Cherry picking

This is not a fruit related post.

For the past couple of weeks our visitors have come home with a USA today, so I have been catching verbal crossword clues and reading USAT's articles and one in particular intrigued me - an editorial on best practices that America could adopt by looking at the way other countries tackle problems that the US has.  The article can be found by google-ing lessons america can learn from other countries (I don't want to get sued by USA today for copyright infringement as this is such a new article)  USAT did one article US and World Report News did the other.  Both articles were fascinating eg Finland values teachers more highly, subsidizes their education trains them better before they even step into the classroom.  Germany has apprenticeship schemes, which teach basic skills things like plumbing, carpentry, brick laying etc and Canada didn't have a housing crisis because it didn't allow the practices that caused the one in the US to flourish.  That's the basics of the article and the US WRN is more of the same but the thing that floored me was the comments section.

There is something about anonymous online posting that brings out the worst in people and in those fifteen pages of mostly nasty comment you could literally put a label on the poster.  The TPs - no one does it better than us, our country is in a mess because of weak liberal policies. The Republicans - Ah but Finland are communist/socialists (two completely different ideologies)  Canada pah! and if you challenge me I'm right and you're wrong and why don't you move to Finland/Germany/Canada if you like their ideas so much.  Ds  We need to look for new ideas but who is going to pay for them - we're not.  And last but not least the Normals (2%?) who advocated the ideas and suggested that adapting them to fit the US was the way to go - and raising taxes to pay for them.

Each side cherry picked facts that supported their position.  Lets face it the US has problems and they need to be solved and looking outward rather than looking inward might help and for starters how about cutting government salaries and getting back in touch with the people.  Here is a classic example from the ap news wires

But Republican Boehner said that tax increases are a nonstarter: "The American people will not accept — and the House cannot pass — a bill that raises taxes on job creators."  

Boner (hey that's how its spelt) says he is speaking for the American people.  Maybe he should ask the American people what they want.  Some will of course not want their taxes raised.  Some will quote the trickle down that tax cuts for the rich brings for the rest of us - which isn't really trickling anywhere except into the rich man's pocket.  Some - like me - will ask how the Clinton administration left the federal government coffers overflowing with cash.  He raised taxes - as this 1993 Washington Post article shows.  Some will also ask why if it worked then it wouldn't work now.  Say what you like about Clinton but he left office with the highest approval rating of any serving President since WWII (most Presidents have some kind of skeleton in their closet he had a whole graveyard full. One thing Clinton wasn't was dull)

Comments welcome here, by e-mail or at the shop but don't hide behind anonymous screen names.  I don't choose my friends by which party they support.