Please, anyone but the Christians

The comments are timeless on this article about Southern Baptists in Baltimore . You see, here in Baltimore we're comfortable with 11 percent of Maryland's population but 60 percent of Maryland's foster children, a nationally ranked homicide rate, a pathetic graduation rate among minorities, and 10 percent of the entire city population living in public housing. Just please, whatever you do, keep us away from those abominable Christians!

Where are all those wag more bark less, evolve beyond hate, find your inner zen, hug a tree, and celebrate diversity folks? Where?

If the Christians in Baltimore are hypocrites, they are in very good company.

Government rids of us Racism.

According to US Employment law, “disparate impact” is an apparently “neutral employment practice that has an unjustified adverse impact on members” of a particular race. In other words, if any action benefits one race more than another, we should edit the results to correct the racial imbalance. For example, if on any given test the white firefighters do better on a test than the Hispanic firefighters, we should toss out the whole test.

Ahh, I feel righteous. Now, where else can we insert this pillar of justice? Here are some stats:

• On average, households headed by a high school graduate accumulate ten times more wealth than households headed by a high school dropout (Gouskova & Stafford, 2005)
  
• The high school graduation rate for white kids is 81% and for black kids is 59% (USDE, National Center for Education Statistics, Average Freshman Graduation Rate, 2005-6)

In other words, our educational system is responsible for disparate impact of the most grotesque magnitude. White kids graduate at a rate over 20% higher than their black counterparts. This obviously results in a staggering wealth transfer to white kids.

I propose that, beginning tomorrow, race should become a factor in the awarding of high school diplomas. White kids should not receive diplomas at a higher rate than black kids as this is like giving white kids more money than black kids. Furthermore, I propose that the United States Secretary of Education be brought before congress to answer for the flagrant racism of our educational system.

Excel Tip: Convert Serial Number Date to Text

People make much to do of converting a serial number (25556) to a text value (12/19/1969) in Excel. After all, it's easy to display the serial number as a date in Excel using Cell Formating. However, if you need to export the date value for use outside of Excel, the serial number format is of no use. Here's a simple way (no coding required) to convert serial number formating to a text value.

In this example, column "A" has the serial number dates. It doesn't matter how they are formatted.

1. Insert two blank columns to the right of column "A"
2. Paste the following formula into the first new column (column "B" in this example)
   =CONCATENATE(MONTH(A1),"/",DAY(A1),"/",YEAR(A1))
   NOTE: Be sure to use relative links (A2 for row 2, A3 for row 3, etc.)
3. Select column "B" and select Edit>Copy
4. Select column "C" and select Edit>Paste Special with the "Values Only" option

You're done. Column "A" contains a date serial number, column "B" contains a formula but displays a date, and column "C" has a text value for the date.

Interactive Mapping Resources

For those of you who are as fond of maps as I am, take a look at these free, interactive mapping resources:

Maryland with distance and area measuring tools and with many layers including park areas, roads and rails, some outdated topographical features, and even some high altitude photos.

Google Earth is the next best thing for those of us who will never be an astronaut. The imaging and layers are truly remarkable. Have fun with the 3-dimensional features and the map tilting capabilities.

Windows Local Live (Virtual Earth) has excellent imaging and strong interactive features as well, such as pushpins, and a truly amazing "bird's eye" view.

Those people aren't ready for democracy ...

What a marvelous quote.

When people say, as they often do, with a glint of ethnic or cultural superiority in their angry eyes, that Arabs or Africans or Persians or Turks just aren't "ready" for democracy, that such people prefer tyrants, or that they have no history of democracy and are hence incapable of it, or they have no middle class, without which no stable democracy can exist, or they believe in Islam, which brooks no democracy, I try to remind them that some of the worst tyrannies came from highly cultured Christian countries with glorious democratic and humanistic traditions. And I don't think that Periclean Athens boasted a large and flourishing middle class.

Michael Ledeen, "When People Freely Choose Tyranny," National Review Online, January 31st 2006.

Get the whole article here.