We are a group of individuals in Washington DC who believe in many things, including, but no limited to, listening to Flight of the Conchords, playing jeopardy, and staying in Quadrant II. What are these things you ask? My best advice: sit back, read a little, and enjoy our musings on the world.
BTW, congratulations to President Obama. He ran a pretty impressive campaign and even though there are many things I disagree with him on, it's a testament to the strength of our republic that there weren't tanks in the streets. Although, it would have been nice if they had kept some bridges open...
Personaly, I'd say beware of the final, errr, nuclear, option. Having an angry lady friend and a permanent crick in your neck is not worth an arm without pins and needles.
This also reminded me of a Facebook group a friend of mine started called, "A Spoon is for Eating." The title referred to her complete disinterest in spooning due to the body heat issue. While that may make sense in the summer, what about when it's 12 degrees?
One thing that's always hard to articulate is the idea that I just don't know. I don't know what's best for other people, therefore I try not to assume I do. This article really nails it home for me. It's tempting to think that every immigrant's greatest dream is to see their kids go to really nice suburban public schools with lots of resources and kids from middle class backgrounds. Turns out, maybe not. Maybe their dream sounds more like, “I want them to keep the good things we used to have back home — respecting their parents, helping each other, respecting their elders.”
While I'm a proponent of schools like KIPP and Uncommon Schools, it would be a mistake to think that I'm in favor of every school turning into them. That kind of school environment works well(so far) for a very specific group of students AND parents that want that kind of education. It's obvious when reading this article that many parents have very different ideas about what constitutes the education they want for their kids.
A key idea behind the school choice movement is the notion that there is just simply no way for school boards that manage 40,000 student school districts to know what every parent wants for their child. The goal to standardize education from on high (the Washington, State, or district levels) seems rather perplexing for this very reason. Of course, you don't meet many people willing to say on the campaign trail, "I don't know what we should do to solve education inequality. I'm putting the responsibility on you to decide what is best for your child." Despite this, somehow a really cool experiment is taking place to test that hypothesis in a bunch of cities.
Hey guys sorry about being dorment in the from platinum appreciation. Times have been tough and to prove it I wrote an unusuially pessamistic piece on how DC works. grumble grumble grumble...
The problem with sites like these is that it doesn’t tell you why they voted one way or another. Too many times we hear crap like “you voted against labor on… fill-in-the-blank bill.” When in reality the letter of legislation is complex and contains many factors that are impossible to boil down to a single initiative like “the environment,” “job creation” or “labor.” A lot of the time politicians don’t vote for a policy because they didn’t get to put their pork in it, they didn’t get bought out. A perfect example of this is the difference between the first financial bailout that didn’t pass and the second one that passed with more tag-on’s and earmarks.
DC is a game of incentives. Phony moral high ground and righteousness poorly mask a “Why should I actually vote for it?” mentality and the greatest thing is people buy it and the system keeps churning! So much fluff you could stuff a mattress with it. (sorry, I’m getting a little pessimistic, maybe I need more sleep)
I came across this article on workplace discussion of politics. I found it interesting to the extent that it really says that it's a not a particularly good idea. Essentially, talking about politics, like any sensitive subject (see your mom jokes), has the potential to disrupt the true work of the office. Therefore, if talking about politics cannot be done in a civil way(see example below), there may need to be directives stating what kind of discourse will be allowed.
To me, this all makes sense. I have tremendous difficulty being civil when discussing politics, even with people I agree with (I hate the messenger, but not the message). The most interesting line of the article is when an expert said the following: It's also important to provide a channel for people to voice concerns, Pratt said. "The trick is to let people approach things with maturity."
Doing some quick research, I turned up two articles(here and here). Reading to the end of the first will give you a special treat. Note that the second article seems to contradict the one at the top.
My question is this, is there any truly platinum way to talk about politics at work? Anyone seen one? From what I see in the articles, unless you work at a place that has politics as part of it's mission like the DNC or RNC, it seems practically impossible, mainly because most people simply don't know how to have a civil debate. Politics is personal(as it should be) and I'm not sure people(including myself) are mature enough to have a debate without a full-on moderator.
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