Sunday, August 9, 2009

Sarah Palin's Educational Death Panels


First of all, let me admit that I love writing about Sarah Palin. For one thing, writing about her just about guarantees some interesting comments from her supporters, some of whom are almost as funny as Sarah herself. They scour the blogs for anti-Sarah posts they can comment on. I can almost picture the spittle flying from the corners of their mouths as they read my obvious lefty-pinko-socialist-commie posts.

Sarah most recently made waves for complaining that Obama's health care plan is "downright evil", and that it would lead to her son Trig, who has Down Syndrone, to face an Obama/Socialist created "death panel" who would decide whether Trig was fit to live. Despite the patent absurdity of it all, Sarah conveniently ignores the fact that millions of children have inadequate health care right this minute, and while they don't have to worry about death squads, their parents must worry about whether an illness will force them to choose between medical care and bankruptcy.

A more cogent argument for Sarah, and hence one she would never make, is that the current wave of education "reform" would be the equivalent of an educational death panel for Trig and others like him. Suppose we do what Sarah's conservative pals want, and expand the number of charter schools? How many charters would be willing to take on a child like Trig? Because charter schools live and die strictly by their results on standardized tests, there is little incentive for them to take on a special needs child. Trig would be denied entrance to school after school by these charter death panels. And because politicians like Sarah want to funnel more and more money to charters, Trig would end up in a public school system sucked dry of the funds needed to give him the education he deserves.

Of course, I doubt that will ever happen, because Sarah can afford to send her kids to private school anywhere she wants. That's what happens when you're a rootin'-tootin', free-wheelin', go-getter who can make a LOT more money by quitting her post than she can by fulfilling the obligations of the job she was elected to do.

Now, Sarah Palin fans, have at it.

2 comments:

endmayoralcontrol said...

Don't forget the corruption money she has made. That can pay lots of private school bills.

Mr. Dugong said...

The notion that high quality education and health care are privileges of wealth is pervasive in American society. Palin is too ignorant to be making such policy decisions because she's not only socioeconomically biased, but she's also clueless about what it means to really live in high-need conditions (at or near poverty-level income).

Palin may think that she is high-need because of her son, Trig, but having a child with down syndrome does not make you a representative of Americans who face hard times.