Maggie's Farm

We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.

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Much Sorry with Delays
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How to Honor Labor Day, Every Day
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Easy for you to say: To the elites on mass immigration
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Labor Costs in U.S.
Your "identity"
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How to Pick a Kayak
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Psychology Experiments' Questionable Results

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Wednesday, June 8. 2022

Wednesday morning links


 ‘Expert’ idiocy on teaching kids to read is beyond comprehension


 Papal Precedent Behind Mercifully Denying Pelosi Communion


 Matt Walsh's New Documentary Explores The Very Ponderable Question of "What Is a Woman?," And Finds "The Experts" Are Extremely Confused And Also Very Touchy About Being Asked About The Question


 The Limits of San Francisco Liberalism 


 “Spare me the bullshit about constitutional rights.”


The Washington Post's Internal Staff Meltdown Is Still Raging


 The Washington Post’s Descent Into Middle School Antics


 Report: CNN may dump hosts who show obvious political bias


 Will the secret New York migrant flights ever stop?


 Border Conveyor Belt Continues. Despite Title 42, thousands fill buses and planes headed for the interior


 Why isn't Mexico stopping the caravan?


 Kremlin Declares "Land Bridge" Complete From Western Russia To Donbas To Crimea






Posted by Bird Dog in Hot News & Misc. Short Subjects at 06:45 | Comments (16) | Trackback (1)

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"...For instance, Carl Cameron covered politics for Fox News for more than 20 years, yet I was surprised after he left to learn that he was very much not a conservative..."

The media world we live in, where journalists that show reasonably traditional levels of competence and professionalism are considered to be the outliers.

The same on the Chesa Boudin and Lucy Calkins stories: What does it require to examine the progress of their fatally-flawed ideas and conclude for oneself that if these represent their flagship efforts, then likely everythingthey are in charge of is of similarly destructive value? And how hard is it to further conclude that one does not want such efforts touching any part of one's life at all?

I guess Boudin's recall will tell us. It may have become to hard for many to conclude it productively, for the sake of their own society.
#1 Aggie on 2022-06-08 08:30 (Reply)
Note: Looks like Boudin has been recalled, on about 60% to 40% vote.
#1.1 Aggie on 2022-06-08 09:30 (Reply)
Immigration problems. Illegals can disappear in the big cities and also find NGO and government assistance easier to acquire in those multicultural wastelands that have "flexible" rules.
And why would Mexico help? No border closures to Mexican products and an easy way to rid itself of those who are illegally in Mexico and create problems for them.
There is no longer any pretense that there are even border controls. Yet the "replacement" theory is all conspiracy. Dems and the admin state need new voters, whether legal or not, to show up at the voting booths. Desperation to maintain power and control drives it and the push for a "socialist/marxist outcome will cement that for the elitists who want to maintain that power and control. We will own nothing and be happy ... or be gone.
#2 indyjonesouthere on 2022-06-08 09:09 (Reply)
Why don't we know who is behind this massive invasion? Yes we know that the UN is giving them pay cards in Mexico. But "who" in the UN. Where does the money come from? Soros? China? Who is it that is trying to destroy our country. Which NGO's are complicit in this crime and who (names and countries) within these NGOs is doing this. This is a crime why don't we get to know who is committing these crimes and then why don't our prosecutors indict them? You have a 15,000 strong caravan of "immigrants" coming here and they all have new clothes and $100 sneakers and backpacks and cell phones... Who is funding this? It is literally impossible that the MSM doesn't know some of these answers but they chose not to share it with us. So much for the 1st amendment.
#2.1 OneGuy on 2022-06-08 10:11 (Reply)
We don't know b/c few in gov't want to know.

There are a good number of elites who benefit from this. Cheap labor, leftist votes, union dues.

US citizens have been sold out by many. (((Some))) are longtime enemies to W. Civ (Asia is a big continent, but very, very few from there actually adhere to and support the principles that created and sustain the US), others are outright traitors.
#2.1.1 DrTorch (Link) on 2022-06-08 10:45 (Reply)
We, as taxpayers, are likely funding it through the NGO's that receive government cash to process illegals. Have you ever heard of anyone doing an audit of NGO income and disbursements? Their funding is no more transparent than money laundering. Look at all the wild Covid spending on anything and everything.
#2.1.2 indyjonesouthere on 2022-06-08 10:47 (Reply)
The alphabet is a technology. Memorize the sound associated with each letter and you can read by sounding out a word. This goes back thousands of years. The Egyptian hieroglyphics were decoded once they figured out the pictures were actually letters. Our alphabet goes all the way back to the ancient Phoenicians, also thousands of years ago.

If I had my way, I’d turn all the Ed Schools and Law schools into homeless shelters. It would keep all the faculty off the streets and they could do something useful.
#3 Paul in Boston on 2022-06-08 10:34 (Reply)
What is it with these Ed School/Ed Adm types? Don't they EVER learn? I had thought that the phonics versus whole language brouhaha had been resolved decades ago, with ample research, in favor of phonics.

I think part of the problem is that the Ed School/Ed Adm types are looking at phonics versus whole language from an adult's perspective, instead of a child's perspective.

Educated adults who have been reading for decades look at reading words from the whole language approach, though we may use phonics for an unknown word. When I saw a passage with letters taken out of words, and was able to decipher it, I was convinced that I was looking at it "fm a whol lnguag aprch."

Unfortunately for the Ed School/Ed Adm types, beginning readers lack the reading vocabulary to easily use the whole language approach. Phonics gives beginning readers the tools to connect letters to sounds, and thus to words they know. It is much more efficient to memorize 40-50 (?) letter-sound combinations, and then apply them to break down words syllable-by-syllable, than to memorize each word.

