Well, I got such overwhelming support for my last post on education that I just had to share more! The people have spoken, and they want more of my ill-informed, half-baked ideas!
Actually, this is going to be a more measured, contemplative thing. I was just talking with Amy through the chat feature in Facebook Scrabble (a wonderful forum for political discourse of all kinds) and I got to thinking more and more about education. It's especially relevant to me personally since I work in education now.
And I hate to say it, but the more I think about it, the more I think that we waste too much time and money in this country trying to force-feed a liberal arts education down the throat of every child, in both high school and college. It comes from a wonderful, egalitarian principle, that all people become better citizens of the world when they read classics, understand biology, know a foreign language, etc. etc.
And it's true, they do. I loved my liberal arts education, and wouldn't trade it for anything. But in the thrall of this idea, I think this country may have forgotten to teach the practical stuff necessary to just survive as an adult.
I don't like drawing conclusions about the world from my own, necessarily limited experiences, but I'm going to do it anyway. When I graduated from college, I knew tons about French New Wave directors and American Indian literature. Which is great stuff to know.
What I didn't know was how credit cards worked. I refused to get one when I was in college, feeling that they were evil tools of the capitalist hegemony. And I was right, they are. The problem was that if you don't get one of those evil tools of capitalist hegemony, you can't participate in capitalist hegemony, which means you can't buy stuff. It was hell trying to get my first credit card, and my credit rating still suffers because I waited too long.
And my life with credit cards has been one unpleasant surprise after another. It wasn't just a matter of reading the fine print -- I couldn't understand the fine print. I didn't really know how APRs worked until I got my first punishing service charge. I didn't know that they could charge different APRs for different types of debts, and that when you pay money, they apply it to the lower APR first ... and so forth.
And don't just go and glibly say "parents should teach their kids this stuff." Parents "should" do a lot of things. They're expected to do just about everything. Maybe they'll find time to teach their kids about APRs after they work their full-time jobs, get nutritious food on the table, spend "quality time" with them, strap kids through the age of 18 into safety seats, tell them about the birds and the bees and how they like to fuck ... and besides, they might not really understand APRs either.
And moreover, I'm not a fan of "should" arguments in general. Saying that someone should be doing something doesn't make it happen. Will telling parents they should sit their kids down and talk about APRs make it happen? Maybe, but not as well as making it mandatory in schools. We want results, not buck-passing.
But there's a lot more that kids should learn before becoming adults. How about the issues of the day? Rather than learning about the Edict of Nantes and Linnean classification in high school, maybe I should have been learning about what the federal deficit really means? The whole bit about possibly defaulting on our debt and how much our federal government pays in interest on the debt every year -- that's important stuff to know! Whatever happened to civics classes? I never had a single one. If education is in the business of making better citizens, shouldn't they inform those citizens about the basics of the issues of the day?
The more I get interested in politics, the more I realize how many people are basing their views on a lot of misinformation and a few insufficient bits of real, substantive information. Take government spending, since it's my favorite thing in the whole wide world to talk about. A lot of people think the solution is just that the government needs to "tighten its belt" and cut unnecessary programs and stop paying women for their aborted fetuses which the government then grind up and put in vaccinations that are designed to make all kids autistic or whatever the hell they think. Wouldn't we all be better citizens if we all learned exactly what the government spends its money on? I had to seek this out -- before I saw this I had no idea either. This is 2006, which admittedly is a lot different than now, but you'll get the idea:
20.7%: Social Security
19.7%: National defense
12.4%: Medicare
8.5%: Interest on debt
6.8%: Medicaid
4.7%: Other income security (I don't know what that means)
4.5%: Education, employment and social services
3.9%: Other retirement and disability
2.8%: Health
2.7%: Transportation
2.6%: Veteran's benefits
2.1%: Community development
2.0%: Food and nutrition assistance
1.5%: Justice system
1.4%: Housing assistance
1.4%: Earned Income Tax Credit
1.3%: Supplemental Security Income
1.2%: Natural resources and the environment
1.2%: Unemployment
1.1%: International affairs (including foreign aid)
1.0%: Agriculture
0.9%: Science, space and technology
0.8%: Family support (including TANF, whatever the hell that is)
0.7%: General government
0.2%: Commerce and housing credit
I went out with a girl once who said her daddy didn't believe in taxes because he worked hard to build a business and succeed and his tax dollars would just go to lazy people who weren't willing to be the shining beacon of virtue that he was. I kinda wish that she or he had known how little of his taxes actually went to help people that he apparently would rather let starve (and then go commit crime to survive, and bring up the crime rate and make life worse for everyone ... ANYWAY, I promised myself I wouldn't go on about taxes again. This is supposed to be about education, Chris! Focus!)
The point is that the above should be mandatory learning for every high school student. How can you be an informed voter, voting on how the government spends its money, when you have almost no knowledge of what the government actually spends its money on? Isn't this stuff more important than forcing kids to plow through the dull swamp of "The Scarlet Letter"?
OK, maybe I shouldn't be posing one type of knowledge against the other. What we need is more knowledge all around. That's why the very straightforward and simple answer to our education problem in this country is ....
NO. MORE. SUMMER. VACATION.
OK, maybe you get a few weeks off in July so that each year your family can take a stifling, painful car trip to the Grand Canyon and learn to hate each other again. But when you think about it, it is more than a little insane that we give kids three months off of school for no good reason.
For any political issue, I always find it fruitful to compare what we do to what they go in other developed nations, and no other nation comes anywhere close to how much time off we give our kids from school. And meanwhile, no other developed nation works its adults harder. It's no wonder kids start out lazy and often take a few kicks in the pants by Life before acquiring the work ethic to join the working world. Laziness is what they've become accustomed to.
Think of how much more we could teach kids if we had another three months each year. We could teach them all the Pythagorean Theorems and Iliads and all the stuff we teach them now, PLUS, we could teach them how to balance a checkbook and how home mortgages work. Maybe if schools had taught that sort of thing for the past 30 years, we wouldn't be in the financial mess we're in now.
I hear you saying, but Ed! I mean, Chris! What about helping your family with the summer harvest? And yes, that was the reason we started the big summer vacation in the first place. But last time I checked, there were only three farmers left in this country, and each farmed 30,000,000 acres of corn, and all of it was turned into corn syrup to make soft drinks that made people fat. So maybe that's not such a good reason any more.
But what about the vital summer camp industry? Well, I personally hated every summer camp I was ever forced into, so this whole plan is actually a fiendish attempt to avenge my childhood traumas.
But what about teachers? They already work like dogs for low pay and the only real perk they get is those three months a year when they can decide they're finally going to write that novel about the secretly passionate high school English teacher whose natural artistic sensibilities are crushed by a stifling bureaucracy -- but instead they find themselves using the whole summer to eat frozen pizza and watch "Oprah." Well yes, I do sympathize there. As an accession to them, make the school day shorter. That way, they don't have to work quite as doggishly during the year. Spread that pain out a bit. Maybe give them raises or something too. Buy them off, basically.
And perhaps most important, another thing you can teach kids with all this extra time each year is exactly what the working world is like. What are the jobs? What do people do? I had no idea when I left college. I knew that some people worked in publishing, since I was an English major. I definitely knew tons about the life of professors. And like a lot of liberal arts kids, I figured I would like to be a professor. It looked awesome. Then, to that end, I went on to get even more education that I didn't end up using. In truth, I was too ignorant and frightened of the corporate world. Now I work for a corporation, and it turns out it's not half bad.
I think a lot more vocational training should be in the high schools. I think when you turn 16, you should be able to opt out of any more math and biology and English classes and start learning the ropes in some trade. It can be anything from garage mechanic to paralegal.
I see the failings of our educational system a lot more sharply nowadays, since I work for what is essentially a trade school. We call it a "career college," because we don't want to be confused with those places that Sally Struthers had ads for back in the day that would offer classes in gun repair and panhandling, but still, the best analogy is of a trade school. We offer associate and bachelor's degrees in things like Business Administration and Veterinary Technology and Information Technology and Accounting and Medical Assistant. They're all fields that always have job openings, and that offer pretty solid careers as professionals of some sort.
