August 28, 2003
Education: Bush flow dries
From the NY Times, Bob Herbert picks a theme familiar to BlogWood readers: (those are 2 different links, but both to BlogWood archives. Click away!)
He was going to be the education president, and during the campaign in 2000 he hugged kids from coast to coast, crowing about the education miracle in Texas and promising to spread the Texas model nationwide.
He said he was a different kind of Republican, a man of honor and compassion who would look out for the kids.
It was all smoke, of course — photo-ops in a cynical campaign. You knew it was smoke when the "compassionate" George W. Bush put Dick Cheney on the ticket, a former congressman who had voted against funding for Head Start, against subsidizing school lunches and against federal aid for college students.
In other words, against kids.
Next week the Senate will take up the education budget proposed for next year by the White House and Senate Republicans. From the perspective of those who are pro-children, it's loaded with bad news. Not only does the bill fall far short of the photo-op promises Mr. Bush made to provide funding for programs to improve public education, but it would actually cut $200 million from the president's very own (and relentlessly touted) No Child Left Behind Act.
...
As for the Texas education miracle — more smoke. The largest and most frequently praised district, Houston, is being monitored by the state after an audit showed that more than half of the 5,500 students who left school in the 2000-2001 year should have been counted as dropouts, but were not.
President Bush was apparently serious about bringing the Texas model to the nation. He made the superintendent of the Houston school district the nation's education secretary.
Posted by Norwood at August 28, 2003 12:22 AMGreat site, thank you for sharing it.
Posted by: reality porn site at July 28, 2004 06:44 AM