Here's a truly sinister development: an elementary school in Oakland is teaching its student "mindfulness," or, as the article definies it, "stress-reduction techniques drawn from Buddhist meditations." I'm not opposed to dealing with hyperactive children, but this mixture of New Age psychobabble ("Practitioners tend to use sticky-mat buzzwords like 'being present' and `cultivating compassion,' while avoiding anything spiritual") and diluted religion only feeds my suspicion that we're not producing educated children -- we're babying them until they go to college, after which they embrace positive values and Paolo Coehlo.