Impressive way to approach it. I think our Congress suffers from a lack of members trained in Engineering and Systems. If you run for office in my state you have my vote!

I disagree with your statement about Philosophy. I took a class in Logic and it may be the course that had the single, biggest impact on my future education, and how I looked at learning and education. I ended up taking a fair amount of Philosophy after that, and some of it was fairly worthless (except from a historical perspective, or learning how not to think), but that initial course in Logic altered my manner of thinking like no other class before or since.

“Most of the PoliSci majors I knew were trying to maintain good GPAs for admittance to law school and went out of their way to avoid any classes that may require work, or a challenge.”

That is very likely true in undergraduate PS programs, I suspect.
I was an “ME” (math-engineering) major then, rather than an “academ” (as the two overarching divisions were known at my alma mater; now it’s “STEM” and “useless”).
My master plan was to do the hard courses for stats and programming first, and the “easy” academic ones later, and it worked out fairly well. I cut my PhD program short because AesopSpouse was admitted to law school (!) in another state.
Some of the best people I’ve ever worked with were in my graduate school TA cohort, all very serious and dedicated. Except for Stuart the Communist, that is; even the other lefties didn’t like him.
At the time, there were still some conservative faculty and students, but the tilt was already trending. Since I became more conservative myself over the years, it’s probably just as well I got out of the discipline instead of beating my head against the wall in the Ivy Halls.

I understand the conventions. I just don’t understand all the wasted time prior to the conventions holding state by state votes of various degrees of effectivity. And why are any of the state votes open?

No offense applied regarding PoliSci majors, and I hope none was taken. Based on your comments here, you actually paid attention in class and have an obvious, genuine interest in political systems and how they present themselves across the modern world, and throughout history. The breadth and depth of your knowledge is impressive, as exhibited most recently on the Israel thread. Most of the PoliSci majors I knew were trying to maintain good GPAs for admittance to law school and went out of their way to avoid any classes that may require work, or a challenge.

I would make that the phone book of some solidly Republican city (should one be located), but definitely never trust the faculty of Harvard.

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2020/04/observations-on-the-great-hunkering-10.php

POSTED ON APRIL 20, 2020 BY STEVEN HAYWARD IN
• Sometimes you just can’t make up stuff like this:

—News item:

Harvard Nets Nearly $9 Million in Coronavirus Aid from Federal CARES Act

—News Item:

Shake Shack Returning $10 Million in Government Loan Meant for Small Business

Reminder: Harvard has a $40 billion endowment, which enjoys tax-free gains and distributions.

Prediction: Harvard won’t return the federal aid, which is on top the multi-millions it gets in federal aid every year already. And—going out on a limb here—Harvard won’t stop lecturing America about “greed.”

But they have a goood excuuuse.

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2020/04/21/trump-calls-on-harvard-to-pay-back-the-wuhan-coronavirus-relief-money-they-received-n2567367

Harvard responded to the controversy about receiving the funding earlier this week. Their excuse, while sitting on a multi-billion dollar back-up, did not go over well.

Copying tweets doesn’t work – they claim Harvard will give 100% to students for financial aid, instead of the mandated 50%, but don’t mention that it goes only to students who had Pell grants etc. to start with.

In some fairness to Harvard, the allocation for educational institutions was part of the bill and was done by formula, but apparently Harvard doesn’t have the same moral standards as Shake Shack, which said, essentially, they were doing fine and wanted the money to go to businesses who needed it more.

Or they could do something really generous, like this guy.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2020/04/21/georgia-restaurant-owner-sells-car-to-help-employees-n2567272

King Cuomo, on the same hand as Harvard, decided it was better to hurt some people directly in the expectation of maybe helping some other people later.

https://nypost.com/2020/03/25/cuny-boots-students-from-dorms-to-make-space-for-coronavirus-hospitals/