And we have a hell of a time getting recent high school grads in the door. They all think they have to go off to State U and drink a lot of beer and squeak through without learning anything. Then they graduate with degrees in 14th century basket weaving and start working at coffeeshops, or drop out and start working at coffeeshops. Then in their mid-20s, with a family in tow and a crappy full-time job, they realize they need a real career. So they come to us, and we train them to be accountants and paralegals and business administrators and suchlike.
The adult learners are coming to our schools in droves these days, and I'm happy for them. I'm continually impressed by them, as they sacrifice what little free time they have to bring a better future for their families. But I wish they had gone through all this earlier, when they had fewer other responsibilities. I can't help but think the success of my company is a symptom of failures in the conventional system. Shouldn't these folks have learned about what jobs are available and how to get them in high school, instead of having their brains fed with dreams of keg parties and all-nighters producing dreadful papers about Kafka? Couldn't they have had one class that kind of made them little mini-interns at various real-life organizations, so they'd see what real people do for a living? Maybe they'll think of majors like Accounting or Information Technology earlier, ones that can lead to jobs, instead of going to college with no clue, taking a whole bunch of classes, deciding Sociology is the least painful, bluffing through it, and then being left with a degree but no idea how to use it.
As the loyal readers of my long, tedious rants might be aware, I am a big-government liberal. So I feel a little weird about the fact that I work for a for-profit company that provides education. And one that is, frankly, kicking the ass of the government version. We're rolling in dough, opening new campuses all the time. Our graduates get financial aid at a much higher rate than students at state or private schools (partly because we work very hard to help them get it, and partly because they tend to be poorer). Our graduates also go on to good jobs in their chosen fields after graduation at a much higher rates than students from state or private schools. We are as practical in our approach to education as all-git-out, hiring working professionals to teach the students what it's really like to work these jobs, and what they need to know to do so. And it works.
I don't often like to admit that private enterprise can beat out public, government-run stuff at the same game, but that's exactly what we're doing. And I think it's largely because we're taking a sector of the population who is never going to become a bunch of professors or lawyers or doctors and such, and giving them a direct line to solid, respectable careers.
I think there's a lesson here for public education, namely to get more kids in line for practical, career-focused education at a younger age. This means putting them on a different track than the ones set out for the honors-roll kids, exposing them to a wide range of career possibilities when they're 16 instead of letting them waste time until they're 27. Then get them into a training program like ours, one that's all about how to do a job. Then they can go out and do it.
But even if you don't do any of that, for the love of God, get rid the summer vacation. It's a ridiculous waste of time.
Sunday, November 22, 2009
Friday, November 20, 2009
Thought I Had That I Just Had to Share ...
... since I'm all fired up and it's the weekend and I've had a few beers and oh crap, there goes Uncle Chris, you know how he gets at every family reunion after a few beers ... (and again, I would like to emphasize that my name is Chris, not Ed, and I'm not sure why people keep calling me Ed) ... the problem with this country is simple. Too many Mexicans. They keep taking our jobs. Cuz see, I've worked my whole life just to get the chance to clean the houses of wealthy Californians, and there those Mexicans go ... no wait, that wasn't it. What was it?
Oh yeah, the problem with this country ... the problem with this country is that we don't have good citizens. OK, I actually just heard Thomas Friedman say this on "Charlie Rose." But it's true. It's not the fault of the leaders. The leaders, some of them at least, are knowledgeable and well-educated. They know what will solve our problems. The problem is that we're not good enough citizens to make the short-term sacrifices necessary to solve our problems. We will vote the leaders out of office if they even threaten possibly thinking about making us make sacrifices for the good of the country. We are just that selfish. We talk a lot about loving America in this country, but we don't prove our love. Love means sacrifice, and Americans don't sacrifice. I love America, but goddammit, I hate Americans.
OK, now's when I go through all the solutions to all our problems. All of them require sacrifice of the part of Americans (usually monetary, but hey, that's what gets things done in this world).
Climate Change: The answer is electric cars and nuclear power. If power plants were run through nuclear power instead of coal, they wouldn't spew all those earth-killing greenhouse gases. And if all cars were electric, they'd just use that nuclear power instead of burning earth-killing gasoline.
I know, nuclear waste stinks, but finding some god-fosaken wasteland to bury it in (look in the Southwest -- from what I can tell it's nothing but God-forsaken wasteland) is a lot better than cooking ourselves to death through global warming. And I wish I could tell you that solar power and wind power and happiness power and love power and all the other alternative powers would do it just as well, but as far as I understand, they just don't add up. They wouldn't produce enough energy.
Why Won't We Do It? Electric cars cost money. And nuclear power plants cost tax money to create. And a long time ago, a few ridiculously antiquated nuclear power plants hurt people. So that's very scary. And plus, I forgot to mention that it costs money. And that's money we could be spending on iPhone apps that make fart noises!
The National Debt: Start a million-dollar income tax bracket. You know how there are those tax brackets, where you pay a higher percent of your income depending on how much you make? Here's the full chart for single adults, stolen from Wikipedia, the source of all human knowledge:
If you make between $0 – $8,350, your marginal tax rate is 10%
If you make between $8,351– $33,950, your marginal tax rate is 15%
If you make between $33,951 – $82,250, your marginal tax rate is 25%
If you make between $82,251 – $171,550, your marginal tax rate is 28%
If you make between $171,551 – $372,950, you marginal tax rate is 33%
If you make above $372,951, your marginal tax rate is 35%
Hold on, what's that last one? If you make above $372,951, you pay 35%, no matter what? So after that point, you're home free? Why? So if you're Alex Rodriguez, and you make $33 million a year, you get paid at the same rate as some surgeon who makes $372,952? If the graduated, progressive tax bracket system is good enough for the first 90% of incomes (or whatever $0 to $372,951 constitutes), why doesn't it keep going? Especially since that once you get beyond $372,952, it's pretty much all gravy? How much gravy does a person need?
And don't give me that crap about higher tax rates stifling incentives to innovate or to get rich or whatever. I'm not talking about making everyone have the same take-home pay. I'm not even talking about a bracket above 50%. Let's keep things in perspective here. If you raised Alex Rodriguez's marginal tax rate to 40%, say, is he really going to be like, "Wait, man, I can't even pay for my toddler's tummy tuck on that shit! Forget it, I'm going to quit baseball and go fulfill my true dream of cleaning the houses of wealthy Californians." No, what he'll actually do is take home $19.8 million instead of $21.45 million, not really notice much difference, and the government will get an extra $1.65 million that it can use to feed poor children. Or, uh, pay off the debt. I forgot about that part. It's important, for some reason which I never admittedly entirely understood. (I think because the Chinese will stop buying or U.S. bonds or something if we default. And because we pay a huge chunk of the federal budget in interest that could go to better things. It's all very complicated. But I don't want complicated right now. I want overly simplistic solutions to immensely complex problems. It's got more punch that way.)
Why Won't We Do It? Wait, you want to raise taxes? HITLER!!!! I'm a good ol' boy who makes $20,000 a year down at the feed store, so therefore any thought of possibly raising some tax of any kind, even if it would not affect me at all and would actually bring great benefit to me and everyone I know, is fascism! I am teabagger, and I believe in the Constitution, and the Constitution clearly states in Amendment 25, and I quote, "Fuck everyone else. I like money. Plus, guns."
Gun control: You know what? I'm not even going to touch this one. Fuck it. Have your guns. Take all the goddamn guns you want and go shoot yourselves in the head. If that's really all you care about, enjoy. As long as you don't shoot them off in the cities, where rational people live, go ahead and have a big gun-fuck party. Maybe then you'll kill each other off and you won't breed another generation of dumb ignorant fucks that doesn't have the goddamn sense to vote for anything that matters because you're so fucking paranoid that someone's going to possibly come near to approaching in any way your only tiny miserable moments of illusory power in those fleeting seconds when you make a BIG NOISE and watch STUFF BLOW UP all AWESOME AND SHIT ...
