August 7, 2026 • 28 mins
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
Good evening.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
I'm Bob Lonsberg and from the banks the Mighty Genesee
in Rochester, New York. This is downtown section third Patoon.
My grandmother taught me how to read. She was ran
the cash register and kept the books at a gas station,
and she worked a twelve hour shift six to six.
And during those times when I was like three, four
(00:31):
and five living with her, I would go to work
with her, and you know, find things through the course
to day I keep myself occupied. And one of those
is there was always a newspaper laying around. It would
be a copy of The Evening Tribune, which then was
a locally owned and locally published newspaper down in Hornell,
(00:54):
New York, in Steuban County. Hornell, one of the more
illustrious suburbs of my hometown.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Can of Steel.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
So we'd be there at Texico Station. You can trust
your car to the man who wears the star. It
was Roy, he owned it. And then there's a guy
named Denny. Denny pumped gas and he was a mechanic.
And it was Roy and Denny and my grandmother and
me and the Evening Tribune. At any rate, sometimes I
(01:23):
get tired of messing around in the back or whatever
they had a fire truck. I don't know if there
was ever such a thing as a model tee fire
truck or what they had for fire trucks back in
that day. But Roy had in a garage behind the
gas station some fire truck of ancient design looked an
awful lot like chitty chitty bang bang. And I could
(01:46):
sit in there, and I could turn that wheel left
and right, and I could make siren noises, and I
could imagine that I was saving the world from fire till.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
The cows came home.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
But sometimes I'd be up there, sit with my grandmother,
watch the customers come, watch customers go, and in the
quiet moments. She who had started out life as a
school teacher. She graduated high school down in Angelica, eighteen
years of age. She went off for six months to
(02:17):
a normal school, it's what they called it then, and
there was a special program. Six months she learned how
to be a school teacher. And she went from that
immediately to teaching in a one room schoolhouse. Schoolhouse still
stands down in West Almond. And at any rate, she
stayed with a family, a family that had built the schoolhouse.
(02:41):
You know, fifty sixty years before, but she stayed with
the family down there. They had a bunch of kids
who were students. They had an older son, excuse me,
and they fell in love, got married. He became grandpa anyway.
But we're there at the gas station, and she would
get that evening tribune. When things were quiet, she'd sit
(03:04):
down there and she would point at the letters in
the newspaper right, And from that she taught me the
name of those letters, the ABC's, And so for a
while I'd look at the paper and do my ABC's.
Identify these twenty six little squiggles. I guess fifty two
(03:24):
if you consider the capital and the.
Speaker 1 (03:27):
Lower case, and those were my letters.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
And sometimes there'd be some extra paper and a pencil around.
Back then kids were not allowed to use pens, but
there'd be extra and a lot more people used pencils,
but there'd be extra paper and pencil around, and I
would draw the letters, write the letters based on the
what was there in the paper. That got me in
(03:53):
trouble when I went to kindergarten because in a newspaper
you probably haven't read read one of those years. But
in a newspaper they would print the typeface would be
what they called seraph right Sarah means foot and meaning
(04:13):
that there was like a little foot on the bottom
of the letter, and specifically in the lowercase are, there'd
be the little part that goes up and down. There'd
be a horizontal line at the bottom, there'd be the
part that comes over a semi circle to the right,
and then there'd be just a little bit that came
(04:33):
up and went back to the left at the top
on the left right. And that is a seraph lowercase R,
as printed in America's newspapers for about two hundred years. Well,
I go to kindergarten and can.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
You write your letters? Yes?
Speaker 2 (04:54):
I can, Yes, ma'am, okay, please write your letters. So
Missus Roach, Gene Roach, great lady used to sing us
puff the magic dragon as we laid down taking our naps.
I mentioned this before, but Missus Roach and her dear
husband Jim World War two vedroom.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
They're buried.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
I can't be more than twenty feet from the window
of her classroom. The cemetery is just next lot over
from the school in Canistello, and they got plots right there,
just outside her classroom window. But I wrote out my letters,
and everything was okay, except there was a little red
(05:35):
circle around the lowercase R. And she said, no, nothing
sticks off to the left on the top like that.