Phonics involves a lot of repetition to insure that beginning readers are very well grounded in connecting sight to sound. Adults do not like such repetition; we find it boring. However, young children like repetition, as it reinforces their still meager information base (meager compared to adults; they have still learned a lot in several years.). Beginning readers like the drills. In addition, the drills give them permission to talk, instead of remaining QUIET. Sounds like a win-win.

How many times does a 4-5 year old want to hear the SAME STORY night after night? Many times. How often does the adult get tired of reading the SAME STORY night after night? Quite often. Children and adults have different perspectives on drills and repetition.
#3.1 Gringo on 2022-06-08 19:36 (Reply)
The very quickest children look like they are using whole word as well, because their phonics is so quick and they anticipate well. So they used to reason - badly - that therefore we should have all the other children do whole language as well. Sort of like teaching basketball by having everyone dunk for the first ten years, with no dribbling, passing, or jumpshooting.

Yet even that is passe. Ed schools insist that they not teach children to read by any method. The intent is to teach them to love a subject, and the student will just naturally want to read thereafter. They really believe this. They teach love. Fortunately, actual teachers see in their own classroom that its not working and slip in various decoding strategies anyway. But they have never been shown the phonics data, and are actually surprised to learn it.

I recommend Freddie deBoer on the subject.
#3.1.1 Assistant Village Idiot on 2022-06-09 10:23 (Reply)
I've probably mentioned this often before, but I was quite taken with Bailey White's accounts of teaching children to read. I believe she used the standard phonics system, but combined that with giving the kids stories they were thrilled to read. For some reason, all her kids were nuts for maritime disasters. She would simplify the text by pasting bowdlerized versions over the more technical paragraphs, but found that her kids were pulling off the tape to get to the text below, in their hunger for more details about how and why the ships went down.

Surely the trick is to harness sensible tools (like phonics) to whatever is necessary to engage the kids' profound desires--like the Wire episode where schoolkids learn to love math by being taught the probability analysis needed to succeed at craps.

I can't remember learning to read, but I do remember an early experience trying to decipher "ing," and the thrill of learning from a helpful adult neighbor that it corresponded with the sound in "ring" that I was already familiar with. It was like being handed a key to a lock in a door that opened on a garden I very much wanted to get into.

I also remember the shock of learning that it was possible to read quietly to oneself instead of out loud to someone else. Some adult who was too busy to sit and listen suggested it. It was both good and bad news.

One more memory: I believe at first I had no real preference between reading right side up or upside-down--apparently from learning to read by sitting opposite someone who was reading aloud to me. That sounds more like whole language than phonics, though I clearly learned phonics as well. I can't remember a time when the sounds associated with each letter weren't fascinating.
#3.1.1.1 Texan99 on 2022-06-09 10:58 (Reply)
I just watched the parents of kids killed in Uvalde tearfully testify to congress. I was sad for them and felt compelled to pass laws that would take guns from honest law abiding people just to get revenge for these murders. Not the criminals of course. We know they don't obey the laws. But the story was so sad that I want to punish the honest and good people just to make me feel better. Join with me to end constitutional rights while we continue to release criminals because of equity. I believe all laws should be passed by angry people who have no concept of the validity of these laws or the effects. If we just punish enough innocent honest people I will feel better.

This seems to be the position of the Democrat party.
#4 OneGuy on 2022-06-08 11:00 (Reply)
BIG TRAINS ROLLING 1955 AMERICAN RAILROAD PROMOTIONAL FILM

This is an old promotional film promoting the railroad industry. I suspect many of us saw this or similar films in elementary school.

The reason I am posting the link is because it shows how much has changed.

In this film, agriculture, mining and industry are celebrated, not demonized.

If railroads are not your cup of tea, skip to about 22:30 in this 25 minute video. The end has some genuine flag waving reminding us how great the United States is and how lucky we are to live here.

No where in this film is the country demonized for being evil or unjust.

https://archive.org/details/75332BigTrainsRollingTogether

Or you can just watch it for the nostalgia.
#5 feeblemind on 2022-06-08 12:06 (Reply)
Nice.

I listed to a book on disc titled "Rival Rails". Not a literary masterpiece, but a fair description of the westward expansion facilitated by railroads.

Pretty good introduction for a novice to the subject (like myself).

https://www.amazon.com/Rival-Rails-Publisher-Random-House/dp/B004S497QM/ref=sr_1_2?crid=2O8FTTFFBKDVV&keywords=rival+rails&qid=1654710281&s=books&sprefix=rival+rails%2Cstripbooks%2C68&sr=1-2
#5.1 DrTorch (Link) on 2022-06-08 13:45 (Reply)
re “Spare me the bullshit about constitutional rights.”

I guess taking the oath to uphold and defend the Constitution is just a meaningless formality these days.

Why do they even bother?
#6 feeblemind on 2022-06-08 12:27 (Reply)
Former Dem Congressman Pleads Guilty To Rigging Elections In PA

QUOTE:
Demuro, who “was responsible for overseeing the entire election process and all voter activities of his Division in accord with federal and state election laws,” then manipulated the voting machines in his respective ward and division in a way that satisfied Myers’

If he can manipulate his voting machines then others can do it too.

https://thefederalist.com/2022/06/08/former-democrat-congressman-pleads-guilty-to-rigging-elections-in-pennsylvania/
#7 feeblemind on 2022-06-08 13:22 (Reply)
"Why isn't Mexico stopping the caravan?"

Why isn't anyone asking how a group of people wearing flip flops and pushing strollers can walk 2,000 miles in three weeks? That's 95 miles a day.
#8 jm01 on 2022-06-08 16:50 (Reply)

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