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Last Sunday’s New York Times had an article highlighting the implementation of the new teacher evaluation system being put in place in Tennessee. The system is part of the Race-to-the-Top attempt to drive education reform in the states by dangling federal cash for reforms.

As you read the article, you should begin to realize why “reform” fails and why many people in both the Government Education Complex and Education Transformation* movement find these rules so absurd.

There simply is no way that a federal bureaucracy (or any bureaucracy, for that matter) can devise a unified system of teacher evaluation. There are too many variables, and teachers are correct to be skeptical of this top-down approach to their craft.

For example, the first few paragraphs of the article expose the unworkable nature of the evaluation process.

Steve Ball, executive principal at the East Literature Magnet School in Nashville, arrived at an English class unannounced one day this month and spent 60 minutes taking copious notes as he watched the teacher introduce and explain the concept of irony. “It was a good lesson,” Mr. Ball said.

But under Tennessee’s new teacher-evaluation system, which is similar to systems being adopted around the country, Mr. Ball said he had to give the teacher a one — the lowest rating on a five-point scale — in one of 12 categories: breaking students into groups.** Even though Mr. Ball had seen the same teacher, a successful veteran he declined to identify, group students effectively on other occasions, he felt that he had no choice but to follow the strict guidelines of the state’s complicated rubric.

“It’s not an accurate reflection of her as a teacher,” Mr. Ball said.

What a shock. A principal knows his teachers better than the federalized check list. Wonders never cease.
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The linked article is, IMO, an important read for all of us in the think tank/free market movement. I’ve often started feeble attempts to write a nearly exact commentary, and thankfully, some one wrote it for me.

It encompasses many of the things I’ve attempted to communicate in various debates/discussions with colleagues at Heartland and out on the Free Market Rubber Chicken circuit. It applies to libertarians as much as conservatives.

MODERNIZING CONSERVATISM cogently lays out exactly why the conservative movement is heading toward rough waters.

While I don’t agree with every aspect of prescribed remedies, the need for a reformation of the movement is 100% accurate, IMO.

Some titillating excerpts…

“Long-term evidence indicates that the starve-the-beast strategy not only fails, but may make the problem of unrestrained spending growth worse, suggesting that a “serve the check” strategy might be a more effective means of curbing the growth of government spending. The simple explanation for this seeming paradox is that the starve-the-beast strategy currently allows Americans to receive a dollar in government services while only having to pay 60 cents for it.”

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embedded by Embedded Video

YouTube DirektHow Liberty Dies

How is this for a headline?

“Key Democrats call for Ending Democracy”

Some people subscribe to the idea that politicians are stupid. They shoot from the hip until reined in by their consultants during election season. There is probably a great deal of truth to that. On the other hand, the use of the “trial balloon” is a well-tested technique for gauging public reaction to an idea.

With that in mind, I submit today’s WSJ’s “Notable and Quotable” into evidence to let the jury decide.

“Most Americans complain that government is unresponsive to their wishes. But not everyone feels that way. In the space of two days, two prominent Democrats have called for less responsive government that ignores public input.
 
One of them, former White House Budget Director Peter Orszag, penned a piece this week in the New Republic arguing, as the title says, “Why we need less democracy.” Orszag wrote that “the country’s political polarization was growing worse—harming Washington’s ability to do the basic, necessary work of governing.” His solution? “[W]e need to minimize the harm from legislative inertia by relying more on automatic policies and depoliticized commissions for certain policy decisions. In other words, radical as it sounds, we need to counter the gridlock of our political institutions by making them a bit less democratic.” . . .
 
[S]imilar comments by Gov. Bev Perdue, D-N.C., are far more troubling. “I think we ought to suspend, perhaps, elections for Congress for two years and just tell them we won’t hold it against them, whatever decisions they make, to just let them help this country recover,” Perdue told a Rotary Club gathering in suburban Raleigh this week. “I really hope that someone can agree with me on that.”

Gaffe or Trial Balloon?

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This is one of the funniest, most creative, accurate, and informative videos I’ve ever seen. It could educate the nation through rap.

Keynes v. Hayek

Enjoy, pass it on.

Check out my recent appearance on WPWR’s (Channel 50) “Perspective” program yesterday (Sunday). The discussion was around a voucher bill, along with other issues confronting education.

Of course, with three people defending the existing system, and only one person (me) describing it accurately as failing, it’s not like we don’t have our work cut out for us. You may be interested in the other guests, as they make their conventional case for dumping more money into a failed system. If not, my stint starts at the 11:22 mark.

As always, constructive critiques are welcome. Being more used to radio, I have to work on my TV persona. Any advice on how to quickly make friends with the first camera shot would be greatly appreciated.

I put up a post titled “What If” over at Heartland’s blog site.

One minute I think we’re going to win this over the next few years, and another minute, I think there’s no hope. But a man can dream.

I made my Fox Chicago debut last week, with the interview/segment airing on Sunday Morning. It’s amazing how much coverage you can get by walking through a parking lot, talking to news anchors.

Since I can’t put the video up here, I linked to Heartland’s new blog, Somewhat Reasonable.

