A recent columnist suggested that high schools should skip the “hard” math because most people will never use it.] [This is as absurd as suggesting that schools shouldn’t bother to teach students advanced vocabulary since most people will never use it.] [Innumeracy is a public scourge, leading to all kinds of misunderstandings about things that are vital to good public policy.] [The strength of our democracy itself rests in the hands of those very teachers whom you columnists would seek to cast aside for wasting our children’s time.] We need to teach math -- even the “hard” stuff -- to every single student. is it reliable or unreliable argument.