The Trumpist Party is waging war on public schools. The Republican nominee’s son, a graduate of an elite private school that no government subsidy will or should ever make affordable to everyone, says public schools are “like Soviet-era department stores” rigged to serve teachers and bureaucrats and not students. The Republican nominee’s running mate undermined public schools by diverting funds to vouchers and charter schools. The Republican nominee glibly assured his convention listeners that his federal government would swoop into state- and local-run schools to “rescue kids” with “choice”.
“Choice” is code, of course, for privatizing public schools and moving away from the guarantee of equal educational opportunity for all.
Choice is also code for racial segregation and inequality, even in the supposedly progressive haven of the Twin Cities:
When neighborhoods were becoming increasingly segregated in the Twin Cities, says [U of M law professor Myron] Orfield, so were schools, and reformists in the Twin Cities hoped to solve the problem by adopting an open enrollment system and embracing charter schools. Those reformists argued that the ability to choose would open up schools to students from all backgrounds, regardless of where they lived. But it had the opposite effect, said Orfield. White students began using the program to move from racially integrated schools to schools without racial diversity. Many charter schools in the Twin Cities began to openly describe themselves as “culturally focused”, catering its operations to one race or another. “They never found an integrated model for charter schools,” Orfield said. Today, among charter school students in the Twin Cities, about 90 percent of black students, 80 percent of Hispanic and Asian-American students, and 70 percent of white students attend virtually segregated schools. Orfield called it a modern version of the “separate but equal” idea, one that systemically sustains inequity as well as the kind of discrimination that killed Philando Castile [Taylor Gee, “Something Is Rotten in the State of Minnesota,” Politico, 2016.07.16].
South Dakota’s Republicans passed their own stealth voucher program earlier this year, diverting public funds to private insurance companies who will give scholarships to church schools (all private schools in South Dakota are church schools). That choice is only practical in our largest communities, where we have the greatest racial diversity. The same white flight from darker neighbors that Orfield sees in the Twin Cities thus got a little easier in South Dakota’s bigger towns, thanks to our Trumpist-Republican Legislature.
Beat up on public schools and facilitate racial segregation—that’s Trumpist education policy.
Appears Dakota wingnuts violate state and federal constitution by giving tax money to insurance companies to provide vouchers, then they explain it away by saying it depends on what your definition of is – is.
Other wingnut states just hand out the money and say pee on the constitution.
The Fascistic Party of Trump has deep ties with the Russian economy so it is no coincidence that the Russian hacker leaked DNC emails that most of us Bernie supporters, already knew had to exist. What is troubling is the way senators like Thune and Rounds ignore that and ignore the fact that Trump is wanting to give Putin what he wants, the Baltic states back into his orbit. By getting out of NATO, that is exactly what followers like Coyote want. They want us, the US, to capitulate. See that way, we have more war, less social programs and more money for the wealthy to consume.
Trump has been schooled well. He also can follow the news that is going on with Putin’s neighbor in Turkey. There Erdogan has basically declared a dictatorship that is closing all things public including schools and judicial branches. Think it cannot happen here? Bull puckey, that is the new republican party, complete with the salute.
When are the liberals going to begin taking and explaining all the action they took to RIG the election for Hillary? I guess the constant twisting of Trumps words is all the liberal press has to offer.
Sam@-put up or shut up. What words are liberals twisting? And can you read?
Off topic, Sam. I twist not one word: I say exactly what Trump means, and you’re diversion to Clinton does nothing to refute my explanation.
Besides, I took no action to rig any election for Clinton. Not my job to say the things you’d rather hear than the ugly truth about the Trumpist party.
Let them all go to Wharton. If the voucher doesn’t cover it. Oh well, what can you do? Government can only do so much. The world needs ditch diggers too. *********
********* denotes sarcasm
If you will allow. Sam@, Progressives have known for months now that the DNC did all in its power to derail Bernie. We all knew that, now it is proven. By the Russians no less. So there is that. Think of that, Trumps foreign business partners hacked a political site to try to sway an election. You cannot make that kind of stuff up. It only happens with your party. Think Watergate and Nixon, you and yours are really some kind of corrupt with a long, really long history of that kind of mischief. I could go current with your Trump supporting senator, EB5 Rounds, but that would be too easy. Everyone who reads this blog knows what kind of crooked little weasel he and his associates are.
Bernie knew that information as well and demanded that Debbie whatshername Shultz be fired from her position. What the leadership has done is to denounce her by not allowing her to give the traditional speech that leaders do at convention. I know that as a proud member of the Trump party, you would have preferred that she be placed in front of a firing squad of NRA shooters like yourself. Alas, this is due process. Something that you and yours sorely lack. Now move along like the rest of us Bernie supporters have done. We hate your leader Trump and who and what he represents. We hate him so much that we will deny him any position other than the fetal one he will be reduced to as this progresses from the progressives like myself.
