>I see that we have a huge segment of our >population that can't measure using the metric >system.

Unfortunately.

>Some of them can't understand ounces and >inches.

That's because they don't make sense. ;)

>We have people who can't read the instructions >on a ballot, and many who don't know how to >count the votes.

Heheh... :)

>We have people who think New Mexico and Hawaii >are foreign countries and that the North Pole is >in Alaska.

Ah, geography is always a funny topic.

>They picture penguins at the North Pole. (I sent >some students to the library once to find out if >polar bears eat penguins. But that's another >story.)

LOL

>We have adults who can't name a dozen states and >others that don't know the difference between >states and cities.

Don't know the difference between cities and states? I've never met anyone that ignorant, I don't think.

>Most Americans have to stop and think before >they can name their Senators and some of them >can't do it.

Voinivitch, DeWine. ;) And the US rep from my district is Jim Trafficant *rolls eyes*

>We have people who can't name two oceans, can't

More geography! It does amaze me how many people know so little about it.

>figure out why things cost more if you buy them >on credit,

Ah, that's why I use a debit card. I'd end up in debt so quickly if I had a credit card, and I don't want that. :)

>don't know how many zeros are in a million,

I bet they don't know what the prefix 'yocto' means either. I didn't. I found it in my physics textbook though, it's 10^-24. That's really small.

>don't know if the year 2000 is part of the 20th >or 21st century,

Hahaha, no one seems to know that.

>can't read a road map,

That's bad.

>can't drive a manual transmission,

Er..... so? As a computer user, I don't expect normal people to be able to use DOS (or Linux, for that matter), because they can use Windows which everyone's used to. So why should I have to be able to drive a car with manual transmission when I can always drive one with automatic? Not to say that I wouldn't like to learn, but saying that manual transmission driving is a skill everyone should know seems kind of presumptuous.

>don't know the difference between an electron >and a proton, think that presidents make laws >and grant tax cuts, couldn't pick their governor >out of a line-up, and can't dail 911 because >they can't remember the number.

Some instances of stupidity are amazing.

>They might know which way is up, but north, >south, east, and west are a complete mystery.

Calvin: "You know how maps always show north as up and south as down? I wanted to find out if that was true."
Calvin's Dad: "What did you find out?"
Calvin: "Not much, your compass didn't survive the trip south from the top of the tree."

-calvin & hobbes

>Then there are those of us who can't spell. >Some can't write a sentence or turn on a >computer.

Some people can spell, but are too lazy to bother with it. That annoys me too.

>They couldn't catch a cyber butterfly in an >internet.

Heh, interesting.

>If you want to see real confusion, show one of >our citizens some figures written by a European >who uses a comma for a decimal point.

Or any foreign custom, for that matter.

>Most people have no idea what the word stop >means when displayed on a red sign.

Er, I think this is a bit of an exaggeration.. otherwise cars would be crashing all over the place. :)


>Last and worst are the people who don't >understand why we need to spend more money to >improve education in this great country of ours.

Yes, of course giving more money to the government is going to improve education!

Oh, wait, no it's not. Throwing money around is _not_ the solution here. The public school system here is not very good, and giving them more money most likely won't help; they'll spend it on new football uniforms or something. Privitization of schools would help a great deal, I think. But I won't get into this now.


That's all.

-syr "attempting to become better-known in rinkworks" inx