What's the Case for Hillary?

[Torie]

What I particularly liked (agreed with), about Krauthammer's essay, was his pointing out the real dirty little secret. The standard of living of those less educated on the Fruited Plain is stagnating, tanking, disintegrating, not because of free trade or evil, rapacious and cunning foreigners, but rather because of the information age ... and those damn robots. But there is no easy fix for that (probably no fix at all), so thus the lash out against those outside our nation, and inside our nation who shouldn't be here in Trump's world. Just demonize the other, and demonize them some more. We have seen that done in the past, and the outcomes where such demagoguery has worked,  are almost invariably most unhappy ones.

[Torie]

Hmm, maybe the fact that she actually has a higher education plan?

When she embraces school choice, and merit pay on steroids combined with firing incompetent teachers, at least for those trapped in down market zip codes where the educational choices are all bad, get back to me.

If the only issue that mattered out there were secondary education policy, and competence and temperament and so forth was something one felt free to ignore (it obviously isn't), I would vote for Trump in a heart beat. This is a really good example of why it is most unwise to be a one issue voter, now isn't it?

[Torie]

We are not on the same page on this one at all Beef. But it is a bit off topic, so well, another time perhaps we can debate this most important issue in more depth. Some are into measuring educational quality by the metric of inputs, others like to focus on what the output is. The disconnect between the inputs and the outputs has been quite tragic in my opinion. Heck, here in Hudson, we I think we are spending about 25K per pupil now. And the results suck.

[Torie]

We are not on the same page on this one at all Beef. But it is a bit off topic, so well, another time perhaps we can debate this most important issue in more depth. Some are into measuring educational quality by the metric of inputs, others like to focus on what the output is. The disconnect between the inputs and the outputs has been quite tragic in my opinion. Heck, here in Hudson, we I think we are spending about 25K per pupil now. And the results suck.

I have many friends who are teachers and I know personally the struggle they go through and how much of student outcome is out of their control.  Especially in Wisconsin, where Scott Walker has done everything in his power to make public teachers miserable, and teachers and their unions are vilified.  So my point of view is probably biased.

We are all biased by our experiences Beef. Heck, my views have changed a fair amount since I moved to Hudson -  based on my experiences. There is nothing wrong with that really.

[Torie]

"But letting white kids flee schools with minorities is complete bullsh-t."

Thus the suggestion to start with really poor and dysfunctional school districts, where that specter will not obtain. And there is nothing wrong with a cocktail of approaches, including magnet schools, and creating a professional track for teachers, so those who are good at what they do, are very well paid, thus attracting more talented persons into the profession. We can experiment with various approaches. But let's get the ball rolling moving in the right direction. Let's do it now.

[Torie]

"But letting white kids flee schools with minorities is complete bullsh-t."

Thus the suggestion to start with really poor and dysfunctional school districts, where that specter will not obtain. And there is nothing wrong with a cocktail of approaches, including magnet schools, and creating a professional track for teachers, so those who are good at what they do, are very well paid, thus attracting more talented persons into the profession. We can experiment with various approaches. But let's get the ball rolling moving in the right direction. Let's do it now.

Which candidate, again, is willing to do the work and research to patch together the piecemeal plan that could begin to get this ball rolling...?

I'm not running.

[Torie]

Blaming the parents is not going to improve the situation. The issue is what to do, given such feckless parents, to mitigate their impact, isn't it?

[Torie]

Hmm, maybe the fact that she actually has a higher education plan?

When she embraces school choice, and merit pay on steroids combined with firing incompetent teachers, at least for those trapped in down market zip codes where the educational choices are all bad, get back to me.

If the only issue that mattered out there were secondary education policy, and competence and temperament and so forth was something one felt free to ignore (it obviously isn't), I would vote for Trump in a heart beat. This is a really good example of why it is most unwise to be a one issue voter, now isn't it?

I'm a big supporter of public or genuine non-profit charter schools but I don't agree with merit pay.  I agree that it should be much easier to fire incompetent teachers but I don't think they are a major reason for any problem in the education system.

However, as Republicans normally will tell you, non college education is a state and local matter, the U.S government should not be dictating to them any of these things.

I found it a little odd that Republicans seemed to embrace Trump's call (or actually one of his son's call) for the federal government to impose charter schools on the states.

As an ex Pub, I can tell you, that almost for the entirety of my Pub existence, I was left cold by the idea of federalism and states' rights, and indeed the whole doctrine of subsidiarity (yes, I know, unusual for a Pub). Sure localities are good to conduct experiments in, but after one finds out what works, our kids are just too important to be left twisting slowly, slowly in the wind, because various localities just don't give a damn, and prefer the dysfunctional status quo, or whatever. What we have now just isn't working. Just like with cities and counties vis a vis the states (they exist solely at the pleasure of the states), so too, states should exist solely at the pleasure of the federal government. I disagree with that aspect of our Constitution that provides otherwise, for historical reasons known to us all. But then I also favor a parliamentary system of government. Our system, in a word, basically sucks. As you can see, I am not gearing up to run for state or federal office.

[Torie]

Hmm, maybe the fact that she actually has a higher education plan?

When she embraces school choice, and merit pay on steroids combined with firing incompetent teachers, at least for those trapped in down market zip codes where the educational choices are all bad, get back to me.

If the only issue that mattered out there were secondary education policy, and competence and temperament and so forth was something one felt free to ignore (it obviously isn't), I would vote for Trump in a heart beat. This is a really good example of why it is most unwise to be a one issue voter, now isn't it?

I'm a big supporter of public or genuine non-profit charter schools but I don't agree with merit pay.  I agree that it should be much easier to fire incompetent teachers but I don't think they are a major reason for any problem in the education system.

However, as Republicans normally will tell you, non college education is a state and local matter, the U.S government should not be dictating to them any of these things.

I found it a little odd that Republicans seemed to embrace Trump's call (or actually one of his son's call) for the federal government to impose charter schools on the states.

As an ex Pub, I can tell you, that almost for the entirety of my Pub existence, I was left cold by the idea of federalism and states' rights, and indeed the whole doctrine of subsidiarity (yes, I know, unusual for a Pub). Sure localities are good to conduct experiments in, but after one finds out what works, our kids are just too important to be left twisting slowly, slowly in the wind, because various localities just don't give a damn, and prefer the dysfunctional status quo, or whatever. What we have now just isn't working. Just like with cities and counties vis a vis the states (they exist solely at the pleasure of the states), so too, states should exist solely at the pleasure of the federal government. I disagree with that aspect of our Constitution that provides otherwise, for historical reasons known to us all. But then I also favor a parliamentary system of government. Our system, in a word, basically sucks. As you can see, I am not gearing up to run for state or federal office.

Yes, but if you are consistent with your beliefs, you shouldn't want education to be a federal responsibility, because a Democratic Administration might ban all charter schools.

Then you toss them out in the next election. And the beauty with a parliamentary system, is then the other side really has the power to change course, as opposed to well, having to get 60 votes in the senate (did I ever tell anyone how much I hate the filibuster?), navigate through the House with its districts gerrymandered to death, and so forth.