Richard Cohen on the Dems

wow

The eight Democratic presidential candidates assembled in Washington last week for another of their debates and talked, among other things, about public education. They all essentially agreed that it was underfunded -- one system "for the wealthy, one for everybody else," as John Edwards put it. Then they all got into cars and drove through a city where teachers are relatively well paid, per-pupil spending is through the roof and -- pay attention here -- the schools are among the very worst in the nation. When it comes to education, Democrats are ineducable.

Here's eduwonk:

First it was Richard Cohen, now Ruth Marcus in today's WaPo calls out the Democratic '08ers. Two thoughts on this. First, these columns and the kinds of things you hear from media-types signal, I think, that the political landscape is shifting and the bar for Democrats on serious education proposals is getting higher. That's good. This issue is right in the groove for the party. Second, what about the Republicans? They are no picnic here and aside from a smattering of governors and No Child Left Behind they haven't had a creative national thought on education policy since Charlottesville. In fact, most of their creativity has been spent figuring out creative ways to try to undercut the federal role in elementary and secondary schools.

(Maybe I'll just spend my summer re-posting items from eduwonk & Jay Mathews....)

I do have the feeling that the climate is changing for the Dems. Hope so, anyway.

As for the Republicans..... I dunno. I get the feeling they're planning to sit this one out (on the subject of education, that is).

Not that I know anything about it.