GraniteGrok: WHY IT'S BLUE HAMPSHIRE

Check out the op-ed in today's Foster's by Republican State Rep Dave Hess on education funding. Hess is part of the "leadership" of House Republicans, so you know his views reflect the views of the House Republican leadership. The gist of the op-ed is that we, the Republicans, know how to spend your money more wisely than Governor Lynch. Here's an excerpt.

"There is neither rhyme nor reason to [Lynch's] formula. In fact, the governor's plan spends the exact same amount, dollar for dollar, as the state would have spent under current law. The governor's current plan, which the Democratically controlled House of Representatives passed unchanged, just shuffles the money around, not unlike a shell game. The biggest difference is that 86 towns lose over $16 million under the governor's plan — towns that can ill afford to lose money, including four of the five original Claremont lawsuit towns."

There isn't a dime's worth of difference between Hess' plan and Lynch's. Both agree that the quality of public education depends on how much we spend. Both agree that we need to spend more. And both agree that the "wise men" in Concord should decide how the money gets spent. The only difference is they disagree over how best to spend our money.

Thus, the voters in this State just get to choose between two shades of blue. A real Republican approach to public education would recognize that just increasing spending on public schools is not going to improve pubic education; competition is needed to do that. It would be based on the premise that parents are much better decision-makers than the "wise men" in Concord. To cut to the chase, the real Republican approach is school choice.

But how bad are things here? Not only are the Republicans not advocating school choice. They're not even for same but less. They're just for the same.

Comments

Too many on both sides have bought into the lie that More Money = Better Education, even though that fallacy has been disproven by a number of studies, including one by the Brookings Institute. Almost all of the studies I've checked have found that it isn't the amount of money that's spent, but how it's spent. Autonomy of the school systems also play a major part in the quality of education, meaning that school systems that are under the control of their towns are almost always far better than those controlled at the state level. State control of schools only accomplishes one thing: Mediocrity. Increased spending under such conditions only gives us a very expensive but mediocre education system. I'm beginning to believe that's what we're headed for in New Hampshire. Heaven help us all if it is so.

Posted by: DCE | April 28, 2007 9:42 PM

It's interesting that Ed keyed in on the "leadership" position of Hess and his piece being indicative of the GOP regime's viewpoint on the matter. I was the receipient of a "heads-up" email prior to the publication of the piece by the chair of our county Republicans. Heh! Why should we give two sh*ts about what ANY Republican thinks about school funding? They've had all the years since the faulty Claremont edicts to do something, and squandered it. Now we should look to them for the answers? What I'm looking for is new Republicans with real ideas. Not the same old ones with the same half-measures and compromises. How much compromising and moderation have we seen from the Dems since the election?

Posted by: doug | April 29, 2007 10:53 AM

GraniteGrok

Blogroll

Favorites

Local Commentary

Local News

Activists

Sam Adams Alliance blogs

Free Market and Limited Government

News

Islamic World

Pure Politics

MilBlogs

Environmentalism (or not)

Geeky Stuff

Education

Blog Commentaries

Radio and TV Shows

Design - Architecture - Stuff

Presidential Campaign Sites

Last Man Standing

Humor

WHY IT'S BLUE HAMPSHIRE

TrackBack

Comments

Post a comment

Search

PODCAST

Categories

Archives

Recent Posts