Is it any wonder government-run education is such a failure?

So this high school student is unable to pass a final math competency test, but because he's "autistic," he should just be allowed to graduate? Then why not give out diplomas upon request, and further cheapen their value? As Judge Smails said, "Well, the world needs ditch diggers too." This kid's big enough. He can get a construction job -- if he can get enough of a hold on himself to keep the job. Is his mother going to watch over his shoulder for the rest of her life? What will he do after she dies? He dreams of film school, but his pattern of speech is appropriate to someone about 10 years old.

In my father's day, a high school diploma was deemed evidence of basic academic competency. It was the difference between working on a farm and working indoors. Now government schools hand them out to just about everyone for merely showing up, and to weed out those who were handed diplomas, employers have to require bachelor's degree for clerical jobs that hardly need a degree. It won't be long before a B.S. or B.A. is so common, so easily obtainable, that a master's degree will be required. Like welfare, food stamps and other "social services," the particular government entity wants to hand out as much as possible. High percentages make it look good, and they also justify the budget for next year. It can be the projected percentage of "people going hungry" who receive food stamps, or the percentage of students graduating. In New York State, the Regents exams have been notoriously dumbed down over the years. I forget which happened first, but I think it was lowering the percentage required to pass, and when that wasn't enough, questions were made easier. Children are passed on to the next grades so they can have "self esteem," not learning a damn thing except for this: they don't need to work at or for something, because the government is all too happy to give it to them.

Now add the great medical hoax of the last two decades: psychiatrists and pharmaceutical manufacturers, enabled by government and lazy parents, make money giving drugs for children who are acting like children. I've never believed this "autism" hogwash, when some kid isn't smart enough or dedicated enough to put in the effort to learn, the lazy parents, unwilling to consider they did nothing to push the desire to learn. I knew someone whose 10-year-old son never learned to read, so of course he must be "autistic." In my father's day, the would-be high school graduate would have been called an idiot, and accepted as someone who wouldn't amount to anything. Parents are told their children have ADHD and are handed a prescription for Ritalin, when all that should be needed is for the children to be told to sit down, be quiet and pay attention. My second grade teacher's solution to a problem student was putting him in a corner, with a screen around him to isolate us. He was still held back that year, but it was effective at keeping him from disrupting the class.

My Macroeconomics I class was popular with non-econ students who needed a statistics or similar class as a general graduation requirement. The class wasn't what those students expected, and most dropped out after the first midterm. The professor ran his class as a serious gateway to an economics degree, not a one-time fling. There was one who kept on till the end, always asking rather stupid questions, which exasperated the professor to no end. Over lunch one day, a friend said, "Did you notice ____'s stupid question today?" So I wasn't the only one to notice the guy's inanity, his irregular shaving of facial hair, or his body odor. One morning, I had to stifle a laugh when he and a couple of others raised theirs hands with questions. The professor wanted to get to the serious students and said to him, "You, shut up." I refuse to call him "autistic" or having "Asperger's Syndrome." He was just an idiot in the literal sense.

With no ability to make logical correlations, how on earth did he get into college? It's unimaginable that he'd score decently on an entrance exam, or get decent grades in high school. I mentioned the "weird guy in my econ class" to another friend, who suggested that there might be some program allowing people of lesser intelligence to attend college. So, I said, what happens when this idiot is given credits just because and winds up with a degree? Aw, my friend replied, let the guy get his degree. But, I protested, what does that do for the degree that we were earning? The more are handed out to people who haven't earned one, the more employers can't trust that our degrees actually mean anything.

This seems what will happen with this latest "autistic" kid in the news. Wait for the "civil rights leaders" to levy charges of racism, and after the boy gets a diploma, he'll wind up at some college. Maybe he'll annoy the professors and dean enough that they'll give him a degree to get out. Film school is highly unlikely. Does his mother think she can help him with his projects?

Somewhere in the comments, someone quoted Albert Einstein: "Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid." Except that Einstein didn't say that. There's no chapter and verse that can be cited, only some schmuck's book that can't point to anything concrete. In other words, Einstein said it as much as George Washington said "I cannot tell a lie" after chopping down a cherry tree. It's also a myth that Einstein failed math. Such stories are fabricated by people who don't want to believe they're less. There's comparative advantage in everyone, but not "genius."