Socrates apparently. Oh and George Clinton. Well George Clinton has a “connection” to Socrates and Cornel West studies Socrates and both are environmental activists. Something like that. But no matter. West and Clinton honored a new New Jersey charter school called the “Barack Obama Green Charter School” whose stated mission is to “create independent critical thinkers capable of applying the principles of sustainability for the development of themselves, the community and the environment.” (school’s web page). The wording of the schools mission statement and the fact that its oriented around a specific ideology reminds me of the many religious private schools I’ve encountered over the years. (I’ve long held that environmentalism is a surrogate religious ideology for the theologically disenfranchised and this is another small bit of evidence. See my post here for another example.). I attended Saint Mary of Mount Caramel Catholic School for example. The charter school West and Clinton honored has a familiar ring.

That aside, it appears that Cornel West cannot only philosophize but jam:

Clinton, absent his famous dreads, even let West have the microphone during a typically stretched-out performance of the Funkadelic classic “I Got a Thing, You Got a Thing, Everybody’s Got a Thing.” (Considering his lyrical speaking style, the professor’s funk vocals were unsurprisingly right on the money.) The musician and the scholar traded lines like they’d been singing together for years.

I wonder what Socrates would have done.

See full article here.