On November 18, 2011 the Arkansas Baptist Eagle football team went to 11-1 for the year with a hard fought 26-6 victory at Camden Harmony Grove. Before this game Barry Groomes of Hootens Arkansas Football picked Camden to win over the eagles because Arkansas Baptist had never won a playoff game on the road. Actually before this year Arkansas Baptist was 3-7 in the playoff with two victories coming in 1998 and one in 2004.
Is the 2011 Eagle team the best ever?
1. The 1998 team featured a huge line with the Witcher brothers (Sam and Ben) in the secordary and the eagles tied Harding and Carlisle for the conference championship. Knocked out of the playoffs by Gus Malzahn’s first state championship team at Shiloh (Gus has won championships at higher levels since, ask Arthur Bennett about that).
2. The 2004 team like the 1998 team also advanced in the playoffs and is the only Arkansas Baptist team to secure sole possession of a conference championship, and it included the most all-conference players (10) in Eagle history on one team.
3. The juniors and seniors on the 2011 team can claim to have more Arkansas Baptist victories in a two year span than any other team (a total of 20 over last two years, the 2003-2004 teams previously held the most).
My final conclusion is very simple: If the 2011 eagles get three victories in the playoffs this year then they have to be considered the best Arkansas Baptist team ever. The problem is they are going up against the Barton Bears who hold more state championships than any other 3A team. We will be pulling for this group of Eagles and we know they can do it.
All State Receiver Greg Bowie catches game winning pass
against Bauxite in the final seconds of the game.
Tennessee wide receiver Zach Rogers makes a catch against Arkansas at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville on Nov. 12, 2011. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)
Tennessee head coach Derek Dooley asks about a call against the team while playing Arkansas at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville on Nov. 12, 2011. UT lost the game 49-7. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)
Tennessee linemen, Nigel Mitchell-Thornton, Willie Bohannon, Curt Maggitt, A.J. Johnson and Antonio Richardson leave the field after a 49-7 loss to Arkansas at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville on Nov. 12, 2011. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)
Tennessee defensive back Izauea Lanier is unable to stop a touchdown run by Arkansas running back De’Anthony Curtis at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville on Nov. 12, 2011. UT lost the game 49-7. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)
Tennessee quarterbacks coach Darrin Hinshaw sends in Matt Simms in the fourth quarter against Arkansas at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville on Nov. 12, 2011. UT lost the game 49-7. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)
In the fog at Stozice Stadium, the U.S. offense became visible for the first time since Jurgen Klinsmann became coach.
On a night when the Americans celebrated captain Carlos Bocanegra’s 100th international appearance, Edson Buddle, Clint Dempsey and Jozy Altidore all scored Tuesday to give the United States a 3-2 victory over Slovenia in Ljubljana.
“We have a three-month break until our next game, so to get the win tonight was the biggest thing for us,” said Bocanegra, who became the 12th American to reach the century mark. “It wasn’t the prettiest game we’ve played, but the result was what we were looking for.”
The Americans had been outscored 5-2 in going 1-4-1 since Klinsmann replaced Bob Bradley in late July, and they had been 0-5 in Europe since a March 2008 victory at Poland.
Klinsmann switched to a 4-4-2 formation, starting two true forwards for the first time in his seven matches. The change led to far more scoring chances on a 36-degree night with fog coming off the Alps.
“That’s the first time that I have ever played in a game with that much fog,” Dempsey said. “You couldn’t really see from one end of the pitch to the other.”
Buddle scored his third goal in 10 appearances, and his first since June 2010 against Australia, after Handanovic’s attempted clearance was stripped by Dempsey from Darijan Matic. Dempsey tipped the ball to Buddle, who put the ball in off a post from 25 yards.
Tim Matavz scored the first of his two goals for the Green Dragons in the 26th to tie it as Timmy Chandler was beaten, leading to the defense getting split.
“With the lights and the fog, it makes it a little difficult to read balls,” American goalkeeper Tim Howard said.
Dempsey put the Americans back in front with an 8-yard header in the 41st off Michael Bradley’s corner kick, and Altidore made it 3-1 when he converted a penalty kick two minutes later after Miso Brecko tripped up Fabian Johnson in the penalty area,
After the highest-scoring first half for the Americans since June 2008 against Barbados, 27th-ranked Slovenia responded with a furious rally, and Matavz cut the deficit in the 61st. The Green Dragons outshot the Americans 14-11.