And I said, oh, yes, it does. You know, I
wasn't trying to be a pig head or whatever, but
yes it does. She said, no, it doesn't. And there
I am kindergarten student, you know, at screening, assuring her that,
(05:59):
oh yeah, yes, oh yeah, there's a thing that sticks
off to the left there. At any rate, I was
there at the gas station, and after I learned my abcs,
it was okay. Now we're going to learn that each
letter has typically a sound that is associated with it,
(06:21):
and you can learn the sounds that are associated with
very letter, various letters, and then you can look at
a word, which is a string of letters, and you
can make the sound of each one of those letters
in order. And there's a pretty good chance that the
sound you make will be a word, right, and you
(06:42):
will have just read a word. And so, sitting there
at the gas station, at the Texaco with the evening.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Tribune, I.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Was sounding out words, and at three and four I
was dazzling the customers, reading to them stories from the paper.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
What a young prodigy I was.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
But that's how I learned how to read. This is
downtown Section third Platoon on news radio. Why I'm eleven
eighty Welcome back this downtown section third Patoon. I told
the story in the last segment about how a little
while ago, my grandmother taught me how to read. She
ran the cast rechster kept the books at a gas
(07:25):
station down in Hornell, New York.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
In the day.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
She worked six to six every day, and I lived
with her some of my preschool years, and I went
to work with her and out of the newspaper down there,
the Evening Tribune, she taught me first my letters, and
then the sounds they made, and how to string those
sounds together, and how to read. She taught me how
(07:50):
to read out of a newspaper in between taking care
of customers at the gas station. And that's how I
learned how to read. By the way, oh maybe twenty
years or so after that, my first job in media
was as a reporter for that very newspaper, the Evening Tribune.
(08:15):
I ended up writing for the paper from whose pages
I had learned how to read. Anyway, I bring that
up because headline out today shows that less than half
of youngsters grades three through eight in the state of
New York can read at grade level.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
They are not proficient. Well, I would.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
Modify that sentence a little bit by cutting off the end.
More than half of youngsters in New York grades three through.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Eight can't read.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Right. Oh, maybe some sounded out or I don't know
if they teach them to do that anymore. But they
can't read, and they're not functionally literate. That's not uh. Oh, well, Bob,
that's that's in you in the city district.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Bob. No, it's pretty much all of them.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
It's a it's somewhere between an irony and a crime.
But New York State spends dramatically more per uh student
for education than any other state uh in the nation, right, I.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
I know.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
We here's the thing. I'm tempted to say that we
spend three times the national average per student. That that
may not be accurate. It may just be two times,
but I know it's at least two times the national
average per student spent in New York. Unfortunately, we have
some of the worst educational outcome in New York. There's
(09:53):
an odd uh situation with education spending an education outcome. Typically,
those states that spend the least have the best outcome,
and those states that spend the most have the worst outcome.
Heavily unionized states are the ones that spend the most.
(10:14):
But anyway, about the reading, that's the one thing you
need to learn, right, that's the one thing you need
to learn. I obviously went to high school down at Canasteele.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
I was a very poor student. I did not pay
attention to class.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
I fidgeted, I made jokes, I stared at pretty girls.
I looked out the window. I daydreamed. I did not
do well in school.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
A funny thing.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
I did tests well, I think, if I recall correctly,
I got a perfect score on the P S A T,
which created a fair amount of excitement. But I still
was a dumb kid who did poorly. But I could read,
and I read a lot. And practice improves whatever it
(11:17):
is you're practicing, and that includes, of course reading. And
you know, maybe I read a lot to you know,
think less about the violence and the alcoholism and the
home just being honest with you. Or maybe I was shy,
or maybe I was escaping or retreating or hiding. I
have no idea, but I read a lot right and
(11:41):
found enjoyment there. And more significantly, I found a facility
with the language. There. I learned a lot of words.
I learned how to spell most of those words. I
learned how an English sentence is typically constructed. I learned
how his story is told. I learned a lot of
facts about life and history and such like that. And
(12:06):
when I found myself facing a new task, like when
I went in the army, I could read about it
and I could learn how to perform that task, uh successfully.
And you know, subsequently, I you know, I got into
the business of writing. I was a newspaper reporter, and
(12:28):
uh you know, subsequently got into the business of talking
being whatever. Hell, this is a professional microphone operator all
and I, you know, read almost continually still and all
of this, you know, and listen, I'm some friggin' jerk here.
But I've been able to, you know, with the Lord's
blessing support my family, educate my children with a skill set,
(12:55):
which largely came about simply because I could read. I
was able to, you know, socioeconomically, you know, move up
from you know, poverty to middle class simply because I
could read. What a powerful and important tool that was
for me, as it has been for countless others. It
(13:19):
may be the only effective tool other than being like
a professional athlete or something like that, or a really
great singer. It may be the only tool available to
most people to raise themselves up the ability to read.
And again, getting back to you know, the news out today,
(13:42):
less than half of New York students, in spite of
all the money we spend, right in spite of all
the power that the teachers' unions have, in spite of
everything that we focus on education, we fail at teaching
our kids how to read. The one thing that really matters,
(14:03):
the one thing that really counts. We fail at that,
and we steal from them their future, and we kind
of doom the society which we'll rest on their back.
