The Last Poets

Nearly one-third of all high school students believe that the First Amendment goes too far in the rights that it guarantees. One fifth of high schools in America have no student newspaper at all, and most of those eliminated it in the last five years due to lack of interest.

A report sponsored by the James L. Knight Foundation goes a long way toward explaining why most Americans cannot understand why the rest of the world does not behave like they're supposed to ... and why they trust Fox News as a source.

For a journalism graduate, these are very sad times. Is it merely laziness? Or is this another play in the right-wing's never-ending to effort strike the right balance: citizens who are informed just well enough to be good Walmart consumers, but who don't know enough to question the President.

In the words of the Last Poets:*

When the revolution comes
some of us will catch it on TV
with chicken hanging from our mouths
you'll know it's revolution
because there won't be no commercials
when the revolution comes

John S. and James L. Knight Foundation - Survey Finds First Amendment Is Being Left Behind in U.S. High Schools

* If you've got to ask, you probably won't get it. While never a commercial success, the 1960s band pioneered the rap style using obstreperous and mostly obscene verse to chide a while nation whose inclination was to maintain the yoke of oppression around the neck of the disenfranchised. One Last Poets' song ends with the chant, "Wake up niggers, or we're all through." Most of us thought they were just talking about black folks.