"I'm not talking about Burma" ( that's off the record )

The JO has been following The Hon. Kurt Campbell, US Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia & the Pacific. Yesterday the JO was lucky enough to sit and listen to Dr. Campbell talk ( off the record at CSIS ) about the outlook for US policy in the ASEAN for 2010. The JO has been able to ask Dr. Campbell a few questions about Burma. What about the upcoming election ? What about China's influence on Myanmar ? What should ASEAN do ? What about imprisoned US citizen Mr.Kyaw Zaw Lin ? Dr. Campbell answered all these questions thoughtfully ( and off the record ).In our latest encounter, he said ( I don't want to talk about Burma ). Then added ( the situation is very delicate ).( We know more about North Korea than we do about Myanmar ). ( We expect Japan to do more on the issue of human rights in Burma than trade )... I guess Dr. Campbell momentarily forgot about all the fingernails the Japanese pulled out in Burma during WWII... aaaah, nothing heals pulled out fingernails like foreign investment.... the JO thinks Japan is on theright track. ASEAN knows Myanmar well ( more than North Korea ) because of trade. If the US wants to learn more about Myanmar than open up trade. The human rights will take care of itself... dont make it such a huge issue that engagement and diplomacy become a non-starter. It's a real learning experience listening to Dr. Campbell. Dr. Campbell speaks like a scholar and thinks like a soldier.

"Plato and Aristotle at the Job Fair" by Raphael

Do not go to grad school in the humanities - study science instead! Speedy has been saying thissince he got BA in Art History... oops. After college Speedy did alot of traveling all over the world as a ummm... "contractor"... yeah, that's it "contractor". Speedy picked up a few foreign languages, studied how nuclear physics works, and then settled down to a nice desk job in DC. Recently Speedy read an interesting article in the Chronicle of Higher Education - "Graduate Schoolin the Humanities: Just Don't Go". There are only just a few slots for phd's to fill in the humanities. But in the science field there are numerous research positions. Okay, the pays not that great for science researchers but you can get a job ( if not in the US some other advanced countries ). American maufacturing industries are outsourcing everything these days. There needs to be better science education in the U.S. President Obama just announced this morning a $250 million initiativefor science and math teachers. Let's see how that goes. Anyhoo, Speedy is not against the humanities, but the jobs aren't there and it's misleading for humanities professors to imply there will be in the future. Here's the Chronicle article - ( join me on Facebook and see more... )

http://chronicle.com/article/Graduate-School-in-the/44846/?sid=pm&utm_source=pm&utm_medium=en