You are using an outdated browser.
Please upgrade your browser
and improve your visit to our site.

Winger Zinger: Public Schools are "Government-Run Schools"

For all of their complaints about public education, conservative Republicans have generally shied away from attacking the idea in principle. That may be changing, according to the Washington Monthly’s Steve Benen.

Benen has been following right-wing rhetoric on public education and, late last week, he noted that the rhetoric has become a lot more hostile: Texas Representative Ron Paul, for example, has been ranting about the “indoctrination of children” while Minnesota Representative Michele Bachmann has called home schooling the “essence” of liberty because “It's about knowing our children better than the state knows our children. Former Senator and Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum has also been on the attack, telling a New Hampshire audience this month that 

Just call them what they are … Public schools? That's a nice way of putting it. These aregovernment-run schools.

Santorum is right. Public schools are government-run schools--just like government-run police departments, government-run national parks, the government-run interstate highway system, and, of course, our government-run army, navy, marines, and air force.

Admittedly, Bachmann, Paul, and Santorum are part of the GOP’s fringe. But it’s not always easy to tell where the fringe ends and where the mainstream begins. As Benen notes, already this talk is picking up in right-wing media, the same place other loopy ideas (Obama's birth certificate, etc.) went before going mainstream. 

In any event, the danger isn’t so much that Republican extremists will succeed in abolishing the public schools, at least anytime soon. The danger, rather, is that they make the rest of the Republican Party, which wants dramatic reductions in public spending, seem reasonable.

Logo

Independent journalism matters

×

Ads help fund our journalism. Please disable your ad blocker so that we can continue striving to be the most influential magazine in Washington, D.C., with our breaking news coverage, in-depth political features, and much more.

Continue without disabling

Choose your Ad Blocker

  • Adblock Plus
  • Adblock
  • Adguard
  • Ad Remover
  • Brave
  • Ghostery
  • uBlock Origin
  • uBlock
  • UltraBlock
  • Other
  1. In the extension bar, click the AdBlock Plus icon
  2. Click the large blue toggle for this website
  3. Click refresh
  1. In the extension bar, click the AdBlock icon
  2. Under "Pause on this site" click "Always"
  1. In the extension bar, click on the Adguard icon
  2. Click on the large green toggle for this website
  1. In the extension bar, click on the Ad Remover icon
  2. Click "Disable on This Website"
  1. In the extension bar, click on the orange lion icon
  2. Click the toggle on the top right, shifting from "Up" to "Down"
  1. In the extension bar, click on the Ghostery icon
  2. Click the "Anti-Tracking" shield so it says "Off"
  3. Click the "Ad-Blocking" stop sign so it says "Off"
  4. Refresh the page
  1. In the extension bar, click on the uBlock Origin icon
  2. Click on the big, blue power button
  3. Refresh the page
  1. In the extension bar, click on the uBlock icon
  2. Click on the big, blue power button
  3. Refresh the page
  1. In the extension bar, click on the UltraBlock icon
  2. Check the "Disable UltraBlock" checkbox
  1. Please disable your Ad Blocker
  2. Disable any DNS blocking tools such as AdGuardDNS or NextDNS

If the prompt is still appearing, please disable any tools or services you are using that block internet ads (e.g. DNS Servers).