Replies to post #30384 on Discover GOP Opprobrium

[teapeebubbles]

Shortly before the midterm elections, the NRCC came up with a fairly clever, albeit spectacularly misleading, campaign tactic. House Republicans would dig around for obscure and trivial measures introduced by Dems, which were perceived as nutty, and then insist that they represented the “Democrats’ platform.”

So, for example, the GOP would point to a Dennis Kucinich bill to create a “Department of Peace,” and say, “If there’s a Democratic majority, this is what they’ll work on.” When Dems protested, they point to the bill as proof of what was to come. If one Dem proposed something outside the mainstream, then all Dems are responsible for embracing the idea.

With that in mind, let’s consider the latest proposal from Jonah Goldberg.

Here’s a good question for you: Why have public schools at all?

OK, cue the marching music. We need public schools because blah blah blah and yada yada yada. We could say blah is common culture and yada is the government’s interest in promoting the general welfare. Or that children are the future. And a mind is a terrible thing to waste. Because we can’t leave any child behind.

The problem with all these bromides is that they leave out the simple fact that one of the surest ways to leave a kid “behind” is to hand him over to the government. Americans want universal education, just as they want universally safe food. But nobody believes that the government should run 90% of the restaurants, farms and supermarkets. Why should it run 90% of the schools — particularly when it gets terrible results?

Once in a while, a high-profile Republican will suggest abolishing the federal Department of Education, which is a common conservative boogeyman. Eventually, however, GOP pollsters insisted that their candidates stop even trying — voters perceived the calls to get rid of the cabinet agency as being anti-education.

But Goldberg, to his credit, is far more direct — he’s skipping the Department of Education and recommending the abolishment of the entire public school system.

Using the Republican campaign tactic as a guide, I’d like to hear “conservatives want to destroy public education in the United States” catch on as a policy meme. Let’s see how that works out for the right.