This page was last updated on August 22, 2011.
Leave it behind; Editorial; Beaver County Times; August 18, 2011. At the time I wrote this critique, this editorial appeared only in the print edition of the BCT.
There’s little new in this editorial on the topic of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLBA), so please read my critique of “Educational boondoggle” for most of my comments.
The editorial tells us “NCLB was trumpeted as President George W. Bush’s major accomplishment in education. In reality, its major flaws were in plain sight for those who wanted to see. (Never underestimate the willful blindness of politics and ideology to reality.)” Does anyone care to guess whom the BCT wants us to believe was guilty of “willful blindness of politics and ideology to reality?”
In trying to imply the NCLBA was purely the result of Republican political ideology, here’s what the BCT hopes we forgot.
1. While Mr. Bush (a Rockefeller Republican) pushed the NCLBA, the late-Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA) was the bill’s original sponsor and supported it to his death. Does the BCT want us to believe Mr. Kennedy was a closet right-winger?
2. The House passed the NCLBA with a vote of 381-41. Despite a Republican majority [221-212 (214 including two independents who caucused with the Democrats)] in the House, more Democrats (198) voted for the bill than Republicans (183). Of the 41 “no” votes, 33 were Republicans and only six were Democrats.
3. Democrats held the majority in the Senate (50-49).
4. The Senate passed the NCLBA with a vote of 87-10; 45 Republicans voted “yes” as did 42 Democrats.
5. When you add the “yes” votes of both houses of Congress, more Democrats (240) voted “yes” than did Republicans (228).
6. Unless the BCT wants us to believe Democrats who voted for the NCLBA were victims of a Jedi (or maybe Karl Rove) mind trick, I think it’s fair to say the NCLBA was a true bipartisan effort.
The NCLBA did drive home one point. Most Republicans elected to Congress at the time were not conservatives.
© 2004-2011 Robert W. Cox, all rights reserved.