John LeBoutillier
Wednesday June 13, 2001

Any hope that our poorest children could be rescued from 'dead-end' public schools died yesterday.

Any hope that Washington, D.C. – under G.W. Bush – would be any different than it was under Bill Clinton died yesterday.

Any hope that the politics of public education – long the territory of Teddy Kennedy and the teachers unions – would change under GOP control of the House and the White House also died yesterday.

A very modest plan to phase in vouchers for our poorest children in a few of the country’s worst failing public schools was killed in the Senate yesterday. Ten school districts in three states would have been permitted to channel federal dollars to low-income students. A mere $50 million would be set aside for this two-year experimental program. And, to prevent any type of discrimination, a lottery would be used to select the students.

But, oh no, the "education lobby" killed it.

Led by Hillary Clinton – rapidly becoming the Democrats' lead attack dog – the Democrats and the teachers unions lied, distorted and crushed the truth about the value of school choice. Hillary the congenital liar, as Bill Safire once dubbed her, had the unmitigated gall to say, "Experiments have demonstrated absolutely no evidence that vouchers help improve student achievement."

Nothing could be more untrue.

Just a few weeks ago a contingent from New York City journeyed to Milwaukee to witness first hand the success of the voucher program there. Student after student talked of their "new lives" since leaving the public schools and entering parochial or private schools.

The teachers unions aren't stupid. They see vouchers as fewer public school teaching jobs. So they fight like hell to kill any voucher proposal - even a modest test program like this one.

But here is the rub: G.W. Bush and 11 Republican senators caved in!

The Bush White House was told early on by Teddy Kennedy that any education bill containing vouchers would be DOA – Dead On Arrival.

So, instead of taking umbrage at Kennedy’s arrogance, Bush did exactly what he used to do in Austin: just join a bill currently being passed by the Democratic Senate and, when you sign it into law, take credit for it!

That makes great headlines – and lousy policy.

The Kennedy-Bush Education Bill has no vouchers – and more federal spending on education than ever before!

Thus a supposedly conservative Republican now believes that more federal spending is the way to help students learn.

What Bush should have done – and he could still do it – is put the same energy into school choice as he put into the tax cuts. He should go everywhere in the nation to teach and educate the people on the absolute value of students and parents having choices made possible for them with their own money!

Short of that, G.W. Bush has knuckled under to the Left.

He has caved.

From now on when he claims he wants to be the Education President we should all just shake our heads. His words are as empty as Hillary's and Teddy's.

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Bush Administration