“It leaves them with the prospect of the only way we leave Guantanamo is death,” Warner said. “Unfortunately, I think the men are ready to embrace this.”
“Your essay must be five paragraphs long, with an introduction, three body paragraphs containing your strongest arguments, and a conclusion,” the assignment read. “You do not have a choice in your position: you must argue that Jews are evil, and use solid rationale from government propaganda to convince me of your loyalty to the Third Reich!”
Here, again, we have an example of the disconnect between what the American people understand and want, and what the corporate owned Congress is focused on.
The only thing that is going to change this equation is a massive voter turnout that supports compassionate life-affirming policies and politicians prepared to act on those wishes. We did it with Elizabeth Warren, we can do it in other districts.
Click through to see the charts and tables that will help you understand this report better.
PRINCETON, NJ — Americans tilt toward the view that the government is doing too little to protect the environment — at 47% — while 16% say it is doing too much. Another 35% say the government's efforts on the environment are about right. These views have not changed much since 2010, although Americans in most years between 1992 and 2006 were more likely than they are today to say the government was doing too little to protect the environment.
Like a car careening down a mountain road, we seem unable as a people and as a nation to gain control of our government and to make it serve national wellness instead of profit. Day after day these stories track the degradation of our quality of life.
Only mass demonstrations and mass voting is going to change this, and we seem to lack the political will as citizens to do either. We hate Congress, but most love their Congressperson, seeing no contradiction.
Our children are obese because of the “foods” they eat. They have diabetes because of the high fructose corn syrup. We have girls experiencing menarche at 9, and breast development at 10 because of the hormones they unwittingly absorb because of industrial animal husbandry. And now we are discovering a growing number of them are autistic. The list goes on an on, all resulting from a society that is structur! ed for maximum profit for the few.
Inequality has been rising in most countries around the world, but it has played out in different ways across countries and regions. The United States, it is increasingly recognized, has the sad distinction of being the most unequal advanced country, though the income gap has also widened to a lesser extent, in Britain, Japan, Canada and Germany. Of course, the situation is even worse in Russia, and some developing countries in Latin America and Africa. But this is a club of which we should not be proud to be a member.
Some big countries — Brazil, Indonesia and Argentina — have become more equal in recent years, and other countries, like Spain, were on that trajectory until the economic crisis of 2007-8.
“Inspired in part by the open source movement, public spaces are emerging where people congregate to share ideas, make cool projects, teach, and brainstorm with collaborators on everything from coding to cooking. With no leaders, they have one rule: “Be excellent to each other.” Take a tour of the hackerspace Noisebridge, located in the heart of San Francisco's Mission District, with co-founder Mitch Altman.”
With educational institutions failing to provide young-people with the information and skills they need to succeed in an ever-evolving planetary-landscape, the hackerspace movement is helping to fill the void. Kids are coming out of schools ignorant, disempowered, lost, and disinterested. Entrepreneurial spirit and constructive risk-taking are in their death-throws as a result. Alternative educational/cultural spaces are needed now more than ever to rejuvenate this untapped generation of human potential.
After more than 13 years of research convinced him that children have the ability to learn almost anything on their own, 2013 TED Prize winner Sugata Mitra aspires to shape the future of learning by building a School in the Cloud, helping kids “tap into their innate sense of wonder.”
In the spirit of Mitra’s invitation to the world to “ask kids big questions, and find big answers,” we asked four brilliant young people to tell us: What do you think is the future of learning?
Click on Image to Enlarge
Here, their answers.
Adora Svitak, 15-year-old writer, teacher and activist
“One of the most powerful shifts in the future of education will come from not only the tools at our disposal, but from an underutilized resource:the students whose voices have for too long been silent. We’re increasingly pushing for seats at the decision-making tables, empowering ourselves by shaping our own learning, and taking on activist roles both online and off. To me, this signals one of the most hopeful signs of the future of education — the shift from a top-down, learning-everything-from-the-authority-figure approach to an approach characterized by peer-to-peer learning, empowerment and grassroots change.”
“My older brother and I believe kids and grown ups can change the world. We’re on a mission with our web series, Kid President, to do just that. If every classroom in the world could be full of grownups and kids working together, we’d live in a happier world. Kids want to know about the world and about how they can make an impact. Kids also have ideas. It’d be awesome if teachers and students could work together and put these ideas into action. There should be lessons in things like compassion and creativity. If those two things were taught more in schools we’d see some really cool things happen.”
