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User: b3d

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Comments · 35

  1. Re:It is bad, wrong way to go about it on Health Care Reform · · Score: 1

    Original post said is there anything that the Government does right. Local government is still government. There is plenty of examples of the government getting things right. Only when the government screws up do you hear about in the media. The rest of the time, the government is just working correctly in the background.

  2. Re:Well, lets see on Health Care Reform · · Score: 1

    Since the insurance industry is the most regulated of all in America, maybe the regulators should take some responsibility for the mess..

    Regulated!? Excuse me?! The health insurance industry has an anti-trust exemption. How is that over regulated? These guys have totally run a muck.

  3. Re:A false choice, of course... on Health Care Reform · · Score: 1

    Dude that is an awesome rant!

  4. Re:A false choice, of course... on Health Care Reform · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The insurance companies are far from true capitalism. They have an anti-trust exemption, for crying out load. That's a license to screw the customer, which is what they are doing. If we actually had true competition in the insurance market, I might accept some of your argument. As it is, the government is the only entity large enough to be able to compete with the ginormous health insurance companies.

  5. Re:no upgrades?? on Google Android — a Universe of Incompatible Devices · · Score: 2, Informative

    My Sprint Samsung Moment is supposed to get an upgrade from 1.6 to 2.1 in the "first half" of this year. Granted that the carrier is the gate keeper for this upgrade, but there IS a path for upgrade. I look forward to the upgrade for many reasons. I chose the Moment over the Hero because I felt that the hardware was better, and I knew the software would be upgraded. That's why I bought an Android phone, because it will be upgraded.

  6. Re:DigiTechGuy on FCC Proposes 100Mbps Minimum Home Broadband Speed · · Score: 2, Insightful

    You are clearly a conspiracy theory nut job.

  7. Fox Nation - Terrorist Site on UK Government Crowd-Sourcing Censorship · · Score: 1

    Fox Nation has plenty of people advocating terrorist activities in the US, against Obama, liberals, gays, blacks, jews, and other classes of people that the wing nuts deem unacceptable. I guess they'll get blocked.

  8. Re:well aren't you just Father of the Year on (Near) Constant Internet While RV'ing? · · Score: 1

    To study the moon landing you would go to Houston or Orlando. Duh. You sackless dumbass.

  9. Re:Sure, let's have more unschooling... on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    I'm not sure why you assume anything about my father being strict. Perhaps you just read a book about conservative/liberal politics, and are keen to apply your new buzzwords?

    Anyway, I beg you to show me one kid who would by his/her own accord sit down and learn to read, write, do math, and so on. Most kids would rather play games and colour books all day, which is what "unschooling" is all about.

    Actually applying some cognitive science terminology to your rant about stupid lazy people. People need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, right?

    No one ever said that the kids would be learning on their own, but that they would be learning about what interests them. My daughter was three and couldn't wait to learn to read. Kids love, absolutely love to learn, as long as we don't impose a system on them that smashes that love. Playing games and coloring are a very important part of growing up. They will do that, until they have done that as much as they want, then they will go do something else, naturally. Let Education Always Remain Natural (LEARN).

  10. Re:If the parents on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    Unschoolers that I know, and since I am one, I know a lot of them, are every one of them is very conscience of socializing.

    I was a lot more open to the idea of "unschooling" before I read this tortured sentence. Really, if they sent words to Guantanamo to be questioned, you'd be the person standing in the water-boarding room waiting for them.

    Good point. Actually, I'm a product of public school. My unschooled daughter would tear me up for having written such a poor sentence. Doh!

  11. Re:I was 'Unschooled' on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    Awesome post Workergnome!

  12. Re:I was homeschooled, my neighbors were unschoole on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    Were there any kids at your high school that didn't go to college? Are there any kids that you graduated with living at home with Mom and Dad?

  13. Re:Sure, let's have more unschooling... on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    Wow! You sound like a very hard right strict father person who hates the government helping people out. So why are you defending an instrument of the socialist state like public education?

  14. Re:PETA on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    LOL! You are so right. How about modding it insightful?

