The truth shows its face on Utah Vouchers

Russell,

You have some interesting points about this whole voucher debate here; however, as a public school teacher who argued against vouchers from a purely ideological point of view (they’re a prime example of fascism), I resent being called a liar. I also resent the argument that vouchers are about school choice. They aren’t. What they are is government money being used to force competition. That’s the textbook definition of fascism. It’s not about choice; it’s about force. Why counteract force with force? I will readily admit that public schools have huge problems; however, the problems we face largely come from too much government regulation. Adding a government-regulated “scholarship” program to the mix won’t help. I’m not sure that it would make things worse, but more government meddling in education definitely won’t make it better. Why not work toward real change, not meaningless change that will lead to more government intervention, not less?

forced competition isn’t fascism so much as the government (the state) placing its interests above that of the individual/society. Force is the side affect of ensuring the ideology.

I’m not sure I understand this point. It sounds like you’re defending government-sponsored competition, but I’m not sure.

Where you’ve gone wrong is when you state that it’s government money.

That’s just semantics. In a perfect world that may be true, but the way it works is that whatever the government funds, via tax money, it regulates. Spending more of the tax payer’s money on education (and spreading that to private institutions as well) will increase regulation, not decrease. People who support private schools (myself included) should run from this idea. I don’t think it would affect public schools much at all, but I do think that it will allow government meddling in the private schools that receive this funding.

And it’s not being used to force competition so much as it is allowing those tax payers the choice of where their education tax dollars are used in educating their own children.

It’s not their “education tax dollars.” It’s a separate fund set up to provide scholarships based on income level. I really see it as no more than a welfare program, a handout if you will. If a program like this were to work, it would all have to come from the same fund, allowing schools to compete. This voucher bill doesn’t do that. Also, you tout the idea of choice. This bill only allows for the wealthy to have that choice, as you noted in one of your posts. A $3000 voucher isn’t going to allow too many students to change their school. All it will do is allow the students who can already afford alternative schooling to receive a government kick-back for doing so.

many teachers were flat out telling lies about how the voucher system worked. Just plain untruths about it. They were so far off, that it only took a few seconds to often realize that many of them never even read the Referendum. They just spouted off the crap they heard spread through the PTA and via their teacher lounges.

There was crap being spouted by both sides. I can admit that my teacher’s union spouted crap. Can you admit that your side did too?

Public school is a government-regulated “Scholarship” as you call it. So, I don’t see what your point is on calling a voucher the same thing.

My point is that you oppose public school for doing the same thing as the voucher program you support. It seems inconsistent.

There would have been less “government meddling” with the vouchers, which is why you heard those bogus ads from Utah’s teacher of the year saying “no oversight.”

This statement contradicts itself. Either the adds were right, and there won’t be oversight, or the add was “bogus,” and there will be government intervention. Right now, government can’t regulate private schools. Once you allow them to help pay for them, they have the “right” (in quotes because I really don’t think it’s their right) to regulate it. Please explain to me how it will create less interference.

What I keep hearing from the pro-voucher side is the idea of choice. I absolutely agree that we should have choice in education. I’d even support giving every dime of the money raised for education back to the taxpayers to spend on any form of education they choose. What I don’t support is creating another government program to give handouts to people who can already afford the choice that they are requesting. There is a better way to do this.

Sounds like you made up that definition.

And, it sounds like you need a history lesson. The dictionary.com definition is too narrow. It sounds like the definition that neo-conservatives use to justify the gross misnomer, “Islamic fascist.” The Macintosh version of World Book Encyclopedia gives this, much better, definition:

the form of government in Italy from 1922 to 1943, under the leadership of Benito Mussolini. It was ruled by a dictator, with strong control of industry and labor by the central government, great restrictions upon the freedom of individuals, and extreme nationalism and militarism. It was opposed to radical socialism and communism.

