GOP/Red States Turn Education Over To Churches & Charters. No More Public Education.

[TheMastersNemesis]

The teacher strikes miss the point. The GOP plans to turn education over to the churches or charter schools. No mor public education in the future on GOO long term goals. Koch's, Mercers, et al want RW or religious propaganda education to be the model for education going forward.

So they want to bankrupt the school system in favor of a corporate or religiously controlled agenda.

[Cary]

1. Which is why we must stop the nonsense and fight together

We must have discipline. Our enemies are evil. What further evidence of that do we need?

The problem I have is that people I regarded as friends, and still wish to have as friends, have turned on me for not toeing their line.

[pazzyanne]

20. Don't feel like the Lone Ranger

My youngest brother and I are in the same boat with our family. We are no longer included in family get-to-gathers, are blocked on Facebook, and are ignored at family funerals and weddings. The younger generation still acknowledges us even though we don't agree with politics. My sister wrote me a farewell letter in which she stated that she can no longer associate with me because our political and religious views are too different. By the way, I am Lutheran and she is an evangelical nut job. Thank goodness, most of my friends are also progressives.

[RandomAccess]

38. Someone said the other day

wish I remembered who -- a guest on one of MSNBC's shows -- that we're experiencing a cold civil war.

I think that's true.

[raven mad]

2. We've been yelling this a long time.

The first teacher I heard say it was my senior year advisor. In high school. In 1972.

[DownriverDem]

6. Yep

I watched in horror election after election as the country voted for repubs. We are at a point now where they can truly destroy us. And those on Social Security and Medicare think they are protected. What fools! I know a lot of folks who are near retiremement, but are afraid to retire.

[raven mad]

8. We so looked forward to retiring - eventually. The folks did (1970's) and had a ball.

We can't now.

The American Dream has become night terrors under the repukes.

[meow2u3]

3. The GOP has devolved into a "Xtian" counterpart to al-Qaeda or ISIS

The only difference between them is the religion they twist to brainwash the kids.

[raven mad]

10. Hit that one out of the ballpark, meow2u3.

I'm thankful to be in the middle of nowhere.

[KPN]

4. The GOP plan has always been to make

public education fail by cutting its funding via reducing tax revenues.

The teachers and parents of the kids affected will prevail if they stand by their guns and we stand with them. It's the only way to beat this evil.

[DownriverDem]

5. We were all warned

Every day with the bad news we hear, I just want to scream: Why didn't voters listen to what would happen if trump and the repubs won? If we ever gain control, it will take years to fix all the damage being done now.

[Hortensis]

7. End to compulsory education and compulsory taxation

for it, both shocking infringements on peoples' personal liberties, along with government regulation of schools. They'll need an archconservative majority on SCOTUS for that, but are building that now.

Corporations would not be interested in providing schooling to poor people without government funding. Don't imagine the Kochs give a damn about whether kids are educated or not. People would find various ways to educate their children, or not. I could probably bring in money for food in my old age by teaching children in our home whose parents themselves needed to work for money to feed their families.

This may sound insane but is very real. Extremists like the Kochs among the top 0.01% have been plotting for over 40 years to turn America into the world's most advanced third world country. Every person totally "free" to live or die on his or her own.

In their extremely selfish, callous way, libertarians can actually be very romantic and tend to imagine most survivors and their societies would be healthier, stronger, happier, more moral, etc. After the die-off of the weak, of course.

The next obvious step for the wealthy to protect their property from libertarian risks would almost certainly be, bizarrely enough, the harsh controls of some form of economic fascism.

[lark]

9. More than that, IMO.

They really don't want most Americans educated at all, they want serfs with little to no knowledge who will work for nothing, have no health care and die young. Charter and religious schools are just a ruse to start the destruction of public education. Charter and religious schools can charge whatever they want, only accept those they want, and expel anyone for any reason. They don't give a shit about religion, it's just a mechanism to ensure no knowledge for working class/poor and to indoctrinate the students in russian repug dogma.

[raven mad]

13. +200, lark.

B I N G O!!!!

[True Blue American]

24. The reason for that is

People with better Educations, real understanding of both Religion, Economics and protection of our Planet become Democrats!