Sorry. Maybe I went a bit far there. I just tend to get a tad frustrated when I hear that gun stores are running out of ammo because ignorant fuckers are paranoid that just because a Democrat's in office holy shit! They's gonna go afta' our guns! Guess what, dumb-ass, no one's talking about guns. No one cares any more about guns. There is a whole ocean of bigger fish to fry than your stupid guns. There's the adequate health care coverage that you don't have. There's the economy that is leaving you either unemployed or barely scratching together a living. There's the climate change that is going to quickly make your home, and yes, your hunting grounds, unliveable. But since you don't know enough to pick your ass off a burning stove, we're going to have to haul you kicking and screaming into a happier future for you and your family ...
Stupid Americans. America would be such a great country if it weren't for all the Americans. Grumble grumble grumble. I need another beer.
Oh yeah, the problem with this country ... the problem with this country is that we don't have good citizens. OK, I actually just heard Thomas Friedman say this on "Charlie Rose." But it's true. It's not the fault of the leaders. The leaders, some of them at least, are knowledgeable and well-educated. They know what will solve our problems. The problem is that we're not good enough citizens to make the short-term sacrifices necessary to solve our problems. We will vote the leaders out of office if they even threaten possibly thinking about making us make sacrifices for the good of the country. We are just that selfish. We talk a lot about loving America in this country, but we don't prove our love. Love means sacrifice, and Americans don't sacrifice. I love America, but goddammit, I hate Americans.
OK, now's when I go through all the solutions to all our problems. All of them require sacrifice of the part of Americans (usually monetary, but hey, that's what gets things done in this world).
Climate Change: The answer is electric cars and nuclear power. If power plants were run through nuclear power instead of coal, they wouldn't spew all those earth-killing greenhouse gases. And if all cars were electric, they'd just use that nuclear power instead of burning earth-killing gasoline.
I know, nuclear waste stinks, but finding some god-fosaken wasteland to bury it in (look in the Southwest -- from what I can tell it's nothing but God-forsaken wasteland) is a lot better than cooking ourselves to death through global warming. And I wish I could tell you that solar power and wind power and happiness power and love power and all the other alternative powers would do it just as well, but as far as I understand, they just don't add up. They wouldn't produce enough energy.
Why Won't We Do It? Electric cars cost money. And nuclear power plants cost tax money to create. And a long time ago, a few ridiculously antiquated nuclear power plants hurt people. So that's very scary. And plus, I forgot to mention that it costs money. And that's money we could be spending on iPhone apps that make fart noises!
The National Debt: Start a million-dollar income tax bracket. You know how there are those tax brackets, where you pay a higher percent of your income depending on how much you make? Here's the full chart for single adults, stolen from Wikipedia, the source of all human knowledge:
If you make between $0 – $8,350, your marginal tax rate is 10%
If you make between $8,351– $33,950, your marginal tax rate is 15%
If you make between $33,951 – $82,250, your marginal tax rate is 25%
If you make between $82,251 – $171,550, your marginal tax rate is 28%
If you make between $171,551 – $372,950, you marginal tax rate is 33%
If you make above $372,951, your marginal tax rate is 35%
Hold on, what's that last one? If you make above $372,951, you pay 35%, no matter what? So after that point, you're home free? Why? So if you're Alex Rodriguez, and you make $33 million a year, you get paid at the same rate as some surgeon who makes $372,952? If the graduated, progressive tax bracket system is good enough for the first 90% of incomes (or whatever $0 to $372,951 constitutes), why doesn't it keep going? Especially since that once you get beyond $372,952, it's pretty much all gravy? How much gravy does a person need?
And don't give me that crap about higher tax rates stifling incentives to innovate or to get rich or whatever. I'm not talking about making everyone have the same take-home pay. I'm not even talking about a bracket above 50%. Let's keep things in perspective here. If you raised Alex Rodriguez's marginal tax rate to 40%, say, is he really going to be like, "Wait, man, I can't even pay for my toddler's tummy tuck on that shit! Forget it, I'm going to quit baseball and go fulfill my true dream of cleaning the houses of wealthy Californians." No, what he'll actually do is take home $19.8 million instead of $21.45 million, not really notice much difference, and the government will get an extra $1.65 million that it can use to feed poor children. Or, uh, pay off the debt. I forgot about that part. It's important, for some reason which I never admittedly entirely understood. (I think because the Chinese will stop buying or U.S. bonds or something if we default. And because we pay a huge chunk of the federal budget in interest that could go to better things. It's all very complicated. But I don't want complicated right now. I want overly simplistic solutions to immensely complex problems. It's got more punch that way.)
Why Won't We Do It? Wait, you want to raise taxes? HITLER!!!! I'm a good ol' boy who makes $20,000 a year down at the feed store, so therefore any thought of possibly raising some tax of any kind, even if it would not affect me at all and would actually bring great benefit to me and everyone I know, is fascism! I am teabagger, and I believe in the Constitution, and the Constitution clearly states in Amendment 25, and I quote, "Fuck everyone else. I like money. Plus, guns."
Gun control: You know what? I'm not even going to touch this one. Fuck it. Have your guns. Take all the goddamn guns you want and go shoot yourselves in the head. If that's really all you care about, enjoy. As long as you don't shoot them off in the cities, where rational people live, go ahead and have a big gun-fuck party. Maybe then you'll kill each other off and you won't breed another generation of dumb ignorant fucks that doesn't have the goddamn sense to vote for anything that matters because you're so fucking paranoid that someone's going to possibly come near to approaching in any way your only tiny miserable moments of illusory power in those fleeting seconds when you make a BIG NOISE and watch STUFF BLOW UP all AWESOME AND SHIT ...
Sorry. Maybe I went a bit far there. I just tend to get a tad frustrated when I hear that gun stores are running out of ammo because ignorant fuckers are paranoid that just because a Democrat's in office holy shit! They's gonna go afta' our guns! Guess what, dumb-ass, no one's talking about guns. No one cares any more about guns. There is a whole ocean of bigger fish to fry than your stupid guns. There's the adequate health care coverage that you don't have. There's the economy that is leaving you either unemployed or barely scratching together a living. There's the climate change that is going to quickly make your home, and yes, your hunting grounds, unliveable. But since you don't know enough to pick your ass off a burning stove, we're going to have to haul you kicking and screaming into a happier future for you and your family ...
Stupid Americans. America would be such a great country if it weren't for all the Americans. Grumble grumble grumble. I need another beer.
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
America Responds! or, Joe's Comment About Charitable Giving Got Too Long, So Now It's Its Own Post
Hmm. I'm afraid I'm going to have to vehemently disagree with my right honourable friend.
In the first instance, my friend is operating under the misapprehension that "real" charities don't squirrel away their money and live off the interest. Au contraire, my good man. Take a glance at Forbes' list of the top 200 charities in the U.S. Last year, there were 21 charities with net assets over one billion dollars. That’s the stuff they’ve kept over the years, squirrel-like. They regularly (when the stock market doesn't crash, of course) earn tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars in investment income each year, which they use to help fund their operations, while the principal sits in Scrooge McDuck’s swimming pool.
And speaking of ducks (or geese, actually)…. An argument could be made that neither these charities nor colleges should be encouraged to become financial geese - building up a huge nest egg and just sitting on it, while goslings of investment income emerge every year to do the work of the gander. My honourable friend would have you slaughter that goose each year, and feast upon its donated flesh. But what, I ask, is more valuable: the present value of today's single goose, which must be replaced in its entirety every year, or tomorrow's limitless flock of goslings, born of one cared-for, always-growing, and well-endowed goose? I leave that to the economists to debate.
(Note to the reader: ignore the foregoing paragraph, if you want; I’m afraid it’s rather strained and doesn’t make sense. But I still like it, so I left it in. If you want to read a thoughtful analysis of encouraging nonprofits to reduce their surpluses by taxing them, take a gander at http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/65xx/doc6567/07-21-UntaxedBus.pdf.)
And non-profits abound that ask for donations beyond an initial fee. I like the zoo. They charge me twenty dollars to see the hippopotamuses. Then they ask me to spend fifty dollars to join the Zoological Society. What for? I already gave them my money. If I want to see another hippo, fine - I'll go back and hand over another appleduster (new slang for a twenty dollar bill). Why should I keep paying for something I already got the benefit from?