“Soviet-era department store?” Isn’t that priceless coming from one of the .01 percent “takers,” to use a Republican phrase?
Yeah, the Trump enterprises screw local property tax payers by failing to pay their fair share of local and state taxes. Of course that means they contribute virtually nothing to improving what they say are the “soviet-era department store” schools that you and I and 99.9 percent of people in this country graduate from. I guess we are the product of those schools that Trump disdains, so we can’t ever measure up to Him, now can we. That’s why we need Him to be our voice.
That elitist scion of wealth looks down his nose at nearly everyone in this country. That’s really what the Trump family thinks of everyone. “I love the less educated!!!!” gushes The Donald. Why can’t his supporters see Trump is no different, really, than Romney? He think the common folk, you and I who don’t go to expensive elite schools, are dumb. Only people who hate themselves could ever vote for that guy. Or people who really are dumb.
Cory et. al. I am sad and angry to report that Obama and Arne Duncan were (and are) enthusiastic supporters of school privatization. EVERY education scheme they devised pounded another nail in the coffin of authentic public education. By privatizing schools, they accomplish many of their goals: destruction of teachers unions, resegregation of schools, and most of all, enrichment of their social class. Their method is/was right out of Milton Friedman’s play book–starve, then privatize. Destroy the school, demoralize the teachers, impose insane degrees of testing. Then claim you have a “magic sauce” to fix the situation.
I worked with the most brilliant, dedicated, committed teachers you can imagine (in Chicago). My position required me to visit many schools across the system. I found that a huge majority of teachers provided warm and welcoming environments in which to learn–and worked their assess off 60 – 70 hours/week to make the learning happen.
Carol, I know Obama and Clinton both have gotten some key points wrong on education. But I suspect we can pull our Democratic Party back from privatization more easily than we can coax Trump and ALEC away from their desire to destroy public schools.
Koch family made its money dealing with Stalin.
http://exiledonline.com/a-peoples-history-of-koch-industries-how-stalin-funded-the-tea-party-movement/
“Think of that, Trumps foreign business partners hacked a political site to try to sway an election. You cannot make that kind of stuff up. It only happens with your party.”
The spin machine begins. Blame it on the Russians. Such corruption and collusion must be the Ruskie’s fault. Let me guess, the Russians made the DNC do it? You did just make that stuff up.
Hillary loving FBI is looking into the hack. Personally, I’m positive Gowdy,Issa and Chaffed nutz subpoenaed the emails and handed them to Putin on a silver platter. Jail them.
The Russians do not make anyone do anything unless they wish to Daniel. The DNC did the emails of course, that is not the question. Bernie Supporters knew all along. Actually, so did Hillary supporters but they were to busy covering up the stink from other piles of crap to understand the implications.
Your boy Trump is up to his bushy eyebrows with the mobs on both sides. His connections run deep into the organized boys in construction and in gaming, unless you do not believe in such things, then you would be in denial or as we call it, a Hillary supporter. Trump has big time business interests that even someone like me can find out about, no secret there. The FBI is on it and we should hope they do a better job than they did with our own EB5 or it will be window dressing at best. There is a lot of corruption Daniel, but who hurts us more?
republicans are on nearly every Dakota Free Press post attempting to hijack them to discuss the DNC emails.
They offer nothing new, just like a room full of parrots they repeat themselves.
Roger,
Less than 48 hours ago, you wrote this. “I’m not holding my breath that there will be a national political scandal by either party.”
The DNC, Mrs. Clinton and WikiLeaks are offering plenty of new material. I’m more than a little surprised that so many Americans are not ticked off about the subverting of American democracy.
Steve Sanchez, you blatantly took my comments out of context, I realize you have some kind of attention disorder, but I was talking precisely about Democrats and Republicans making the Rounds and Kaine EB-5 a scandal.
And for your information Steve, the FBI has launched a formal investigation into the communist hacking the DNC emails. That is the real story here.
Do you have any idea which political leader has the power to ask the Russians to undermine a U.S. election?
Only one name should come to mind, Donald Trump.
I prefer individuals be investigated for their illegal activities and not their party affiliation. You with me on that, Mr. Cornelius?
I think you’re being a bit generous in your description of Donald Trump. The real story isn’t just that DNC communications were hacked by Russians. The rest of the story includes the fact – the fact – that the DNC conspired to rig primary elections across the nation. Everyone could see it happening, but DWS refused to acknowledge it. In fact, she lied multiple times when asked about it directly. Why is the hijacking of the election process not part of the story?
Steve, are you outraged Roger calls you ill? Pattern.