Fascism rose in Europe as a counter-movement to communism. Whereas communism is government controlled corporations, fascism is corporate controlled government. You’ll also note in the above definition that fascism has “strong control of industry and labor by the central government.” This control took the form of government forcing competition between corporations, which is what the voucher program pretends to do. My calling it fascism is very accurate.

Democratically voted in state representatives voting for vouchers (the first round) and the populace deciding the voucher issue (round 2) is far from fascism.

No, it’s not. It’s proof that voters know better than to allow fascism into their state. Also, since vouchers were defeated by 70% of the voters, it shows a huge disconnect between our elected officials and the voters that elected them. Maybe it’s time to throw the bums out. That kind of disconnect between the voters and the elected officials is really, really scary. What else are they doing that the voters don’t approve of?

Refusing the vouchers gives more power to the government than allowing vouchers.

That’s a huge assumption that you’ve given with absolutely no evidence to support it. I argued the opposite above with evidence. You must disprove my argument before even considering taking the leap you took here.

Fascism actually sounds more like the anti-voucher camp as they went out and stole signs from those supporting vouchers and painted critics of it with a broad brush of “hate speech” and “fascism”; and fulfilled the definition of fascism: “forcibly suppressed opposition and criticism”.

Come on. Both sides were horrible in their use of hate speech and dishonest rhetoric. I know it’s hard to see that in a cause you support, but it’s true. For instance, Patrick Byrne called voters in the state “stupid” and “insane” for their votes against vouchers. He also said that we don’t care about our kids in Utah. How is that for hate speech? Also, those who aren’t in power using hate speech and crappy rhetoric doesn’t even fit your narrow definition of fascism, where the rulers “forcibly suppressed opposition and criticism,” so your argument is weak at best.

Finally, this gem:

Vouchers are capitalistic, offering the public choices and competition.

You need to study capitalism. If the government is the entity making the business decision or “forcing” competition, it isn’t capitalism. Capitalism demands a market free of government regulation and interference, neither of which is the case here. For a great resource on the definition of capitalism, read Ayn Rand’s masterpiece Atlas Shrugged. It should enlighten you. Furthermore, the voucher program didn’t take any funds from public schools, so it would actually benefit the schools to lose a few students to vouchers, allowing them to spend more money on fewer kids. If we assume that the schools are failing and are therefore losing students to vouchers, why reward them with more money for fewer students? Isn’t that the opposite of competition? Don’t vouchers actually reward schools for failing by lowering their population without lowering their funding? Also, Byrne claims that this program would only affect .3% of students. How is that giving choice and the benefit of competition to all Utah students? How is that capitalism?

There is a difference between the fascism you describe and the fascism that I described. One is a political philosophy, the other an economic philosophy. I’m sorry you can’t see that. Maybe we’ll have to agree to disagree on that one point; however, there is plenty to discuss in the rest of your comment.

it isn’t the government’s money. It is the people’s money.

Please read comment #4 above. I address this issue there.

Schools would compete to offer better education to get more students and money? A little competition never hurt any industry and is what made America’s economy so great…whoever did it the best got paid and the public got the best product.

Did you read Ref. 1? The money for vouchers wasn’t going to come from the same fund as public education. Schools that lost students to vouchers weren’t going to lose funding. How is that competition? There is no downside for a public school to lose a student to a voucher the way Ref. 1 was written. The downside was to private schools who would, possibly, have to submit to government regulation. There is no competitive aspect to the referendum. None. Zero. Zilch.

BTW, I’m a capitalist to the bone. I’m a registered libertarian and a die-hard fan of Ayn Rand. Therefore, I love the thought of competition, even in schools. The problem is that this bill doesn’t do that. Again, see my above comment for a plan that I think will work, which, incidentally, is one of the few things Connor and I agree on.

For example, if 99.7% of the people went to McDonalds and only .3% went to Burger King that doesn’t mean that there is no capitalism.

