Archive for the 'Literacy' Category
Sunday, July 29th, 2012
For centuries, a few hundred wealthy individuals, families and corporations have had de facto control over what we consume as “news” — simply because they could afford to buy big printing presses, and ink by the barrel. Despite early fears in the newspaper industry, neither radio nor television ever broke this monopoly. You’d quickly realize [...]
Full Article Categories: Economics, Free Speech, Literacy, Media
Wednesday, July 4th, 2012
How are we doing, safeguarding those “unalienable Rights” with which we are “endowed by our Creator” — in support of which 56 patriots solemnly pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred Honor, 236 years ago? We remain free by many measures. Americans can still pretty much live where we want, work where we want, [...]
Full Article Categories: 2012 Election, 2nd Amendment, Big Brother, Drug War, Due Process, Free Speech, Groundhog Day, Immigration, Law Enforcement, Literacy, Medicine, Middle East, Nevada, Taxation, Transportation
Sunday, February 26th, 2012
I see where two local groups have announced the largest in-kind donation ever made to Southern Nevada’s Public Education Foundation, the nonprofit that channels charitable aid to the Clark County School District. The Latin Chamber of Commerce and Another Joy Foundation plan to give to the Foundation textbooks for which they list a value of [...]
Full Article Categories: Education, Literacy, Nevada
Sunday, August 14th, 2011
Mark Aug. 8 on your calendar. Few realize it, but the events of Aug. 5 through 8 marked the beginning of massive changes in America. No, I don’t write today about the overdue Standard & Poor downgrade of the actuarially bankrupt federal government’s bond rating, or even the (possibly more important) whining, petulant, vapid reaction [...]
Full Article Categories: Education, Literacy
Sunday, August 7th, 2011
It used to take years to get a book into print. And during the laborious process of re-keyboarding the manuscript, plenty of people had a go at the thing. Today’s technology has enormously speeded the process of creating a book from the author’s original computer disc. But in an era when young high school graduates [...]
Full Article Categories: Literacy
Wednesday, May 26th, 2010
“Vin, sometimes you run excerpts from letters that arrive at your desk, but you rarely run an entire letter, much less an uninterrupted series of letters from the same writer, which would give us a better idea of the thought process of a typical reader.” Yes, and there’s a reason for that. But since such [...]
Full Article Categories: Literacy, Readers Write
Wednesday, November 11th, 2009
When a reporter for CNSNews.com last Thursday asked House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., where in the Constitution Congress is delegated the specific power to order Americans to buy health insurance — a mandate included in both the House and Senate versions of Obamacare — Ms. Pelosi responded: “Are you serious? Are you serious?” “Yes, yes [...]
Full Article Categories: 2008 Election, Big Brother, Literacy, Medicine
Sunday, January 25th, 2009
I see where the Review-Journal published without notable dissent (lede story, Page 2B, Jan. 16) another one of these cooked-up “report cards” on how Nevada is doing, this one from a Henderson-based outfit calling itself the Children’s Advocacy Alliance. As usual, the finding was: “We suck.” Oh, the state scored an A-minus for infant and [...]
Full Article Categories: Education, Literacy, Media, Welfare
Friday, September 19th, 2008
Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., who is apparently still alive, was described this week by Washington Post staff writer Valerie Strauss — by all indications with a straight face — as “a constitutional expert.” Since the only roads which the Congress is authorized by the Constitution to fund are “post roads,” presumably the good senator has [...]
Full Article Categories: Education, Elections, History, Literacy
Sunday, July 6th, 2008
Where do you go to buy books? “A big bookstore, of course.” Why? I strongly doubt any of us have read 2 percent of the books published in English in the past century. Even if you narrow it down to “books in the genres, on the themes, or by the authors I prefer,” it would [...]
Full Article Categories: Literacy