Just being honest with you, this is Downtown Section third
Platoon on news radio Wham eleven eighty. Welcome back to
this Downtown Section third Platoon tonight. For no discernible reason
(14:26):
other than some bad news reported about the teaching of
reading in New York State, less than half of our
students grades three through eight can read a grade level.
And the unfortunate reality in this era of dumbing down
grade level is pretty dang low. Right, We here in
(14:48):
Rochester and named the airport after Frederick Douglas. We're very
proud of the twenty years that portion of his life
that Frederick Douglas spent in our town. We kind of
claim him as our own. But Frederick Douglas is an
illustration of the power of being able to read. Frederick Douglas,
(15:13):
of course, born into slavery. He was mistreated in one
circumstance where he was held in bondage.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
He was in association with.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
Little white boys and he sometimes could get them to
teach him letters. He was held in a bondage briefly
by this family where the woman, thinking it cute, sort
of taught him a little bit, uh, gave him a
(15:45):
little lessons in how to read. When that was discovered,
of course, that was stopped. And you know, but that
was the totality of any instruction in reading that he had. Right,
some little boys seven eight told him the name of
some letters and some kind of you know, nose in
(16:07):
the air. White lady almost playing a game, taught him
a little bit about sounding out words. And Frederick Douglas,
who while all this is going on, also had to
think of a way to escape and then find his
way to the north and avoid a fugitive slave slave catchers,
(16:29):
and make a living and make a life. Frederick Douglas
focused on learning how to read, and then once he
knew how to read again overwhelmingly he taught himself. He
taught himself. When he got north. He could ask people questions,
(16:50):
how do you pronounce this? What does this word mean?
How do I say this letter? What is ion?
Speaker 1 (16:57):
How does that? How do I pronounce that?
Speaker 2 (17:00):
He took a book called The Colombian Orator, which at
the time was kind of an old school textbook, which
was a collection of supposedly noteworthy speeches from history. I
have a copy of The Columbian Orator, to be honest
(17:22):
with you, I had one special printed so that I
could read what Frederick Douglas read. And you know, I
must not have the same fire in the belly that
he did, because I find it abysmal, not very good.
But Frederick Douglass studied it, studied it, studied it, studied it,
(17:45):
and he read the Bible, and he studied that, and
he studied that, and from those two books, the Columbian
Orator and the Bible, he developed his vocabulary, he developed
his reasoning, He practiced is speaking. He became one of
the best writers and speakers of the middle eighteen hundreds
(18:09):
in the United States. Not one of the best black
writers and speakers in the middle eighteen hundreds of the United States.
Not one of the best escaped slaves writers and speakers
of the middle eighteen hundreds the United States, but one
of the best writers and speakers in the middle eighteen
hundreds in the United States. You can read a Frederick
(18:29):
Douglas speech today and it still stands up. In fact,
you may not be able to understand it, because no
offense intended. You're not as smart as he was. He,
in the style of his day, sometimes used very complex sentences,
(18:50):
which are grammatically solid gold. Right back when they used
to diagram sentences. If you diagram a Frederick Douglas sentence,
it's coming out. Yes it's a big one. Yes it's complex.
But he took the way they spoke that day kind
of in complex fashion, and he almost perfected it right.
(19:11):
And I just use this example. That was a friggin
runaway slave, a guy who had nothing right, but he
had fire in the belly, he had a desire and
He through literacy, made not just the language written and
spoken his servant, but he rose to national prominence and
(19:33):
impacted the policies of the United States of America and
was a significant voice and force in the ending of
slavery and in a movement towards a better relationship toward
a black Americans based more in like what America is
(19:54):
supposed to be, and that came from reading and Frederick Douglas.
When James A. Garfield was inaugurated President, Garfield asked to
be escorted to the podium or the lectern. Rather onto
(20:15):
the podium to the lectern to be sworn in. He
hasked to be escorted out there by his own mother
and by Frederick Douglas. James Garfield was presented for the
oath of office by Frederick Douglas, and just a token
of who he was and what he meant. And all
(20:35):
of that came from the fact he knew how to read.
