Democrats in the Federal government the past few years sent a couple hundred billion dollars to the teachers’ unions the schools to help them fund teacher vacations recover from the needless and destructive COVID lockdowns.

I shouldn’t be so cynical about the COVID lockdowns. After all, they did apparently prevent the pandemic from spreading to children, along with preventing asteroid strikes and on-campus bear maulings, all three of which were notably absent in 2020-2021.

Oops, I’m being cynical again.

OK, I’ll admit that, as an educational tool, the lockdowns were not entirely wasted. For example, one education that many of us received through the lockdowns was that we should be wary of our establishment’s susceptibility to mass hysteria and their desire to control society.

Another education we received was that the teachers’ unions, a/k/a, the child indoctrination division of the DNC, will go to any depths for more money and less work, all at the expense of taxpayers and the education of the nation’s children. “It’s for the children” is the most destructive, self-serving lie since “to each according to his needs.”

But here’s the billion-dollar question: We may have learned a few things during the lockdowns, but did the kids learn anything?

This is a multiple-choice question, so you have a chance of getting it right just by guessing. I figure your odds are about 25% (give or take – I’m a product of public schools). Here are your choices:

(A) No, nobody learnt nothin’

(B) Yeah, everybody learnt everythin’

(C) Some learnt stuff, others didn’t no-how-no-way

(D) All of ‘em

The answer is (C). According to recent data, average test scores are way down from pre-lockdown scores, and don’t show signs of recovering. It turns out that most children accomplish about as much with schooling-from-home as their parents accomplish with work-from-home. That’s no surprise.

The interesting thing, however, is that while average test scores are way down, the high scores are not. Good students found a way to be good students during and after the lockdowns. Although most kids didn’t learn stuff, those good students did – and just as much as before.

Those good students who prevailed over the lockdowns while other students succumbed to them, tend to be from wealthier families. The reason could be that wealthier families hired tutors (doubtful) or that wealthier families have parents who got involved in their kids’ education when the lockdowns hit (likely), or that kids from wealthier families are imbued with their wealthy parents’ motivation (probably), or that wealthier families tend to be whiter and white kids do better on standardized tests which are racially discriminatory and became more so during and after the lockdowns (c’mon!).

This data present an interesting philosophical and social question: If our brightest minds continue to burn brightly, does it matter that the rest of the population is fading fast?

The humanistic answer to that question is, yes, it matters a lot. That’s my intuitive answer, as well, as a semi-humanistic full-human.

But does it really matter? It’s a fact that the top 2% of the population are responsible for practically all of human achievement in – you name it – science, math, chess, athletics, art, adventure, innovation, and business. The top 2% would include Edison, Aristotle, Einstein, Musk, Magellan, da Vinci, Fischer, Newton, and all the rest who matter.

“The rest” of the 2% is a big number. It’s estimated that about 100 billion people have lived altogether. So 2% of them amount to some two billion humans and hominids. Even among the living humans, 2% would amount to nearly 200 million people. There would not exactly be a danger of extinction.

The other 98% of us have always lived off these geniuses. Without the top 2%, we’d still be in caves trying to figure out how to make that hot, burny stuff that natural lightning makes with no trouble at all. We’d be unable to even imagine a wheel, much less manufacture or use one.

(That top 2% pay the lion’s share of Federal income tax, too, but that’s a different column.)

So long as we have that top 2%, the rest of us are fine. In fact, if the top 2% gives us just a little bit more innovation in the form of artificial intelligence machines (such as HAL, depicted above, a quarter century past his prime) we won’t need even them.

Right now, the 98% are stupid but not happy – because we’re always jealous of that smart 2%. If we replace the smart 2% with smart machines, we could be both stupid and happy.

On the other hand, consider the possibility that the 2% — being clever creatures – are already fixing to replace the 98% with machines. They wouldn’t even have to be smart machines; stupid ones would do. Hmm.