[ColinWright]

  > 99% of kids who were "always good at math"
  > will continue to be good at math in college.

As someone who works as a part-time teaching fellow at a UK University, this does not match my experience. I find that many who do well at school do not, in truth, understand what they're doing. Some do, but many have become adept at magically divining the right process to follow, and then following it without mistakes.

So your claim that this is "a rant against a straw man" does not match my experience. As a result, I'd be interested to know what leads you to make the claim I quote. Do you have figures, or personal experience? And are you talking about math as in Analysis, Number Theory, Logic, Topology, and similar, or are you talking about "Math Methods" such as are required in subjects such as Physics and Engineering?

For reference, this:

  > The much bigger and real tragedy of math education
  > in the US is the very large percentage of kids who
  > have been labeled as "not good at math". Those kids
  > 99% of the time are actually plenty good at math but
  > have fallen out of the system because of frustration
  > and a poor fit for their learning style.

That is absolutely true., and is why I give some 150 talks every year to school age kids, trying to encourage them to engage (continue, return, or start) with math.