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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TimF who wrote (10429)	1/31/2006 7:50:44 AM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 541430

The public schools are part of government. I, too, think this is a stretch. You wouldn't say that the government "owns" the military but rather that the military is a governmental function. I don't think you can claim socialism for anything that wouldn't, by default, be privately owned. In this country, schools have always been a governmental function, at least as long as we've had government. Before that it was a community function. In history, schooling has been either a community, government, or church function. I think you can reasonably argue that it shouldn't be a government function. And I would totally agree that it shouldn't be a federal government function. But I don't think that calling it "socialist" is apt. Call it "collectivist" if you like, but not "socialist." That's just too weird.

To: TimF who wrote (10429)	1/31/2006 2:23:50 PM
From: JohnM	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 541430

Tim, you may have a point with your argument but this bit about the schools being a part of government doesn't make it well. Your argument would seem to be strongest in municipalities in which the mayor has control over the schools, such as Bloomberg is trying to obtain in NYC. But it's weakest in places like NJ in which neither mayors or governors have "control." In NJ, even though local property taxes fund k-12 public education, the boro councils have no control over it. The school board must sponsor public boro wide votes each year in which the budget must be either approved or disapproved. The school board is elected by the voters and they are expected to set policy parameters. But it's been my experience, just recently renewed with some participation, that the only real power they have is to hire and fire the top most rank(s). An adept and able superintendent of the system is easily able to manipulate school board members who know little about the intricacies of operations. But that's hardly different from any company. One further argument you might make would have to do with competition. You might argue that k-12 public schools have monopoly control and that's tantamount to socialism. But I don't think that works. In suburban areas, families, quite frequently, pick their place of residence on the basis of school quality. And school boards routinely argue that if the municipality wishes to keep property values high, the residents need to approve higher school taxes. So there is definitely competition.