Deeply shallow

Obama thinks he was a humanities major, but he wasn't.

Political science, like history, is not, generally speaking, one of the humanities. Art history isn't either, but that's beside the point. Humanities include English, foreign languages, literature, etc. Muddled thinking like this is characteristic of Obama's utterances, which expose the shallowness of his ideas--glib but essentially meaningless. Obama appears to think that any field of study which is not STEM is "humanities"--or if it isn't it doesn't matter. It's close enough for government work.

The use of precise language is important to critical thinking. Critical thinking is essential to understanding what is being discussed. In other words, ideas have consequences, and muddled ideas have negative consequences. But what would Obama know about critical thinking?

People who should know better...

are dissing the liberal arts and advising college students to go in for STEM courses instead. This is based on a false dichotomy. The liberal arts as taught today are a far cry from your grandmother's liberal arts. I should know--I'm a grandmother. When I went to college back in the late lamented 20th century, liberal arts students read "the best that has been thought and said." We read great works of English and American literature. In addition, we had to take courses in history and science. These courses were survey courses, not the greatest, but they did present an overview of Western civilization. We also had to take a couple of years of a foreign language. We read all of Shakespeare's plays as well as those written by other Renaissance playwrights, and a ton of poetry. We were taught grammar and had to do a good deal of writing, which is an excellent way of learning to think. Today's students master Grievance Studies such as Black History, Womyn's History, GLBT history and so on ad infinitum. Or popular culture like soap operas and cartoons. It is no surprise that they get As in everything, who wouldn't? Foreign language departments are closing, as no-one is required to study language any more. Ditto for philosophy. And a four-year course of study takes six years! Students are leaving colleges with worthless diplomas, heavy debt, and empty heads. But don't blame the liberal arts. Nobody is studying them any more.

Biden didn't get the memo

...about college education:

After leading the world in college graduates for decades, the United States has slipped to ninth, and a new initiative Vice President Joe Biden announced earlier this week aims to help reverse the trend.

However, according to Instapundit:

“In fact, setting aside the technical professions (medicine, engineering, etc.) the cost of a bachelor’s degree is exploding just as its value in the marketplace is declining.”

So now we need more of what we have too much of already.  Let's spend federal money on it!