From: Kevin Carey

To: Diane Ravitch, Richard Rothstein, and Ben Wildavsky

Subject: Looking for answers to the problems plaguing education? Diane Ravitch doesn't offer them. 

Long-lost reader EC writes:

Something wonderful, or terrible, is taking place in Philadelphia. The city's sports fans, whose only consistent love has been for an inanimate object--the statue of Rocky--are becoming warm and fuzzy.

Whatever happens in the National League and American League Championship series unfolding over the next week or so, one outcome has already been decided--the effective end of the theories of Moneyball as a viable way to build a playoff-caliber baseball team when you don't have the money. That no doubt sounds like heresy to the millions who embraced Michael Lewis's 2003 book, but all you need to do is keep in mind one number this postseason: 528,620,438.

When Major League Baseball let George Steinbrenner resume active ownership of the New York Yankees after his celebrated two-and-a-half-year banishment in 1993, it was like Commissioner Gordon telling Batman that the Joker had once again escaped from prison: it was only a matter of time before Gotham would be held hostage to some new outlandish threat. True to form, Steinbrenner soon began making noises about moving the Bronx Bombers out of the Bronx home where they've been for seventy-two years.