And so I look, for example, the city of Rochester,
which couldn't teach Einstein to read.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
I don't think.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
And you think about to be honest with you, it
is a district where you know, as a percentage, the
largest share of regional African American youngsters go to school,
and I think about what they are to derived of
the futures that they may be deprived of by the
fact they go to a school that, for whatever reason,
(21:09):
can't teach people to read. It's a crime against the
rising generation.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
And it's not just.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
The City of Rochester school district. Across the state, more
than half of our youngsters can't read at grade level,
and that is horrifying. That is a crime. This is
Downtown Section third Platoon on news radio Wham eleven eighty.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
Welcome back.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
This is Downtown Section third Patoon. I like scientists, right,
I mean they've done a lot of good things for us,
for example, a juicy fruit gum. Obviously, I believe scientists
are responsible for cap'n Crunch. It was scientists who made
(21:55):
I'm sure some good stuff, you know. I mean there's
a downside as well, also scientists who I think did Frankenstein. Right,
that's kind of an idea that got out of hand,
wasn't it, boys, you know, turning your lab coat. But
scientists are fine. They they're you know most of the time.
I think, sure, why not? Anyway, scientists are in the
(22:19):
news today. It is reported today that scientists asked AI,
AI design a virus for us?
Speaker 1 (22:33):
And I don't mean one of those nasty.
Speaker 2 (22:35):
Things you get from opening an attachment on an email.
I mean one of those nasty things that like can
kill you. I'm talking about like that that kind of virus,
a DNA with a crew pro protein coat that gets
up in your cells or something like that and somehow
takes them over and causes them to spew forth gazillions
(22:57):
of newly replicated viruses.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
So these scientists.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
People said, hey, AI, could you design a virus?
Speaker 1 (23:07):
AI said, hold my beer.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
And so it was that AI, from what we've been told,
designed several viruses. It's like, hell, this is easy, I'm saying,
and here's a deal. AI probably was bored right now.
Mostly AI is used to take pictures of old, ugly
(23:30):
hags on Facebook. It take their picture and make them
all look pretty. I'm saying, like, oh my gosh, holy
son of a gun. That's mostly what AI goes for now. Also,
AI is used to make posters denouncing data centers. But
these guys said, well, tell, let's make a virus. And
(23:52):
so the AI designed viruses, several of them. Okay, and
viruses designed by AI, which they've never existed in nature. Right,
this is a life form designed by artificial intelligence. I
(24:16):
mean like it wasn't made by God, right, wasn't involved
by Darwin. This came out of them friggin scientists, the
same guys who brought us Frankenstein. Okay, and this isn't
just a hypothetical, a theoretical. They have, these scientists people
(24:37):
the ability to Okay, we can make a DNA, right,
and so the AI created this. Here's the here's how
a virus would be. And so they then the scientists
made that virus. Okay, we can put those parts together. Okay,
but it's a lot like legos. I guess, I don't know,
(24:58):
probably cheaper. Nothing could be more more expensive than legos. Okay,
and at any rate, So scientists have made AI viruses,
and these viruses have functioned as viruses do, by you know,
penetrating a cell or something like that and whatever and
(25:19):
taking over and replicating and pew, a whole bunch more
come out. It is a life form. Now, granted, a
virus is not a great conversationalist. Okay, there have thus
far been no prominent viruses, say in the NBA. Okay,
but but but it's a life form and uh.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
And there it is.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
And this was reported earlier today by the New York
Times with excitement and glee, the scientists saying this will
be very good because now we can like make things
to like go fight other viruses, and we can do
a lot.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
This is like men.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
Since this would be so great, then there was a
comma and they did allow that. Of course, bad people
could make bad viruses, at which point, if you just
stopped and paused carefully, you could hear over in China
people saying, Ben, they're done that.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Yeah, so here's a deal.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
Humankind, with the help of AI, now has the ability
to create and craft viruses. That's remember the Frankenstein reference.
That's really bad, right. They have this thing called biological warfare.
I'm sorry you called it COVID, but they have this
(26:46):
thing called biological warfare, all right, and it's where well,
we could just give them all smallpox. Okay, why don't
we take the smallpox blanket and throw it over the
fence and when they sleep in it, they'll get smallpox.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Won't do that?
Speaker 2 (27:03):
Biological warfare this allows for the creation of viruses that
you know, could kill people and be communicable. And if
you think China isn't already working on this, if you
(27:25):
think Russia isn't already working on this, if you think
Iran's not already working on this, if you don't think
North Korea is already working on this, holy crap. You know,
I'll be honest with you. I may not be in
favor of data centers anymore. Ah, but anyway, scientists can
(27:48):
be our friends. But I do remember about Frankenstein. Okay, sure,
Brida Frankenstein was hot. Love that air baby. You wear
a gown like nobody's business. But any rate, so as
you try to go to sleep tonight, just think that
some squirrel brain and a lab coat is turning loose
AI to develop killer bugs right now. So that ought
(28:10):
to be that ought to be really swell. You know what,
if things get out of hand, though, we could always
call Fauci. He could help us out, no doubt. I
need to run from the banks of the Mighty Genesee
in Rochester, New York. This is Downtown Section, third Platoon,
and we are ten to seven on the night
Good evening.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
I'm Bob Lonsberg and from the banks the Mighty Genesee
in Rochester, New York. This is downtown section third Patoon.
