I was driven mad by the Chinese education system

Parts of Texas are still horrible, but Northwestern is amazing when it comes with dealing with diversity.

I have carried with me the work ethic springing from their statements, but tend to ignore the ill will that inspired it. It's useful to learn how to work hard.

'Students graduate in to a world where connections, wealth, accident of birth and not talent determine your success in life.'

This is clearly true everywhere in the world, and if you meant to say that this is MORE true in China, then you better rethink because there is far more opportunity there right now compared to most places in the world. Might I suggest a few reasons why you cannot higher the 'best' cs graduates:

The best will go where the money is, are you offering enough money? A lot will go overseas. Another good reason is CS is not where the money is at in China. You must also remember that IT is a new field in China, and not long ago a computer and the internet was a luxury, ditto for the education of CS.

I am a Chinese who moved to the Australia when I was 9, the education system here seemed to me like kindergarten at the start, it was just play all day and do nothing. This moved to Chinese primary school year 4 level at the start of high school.

Anyway, although I attended one of the top public schools (my year was very strong), it provides no where near the same rigor nor depth of education, and most importantly the majority of students here did not actually want to learn, which was probably the one thing I hated most about this system, nobody cared, what a waste of youth and talent.

Chinese students at the end of high school are amongst the most well educated in the world, not to mention the vast differences in education and life culture, which a lot of westerners are ignorant about.

The big fallacy of the Chinese education system is that its hard to get IN to a university, and once you're there you're pretty much assured graduation (or the mentality is there), this is perhaps the reverse of western society and needs to be fixed.

Also note that trauma care is much, much better now than in 1900. All things being equal, you'd expect a much lower homicide rate now. In 1900, if a guy gets shot three times in the stomach, he's a statistic. In 2009, he makes a full recovery ( http://meganmcardle.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/07/crime_d... ).

At any rate, the point remains that many of the once great American cities - Detroit, St. Louis, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Cleveland - are either in ruins or feel like they came out of the movie Blade Runner ( http://www.detroityes.com/home.htm ). This did not need to happen. The fall of these cities was the result of particular decisions made by particular political actors, and we are all poorer for having lost them.

Indeed it was. But perhaps you have heard the name K Street before? The retail, envelopes-full-of-cash corruption is now mostly gone. Corruption today is organized, supersized, and legalized. It's called interest group politics. Worse, because government is so much bigger, both in revenues and the extents of its regulations, interest group politics has a far more pernicious impact on our lives than the corruption of 1909 ever did.

The world would probably be more wealthy without that drain, but I don't know if it would be better.

Even given that we want to spend more on healthcare, the government healthcare programs waste somewhere on the order of 80% of the dollars spent. My point was that the taxes we now pay are not being put to good use.

I expect the government of 1908 was more corrupt than the government of today, people did not have the money to let government take that much off of them

Just look at the rates. Combined federal tax rates for a median earner in 1909: 0%. Combined federal tax rates for a median earner 2009: ~20%.

The government was very corrupt then, but at least people new it was corrupt and thus had little inclination to vote in leaders that would raise taxes. Our modern government, via its K-16 education system, has basically taught everyone that the government is our mother and that giving it money is righteous and good.

So yes taxes are up, but it's not like the money is set on fire we are getting a lot of services from that money.

Federal taxes do not pay for streetlights and cell phones ( and neither does much of state and local taxes). I generally view the interstate highway program as a disaster that destroyed urban neighborhoods and created an unsustainable reliance on automobiles.

When it comes to social organizations things like MMO guilds and facebook let people be far more social than the average pre car social club.

You have got to be be kidding. Human beings did not evolve to socialize via text.

Over the last 100 years the middle class and the wealthy have left city's and have only recently been returning. Murder statistics among the poor and they have always been high so correlating it with city living is missing the point.

Murder statistics among the poor and they have always been high so correlating it with city living is missing the point.

This simply false. At the turn of the century, 85% of the population of Milwaukee were immigrants or the children of immigrants. Yet the homicide rate was 3.7. The other big northern cities were similar. The people in these cities were mostly poor immigrants. Yet they worked hard and moved forward in life. In the 60's, breakdowns in law enforcement, "urban renewal", and the growth of the welfare state allowed the growth of a large criminal underclass in the cities. Riots and muggings pushed the hard working middle class out into the suburbs Poverty does not cause crime. Culture and lack of rule of law cause crime.

>> From your post I think I might have offended you but I am not sure how.

I was reacting to the fact that your original post contained lots of detailed knowledge of recent Chinese educational history, but evidenced no sense of China's recent politics. I took this as a sign of disingeniousness. I'm happy to see that I was wrong.

>> "loyalty to the country" or patriotism

Patriotism is very unpopular among today's bien pensants, partly because it's widely conflated (both by supporters and critics) with nationalism. They're very different, I think. Patriotism is simply love of country. That means wanting the best for it and its people and carries no implication of wanting less for any other country. In fact, since free and wealthy countries are not a burden on others, part of patriotism becomes actively wanting the best for other countries as well, since (via trade and reduction of conflict) our country becomes better off as well.

Nationalism is comparative. It's "we're better than you", or "we will be better than you" or "we will be better than you, even if we have to stomp your brains out". This almost always leads to bad things happening to both countries, the opposite of what any true patriot wants.

>> I'm sorry I missed the distinction between "loyalty to the party" and "loyalty to the country" or patriotism.

Political parties will always, to some extent, put their own interests ahead of those of the country. When there is no representative government (as in Mao's China), the pressure to put the country's interests first (i.e., patriotism) is largely severed.

>> Please accept my apologies.

No need to apologize to me. My suffering has been limited to listening to the stories of my wife and her friends (or more exactly, the friends who survived).