before going to MPU, while still in high school, they had me write an essay to assess my writing skills, and determine whether i had to take bonehead English. my teacher arranged through a friend for our whole class to take it and be graded by the actual MPU readers. on the 'verbal' portion of the SAT i had either a perfect score, or one notch less (because there had been a question where i saw the answer they expected, which was wrong, and i chose to answer correctly). in that first essay, i ranted about excessive government environmentalism, and how they would one day make a rule against walking in the woods. it came back with a c- grade. i decided that this meant that the people at MPU were liberals, and decided to be more crafty on the real test. i happened to read an in-depth article about the AR-15 being superior to the M-16 they adopted after politics mucked with it. the hero of the article was barry goldwater, but when i officially took the essay exam for MPU, i stuck to the facts, using the magic phrase 'no matter what your politics are....' after the test, i even argued the point with a green beret vietnam vet teacher, who told me i was wrong. i figured 'they' had deluded him too. i was not required to take the remedial class.