When you get my age, a favorite pastime is to bitch about how young people today, they don't know nuthin.  In that spirit I offer this New York Times story that confirms to the world that young people today, they don't know nuthin.

Based on this survey, the story points out a few distressing factoids:

• Three-quarters of high school seniors could not name a power granted to Congress by the Constitution
• Fewer than half knew the purpose of the Bill of Rights
• Only 1-in-ten knew anything about the checks and balances among the three branches of government.

Which leads us to suspect that young people today, they don't know nuthin.  As the NYT story reports:

“Today’s NAEP results confirm that we have a crisis on our hands when it comes to civics education,” said Sandra Day O’Connor, the former Supreme Court justice, who last year founded icivics.org, a nonprofit group that teaches students civics through Web-based games and other tools.  

Of course we don't really test on civics knowledge, at least not in a world of No Child Left Untested. My own high school children would do well, but they have the advantage of taking AP American History and a class in Government.  Apparently most do not, because some of the questions are so straightforward as to be, well, straightforward.