Well, donations don’t have to be seen as retroactively increased payments for something you already bought. You can give money to the zoo or a college because you have warm, fuzzy feelings today about the good times you had there. Or you can give to them because you want the zoo or your college to be around for the next generation – and hopefully in better shape than when you went there.
The fact is, fees (and tuitions) usually only cover a smallish percent of institutional costs. Most established charities depend on some balance of fees, grants by foundations and governments, and investment income (which would be replaced by gooseflesh in Ed’s endowment-less scheme). And of course, donations by people like you. If people didn't donate to the zoo by joining the Zoological Society, they might have to start killing endangered animals because they ran out of money to buy Okapi Chow.
Of course, no one forces anyone to donate extra money to a fee-charging charity. (Except of course for the Mobsters' Fund for We Won't Break Your Elbows If You Give Us A Lot of Money Right Now.) You give to the ones you like, according to how much you have and want to give. If you hate okapis, don’t join the zoo. If you think the zoo has started to spend too much money on muskrat enclosures, stop giving them money. If you don’t think your college should be spending money on stairmasters, don’t give them anything.
And not to nitpick, but people can donate to the government, too. Not usually as a “here’s double my tax bill, made out to The Government”, but go to any National Parks website, and you can donate your money directly to that government-run entity.
As for need-blindness, there are few colleges who remain totally need-blind these days. But my understanding is that most places are still something like 80-90% need-blind, meaning that they take financial ability into account only for borderline admittees and wait-list kids. And they meet the full need of anyone that they do admit. So money for scholarships is still useful.
Bottom line is, colleges are worthy recipients of charitable giving. And each dollar you give saves the life of an okapi. So please, give today.
In the first instance, my friend is operating under the misapprehension that "real" charities don't squirrel away their money and live off the interest. Au contraire, my good man. Take a glance at Forbes' list of the top 200 charities in the U.S. Last year, there were 21 charities with net assets over one billion dollars. That’s the stuff they’ve kept over the years, squirrel-like. They regularly (when the stock market doesn't crash, of course) earn tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars in investment income each year, which they use to help fund their operations, while the principal sits in Scrooge McDuck’s swimming pool.
And speaking of ducks (or geese, actually)…. An argument could be made that neither these charities nor colleges should be encouraged to become financial geese - building up a huge nest egg and just sitting on it, while goslings of investment income emerge every year to do the work of the gander. My honourable friend would have you slaughter that goose each year, and feast upon its donated flesh. But what, I ask, is more valuable: the present value of today's single goose, which must be replaced in its entirety every year, or tomorrow's limitless flock of goslings, born of one cared-for, always-growing, and well-endowed goose? I leave that to the economists to debate.
(Note to the reader: ignore the foregoing paragraph, if you want; I’m afraid it’s rather strained and doesn’t make sense. But I still like it, so I left it in. If you want to read a thoughtful analysis of encouraging nonprofits to reduce their surpluses by taxing them, take a gander at http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/65xx/doc6567/07-21-UntaxedBus.pdf.)
And non-profits abound that ask for donations beyond an initial fee. I like the zoo. They charge me twenty dollars to see the hippopotamuses. Then they ask me to spend fifty dollars to join the Zoological Society. What for? I already gave them my money. If I want to see another hippo, fine - I'll go back and hand over another appleduster (new slang for a twenty dollar bill). Why should I keep paying for something I already got the benefit from?
Well, donations don’t have to be seen as retroactively increased payments for something you already bought. You can give money to the zoo or a college because you have warm, fuzzy feelings today about the good times you had there. Or you can give to them because you want the zoo or your college to be around for the next generation – and hopefully in better shape than when you went there.
The fact is, fees (and tuitions) usually only cover a smallish percent of institutional costs. Most established charities depend on some balance of fees, grants by foundations and governments, and investment income (which would be replaced by gooseflesh in Ed’s endowment-less scheme). And of course, donations by people like you. If people didn't donate to the zoo by joining the Zoological Society, they might have to start killing endangered animals because they ran out of money to buy Okapi Chow.
Of course, no one forces anyone to donate extra money to a fee-charging charity. (Except of course for the Mobsters' Fund for We Won't Break Your Elbows If You Give Us A Lot of Money Right Now.) You give to the ones you like, according to how much you have and want to give. If you hate okapis, don’t join the zoo. If you think the zoo has started to spend too much money on muskrat enclosures, stop giving them money. If you don’t think your college should be spending money on stairmasters, don’t give them anything.
And not to nitpick, but people can donate to the government, too. Not usually as a “here’s double my tax bill, made out to The Government”, but go to any National Parks website, and you can donate your money directly to that government-run entity.
As for need-blindness, there are few colleges who remain totally need-blind these days. But my understanding is that most places are still something like 80-90% need-blind, meaning that they take financial ability into account only for borderline admittees and wait-list kids. And they meet the full need of anyone that they do admit. So money for scholarships is still useful.
Bottom line is, colleges are worthy recipients of charitable giving. And each dollar you give saves the life of an okapi. So please, give today.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Things I Hate: Giving Money to My Alma Mater
I loved college. It was a wonderful experience. I made some lifelong friends, learned a ton, and generally, it was top-notch, top-drawer, top-shelf, top-flight, top-hat, Topper-Returns, Top-of-the-Pops ... tops.
And I paid handsomely for it. Well, I didn't pay for it -- my dead great aunt did. Either way, I don't see much point in continuing to pay for it.
I know, there are plenty of kids who couldn't afford to pay for college without some assistance. Thing is, my school isn't very interested in them any more. My school gave up on need-blind admissions when I was a sophomore. To me, that's discrimination in favor of the rich. That's one reason I don't give.
Another is that that my school, like most, is actually loaded with dough. They're so rich that they have big wads of cash just sitting in the bank, and they operate by skimming off the top of it. The call it an "endowment," which makes it sound nice, but it's really just a big hoard of money that they should be using to run the school. That money could go towards scholarships. Or maybe reduce tuition so that normal people can actually afford to go. Do other charitable organizations have the luxury of just squirreling money away and living off of interest rather than using it to fund their operations? Do even the richest for-profit businesses get to do that? (I actually don't know, but I would imagine they wouldn't.)
But yet my college keeps coming to us alumni, hat in hand, saying how they need more money. Yeah, sure, and next I'll make out a check to Microsoft. In 2001, my school lost its shirt in the dot-com crash. This left it only a quarter-billion in its endowment. Only a quarter-billion! Mercy me! How do they put gas in their cars?
And despite losing their shirt, relatively speaking, they still had plenty of money to bring about a lot of unecessary improvements. They redid dorm interiors that were already perfectly fine. They added another cafeteria, despite the fact that I don't remember ever feeling I couldn't find a seat in any of the old ones. They added a huge exercise facility even though they already had two, and the school was full of nerds who shouldn't be exercising anyway.
So this is what my charity dollar is supposed to go towards? Giving rich kids fancier places to work out? I could feed a kid in Africa, combat global warming, contribute to AIDS research ... or give a dorm room a new chair. Somehow, I kinda think I'd do more good giving to the kid in Africa. Maybe that's just me.
In fact, comparing a wealthy and successful college to real charities is unfair to the real charities. Real charities don't get to charge exorbitant tuitions -- they make almost all of their money from donations. Colleges are really more like sports teams. They're tons of fun, you love them, they're part of who you are ... and you pay what they charge, and that should be it. As much as I love the Minnesota Twins, I don't think I'll be donating money to them any time soon.
I'll grant that colleges have a higher purpose than sports teams do. But hey, so do governments. We love our alma mater, so we voluntarily pay even more than we're charged, long after we stopping being a member. We also love our towns, our states, our countries -- yet we take every possible angle we can to avoid paying even the regular amount that they ask of us in taxes. And that's while we are still a member of those places, still benefitting from their work. And forget about giving them something extra.
In short, it will be a great day when our governments get all the money they need and our private colleges have to have a bake sale to buy a building.
And I paid handsomely for it. Well, I didn't pay for it -- my dead great aunt did. Either way, I don't see much point in continuing to pay for it.
