 March 2004
American Friends Service Committee Peacework Magazine Sara Burke, Managing Editor Sam Diener, Editor Pat Farren, Founding Editor 2161 Massachusetts Ave. Telephone number: Fax number:
pwork@igc.org Peacework has been published monthly since 1972, intended to serve as a source of dependable information to those who strive for peace and justice and are committed to furthering the nonviolent social change necessary to achieve them. Rooted in Quaker values and informed by AFSC experience and initiatives, Peacework offers a forum for organizers, fostering coalition-building and teaching the methods and strategies that work in the global and local community. Peacework seeks to serve as an incubator for social transformation, introducing a younger generation to a deeper analysis of problems and issues, reminding and re-inspiring long-term activists, encouraging the generations to listen to each other, and creating space for the voices of the disenfranchised. Views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily of the AFSC. |
Counting Weapons of Math Instruction Original source unknown. A slightly different version can be found at http://davidakin.blogware.com/blog/_archives/2003/11/30/7772.html. At New York's Kennedy airport today, an individual later discovered to be a public school teacher was arrested trying to board a flight while in possession of a ruler, a protractor, a T-square, a slide rule, and a calculator. At a morning press conference, Attorney General John Ashcroft said he believes the man is a member of the notorious al-gebra movement. He is being charged by the FBI with carrying weapons of math instruction.
"Al-gebra is a fearsome cult," Ashcroft said. "Their deviations are not standard. They desire average solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on tangents. They use secret code names like 'x' and 'y' and refer to themselves as 'unknowns,' but we have determined they belong to a common denominator of the axis of medieval with coordinates in every country." "As the Greek philanderer Isosceles used to say, there are 3 sides to every triangle," Ashcroft declared. When asked to comment on the arrest, President Bush said, "If God had wanted us to have better weapons of math instruction, He would have given us more fingers and toes. Murky statisticians love to inflict plane on every sphere of influence." "I am gratified that our government has given us a sine that it is intent on protracting us from these math-dogs who are willing to disintegrate us with calculus disregard." The President warned, "These weapons of math instruction have the potential to decimal everything in their math on a scalene never before seen unless we become exponents of a Higher Power and begin to factor-in our absolute values." The President added, "Under the circumferences, we must differentiate their root, make our point, and draw the line." Attorney General Ashcroft said, "As our Great Leader would say, read my ellipse. Threats from Al-gebra are multiplying and coming at us from all angles, but there's one pithy theorem we know: their days are numbered as the squared hypotenuse tightens around their necks." Truth is stranger than satire. This piece was written before Secretary of Education Paige, frustrated with opposition to un-funded educational mandates and other aspects of the so-called No Child Left Behind Act, described the largest teacher's union in the US, the National Education Association, as a terrorist group.
See www.nea.org/presscenter/supportnea.html.
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