From: mwilson@ncratl.AtlantaGA.NCR.COM (Mark Wilson)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian,talk.politics.misc
Subject: Re: Bush Voucher plan != Educational Freedom
Keywords: voucher
Date: 11 Jan 93 18:20:04 GMT
Organization: NCR Engineering and Manufacturing Atlanta -- Atlanta, GA

In <1993Jan8.211901.29666@src.honeywell.com> sticks@sr71.mavd.honeywell.com (Karl Lieder) writes:

||| From: <24630@hacgate.SCG.HAC.COM> msheldon@luna.dpl.scg.hac.com 
||| Marti Sheldon says:
||| If I had a child, which I do not; and I could afford private school, 
||| which I probably could; and my neighborhood schools were understaffed,
||| underfunded, and unsafe, which fortunately for my area they are not, 
||| but most in my state are; I would send my child to private school.
||| Yet I would do EVERYTHING IN MY POWER to defeat the voucher system.
||
|| From: <82348@ncratl.AtlantaGA.NCR.COM> mwilson@ncratl.AtlantaGA.NCR.COM
|| Mark Wilson replies:
|| I just love this attitude.  I will do everything in my power to help
|| my own child, but for those of you who can't afford the best, well
|| screw you.
|| You have just said that you don't care how bad public schools get, you
|| favor forcing other people to send their children to them.
|| --

|Oh, very coy Mark!  I'm impressed.  You managed to twist the original
|desire to support public education (without any possible personal gain)
|into (your interpretation) a desire to force inferior education on
|"other people."

I'm just reading what you wrote, I'm sorry if you have trouble writing
what you mean.

|1. FACT - There are many students whose only educational option
|          is overcrowded, unsafe, and unlikely to adequately prepare
|          them for higher education or the work place.

Which is why a support reasonable vouchers, so that this will not be the
case.

|2. FACT - Funding vouchers out of general tax revenue, or public education
|          revenue will not in any way improve public education.

This is an opinion, not a fact.  Not even a very good opinion at that.

|3. FACT - The private schools in this country are NOT going to 
|          take a $1000 voucher as full payment for education and
|          transportation.

Which is why I support vouchers in the $3000 to $5000 range.
Or better yet, just take what the district spends on each child and give
it to that child in the form of a voucher.

|4. THUS - The only people who will benefit under the BUSH voucher plan
|          are those who can afford to send their kids to private
|          schools regardless (Probably 90%) and a tiny fraction of
|          people for whom a 1K boost in net income makes the
|          difference.

Who said I support the Bush plan?  Who said the Bush plan is the only
voucher plan around?  Sounds to me like you are trying to set up a
straw man so that you can knock it down.

|5. FACT - The Bush voucher plan has exactly Zero chance of enabling
|          the real poor to utilize private education.  What it will
|          do is funnel millions of dollars of public funds back into
|          the hands of those who are rich enough to afford private
|          schools, at the expense of public education.
|          - Another regressive tax, in the guise of "Educational Freedom"

I wonder why you keep harping on the Bush plan.  If you had mentioned the
Bush plan in your first post I wouldn't have disagreed with you so strenuously.
In your post you said that you opposed vouchers, from which I assumed that
you meant all voucher plans.  From your fixation on the Bush plan I can only
assume that you deliberately choose the worst plan in order to tar all the
others.  Doesn't say much for your intellectual honesty.

|OPINION - Anyone who really gives a damn about education in this country
|          belongs inside those same public schools, tutoring, mentoring,
|          coaching, etc!  Any teacher in the world can explain to you
|          that personal attention is directly linked to educational success.
|          So, keep your $5000-50000 in your pocket and your kids in public
|          schools, and then spend one hour a day with you kid working on
|          school!  If your IQ is above 80 your kid will be better off.

I find it amazing that anybody still thinks that the only way to get
something done is for the government to do it.  The absolute worst way to
do anything is to give the consumer only one option.  We have been trying
public education for the past 50 to 70 years.  Despite hugh increases
in the amount spent on public education, the quality of that education
has gone down steadily over this time.

Anyone who gives a damn about education should be working to improve
education.  Why do you limit yourself to public?

Do you believe that only public school kids get any attention?

If I spend time helping my kids learn, they will be better off, regardless
of whether they attend public or private schools.

|          In the mean time keep your hands off the precious few dollars
|          we can manage to get into the public educational system.

Spoken like a true ideolouge.  (sorry about the spelling, I attended public
school.)

|Re:       Mob rule doesn't become any prettier,
|          just because the mob start <sic> to call itself a government.

|          Absolutely true, and if you found someone in the LA riots or
|          Somalia calling themselves "the government" your comment would
|          be admirable.  However when the "mob" is freely and fairly
|          elected, and is a "mob" only because they don't mirror your
|          sense of order, you should probably consider yourself an
|          anarchist, and find yourself a desert island.

I just love this attitude.  If the majority wants it, it must be right.
-- 
Mob rule doesn't become any prettier, just because the mob start to call itself
a government.
It ain't charity if you are using someone else's money.
Mark.Wilson@AtlantaGA.NCR.com
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian,comp.org.eff.talk,soc.culture.usa,alt.activism