How Stupid Can Americans get Before the Country Falls Apart

I used this clip in my last chapter of ADHOLES: The Unsolicited History of Advertising

 

Note: When you go to Walmart to check out "the People of Walmart" you become, by default, one of "the People of Walmart"...


Wear your funny hat...

 

I went to Walmart today and was reminded of Seinfeld's critique of the DMV: "It's like a leper colony down there!"

 

TBH, I have been in a Walmart probably five times. Been in a Sam’s Club once.

 

That's like a club for People of Walmart, isn't it?

 

What I see is the loss of common sense having taken place over the last few decades. At one time a diploma meant something, that is that one had learned certain basic skills. At that time, students were not promoted if they didn't measure up. Over the years the public education system reformed to push students ahead regardless of accomplishment. Also, it became uncool to be a good student, one who is fascinated by learning. Those who demonstrated ability and accomplishment were ridiculed and bullied. The mediocre minds reigned and helped the dumbing down system do moreso and become even less effective. Meanwhile, teachers unions were pushing systems where teachers were difficult to impossible to fire regardless of how ineffective they were at inspiring students. And pushing higher teacher salaries which they claimed would attract better teachers, but being as that was just the ruse, it attracted people who wanted a good salary and would put up with the brats for the money and perks, rather than simply attract people who were more interested in investing in people than building bank. All these factors combined to put us well down from the top in capability of graduates worldwide and the same issues continue today. And whenever it's brought up that kids (parents) should have the right to choose between schools which compete for education budget dollars, the wealthy interests benefiting from the current archaic system scream in opposition, pretending that education quality would suffer (as if it could get any worse) defying the obvious fact that competition spurs improvement. And so until gonads are again allowed to be grown, Americans will indeed get stupider on the whole, and the pace of the country falling apart will continue to accelerate. In large part, it's increasingly contributing to a widening gap between the well educated and the poorly educated.

 

It's curious how that seemed to only have started once it appeared he was becoming an actual threat to the political machine that had the country by the balls.
Do we have any examples of him receiving anything but praise from the media and powers that be prior to his presidential run? Or was he a considered a good boy until it looked like he could disrupt the balance of power in DC?

 

That's right, "work in school, F that!"

 

You and I don't agree on much. However, I agree with you about teacher's unions. Why do teachers need a union?

 

How Stupid Can Americans get Before the Country Falls Apart?

Not much more.

 

Out here in Bumfuck, Texass, Walmart is all we got, unless your willing to drive 75 miles to a Whole Foods or shop at the 100 year old IGA run by slackjaw yokels and overrun with black mold and flies.

 

Walmart is the reason there's no competition, but Amazon moved next door to the Pentagon so they can share drones. Texas may require another century to catch up, but Amazon will soon deliver anything Walmart sells to your door, and buzz your phone. They're waiting on the technology, with the Pentagon insisting someone needs to come up with a strategy for dealing with drones, but nobody has yet that I know of. They want a chip in every drone that they can track or whatever, but the Pentagon wants a Star Wars Death Star too.

 

I bet if you and I were to sit down and talk wide spectrum we'd find that we would actually agree on much more than we'd disagree, it's just that by human nature we tend to focus more on our differences of opinion than on that which we agree, amplifying the sentiment of disagreement.

 

Walmart isn't actually the Mecca of human scum as it tends to be portrayed by some. The "People of Walmart" is the most salient example. All while interesting characters are interspersed throughout much of outings so around, we're sort of ingrained to ferret them out moreso in Walmart stores. But look around the MVA/DMV. Home improvement stores, grocery chains, easy access parks, etc. It's everywhere. Sample a high school graduation ceremony. The clientele at Walmart is simply representative of the population at large, running quite the gamut. I just view it as an interesting show.

 

And nobody else has? Hmmm
That's just representative of the times and everybody went through them suffering all the same whims and practices.
Now we have laws that not only protect the historically disadvantaged, but place them at advantage, a form of reparations.
The teachers unions are all about power, money, and compliance to their directives.
Making teachers paid more so they can take a chunk from each of them to feed their own coffers so they can galavant around in style while bashing the rich. Preventing schools from improving to assure socioeconomic class division so they can feel demonstrably superior and have clout.
Unions for government employees involving exchange of money should be banned.

 

Dude, I think you need to go out and actually meet some K through 10 educators. Maybe your statement holds true for tenured educators in middle class neighborhoods but is certainly not representative of the trade as a whole or even a majority, i.e. Mrs Kat has been teaching since the 90's, she started in Chicago where she could expect to earn about 62k a year if she were there now.

Out here in the sticks she was taking home less than 30k, because the teachers union in AZ is a fucking joke.


And it's not as if teaching is some sort of 9 to 5 gig, tons of ancillary garbage to wade through after class, grading homework, organizing lesson plans, endless & pointless emails from admin at all hours with an expectation of a speedy reply (because everyone has a phone in their pocket these days so "office hours" are a lost concept on these fucks) and then having to meet with the disinterested parents to try and explain why their 8th grader is reading at a 3rd grade level mostly because the fucking parent is too damn busy watching reality TV and sucking down pisswater beer to ensure their kid gets down to business with the homework but God forbid that's ever mentioned...

 

debatable, but if so, it’s a sad commentary.

 

That’s true of many professions. However, I think most of the problem is that people are put in charge who are power hungry. I’ve seen it with my own eyes.

 

More clearly, the People who are power hungry are often the ones with the required drive & ambition to play the cut-throat game of "who's in charge?"
I mean if you aren't power hungry to begin with then there's really little chance you'll make the cut for "chief asshole"