I have always been puzzled by the indifference of state and federal legislators to widespread failure and fraud in the charter sector. The same mystery shrouds the decisions of the billionaires who keep pouring new money into new charters. No matter how many of the charters fail and close their doors, no matter how many of their founders are convicted of embezzlement or padding enrollment, no matter how many are in the state’s list of low-performing schools, the money keeps flowing.
The obvious reason that politicians support charters is because hedge funds and very wealthy donors make sizable campaign contributions. In New York, both Governor Kathy Hochul and NYC Mayor Eric Adams received millions in campaign donations from the charter boosters. We know why free-market zealots like Betsy DeVos and Charles Koch ignore the evidence: They want to privatize education. Why the Wall Street crowd continues to fund failure is a mystery.
A friend in Missouri sent me the previous post about a charter school that was taking in public money despite low academic performance. I asked him why the legislature wanted more charter schools, instead of supporting public schools. It wasn’t rational, I said.
He replied, you have to understand the Missouri legislature, and he sent me the following article. It was written by Stacey Newman, who served in the Missouri legislature for nine years. The picture she paints conjures up thoughts of Mark Twain, H.L. Mencken and Will Rogers. It’s a description of an institution where chaos, dysfunction, and drunkenness are par for the course.
Newman wrote that “dysfunction” was the legislature’s middle name.
As do most voters, I expect legislators to be serious when they take their oath of office. I want to trust they will treat their offices with reverence instead of middle school immaturity — I really do. My first late-night session as a freshman involved debate over a pornography bill. Arguments proceeded way past midnight as I was introduced to #molegafterdark. Coffee cups are allowed on House chamber desks, yet during evening sessions, many of those cups contain alcohol. I was appalled at the drunken debate, remembering how hard I campaigned just to be sitting at one of those desks. Surrounding us were the words carved at the very top of the House chamber: “Liberty, Justice, Law, Progress, Truth, Knowledge, Honor.” Yeah, right.
Hijinks abound every session — particularly as tempers flare between the Republican-controlled state House and Senate. It is routine for both chambers to be at odds as constitutional deadlines loom and members are often campaigning against each other for higher office. Legislators are permitted to carry concealed guns in the Capitol (really) and many pat their pants pockets during high stress debates, reminding everyone who has firepower. One year, I witnessed a screaming near-fistfight of legislators behind my seat as security rushed to intervene. On another late night, I prepared to hide under my desk as an armed inebriated state senator paced our side gallery in intimidation during a contentious House vote on her bill…
Yet we keep hoping for serious people to take over and heed the state motto, “Let the welfare of the people be the supreme law.” It doesn’t say anything about hijinks. There is plenty to do: Fund public schools instead of banning history and attacking teachers; provide access to health care to those who desperately need it and allocate federal relief education dollars, for starters. Accept that masks are not the enemy during a pandemic and that vaccinations, which most elected officials in Jefferson City have received, are lifesaving. Stop with the anti-science hooey left over from the 1692 Salem witch trials. Stop pretending you are aggrieved and, for once, leave your racism and hatred of transgender kids buried at home.
Read more at: https://www.kansascity.com/opinion/readers-opinion/guest-commentary/article258850773.html#storylink=cpy
Diane Ravitch's blog 
More fraudulent $$$? Just asking.
Duh, Buck In Pockets …
One of the greatest consequences of our current economic inequality is that the few who fund most of the levers of power believe that their act of disruption fixes what they deem needs to be fixed. It is estimated that 90% of all start-ups fail within five years. As long as there are a few who are throwing their dollars at a multitude of investments while profiting handsomely from the few that make it, this practice will continue. This is the Amway, Devos, pyramid playbook. These same individuals put significant money into lobbying and corrupt payoffs funding campaign coffers, making many of those who end up in office merely puppets on a string. This is why the charter school scam continues. As long as state governments are willing to give these charlatans money with no questions asked, the ones who profit will continue to do so and corrupt politicians will be rewarded handsomely. It seems to me that the few of means who are disgusted by the behavior that comes about from “dark money” could introduce their own transparent contributions. Let everyone know what is being given and who will get it for meaningful legislation. This light might just scare some of these legislators and perhaps we might see different results.
I think part of the attraction of the Wall St. crowd is the draw of an investment that is so-called innovative. They likely also like the tax write-off and sometimes credits they can get. If charters get too tarnished by failure, my guess is Wall St. would drop them for something new, shiny like bitcoin, equally as speculative and risky.
