copious these days. If one is good, twelve are Grande. More ink than the Sunday funnies.

Lady tats aren’t just for the bad girls anymore. Look to the melodious examples of Ariana “I hope my fans f*cking die!” Grande and Reality “Who’d she meet with in Belize??) Winner. I know a grandmother sporting some shade of gaudy illustration on her ankle. All very special. Unique. Each and every decorated “lady” at the beach or the gym or the supermarket as different and special as the next dozen.

The good news is several. First, the trend must be getting overdone. A return to modest sense surely has to be in order. Second, time permitting, a fortune could be made in the tattoo removal business. Third, time expiring (20 years, maybe), the markers may serve as just that, post-collapse; a way to … differentiate.

Or it could be time once again to ramp it down a notch. Might I suggest nose bones and lip plates. How about tree swinging and poo flinging? Blue faces for the cave set?

I’d like to congratulate Ma belle Française on keeping it clean, original, and classically feminine. La tableau est l’art.

Curmudgeonly Bonus: Vox Day’s continued exposition of the bleak batty Boomer banality. “Lifestyle” is the Boomer’s tacky tattoo.

Happy Monday morning, all!

Back to the First Age Again

09 Friday Jun 2017

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Just got my first edition print of Beren and Luthien by J.R.R. Tolkien. Well, it’s a first edition for Kindle – my first Tolkien on an electronic format. It seems the pitiful toy and coffee bookstore I went to, their whole chain, and the publisher are out of hardcover prints already (released June 1st). How many decades of Tolkien bestseller experience does Houghton have??? Anyway, I could have consulted Amazon and express shipped one (if available) but I wanted it immediately – thus, Kindle:

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Houghton Mifflin / Tolkien Estate / Christopher Tolkien / Alan Lee.

As I mentioned at the beginning of the year:

Beren and Luthien is the great love story of the legendarium. It tells the tale of Beren, a mortal Man, and Luthien, an Elvish princess – one of only three such “mixed” marriages in Middle Earth. They undertake the most daring quest in the long history of that world.

Some of you have read perhaps the short version of the story in the Silmarillion. From that work also came The Children of Hurin, which was released ten years prior to B&L. Christopher Tolkien’s editing and narration skills have increased dramatically since 1977 (and I never shared the contemporary criticism of his work, then). This book will be excellent.

And it would also make for one of the best Tolkien movies imaginable. That is, if Peter “Ruin Everything Possible” Jackson is kept as far away as possible. A movie with something for everyone – date movie, chick flick, fantasy, action. Come to think of it, TCOH, Tolkien’s tragedy, would make a fine movie. No Jackson.

The B&L legend soundly defeats one of the major (unjust) claims of Tolkien detractors – that of a lack of romance. In that regard, the legend was so important to Tolkien that he had “Beren” and “Luthien” inscribed as nicknames on his and his wife’s tombstone. This is a romantic epic of the highest order, riddled through with adventure. Sauron even makes an appearance, in person and in voice.

I highly recommend this work when available. If you must buy just one novel this year, this should be the one. It will probably be mine.

Now, I sincerely hope Christopher is already at work completing the tales of Tuor and Idril.

It seems, from the Preface, that Christopher is hanging it up with this book. He points out he is 93. Perhaps the third and/or fourth generations will attack the other legends.

For now I’m looking forward to the release of a deluxe, boxed, collector’s edition to go with my collection. You can and should obtain yours: here and now:

Beren and Luthien (2017)

Please excuse me; wheels up for Beleriand.

*Review to follow, here and at Amazon, in time …