Boston Marathon Explosion - Today's Topics: Public Schools

Heylel

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Only 3 or 4 times.
Sorry. I guess it was buried under all the discussion about ball hair.
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Zhaun_sl

shitlord
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Shitty biased graphs are shitty. If you actually follow up the "Homegrown threat" article that is based on, they basically categorize any incident they don't consider Islamist as right-wing, even people that are just anarchists or those that we don't even know what the motivation was.
The article states that the 5 anarchist attacks were separate from the 51 right-wing one. It also points out during the 70's most of the domestic terror was far-left groups.

I think the point of the article is less "omg right wingers!" and more "the muslims really aren't a horrible threat here, especially the ones that live here."
 

Lithose

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I'd also consider it cherry picking if you start your data immediatelyaftera massive Islamic terrorist attack.
It's also misleading because there isn't any context to the numbers...I mean, I agree with their sentiment, but they are playing a numbers game here to get a point across, and it's not too different from the Conservatives who scream about the 3.7 trillion budget out of context. But for example..

The Islamic population in the U.S. is 3 million--there have been 23 terrorists, they go on to say that's only .0007%. However, 42% of the U.S. identifies as "heavy" conservative, or what the rest of the world would classify as "lunatic, racist right wingers"--Or 131 Million (Since the Muslim number didn't detract kids, we won't either.) So .000039% of the "Right wing" become terrorists.

Which means Muslims are 18 times (Edit: made a stupid napkin math error) more likely to blow something up based on population.

Again, I agree with their sentiment--in the big picture, the "threat" Muslims pose is laughably small. People should be more cautious about being tired while driving--it will do more to save their life. But yeah, there is no denying it--looking at it from a strictly statistical point of view, the Muslim community within the U.S. is far more prone to terrorism--however, there are just far, far more christian right wingers. But neither group really warrants special concern, we just need to stop being scared of our own shadow.
 

Brodhi

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Well lets see Araysar , in the 1970s it was the radical liberal left bombing our cities and trying to incite riots and terror. Now, radical liberal left are still trying to incite violence, upheaval, and disorder. Radical Islam has jumped on board also. Is there the random radical right extremist? Yes, now and then, but isolated nut jobs. No where in the same ballpark as the extreme liberal and islamist.

Keep on posting shit though Araysar, you confused soul.
 

chaos

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The alternative is the kids being off for two weeks every 6 weeks, and I don't know if you're a parent or not, but as a parent I can tell you that that would basically make my life impossible. Who will care for my kids while I"m in school during the fall/spring? That two weeks off every two months bullshit and all year round schooling would basically mean my wife and I have to drop out of school ourselves just to ensure someone is there to watch the kids during that time. Our entire society is built around school schedules in a way, its fucking crazy but that would disrupt basically the entire structure of most families in the nation, and cost the poorest people bucketloads in dollars just to make sure the kids are being cared for during that time period.
Why is that the only alternative? In that Outliers book he is referencing, the argument they make is not "spread summer out over the year", it is "more school."
 

Zhaun_sl

shitlord
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Well lets see Araysar , in the 1970s it was the radical liberal left bombing our cities and trying to incite riots and terror.Now, radical liberal left are still trying to incite violence, upheaval, and disorder.Radical Islam has jumped on board also. Is there the random radical right extremist? Yes, now and then, but isolated nut jobs. No where in the same ballpark as the extreme liberal and islamist.

Keep on posting shit though Araysar, you confused soul.
Where is this?
 

AladainAF

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People should be more cautious about being tired while driving--it will do more to save their life
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They aren't because our government during the Bush years, and especially during the Obama years have done an absolutemasterfuljob of ensuring that their citizenry stay terrified of this threat no matter how insignificant it might be. Things that actually kill us in large numbers aren't really priority, because saving lives really isn't the intent here.
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BrutulTM

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Again, I agree with their sentiment--in the big picture, the "threat" Muslims pose is laughably small.
While I agree completely with those saying that the Mother Jones graphs are bullshit, the thing you should really take away from those graphs is that terrorism of any kind is hardly a major problem in the US and just like with mass shootings, the idea that we need to buttfuck the bill of rights, make most of the world hate our guts, and bankrupt the country to protect ourselves from this threat is ludicrous. It's like stationing the entire US Navy as close as possible to popular beaches in order to protect surfers from sharks.
 

hodj

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Why is that the only alternative? In that Outliers book he is referencing, the argument they make is not "spread summer out over the year", it is "more school."
Every time I've seen "year round school" proposed, nationally or locally, the premise has been that instead of having the block of 2.5 summer months off, instead, they take that time, and spread it out throughout the year, such that kids go for a period of time, usually 6 or 8 weeks, then they have two weeks off, then go for 6-8 weeks, then off for two weeks. This is how, from my experience, the proposals have functioned.

Here's the NEA's website on the subject

http://www.nea.org/tools/17057.htm

Most schools in the United States operate on the 10-month calendar that was established when America was still an agrarian country. But times have changed and many people propose doing away with this "outdated" system and moving to "year-round education." In this updated system, schools continue to operate 180 days per year, but they stretch out the 180 days over the entire year and take shorter breaks between each term.

The most popular form of year-round education is the 45-15 plan, where students attend school for 45 days and then get three weeks (15 days) off. The usual holiday breaks are still built into this calendar. Two other ways to organize a school calendar are the 60-20 and the 90-30 plans.
See?

This format is the type typically proposed. That's why it would be the alternative chosen, because its the one the NEA and these groups who want year round schooling have been pushing for well into two decades now, and I've never seen a different alternative proposed, and I'm not even sure what that would be. You have to understand, too, that teachers love teaching in part because they only "work" 9 months out of the year. The teachers unions of course see this as a direct benefit for their members, and they aren't going to go along with a plan that takes away summer without retaining the same amount of time off for teachers, just spread throughout the year. They would basically consider that to be being forced to work many more hours, for no extra pay (teachers are salaried positions) so yeah. The Chicago school district unions and employees almost rioted last year because the district wanted to make the school day one hour longer without increasing teacher pay. Just think about how the national union members would riot if they found out they were losing their summers and not getting the same amount of time off spread throughout the year.
 

Szlia

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For the sake of comparison, schools in Switzerland have seven weeks off during the summers (early July to end of August) and then three blocks of two weeks off (end of October, around new year, around easter) and one of one (end of February). Plus some off days here and there for religious or historic celebrations for just a little over 180 days in the year (school is 5 days a week). So it's somewhere in between the 'school all year round' system and the 'big summer holidays, two one week recesses and a bunch of free days sprinkled on top' american system.