The difference is that people who make the choices in your example can make a different choice. With vouchers, a very small percentage would be given a choice different from what they already have. If it’s capitalism, they should all have a fair (not equal, btw) choice. The point is that a $3000 voucher will allow very few students the option of attending a private school whose tuition is $15,000 a year. Those who can already afford private school will benefit from it, but those who can’t already afford it aren’t going to be able to make up the difference.

If you want a truly capitalistic system, all the money needs to go back to taxpayers, who can in turn spend it on whatever form of education they desire. Vouchers, especially as proposed in Utah, don’t even come close to that.

Also “Forced government competition” seems to be working well for the schools of higher education. The government subsidizes private universities and colleges as well as funds state schools. This “forced government competition” is a non-issue…unless you are the teachers union.

2 points to consider here:

1- Money follows college students to whatever institution they desire. It doesn’t with vouchers. That is a huge difference.

2- No teacher’s union on earth is making the argument I’m making here, so your smart-ass remark about the union just shows how uninformed you really are on the issue. My line of thought here comes from my libertarian leanings, not my NEA membership.

I agree that the vouchers isn’t the perfect system, and you and I would probably have a relatively close opinion on what a more perfect system would be. I see the vouchers as a step in the right direction, starting to put more choice in the parents hands and an improvement upon the status quo.

I just don’t think they improve anything at all the way the referendum was written. It seemed like a step sideways, not a step forward (or backward). I do think that the end effect would have been more regulation of private schools, but other than that, they wouldn’t have done much. I also think that we would find a lot of agreement on what the ideal would be.

$15,000?! Did you make that up? The average Private School is $6000 as quoted by the PTA president in the Daily Herald.

I stand corrected; however, I imagine there are some $15,000 a year private schools, but it’s not terribly important to the discussion. Your point about special needs students is a good one. I would definitely support some kind of voucher for them (even if it came out of the road-building coffers–call me hypocritical ). Public school doesn’t offer much at all for special needs students, especially rural public schools like where I teach.

1. It is a start to a more competitive system and allows an easier transition to a more competitive system. Jumping from where we are now to what you would like is never going to happen.

It’s a jump sideways not in the right direction. And, I know that the kind of change I’m calling for is unlikely, but people need to lobby for it if it is to ever have a chance. Call me an idealist, but I have a hard time voting for something that only pretends to do what I want it to do. The concept of vouchers sounds great; unfortunately, the way Referendum 1 was written, it didn’t do what it claimed to.

2. Wasn’t meant to be a smart-ass (I liked that from you Mr. “Fascist History Lesson”)

HA HA! I never claimed I wasn’t a smart-ass too.

It didn’t come from Libertarians, it came from the teachers unions.

True, but that wasn’t my point. My point was that the argument I’m using isn’t even close to the same argument the union uses. The way your comment was worded, it sounded like I was just “towing the union line,” which I most definitely am not.

the teachers unions almost single handedly got this rejected (NEA put in $3 million and lots of man power- Deseret News).

The pro-voucher side spent just as much money, with it’s money coming from special interest groups as well. Pooling all of that money could have paid for the first year of the program without a dime coming from taxpayers ($8.4 million spent on the campaign by both sides–$5.5 million to fund the program for the first year). Maybe the pro-voucher special interest groups ought to start a scholarship program instead of using the money to try to get tax payers to pay for other kids’ private school.

Also, money doesn’t win elections. Just ask Howard Dean. It especially doesn’t win elections with a 70%-30% margin of victory. The NEA didn’t beat vouchers. The voters did. Once again, I think that it’s scary that there’s such a disconnect between our legislature and us, but that’s just me.

As for the union, I belong to the union just in case I get sued. We live in such a litigious society that I feel the need to protect myself and my family. The union offers me that protection. Most of what the union does I disagree with, but I send them my money dutifully every month because they can afford much better lawyers than I can. Fair enough?

I answer your questions about solutions in this post over at my blog. As far as radical change, we need to change people’s mind one at a time. That’s how change happens in America, one vote at a time.