Maybe this silly story appeals to me because I have one kid in college and another one contemplating a liberal arts major when she enters college next year. Or maybe it's just because Rick Scott strikes me as someone who views liberal arts as something alien and useless. Whatever it is, his recent statements about how kids who go to college shouldn't choose a liberal arts degree just prove he's pretty alien and useless to me.

In an interview with the Sarasota Herald Tribune, Scott outlined what he plans to do to Florida state universities:

Scott said Monday that he hopes to shift more funding to science, technology, engineering and math departments, the so-called “STEM” disciplines. The big losers: Programs like psychology and anthropology and potentially schools like New College in Sarasota that emphasize a liberal arts curriculum.

Then he repeated that refrain Tuesday, while speaking to a business group in Tallahassee, but with some embellishment.

“I got accused of not liking anthropologists the other day,” Scott said. “But just think about it, how many more jobs do think there are for anthropologists in the state?

“Do you want to use your tax dollars to educate more people who can’t get jobs in anthropology? I don’t. I want to make sure that we spend our dollars where people can get jobs when they get out.”

Turning to a veteran Tallahassee reporter, Scott also questioned the value of a degree in journalism.

“There’s a lot of jobs in journalism?” Scott rhetorically asked the reporter. “No, it’s tough.”

Ok. Anthropologists are out. Check. Journalism is out. Check. What's in? Well, according to Scott, more science and technology degrees, because not enough students choose those majors. And to that end, he would push funding away from liberal arts and into those areas.

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The violation of the no-fly zone Wednesday led more than 30,000 people to quickly leave the White House complex, the Capitol and the Supreme Court and triggered an eight-minute "red alert" at the White House.

At the time, Bush was riding a bicycle at a wildlife center in suburban Maryland and wasn't told of the alert until after he had completed his ride at 12:50

According to the latest campaign finance report, Wal-Mart has spent more than $280,000 trying to overturn one local ordinance. This makes this little local election the most expensive in Flagstaff's history. The Wal-Mart money is spent on full-page newspaper ads and mailings, both full of vicious Orwellian rhetoric implying that a zoning ordinance that limits store size is somehow the same as burning books. Yeah, go figure.

So, when H. Lee Scott Jr. says that Wal-Mart doesn't do that sort of thing anymore, he's a liar....I'm so surprised.

Immigration is the hot button issue of the California campaign, and Meg Whitman takes the hard stance while still courting Latino voters. But for a candidate who claims to be 'pro-family', she has a really strange and weird attitude toward the achievers who, through no fault of their own, came to California illegally and have not been able to resolve their immigration status.

Yesterday's debate between Brown and Whitman in Fresno highlighted one of the clearest-cut cases of our unfair immigration policies and how stupid Whitman is about these students.

From debate transcript at Fresno Bee:

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The General has a few snap shots of Paul Gorley, the new chairman of the College Republicans taking communion.

I cross-posted at Operation Yellow Elephant on 8/4

Mismanagement by Objective Eyewitness Muse

Why am I not surprised that the Bush Administration has discovered 22 “ineffective” federal initiatives that they want eliminated and that among these programs’ intended beneficiaries are preschool children, displaced workers, at-risk youth, migrant agriculture workers, low-income college students, the disabled and families that cannot afford housing. After all, if anybody deserves to feel the pinch, it’s a grimy lot like that. Read More

I agree with Karl Rove The Next Left

Whoa. This is kind of scary. At a forum on the press at a college in Maryland, Karl Rove said of the press, "I think it's less liberal than it is oppositional."

"Reporters now see their role less as discovering facts and fair-mindedly reporting the truth and more as being put on the earth to afflict the comfortable, to be a constant thorn of those in power, whether they are Republican or Democrat," Rove said.
His indictment of the media -- delivered as part of Washington College's Harwood Lecture Series, named for the late Washington Post editor and writer Richard Harwood -- had four parts: that there's been an explosion in the number of media outlets; that these outlets have an insatiable demand for content; that these changes create enormous competitive pressure; and that journalists have increasingly adopted an antagonistic attitude toward public officials. Beyond that, Rove argued that the press pays too much attention to polls and "horse-race" politics, and covers governing as if it were a campaign.

I would not, however, say journalists are increasingly antagonistic towards anything. The "horse-race" coverage of politics, is decidedly un-antagonistic. During the election coverage this year, NPR and the NYT, the outlets from which I get most of my news, were just spin machines: "Kerry said this. Bush said this. Blah blah blah."
Nevertheless, I gotta give Rove credit for actually being honest about the media, instead of taking the standard Republican line.

Via Washington Post

Whoa. This is kind of scary. At a forum on the press at a college in Maryland, Karl Rove said of the press, "I think it's less liberal than it is oppositional."

"Reporters now see their role less as discovering facts and fair-mindedly reporting the truth and more as being put on the earth to afflict the comfortable, to be a constant thorn of those in power, whether they are Republican or Democrat," Rove said.
His indictment of the media -- delivered as part of Washington College's Harwood Lecture Series, named for the late Washington Post editor and writer Richard Harwood -- had four parts: that there's been an explosion in the number of media outlets; that these outlets have an insatiable demand for content; that these changes create enormous competitive pressure; and that journalists have increasingly adopted an antagonistic attitude toward public officials. Beyond that, Rove argued that the press pays too much attention to polls and "horse-race" politics, and covers governing as if it were a campaign.

I would not, however, say journalists are increasingly antagonistic towards anything. The "horse-race" coverage of politics, is decidedly un-antagonistic. During the election coverage this year, NPR and the NYT, the outlets from which I get most of my news, were just spin machines: "Kerry said this. Bush said this. Blah blah blah."
Nevertheless, I gotta give Rove credit for actually being honest about the media, instead of taking the standard Republican line.

Via Washington Post

NBC Sports Chief Survives Plane Crash

By P. SOLOMON BANDA, Associated Press Writer

DENVER - A charter plane carrying NBC Sports Chairman Dick Ebersol crashed and burst into flames during takeoff from a southwest Colorado airport Sunday, killing at least two people and seriously injuring Ebersol and one of his sons. Rescue crews were searching for another son.

Dick Ebersol, 57, and son Charles Ebersol survived the crash at the Montrose Regional Airport outside this southwest Colorado town, NBC said in a statement through its Denver affiliate KUSA-TV.

Eyewitness Chuck Distel told The Associated Press by phone that Charles, a college senior, helped his father out through the front of the plane, whose cockpit had been ripped off by the force of the crash. read

Tim Russert on the Imus show called it for Bush.

After David Gregory reads a quote from John Boehner bashing the Democrats' plan to clean up George Bush's mess and get the economy going again, Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel forcefully defends the proposal and beats back the bogus criticism.

NBC:

MR. GREGORY: But an additional $700 billion?

MR. EMANUEL: President Obama's been very clear, you cannot have a strong economy that does not have a strong middle class. And the, the approach has been to provide the middle class with a tax cut, and also to start getting the economy moving again by making critical investments. That's why we want to create three and a half million jobs.

MR. GREGORY: Right.

MR. EMANUEL: The--it is no doubt you have to couple it, which has been very clear, which is why the President-elect Obama has called for an--a summit on fiscal responsibility to change the way we spend money, to do it in a more efficient way, to get rid of waste and fraud, but also to deal with the challenges that for too long have been kicked down the road.

Rahm Emanuel was Obama's first and perhaps wisest choice. Chief of Staff requires a certain skill set and Rahm fills the role perfectly. It's no wonder that GOPers went berserk when it was announced.

Full transcript below the fold.

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