Gongol.com Archives: October 2014
What's on the mind of Bill Gates
One of the world's smartest people has an unlimited budget to do what he wants, and he's using it to make the world a better place. That hasn't happened a lot in human history. He is the perfect technocrat and he doesn't have to work inside a bureaucracy -- it's a very special event in history, really. Broadly speaking, people really just want things to work. And who can blame them? We're paying for the system, whether it works or not, so we ought to get our money's worth.
The Chinese military is targeting US military contractors
If you thought we were all going to hold hands and sing "Kumbaya", you would be mistaken
"[D]o we really want to tell them we tore down an historic building to put up a glitzy highrise?"
Yes. Yes we do. The decision not to grant historic-preservation status to the downtown Des Moines YMCA building is a perfectly fine one, especially if it moves the space from a lower value to a higher value. There's nothing wrong with being nostalgic unless you're trying to do it on someone else's dime.
Mistakes of the 1970s: Open floor plans in schools
Classrooms need doors, it turns out. The plans to wall up some classrooms around Omaha is an example of how decisions often have long-lingering consequences (35 to 45 years, in the case of schools from the 70s), and how knowledge isn't the same as judgment. Anyone can learn how to design a classroom, but deciding what layout to use takes judgment.
Show notes: Brian Gongol Show on WHO Radio - October 5, 2014
Streamed live at 9:00 pm on WHORadio.com and heard on AM 1040
