From: larry@peak.psl.nmsu.edu (Evil Engineer doin' it the Cowboy Way)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.bush
Subject: Re: Public Education (Was: Re: Family Leave)
Date: 13 Oct 92 19:13:33 GMT
	<1992Oct1.133331.2763@news.uiowa.edu> <5948@news.duke.edu>
Followup-To: alt.politics.bush
Distribution: usa
Organization: New Mexico State University, MetaPhysical Science Laboratory

In article <5948@news.duke.edu> lanier@acpub.duke.edu (Dustin Lanier) writes:

   In article <1992Oct1.133331.2763@news.uiowa.edu> williams@herky.cs.uiowa.edu (Kent Williams) writes:
  >Let's get down to cases -- Norfolk Public Schools.  The public schools
  >are for poor people.  Nobody of any means send their kids to public schools.
  >The public schools suck.

  and why do you think public schools suck? Why do you think no one wants to 
  go there? Because our school systems have stagnated.  because there is no 
  competition in the school system and the schools are don't have to respond
  to anyone!  School choice gives power to the parents of children who can't
  afford to send their kids to private schools.

<<And here I thought it was because the Ten Commandments weren't posted and
we didn't have a short prayer and Bobble lesson every morning..>>

   >My parents, good liberals that they were, moved to Norfolk and put two

   Good liberals move to Norfolk?

   >kids (my younger brother and sister) in public school.  Having moved
   >from Iowa, where the public schools are excellent, they thought "how
   >bad can it be?"  They were uncomfortable with the elitist aspects of
   >private school.
   >
   >After two years, they had to bail out and put the kids in private
   >schools.  The schools in Norfolk weren't just not as good as Iowa's,
   >they were a travesty.  There is an de facto two tier system -- one for
   >white people with money, and one for poor people.  And the private
   >schools are accountable to no one except the parents who send their
   >kids.

  Evidently you were a member of the white people with money tier.  And who
  should schools be accountable to if not the parents?  Let me explain how 
  supply and demand work with school choice ... If parents are spending their
  money on school you can be damn sure that school is going to work their asses
  off to make it as good as possible, and you better believe they will be 
  willing to discuss the direction of the school with the parents of
  children there.

  Why should only rich parents have this luxury?  So what would you do?
  evidently you have decided that public schools are unsavable. You were put 
  in a private school, what about people who don't have that choice? think 
  about someone other than yourself.

Yeh! So what we need is to come up with a way where we can use public funds
to subsidize private education! Affluent mommy and daddy are already
paying too much taxes, eh?

  >Bush's school choice platform ratifies systems like Norfolk, and moves
  >backwards from the United States historical commitment to universal
  >education.  It is just one more way that Bush wants to divide the
  >country into winners and losers, and to penalize the losers for being
  >born.

  school choice will make the schools respond to the people that go to their 
  schools. What power do they have now?  if your parents wanted to do something
  about that school, the principal could have told you "Fuck off, what are you
  going to do?  The government forces your kid to go here no matter what
  you say and if you don't like it send your kid to a private school." You say
  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well, if you can't stand the idea of your kid having to attend this
*public* school, like every other kid in the neighborhood, I think that is
a fair option to you. 

And you're wrong if you think you don't have quite a lot to say about the
use of public funds for public education. (You will, however, have to
actually make some attempt to get involved. You can start by joining the
PTA, and meet some of those evil teachers eyeball to eyeball..) 

Or, you have a perfect opportunity here to exclude the government completely
from the education of your child. Can it be that you really just want the 
government to subsidize your child's attendance at a private school with funds
removed from the public school system? If so, you'll probably have to put
up with some Government regulations and controls over the private school.
Public monies always have strings attached.

  your parents wanted to avoid an elitist atmosphere, yet you avoided public
  schools through private ones, so give me a break ... you have given your 
  opinion as blatant fact with not one reason for why it is a bad idea.  You
  clearly don't understand this issue because it is one that takes power OUT
  of the hands of big amourphous government and teacher union's hands and
  puts it exactly where it belongs ... in the hands of the parents.

Empower yourself! Pay for your own private education all you want. But
don't ask to have your "share" of public education money back because you
don't choose to participate in the public education system. 

(BTW, Dustin, I don't have any children, and I still pay all kinds of
taxes for education. If we taxpayers do have some remedy to avoid the portion
of taxes we pay for services and goods we don't use or want, then I have a
whole list of things I don't wish to pay for:

	B2 bombers,
	loan guarantees to Iraq,
	jet airplane trips to the dentist for Sununu,
	storage of rotting grain surpluses,
	endless "studies" by my city government,
	the defense of Europe and Japan,
	capitol hill beauty salons for government employees,
	social security receipients who never paid any,
	spaced based ICBMs,
	that new stretch of highway north of El Paso,
	S & L bailouts,
	banking bailouts (coming soon),
	agricultural department bureacrats,
	MFN status for Red China,
		:
                :     )

Public education? OK. Welfare? OK. AIDS research? OK. I'll pay.

  >Kent Williams

  Dustin Lanier
  lanier@acpub.duke.edu

L.
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Disclaimer: Opinions expressed here are CORRECT, mine, and not PSLs or NMSUs..
Oh sure, we could do it the _easy_ way. But it just wouldn't be the COWBOY WAY.
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