Education

Newsweek’s Eleanor Clift on Friday said something that might explain a lot to conservatives. After Pat Buchanan commented on PBS’s McLaughlin Group that "the United States is moving towards Third World [education] standards because most of the students coming in now, the principle feeder nation in the country now is Mexico which is at the bottom of the OECD,” Clift replied, “When my ancestors…

Full of hot air and partisan bluster, MSNBC's Ed Schultz cynically and ghoulishly exploited the disaster in Moore, Oklahoma last week to blast Republicans over unrelated education policies. Schultz recounted the inspiring stories of teachers who threw themselves on students while their schools were being ripped apart by the tornado. But his monologue took an ugly turn when he pivoted to the…

It sounded like a freedom-of-religion case when a Columbus, Texas high school relay-race team was disqualified from the state track championship because Derrick Hayes pointed heavenward after his team won the race. That would seem odd in a red state like Texas. It turned out that officials were so strict, they warned runners to make no hand gestures after the finish line. Hayes had apparently…

In 2005, USA Today uncovered the scandal that black columnist Armstrong Williams was paid to promote Bush’s Education Department initiatives. In 2013, it’s never a scandal when MSNBC anchors promote Obama’s Education Department initiatives. It’s another Great Leap Forward for government-media synchronicity. Today at 4 pm, after her daily on-air hour is up, MSNBC anchor Tamron Hall is serving…

Two years ago, Jimmy McMillan ran for New York governor and became a viral sensation, with more than 7 million Youtube views.  Now the creator of The Rent is Too Damn High party is running for New York City mayor and has expanded his platform is his new rap anthem video. In the first 30 seconds of his video, the news reporter declared that rent in New York is at an all time high. “Critics say…

Martin O’Malley’s One Maryland is a fairy tale, and Politico’s Alexander Burns and Burgess Everett are the Brothers Grimm.  In another Politico puff piece Burns, aided by “transportation reporter” Everett, uncritically report O’Malley spin as fact.   Burns and Everett overly indulge and perpetuate O’Malley’s pragmatism fetish.  O’Malley paints himself as a results oriented politician, and…

Maybe MSNBC was trying to deflect some of the controversy surrounding Melissa Harris-Perry's previous "Lean Forward" promo by pushing out a new one. MH-P had provoked outrage in that earlier promo by proclaiming that "kids belong to their communities," not to their parents. But if anything, the new promo aired during today's Morning Joe just adds fuel to MH-P's socialist fire. While claiming…

Melissa Harris-Perry declaring in an ad that we must “break through” the “private notion” that “your kid is yours” because “kids belong to whole communities” is an outrage. This isn’t what Mediaite called “a collection of tired progressive cliches on steroids.” This is shredding the notion of family, replacing it with the commands of the state. MSNBC has awarded itself a new acronym: My Son…

In a roundup of editorial commentary published on Wednesday, the Associated Press excerpted an editorial at the Los Angeles Times condemning the Atlanta Public Schools cheating scandal, which has thus far led to 35 arrests, including that the of the district's former superintendent. "Somehow," the excerpt omitted the specifics of the excuse-making on the part of the American Federation of…

Most Americans would agree that a federal study -- burning through hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars by the way -- on duck penises is not exactly a high priority when we need to get our fiscal house in order. But Patricia Brennan would disagree with you, and she took to the liberal online journal Slate to do so last Tuesday. Wait, did I mention that Brennan has a vested interest in…

A question with a more obvious answer might yet be asked on national TV this morning, but someone's going to have to try very hard . . . On today's Morning Joe, during a segment on the Atlanta school-test scandal, Mike Barnicle actually wondered out loud why more top college grads take jobs with high-tech firms like Google, or in the financial-services sector, instead of teaching. Barnicle…

Saturday's front-page New York Times story by education writer Michael Winerip on a school testing scandal involving Beverly Hall, former superintendent of Atlanta public schools: "35 Indicted in Test Scandal at Atlanta Schools." Hall is "charged with racketeering, theft, influencing witnesses, conspiracy and making false statements. Prosecutors recommended a $7.5 million bond for her; she…

Two years ago today, I chronicled wire service reports which appeared shortly after John Hinckley's unsuccessful attempt to assassinate President Ronald Reagan on March 30, 1981 reporting that schoolchildren in many parts of the country cheered when they heard that he had been shot. At the time, I suggested that school teachers and administrators who were appalled at the reactions might have…

The Supreme Court of Indiana ruled unanimously that their state’s voucher program was constitutional, much to the chagrin of Washington Post blogger Valerie Strauss. “It isn’t the first time a supreme court has made a questionable call,” she wrote in her March 26 Answer Sheet post. According to Strauss, voucher programs are bad for several reasons. First, she is quite offended that families…