State of the State of the State
I’ve been working on this one for a while, and I knew it was going to be a biggie, but… If I went a little overboard, let me know. Also, feel free to splash some cold water on my face if you think I’m being stupid, that’s what talking’s all about!
A couple weeks ago, I took the time to watch the State of the State address given by the newly inaugurated Eliott Spitzer. I haven’t been a big follower of his in the past, but from what I do know, he was the “ethics is black-and-white” watchdog of Wall St. while he was Attorney General.
Two of the big themes that I was interested to hear in his speech were “Spending Requires Accountability” and “the Innovation Economy.”
Spending Requires Accountability
This is a pretty important theme these days. With all the news of accounting scandals, and embezzlement from schools, everyone is going to have a bit of spendthrift on their brains. Grab any old schmuck off the street and ask them how they feel about school taxes, and you’ll get an earful. What Spitzer repeated throughout his speech was “I want to give more to education, but I want to make schools accountable for that money.” He doesn’t propose signing lots of big checks to underprivileged schools and walking away, he wants to give them what they need to do well, and then require that they prove it was a worthwhile expense.
Yes, I am aware there is a lot of contention to this concept because schools and likely teachers will have lots more work to do to show that the funds are being put to good use. But when it comes to compensation, what’s a better measure than performance? Surely he doesn’t put forth A Modest Proposal to deal with the schools that don’t meet their goals. But in the meantime, how better to squeeze out the embezzlers than to make them work for every penny? Government money isn’t free money, people - it was earned on the backs of hard working citizens.
Innovation Economy
Key to Spitzer’s plans for education is the idea that students need to be trained and prepared to compete in the new economy - the information economy. Just speaking English isn’t enough these days, it helps if you speak Java and SQL too. For years people have been complaining about how outsourcing will make it impossible for skilled workers to get jobs in the US, and now, Spitzer is proposing a solution. Instead of complaining, or making it harder for companies to do business with overseas firms, why don’t you make your own workforce better? And how do we do that? Education!
By getting the right programs in schools, and bringing technology into the classroom, these kids will have the opportunity to really learn something that they can use in their life. By being skilled with all facets of high-tech, a graduate can be competitive in almost any field - science, English, mathematics, arts… And when these kids grow up and graduate from the similarly well-equipped state college, they will have excellent skills, get good jobs, and be able to afford to live here and contribute back to the local economy!
While I was at the PHP Con in 2005, Mark Andreessen gave a keynote in which he echoed many of these themes, only they weren’t aimed at kids in the US. Mark was talking about how wonderful PHP and open source is in developing countries because it gives kids the opportunity to enter the market with little-to-no cost. He lauded the $100 laptop and said (roughly) “with a cheap computer and an internet connection, these kids are as capable as any of you.” Naturally, that’s a bit of an exaggeration - not many kids in developing nations can afford a $100 laptop, and many of them may lack the educational resources to communicate effectively online. However, it was this assumption of the ubiquitous internet connection that I was reminded of as I listened to Spitzer.
In stating his goal to make sure every kid has affordable access to the internet, Spitzer made it apparent that kids here have obstacles that make it hard to compete - just like the kids in other countires. If your family can’t afford a computer or internet service and you live in rural New York, you’re nearly as excluded as a kid in Brazil or Thailand when it comes to the advantages of high-tech.
Coincidentally with all of this, I had just seen Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth and was reading Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson. They seem to be totally unrelated, but bear with me.
In Gore’s presentation, he makes light of a PowerPoint slide made by a lobbying group that depicts a balance scale, and on one side of the scales is literally “$$$” and on the other, an icon of the globe. It is meant to show that in the choice between the economy and the environment, it is a mutually exclusive (XOR) decision. By deciding to do something about the environment, you’re screwing the economy, and vice-versa. Gore makes the case that this is patently false. I would agree.
In Cryptonomicon, a character named Enoch Root gives a fascinating diatribe/lesson on Greek mythology, specifically the difference between Athena’s and Aries’ war associations.
Athena’s much-debated origins involve Zeus impregnating his wife Metis (goddess of wisdom and deep thought), who he then swallowed, and some time later suffered from a headache, which was resolved by some masculine god beaning him on the head, which resulted in fully-grown Athena. While her birth was rather violent, her lineage is both majestic and wise. She is therefore associated with the well-thought out, crafty and strategic parts of war.
Ares, on the other hand, is the much more sinister patron of war. He is more associated with the bloodlust, brute force and unpredictable violence of war than actual outcome. It is for these reasons he is the “untrusted” of the gods.
Root then metaphorically draws Athena and Ares as two halves of a circle, and asserts that when it comes to war, you are either more Athena or more Ares, and nearly always it is the Athena that wins the war. To prove his point, he makes the case that during The Great War, the advantages that were afforded the Allies were tactical and technological. That having superior smarts on your side was the way to defeat your enemy - be it through better cryptanalysis or better bomb making.
Now to bring this all together… 
It seems to me that it is possible to do better by the environment and have a strong economy - by being smarter. For nearly a hundred years the US has been a leader in technology and science in the world. Tremendous breakthroughs have been made here, and there’s the old addage: “we put a man on the MOON, dagnabit!” Since that mystifying day in July, 1969, what have we done to advance science and the world? It seems we’ve been more Ares than Athena, running around “resolving conflicts.” Meanwhile, the world has passed us by. Europe and Asia are so far ahead of us in efficient energies that it would be truly amazing if we caught up any time soon.
But lord knows this country loves a challenge. By participating in the global race to build efficient technologies, this country could attract the best minds in technology and create an entire industry that would work side-by-side with our current manufacturing juggernauts to build more efficient technology for us and the world. If you’re afraid of companies sending your jobs overseas, make your talents indispensable. And where will we find all these high-tech geniuses and skilled workers and innovators? Right here in our schools.
If you want people in this country to be smarter than those in other countries, you need to educate them. Spend the money you can on educating students on the latest technology with the best tools, and when they graduate, they’ll start businesses or generate ideas or assemble sophisticated components that will make this country a leader again. So there you have it in a coconut shell. The solution to the current crisis. Any questions?