And Tater Tots Are Evil Too

This week President Obama proposed that American school children extend their time in class, either by lengthening the school day, or spending less time on summer vacation. “We can no longer afford an academic calendar designed when America was a nation of farmers who needed their children at home plowing the land at the end of each day,” Obama said. He continued to say “That calendar may have once made sense, but today, it puts us at a competitive disadvantage. Our children spend over a month less in school than children in South Korea. That is no way to prepare them for a 21st century economy.” (I won't even get into how the children of South Korea are about to spend 365 days of their year in a radioactive graveyard, thanks to Obama's inaction against N.K.'s nuclear intent or the fact that preparing for the U.S. economy that is being shaped by Obama's policies has more to do with being an illegal alien with a union membership card than it has to do with any amount of eduction.)

Just like the News Media there are plenty of blogsters in the tank for Obama as well and I read some of what they were blogging while looking for this quote. They are saying it will never happen because municipalities and states have authority over the schools and not the Federal government. So I guess NCLB was just a suggestion by the previous administration.

Texas Governor, Rick Perry was championing 10th Amendment rights here recently (that's where the Federal government has limited authority over the States) when the Obama-reich was trying to cram stimulus down our throats. But let's also not forget how many schools get Federal funding and that Chicago-style politics involves open extortion -- "do this or we'll pull your funding". And that's what he'd bother doing under the mantle of our 232 year old America. Now, in year One of the Obamerica he'll dispense with all of that legislative, Constitutionalized mumbo-jumbo and do what he's doing with the Fed, any Inspector Generals who are politically inconvenient, with G.M., Chrysler and AIG.

The only real challenge to this latest executive fiat is that his good buddies in the NEA will oppose this and the fundamental difference is that when the Obamafia strong-armed debt collectors in that Chrysler faux-bankruptcy, UAW members got paid NOT to have to work. NEA members are potentially looking at a longer school year -- having to work more or just facing longer school days and shorter breaks between the next stretch is likely not to be received well.

Suffice it to say, I know a few teachers who will be opposed to this and will likely leave the profession for something more lucrative if they lose their summer's off with their children.

And I've heard some interesting arguments in support of changes to the school calendar but my only point is that schools are the domain of local and state government and are well served by engaged parents actively involved in PTO's and supporting improvements from the home. I am confident education will not benefit from yet another Federal mandate.