I know, there are plenty of kids who couldn't afford to pay for college without some assistance. Thing is, my school isn't very interested in them any more. My school gave up on need-blind admissions when I was a sophomore. To me, that's discrimination in favor of the rich. That's one reason I don't give.
Another is that that my school, like most, is actually loaded with dough. They're so rich that they have big wads of cash just sitting in the bank, and they operate by skimming off the top of it. The call it an "endowment," which makes it sound nice, but it's really just a big hoard of money that they should be using to run the school. That money could go towards scholarships. Or maybe reduce tuition so that normal people can actually afford to go. Do other charitable organizations have the luxury of just squirreling money away and living off of interest rather than using it to fund their operations? Do even the richest for-profit businesses get to do that? (I actually don't know, but I would imagine they wouldn't.)
But yet my college keeps coming to us alumni, hat in hand, saying how they need more money. Yeah, sure, and next I'll make out a check to Microsoft. In 2001, my school lost its shirt in the dot-com crash. This left it only a quarter-billion in its endowment. Only a quarter-billion! Mercy me! How do they put gas in their cars?
And despite losing their shirt, relatively speaking, they still had plenty of money to bring about a lot of unecessary improvements. They redid dorm interiors that were already perfectly fine. They added another cafeteria, despite the fact that I don't remember ever feeling I couldn't find a seat in any of the old ones. They added a huge exercise facility even though they already had two, and the school was full of nerds who shouldn't be exercising anyway.
So this is what my charity dollar is supposed to go towards? Giving rich kids fancier places to work out? I could feed a kid in Africa, combat global warming, contribute to AIDS research ... or give a dorm room a new chair. Somehow, I kinda think I'd do more good giving to the kid in Africa. Maybe that's just me.
In fact, comparing a wealthy and successful college to real charities is unfair to the real charities. Real charities don't get to charge exorbitant tuitions -- they make almost all of their money from donations. Colleges are really more like sports teams. They're tons of fun, you love them, they're part of who you are ... and you pay what they charge, and that should be it. As much as I love the Minnesota Twins, I don't think I'll be donating money to them any time soon.
I'll grant that colleges have a higher purpose than sports teams do. But hey, so do governments. We love our alma mater, so we voluntarily pay even more than we're charged, long after we stopping being a member. We also love our towns, our states, our countries -- yet we take every possible angle we can to avoid paying even the regular amount that they ask of us in taxes. And that's while we are still a member of those places, still benefitting from their work. And forget about giving them something extra.
In short, it will be a great day when our governments get all the money they need and our private colleges have to have a bake sale to buy a building.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
My Hard-Hitting Critique of Flags
I love flags. Even if they're kinda useless nowadays. In the days before people could read, they had very practical uses: Flags were the only way to identify yourself as coming from a particular country. People also couldn't talk or hear in those days, so all communication was done through flags. Every nobleman had a flagbearer who would carry about 5,000 different flags, one for each word in the English language at the time. Even the best flag-waver would take about a half hour in between each word to shuffle through his flag collection and find the next flag, so each sentence took about a day. Lots of awkward pauses in those days. If you were a peasant and couldn't afford a flagbearer, you would communicate through punches to the face.
No, not really! Ha ha ha. But flags were a lot more of a practical necessity in those days. And people didn't get all "sacred-relic"-y about their country's flag like they do now. True story: Few people in the United States saw a single American flag for many years after it was adopted, because it really weren't seen as being terribly important. Several years after its adoption, Ben Franklin was quoted as describing the flag wrong, saying it had 13 stripes of red, white and blue instead of red and white. He'd likely seen one or two by then, but just wasn't a big thing at the time. They certainly didn't worry about flag being burnt or touching the ground or being wrapped around penises or whatever people are upset about today. That whole farcically overwrought and overcomplicated flag-folding ceremony was created in the 1970s. Point is, only recently have Americans been all spazzy about the flag.
But anyway, flags are fun. And the American flag is the funnest. It really is the best flag, and I say that not just because I'm a flag-waving, jingoistic, xenophobic white supremacist. It's a unique flag, yet not bizarre. There's lots of good symbolism in there -- the 50 stars for the 50 states, the 13 stripes for the 13 colonies, the white for white people, the red for the blood of white people, the blue for the blood of rich white people. And it's nice-looking too. Here it is:
I bet it's immediately recognizable to just about everyone in the world. In the marketing biz, we call that "good branding." Then we feel icky for using the word "branding," and we reevaluate our choices in life. Then we realize that we have no discernable talent of any kind, so marketing was basically our only option. Then we cry all the way to the bank.
And I really think that should be the number-one qualification for a flag. Attractiveness is important too, but number one in my book is recognizability. If it's easy to remember that a certain flag stands for a certain country, then it's a good flag.
So what would be a counterexample? Basically every flag in Europe. European countries suck at making flags, much as they suck in creating health-care systems, moral values, and people. (Remember, I'm a jingoistic xenophobe.) Pop quiz, hot shot: What country proudly (?) bears this standard atop their mighty whorehouses and "coffeeshops"?
Nope, not France -- France has the same exact colors, except its stripes are vertical instead of horizontal. It's Holland, or, as it's actually called, the Netherlands. What, you didn't recognize it? Maybe because it looks almost exactly like every other fucking flag in Europe?
Here's another pop quiz: what so-called "country" is so perpetually ashamed of itself that it created this flag, apparently in the hope that they would be mistaken for other countries and that no one would notice them ever again?
You guessed it, it's the world's shittiest country, Luxembourg. Luxembourg and the Netherlands even border each other, folks. The Netherlands was so unoriginal that it did the tri-color thing, like every other European country, and used the same colors as France -- and then Luxem-fucking-bourg upped the ante for unoriginality to the stratosphere by using the same flag as its neighbor! They just made one color slightly lighter! That's so unoriginal that it's almost amazingly original!
So both those flags are absolute failures. People who aren't Joe will never come across the Luxembourg flag and be like, "Oh shit, Luxembourg's in the house!" They will instead be all "Is that France's flag? No wait, its stripes are vertical. Eh, it's probably one of those shitty European countries that doesn't even try to pretend that it has enough national pride to make a flag that normal people (i.e., not Joe) can recognize." It's like if the Netherlands had instead called itself Franceland, and then Luxembourg had called itself Francelande.
So where are the good flags? Not Africa, I'll tell you that. As if it wasn't bad enough that they have so many black people there (reminder: I am a racist), their flags are even worse than Europe's. They all use the same freakin' colors, and just arrange them slightly differently. For instance, here's Ghana:
I know, it's like, SO Ghana, isn't it? You think Ghana, and you think about a star, with red, yellow and green stripes. You would never look at that and be all, oh, hey, Guinea-Bissau! However, if you saw this flag ...
... you'd be all, "oh, snap, it's Guinea-Bissau!" A star with red, yellow and green stripes! And it's so symbolic the way one of the stipes is vertical. People in Guinea-Bissau are known for walking while vertical. It's kind of the thing down there.
No, not really! Ha ha ha. But flags were a lot more of a practical necessity in those days. And people didn't get all "sacred-relic"-y about their country's flag like they do now. True story: Few people in the United States saw a single American flag for many years after it was adopted, because it really weren't seen as being terribly important. Several years after its adoption, Ben Franklin was quoted as describing the flag wrong, saying it had 13 stripes of red, white and blue instead of red and white. He'd likely seen one or two by then, but just wasn't a big thing at the time. They certainly didn't worry about flag being burnt or touching the ground or being wrapped around penises or whatever people are upset about today. That whole farcically overwrought and overcomplicated flag-folding ceremony was created in the 1970s. Point is, only recently have Americans been all spazzy about the flag.
But anyway, flags are fun. And the American flag is the funnest. It really is the best flag, and I say that not just because I'm a flag-waving, jingoistic, xenophobic white supremacist. It's a unique flag, yet not bizarre. There's lots of good symbolism in there -- the 50 stars for the 50 states, the 13 stripes for the 13 colonies, the white for white people, the red for the blood of white people, the blue for the blood of rich white people. And it's nice-looking too. Here it is:
I bet it's immediately recognizable to just about everyone in the world. In the marketing biz, we call that "good branding." Then we feel icky for using the word "branding," and we reevaluate our choices in life. Then we realize that we have no discernable talent of any kind, so marketing was basically our only option. Then we cry all the way to the bank.
