Maine Governor Paul LePage had a tantrum (or hissy fit) when the state’s Charter School Commission rejected four out of five applicants. He was especially annoyed because two of the four rejected were for-profit online corporations. As we learned from an exposé last fall in the Maine press, the state commissioner of education got help from Jeb Bush’s friends in writing a “digital learning” law for Maine. Governor LePage must have longed to win more praise from Jeb and the technology industry, which really really really wants to break into the Maine market.

The Maine Charter School Commission did due diligence, followed the law, and rejected unqualified applicants, despite political pressure from the governor.

To learn why the commission rejected four of the five applicants, read this great column.

Here is a sample:

“LePage caught many in the State House off guard Wednesday when he called a rare news conference to complain that Maine schools are “failing” and that our educators “abuse our children in the classroom by lying to them.”

His primary target: the all-volunteer Charter School Commission, which earlier this week denied four of five pending applications for new charter schools — including two “virtual” online schools pitched by out-of-state, for-profit companies that have spent much of the past year or two cozying up to the LePage administration.

“I’m asking (members of the commission) for the good of the kids of the state of Maine, please go away,” snarled LePage. “We don’t need you. We need some people with backbones.”

Two things worth noting here:

First, as he hits the halfway point of his seemingly endless four-year term, Maine’s chief executive has been reduced to telling those who tick him off (an ever-growing segment of Maine’s population, mind you) to simply “go away.”

Second, if their actions this week are any indication, the seven members of the Charter School Commission have backbones of pure titanium.”