View From a Height

By now, you've heard about Jay Bennish, the geography teacher who's a few maps short of an atlas. Apparently his own personal compass has been deviating from true north for a while now, but only now has a student caught his, um, lectures, on MP3. This is a bit Ward Churchillian, in that it's one of public education's many dirty little secrets; teachers do this sort of thing all the time, and it doesn't make them any less popular or any less tenured.

(Just for fun, though, Bennish on the doctrine of pre-emption:

Why doesn't North Korea invade South Korea, because they're afraid of being attacked.

Uh, been there, done that. I suppose it's too much to expect a public school geography teacher to find the letters "DMZ" on a map, but maybe he could hit his older brother up for a few bucks to rent some old M*A*S*H DVDs.)

But keep your eye on the ball here - not the teacher, but the administration:

Superintendent Monte Moses, who received a copy of the recording on Monday from 850 KOA-AM radio show host Mike Rosen, said it appears "a breach of district policy" occurred.

"Our policy calls for both sides to be present ... in the interest of intellectual discourse," Moses said. Bennish's presentation appeared to be unbalanced, he said.

The district is looking into whether the incident was an isolated one and will ensure that a balanced viewpoint of the president's State of the Union address is provided to students, Moses said.

Something's certainly unbalanced here, and it's not just that Bennish's Triptik leans a little to the East, if you know what I mean. It'd be generous even to suggest that an "intellectual discourse" is possible with someone who buys into the whole Bushitler meme. But what goes for universities - where academic freedom is valued for the research it produces - is completely and utterly irrelevant for a high school geography class.

What on earth is the "other side" of saying that President Bush is like Hitler. That President Bush isn't Hitler? If those are the terms of the debate, even winning it doesn't get you very far, and even agreeing to debate the point legitimizes it.

If you actually listen to Bennish's ravings, you find them to be as fact-depleted as any comment posting over at DailyKos. What, exactly, would constitute equal time for "capitalism is at odds with humanity?" For equation of Hamas with Israel? For claiming we want a strategy of "divide and conquer?" Or that the Twin Towers were "military targets," taken out to equalize the loss of a Sudanese aspirin factory?

If these assertions aren't immediately ridiculous - and it certainly sounds like a fair number of students are willing to go along with them - then they're the product of a radical worldview that hates this country. (Yes, for the record, I am questioning Bennish's patriotism.) A 20-minute editorial from the other side, especially now that Bennish himself has become a cause, would be worse than pointless.

No, the only "balance" available is what used to be called, "an education."