And I really think that should be the number-one qualification for a flag. Attractiveness is important too, but number one in my book is recognizability. If it's easy to remember that a certain flag stands for a certain country, then it's a good flag.
So what would be a counterexample? Basically every flag in Europe. European countries suck at making flags, much as they suck in creating health-care systems, moral values, and people. (Remember, I'm a jingoistic xenophobe.) Pop quiz, hot shot: What country proudly (?) bears this standard atop their mighty whorehouses and "coffeeshops"?
Nope, not France -- France has the same exact colors, except its stripes are vertical instead of horizontal. It's Holland, or, as it's actually called, the Netherlands. What, you didn't recognize it? Maybe because it looks almost exactly like every other fucking flag in Europe?
Here's another pop quiz: what so-called "country" is so perpetually ashamed of itself that it created this flag, apparently in the hope that they would be mistaken for other countries and that no one would notice them ever again?
You guessed it, it's the world's shittiest country, Luxembourg. Luxembourg and the Netherlands even border each other, folks. The Netherlands was so unoriginal that it did the tri-color thing, like every other European country, and used the same colors as France -- and then Luxem-fucking-bourg upped the ante for unoriginality to the stratosphere by using the same flag as its neighbor! They just made one color slightly lighter! That's so unoriginal that it's almost amazingly original!
So both those flags are absolute failures. People who aren't Joe will never come across the Luxembourg flag and be like, "Oh shit, Luxembourg's in the house!" They will instead be all "Is that France's flag? No wait, its stripes are vertical. Eh, it's probably one of those shitty European countries that doesn't even try to pretend that it has enough national pride to make a flag that normal people (i.e., not Joe) can recognize." It's like if the Netherlands had instead called itself Franceland, and then Luxembourg had called itself Francelande.
So where are the good flags? Not Africa, I'll tell you that. As if it wasn't bad enough that they have so many black people there (reminder: I am a racist), their flags are even worse than Europe's. They all use the same freakin' colors, and just arrange them slightly differently. For instance, here's Ghana:
I know, it's like, SO Ghana, isn't it? You think Ghana, and you think about a star, with red, yellow and green stripes. You would never look at that and be all, oh, hey, Guinea-Bissau! However, if you saw this flag ...
... you'd be all, "oh, snap, it's Guinea-Bissau!" A star with red, yellow and green stripes! And it's so symbolic the way one of the stipes is vertical. People in Guinea-Bissau are known for walking while vertical. It's kind of the thing down there.
And you know, my farcical "Franceland" thing is actually the reality here, because look at Guinea's flag:
Sigh. So you have countries called "Guinea" and "Guinea-Bissau." Already, you're starting with a big similarity problem right there. Then these countries each choose almost the same flag. It's like identical twins who dress the same. Don't you guys want to even try to carve out your own identities? If not, then hell, we're wasting time and money keeping you guys as separate countries. We need to conserve ambassadors and embassy buildings -- did you not you see the Al Gore movie? You're wasting valuable paper and chairs at U.N. meetings by insisting on being different countries.
You know, maybe I actually hate flags. Flags seem to willfully contradict my main qualifications: that they be memorable, unique, and blatantly symbolic. I know that the colors in the African flags are symbolic of Pan-Africanism, but couldn't you think of better symbols than just colors? Colors are very busy things: They are on everything in the world, and each color can symbolize life, death, nature, freedom, ham, and every other possible thing imaginable depending on who you are and where you're from. Can't you go with more concrete and obvious symbols? Can't you be more like Swaziland?
Now there's a fuckin' flag! It's got that kick-ass shield and those spears in the middle, plus a bunch of leaves or pinecones or Tribbles or whatever those things are. Swaziland has no self-esteem problems: With this flag, they're saying to me, "Hey, we're Swaziland, and if you don't like it, we will stab you!" As opposed to Luxembourg or Guinea, who are all "ooh, colors are pretty."
Plus, I think it has a nice look to it. The above representation is not a great one -- usually they use a nice light blue that goes well with the other colors and makes it look like something that a professional artist may have created. I mean seriously, imagine what awesome country flags professional artists could create. They would be attractive, recognizable, unique -- why instead, did most countries just pick a few colors and smack 'em together, with nary a thought toward aesthetics?
But anyway, the all-time greatest flag is Nepal's. They really knew how to "think outside the box" ... literally! (By the way, I am available to speak at your next corporate event. My presentation, "Marketing Lessons from Flag Design: Think Outside the Same Goddamn Boxes of Color That Everyone Else Uses," has inspired countless people to improve their ROI efficiency and upflow their innovationability. Contact me today!)
Yeah, buddy! The people at Nepal said "Hey guys, why don't we innovate? Why don't we break the paradigm and promote a brand identity of young, hip, different, EXTREME?!" So that's what they did, and they have since become the market leader in Nepalese products.
And it's symbolic, too. The sun represents the fact that they have sunlight there. The sun on top of the crescent symbolizes the fact that their Muslims think the sun rises and sets just for them. And the whole shape of the flag symbolizes the extremely pointy breasts that all Nepalese women have.
But I should emphasize that to have a passable flag, you don't have to go as far as Nepal did. You can just put some object in the middle. Mexico's flag (which you should know well, so I'm not putting it in here) is a fine one, I think. Nothing earth-shattering -- basically just Italy's flag with a bird in the middle -- but it's enough to make it memorable. If the Netherlands had stuck a picture in the middle of its flag of a man smoking a joint while being fellated by a prostitute, I would have no problem with it whatsoever.
(For further flag-looking-at: Other good flags include the Marshall Islands, Kenya, Kosovo, Dominica, Seychelles, Montenegro, and St. Lucia. Bad ones include Mali, Lithuana, Hungary, Poland, Indonesia and Monaco (same exact flag for those two), and all those goddamn Scandinavian countries that I can never keep straight. Sweden I can get every time. The rest I can never remember.)
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Movies I Dreamt Up
My dreams take all forms. (Again, I must remind you that by "dreams" I do not mean aspirations. I only use that word when referring to the stuff my brain conjures up when I'm asleep.) When I'm not dreaming painful scenarios that drag my emotions over past failures, I often dream up movie ideas. My brain will make up some weird scenario, and then at some point in mid-dream I realize it's a movie, and as I'm dreaming, I'll form it into a better movie. It's kind of awesome really. I've also come up with songs in my sleep that I was able to remember the next morning. I've never been able to write a song in waking life.
Anyway, here are a few recent movies I dreamt up:
1. "Back to High School"
Glib version of the explanation: Like that Drew Barrymore movie, except better.
It's sorta kinda a lot like that Drew Barrymore movie where a grown-up goes back to high school as an undercover reporter, except a little different. So it starts with our heroine, who we'll call Emily (just to pick a random name), going through high school. This will be a pretty quick introductory segment, in which we run through all the typical characters and themes of all "high school sucks" movies -- there are the popular, rich, mean girls tormenting Emily, there's the charming, cute jock who doesn't have any interest in her, there's the nerd boy who pays attention to her but turns out to be a sex-obsessed jerk, and it's all generally a miserable experience.
All the above is stuffed in one day in which Emily is tired of blending into the woodwork and decides to break out of her shell by wearing these wacky socks that her mother gave her, and that she loves. But instead of getting her noticed in a good way, she gets ridiculed mercilessly. For the rest of high school, she's derisively known as "Socks" Macarthur. (Her last name's Macarthur. That's what my dream told me, so it must be a portentous sign from God.)
So anyway, Emily goes to college, and has a blast. Now she breaks out the wacky socks and everyone loves them. She again becomes known as "Socks," but this time it's a fun nickname. Now instead of wallowing in a crippling fear of people, she relishes their company.
While in college, she becomes fascinated with computers, and creates a few iPhone apps (or something like that -- something in science or technology) that she's then able to market and make a mint off of. After she graduates, she's pretty well set for a while. She's immensely happy.