“The attitude was to go forward,” Buddle said. “It was good to receive the ball and to look up and have a partner up there and see Jozy. It was much easier to combine with two strikers and having Clint sitting right in behind.”
At last year’s World Cup in South Africa, the Americans rallied from a two-goal deficit in the second half to tie 2-2 on goals by Landon Donovan and Michael Bradley, and an apparent go-ahead goal by Maurice Edu was inexplicably disallowed by referee Koman Coulibaly.
Slovenia returned its four defenders and goalkeeper from that match. The Americans played a higher defensive line and got caught several times.
“When the tempo is that high and a team like Slovenia has very, very good individual players that can always create something out of nothing, you always have to be very alert,” Klinsmann said. “This is something that we have to improve.”
Buddle and Bradley – son of the former coach – got their first starts since Klinsmann’s debut in August.
Johnson, who started for Germany in the 2009 European Under-21 final, was in the midfield, four days after making his American debut as a second-half substitute.
“We know that Michael has tremendous qualities in terms of his commitment. He covers so much ground, stays calm and is very experienced,” Klinsmann said. “Fabian Johnson is now coming through the ranks and his big potential in terms of how he sees the game. He reads the game well, sees gaps and can play killer balls. For the last couple months we have been working on our strikers to get them fitter and fitter. At this point we see Edson at his best again. He’s healthy, sharp and hungry.”
Johnson nearly put the U.S. ahead in the first minute, with goalkeeper Samir Handanovic just tipping his volley over the crossbar. Altidore had a good scoring chance in the 13th but skied one over the crossbar from Johnson’s cross.
“We needed a win. We’d been struggling a little bit,” Bocanegra said. “We have a three-month break until our next game, so to get the win tonight was the biggest thing for us. It wasn’t the prettiest game we’ve played, but the result was what we were looking for.”
NOTES: The U.S. is planning exhibitions at Panama on Jan. 25 and at Italy on Feb. 29. The second is a FIFA fixture date, meaning most of the player pool should be available. … With his 24th international goal, Dempsey tied Joe-Max Moore for fourth place on the U.S. scoring list, trailing only Donovan (46), Eric Wynalda (34) and Brian McBride (30). … The Americans, who have dropped to 34th in FIFA’s world rankings, finished the year 6-8-3, their worst record since going 7-9-11 in 1994. … Bocanegra received an engraved crystal cube from the U.S. Soccer Federation and a jersey from Slovenia with his name and the number “100” to mark his milestone appearance. “That was a nice, classy touch,” Bocanegra said. “I’m really proud to have accomplished this.” … Howard’s 38th victory moved him past Tony Meola for second among American goalkeepers, trailing only Kasey Keller’s 53.
Aug. 03–DARIEN — Tears welled up in Jim Kelly’s eyes Tuesday as he described what brought him to Christianity as his marriage was nearly falling apart.
The moment of clarity, he said, came after his son, Hunter, had died.
“I wanted to see my son again,” the former Buffalo Bills quarterback recalled. “I wanted to see him do the things in heaven that he wasn’t able to do here on Earth.”
Jim and Jill Kelly took the stage Tuesday afternoon at the four-day Christian festival known as Kingdom Bound at Darien Lake Resort to describe to hundreds of people why they had turned to God.
For Jim Kelly, the moment came after losing Hunter and on the verge of losing his marriage. He realized, he said, that he could lose three things if he “kept living the life that I was living in the past.”
“Number one, I wouldn’t be able to see Hunter,” Kelly said. “Number two, I wouldn’t be able to cherish the rest of my life with the woman I love.”
“Number three,” Kelly said before the words choked up in his throat. The tent grew quiet. His face turned red and tears welled in his eyes.
“My daughters,” Kelly said as he looked out to Erin and Camryn, seated in the first row of a long tent packed with people. “I want to be the father to them that they deserve.”
The Kellys’ 45-minute talk, filled with laughter and tears, was one of the first times the couple has talked publicly together about the upcoming release of a new memoir, “Without a Word,” by Jill Kelly.
The Kellys’ story of loss and redemption was one of dozens of emotional seminars that filled the four-day Christian music festival, which will wrap up today. Wednesday.
The annual event is expected to draw more than 45,000 people to the Darien Lake Performing Arts Center and has turned the campground into a city of worshipping teenagers, parents and youth leaders.
