Is God more popular than Jesus on Google?

God certainly has a great deal more all-year round appeal, while interest in Jesus is naturally more seasonal. But do these figures show an uptick in interest in God versus Jesus in Google searches? Possibly. Why might that be? And is the uptick in interest in God in March 2010 something to do with the Catholic church child abuse scandals?

Official: Christmas is not getting earlier.

Look at this time line of searches for "Christmas" on Google trends. I can see no evidence that Christmas is getting earlier but it does look like people have been getting less interested in Christmas since 2005. Shopping fatigue?

No surprises

Detroit's bankruptcy 

Given the green light 

Dec 3rd 2013, 21:31 by N.L. | CHICAGO 

 FOR A city as indebted as Detroit it may seem surprising that a judge would have to decide whether it is eligible for bankruptcy. Nonetheless this is what Judge Stephen Rhodes has been obliged to consider since the city filed for Chapter 9 protection in July. On December 3rd he decided that Detroit was insolvent and could move ahead with its bankruptcy filing. That is good news for the city, but bad news for its over 100,000 creditors, among whom are pensioners, bondholders and even those awaiting payouts in lawsuits against the city.

In his ruling, Mr Rhodes turned away arguments that the bankruptcy violated the federal constitution. The use of federal mechanisms for resolving municipal debts does not violate the tenth amendment, he said, citing the Supreme Court case of US v Bekins. Then he turned to the state constitution, which protects the pensions of public workers, except in the case of bankruptcy. Mr Rhodes ruled that the constitutional protections "do not apply to the federal bankruptcy court" and that pensions ought to be treated like the city's other debts.

Creditors also tried to argue that the city did not negotiate in good faith, which it must do in order to be approved for bankruptcy. On this point the judge's ruling was particularly interesting. He deemed that the city did not satisfy the good-faith requirements with its proposal to creditors in June. Moreover, he said that creditors could not be faulted for failing to counter the city's restructuring deal, as it was vague and creditors were given little time to consider the offer. But these concerns were trumped by his ruling that it was impracticable for the city to negotiate with so many creditors. [More...]

Detroit or bust

Tomorrow judge Stephen Rhodes will decide whether Detroit is eligible for Chapter 9 protection in the largest municipal bankruptcy in American history. Two-hundred prospective jurors have already been summoned to appear. It is difficult to imagine that the judge will simply announce that the city is ineligible and tell them all to go home.

More telling than the decision to approve the bankruptcy will be how he tackles retiree pensions and what he says about the question of negotiating in good faith. It is possible that he may leave the fate of retiree pensions undecided. That would be unfortunate for everyone (except the pensioners) because Detroit needs a comprehensive deal. Retirees will do better outside of Chapter 9 though, as the constitution offers protection to their pensions. Inside a bankruptcy case they are likely to receive a fraction on the dollar (of the unfunded portion of their pensions). But if the case does go ahead and include retiree pensions there is likely to be a fight over the extent to which Michigan's constitutional protection is trumped by federal bankruptcy law.

Tellingly the judge asked at one point during the hearings so far,

“Is there any other constitutional right, state or federal that is that absolute?” asked the judge. “Even freedom of the press isn’t that absolute, is it?”  

It will be interesting to see what he says about the issue of whether the city negotiated in 'good faith'--a prerequisite for bankruptcy to be approved. Although this question was hard fought over, I wonder if it is a little bit of a red herring? Perhaps it is the true that the emergency manager of Detroit overstated the chances of doing a deal. Or perhaps they always knew that bankruptcy was a very likely outcome and pretended it was not. Maybe they even decided long ahead of time that bankruptcy was really the only option, and decided to 'go through the motions'.

The problem with even the worst-case scenario is that you have to argue that Chapter 9 protection must be denied because the situation was so bad that the city had no other real option. Of course the creditors will say a deal would have been possible with more time. What seems more likely is that more time would have allowed for a blizzard of lawsuits. So even if the judge decides that there was not as much good faith as he would have liked to have seen, it is hard to see him deciding to deny eligibility.

A recent online piece about the Detroit case:

Detroit

Bankruptcy or bust

Nov 15th 2013, 14:22 by N.L. | CHICAGO

OVER the next few days it will up to one man, Steven Rhodes, a federal bankruptcy judge, to decide the fate of Detroit. In July the city filed for the largest municipal bankruptcy in American history. This was challenged by unions, retirees and creditors. Last week the trial wrapped up on whether the city was eligible to declare Chapter 9. Now it is up to Mr Rhodes to decide.

 Failure to win such protection would be a disaster for Detroit, which has some $18 billion worth of debt and liabilities. Creditors would undoubtedly sue. City services would continue to decline. Of course, bankruptcy, too, has its drawbacks. It is likely to result in cuts to pensions and health-care benefits, and the sale of city assets (possibly even its fine art). Cuts to retiree benefits have the public-employees unions up in arms.

 The unions and retirees claim the bankruptcy is an attempt to get around a ban on pension cuts in the state constitution. During the trial their representatives argued that the state did not negotiate in good faith prior to declaring bankruptcy, as is required by law.