But she keeps having dreams about how awful high school was. She meets with a therapist, who tells her that there's not much she can do about that one -- there's no aversion therapy for high school. At this point, Socks has become a bit of a perfectionist, obsessed with having a perfect life and no fears or scars. So she says, heck, that's exactly what I'm going to do.
So she goes ... back to high school! (OK, I realize this is a bit cheesy. But it could be fun. And the movie's kinda meant for kids.) She creates a fake identity for herself and enrolls in a different high school. (Maybe some comedy can be mined from having her college buddies pose as her parents. Socks is young-looking, and maybe she gets some bald dude with a beard from college to pose as her dad. Probably shouldn't make her boyfriend do it. That's too icky.)
In high school, she meets exactly the same archetypes as she knew in her high school. At first, she's a bit cowed, but then gathers herself, and acts very confident. She wears her crazy socks all the time. Of course, she gets made of, but she is able to shoot back now, and she becomes pretty popular, one of those rare popular kids who is friends with everyone. This time she actually gets to know all these archetypical characters -- jocks, sex-obsessed nerds, popular girls, etc. Her motives are kinda evil, to befriend them and then find a way to give them a good comeuppance, or at least get them to change from being so terrible to each other. But the more she gets to know them, the more she sees that they're packed with insecurities too, and are just better at hiding them. The popular girl, it turns out, had to fend off sexual advances from a teacher. The nerd has an oppressive family. Et cetera. She ends up being a genuine friend to them, helping them with their problems, but then when they start ganging up on a wallflower girl that reminds her of herself, she can't help herself. She ends up taking revenge on them, and of course it turns out horribly, making things much worse. She tries to atone for what she did, but by then someone discovers her fraud, and she's kicked out. Then everyone feels they've been defrauded and she's demonized and shunned.
She gets a criminal conviction but no jail time (she never did anything icky with any of the high school kids, always telling them she had a boyfriend from another school, which she actually does, and maybe her real boyfriend comes and meets them, and they're just awed by him), and returns to adult life. But maybe eventually, something makes the kids come see her at her cool apartment and there's some sort of tearful admittance that they have changed for the better because of her. So there's sort of a happy ending, somehow. Maybe in the end she becomes a school psychologist. I haven't worked out all the details.
2. "Wall Street Hustlers"
Glib version of the explanation: Chris Rock version of "Wall Street"
OK, I can't really describe this one and not look like an asshole, since I'm a white man. I'll just sound like I'm trying to put on a minstrel show or in some other way be insulting to African-Americans. So I'll resolve this problem by acting all black and shit.
Yo, bitch, what up? Mothafuckin' E to the D here to kick the ballistics on the ultimate balla comedy in the hizzay!!! Peep this .... oh Jesus, I am a horrible human being. I apologize with all my soul to everyone who is African-American, has ever met anyone African-American, or has ever heard of African-Americans. I'm so sorry.
But not sorry enough to not try again. OK, so there's this ghetto businessman who is ruling many of the illicit trades in the neighborhood. Let's call him Joe (just to pick a random name). He's cornered the market on marijuana. But he doesn't sell coke or crack or anything else, because he feels that those destroy the community, and a destroyed community is a dangerous one, and thus bad for business. Marijuana, he says half-jokingly, helps the community, making everyone relax. That's good business. He puts everything in terms of whether it's good or bad for business. He's a charmer, genuinely likable and not smarmy or evil, but he's also a ruthless capitalist, doing whatever it takes to maintain his monopoly. He is an extremely wise businessman, but a mostly amoral one. In a very charming way.
In the beginning he is challenged by an upstart who barges into his office and is shocked by un-fancy it is. Joe lets loose one of his many maxims, something about never looking like you have money. He wears very simple clothes that make him go mostly unnoticed. But he's rolling in money. The pictures on his wall are of Donald Trump, Michael Milken, Ken Lay -- his heroes.
So anyway, this upstart makes bold pronouncements about taking him over, and Joe flashes a genuine smile and says "Well, I welcome the competition! Competition is what makes the system great!" He then asks the upstart about his business plan. Of course, the upstart doesn't really have one. What areas are you going to go into? No idea, but he just spews more bluster instead of answering. How do you intend to get loyalty from the dealers and suppliers? No idea. Joe reveals that he gets their loyalty by always giving them a solid cut and treating them fairly. He even provides health insurance and a 401(k) (which would be a bit of a laugh line). When things get out of hand, which the inevitably do, he has an enforcement team, led by Big Mike, a man who then appears from the shadows and is very large and intimidating. So anyway, the opening scene is mainly meant to establish that Joe is an expert businessman and to set up how he does his thing.
Eventually the upstart goes away, and Joe's smile drops. He's tired of this shit. He wants to move to the next level, to go legit, maybe run some restaurants or other businesses so he can deal with professionals instead of blowhards. People like Trump, or Ken Lay.
Soon after he meets up with old friend from the neighborhood, Chris. Chris was a mathematical genius who got out of the ghetto on a scholarship and ended up working for a major bank. Recently, however, when the financial mess hit, Chris was fired, digraced, and came back to the ghetto.
Despite Chris' fall, Joe is inspired by his rise. Banking! There are no banks in their neighborhood. People go miles out of their way for a bank or just stash their money in mattresses, which often get stolen. Joe, with Chris' help, opens up a bank. It's a different kind of bank, with intense security. Maybe the upstart, who of course never did anything, comes in and tries to rob the place. He pulls out a gun on the teller, and the teller pulls out her own. As does everyone else in the bank. (OK, now you see where the offensiveness comes in. I've been telling it as straightforward as possible, avoiding the jokes, which are often about applying the ghetto world to the "straight" world, but it's hard to do that without playing on stereotypes of ghettos that I'm really not allowed to play on, as a white man. But you get the idea. A black screenwriter could do better on this.)
So anwyay, the bank is a success, and Joe and Chris quickly start opening other franchises. They start to gain some press. Reporters start asking uncomfortable questions about where Joe got all his money to begin with. Chris buts in and starts talking about credit default swaps and derivitatives and such, and that placates everyone. Afterwards, Joe says "What was all that? I don't know what any of that means." and Chris says,"Neither do I. Neither do they. Doesn't matter. It's all a hustle." You get the idea.
So quickly Joe and Chris start building a financial empire, getting into investment banking and all sorts of things. Then maybe they meet the real tycoons, and Joe is of course enthralled. But when he sees what they do, he gradually becomes more and more horrified. They talk casually of laying off thousands just to boost the stock price a bit so that they can then sell their own stashes for a profit. Or they talk of investments like buying up rivers from indigenous South American populations so they an use them for a new type of bottled water. Joe discovers his conscience, and threatens to expose all of their awful deals. The tycoons laugh and tell them that these deals are all well-known, and nobody cares.
Then the tycoons, just to be safe, expose Joe as getting his start in marijuana sales, and Joe is arrested and his businesses destroyed. Maybe at the trial he makes an impassioned speech, asking which is worse -- selling a mostly harmless drug in order to make a system of banks that help the community, or using your riches to destroy communities and people for the sake of gaining slightly more riches. He becomes a folk hero, taking every interview he can get and talking about this stuff. And then there's some happy ending. I don't know what.
So maybe these movies are a bit preachy. I'm so political these days that it would be hard for them not to be. But both would be comedies, with all this stuff underneath it all. What do you think? Neither would be great art, but they could be fun.
Anyway, here are a few recent movies I dreamt up:
1. "Back to High School"
Glib version of the explanation: Like that Drew Barrymore movie, except better.
It's sorta kinda a lot like that Drew Barrymore movie where a grown-up goes back to high school as an undercover reporter, except a little different. So it starts with our heroine, who we'll call Emily (just to pick a random name), going through high school. This will be a pretty quick introductory segment, in which we run through all the typical characters and themes of all "high school sucks" movies -- there are the popular, rich, mean girls tormenting Emily, there's the charming, cute jock who doesn't have any interest in her, there's the nerd boy who pays attention to her but turns out to be a sex-obsessed jerk, and it's all generally a miserable experience.