“It’s quite an experience to see this many people and especially to see people worshipping unashamedly,” said Ken Metzger, a Clarence resident who attended the festival for the first time with his wife. “I really believe that when the Lord touches your life, you just don’t hold anything back.”
Jill Kelly, who said she turned to Christianity shortly after Hunter’s diagnosis with Krabbe disease, told the audience she was skeptical when her husband first told her he had decided to turn his life over to God.
Jill Kelly appeared surprised at times when her husband teared up on stage.
She recalled first meeting Kelly at a party at his house and refusing to give him her phone number. She was 21, dating someone else and determined not to become “another notch on Jim’s belt.”
Jim Kelly eventually won her over. The first few years of their life together, she said, were filled with Super Bowl glitz and parties.
“I just want you to know that, yes, we experienced that side of this world,” Jill Kelly said. “What fame and celebrity and all those things can give you, but they were all empty, apart from friends.”
Jim Kelly described his life as a “roller coaster ride.”
Everything changed, she said, when Hunter was born.
It was then, she said, that she turned to God.
“I ran after God,” Jill Kelly recalled. “And Jim ran from God.”
The running, Jim Kelly said, began in the locker room in the early days of his football career. It was there, he said, that religion “was pushed on me to the point where it turned me off.”
It wasn’t until years later, after the death of his Hunter, that he found himself in the counseling room at The Chapel at CrossPoint with his brother.
Later he told his wife he felt “free.”
“I had no idea what free meant when I said ‘free,'” Kelly said. “I just knew that when I decided to give myself, my body, my heart, everything to God, it just felt so good, and I said to Jill, ‘If I would have known it would have felt this good, I would have done it a long time ago.'”
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Dan Mitchell, Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute, speaks at Moving Forward on Entitlements: Practical Steps to Reform, NTUF’s entitlement reform event at CPAC, on Feb. 11, 2011.
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I am disappointed in some of the Republicans who do not want to take the bull by the horns on this issue.
Michael Tanner is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and coauthor of Leviathan on the Right: How Big-Government Conservatism Brought Down the Republican Revolution.
There was telling moment during the CNN Republican presidential debate: Asked about the possibility of repealing George W. Bush’s Medicare prescription-drug benefit, which is adding some $17 trillion to Medicare’s unfunded liabilities, every one of the candidates pledged varying degrees of fealty to the program. No one came out for significantly cutting this vestige of Bush-style big-government conservatism, let alone repealing it. This put the current crop of Republicans to the left of John McCain, who at least campaigned in favor of means-testing the program in 2008.
The failure to stand up against one of the Bush administration’s most obvious mistakes is not just a case of hypocrisy; it is part of a disturbing trend toward ducking the tough decisions on budget cutting among the Republican aspirants. For all the sound and fury, and the charges and countercharges surrounding entitlement reform, the GOP candidates have been remarkably reluctant to put forward actual proposals.
Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, for example, has been attacking Texas governor Rick Perry over Social Security from the left, praising the program as “an essential federal program,” that has been a “success” for more than 70 years. But for all his criticism of Perry, Romney has been much vaguer about his own plans for reform. At times he has sounded almost like Obama, suggesting that there are lots of reform ideas — raising the retirement age, means testing, changing the wage-price indexing formula — that are “on the table,” but not actually endorsing any of them. One reform that Romney has taken off the table is allowing younger workers to privately invest a portion of their payroll taxes through personal accounts. In his book, No Apology, Romney endorses so-called “add on” accounts, allowing workers to save in addition to Social Security, but not carving out a portion of their current taxes. “Given the volatility of investment values that we have just experienced, I would prefer that individual accounts were added to Social Security, not diverted from it,” Romney wrote.
The Republican candidates all talk about reducing government spending. But they cannot do that unless they commit to real entitlement reform.
On Medicare, Romney has avoided specifics as well, praising Paul Ryan’s proposed reforms for example as “taking important strides in the right direction,” but not endorsing them.
For his part, Governor Perry has been forthright about the flaws of Social Security but has offered nothing in the way of a proposal for reform. As Romney has pointed out endlessly, Perry suggested in his book that Social Security might be returned to the states. But Perry has since disavowed that idea, claiming that he was only referring to state employees, some 7 million of whom are currently outside the Social Security system. Perry has also praised the privatized system for public employees in Galveston and two other Texas counties, suggesting that he might be open to some type of private investment option. But “suggesting” is as far as he goes.
