Or maybe just bloated. These days, who can tell?
- Shockingly, "school choice" is another name for "segregated schools" — no surprise at all if you look at a picture of any conference concerning "school choice" (or paid any attention whatsoever to the leadership of the Department of Education under the… prior administration). The real problem is that "school choice" advocates don't want to pay for a system that doesn't reflect the same priorities as legacy admissions: Visiting the merits of the fathers upon the sons. Schools, of all kinds, are not (or at least should not) be about predicting successful individual assimilation of the entire school experience and its expression in achievement and life years and decades in the future… except, of course, when that's viewed as strictly competitive division of a shrinking pie of "Opportunity."
And one wonders just how happy these "school choice" advocates are going to be with the health care provided in nursing homes in thirty years, while their own charming little darlings are too busy with Important Careers to provide any assistance themselves, and the low-paid/low-prestige/absolutely essential direct-contact healthcare positions are being filled by all of those black and brown and non-xtian — perhaps worse yet, non-evangelical xtian — kids who couldn't take advantage of "school choice." All they have to do to avoid this future is pay for real education now. Education policy — not uniquely, but most visibly — in this country is all about "Let's you and him pay for it." Then, too, not all of the "payment" is economic. And more to the point, "school choice" is about ensuring that all of the kids in the class look and act the same, regardless of how diverse the neighborhood has become since the undesireables were allowed in. (I don't think I really need a <SARCASM> tag there, do I?).
The real problem with "school choice" programs is that they are not about educational quality or opportunity being evaluated by people who know one damned thing about how educational quality or opportunity actually work. (Sadly, I include an awful high proportion of non-academically-elite-themselves "education professionals" in there.) They are, instead, about choices of indoctrination — not education. But then, as a class traitor, I would say that, wouldn't I?
- On the other hand, sometimes those "school choice" advocates, and their allies and fellow-travellers, get exactly what they deserve. The real problem here is that gun rights and gun violence — and I'm not minimizing the issues on their own merits — have become proxies as other means of actually effecting change have become unavailable. Once upon a time, one could write to one's own legislators — local, state, or federal — and have some chance of the legislator him/her/themself actually seeing the communication, and actually responding with something other than a bloody form letter. Now, if one isn't a potential/actual campaign donor or writing on an issue/matter that is already being exploited for some advantage by that legislator, that's… not gonna happen.
- Which explains all too well why the Democratic Party is starting to fear loss of young voters. Leaving aside that the actual policies are only marginally friendly to those below the 30–54 "prime advertising demographic" for the moment, just look at the age of the leadership. If your first impulse when you need to talk to a "youngster" you haven't met before who isn't in the same room is to pick up the phone and wait for the dial tone, you've already miscommunicated! And the less said about "paying one's dues" as a prerequisite to even having a voice, the better — if only because "paying one's dues" requires the spare resources with which to pay in the first place, and that is something largely being denied to those born after "the era of big government is over" (chosen because it's a convenient marker for those now in their late 20s and facing the resumption of student loan payments — for themselves or their managers/customers/associates/doctors and nurses/lawyers/etc.).
- That also reflects the simultaneous advantages and flaws of single-cause thinking. Looking for singular fundamental differences, however broadly defined, can provide some valuable insights… that almost never extend to practicality. The obvious flaw in Mr Jung's piece is, simply, "What would 'standing up to business' in the UK in 2020 have looked like?" The less-obvious flaw is "Please explain why '2% inflation' is the appropriate target"… because there actually isn't a good rationale for it, let alone specific evidence that is not drawn from instances in which government/other central authority did not "stand up to business."
In reality, it's not "business" that a government needs to stand up to. It's "those wealthy individuals who control business" that one needs to stand up to. No matter what the "wealth maximization" imperative for a business is, its decisions and everything else about it are still being made by individuals. This is why militaries have the concept of "command responsibility," and why we had Nuremberg trials for people who never pulled triggers themselves. Only the appropriate and proportionate consequences change (not necessarily diminish — consider the epistomologically-appropriate ultimate fate of this "rags-to-riches" story), not the evaluative rubric. Of course, the same goes for standing up to a government; which makes this all very circular indeed.
- One last thought on all of the mock-schadenfreude spewing forth from Certain Quarters regarding the US Women's National Team exit from the World Cup at an earlier stage than ever before: In almost any other context, these same commentators would be (and uniformly have been) calling for a clean sweep of top management. Out of thirty randomly-chosen opinion pieces expressing carefully-subdued glee at the "demise" of the "woke grrrls," I've seen not one word suggesting that "management" at US Soccer House needs to be changed; the highest level anyone reaches is "fire the coach." Comparison to the ire being directed at Disney by those same commentators is instructive… and rather disheartening… and entirely consistent with another "coach" who should be fired (and the snarled relationship to the first sausage on this platter bears some further consideration in itself).