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

To: Stan J. Czernel who wrote (83410)	9/10/2008 5:53:55 PM
From: Lane3	Respond to of 544278

I won't specify what these are - but a national debate might be useful Having a national debate doesn't require a federal program. Some of that already gets done as part of the textbook development process. That process may need some improvements but I don't know that we need a federal bureaucracy to do it. You could use professional associations or academia to develop proposals, then run a process to pick from the proposals by some committee. You could even have people vote on the internet for what to include. Then the states would have pressure to adopt it. My experience with federal programs in such areas is that there is little value added by much of the federal presence. Policy people at the national level impose some requirements, including reporting requirements, but the whole business goes to the state for implementation. The trend has been toward more state autonomy. It makes you wonder why the feds need to be there. If congress has certain mandates, it can just pass laws, let the states implement, and skip the overhead of the middlemen. The other problem with coming up with a list via a national program is all the special interests. Everyone has ideas on what should be there. Add them all up and the kids will be 50 before they graduate high school. At lunch today and friend and I offered that kids should be taught about copyrights in school re the use of music and photos from the internet. Whether that should or shouldn't make the list, it's an example of the myriad topics that would be lobbied. Given the way our politics work, you'd end up with all kinds of obscure, special-interest topics like Wackadoo Indian history or the role of pit bulls throughout American history. I see a monster. I also question the premise that there's a list for all kids. There are things all kids should know, but they don't necessarily need to learn them in school. For example, disadvantaged kids don't learn a lot of things at home that advantaged kids pick up simply by being part of a more sophisticated culture, for example, the difference between a protein and a carbohydrate or a checking and savings account. There's also a difference in the list for college bound kids, blue collar workers, pink collar workers, honors kids, etc. It's a waste of time to teach kids what they don't need to know. I do think that public school should be funded by federal taxes - not property taxes. I think there's something to be said for funding by income tax, which is what is implied in your point. Given that states are more and more using federal income taxes at their basis and adding some tailored tweaks, the state might as well take the money directly than have the feds collect it and send it back.