On Medicare, Perry has been equally murky. At times, he has suggested that we should “transition away from” the current Medicare system, but without saying what we should transition to. His aides point out that Perry has only recently joined the race and hasn’t had time to develop specific proposals. But given his fiery talk on the issues, until he does he will seem more hat than cattle.
Rep. Michelle Bachmann has also largely tried to have it both ways on entitlement reform. She voted for the Ryan plan in Congress but promptly put out a statement distancing herself from it, claiming that her vote came with an asterisk. On Social Security, Bachmann once called the program a “monstrous fraud,” but has now joined Romney in attacking Perry’s “Ponzi scheme” description. She says that a key difference between her and Perry is that she believes Social Security “is an important safety net and that the federal government should keep its promise to seniors.” But with Social Security currently facing more than $20 trillion in unfunded liabilities, the question is how it will keep that promise.
Second-tier candidates, with less to lose, have been more willing to spell out their proposals. Businessman Herman Cain, for example, supports both the Ryan plan and Chilean-style personal accounts for Social Security. Former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum takes similar positions, as does former New Mexico governor Gary Johnson. Former Utah governor Jon Huntsman has endorsed the Ryan plan but has not spelled out his views on Social Security reform. Newt Gingrich, on the other hand, has focused on cutting “fraud, waste, and abuse,” rather than fundamentally altering the structure of those programs. Ever the iconoclast, Rep. Ron Paul opposes both the Ryan plan and personal accounts for Social Security, since he opposes a federal role in either health care or retirement on principle.
The facts are both simple and frightening. The unfunded liabilities of Social Security and Medicare run between $50 trillion and $110 trillion. Those two programs, along with Medicaid, are the primary drivers of our future indebtedness. In fact, by 2050, those three programs alone will consume 18.4 percent of GDP. If one assumes that revenues return to and stay at their traditional 18 percent of GDP, then those three programs alone will consume all federal revenues. There would not be a single dime available for any other program of government, from national defense to welfare.
The Republican candidates all talk about reducing government spending. But they cannot do that unless they commit to real entitlement reform. There’s time, and lots of debates, to hear specifics from them. But so far, the omens are not auspicious.
Amy Harder has a good take on the Solyndra issue in National Journal Daily (subscription required):
Lesser evil: crony capitalism or bad policy?
Energy Secretary Steven Chu is about to find out when he testifies before a House panel on Thursday about the $535 million loan guarantee his department awarded to Solyndra, the now-bankrupt solar-energy company that was, before its demise, the poster child for America’s renewable-energy industry and President Obama’s 2009 Recovery Act.
The White House and the Energy Department say the influence of political donors such as Oklahoma oil billionaire George Kaiser, whose venture-capital firm was the major investor in Solyndra, did not sway any of the administration’s decisions on Solyndra’s loan guarantee, which was funded from the stimulus package.
By denying politics was involved, the administration is saying that its top officials genuinely and continuously thought Solyndra was a good bet—despite numerous warnings raised both inside and outside of the administration—and that the loan-guarantee program was being carefully managed despite oversight reports and an internal West Wing memo that said otherwise.
“As time went on, there was a growing concern because of the cash-flow,” Chu said in an interview with NPR on Tuesday. “And so we certainly were watching this and looking at this very closely. And eventually we recognized they were in deep trouble.”
Yet, throughout the two years Solyndra was borrowing money from federal coffers, the DOE essentially stayed the path right up until the bitter end when the California-based manufacturer went bankrupt in September. When Solyndra was on the brink of bankruptcy in late 2010, DOE decided to restructure the loan to try to keep the company afloat.
Meanwhile, in today’s congressional hearing, Energy Secretary Steven Chu insisted that “the final decisions on Solyndra were mine, and I made them with the best interest of the taxpayer in mind. . . . I did not make any decision based on political considerations.” This came on a day when the front page of the Washington Post reported:
In the two years preceding its collapse, Solyndra and its biggest investor aggressively asserted themselves in dealings with the Obama administration, pushing Energy Secretary Steven Chu to visit the company’s headquarters to help it raise private money and later suggesting it would file for bankruptcy if the Energy Department rejected its proposed rescue plan. . . .