The concept of disruption being good is a primary tenet of predatory capitalism. Charters simply represent a row of sharpened teeth, easily replaced, for these “disrupters”.
Charters are not innovative. They have been around for 30 years. They come and go.
Yep
There’s a columnist in Toledo who calls charters “the darlings” of politicians, and it’s certainly true in Ohio.
They simply prefer privatized school systems. It’s partly ideological, it’s partly campaign donations, it’s partly because if they’re opening new charters they can say they’re performing some work on education, but the preference for charter schools over public schools is undeniable.
Anyone can see this themselves by looking at the big ed reform orgs. Every article or proposal involving public schools is negative and every article or proposal involving charter schools is positive. It’s overwhelmingly biased against public schools and towards charter schools and this is so much the norm inside ed reform no one even questions it.
Here’s Fordham in Ohio on charters:
https://fordhaminstitute.org/ohio/commentary/ohio-charter-news-weekly-21822
It’s all like this. 100% charter cheerleading. No dissenters.
Follow the money
And you can bet
It flows in circles
Pocket to pocket
And down the toilet.
BURMA SHAVE
Do the legislators really get drunk and finger loaded pistols while trifling with each other? I can’t believe it. How can it be? Don’t they broadcast the sessions on a public television station?
Religious zealots and libertarians capitalize on GOP government that is “chaotic, dysfunctional and alcohol impaired.”
There are almost 50 state Catholic Conferences. A lot of them promote school choice. As examples, in Kentucky, media report that the VP of Ed Choice- Ky is also the associate director of the Catholic Conference of Kentucky. Indiana Catholics take credit for the school choice legislation in Indiana. Ohio’s government is heavily conservative Catholic.
Tim Busch, a wealthy. politically active, right wing Catholic wrote, “The remarkable similarities between Catholicism and Charles Koch’s recent book.”
School choice rallies in some states are co-hosted by state Catholic Conferences and the Koch’s AFP. Koch-funded ALEC promotes privatization. Koch’s Ilya Shapiro was hired by Georgetown Catholic University. He was made famous by his tweet, lesser Black woman.
It’s so obvious, no connection of dots is necessary which begs the question, why are so many public ed. defenders acquiescing to right wing religion.
🤑💰🤑💰🤑💰🤑💰🤑💰🤑💰🤑💰🤑
& the dumbing down of American education to turn “other people’s children” into lifelong factory widgets (minimum wage, no healthcare benefits) so the Waltons🤑, Kochs🤑 , et.al.🤑can make 💰💰💰💰💰💰💰.
Of course, then everything will be going robotic, so there will be even more 💰💰💰 to be made. (Our local CVS employees told us that they were moving to all self service check out. When the clerk there was asked if she would be losing her job, she said, no, she’d be on the floor, stocking the shelves.)
Again… until the robots appear.
This won’t stop until the US Congress and the president, whoever that may be, passes Campaign Finance Reform that overturns the US Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United that metaphorically turned dollars into citizens and votes. Billiaonres have more dollars and keep turning those dollars into votes by buying elections.
Wish that Missouri had a cap on charter schools!
Four of the 22 co-sponsors of the “Congratulating charter schools” US Senate Resolution in the 2020-21 Congress were Democrats. Michael Bennett, Cory Booker, Thomas Carper (Del.) and Diane Feinstein. I presume the 4 are corporate hacks. A former Feinstein staffer thinks the problem is different and significantly worse in the case of Feinstein.
It is widely believed that Feinstein is not mentally competent.
Carper’s bio
He is “a business oriented Democrat following the lead of the two previous GOP governors.” He pushed for a reduction in income tax rates. IMO, he’d be as comfortable on either side of the aisle.
Btw-He admitted to slapping his wife i.e. he’s a “family values” kind of guy.
OMG, that description of Missouri legislature is priceless. Too bad Thomas Nast is no longer around to memorialize it in cartoon.
Diane-
The former staffer who is Black said that Feinstein cares more about her dog than Black people. It might be revealing if the Latin Rebels who interviewed Jamarcus Purley for the report, followed up with him. He is a grad of Stanford and Harvard School of Ed. Feinstein who has supported charter schools likely thought she was hiring someone other than she thought. Purley in one interview said he was re-examining the role philanthropies have given themselves in public policy. Reportedly, Purley’s been fired. He may have got sideways of the DINO money?