‘The Wild Ones’

Re: “The Wild Ones: Lee Marvin:The Coolest Lethal Weapon”, Arts + article: As read, with some disbelief, Mr Bennett’s paean to Lee Marvin and his trashing of John Ford I kept thinking of two movies. One was a Ford film of the 1930’s called “The Informer” which won for Victor Maglaglan a best actor oscar for his portrayal of a member of the Irish rebellion who is desperate for money and informs on a buddy for the reward money. It is one of the finest films ever made. The other was “The Pawnbroker” for which Rod Steiger won nomination for best actor. He lost to Lee Marvin, who got it for “Cat Ballou”. This had to be either the worst or one of the worst judgment calls in Academy Award history. I recommend that Mr. Bennett see these two movies.

Dave M. O’Neil
New York, N.Y

‘The Unfairest of Them All’

In response to Andrew Wolf ‘s “The Unfairest of Them All” (May 11, 2007), the Department of Education’ Fair Student Funding initiative is driving new money into schools that have not gotten their fair share historically. While Mr. Wolf says that the initiative “looks a lot like income redistribution, no redistribution is occurring. Every school is receiving at least as much as it would have received under the old system. And all schools are receiving additional dollars from reductions in bureaucracy.

What is true is that schools with high levels of poverty and need are receiving most of the new resources from Fair Student Funding. But that is as it should be: these schools face the largest challenges, their performance is weakest, and they have been historically short-changed by funding formulas that punish schools with less experienced teachers. This said, new money is flowing to under-funded low-poverty schools such as P.S. 6 on the Upper East Side. The formula is even-handed, looking at schools and students rather than politics and past practices.

Mr. Wolf ‘s remaining points are also unimpressive. He ccomplains that the program’s “central premise” is that “the quality of education is tied to the number of dollars spent.” If Mr. Wolf believes money does not matter, why has he written this column? In fact, our premise is that money can matter – provided that schools are held accountable for spending it well. Under the new reforms, every school is graded “A” to “F” based on results; every principal’s job is on the line for results. And a state-of-the-art data system will give schools the tools to tailor education to meet students’ needs.

Mr. Wolf charges that the new formulas will be subject to political manipulation. As though the old formulas were not? In fact, the new formulas bring tough judgments into the open, instead of hiding them behind a haze of incomprehensible adjustments.

Finally, Mr. Wolf complains about the size of the “weights” for English Language Learners, while neglecting to note, as we did on our public materials, that most of these dollars are from pre-existing programs consolidated into Fair Student Funding.

Robert Gordon, Managing Director of Resource Allocation
New York, N. Y.

‘Despite Being No. 2 for Health, Taiwan Is Blocked From WHO’

Re: “Despite Being No. 2 for Health, Taiwan is Blocked From WHO” (Benny Avni, May 11). If the Chinese diplomat you quoted really wants to make a comparison between Taiwan’s capabilities and China’s, it will soon become apparent just which country is “walking ” and which is “flying.”

As evidenced by having been ranked by The Economist as having the world’s second-best health system, Taiwan has achieved remarkable success with a state-of-the-art, universal healthcare system and a history of such accomplishments as having been the first country in the world to completely eradicate polio. China, by contrast, has the world’s second-highest TB infection and mortality rate, and only 21% of its rural residents have health insurance. Who is flying here?

Taiwan deserves WHO participation because of its immense achievements. And the rest of the world deserves to benefit from Taiwanese expertise. In our global age, diseases know no borders, and the world cannot afford to have a gap in its healthcare system — nor can the world afford to lose out on what Taiwan has to offer.

Ben Shao,
Director of Press Division of Taipei Economic and Cultural Office
New York, N. Y

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