Zirra, What's up with Nigerian politics?

I'm curious as to what is going on in Nigeria. I just learned that their vacant presidency has been filled by a gentleman by the name of Goodluck Jonathan. If I heard correctly, Mr. Jonathan had been serving as Vice President. Zirra, I wonder if you would be willing to take a few minutes either in class or here to explain the context of the current political crisis, and what you think of Mr. Jonathan. That's quite a name for anyone, let alone the president of the most populous African country!

While I'm "picking on Zirra" to serve as a tutor to the rest of us who are, like me, not well informed on Nigerian political developments of late, let me solicit a similar initiative from others in the seminar. Please bring with you to class your choice of most interesting news story of the week (or two) to complement our final formal appraisal of the Ricci volume. If you've not done so, you should be ordering your copy of the Friedman volume, Hot, Flat and Crowded 2.0 for the week or two following Monday's class.

Though unable to attend Monday night's class, my un-named intelligent assets have delivered a classified report on the group's efforts. I'll be interested to see if those reports are validated by appraisals from class members themselves.

Remember, our micro-miniature experiment with democracy in this class -- in designing a seminar that measures up to our hopefully-internalized standards of excellence without the professor taking the lead in doing so -- is itself a large compenent of the "curriculum" in PS460. I'd be less than candid, were I to say that progress thus far with this format has been an unqualified success. There have been a few of you who have assumed virtually the entire load of responsibility for posting to this blog. A number of you have yet to contribute a sentence. Does this mean you would be happy with others "carrying the ball" when the group is small enough to make maximum feasible participation a realistic prospect for all who are enrolled in the class. I will be visiting with those of you who have thus far failed to participate in any visible, meaningful way in using the opportunity you've been given to claim ownership of your formal education. I've commented publicly on the horrid performance of last year's seminar -- the childish, immature cliques, the declaration by many non-participants that their virtual silence and free-loader approach to the class was somehow the fault of those who didn't like them. I'm not sure what's preventing the current group from getting on with it, but I can say that you have a right to feel good about your work and progress in this class when it's finished and you look back on it. I would hate to think that there are members who have already concluded that this format or a challenging book are too much to expect a group of advanced undergraduates to take on and make of the experience a productive and fun learning experience. But I'm unwilling to pretend that this group is unable to do better. If Abhay is not the only one that's a bit "off his game," then we need to ask what the game actually is, and what is it that might interfering with "A-game" performance to the maximum extent feasible. Enough speculating; all look forward to your own thoughts as we move forward.

Cheers,
DT