“The DOE really thinks politically before it thinks economically,” a Solyndra board member wrote in December to George Kaiser, an Obama fundraiser whose family funds owned a third of the company.
I have loved reading Thomas Sowell’s articles for many years. I remember when Milton Friedman brought him into the discussion in his film series “Free to Choose.” I have put some links below to some of those episodes.
Many papers across the country carried this story below from Sowell. Basically he points out in the past that the Republicans have a candidate that takes the middle of the road approach (Bush in 1992, Dole in 1996 and McCain in 2008) and the Republicans lose. He fears the same thing may happen this year with Romney.
Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes said that a good catch phrase could stop thinking for 50 years. One of the often-repeated catch phrases of our time — “It’s the economy, stupid!” — has already stopped thinking in some quarters for a couple of decades.
There is no question that the state of the economy can affect elections. But there is also no iron law that all elections will be decided by the state of the economy.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt was re-elected for an unprecedented third term after two terms in which unemployment was in double digits for eight consecutive years.
We may lament the number of people who are unemployed or who are on food stamps today. But those who give the Obama administration credit for coming to their rescue when they didn’t have a job are likely to greatly outnumber those who blame the administration for their not having a job in the first place.
An expansion of the welfare state in hard times seems to have been the secret of FDR’s great political success in the midst of economic disaster. An economic study published in a scholarly journal in 2004 concluded that the Roosevelt administration’s policies prolonged the Great Depression by several years. But few people read economic studies.
This economy has been sputtering along through most of the Obama administration, with the unemployment rate hovering around 9 percent. But none of that means that Barack Obama is going to lose the 2012 election.
Even polls which show “any Republican” with more public support than Obama does not mean that Obama will lose.
The president is not going to run against “any Republican.” He is going to run against some specific Republican, and that Republican can expect to be attacked, denounced and denigrated for months on end before the November 2012 elections — not only by the Democrats, but also by the media that is heavily pro-Democrat.
We have already seen how unsubstantiated allegations from women with questionable histories have dropped Herman Cain from front runner to third place in just a couple of weeks.
In short, it takes a candidate to beat a candidate, and everything depends on what kind of candidate that is.
The smart money inside the Beltway says that the Republicans need to pick a moderate candidate who can appeal to independent voters, not just to the conservative voters who turn out to vote in Republican primaries. Those who think this way say that you have to “reach out” to Hispanics, the elderly and other constituencies.
What is remarkable is how seldom the smart money folks look at what has actually been happening in presidential elections.
Ronald Reagan won two landslide elections when he ran as Ronald Reagan. Vice President George H.W. Bush then won when he ran as if he were another Ronald Reagan, with his famous statement, “Read my lips, no new taxes.”
But after Bush 41 was elected and turned “kinder and gentler” — to everyone except the taxpayers — he lost to an unknown governor from a small state.
Other Republican presidential candidates who went the “moderate” route — Bob Dole and John McCain — also came across as neither fish nor fowl, and also went down to defeat.
Now the smart money inside the Beltway is saying that Mitt Romney, who is nothing if not versatile in his positions, is the Republicans’ best hope for replacing Obama.
If conservative Republicans split their votes among a number of conservative candidates in the primaries, that can mean ending up with a presidential candidate in the Bob Dole-John McCain mold — and risking a Bob Dole-John McCain result in the next election.
The question now is whether the conservative Republican candidates who have enjoyed their successive and short-lived boomlets — Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry and Herman Cain — are prepared to stay in the primary race to the bitter end, or whether their conservative principles will move them to withdraw and throw their support to another conservative candidate.
There has probably never been a time in the history of this country when we more urgently needed to get a president out of the White House, before he ruined the country. But will the conservative Republican candidates let that guide them?
Examiner Columnist Thomas Sowell is syndicated by Creators.
