Mike Taibbi, on MSNBC, just made reference to an Al Jazeeera poll of it viewers. Can anyone find this poll?? Anyway, he said that --80% of those polled said that the USA will use WMDs in this war. --55% of those polled said Iraq will win the war.
Re: Re: Al Jazeera Poll They almost did back in the 80's when the USSR invaded Afghanistan. An employee of the Agency came up with an idea to aquire a Russian transport plane complete with proper markings, fill it with pigs, and drop them over Mecca in an attempt to encite the entire Muslim world to enter the fight. THat one got rejected pretty quickly.
Pretty sure we can. We arn't last in education by far. However, i am totally ashamed how bad Americans are at geography. Most don't even know the States! You ask me where Azerbaijan is, i can point it out on an unlabled map easlily. And Americans don't know where Iraq is? Jesus..... Maybe i am just a geography geek.
We're imperial center, supposedly the richest country on the planet. And yet, as you noted, our students can't even find the United States on an unmarked map, can't identify prominent U.S. politicians on a regular basis and think "Central America" means Kansas. There's no excuse for our society producing uniformed and misinformed ignoramuses. And it's not like the adults are much better, seeing as almost half of them believe Saddam was behind the 9/11 attacks.
What do you feel about the geography issue specifically? I mean i think it is important to know geograhpy in order to better understand the world.
Re: Re: Re: Al Jazeera Poll Then why did 4000 Jews stay home instead of going to work that day. Is Saddam in cahoots with the Jews??? Hmmmm. *** Obligatory for post referencing Jews ***
There's a professor in my wife's department who teaches an African Studies class. On day one, he gives every student an unmarked map of Africa. Usually, only 3 or 4 students will get it all right (even African students might miss something occasionally). This semester, 7 students out of 25 had the map sideways. Needless to say, they got skunked. A couple put South Africa in what would be western Africa, but some even had it on the left side of the map, which shows a pretty marked unfamiliarity with even the concept of "Map." We obviously don't have a monopoly on ignorance in this country, but we should be doing better at a lot of things.
It's one thing to expect American students to be able to find, say, Chad on a map. But to not know where your own country is? Or who the Vice-President is? Yikes.
I think it points to a larger problem. Bill Maher made a good point on his show a few weeks ago. He said he wondered how many Americans who claim that America is the greatest country in the world had actually ever been to another country. We tend to be willfully ignorant of the rest of the world yet blindly declare ourselves the "greatest."
The problem is that you're from Appalachia! Seriously though, I agree with joseph pakovits on the geography situation. I consider myself somewhat of a geography buff, but I didn't know that Chad was East of Niger before I looked it up. I did know where Azerbaijan was since I once applied for a position in an oil company that had interests in Baku, but that is neither here nor there. Remember that for some fairly obscure trivia there is a reason why we have an atlas. I also have to use the word "Yikes" when people cannot cite general knowledge (i.e. where is the U.S. and who are Dick and Bush?)....
Of course, the flipside of the this argument is when the Euros wonder why Mexico doesn't qualify out of CONMEBOL. And asking the typical Euro high schooler (or whatever) to find Chicago, Ottawa and Mexico city on a map would probably produce some interesting results. I'll give 'em New York, LA and DC, of course. To continue highjacking the thread, I'll go waaaaay out on a limb and posit that the problem isn't with the US educational system; rather, it's a societal problem as a whole. Poll 1000 kids from Greenwich, Darien and Westport, Ct. on math/geography/verbal skills/whatever, and you'd probably say "Wow! US schoolkids are the best educated in the world!" Then poll the kids who go to high school down the street from where I live, and see what you get. You think the discrepancy is due to genetics, or society? And if it's societal, who should fix it? Any republicans want to take a sure-to-be-amusing cut at this softball?
Where do street smarts rank? The Vice-President is "hanging" out in Chad. Problem solved. Now, where in the world is that Carmen San Diego lady? You aren't helping much.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Al Jazeera Poll Nope. True story. I'll try to find the passage in "See No Evil" by Bob Baer about it.
Not trying to un-hijack the thread or anything. There's no question there's lots of room for improvement in the US educational system. As for the results of the AJ poll, I don't think it's a reflection on education as much as it is a reflection on accurate information and access to it. The reason there are so many varying opinions in this country is because we seem, for the most part, to have access to accurate information and can form a more educated opinion. But it's no surprise with most Arab information outlets, and AJ in particular, spewing the company line (i.e. this war is for oil, this is a war of conquest, we're targeting civilians, etc.) that you get poll results like the one mentioned at the beginning of this thread.