The formidable former British Prime Minister, Lady Margaret Thatcher, might have been speaking about the Texas public education bureaucracy of today when she addressed her political party’s convention in October of 1975.

“They have the usual socialist disease; they have run out of other people's money.”

For months we have suffered the loud wailing and gnashing of teeth from the public education bureaucracy and their allies in Texas politics. Their demand has a familiar ring: more money. Not just more money, but money without accountability.

Testifying recently before the Texas Senate’s Committee of the Whole, former activist-liberal-judge turned liberal-policy-activist Scott McCown (who legislated “Robin Hood” from the bench) passionately defended the thinking that has kept the school finance debate focused on spending-envy instead of academic results.

“To have a system where some districts have laptops and others don’t is simply unacceptable,” he said.

Why? Not a shred of research exists to prove computers in the classroom actually improve education. If one school wastes money on pointless activities detracting from education, why must all? But in the crusade for equity, McCown and his ilk simply want to spend more money.

As one newspaper ironically pointed out, the “wealthy” Highland Park school district does not have laptops for its kids, but districts receiving money under Robin Hood from Highland Park do.

Ronald Reagan, while serving as president, summed up the problem with the public education bureaucracy.

“If you serve a child a rotten hamburger in America, federal, state and local agencies will investigate you, summon you, close you down, whatever. But if you provide a child with a rotten education, nothing happens, except that you're liable to be given more money to do it with.”

Proof Providence has yet to abandon Texas: the Legislature concluded the recent Special Session without doing anything. That was best; they were going to simply give more money to the existing system without truly distinguishing between the purveyors of good and bad education. (Be warned: another special could be called as soon as this summer.)

Consider this: we’ve tripled real-per-student spending in less than 30 years, and built monuments to fiscal mismanagement with athletic and administration complexes rivaling college facilities; we have superintendents with multi-year contracts valued in the millions of dollars.

Meanwhile, scores on the SAT, ACT and other national indicators of academic achievement have shown no improvement in the quality of education for kids surviving the system. Drop-out rates, especially for minorities, are an embarrassment.

In all, Robin Hood “costs” Texans a billion dollars a year in recapture – that is, the money taken from “wealthy” districts and redistributed to “poor” ones. Of course, taxpayers whose cash was redistributed receive no accounting for the use of their money.

Let us set aside reason and pretend more money might actually, finally, for the first time, make a positive difference. Why not prioritize state spending? Is there nothing to cut in the state budget to provide more money for education? Nothing less important?

We have a commission to encourage government employee productivity; there are at least a dozen river authorities with billions in assets. Texas has a commission on acupuncture. There is nothing to cut? Nothing to change? No way to save money?

In the religious pantheon of the left, government agencies and programs are wrathful gods to be fiscally appeased – never questioned – on a regular basis, regardless of the economic effect.

Thomas Jefferson lamented that “as a government grows, liberty decreases.” He wisely noted, “Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have.”

The Robin Hood of legend stole from tyrannical government functionaries, returning the loot to the victimized poor. In Texas, he was hired by an elected judge and legitimized by the legislature to victimize taxpayers in the name of the children, while enriching the bureaucracy.

Despite noble intentions, and precious few benefits, Robin Hood has been an unwitting tool for the advocates of increased spending without any accompanying accountability for classroom improvement.

In the end, it is one more destructive attempt to soothe the ravages of the socialists’ disease.

Where did you get this plum of god-like insight?

"In the religious pantheon of the left, government agencies and programs are wrathful gods to be fiscally appeased – never questioned – on a regular basis, regardless of the economic effect."

Wow, talk about clueless.

I like the way morons can believe they see into the depths of the minds of the 'left'.

Ignorance is bliss untill you step on a land mine. Then someone has to clean up the mess.

So the right wing fascist class has locked us into an unwinnable war, record deficits, attacked the environment. and legitimized lying and corruption.

Now comes the onslaught on public education.

Maybe these right wing psychopaths should use some of their energy and money to rebuild the bridges burned between us and the international community due to this war and apocalyptic focus of the religious right.

No, couldn't happen. That would be an indication of some degree of relative sanity.

I looked for this name on google, and he only comes up two times. Once for some business thing, and another time supporting God in schools. Ooooooh I'm angry!

Do the math. He's out to destroy the secular public school system so that his parochial school cronies can rake in the bucks with vouchers.

Don't read any more if you want to stay calm. It's offensive... I'm warning you....









He's just a greedy Bible thumper. With these essays, he's sharpening his rhetorical hatchet to deliver the death chop to another public school teacher. Then, he'll take a cross and shove it into the still-spurting bloody stump of the teacher's neck, and hold the body up for all to see, and say, "another ineffective propagandist for Satan and devlish though, vanquished!"

What a fantastic deceiver this Michael Q. Sullivan is!

Hisssssss... Hissssssssss....

PS - I'm not against religion.

I find it strange that none of these arguments about money not solving the problem are ever applied to the astronomical military budget or that for the CIA. It is only programs that help people, rather than destroy them, that seem to have this label of money not solving the problem.

Conservatives drastically underfund education and then when the failures become apparent to everyone, they say that millions of dollars have been spent and money is not the answer. What they would really like to do is convince us that public education doesn't work and private schools are the answer. Yes, like private control of water was the answer for the people of Bolivia, when their water bills went through the roof. Or private control of energy is the answer when Enron robbed the people of California of billions of dollars.