The ongoing controversy over what to do about the financial meltdown has generated its defining cliche. Is there a politician in America who is not dedicated, at least rhetorically, to the proposition that “we need to help Main Street, not Wall Street”? Barack Obama and John McCain were all over this one in the debate last Friday, and I expect Sarah Palin and Joe Biden to echo them tonight.

The truth is that the Main Streets of America’s small towns and cities died years ago. Retail moved out to the bypass, first to strip malls and then to Wal-Mart. So did restaurants, as fast-food franchises and other chains replaced local diners, and the public library. Churches either moved or saw their congregations dwindle and age, with funerals far outnumbering baptisms...

Dear Mark,

The two cases you cited in your last post — the young whippersnapper on CBC declaring that “you can’t ask students to sit back passively and repeat what the teacher says any more” and the horrific results of the essay exam in Maine — demonstrate a crisis that goes far beyond the particular technological platforms that we have been discussing.

Simply put, there has been a steady and dangerous erosion of authority in teaching at all levels in America. It’s older than Facebook, even older than AOL. It’s not the fault of teachers (although many have been passive or complacent in its face). It’s not the fault of the students, who will bend toward short-term rewards and away from short-term costs no matter when they were...

Dear Mark:

Thank you for having me as a guest in your blog this week. I have admired the ways you have used this space to puncture one of the chief myths we both abhor: the notion that if some technology is good, then more must be better. Perhaps I even understated your aversion to the role of technology in education. But let’s get into that later.

Clearly, judging from our two essays published this week in The Chronicle Review, we share many concerns. But our approaches scrape up against each other in some places as well. Let me start with the conclusion to your essay, to which I must take qualified issue:

“So let’s restrain the digitization of all liberal-arts classrooms,” you wrote....

Almost all of us can remember America’s reaction to 9/11. In the days following the horrendous event many defensive initiatives were taken and, since two of the perpetrators were foreign students, one reaction was to restrict access to America’s colleges and universities. Barriers were imposed overseas, visas became difficult if not impossible to get. Personnel in American embassies were frosty, if not outright rude, to inquiries from those interested in enrolling as undergraduate or graduate students. When I was traveling in China, numerous students told me about their visa problems. Later, in a meeting in Beijing with our ambassador, he acknowledged the unusual circumstances and the problems they were causing both for his staff and Chinese nationals.

I myself received calls from several Middle Eastern ambassadors to the U.S. asking if I couldn’t be...

Take a walk on the wild side, sings Lou Reed over my cheap radio. I’m taking the Valium that the doctor gave me, and I feel I’m only getting a staccato version of my life. I can’t even imagine my life. There’s nobody I’ve ever met and wanted to be. Nobody comes from the same place and goes to where I want to go. Once again there are railway stations right beyond my window and way beyond my reach. Places I might end up but who knows. No one would have expected me in London and Cambridge or Hanover for that matter. I’ve traveled far, and it isn’t well measured in miles. I’m not bragging (or am I?) but I’m in seats where no one would have expected to see me. So? What would I have expected anyway? A house and kids by 22, living in Long Beach or Queens, and having screaming fights with a husband near a screen window with a tear in it...

When faced by another’s success, why do we often hear a scratchy inner voice hissing, “Does he really deserve that?” Is it just envy that makes us feel that way? Or is there something more sophisticated, darker, more complex, more intricate, woven into this design?

Probably not. It’s probably envy. And it isn’t pretty.

The wish to have achieved, accomplished, or owned something of similar illustriousness and slightly more fabulousness to that which has been achieved, accomplished, or owned by our friends isn’t the most adorable part of ourselves, even if it is the most universal.

Isn’t there somewhere inside of us where we all wonder, “Why did she get this and I didn’t? Why does he like her better than he likes me? How come she got a raise? Why did she get a grant, he get a promotion, they get books...