The Fall'll Probably Kill Ya!

I read recently of a decision by New York State’s Board of Regents eliminating the requirement that high school students complete a year’s study of both US History and Global History in order to graduate.

Apparently, this decision is related to the so-called “Common Core” movement which – unlike Ebola – has reached epidemic proportions in this country.

As an old history teacher, I was, of course, dismayed.  But on reflection, the Regents’ decision struck me as a matter of little significance – something akin to the moment when Butch and Sundance are about to jump off an absurdly high cliff into the river below.  Sundance worries that he can’t swim, and Butch laughs:  “Why, you crazy – the fall’ll probably kill ya!”

This country’s educational system does such a poor job of teaching history that – unless we dramatically change things – we’re already doomed as a free society.  Of all the subjects which citizens can study, the only one which offers any preparation for meeting the challenges of the future is the study of the past.

For, if history doesn’t precisely repeat itself, there are patterns.  An understanding of history is, for a society, analogous to the wisdom an individual gains over the course of a long life.  Everyone makes mistakes.  Those who survive those mistakes – and learn from them – have a shot at wisdom.

History is a society’s collective wisdom. 

America’s educational system gave up on History during the Vietnam era, when colleges and universities expanded rapidly to profit from the tuitions of hundreds of thousands of young men who didn’t want to go to war.  Arriving in unprecedented numbers, this influx of students – whose interest in college had far more to do with survival than learning – demanded all sorts of absurd “reforms”.

Among these was the elimination of general education requirements.  Before 1960, most American colleges and universities required that all students take a set of core subjects – American History, Western Civ, English and American Lit, Composition, a couple of science courses, one foreign language to the level of basic fluency – even physical education.

Your prospective major made no difference.  Future lawyers took calculus.  Future rocket scientists studied poetry.  Everyone grumbled through calisthenics and ran laps.  And everyone learned a respectable smattering of the history of their country and the civilization from which it sprang.    

Which – in terms of the survival American democracy – was the most important part of this common curriculum.  Because History – along with its allied subjects, biography and geography – is the absolute prerequisite for intelligent, active citizenship in a democracy. 

It was probably a good thing, in those days, that future lawyers and politicians had to sweat through elementary calculus.  Higher math teaches humility – something today’s lawyers and politicians clearly lack. 

It was probably good, too, that future scientists, physicians, and engineers learned a little literature.  The more we push back the frontiers of knowledge – the more we find ourselves able to do – the more we need some basis for thinking about what it all means.  Those are the questions which poets and playwrights have been wrestling with for millennia. 

But what was indispensable was that all college-educated Americans – those whose educational attainments would make them the natural leaders of their future communities – learned something about history. 

History is the essential study of the leader.  Always has been.  Always will be.

Read up on any great leader, of any nation, from any period, and you will find that he or she not only studied history as a young person – but continued to read and study it as an adult. 

History teaches us many things.  Above all, because the patterns within and among human societies tend to repeat themselves, history teaches us to recognize dangers before they become obvious – or before it’s too late.

Some years ago, when reasonable people could still question the dangers of anthropogenic global climate change, I wrote a piece comparing Al Gore’s efforts to alert Americans to this danger with Winston Churchill’s efforts to alert Britain to the dangers of Adolf Hitler.

One angry reader responded, furiously insisting that Gore was no Churchill.  He missed the point, which was that democratic societies – confronted with a threat calling for self-discipline, sacrifice, and years of unrelenting effort – will go through all sorts of contortions to deny that a threat is real.

Democracies are fortunate if they have prominent leaders willing to risk telling citizens things they don’t want to hear. 

History teaches leaders how to lead – by adopting the successful methods, and avoiding the mistakes, of those who have gone before.

Lincoln was a lifelong student of George Washington – and, before taking office, he read up on the presidency of Andrew Jackson, who had faced an earlier secession crisis.

Theodore Roosevelt was a devoted student of Lincoln, and actually wrote a biography of Alexander Hamilton.

As wartime leader of Great Britain, Winston Churchill faced the necessity of pulling together a coalition of incompatible partners to prevent Hitler’s Germany from conquering the world.  In the decade before he took power, Churchill wrote a six-volume biography of his ancestor, John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, a brilliant diplomat and soldier of the late 17^th and early 18^th centuries.

Serving William III and Queen Anne, Marlborough had pulled together a coalition of incompatible partners to prevent Louis XIV’s France from conquering Europe.

Churchill, you might say, spent the 1930s doing his homework.

A country led by serious students of history can achieve remarkable things.  A country led by those ignorant of history risks disaster.

