Maggie's Farm

To be fair, The New York Times' America does suck. Who wants to live in such a place. Free America, on the other hand, is a fine place. I've not done a close survey but I venture that there are pockets of Free America even within the area the New York Times claims as its own backyard.

Why? Leave the universities to die. Or become girl's finishing schools.

The university served a purpose. Originally, to protect "scholars" from taxes and other royal impositions. Later, they realized they'd better put real effort into this teaching thing lest the public now controlling the purse and the tax laws do them in. Now, they've reverted back to their Medieval purpose with a good PR cover campaign about "education".

We've long had the technology, books, for the true scholar to learn from. We now have the internet to make that even easier and cheaper to achieve. The "campus" is no longer relevant except as a place for pseudo-intellectualism to prance pretending to be independent thought. Original thought being a bridge to far.

The true university these days is a collection of books.
- Thomas Carlyle

So again, why fight over a dying corpse when everything good can be achieved more easily and cheaper by simply focusing on the outcome rather than the antiquated, and now corrupted, delivery system

There isn't a lot you can do about government/military employment credential bubble. Although, the military can self correct were we to have a big war where they needed a lot of people competence rather than credentials. Unfortunately, that correction comes at the cost of a lot of blood spilled due to bad leaders in the first critical moments/weeks/months.

On the other hand, if we concentrate what employers actually need and an efficient way to signal that, say through competency testing. Then the university credential problem will correct first in the private sector where competency matters then in the "public" sector were incompetency is buffered.

Now is the time for Congress to move to amend the legislation authorizing both the Department of the Interior and the National Park Service to remove their ability to close off our national treasures out of spite or on a whim.

I'd say something like the NPS must appear before a federal judge in the district of the monument or park to show cause as to why the closure to the public is necessary and reasonable. And that for every day of closure the NPS budget is reduced by the amount allotted for the operation of the park/monument unless restored by Congress after the re-opening.