Liberals like President Obama want to shoot for an equality of outcome. That system does not work. In fact, our free society allows for the closest gap between the wealthy and the poor. Unlike other countries where free enterprise and other freedoms are not present. This is a seven part series. Created Equal [5/7]. Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose […]
Liberals like President Obama want to shoot for an equality of outcome. That system does not work. In fact, our free society allows for the closest gap between the wealthy and the poor. Unlike other countries where free enterprise and other freedoms are not present. This is a seven part series. Created Equal [4/7]. Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose […]
HALT:HaltingArkansasLiberalswithTruth.com John Stossel, Walter E Williams and Thomas Sowell comment on how market forces can improve education in America. http://www.libertypen.com I read an excellent article called “School Choice in Sweden: An Interview with Thomas Idergard of Timbro,” (March 8, 2010) by Dan Lips and I wanted to share some of his answers with you below: […]
Thomas Sowell – Welfare “Saving the American Dream: The Heritage Plan to Fix the Debt, Cut Spending, and Restore Prosperity,” Heritage Foundation, May 10, 2011 by Stuart Butler, Ph.D. , Alison Acosta Fraser and William Beachis one of the finest papers I have ever read. Over the next few days I will post portions […]
HALT:HaltingArkansasLiberalswithTruth.com Dr. Thomas Sowell on schools in USA Over and over you hear people criticizing the Little Rock public school system, but none of the liberals want to try a new approach like vouchers. Here is the second part of the article “Sweden’s school voucher system is a model for America,” (The Daily Caller, Jan […]
Arkansas running back Broderick Green clears a tackle by Tennessee linebacker Austin Johnson to score a touchdown at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville on Nov. 12, 2011. UT lost the game 49-7. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)
Arkansas running back Broderick Green scores a touchdown at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville on Nov. 12, 2011. UT lost the game 49-7. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)
Tennessee tailback Marlin Lane goes in at quarterback against Arkansas at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville on Nov. 12, 2011. UT lost the game 49-7. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL
Tennessee wide receiver Da’Rick Rogers is tackled by Arkansas defenders at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville on Nov. 12, 2011. UT lost the game 49-7. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)
Johnny Majors from Huntland, TN tried out for the UT Football team weighing 150 pounds. His Father, Shirley Majors his HS Coach,encourage him and then 4 younger brothers all to be Vols. Johnny Majors was the runner-up in 1956 for the Heisman Trophy to Paul Horning, on a loosing Notre Dame team. So much for Northern politics with writers.
Arkansas safety Tramain Thomas intercepts a pass for Tennessee wide receiver DeAnthony Arnett at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville on Nov. 12, 2011. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)
I got to hear Johnny Majors speak at the Little Rock Touchdown Club on 11-7-11. I got to hear Frank Broyles speak a couple of years ago. Of course, the most amazing thing was Broyles’ ability to hire top notch assistant coaches that later went on to win national titles and Super Bowls. Johnny Majors did just that (won a national title in 1976). In fact, did you know that as a player Majors lost the Heisman Trophy to Paul Hornung, who starred for Notre Dame. Wikipedia said that year Notre Dame had a losing record (2–8). To date, this is the only time the Heisman Trophy has been awarded to a player on a losing team. Many fans of college football, particularly Tennessee fans, believe that Hornung won the Heisman because he played for Notre Dame which at the time was one of very few college teams that enjoyed the benefit of having nationally televised football games. As a coach Majors did two things that I really respect. He won a national title at Pittsburgh and he returned UT to the top of the SEC by winning SEC titles in 85, 89, and 90.
Tennessee tailback Marlin Lane carries the ball against Arkansas at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville on Nov. 12, 2011. (AMY SMOTHERMAN BURGESS/NEWS SENTINEL)
Friedman Friday” Free to Choose by Milton Friedman: Episode “What is wrong with our schools?” (Part 3 of transcript and video)
Here is the video clip and transcript of the film series FREE TO CHOOSE episode “What is wrong with our schools?” Part 3 of 6.
Volume 6 – What’s Wrong with our Schools
Transcript:
If it doesn’t, they can simply pick up and go elsewhere. For the students, they want to get their money’s worth. They are customers, and like every customer everywhere, they want to get full value for the money they are paying. And so much of the success here comes from the fact that students understand precisely the cost involved and they are determined to get their money’s worth.
Regina Barreca, Student:. . .they send you sheets saying how much everything costs all the time, so that you know exactly, you can break it down per lecture. And when you see each lectures costing $35, and you think of the other things you could be doing with the $35, you’re making very sure you’re going to that lecture.
Friedman: Many of the buildings and facilities at Dartmouth have been donated by private individuals and foundations. Like other private universities, Dartmouth has combined the selling of monuments with the provision of education and the one activity reinforces the other.
The students, in effect, earn part of their keep by helping to solicit alumni for contributions, knowing full well that they will be solicited in their turn. It is another way in which the real value of education is brought home. This may not be the usual idea of an economic market, but it is nonetheless a marketplace where buyers can choose and sellers must compete for customers.
