Hoary Old Chestnuts Roasting....

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On Hardball Wednesday, the discussion turned to education, and Salon's Joan Walsh pointed out that John Boehner's sad, sad tears about children mean nothing compared to the lack of action and effort by Boehner to actually improve the lives of children. Right on cue, Michelle Bernard trotted out yet again the magic word of conservative ideologues everywhere: vouchers.

Please.

What good's a voucher going to do for a poor kid whose tuition would be thousands of dollars more than the value of a voucher? What good's a voucher going to do when the next nearest school to the rural combined school is twenty miles away on country highways covered with ice and snow this year.

Walsh had it right. Vouchers are a panacea. The typical grab-a-buzz-word tactic of the right. Shallow. Clipped. About as much value as my spaniel's toenails.

So maybe Boehner ought to dry his poor-poor-me-I-have-to-see-what-I-should-be-doing tears. Pack away the golf clubs and the country club memberships. Visit schools every single week.

And Michelle Bernard. Maybe she ought to chip her manicure a bit by going into a DC school with a paintbrush.

Teachers unions aren't the problem, as follow-up guest Michelle Rhee noted. They're doing their job. It's the rest of us that aren't doing ours.

So to Boehner and Bernard and the ideologues on the right, how about taking in a holiday movie this Christmas season. Waiting for Superman.

Education means all the kids...fix the problems. Don't just divide and favor the vouchered few.
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crossposted at firedoglake/MyFDL

Book Larnin' Brouhaha

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Never let it be said that the Rethuglicans would waste any opportunity to turn anything...repeat, anything...into an opportunity to politicize and partisanize and disrespect this President.

The Republicans—who have spent August re-living the Florida 2000 Brooks Brothers riots with the 2009 edition: tea parties and rants at town halls—now that it's back-to-school time in America, are busily attacking the President's upcoming talk to the kids about education.

Let's be clear. When a Republican governor in oh, say, Minnesota, attacks the President's speech to children and there's talk of not allowing any school in Minnesota to air the speech, that's not only anti-education...and anti-history...and anti-American...it is racist.

So if that's the campaign strategy folks like Tim Pawlenty see as the route to success in 2012, all I can say is: enough.

And to those who have in some quarters finally started asking if the Rethuglicans have no shame, the answer is no. All they have is no.

And that's what you need to know each and every time a Republican politician or pundit speaks these days. They offer nothing except divide and destruct.

Republicans are the party of "We ain't got nuttin' but no...."
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crossposted at firedoglake's The Seminal

Pell Grants = Jobs, Senator Nelson

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ThinkProgress is reporting that Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson may oppose the stimulus package because of--get this--Pell Grant funding.

Excuse me?

More Pell Grant funding = more students who can afford to go to college = more students who need teachers to teach them at that college = more jobs for college-level teachers.

Jobs.

Sounds to me like the good Senator may need to go back to college for some remedial arithmetic and critical thinking.

This message brought to you by the parent of a doctoral teaching assistant.
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Prairie Listening Post

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There's a lot of high-steria flying through the airwaves right now about the state of our economy.

Thought you might be able to use a bit of calm reasoning and forward thinking instead:



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Hey, kids...convinced you'll nevah-evah use some dopey subject like high school algebra so why study? Just so you know, this embed was bleedin' off the page before I put the ol' high school sophomore math equationing to work and made it smaller. Perfect-O.
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h/t to Josh's place for the signpost

Is Our Children Learnin'?

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Not if the Current Occupant has his way about it...

Dollars allocated for the Reading Is Fundamental [RIF] in the Bush budget? Zero

Because if there's one thing Bush has learned...

oh, wait.

He's learned nothing.

The rest of us, well, we'll need to make sure our Congresspeople safeguard this most fundamental part of governance and democracy.

I know, quaint. So pre-9/11. Let 'em hear you roar.