UPDATE: Video appears below.

I doubt if I was the first person to use the phrase “Government-Education Complex,” but I use it often to describe the current education system. Others have clearly started to pick up on the meme, which is good.

A friend of mine in Indiana emailed me and asked me to define it for him. So I did.
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The Heartland Institute is “trigger happy” today.  They’ve been one of the few free-market think tanks really promoting the concept of parent empowerment.  That’s why today’s news is so promising.

The first school has pulled the trigger, and is working to convert “government/education complex” infrastructure over to independent infrastructure.  This is a good thing.

For more information on how the Parent Trigger changes the dynamic on education reform, check out these links.

Heartland’s Parent Trigger page.

Wall Street Journal op-ed.

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For purposes of full disclosure, yes, I am the director of the Center for School reform at The Heartland Institute.

As someone involved in the education reform movement, I hate to criticize Michelle Rhee.  That said, if you want to bring about a better education system, you have to know the source of the problem.  That’s the only way you can develop a solution.

Rhee’s article is an lesson in problem avoidance.  It makes the point that education reform is a political battle.  So far, so good.  It’s high time that high profile people started talking like this, though I suspect much of that can be attributed to Chris Christie’s surviving the campaign of lies put out by the teachers unions and bloated bureaucracy.

Where the article fails is her failure to take on the 800 lb. gorilla in the education debate.  After being successfully targeted for destruction by these engines of greed and mediocrity, Rhee turns tail and opines the this is what unions are supposed to do.  This is a travesty.

What I’ve Learned
We can’t keep politics out of school reform. Why I’m launching a national movement to transform education.

The teachers’ unions get the blame for much of this. Elected officials, parents, and administrators implore them to “embrace change” and “accept reform.” But I don’t think the unions can or should change. The purpose of the teachers’ union is to protect the privileges, priorities, and pay of their members. And they’re doing a great job of that.

What next, Michelle?  ”Kim Jong Il’s role is to turn millions of North Koreans into brainwashed, undernourished midgets building bombs to terrorize neighboring nations, and he’s doing a great job of doing that.”
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While I’ve been purposefully avoiding any news shows or blogs this weekend, the situation in North Korea forces me to post this potential solution to the problem. Let’s start with some premises.

1. NK is a buffer state for China. It exists at China’s will.
2. NK is a clear and present danger to its own people and to the world.
3. China, belligerent and “ascendant” as she may be, is linked to our currency and to our consumption of her cheap goods.

While I could add details and subheadings to the above, I think the premises are sound. If not please correct me.

With that in mind, why shouldn’t America, in the person of its CEO, simply offer China the ultimatum below.

Dear Hu,

President Obama (or his successor)

Why shouldn’t we use trade as weapon in this situation? Aside from hurting Walmart’s stock price for a few quarters and losing a few transportation jobs in the interim, why can’t we do this? Discuss.

News reports are rolling in regarding the TARP paybacks and stock sales on GM.  Some are saying that these bailouts  are “turning a profit” for taxpayers.  Here is one example.

G.M. Prices Its Shares at $33 in Return to Stock Market

American taxpayers’ ownership of General Motors was halved on Wednesday, and billions of dollars in bailout money was returned to the federal government, as a result of the nation’s largest initial stock offering ever.

The offering, which raised $23.1 billion, is bigger and more ambitious than had once seemed possible. But the recently bankrupt automaker will have to build on its revival for the government to recoup its entire $50 billion investment and validate the Obama administration’s decision to keep G.M. from collapsing.

The idea that these policies were beneficial, simply based upon some of the money being returned through IPOs, needs to be placed into context.

Let’s start with this. Since 2007,  revenues to the Fed. government have collapsed.  This collapse was precipitated by a dramatic slowdown, which, in turn, was based upon a variety of factors.  The key is that many of these factors could have been addressed prior to the collapse.

Instead, American governance is a freak show where we have an above the surface gridlock on any good policy, with a below the surface greasing of every stupid policy under the sun.  This culminated in bursting asset bubbles, bailouts of rent-seekers, and a slew of morally hazardous policies that replace self-governance with “Czarism.”

Into this tragi-comedy of political idiocy, unemployment, and huge deficits, defenders of the bailouts point to a paltry few pennies returned to the treasury as a sign of “success” while ignoring the billions (or trillions, even) in lost revenues based upon bad government policies.

This is ridiculous. GM’s $33/share price is based upon a czarist edict waiving away taxes on bailed out entities.  What some tout as a “return on investment” reads more like a scene out of Atlas Shrugged, where some people get bailed out based upon the “aristocracy of pull.”

There are far too many Republicans, conservatives, and libertarians who operate under the false theory that the well of our moral, social, financial and intellectual capital will never run dry. I think they are wrong.

The GM situation is evidence of deep decline, not of a “bailout” having worked.

“Can you govern yourself, or do you need a Federal Czar to govern your life for you?”

That question should be asked of every interested person who might vote in the next few elections. Everyone.

“Can you find a doctor, a light-bulb, or control the flow of your toilet, or should one of our Federal Czars take that decision out of your hands?”