All the above is stuffed in one day in which Emily is tired of blending into the woodwork and decides to break out of her shell by wearing these wacky socks that her mother gave her, and that she loves. But instead of getting her noticed in a good way, she gets ridiculed mercilessly. For the rest of high school, she's derisively known as "Socks" Macarthur. (Her last name's Macarthur. That's what my dream told me, so it must be a portentous sign from God.)
So anyway, Emily goes to college, and has a blast. Now she breaks out the wacky socks and everyone loves them. She again becomes known as "Socks," but this time it's a fun nickname. Now instead of wallowing in a crippling fear of people, she relishes their company.
While in college, she becomes fascinated with computers, and creates a few iPhone apps (or something like that -- something in science or technology) that she's then able to market and make a mint off of. After she graduates, she's pretty well set for a while. She's immensely happy.
But she keeps having dreams about how awful high school was. She meets with a therapist, who tells her that there's not much she can do about that one -- there's no aversion therapy for high school. At this point, Socks has become a bit of a perfectionist, obsessed with having a perfect life and no fears or scars. So she says, heck, that's exactly what I'm going to do.
So she goes ... back to high school! (OK, I realize this is a bit cheesy. But it could be fun. And the movie's kinda meant for kids.) She creates a fake identity for herself and enrolls in a different high school. (Maybe some comedy can be mined from having her college buddies pose as her parents. Socks is young-looking, and maybe she gets some bald dude with a beard from college to pose as her dad. Probably shouldn't make her boyfriend do it. That's too icky.)
In high school, she meets exactly the same archetypes as she knew in her high school. At first, she's a bit cowed, but then gathers herself, and acts very confident. She wears her crazy socks all the time. Of course, she gets made of, but she is able to shoot back now, and she becomes pretty popular, one of those rare popular kids who is friends with everyone. This time she actually gets to know all these archetypical characters -- jocks, sex-obsessed nerds, popular girls, etc. Her motives are kinda evil, to befriend them and then find a way to give them a good comeuppance, or at least get them to change from being so terrible to each other. But the more she gets to know them, the more she sees that they're packed with insecurities too, and are just better at hiding them. The popular girl, it turns out, had to fend off sexual advances from a teacher. The nerd has an oppressive family. Et cetera. She ends up being a genuine friend to them, helping them with their problems, but then when they start ganging up on a wallflower girl that reminds her of herself, she can't help herself. She ends up taking revenge on them, and of course it turns out horribly, making things much worse. She tries to atone for what she did, but by then someone discovers her fraud, and she's kicked out. Then everyone feels they've been defrauded and she's demonized and shunned.
She gets a criminal conviction but no jail time (she never did anything icky with any of the high school kids, always telling them she had a boyfriend from another school, which she actually does, and maybe her real boyfriend comes and meets them, and they're just awed by him), and returns to adult life. But maybe eventually, something makes the kids come see her at her cool apartment and there's some sort of tearful admittance that they have changed for the better because of her. So there's sort of a happy ending, somehow. Maybe in the end she becomes a school psychologist. I haven't worked out all the details.
2. "Wall Street Hustlers"
Glib version of the explanation: Chris Rock version of "Wall Street"
OK, I can't really describe this one and not look like an asshole, since I'm a white man. I'll just sound like I'm trying to put on a minstrel show or in some other way be insulting to African-Americans. So I'll resolve this problem by acting all black and shit.
Yo, bitch, what up? Mothafuckin' E to the D here to kick the ballistics on the ultimate balla comedy in the hizzay!!! Peep this .... oh Jesus, I am a horrible human being. I apologize with all my soul to everyone who is African-American, has ever met anyone African-American, or has ever heard of African-Americans. I'm so sorry.
But not sorry enough to not try again. OK, so there's this ghetto businessman who is ruling many of the illicit trades in the neighborhood. Let's call him Joe (just to pick a random name). He's cornered the market on marijuana. But he doesn't sell coke or crack or anything else, because he feels that those destroy the community, and a destroyed community is a dangerous one, and thus bad for business. Marijuana, he says half-jokingly, helps the community, making everyone relax. That's good business. He puts everything in terms of whether it's good or bad for business. He's a charmer, genuinely likable and not smarmy or evil, but he's also a ruthless capitalist, doing whatever it takes to maintain his monopoly. He is an extremely wise businessman, but a mostly amoral one. In a very charming way.
In the beginning he is challenged by an upstart who barges into his office and is shocked by un-fancy it is. Joe lets loose one of his many maxims, something about never looking like you have money. He wears very simple clothes that make him go mostly unnoticed. But he's rolling in money. The pictures on his wall are of Donald Trump, Michael Milken, Ken Lay -- his heroes.
So anyway, this upstart makes bold pronouncements about taking him over, and Joe flashes a genuine smile and says "Well, I welcome the competition! Competition is what makes the system great!" He then asks the upstart about his business plan. Of course, the upstart doesn't really have one. What areas are you going to go into? No idea, but he just spews more bluster instead of answering. How do you intend to get loyalty from the dealers and suppliers? No idea. Joe reveals that he gets their loyalty by always giving them a solid cut and treating them fairly. He even provides health insurance and a 401(k) (which would be a bit of a laugh line). When things get out of hand, which the inevitably do, he has an enforcement team, led by Big Mike, a man who then appears from the shadows and is very large and intimidating. So anyway, the opening scene is mainly meant to establish that Joe is an expert businessman and to set up how he does his thing.
Eventually the upstart goes away, and Joe's smile drops. He's tired of this shit. He wants to move to the next level, to go legit, maybe run some restaurants or other businesses so he can deal with professionals instead of blowhards. People like Trump, or Ken Lay.
Soon after he meets up with old friend from the neighborhood, Chris. Chris was a mathematical genius who got out of the ghetto on a scholarship and ended up working for a major bank. Recently, however, when the financial mess hit, Chris was fired, digraced, and came back to the ghetto.
Despite Chris' fall, Joe is inspired by his rise. Banking! There are no banks in their neighborhood. People go miles out of their way for a bank or just stash their money in mattresses, which often get stolen. Joe, with Chris' help, opens up a bank. It's a different kind of bank, with intense security. Maybe the upstart, who of course never did anything, comes in and tries to rob the place. He pulls out a gun on the teller, and the teller pulls out her own. As does everyone else in the bank. (OK, now you see where the offensiveness comes in. I've been telling it as straightforward as possible, avoiding the jokes, which are often about applying the ghetto world to the "straight" world, but it's hard to do that without playing on stereotypes of ghettos that I'm really not allowed to play on, as a white man. But you get the idea. A black screenwriter could do better on this.)
So anwyay, the bank is a success, and Joe and Chris quickly start opening other franchises. They start to gain some press. Reporters start asking uncomfortable questions about where Joe got all his money to begin with. Chris buts in and starts talking about credit default swaps and derivitatives and such, and that placates everyone. Afterwards, Joe says "What was all that? I don't know what any of that means." and Chris says,"Neither do I. Neither do they. Doesn't matter. It's all a hustle." You get the idea.
So quickly Joe and Chris start building a financial empire, getting into investment banking and all sorts of things. Then maybe they meet the real tycoons, and Joe is of course enthralled. But when he sees what they do, he gradually becomes more and more horrified. They talk casually of laying off thousands just to boost the stock price a bit so that they can then sell their own stashes for a profit. Or they talk of investments like buying up rivers from indigenous South American populations so they an use them for a new type of bottled water. Joe discovers his conscience, and threatens to expose all of their awful deals. The tycoons laugh and tell them that these deals are all well-known, and nobody cares.
Then the tycoons, just to be safe, expose Joe as getting his start in marijuana sales, and Joe is arrested and his businesses destroyed. Maybe at the trial he makes an impassioned speech, asking which is worse -- selling a mostly harmless drug in order to make a system of banks that help the community, or using your riches to destroy communities and people for the sake of gaining slightly more riches. He becomes a folk hero, taking every interview he can get and talking about this stuff. And then there's some happy ending. I don't know what.
So maybe these movies are a bit preachy. I'm so political these days that it would be hard for them not to be. But both would be comedies, with all this stuff underneath it all. What do you think? Neither would be great art, but they could be fun.
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