Early Christmas? Senate Plays Scrooge to DC Schoolchildren

Racist Tea Party Goers Oppose Democrat/Obama Plans for DC Schools

Duplicitous and Shameful, is how the WSJ characterizes the Senate's recent vote to kill Washington DC's Opportunity Scholarship program. I couldn't agree more, and it comes just in time for Christmas. Notice how the Democrats always claim that everything they do "is for the children" except when they might cross their union paymasters. (BTW: Health care also screws the young disproportionately.) You can just feel the evil oozing from this paragraph:

"Opposition to vouchers is a top priority for NEA," declared the union in a letter sent to every Democrat in the House and Senate in March. "We expect that Members of Congress who support public education, and whom we have supported, will stand firm against any proposal to extend the pilot program. Actions associated with these issues WILL be included in the NEA Legislative Report Card for the 111th Congress."

Is the NEA the most evil organization in America? Maybe not compared to Tony Soprano, but give them credit, they are working on it.

Helping the President keep his campaign promise to kill programs that have proven ineffective, the Senate sent President Obama spending bill that phased out the program. How ineffective you ask? Here's a quote from an Earth Times article:

The reading effects of the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program (OSP) show the largest achievement impact of any education policy program yet evaluated in a randomized control trial by the U.S. Department of Education and reveal an important trend toward increased reading gains for students the longer they remain in the program, according to the evaluation’s principal investigator, Patrick Wolf of the University of Arkansas.

Republicans need to get off their dead rear ends, NOW, and make a campaign promise to restore funding for this effort. If there was ever an issue that combines core principles with the desire to reach out to minorities, this is it. Please check the Weekly Standard blog for pictures of those protesting this outrageous action by the Congress. This is fertile ground for the Freedom Coalition.