When framed in this fashion, the answers to these questions probably have a 75-25 pro-freedom response rate, even in today’s electorate.

This “frame” (see Lakoff and Overton Window)  articulates the central message that all Republicans, conservative Democrats, the Tea Parties/Patriots, as well as the think tank types should be shouting from the hilltops.

Once brought to consciousness in this philosophical context, virtually every “self-government” policy initiative can be promoted on the foundation of “self-government”. Most Americans are hard-wired to agree with the conservative view on this. Read the rest of this entry »

For background on just how awful a person I am, start with my first installment of the Tea Party Bozo Show.  Read all the slams on my breach of protocol against Senate Candidate Joe Miller.  Once finished, read on.

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Miller cites Communist East Germany as effective in dealing with border security

The scuffle between the editor of Alaska Dispatch and Joe Miller’s security guards at a public forum in Anchorage late Sunday is getting much national attention today. Getting lesser but growing attention is Miller’s answer at the forum to a question from the audience about how he would deal with illegal immigration. Anchorage blogger Steve Aufrecht was there and is among those today who are criticizing Miller’s response that Communist East Germany is a good example of a nation achieving border security. He quotes Miller as saying: “The first thing that has to be done is secure the border. … East Germany was very, very able to reduce the flow. Now, obviously, other things were involved. We have the capacity to, as a great nation, secure the border. If East Germany could do it, we could do it.”

What a blithering idiot!

These apparently are the only choices for Rs these days.  A class of in-bred crooks who serve the functional equivalent of perverted uncles molesting American principles, or a class of pseudo articulate ass-clowns.

Oh well, the upside is that I’ll likely get my wish that Rs don’t get the senate. That’s a nice silver lining.

The Heartland Institute just opened up their new blog today, somewhatreasonable.com. I encourage a visit.

This is where the Heartland staff will post their quick takes and commentary on the rapidly developing stories of the day.

I just posted a spirited defense of Mitch Daniels there…like he needs my help.

It’s nice to know that the rhetoric I’ve been using on my website for about 6 years now, which some called “extreme,” has gone mainstream.

The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page editors are dipping their toes in the water of truth. They ought to dive in head first, and start rescuing children.

Hating ‘Superman’

The new film “Waiting for ‘Superman’” is getting good reviews for its portrayal of children seeking alternatives to dreadful public schools, and to judge by the film’s opponents it is having an impact.

Witness the scene on a recent Friday night in front of a Loews multiplex in New York City, where some 50 protestors blasted the film as propaganda for charter schools. “Klein, Rhee and Duncan better switch us jobs, so we can put an end to those hedge fund hogs,” went one of their anti-charter cheers, referring to school reform chancellors Joel Klein and Michelle Rhee and Education Secretary Arne Duncan. The odd complaint is that donors to charter schools include some hedge fund managers.

Or maybe not so odd. Teachers unions and the public school monopoly have long benefitted from wielding a moral trump card. They claimed to care for children, and caring was defined solely by how much taxpayers spent on schools.

That moral claim is being turned on its head as more Americans come to understand that teachers unions and the public bureaucracy are the main obstacles to reform. Movies such as “Waiting for ‘Superman’” and “The Lottery” are exposing this to the larger American public, leaving the monopolists to the hapless recourse of suggesting that reformers are merely the tools of hedge fund philanthropists.

Teacher’s unions are on the moral defensive because people have finally started to question their moral legitimacy. (welcome to the club) Teachers Unions have none, and, as a concept, they have no right to exist.

Every dime a teachers union extracts from a tax payer for pay, benefits, pensions, etc., is a dime that can’t be used to better educate a child. It’s so obvious that it’s been staring us in the face for decades.

Just as Reagan hastened the fall of the USSR by challenging their moral legitimacy (evil empire, ash heap of history), we must openly start telling our neighbors that teachers unions have no right to one iota of say in education. Their interests, and the interests of society are diametrically opposed.

You don’t negotiate with such an entity, you abolish it. It’s that simple. Get to work.

You want to teach? Compete in the open field of professionals and processes that can better educate our children.

My son made it back from his first tour in Afghanistan two days ago.  He will probably have to go back at least once.  This is from his Facebook posting.

“Lindsay Lohan, 24, is all over the news because she’s a celebrity drug addict. While Justin Allen 23, Brett Linley 29, Matthew Weikert 29, Justus Bartett 27, Dave Santos 21, Chase Stanley 21, Jesse Reed 26, Matthew Johnson 21, Zachary Fisher 24, Brandon King 23, Christopher Goeke 23, Sheldon Tate 27, they are all Marines who gave their lives this week, no media mention. Honor THEM by reposting…”

Done.

Watch this video.

Then watch this one.

Put it on all your websites, facebook pages, and e-mail lists.

Public Unions are taking well-deserved heat for their pension greed. If you look at all the pension articles, the comments are full of reasonable sounding folks trotting out the argument that the really bad examples of abusive pensions are “outliers.” They then tell you that the average benefit is “only $20,000/year.” It’s best to address this calmly, reasonably, and accurately. Here’s how. Read the rest of this entry »