[appalachiablue]

29. Big post rec. Right on the $$$

Private, for profit charter schools, religious schools, vouchers and homeschooling, anything but public schools is the goal. Completely free to discriminate against minorities, the disabled and non wealthy, non Christian students and teachers, and educate only their desirables. Make lots of money doing it. The American, extreme right and Libertarian ideology.

[PatrickforO]

11. Of course they do. But on the ground they have found that a bit harder than they thought.

This is why they try and take over everything at the state level, because states are easier to control. The federal government is too big, and local government is like herding cats.

Even so, the best they've been able to do so far is chip away at funding. That's bad, but people are really starting to fight back. I live in a deep red county where Dems are outnumbered by Republicans 48,000 to about 150,000. Well, they got a group of tea baggers elected to the school board, and they fucked thing up really bad - ended up getting caught misappropriating over $1 million.

The next election, sane people all over the district supported a new group of candidates and they were elected en masse.

Problem with idealogues like the tea baggers is they have no clue how to actually govern.

[True Blue American]

27. Republicans did the same thing

Under that wonderful Moderate, Kasich.

Between giving his wealthy friends Charter Schools and cutting funding to Education it became so bad and obvious the Republican Legislature over ruled his last cut. Replaced the funding.

That was after our newspaper exposed scandal after scandal in the Charter Schools.

[Ilsa]

12. And how many teachers would be unemployable by some churches

because they are unwilling to take a religious oath, or because they are LGBTQ, or a Democratic Socialist, or married to someone of a different color, or are pregnant out of wedlock?

The conformity isn't just for the kids, but employees as well.

[Toorich]

14. Hey now....

my Daddy quit the 6th grade and he did fine and I gradeated the 8th grade and I'm doing fine. And soon as I find some work in the oil patch I'm gonna quit sleeping in the back of my car and git off this meth. Last Christmas I got the wife and kids some new clothes down at the thrift store. She got pissed about the meth and took the kids and moved back with her folks. I told her we ain't taken no gubbmint handouts and if the oil field don't pick up we gonna move to Kentucky and me and the oldest boy can do some coal minin' til the oil play picks up. She tolt me to go to hell and said her boy aint going to work in a hole in the ground. Damn you'd a thought I tole her we was gonna vote Demoncrat and get matching abortion tattoos. But hey, MAGA.

[True Blue American]

30. Funny, but so close to

The truth it hurts.

Like that dummy on Chris Hays in WV. ‘ Been a coal miner all my life, Coal minin’ Is in my blood,I will be a coal miner Til I die!

Even though the State Representative and Bernie told them, “ Those Coal mining jobs are not coming back!”

That was in the town where teenagers were dying like flies from Opioids because there was nothing to do.

Now, I am not making fun of the accent. I have one,too. But knew when the plants all shut down, there is no going back. You move on.

[mountain grammy]

15. As I look at all these teachers in these republican controlled states..

I wonder, who did they vote for and who will they vote for in the future? Public education is at risk and being starved in these states and has been for years.

[bpj62]

16. Teachers are part of the problem

I have many friends who are teachers and quite a few of them are Republicans. So for most of their teaching careers they were voting for people who were/are hellbent on destroying their profession as we know it. It baffles me because many of them have multiple degrees but they still vote against their own interests.

[Zambero]

19. Degrees of stupidity

Teachers who vote for an anti-education agenda are leaving their better judgment at home before heading to the polls.

[Freddie]

36. Absolutely

My cousin is a retired teacher - was able to retire at 55 thanks to PA's (still) nice teachers retirement, hard fought for by the union. Votes straight Repug. I rarely see her and this is mainly why. I think she "turned" when there was a brown man in the White House.

[world wide wally]

17. This has been their goal for the past 35 years.

They want to destroy public education to promote vouchers; another tax incentive for the wealthy.

[woundedkarma]

18. I find it humorous that anyone would think this a recent phenomenon

When I was a kid, teachers were complaining about tight budgets and low supplies.

Fast-forward 20 years I can only imagine how bad it is now.

The teacher's strike doesn't miss the point. The GOP thinking this is only about money for teachers is missing the point. They tried to give them some and the teachers said not enough.

If the GOP keeps fighting against teachers, they're going to lose everything... state level reps and governors.

[bitterross]

21. This is so sadly true. They are not seeing the global implications - or maybe they are.

This is right on in it's premise. They want a dumb, religious populous. That has proven to be a very useful populous when you look at the South or much of much of the Middle East. The South is overwhelmingly one of the least well-educated and most religious areas of the country.