My grandmother taught me how to read. She was ran
the cash register and kept the books at a gas station,
and she worked a twelve hour shift six to six.
And during those times when I was like three, four
(00:31):
and five living with her, I would go to work
with her, and you know, find things through the course
to day I keep myself occupied. And one of those
is there was always a newspaper laying around. It would
be a copy of The Evening Tribune, which then was
a locally owned and locally published newspaper down in Hornell,
(00:54):
New York, in Steuban County. Hornell, one of the more
illustrious suburbs of my hometown.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Can of Steel.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
So we'd be there at Texico Station. You can trust
your car to the man who wears the star. It
was Roy, he owned it. And then there's a guy
named Denny. Denny pumped gas and he was a mechanic.
And it was Roy and Denny and my grandmother and
me and the Evening Tribune. At any rate, sometimes I
(01:23):
get tired of messing around in the back or whatever
they had a fire truck. I don't know if there
was ever such a thing as a model tee fire
truck or what they had for fire trucks back in
that day. But Roy had in a garage behind the
gas station some fire truck of ancient design looked an
awful lot like chitty chitty bang bang. And I could
(01:46):
sit in there, and I could turn that wheel left
and right, and I could make siren noises, and I
could imagine that I was saving the world from fire till.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
The cows came home.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
But sometimes I'd be up there, sit with my grandmother,
watch the customers come, watch customers go, and in the
quiet moments. She who had started out life as a
school teacher. She graduated high school down in Angelica, eighteen
years of age. She went off for six months to
(02:17):
a normal school, it's what they called it then, and
there was a special program. Six months she learned how
to be a school teacher. And she went from that
immediately to teaching in a one room schoolhouse. Schoolhouse still
stands down in West Almond. And at any rate, she
stayed with a family, a family that had built the schoolhouse.
(02:41):
You know, fifty sixty years before, but she stayed with
the family down there. They had a bunch of kids
who were students. They had an older son, excuse me,
and they fell in love, got married. He became grandpa anyway.
But we're there at the gas station, and she would
get that evening tribune. When things were quiet, she'd sit
(03:04):
down there and she would point at the letters in
the newspaper right, And from that she taught me the
name of those letters, the ABC's, And so for a
while I'd look at the paper and do my ABC's.
Identify these twenty six little squiggles. I guess fifty two
(03:24):
if you consider the capital and the.
Speaker 1 (03:27):
Lower case, and those were my letters.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
And sometimes there'd be some extra paper and a pencil around.
Back then kids were not allowed to use pens, but
there'd be extra and a lot more people used pencils,
but there'd be extra paper and pencil around, and I
would draw the letters, write the letters based on the
what was there in the paper. That got me in
(03:53):
trouble when I went to kindergarten because in a newspaper
you probably haven't read read one of those years. But
in a newspaper they would print the typeface would be
what they called seraph right Sarah means foot and meaning
(04:13):
that there was like a little foot on the bottom
of the letter, and specifically in the lowercase are, there'd
be the little part that goes up and down. There'd
be a horizontal line at the bottom, there'd be the
part that comes over a semi circle to the right,
and then there'd be just a little bit that came
(04:33):
up and went back to the left at the top
on the left right. And that is a seraph lowercase R,
as printed in America's newspapers for about two hundred years. Well,
I go to kindergarten and can.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
You write your letters? Yes?
Speaker 2 (04:54):
I can, Yes, ma'am, okay, please write your letters. So
Missus Roach, Gene Roach, great lady used to sing us
puff the magic dragon as we laid down taking our naps.
I mentioned this before, but Missus Roach and her dear
husband Jim World War two vedroom.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
They're buried.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
I can't be more than twenty feet from the window
of her classroom. The cemetery is just next lot over
from the school in Canistello, and they got plots right there,
just outside her classroom window. But I wrote out my letters,
and everything was okay, except there was a little red
(05:35):
circle around the lowercase R. And she said, no, nothing
sticks off to the left on the top like that.
