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Progressive, The, May, 1999

Face Off

A wire service story in the Wisconsin State Journal, datelined Midland, Texas: "As Principal Scott Skidmore understands school district policy, all students must be clean-shaven, even if the student is just twelve years old and even if his mustache looks more like peach fuzz. Skidmore, head of James Brooks Middle School, ordered Stanley Diaz Jr. to shave or face indefinite suspension."

Gentleman Farmer

Vice President Al Gore, graduate of St. Albans Academy in Washington, D.C., and Democratic Presidential hopeful, quoted in the Des Moines Register about the lessons he learned growing up with his father, Senator Albert Gore Sr.: "He taught me how to clean out hog waste with a shovel and a hose. He taught me how to clear land with a double-bladed ax. He taught me how to plow a steep hillside with a team of mules. He taught me how to take up hay all day long in the hot sun."

Frontiers of Free Enterprise

An item in The Progressive Review, a Washington, D.C., newsletter: "McGraw-Hill has published a new version of a math textbook used in about fifteen states that is filled with exercises serving as soft advertising for corporations such as Mattel, Kellogg, Sony, Nike, Warner Brothers, Burger King, and McDonald's. Sample: `Will is saving his allowance to buy a pair of Nike shoes that cost $68.25. If Will earns $3.25 per week, how many weeks will Will need to save?' The question is accompanied by a photo of some Nike shoes."

Now You Know

Joffree Leggett, mayor of Trenton, North Carolina, quoted in the Free Press of Kinston, North Carolina, on African-Americans: "They're not leaders. A black man would rather work for a white person."

Military Intelligence

Defense Secretary William Cohen, quoted in The Seattle Times, speaking to a group of Microsoft employees: "I will point out that the prosperity that companies like Microsoft now enjoy could not occur without having the strong military that we have."

Learning Gap I

From an article in the Boston Herald, datelined Shelton, Connecticut: "A school bus stop was relocated after a parent complained his daughter could see a replica of Michelangelo's `David' from the route. ... Mark Del Vecchio said that when his ten-year-old daughter told him she was offended by the statue, he asked that the bus stop be moved. `A lot of people think I'm ridiculous, but you've got to remember how tall a school bus is,' Del Vecchio, a single father of three daughters, said yesterday. `The view you actually get from the window is from the navel down.'"

New Year's Baby Rush

From an article in The Washington Post on Claudette and Scott Gagnon, who hope to conceive a baby in time for a January 1, 2000, birth: "The Prince William residents--and nine other couples competing in a radio station's Millennial Conception contest--are hoping that a free night at the Cherry Blossom Travelodge in Arlington, a candlelight dinner, and some Barry White mood music will enhance their chances of winning.... `Millennium baby' mania is growing worldwide.... BabyCenter.com, a pregnancy and parenting web site, has created a special area for parents interested in conceiving a millennium baby. At its online store, couples are snapping up $49.99 Millennium Conception Kits, which include ovulation prediction tests, candles, and massage oil."

Learning Gap II

From an article in the Scranton Times of Scranton, Pennsylvania, about a controversy in the Bedford Central school district, where students were allowed to play a supernatural fantasy game called "Magic": "Parents went to court and added a number of other school activities to their complaint: making models of Aztec gods as part of the study of Mexico; studying an owl's regurgitated lunch for evidence of its diet; taking a field trip to a cemetery; celebrating Earth Day; and making `worry dolls' to put under children's pillows to keep nightmares away. Such activities, they said, amount to `the promotion of Satanism and occultism, pagan religions, and New Age spirituality.'"

Politically Challenged

From Al Kamen's "In The Loop" column in The Washington Post: "Senator Conrad Burns [Republican of Montana] is at it again, this time apologizing to the Montana Equipment Dealers Association for `using a term pertaining to Arabs that I should not have used and which is widely considered offensive.' Burns told the association he `became too emotionally involved' in a February 17 speech to the group on U.S. dependence on foreign oil and called Mideast producers `ragheads.' ... In 1994, Burns used an offensive racial term when he told a Bozeman Chronicle editor an anecdote about an old rancher who asked him how he could live in Washington with African-Americans. Burns replied it was `a hell of a challenge.'"

The Inevitable Hand

From an article in The Wall Street Journal on oligopolies: "Telecommunications, music, soft drinks, and countless other industries are congealing into their own lineups of just a few dominant giants. And in the latest frenzy of deals, oligopolies are starting to go global.... Says Louis Galambos, a leading business historian at Johns Hopkins University, `Global oligopolies are as inevitable as the sunrise.'"