I wouldn't know where to start with this: it reads like an informal position paper full of talking points meant to be "mimeographed" and sent to circulate among "the faculty". Even the points he makes about some of the drawbacks of homeschooling, he doesn't even make in quite the right way: he cannot be objective about the possible strengths and weaknesses of both public school ed and homeschooling, because he is only talking about a representative and defender of one of them, public school ed. Socialization is indeed a problem, but not in the way he discusses it: while public school might expose a kid to a long relationship between him and autocratic, impersonal teachers, AND at the same time, bullying, impossible-to-deal-with peers and the social structures of inclusion/exclusion, and hence, get you ready for "real life", the homeschooling environment might tend to foster too sloppy a relationship with the teaching parents, and relationships with parents are fraught with enough complication already. If only Public School teachers had lived up to "in loco parentis"! As another poster put it, "give me HALF of what it costs taxpayers (13K/yr.) to keep a kid in public school, and I will run rings around them". Of course things will never get that far, but indeed, think of what a parent interested in homeschooling could do with that kind of subsidy....first, though, the battle has to be fought for school choice and vouchers,etc.
And of course, one of the reasons homeschooling has not evolved as quickly or as dramatically as it might have is because the parents are doing it on their own, with no outside help from "the taxpayers" (i.e., THEMSELVES, who are already paying for OTHER people's kids in public schools. Nothing will change without revolt---large numbers across the country putting pressure on "lawmakers" to expand the structures of American education, or face the consequences of tax revolt. Who could organize something like this?
"Of course things will never get that far, but indeed, think of what a parent interested in homeschooling could do with that kind of subsidy....first, though, the battle has to be fought for school choice and vouchers,etc."
We absolutely must have school choice, that is an imperative for education in the 21st century.