And I said, oh, yes, it does. You know, I
wasn't trying to be a pig head or whatever, but
yes it does. She said, no, it doesn't. And there
I am kindergarten student, you know, at screening, assuring her that,
(05:59):
oh yeah, yes, oh yeah, there's a thing that sticks
off to the left there. At any rate, I was
there at the gas station, and after I learned my abcs,
it was okay. Now we're going to learn that each
letter has typically a sound that is associated with it,
(06:21):
and you can learn the sounds that are associated with
very letter, various letters, and then you can look at
a word, which is a string of letters, and you
can make the sound of each one of those letters
in order. And there's a pretty good chance that the
sound you make will be a word, right, and you
(06:42):
will have just read a word. And so, sitting there
at the gas station, at the Texaco with the evening.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Tribune, I.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Was sounding out words, and at three and four I
was dazzling the customers, reading to them stories from the paper.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
What a young prodigy I was.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
But that's how I learned how to read. This is
downtown Section third Platoon on news radio. Why I'm eleven
eighty Welcome back this downtown section third Patoon. I told
the story in the last segment about how a little
while ago, my grandmother taught me how to read. She
ran the cast rechster kept the books at a gas
(07:25):
station down in Hornell, New York.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
In the day.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
She worked six to six every day, and I lived
with her some of my preschool years, and I went
to work with her and out of the newspaper down there,
the Evening Tribune, she taught me first my letters, and
then the sounds they made, and how to string those
sounds together, and how to read. She taught me how
(07:50):
to read out of a newspaper in between taking care
of customers at the gas station. And that's how I
learned how to read. By the way, oh maybe twenty
years or so after that, my first job in media
was as a reporter for that very newspaper, the Evening Tribune.
(08:15):
I ended up writing for the paper from whose pages
I had learned how to read. Anyway, I bring that
up because headline out today shows that less than half
of youngsters grades three through eight in the state of
New York can read at grade level.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
They are not proficient. Well, I would.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
Modify that sentence a little bit by cutting off the end.
More than half of youngsters in New York grades three through.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Eight can't read.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Right. Oh, maybe some sounded out or I don't know
if they teach them to do that anymore. But they
can't read, and they're not functionally literate. That's not uh. Oh, well, Bob,
that's that's in you in the city district.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Bob. No, it's pretty much all of them.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
It's a it's somewhere between an irony and a crime.
But New York State spends dramatically more per uh student
for education than any other state uh in the nation, right, I.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
I know.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
We here's the thing. I'm tempted to say that we
spend three times the national average per student. That that
may not be accurate. It may just be two times,
but I know it's at least two times the national
average per student spent in New York. Unfortunately, we have
some of the worst educational outcome in New York. There's
(09:53):
an odd uh situation with education spending an education outcome. Typically,
those states that spend the least have the best outcome,
and those states that spend the most have the worst outcome.
Heavily unionized states are the ones that spend the most.
(10:14):
But anyway, about the reading, that's the one thing you
need to learn, right, that's the one thing you need
to learn. I obviously went to high school down at Canasteele.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
I was a very poor student. I did not pay
attention to class.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
I fidgeted, I made jokes, I stared at pretty girls.
I looked out the window. I daydreamed. I did not
do well in school.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
A funny thing.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
I did tests well, I think, if I recall correctly,
I got a perfect score on the P S A T,
which created a fair amount of excitement. But I still
was a dumb kid who did poorly. But I could read,
and I read a lot. And practice improves whatever it
(11:17):
is you're practicing, and that includes, of course reading. And
you know, maybe I read a lot to you know,
think less about the violence and the alcoholism and the
home just being honest with you. Or maybe I was shy,
or maybe I was escaping or retreating or hiding. I
have no idea, but I read a lot right and
(11:41):
found enjoyment there. And more significantly, I found a facility
with the language. There. I learned a lot of words.
I learned how to spell most of those words. I
learned how an English sentence is typically constructed. I learned
how his story is told. I learned a lot of
facts about life and history and such like that. And
(12:06):
when I found myself facing a new task, like when
I went in the army, I could read about it
and I could learn how to perform that task, uh successfully.
And you know, subsequently, I you know, I got into
the business of writing. I was a newspaper reporter, and
(12:28):
uh you know, subsequently got into the business of talking
being whatever. Hell, this is a professional microphone operator all
and I, you know, read almost continually still and all
of this, you know, and listen, I'm some friggin' jerk here.
But I've been able to, you know, with the Lord's
blessing support my family, educate my children with a skill set,
(12:55):
which largely came about simply because I could read. I
was able to, you know, socioeconomically, you know, move up
from you know, poverty to middle class simply because I
could read. What a powerful and important tool that was
for me, as it has been for countless others. It
(13:19):
may be the only effective tool other than being like
a professional athlete or something like that, or a really
great singer. It may be the only tool available to
most people to raise themselves up the ability to read.
And again, getting back to you know, the news out today,
(13:42):
less than half of New York students, in spite of
all the money we spend, right in spite of all
the power that the teachers' unions have, in spite of
everything that we focus on education, we fail at teaching
our kids how to read. The one thing that really matters,
(14:03):
the one thing that really counts. We fail at that,
and we steal from them their future, and we kind
of doom the society which we'll rest on their back.
