Class war and the denial of expertise. You may have gotten your fill of moosemeat watching last nights Republican convention. Alaska governor Sarah Palin, McCain's attractive but shrill and bellicose Vice Presidential nominee ranted against the "experts" in Washington, insisting that her own experience in the PTA, small town politics and 20 months as Alaska governor gave her greater insight into the needs of real Americans.

The class war that Palin opens like a wound in this election has been with us a long time, and was sustained by the liberal elite as described by Woodrow Wilson when he was President of Princeton.

"We want one class of persons to have a liberal education, and we want another class of persons, a very much larger class, of necessity, in every society, to forgo the privileges of a liberal education and fit themselves to perform specific difficult manual tasks."

Educational Sloyd, as proposed by Salomon sought the dissolution of the class system, through the introduction of manual training for all. Learning the work of the hands by the upper class was proposed to create in them respect for ALL labor and a sense of its dignity.

But there are other things that happen when manual training is used pedagogically for the full development of all children.

What I am referring to is the movement from the concrete to the abstract. Concrete experience is the foundation for abstract thought and there has to be a continual testing of the relationship between the two. It is the same as whittling with a knife. Your blade enters the wood, then through constant observation you adjust the angle and force of the blade, making its motion through variations of grain and density conform to the desired result. As education proceeds far beyond a child's first experiments with the knife, concrete skills of making lead to greater ability for abstraction. In moderns schools and for the sake of efficiency, children are launched into abstraction at the earliest possible age, laying the foundation for class war and the manipulation of classes by destructive divisive forces in American politics. Children are taught that there are right and wrong answers, and given few of the tools necessary to explore things for themselves.

We know now that McCain will do or say anything necessary to win, including lying to the American people, manipulating those who have no concrete means, confidence or inclination to test reality. And the dangers are very real. Examples: Sarah Palin does not believe in global warming ignoring the huge amount of scientific evidence that it is real and having profound effect. She believes that abstinence training is the most effective means of preventing teen pregnancy and should be the only training available to children, ignoring the obvious swelling belly of her own poor child and what that describes of her own failure and the failure of education that ignores concrete reality.

We live in a society in which people just choose what to believe as though reality has nothing to do with it. We say things over and over thinking that mind numbing repetition will make them true. We are in very serious danger.