Why “bankruptcy” is a stupid mechanism to get back at public-employee unions
After New Jersey Governor Chris "Powderkeg" Christie mentioned state bankruptcy in connection with health-care costs, New Jersey had to reduce a bond sale (hat tip: a friend in New Jersey). While state officials are denying any connection, this should put a damper on any foolish schemes to declare local or state bankruptcy for the sole purpose of […]
Short news items
It's the start of the semester, I've acquired a few added responsibilities, and so this entry will be a combination of a few items. Planning for disaster–please turn on head. Bruce Baker and Mike Petrilli have been battling back and forth over the best ways to cut school budgets, or rather the least worst way. Petrilli has […]
Michael O’Malley’s take on Virginia history textbook errors
The SOLs are the problem. They combine the huffing and blowing of conservatives, who want measurable fact-based standards, with the wheedling of liberals, who want “inclusion.” The result trains kids away from argument and reason and towards empty memorization. via Those VA History textbooks – The Aporetic. Bad standards aren’t the entire problem, but incoherent […]
Cillizza channels Vizzini
Sometimes you gotta laugh to avoid crying at the ignorance of the punditocracy. In the 1990s, mostly-GOP consultant Dick Morris advised President Clinton to triangulate, which we learned meant moving to the center and thereby hoping to steal your opponents' rhetorical thunder. Here comes Chris Cillizza, either redefining or misunderstanding the term: Former Massachusetts Gov. […]
Is Jeb Bush stuck in fourth grade?
The title above is a bit flippant, but since Jeb Bush's op-ed in the Wall Street Journal yesterday focused (again) on fourth-grade achievement data in reading, it's important to keep in mind that there are students in other grades, too. Florida's fourth-grade reading NAEP data is where you see the strongest evidence on the Florida […]