Just being honest with you, this is Downtown Section third
Platoon on news radio Wham eleven eighty. Welcome back to
this Downtown Section third Platoon tonight. For no discernible reason
(14:26):
other than some bad news reported about the teaching of
reading in New York State, less than half of our
students grades three through eight can read a grade level.
And the unfortunate reality in this era of dumbing down
grade level is pretty dang low. Right, We here in
(14:48):
Rochester and named the airport after Frederick Douglas. We're very
proud of the twenty years that portion of his life
that Frederick Douglas spent in our town. We kind of
claim him as our own. But Frederick Douglas is an
illustration of the power of being able to read. Frederick Douglas,
(15:13):
of course, born into slavery. He was mistreated in one
circumstance where he was held in bondage.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
He was in association with.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
Little white boys and he sometimes could get them to
teach him letters. He was held in a bondage briefly
by this family where the woman, thinking it cute, sort
of taught him a little bit, uh, gave him a
(15:45):
little lessons in how to read. When that was discovered,
of course, that was stopped. And you know, but that
was the totality of any instruction in reading that he had. Right,
some little boys seven eight told him the name of
some letters and some kind of you know, nose in
(16:07):
the air. White lady almost playing a game, taught him
a little bit about sounding out words. And Frederick Douglas,
who while all this is going on, also had to
think of a way to escape and then find his
way to the north and avoid a fugitive slave slave catchers,
(16:29):
and make a living and make a life. Frederick Douglas
focused on learning how to read, and then once he
knew how to read again overwhelmingly he taught himself. He
taught himself. When he got north. He could ask people questions,
(16:50):
how do you pronounce this? What does this word mean?
How do I say this letter? What is ion?
Speaker 1 (16:57):
How does that? How do I pronounce that?
Speaker 2 (17:00):
He took a book called The Colombian Orator, which at
the time was kind of an old school textbook, which
was a collection of supposedly noteworthy speeches from history. I
have a copy of The Columbian Orator, to be honest
(17:22):
with you, I had one special printed so that I
could read what Frederick Douglas read. And you know, I
must not have the same fire in the belly that
he did, because I find it abysmal, not very good.
But Frederick Douglass studied it, studied it, studied it, studied it,
(17:45):
and he read the Bible, and he studied that, and
he studied that, and from those two books, the Columbian
Orator and the Bible, he developed his vocabulary, he developed
his reasoning, He practiced is speaking. He became one of
the best writers and speakers of the middle eighteen hundreds
(18:09):
in the United States. Not one of the best black
writers and speakers in the middle eighteen hundreds of the United States.
Not one of the best escaped slaves writers and speakers
of the middle eighteen hundreds the United States, but one
of the best writers and speakers in the middle eighteen
hundreds in the United States. You can read a Frederick
(18:29):
Douglas speech today and it still stands up. In fact,
you may not be able to understand it, because no
offense intended. You're not as smart as he was. He,
in the style of his day, sometimes used very complex sentences,
(18:50):
which are grammatically solid gold. Right back when they used
to diagram sentences. If you diagram a Frederick Douglas sentence,
it's coming out. Yes it's a big one. Yes it's complex.
But he took the way they spoke that day kind
of in complex fashion, and he almost perfected it right.
(19:11):
And I just use this example. That was a friggin
runaway slave, a guy who had nothing right, but he
had fire in the belly, he had a desire and
He through literacy, made not just the language written and
spoken his servant, but he rose to national prominence and
(19:33):
impacted the policies of the United States of America and
was a significant voice and force in the ending of
slavery and in a movement towards a better relationship toward
a black Americans based more in like what America is
(19:54):
supposed to be, and that came from reading and Frederick Douglas.
When James A. Garfield was inaugurated President, Garfield asked to
be escorted to the podium or the lectern. Rather onto
(20:15):
the podium to the lectern to be sworn in. He
hasked to be escorted out there by his own mother
and by Frederick Douglas. James Garfield was presented for the
oath of office by Frederick Douglas, and just a token
of who he was and what he meant. And all
(20:35):
of that came from the fact he knew how to read.
And so I look, for example, the city of Rochester,
which couldn't teach Einstein to read.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
I don't think.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
And you think about to be honest with you, it
is a district where you know, as a percentage, the
largest share of regional African American youngsters go to school,
and I think about what they are to derived of
the futures that they may be deprived of by the
fact they go to a school that, for whatever reason,
(21:09):
can't teach people to read. It's a crime against the
rising generation.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
And it's not just.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
The City of Rochester school district. Across the state, more
than half of our youngsters can't read at grade level,
and that is horrifying. That is a crime. This is
Downtown Section third Platoon on news radio Wham eleven eighty.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
Welcome back.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
This is Downtown Section third Patoon. I like scientists, right,
I mean they've done a lot of good things for us,
for example, a juicy fruit gum. Obviously, I believe scientists
are responsible for cap'n Crunch. It was scientists who made
(21:55):
I'm sure some good stuff, you know. I mean there's
a downside as well, also scientists who I think did Frankenstein. Right,
that's kind of an idea that got out of hand,
wasn't it, boys, you know, turning your lab coat. But
scientists are fine. They they're you know most of the time.