The city disagrees. It says it tried to negotiate, but met with a lack of cooperation from debtholders. Rick Snyder, Michigan's governor who approved the bankruptcy filing, described the move as a "very last resort" when he took the stand last month. But he avoided questions about the impact bankruptcy might have on pensioners.

 How might the judge be leaning? It helps to look at his questions. Mr Rhodes has pressed lawyers opposing the bankruptcy to explain why municipal pensions in Michigan are sacrosanct, and whether this means the state must guarantee payment. “Is there any other constitutional right, state or federal that is that absolute?” asked the judge. “Even freedom of the press isn’t that absolute, is it?” [More...]

My other stories about Detroit:

Skid row, A state takeover of Detroit, once America’s third-largest city, looks likely, Feb 23rd 2013 | CHICAGO |From the print edition

Can Motown be mended? America’s biggest-ever city bankruptcy starts to roll, Jul 27th 2013 | DETROIT | From the print edition

Manna for Motown,  Uncle Sam offers a little help. Oct 5th 2013 | From the print edition

Buy to the sound of gunfire,  Some parts of Detroit are doing well Jul 27th 2013 | GILBERTVILLE, DETROIT | From the print edition

Iron Orr The city’s default spells pain for creditors, employees and residents Jun 22nd 2013 | CHICAGO | From the print edition

Nowhere to run,  The motor city flirts with fiscal disaster Dec 8th 2011, 16:17 | From the print edition

Technology can help close the achievement gap

Education 

Minding the gap 

Education technology helps minorities do better at university 

Nov 16th 2013 | CHICAGO |From the print edition

 Only 40% of black college students graduate within six years; 62% of whites do. No one knows why. One academic has suggested teaching “grit” and “determination” in the face of obstacles. But what minority students often need is good advice. Higher education is a maze of different courses and programmes, which students who are the first in their family to attend college struggle to navigate. Some choose their courses simply because they begin late in the morning, or because their friends are doing them. As a result, they often fail. Some institutions, such as Georgia State University, have improved results by getting faculty, advisers and older students to work more closely with minority students. But this takes time and money. Technology can help. [More...]

Testing teachers in America

Education

On your marks

States are starting to test teachers 

Nov 9th 2013 | CHICAGO |From the print edition

IN THE film “Bad Teacher”, Cameron Diaz’s character says she entered the profession “for all the right reasons: shorter hours, summers off, no accountability”. No one is threatening to take away the first two agreeable perks, but several states are eyeing the third.

 In the past, teachers were judged solely on their level of education and the number of years they had spent in the classroom—neither of which tells you whether their pupils are learning anything. But this is changing. A new report from the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ), a research group, finds that most states now demand that student achievement should be a significant factor in teacher evaluations (see chart). Only Alabama, California, Idaho, Iowa, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Texas and Vermont have no formal policy.

The expansion of teacher evaluation is broadly good news. Work published in 2011, from Columbia and Harvard, showed that pupils assigned to better teachers are more likely to go to college and earn decent salaries, and less likely to be teenage mothers. If teachers in grades 4 to 8 are ranked according to their ability to add value (ie, teach) and those in the bottom 5% are replaced with ones of average quality, a class’s cumulative lifetime income is raised by $250,000. Bill Gates once said that if every child had mathematics teachers as good as those in the top quartile, the achievement gap between America and Asia would vanish in two years. (His lecture has been watched 1.5m times online.) [More...]

Essential decisions...

The story so far is that the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) is refusing to release a University of Chicago survey of school performance around the state.

My FOIA request to them earlier this month was declined on the grounds that the reports I requested were "preliminary" under section 7(1) of FOIA. I wrote to the Attorney General requesting a Request for Review of this decision. The point I raised was that one cannot on the one hand argue that completed analyses, produced by leading education researchers at one of the nation's top universities are "preliminary", while at the same time argue that the disaggregated raw data (that ISBE has said it will release) is a "final" report. Something that is preliminary is an action or event that precedes something full or more important.

I'm looking forward to hearing how the ISBE justifies its decision to withhold the 5 Essentials report from public release. It has seven days to do this, according to the letter I have just received from the office of the Attorney General today which rules that "further inquiry is warranted".

Excepts from the letter:

"We have determined that further inquiry is warranted in this matter. Please provide this office with a detailed explanation of the ISBE's legal and factual basis for asserting the section 7(1) exemption to deny Ms Loder's October 9, 2013 FOIA request, together with an un-redacted copy of the withheld records. In your response, please confirm whether ISBE has provided parts of the requested records to Ms Loder as indicated in Ms Loder's Request for Review. If so, the ISBE's response should also include a detailed legal and factual explanation of its basis for withholding the analysis and/or interpretation portions of the requested survey reports. 

As required under FOIA, please provide this information to our office within seven (7) business days after receipt of this letter (5 ILCS 140/9.5(c) (West 2012). In the context of a Request for Review, the issue is whether the public body has proved by clear and convincing evidence [their emphasis] that its reasons for denying information or records were proper".