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The education establishment likes to blame poor parenting and rowdy and lawless students for educational mediocrity. Without a doubt, that's part of the problem, but incompetent, uncaring teachers are also a part of the problem.

The remarkable thing about this article is that the discussion is taking place at all.
I remember well Cultural Literacy and *GASP!* The Bell Curve.

Nothing has changed, indeed, things have gotten worse, and in the process enormous amounts of the State budget has been placed "off limits", and is no small part of California's descent into fiscal hell.

This particular pararaph sums it all up. The deadly combination, societal and educational ebola infecting a huge chunk of of our population and feeding the only inevitable result: disaffection, resentment and cluelessness.

Is it true that "we" spend more on sports, rap music and running shoes than we do on education? In spite of the bloated education budget? That says it all.

I work in a building with around 80 people in it, at a work site with around 400 employees total.
Of our 80 bodies, in a highly technical atmosphere there is one black in a professional technical position and two in support clerical positions, and already the "one" has played the race card in resolving disputes with outside contractors.
In a critically technical environment, only the best qualified survive, and there is no "faking it". The price of admission is ruthlessly uniform and uncompromising.

But more significantly, in addition to the usual banter about sports, camping, cars, guns, you will find discussions about religion, ethics, mathematics, literature, cosmology, in short, all the "useless" disciplines that the clueless eschew. No Gangsta Rap there...

The real life imperative of getting a critical job done professionally and efficiently allows no leeway to worshiping the multicultural god. Life is a bitch.