I thought we had all these "people" confined to politics and law?
Guess not.
No. I majored in 'government' and 'American history' in college before I got my true calling... (but anyway) And I got a rude wake up to the way capitalism works in 'the sticks'. Apparently major international corporations can't just buy politicians (local and federal) but they can also buy universities (the University of Michigan) but also the local colleges and the local high schools too.
Yes, they can act all coy and fan their millions and draw all kinds of people to their side to take their money, and their side. Even in spite of a huge mountain of 'scientific evidence' that they are wrong and the sky really is blue.
I sat in a meeting so angry and disgusted by the BS that the corporate UofM whore was spouting that I stood up and confronted him myself. He was pissed because a member of 'the stupid class' actually had the nerve to call him on his BS. It was nearly hysterical. He thought that he had all of us snowed because he came from 'the BIG university' and 'knew everything' and was 'taking care of us' and should 'be grateful' that he was taking time out of his busy schedule to stoop down and talk to us heathen...
Only, one of the heathen had worked for 10 years on university research projects and statistical analysis and started asking pointed questions about his self serving study and how the stats were done. Oh boy he wasn't prepared. He didn't expect to have to defend his research (his retirement fund more like) to heathens like those that were in attendance. Worse, most of the heathen were entranced by his rhetoric and his command of the BS.
Except for one...
And I ruined his ego trip, and got the heathen wondering why the 'big university professor' looked like he'd been sucker punched to the stomach... And he was PISSED!
So yes, everyone has their price, and university departments can be bought, and owned, for a surprisingly small amount of money...
Sorry for the long winded comments...
Oh, and I also got in an email argument with the very pro-corporate local department of health head who had just accepted an 'honorarium' from the same corporation to fund a gala party for their year end meeting. It was quite an affair from what I heard. 'Spared no expense'... The guy's grasp of statistics was just slightly better than the average newspaper readers...
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And regarding computer science education...
I was at a party a number of years ago and happened to be talking to a PHD candidate from the computer science department of the local big 10 university. happened to work there and had just had a problem with a 'MUX' box. A multiplexor... So we started discussing that part of the computer biz at that time and he had no clue what a mux, let alone what multiplexing was. And he was to be a PHD graduate? And had never heard of multiplexing? Ever?
Wow... The university at the time had hundreds, if not thousands, of mux boxes all over campus... You would have thought that he would have heard of them at some point...