  15. Re:Great idea! on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    Unschoolers don't use a cirriculum. The idea of unschooling is that when you come up with something that sounds interesting enough to learn, you figure out how to learn about that subject. Go as deep or as shallow as your interest takes you. Just like in the adult world. When we started homeschooling our kids, we were using a curriculum, and the kids did it, but they were bored silly pretty quickly. We came to call this "school at home". What's the point of that? Once we embraced unschooling, our kids blossomed. The loved it. They learned so much on their own it was astonishing.

    The public school methodology works great for what it was designed for. The problem is that it was designed to create good factory workers for the dawn of the industrial age. For today's world, the school system is broken, and unschoolers aren't going to wait for someone to fix it. Taking action. Taking control.

    The unschooling community is very much like the open source community. It's about freedom and control of your own destiny.

  16. Re:Good luck in university on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    No, they don't. With the possible exception of sham universities (unaccredited christian universities that are deathly afraid of proper education), no university seeks out homeschooled kids.

    And you know this how?

    There used to be aversion by universities to homeschooled children. More recently they have learned that kids who learn at home or on their own are better prepared for the independence of college than most of their public schooled peers. Yes, real, state run universities accept willingly applications from homeschool children. They can't "seek" them out because they are not aware of them, but if a homeschool kid applies, then they are recruited every bit as much as a public school "A" student.

  17. Re:Great idea! on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    But, to succeed (at either college admissions or finding a desirable non-college job), a student has to have a balance of useful skills. If the parent lacks those skills, lacks the tools, or lacks the commitment to teach and promote those skills within their child, this could turn out really badly for the child.

    If the parent lacks the skills, they find someone else to teach the kid that skill, if that's what the kid really wants to learn. Unschooling is about being and learning in the real world, not some artificial teaching environment.

  18. Re:What would these kids grow up to be? on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    "Unschooling: For those kids who aspire to be the dish washers of the future"

    That, sir, is a statement.

  19. Re:If the parents on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Most homeschoolers I know are people who aren't sociable and just don't want to deal with the daily social 'grind' of dealing with people. Also they ahve some fear the child will be exposed to something outside there own beliefs. Political or theological.

    Those aren't unschoolers. Unschoolers that I know, and since I am one, I know a lot of them, are every one of them is very conscience of socializing. They just want control of their children's education, and not turn it over to the state and the kids peers. I would argue that the main problem with public school is that we group all the kids by age rather than skill in each subject. By grouping by age, we end up with lots of peer groups that divide our children in ways that don't exist in the "adult" world.

  20. Re:No preparation on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    Let us hope that a few can break out of that mold. I'm trying, but I'm trapped.

  21. Re:It's called "Evenings" on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    The kid is only in school for 6 hours in the day. Use the other 8-10 of their non-sleep hours to do this stuff. School isn't a substitute for parenting, and it shouldn't be their only source of learning.

    Why waste those six hours?

  22. Re:Good luck in university on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

    Universities actively recruit homeschool kids because they are better able to work independently than public school kids who have been told what to do for every task of their "education".

  23. Re:What would these kids grow up to be? on Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling" · · Score: 1

      "Unschooling: For those kids who aspire to be the dish washers of the future"

    But seriously, is there any less way to be prepared for higher education (higher, meaning anything from 3rd grade on up)?

    My kids were unschooled their entire lives, and when they went to college, they got straight A's. They are very intelligent, creative, inquisitive, social people. Your statement, sir, is not insightful, it is the statement of someone who knows not of what they speak. Unschooling respects the children as humans, instead of arresting their development by treating them like dumb animals kept in cages all day.

  24. Re:No OGG Vorbis support on Nokia Releases Linux Handset · · Score: 1

    iRiver seems to be the only vendor that consistently supports Vorbis formats. /.ers please correct me if there are others.

  25. Re:No native Vorbis support... on Nokia Releases Linux Handset · · Score: 1

    My thoughts exactly! It's a Linux based phone for crying out loud. Why not support open codecs? Out of the box?!

    I'm going to get an iRiver player just to support the fact that they support Vorbis formats.