What happens when the educational market is distorted? Look at state colleges and universities. Their fees are generally very low, paying for only a small part of the cost of schooling. They attract serious students just as interested in their education as the students at Dartmouth or other private schools, but they also attract a great many others. Students who come because fees are low, residential housing is good, food is good, and above all there are lots of their peers, it’s a pleasant interlude for them.
The University of California at Los Angeles __ for those students who are here as a pleasant interlude, going to class is a price they pay to be here, not the product they are buying. Darrell Dearmone,
Lecturer: We frequently wind up with people who cannot compete favorably with even the average person here. There is a magnet here for everything. We have the best weather practically speaking, in the country. Hollywood is here, Beverly Hills is here, the social scene, the television industry in this country is centered here.
Friedman: The justification for using tax money to support institutions like this is supposed to be so that every youngster, regardless of the income or wealth of his parents, can go to college. A few youngsters from poor families are here, but not very many. Most of these students are from middle and upper-income families, yet everybody, whatever his income, pays taxes to help support these institutions. That is a disgraceful situation. It is hardly what public education was all about. These students are being subsidized by people who will never go to college. That means that on the average people who will end up with higher income are being subsidized by people who will end up with lower income. And in addition, the quality of undergraduate education is poor. Undergraduate teaching is not what UCLA is famous for. Besides from its athletic team, UCLA’s reputation is for graduate work and research.
Faculty members have every incentive to do research, that’s the way to advance in their profession. They have much less to gain by good teaching.
Only about half of those who enroll in UCLA complete the undergraduate course. Compare that with the 95% at Dartmouth who finish the work for their degrees. What a waste of student time and what a waste of taxpayers’ money.
What should we do about this disgraceful situation? We must not deny any young man or woman whose desires formal education. Everyone who has the capacity and the desire to have a higher education should be able to do so, provided they are willing to undertake the obligation to pay the cost of their schooling either currently or in later years out of the higher income that their education will make possible. We now have a governmental program of loans which is supposedly directed to this objective but it’s a loan program in name only. The interest rate charged is well below the market rate. Many of these loans are never paid back. We must have a system under which those who are not able or do not go to college are not forced to pay for those who do.
As we have seen the market works in education. When people pay for what they get, they value what they get. The market works in higher education. It can also work at the level of primary and secondary education. Until we change the way we run our public schools, far too many children will end up without being able to read, write, or do arithmetic. That is not what any of us wants.
The system is not working and it is not working because it lacks a vital ingredient. The experts mean well, but a centralized system cannot possibly have that degree of personal concern for each individual child that we have as parents. The centralization produces deadening uniformity, it destroys the experimentation that is the fundamental source of progress. What we need to do is to enable parents, by vouchers or other means, to have more say about the school which their child goes to, a public school or a private school, whichever meets the need of the child best. That will inevitably give them also more say about what their children are taught, and how they are taught. Market competition is the surest way to improve the quality and promote innovation in education as in every other field.
DISCUSSION
Participants: Robert McKenzie, Moderator; Milton Friedman; Albert Shanker, President, American Federation of Teachers; Professor John Coons, Initiative for Family Choice in Education, California; Thomas A. Shannon, Executive Director, National School Boards Association; Gregory Anrig, Commissioner of Dept. of Education in Commonwealth of Massachusetts
McKENZIE: The distinguished guests tonight are all intimately concerned with the world of education; so lets find out how they react to Friedman’s analysis.
SHANKER: I think it’s very foolish to throw out something that you’ve got and that has some shortcomings, but is very, very good in order to try out someone’s pet ideas.
McKENZIE: Well, before we ask Milton to reply to that, lets get other views on the same quotation, “Market competition is the surest way to improve the quality and promote innovation in education.” John Coons.
COONS: Well, of course, there’s enormous evidence that that is exactly right and we see it in the case in California that I observe every day of low income children whose families are making great sacrifices to go to schools that operate at a third of the cost of public education and are turning out kids who are performing and are learning and achieving at very high levels. On the other hand, I wouldn’t want to suggest that unlimited competition is the answer to every problem. And, indeed, the whole definition of competition is very ambiguous. It seems to me that if one is truly interested in liberty, which I think is the ultimate value that Milton Friedman talks about, one has to be very careful how he structures the kinds of subsidies…
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