As IF Times

link One in four Americans do not know the Earth circles the Sun – Telegraph.

To be fair, judging from the rampant narcissism that’s taken hold of much of American culture, many in the survey, which I suspect included Kim Kardashian and Kanye West, were amazed to find that the earth did not circle around them. 

It’s the greatest of ironies that at a time in history when the tide of information available has never been higher,  somehow the level of the informed is at the opposite low ebb.  It’s as if people were dying of hunger while sitting in a Red Lobster.

The biggest factor in this existing information/misinformed paradox is the acceptance of the widely adopted teaching philosophy propogated by liberal educators of “there is no wrong answer, only different interpretations.”  This ensures that children are not traumatized by giving a wrong answer to a question in school.  Kids are allowed to progress through their formative years without having to endure the shame of being wrong but instead gently consoled that there is an alternate ‘better’ answer.  We know that letter grades have even been eliminated since that would be discriminatory and hurtful to the young egos.  If the kids feel educated, that’s enough.  And spelling doesn’t count.

There is the old chestnut that the reason that little Johnny thinks 2 plus 2 equals 4 is not because of arithmetic logic but rather because the teacher told him it was.  If kids aren’t taught basics at a young age, they default to parroting their teachers for their ‘facts’.

Fast forward to their post teen years when the biggest information sources are their peers, TV and of course the Internet.  Peers may be an iffy source of knowledge, but TV and the Internet are inviolable.  If it’s viewed on YouTube a million times, “liked” on Facebook, tweeted on Twitter or depicted on Saturday Night Live, then it must be true.

Of course it doesn’t help that high profile personalities are spouting bumper sticker science as hard facts. If for example, Eva Longoria, noted scientist and part time actress says that climate change is real, then it must be real.  If Sean Penn, noted historian, philosopher and part time actor dishes on the virtues of communism and socialism, then it must be true.  If John Kerry, noted doppelganger for Lurch of the Addams family fame tells us that Global warming is a bigger threat to mankind than a nuclear Iran, terrorism, disease epidemics and poverty, then it must be.

If people don’t believe the facts as presented by those that are “experts” in their field, they run the risk of being sued, such as the tactic employed by a Penn State University climate scientist in an attempt to silence his critics. It may well turn out that what’s acceptably true as fact is determined not by science but by lawyers.  Whether the rumor that the earth revolves around the sun is true or not is the least of our problems.

link  Russian spy ring: 11th suspect arrested in Cyprus; Moscow calls spy claims ‘baseless and improper’.

Interesting story about how a number of ‘deep’ cover Russian spies have been living in the United States for years, under the guise of very innocuous citizens.  Obviously surprised by the discovery of their ‘alleged’ agents, the Russians employ the classic “did not!” response.  In the case of the gal pictured in the article, Anna Chapman, she went as far as to get a divorce and drive minivans, the ingenious melding into mainstream society.  Some of the spies even had kids.  Talk about method acting.

So far, it’s unclear what kind of surveillance they have been up to, but given the state of American culture, I’m sure they weren’t exactly on the verge of government overthrow.  You can imagine the reports back to KGB headquarters that the Americans have elected a socialist leaning government, have cratered their banking and industrial system, have rampant corruption in the administration and the influential people in culture are the likes of Michael Moore and Sean Pean, both avowed anti capitalists.  Why spy when they could have got the same reports off MSNBC? An ex VP is now a world statesman who wishes to have people drive around on bicycles to save penguins.  Why bother to undermine or sabotage the government when the liberal press already does it?  Rolling Stone magazine is the best anti military weapon the Taliban ever had.

In any event, the article says that the woman, Anna Chapman actually founded an on line real estate company worth 2 million dollars.  Two things jump out here.  First, if she has built a company worth 2 million dollars, why would she want to go back to Russia to work for mere rubles?  Secondly, if Russian spies can be so successful and industrious, the U.S. should actually recruit them to jumpstart the economy.  The question the U.S. government should be posing to these spies is, are there any more of you and how soon can they come?