These two things go together. The willingness to believe and the ignorance to sustain that belief are vital to submitting to those in power. It allows those in power to be seen as some sort of divine and God-chosen leaders more easily.

The larger implication is that the rest of the world is passing us by. As they continue to become educated and less willing to believe in mythology they are more questioning of those in power. They will surpass the US and become super-powers as we tumble to becoming a third-world.

Think it can't happen? Look at the Middle East. Once a place of innovation and science. Think Algebra and Astronomy. It is now back to being a place where the religious rule and free thought is forbidden.

It can happen here.

[DBoon]

28. A dumb religious population makes perfect slaves

I believe most of us mistakenly believed the Union won the civil war and abolished slavery

Slavery survived and is making a vicious comeback

[vkkv]

22. Their kids will end up STUPID and POOR ! Kinda like nowadays...

[workinclasszero]

23. As proof of your theory I give you...Betsy DeVos, United States Secretary of Education

[lancelyons]

25. The GOP is systematically trying to change peoples thoughts and beliefs with their approach

It has worked for them on Fox News.
They are trying to do this with Sinclair.
The president is trying to make the truth out to be fake news.

The GOP is trying to program people to their beliefs and changing how kids are taught goes down this line.

This is what the democrats need to be fighting. Not stupid technicalities on Gillibrand calling for Franken to resign or the small petty things between the Bernie coalition and others.

[DBoon]

26. Private charters for the elite

Christian madrases for everyone else

[zipplewrath]

31. They never studied history

The funny part about this is that public education came around for a few reasons, and one of them was that Catholics were running schools and the protestants got all worried about that and so wanted public schools so their kids wouldn't have to go to a Catholic school to get an education.

It is also true that WWI influence education because when they drafted an army, they basically had to send many of the draftees to a quicky school to learn enough writing and math to be useful. The GOP seems to have "unlearned" these lessons.

I'm gonna laugh when they find out that when they turn the schools over to the churches, the Catholics and the Jews will be running some of the best and most popular.

[vi5]

32. Let's not pretend that there aren't plenty of pro-Charter school Dems...

not the least of which was Arne Duncan, President Obama's secretary of education.

Or one of the shining lights of our party, Corey Booker.

The charter school system is one of the biggest scams in American history, is destroying the American Public school system, and every Democrat should denounce it. But instead this cancer on our society has been allowed to flourish because of some false notion of "Well both sides can agree that something needs to be done about public schools....." and trying to seem reasonable in the face of unreasonable men.

[iluvtennis]

33. In California "charter schools" are public schools. They are just what CA calls a school of choice

that allows students to go to schools outside of their "assigned school" which is based on where you live. You have to apply for the charter school. If there is room, all get in. But more times that not, there is a lottery for who gets in and then everyone on the waiting list.

My girls went to a "charter" elementary school as it's charter/specialization was a full Spanish immersion program. In Kinder through 2nd grade, all classes were taught in Spanish. In 3rd - 6th classes were taught in Spanish and English (e.g., say Math in Spanish and History in English).

My girls are sophomores in high school now, but still speak, read, and write Spanish. They also pick up speaking Italian from their dad who is from Italy. So, I have tri-lingual kids who speak, English, Spanish, and Italian. And I love it cuz I always admired that abour Europeans and their ability to speak multiple languages.

[Initech]

35. And there's a lot of room for corruption in these schools.

My mom knew someone who ran a small chain of charter schools that got busted for fraud and shady accounting practices - mainly having to do with the school's admission fees. They are currently doing some hard time for it. That's what happens when you throw accountability out the window.

[Initech]

34. The GOP wants rule by the clergy.

That is their ultimate goal - to strip the government of its' power and let the clergy decide:

- Who can and can't get married
- Who can and can't buy housing
- Who can and can't attend school
- Who can and can't afford health care

In a free and just society this can't happen. We can't let these psychos get away with this.

[workinclasszero]

37. Yes they want a theocratic dictatorship in this country

People need to open their eyes and see what the hell is going on in this country.

[randr]

40. You have described a christian caliphate

[randr]

39. The GOP began the war against America 50 years ago

The first victims were local school boards. Once they dumbed down the masses it was a cake walk into the WH.