Posted on 01/22/2020 4:04:59 AM PST by Kaslin
Sometimes the timing of events is so auspicious that it is hard to attribute it to coincidence.
The week of Jan. 26 is National School Choice week.
First observed in 2011, for the 10th time, events will take place around the nation that are focused on raising awareness about parental choice in K-12 education and the options available to parents and children.
A few days before National School Choice week, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in the case Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, which will address the constitutionality of the so-called Blaine Amendments, arguably the greatest obstacle to school choice the nation faces.
Named after Rep. James G. Blaine, who attempted but failed to enact a federal ban on funding religious schools, 37 states subsequently adopted the provision in their state constitutions.
In the case of Espinoza, the state of Montana passed a law allowing dollar-for-dollar tax credits for funds contributed to scholarship programs that parents could use for paying for education in private schools. In that some of these funds would be used for religious schools, the constitutionality of the program was challenged, and the state wound up trashing the whole program.
The hope of many, including me, is that the court will find the rationale behind the Blaine Amendments unconstitutional. It will be a victory for both religious freedom and education freedom.
It is perverse that the First Amendment, which is meant to guarantee religious freedom, has become a tool for discrimination against religion.
After all, when public funds are available for education of any kind and some parents use those funds for a religious school, this is a private choice, not a government mandate. How can this in any way be understood as government establishing religion? It most certainly interferes with the "free exercise" of religion, which the First Amendment protects.
A decision wiping out the Blaine Amendment prohibitions will also be another reason to congratulate President Donald Trump, who has given us this solidly conservative Supreme Court.
It's also another factor in why black voters may realign their political allegiances.
Education freedom is an issue that deeply divides Republicans and Democrats. And it is an issue on which blacks are more aligned with Republicans.
In a May 2019 poll by Education Next, 70% of black Democrats expressed support for targeted vouchers, 60% for universal vouchers and 55% for charter schools.
It makes sense. Black parents understand the importance of education. Yet their kids are trapped in the worst public schools in the country.
Black parents understand the simple logic of education freedom and the benefits of parents having the power to choose where to send their children to school.
President Trump is now advancing Education Freedom Scholarships, which would provide for up to $5 billion in annual tax credits for donations made to scholarships that fund education-choice opportunities.
The Democratic presidential candidates across the board want to slam the door on charter schools and education choice. They all see one answer to K-12 education: more federal dollars for public school monopolies. Democrats have their eye on political contributions from teachers unions, not on what children, particularly black children, need.
The electoral model that Republicans need to follow for 2020 is that of the 2018 Florida governor's race. Ron DeSantis defeated his black opponent, liberal Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, by a margin of 0.4%. DeSantis got 14% of the black vote and 18% of the black female vote. By most analyses, the explanation for this unusually high black support is that DeSantis is a stalwart on education freedom and parental choice.
Education could, and should, be a defining issue in 2020, and be what makes a critical difference in moving black votes into the Republican column.
I’ve been saying that for years, too. School choice is the silver bullet.
Trump will speak about this at one point or another.
He doesn’t seem to miss a beat.
I hope he has good people out there helping to get the black male vote to 30 percent.
Kanye campaigning with Trump would add maybe 5 percent or more, I think. That would help.
If school choice takes hold the competition will be so fierce that families will be flooding back to churches to qualify for enrollment.The teachers will also have more choice.
This is insanity.
The black vote isn’t coming.
The white vote will save Trump, or sink him.
The black vote came already.
78 percent of black men voted for clinton. Had that been the usual 96 percent, we maybe don’t win 2 or 3 states.
Black women are a lost cause.
I think black men can be pushed up to 25 or 30 percent.
IF Christie could get 20 percent in NJ, Trump can do it at the national level.
Not to mention, how many White swing votes will leave the R’s due to pandering to Blacks. A lot of White people are tired of this shit. Gain 3% of the Black vote, lose 5% of the White vote...genius!
Not insanity. You, whether you mean to or not, are taking the establishment position that the black vote is monolithically Democrat.
Ron DeSantis is governor of Florida due to the votes of approximately 100,000 black women who considered school choice their most important concern. Exit polling indicates that this issue was important enough to these voters that they voted against a black candidate and for Mr. DeSantis.
Compete for every single vote, don’t cede blocks of voters to our opponents. Mr. Trump won’t get a majority of either black or Hispanic voters, but he can chip away at the Democrat dominance enough to make a difference.
At the same time it occurs to me we have been “waiting for blacks to wake up” for decades.
South Africa Experiencing Nationwide Blackouts as Electricity Grid Collapses
I used to feel that way too. Until a private Islamic school opened up in my state and the students received vouchers to go there. Use my tax money for an Islamic school? No way. Parents want to send their kid to private religious schools let them pay for it.
yet blacks in DC continue to vote for Democrats, even after they trashed the only choice that blacks had for their children.
Because Republicans are racist, doncha know!
For Dems, the teachers’ unions are more powerful than the kids’ parents.
For the Rs, the teachers’ unions are a 100% lost cause under all circumstances, but the parents can be pried away from the plantation under the right circumstances.
So my tax dollars could be used to send a kid to an Islamic school? Not sure I would like that. And if the federal government is subsidizing private schools then how long before they start placing requirements on what they teach?
This article was written by Milton Friedman in the late ‘60s.
And each year ever since.
And also pay taxes from which they aren’t benefiting? So long as they teach the 4 R’s, Reading, Writing, ‘rithmatic and Reasoning, they can teach whatever else they want besides. When they become teenagers, they can rebel against any indoctrination anyway.
Are you saying you wrote it? *grin*
No! Wait! I am not named after Milton Berle?
https://www.edchoice.org/engage/milton-friedman-the-father-of-school-choice-esas/
>
I’ve been saying that for years, too. School choice is the silver bullet
>
The ‘silver bullet’ is multi-stepped:
- Term. the DoEd (40yrs+ on the (R)N(C) TODO list)
- Elim. the illegal welfare state
- Elim. property taxes
- Return to ‘user pays upon service(s) received’
NOBODY cares about quality & cost like the one writing the check
The check-writers have no control whatever over public schools at present. Giving the parents say over where their kids go to school is the first step towards some sort of accountability for the educational bureaucracy. If they want the money to stay with their school, keep the parents satisfied that their kids are getting something out of the school, or they’ll go elsewhere and take the money with them.
Hugely popular idea with minorities, and the leftard establishment is dead-set against it. Based on the presidential debates, they want to bring back busing or some damned idiocy or other, or make sure all the kids are scared to death of global warming, to the extent that they give any thought to education at all. Oh, and keep affirmative action around for the few minority kids who might be college bound, and want to devote the rest of their working lives to paying back student loans.
If a two-house majority and state legislative majorities can bring about school choice, the Dems will not be able to scream “racism” loud enough to dissuade minorities from voting Republican. Trump can make it happen.
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