When I read your post, I could not help but think that it was conceding defeat while the battle was still on. So, I said to myself, wait until after the election, and see how well his prognostication went. Based on the current state of affairs, I think that we can agree, even though the final result is still in doubt, it was premature to conclude that a Gore presidency was impossible.
I have the same sense about your analysis of education. That these battles could end with widespread vouchers and massive privatization is clearly a distinct possibility; if it wasn't, there wouldn't be a battle. The standard testing craze is already, IMHO, playing itself out, and I am much less concerned about it. But to conclude that we have already lost -- I just don't buy that. It seems to be a kind of perverse notion of Gramscian analysis: depression of the intelligence, pessimism of the will.
And why, pray tell, should education NOT be an issue in a national election? What makes health care, or social security, or any one of numerous other issues, proper or legitimate issues, but not education? The logic here evades me.
> Leo, the prospect of a Gore presidency has fizzled, so my response is truly
> academic. Politicians like Gore work with a very elastic political
> philosophy that has two end points. One is the concession to a salt of the
> earth conservatism that provides a fix on what the people want. The other
> is the old do what it takes to win strategy. Those points can easily become
> scissor blades that will cut bait
> whenever the circumstances call for it. And your political agenda is their
> bat. Gore might not have been pro-vouchers but like Clinton if the
> political winds shift he's sign-on or at least sign it and then take credit
> for it.
>
> Education should never have been an issue in this election - it's a side
> issue at the best of times. Of course there's serious stuff going on in
> education that call for attention. But the issue was coopted by the right
> a long time ago and the best you're doing is rear-guard action. In this
> case, the agenda is frozen: school reform is now settled. The other side
> got its message across: Schools now need
> reforming and it will best be done by moving away from how and how much
> schools are funded to the accountability stuff: test scores and teacher
> competency. You've been out Gramscied...some time ago.
>
>
Leo Casey United Federation of Teachers 260 Park Avenue South New York, New York 10010-7272 (212-598-6869)
Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never has, and it never will. If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation are men who want crops without plowing the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightening. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its waters. -- Frederick Douglass -- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <../attachments/20001108/be295478/attachment.htm>