I think, sure, why not? Anyway, scientists are in the
(22:19):
news today. It is reported today that scientists asked AI,
AI design a virus for us?
Speaker 1 (22:33):
And I don't mean one of those nasty.
Speaker 2 (22:35):
Things you get from opening an attachment on an email.
I mean one of those nasty things that like can
kill you. I'm talking about like that that kind of virus,
a DNA with a crew pro protein coat that gets
up in your cells or something like that and somehow
takes them over and causes them to spew forth gazillions
(22:57):
of newly replicated viruses.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
So these scientists.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
People said, hey, AI, could you design a virus?
Speaker 1 (23:07):
AI said, hold my beer.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
And so it was that AI, from what we've been told,
designed several viruses. It's like, hell, this is easy, I'm saying,
and here's a deal. AI probably was bored right now.
Mostly AI is used to take pictures of old, ugly
(23:30):
hags on Facebook. It take their picture and make them
all look pretty. I'm saying, like, oh my gosh, holy
son of a gun. That's mostly what AI goes for now. Also,
AI is used to make posters denouncing data centers. But
these guys said, well, tell, let's make a virus. And
(23:52):
so the AI designed viruses, several of them. Okay, and
viruses designed by AI, which they've never existed in nature. Right,
this is a life form designed by artificial intelligence. I
(24:16):
mean like it wasn't made by God, right, wasn't involved
by Darwin. This came out of them friggin scientists, the
same guys who brought us Frankenstein. Okay, and this isn't
just a hypothetical, a theoretical. They have, these scientists people
(24:37):
the ability to Okay, we can make a DNA, right,
and so the AI created this. Here's the here's how
a virus would be. And so they then the scientists
made that virus. Okay, we can put those parts together. Okay,
but it's a lot like legos. I guess, I don't know,
(24:58):
probably cheaper. Nothing could be more more expensive than legos. Okay,
and at any rate, So scientists have made AI viruses,
and these viruses have functioned as viruses do, by you know,
penetrating a cell or something like that and whatever and
(25:19):
taking over and replicating and pew, a whole bunch more
come out. It is a life form. Now, granted, a
virus is not a great conversationalist. Okay, there have thus
far been no prominent viruses, say in the NBA. Okay,
but but but it's a life form and uh.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
And there it is.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
And this was reported earlier today by the New York
Times with excitement and glee, the scientists saying this will
be very good because now we can like make things
to like go fight other viruses, and we can do
a lot.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
This is like men.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
Since this would be so great, then there was a
comma and they did allow that. Of course, bad people
could make bad viruses, at which point, if you just
stopped and paused carefully, you could hear over in China
people saying, Ben, they're done that.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Yeah, so here's a deal.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
Humankind, with the help of AI, now has the ability
to create and craft viruses. That's remember the Frankenstein reference.
That's really bad, right. They have this thing called biological warfare.
I'm sorry you called it COVID, but they have this
(26:46):
thing called biological warfare, all right, and it's where well,
we could just give them all smallpox. Okay, why don't
we take the smallpox blanket and throw it over the
fence and when they sleep in it, they'll get smallpox.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Won't do that?
Speaker 2 (27:03):
Biological warfare this allows for the creation of viruses that
you know, could kill people and be communicable. And if
you think China isn't already working on this, if you
(27:25):
think Russia isn't already working on this, if you think
Iran's not already working on this, if you don't think
North Korea is already working on this, holy crap. You know,
I'll be honest with you. I may not be in
favor of data centers anymore. Ah, but anyway, scientists can
(27:48):
be our friends. But I do remember about Frankenstein. Okay, sure,
Brida Frankenstein was hot. Love that air baby. You wear
a gown like nobody's business. But any rate, so as
you try to go to sleep tonight, just think that
some squirrel brain and a lab coat is turning loose
AI to develop killer bugs right now. So that ought
(28:10):
to be that ought to be really swell. You know what,
if things get out of hand, though, we could always
call Fauci. He could help us out, no doubt. I
need to run from the banks of the Mighty Genesee
in Rochester, New York. This is Downtown Section, third Platoon,
and we are ten to seven on the night
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