Because America no longer teaches its citizens history, it must soon either cease to be a great country, or cease to be a democracy – ceding power to an educated elite who have taken the trouble to learn it.

By far the safer course is to teach our children the history they will need to govern themselves.

But to do so, we will need to overrule an educational elite which does not understand history because – having attended college since 1970 – they never learned it.

Fear and Stupidity

I don’t own a television.  I do listen to public radio – and, during baseball season, some sports radio – but, since neither normally carries political advertising, I’m largely spared the annual flood of nonsense through which American political campaigns are conducted.

I’m glad to miss out on the political ad wars.  The issues which politicians believe voters care about are sometimes trivial, sometimes important.  But the solutions which candidates offer – when they bother to offer any – would embarrass the folks who air late-night infomercials for “miracle” products.

And politicians don’t even offer a money-back guarantee.

Occasionally, between elections, you hear an elected leader offering actual, practical solutions.  During a campaign, all you hear is dumb – and dumber.

Still, not listening to the political ads, I sometimes miss things.  Recently, I was astounded to learn – via posts on social media – that some of my friends have become convinced that our government should ban international flights in order to prevent an Ebola epidemic here. 

The source of these panicky posts appears to be a coordinated campaign by Republican candidates for the House and Senate – though some terrified Democrats have apparently climbed aboard the bandwagon.

Now, I’m used to the inevitability of candidates offering up stupid policy ideas during political campaigns.  But an international flight ban isn’t just stupid – it could be suicidal.

Of course, this hasn’t stopped a majority of Americans telling pollsters they support a ban.  

No surprise there.  Americans will fall for anything – for a little while.  The good news is that most Americans – given time – will get back in touch with their native common sense.

That will have to happen soon, if we aren’t to end up electing a bunch if irresponsible fear-mongers to office.  But in an election campaign, two weeks is an eternity.  I’m betting the Republicans created their Ebola panic a couple of weeks too soon.

We’ll see.

It might be a little early for common sense to reassert itself, but – since I’m not running for anything – let’s give it a try.

In the first place, let’s understand that there are basically no direct flights from West Africa to the United States.  To get from Monrovia, Liberia, to JFK, Dulles or Hartsfield, you normally fly through Europe.

So right there, banning flights from West Africa to the US is nonsense.  There are no flights to ban.

But maybe the idea is to prevent anyone flying from West Africa from entering the US.  How would that work?

Well, clearly, US authorities could monitor passenger manifests and prevent the entry of passengers from West Africa who had taken connecting flights through Europe.

But suppose someone in West Africa really needs to get to the US – on business, for school, to visit family – and there’s a travel ban.  The obvious solution would be to take two non-connecting flights.  Fly to Rome or Paris; spend a day or two dining well; then fly into the US as a passenger from that European city.

Or you book connecting flights from West Africa to Toronto Pearson – and cross into the US by land transport.

Now, understand, anyone doing this would be violating the proposed travel ban.  But assume you’re in West Africa; you’re absolutely certain you don’t have Ebola; and you have important reasons for getting to America.

Is a travel ban going to stop you?

Consider our record of success at preventing illegal immigration – or the importation of marijuana and cocaine. 

Guess what?  In today’s world, you can’t keep people from crossing borders.

Not even North Korea can do that – and North Korea is a police state with two short, militarized borders.

Common sense says a flight ban would be unworkable.  But at the beginning of this piece, I suggested it might also be suicidal.

Here’s why.

At present, US authorities automatically screen everyone flying into the country from nations in which Ebola has erupted.  These passengers are asked several key questions.  Their temperatures are taken.  They are instructed on what to do if they begin to develop symptoms.

Thus far, passengers from West Africa have been cooperative with these sensible screening procedures.  They’re not intrusive, and – really – no one wants to bring Ebola into this country, or pass it on to his loved ones or business associates.

But suppose we imposed a flight ban – and passengers from West Africa started avoiding that ban by taking non-connecting flights or by flying into Canada.

People sneaking in via ­an indirect route could hardly be expected to present themselves to US authorities for screening once they arrived.  They’d be here – among us – but we wouldn’t know anything about them. 

And that’s where things get scary.

Because, sooner or later, someone will enter this country who has been infected – and doesn’t know it.  Under our present screening regime, there’s every chance a symptomatic person would promptly contact proper authorities for treatment.

But if he had sneaked in to avoid a travel ban, there’s a fair chance he’d delay doing so.  And that delay is where the proposed travel ban becomes dangerous.

Fear-based political campaigns are nothing new.  But when politicians propose stupid, dangerous policies in order to win elections, they demonstrate their unworthiness to hold public office.

Let’s hope common sense kicks in soon enough to punish this fear-mongering nonsense.