Just have to comment before Alex decides this is getting political! Like

Just have to comment before Alex decides this is getting political! Like everyone else, I look for the reasons ie. who is to blame. To me, it's a combination of things: educators may top the list...as they try to push everyone into college regardless of their fittness. I chatted with a young woman recently. She was fat, unattractive and had very poor grammar, but remarked "Im EDUCATED now" (having just graduated from a local community college) " and need to look for a job". To me it's a SIN the way educators push kids into some mediocre 'college' so they come out thinking like this poor soul, that 'they're educated' so why can't they get a really good job? I don't mean to indicate that I feel that fat people can't enter the market, just that she had everything against her. It obviously makes the school and teachers 'look good' to have a high percentage of students in college, regardless of how good the college IS. Next, we have become such a litiguous society, suing left and right, blaming everyone else instead of taking personal responsibility for our mistakes. Who remarked that his vocational high school stopped using it's first class equippment because of fear they'd be sued? When are we going to stop this and just say 'screw you'! I'm going to do it regardless! I suppose this will bring the wrath of some, but I disagree with Lee Robinson re unions. Once serving a purpose, I feel that unions have now caused everything to become adversarial. Rather than working together to persue the goals of a buisness to make the best product with pride, every little thing becomes an 'issue', a 'them vs us' big deal wherin the end product, quality, suffer in an artificial scuffle. To have the highest standard of living in the world, we have out priced ourselves. Trying to balance wages so we all have 'everything' is like comparing apples and grapes. The little (they're so small!) Mexicans were the ones who came in and cleaned up my condo complex so well and so fast after Charlie, not 'blue collar workers' with their wage scale demands and 'I'll only work so hard and so many hours' attitudes. They were happy to have a job, their boss having lost everything in the storm. I certainly am not pleased with so much being farmed out to foreign producers, but we have brought this mess on ourselves. My two sons went to engineering school. One dropped out and went into the family business (no longer exists) and he is content to stay a blue collar worker as head of quality control. The other son graduated from Rose Hullman and is way up there in Engine Design at Ford (Aviator for one). Overtime? You've got to be kidding! Both started out buying old VWs at 14 and 15 and an MGA which their father (an ME) encouraged them rebuild. Now they can do about anything mechanical. Jamie's step sons, inspite of his direction, cannot learn the difference between a wrench and a screw driver. They both do well in architecture and design school, however. For Rich Gano...can't start too young! Gordon soloed in a sail boat at age 6 and had built his own at age 11, out of salvage from the hurricane that destroyed his RI home. REbuilding and antique car ain't bad training, Rich! You either have the interest/apptitude or you don't, but Voc-ED schools NEVER should be allowed to die out of fear! Enough already, Marge! Marge Griffith Cinderella Linssen GS 410