Trump’s most important cabinet nominee is …

By Tom Quiner

Betsy DeVos, President Trump's most important cabinet nominee

Betsy DeVos, President Trump’s most important cabinet nominee

Betsy DeVos. She is Donald Trump’s most important cabinet nominee, even though she’ll work for the most superfluous of all government agencies.

Education is best managed at the state and local levels. Since Jimmy Carter installed the Department of Education early on in his term, has this nation’s education gotten better or worse? Worse.

This leads to why Betsy DeVos’ confirmation is so important, and why Democrats are opposing her as much or more than any of Mr. Trump’s other nominees. Public schools have become more about indoctrination than education in recent decades. The indoctrination is managed by the teacher’s union who donate heavily to Democratic candidates to ensure their philosophical grip on our kids.

The indoctrination flies in the face of the values that animated this nation since its founding. Radio talk show host, Dennis Prager, presented the contrasting philosophies in a brilliant column last month. Here are a few of the differences Prager points out between the philosophy being inculcated in our youth by public schools in contrast to the animating principles that defined our nation through all generations until the current one:

Source of Human Rights

Left: government

Right: the Creator

Economic Goal

Left: equality

Right: prosperity

Primary Role of the State

Left: increase and protect equality

Right: increase and protect liberty

Government

Left: as large as possible

Right: as small as possible

Family Ideal

Left: any loving unit of people

Right: a married father and mother, and children

Guiding Trinity

Left: race, gender and class

Right: liberty, In God We Trust and e pluribus unum

Good and Evil

Left: relative to individual and/or society

Right: based on universal absolutes

Humanity’s Primary Division(s)

Left: rich and poor; strong and weak

Right: good and evil

Ideal Primary Identity of an American

Left: world citizen

Right: American citizen

Gender

Left: a social construct

Right: male and female

Most Important Trait to Cultivate in a Child

Left: self-esteem

Right: self-control

Worth of the Human Fetus

Left: determined by the mother

Right: determined by society rooted in Judeo-Christian values

Primary Source of Crime

Left: poverty, racism and other societal flaws

Right: the criminal’s malfunctioning conscience

Read Prager’s entire column for more.

Betsy DeVos stands squarely against the teachers union’s headlock on public schools, and presents a revolutionary idea to improve our educational system: choice.

She wants our kids and their parents to have more choice at the local level on which school they attend. What this does is create competition between schools, and competition breeds innovation and accountability. If kids are making a mass exodus from certain schools, that’s a good sign that something is wrong with those schools, and school boards are motivated to force change.

Even more heretical, Ms. DeVos wants to give kids a choice on whether they attend public schools, private schools, or charter schools, which aren’t bound by stifling union rules. For the record, most charter schools are still public schools.

Even more heretical than that, President Trump has signaled his support for a $20 billion federal voucher program for families to use to send their kids to the school of their choice.

Free choice will move students beyond the grasp of the rigid ideologues who control our public schools. The future of the Democratic Party depends on the ongoing indoctrination of our kids.

They will go to the mat to try to stop Betsy DeVos.

It’s touch and go. Two left-leaning Republicans have indicated that they may oppose her, which brings her confirmation down to a tie-breaking vote by Vice President Mike Pence. If that happens, she’ll be confirmed. However, she’ll be defeated if one more Republican defects.

The stakes are enormous.

Betsy DeVos could spark an educational revolution that liberates our students from the crushing burden of anti-Americanism and anti-intellectualism that breeds kids who can’t read, write, or think.

That’s why Betsy DeVos is Donald Trump’s most important cabinet nominee. This nation can’t survive if we keep churning out uneducated kids who loathe their country.

 

4 Comments

  1. Lori on February 3, 2017 at 8:26 pm

    I don’t hold out much hope for public schools as I think they are fairly good at doing exactly what they were designed to do- but here’s hoping.



    • quinersdiner on February 3, 2017 at 9:02 pm

      I hold out hope if there was more competition. School choice requires a strong advocate. I believe Ms. DeVos would be up to the task to advance the cause.



  2. d. knapp on February 3, 2017 at 8:36 pm

    I used to think that vouchers were a good idea. I know many of the awful schools are frequented by kids who are either just not taught better or worse. Many are actually TOLD to go to school & be violent and disruptive by parents. Imagine being the parent sacrificing to PAY out of pocket to send kids to good schools and the thug they were trying help their kid escape gets to sit w/ their kid essentially free. Once the private school accepts the fed. $$$, they will be subject to the horrible regulations parents were seeking to escape. I dont know how to help genuinely trapped kids and not hurt the ones who’s parents strove to get them out by transplanting a big part part of the problem back into the equation.



    • quinersdiner on February 3, 2017 at 9:04 pm

      The answer: competition.