Leefeller - I agree with you regarding the level at which the Media offers its information both in writing and orally. What’s even more disturbing is how 8th grade level discourse is used to manufacture the most banal, uneducated and sophomoric material possible..Americans consume this nonsense 24/7 and look what we have today: a nation of half-wits who all think they’re going to become rich and famous…..I think Joe-the-Plumber is a fine example of what our masters want for us.

At what level one speaks to communicate to an audience is most important in getting a point accross for understanding, what seems even much more important would be how one thinks.

I question the creditability of this article when it states: “Most major newspapers are written at between an 11th and 14th grade level.” I would say more like 8th grade level!

And some people thought Idiocracy was just a movie.

Yes. What’s weird and scary is it’s happening at our universities as
well.

I once had a guy with a Ph.D try to browbeat me into agreeing that
the force keeping us on earth is “centrifical.” I tried to explain
that centrifical is not even a word; he’s thinking of
centrifugal force, which plays a role in planetary orbits, but it’s
gravity that keeps us on earth—a law of Newtonian physics: 
all mass attracts (for details go here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton’s_law_of_universal_gravitation).

Consider, too, how many people memorize the Bible but do not
understand it is the historical myths and laws of ancient peoples. 
That is very strange—to be able to read at an advanced level and
yet not understand the context of what you’re reading.

It’s explains why the debates in this country are so shallow and
destructive. We are a nation of educated idiots.

All that aside, or perhaps to the point, it is why it is such a
pleasure to post and correspond with the members of the TruthDig
community.  There is a high level of discussion here that is much
appreciated.

All the best.

Zing.

I’ve been in the credit industry for many years. Recently, I was doing some research into the lack of “financial literacy” that exists in this country. An interesting issue arose:

Did you know that most credit card contracts and other financial contracts are written at…....drum roll…......A 12TH GRADE LEVEL and this is one of the reasons why industry critics claim most Americans cannot understand what they’re signing….......?

So, to speak to Gerard’s point: We elect the morons we relate to. We aren’t electing the best or the brightest, nor are we working for them. We have become a nation of block heads without focus, without conviction and without a collective brain.

Lets face it, we have never been led by our best and brightest. We have however, always been led by our most ruthless, our most aggressive, people who act first, and think later.

It explains how we arrived to where we are now. This fall we will once again be forced to choose between one of the ruling oligarch class, and a toady oligarch wanna-be.

We elected them.  So we have only ourselves to blame.
On the other hand, unfortunately Americans are not noted for their brains. That’s a big part of our problems—anti-intellectualism as a traditional posture, including scorn for higher education and willingness to go in for home-schooling and privatization.  The entire routine leads to a gradual dumbing down, especially when the idea of “teaching to tests” comes into the equation. I feel genuinely sorry for teachers, most of whom know better than this but can’t do much about it, partly because teachers’ unions are so unreasonably maligned and feared.