| This morning's column from Tim Skubick is pretty hilarious. The Center for Michigan spent a bunch of money on townhalls around the state regarding education to find out what reforms interest the public. What does the public want? Better trained and supported teachers, and more engaged parents. What reforms is the public cool to? Choice, especially if choice means replacing actual schools with online education. What are we likely to see from the Republicans who run the Legislature? The exact opposite. More than anything, this ought to send a fairly clear message to the Very Serious Persons at The Center for Michigan that they can spend all the money they want and produce all the research they can and all the great journalism that is possible, and it's not going to dent the thinking of people who think they are right out of the sheer power of assumption. Let this also be a message that touches the thinking of the state's editorial pages, and really anyone who thinks that our path out of the woods involves "both sides" negotiating and compromising in good faith. Not only ain't it gonna happen by the designs of one party, but their ideas are alien to what taxpayers actually want. |
