I don’t usually get irritated by the comment threads on my own posts. I enjoy a healthy dialectic. And an unhealthy one can be even more fun.
But the comments on my post about the controversial sale of MLK Elementary to the First AME Church kinda piss me off. Not because folks disagree with me, or because they absolutely insist on maliciously reading things into my words that just aren’t there. That’s pretty much standard procedure in the blogosphere. I’m desensitized to that. No, what’s really got my undies in a knot is the way everybody seems so willing and eager to let petty, bullshit, maybe-maybe-not-scandals like this distract them from the way K-12 and higher education funding has been systematically raped over the past decade or so.
Look… squirrel!
That’s pretty much the level of discourse we’ve been having over education funding in Washington state, the kind that’s designed to keep our eyes off the ball by assuming that voters have an attention span shorter than that of the average dog. Another $1.4 billion slashed from K-12 education, about $1,400 per student? Squirrel! 3,700 fewer teachers funded in WA’s public schools? Squirrel! A more than 50 percent reduction in higher education spending over the past two budgets? Squirrel!
No, don’t look at the cruel and shortsighted all-cuts budget the editorial boards relentlessly championed. Don’t bother your little canine brains about the fact that Washington state is amongst the worst in the nation in class size, teacher pay, and per student spending, or that we’re saddled with a highly regressive and unsustainable tax structure that assures further cuts in education spending as far as the eye can see. No, the real cause of all our education woes, the Seattle Times‘ editors pontificate, is a questionable real estate deal and $162,228 in accounting errors. “The school district is developing a grim reputation for sloppy stewardship of tax dollars,” the editors solemnly inform us. “A legacy with consequences.”
Squirrel!
And like the dogs that we are, we stiffen up, drop everything, and look.
@50: Your point deserves reiterating – the AME scam only fuels disillusionment with and flight from public education, which, of course, makes people less inclined to put money into it.
The thing is, the AME deal isn’t propaganda, it’s an actual scandal, even if it doesn’t fit the left-wing’s preferred narrative.
@53: So, you think only stupid people make the occasional grammatical error? On a blog?
Whenever some arm-chair grammarian pipes up like you have, I generally assume they are OCD, tend to lose the forest for the trees, and have a need to feel intellectually superior to others that stems from insecurity about their own intelligence.
But, hey, I made a grammatical error, so what could I possibly know?
BTW, douchebag, you forgot the comma after “but”, and you included one too many dots in your ellipses.
This sort of scandal is nothing new, and I expected we’d have something arise out of all these surplussed schools.. But I have to say, I thought it would be TT Minor being sold for a song for high-priced view condos, instead of MLK elementary.
So from this we can all then assume that the Stranger editorial board will endorse political candidates based on serious criteria such as how they will prioritize education funding, right? Instead of waxing on about how “dreamy” or “fuckable” McGinn or Fitzgibbon is? You’ll actually talk like adults? You’ll give someone like Bill Bryant a platform (even though he’s -ohmygod- a Republican) since he’s been championing infrastructure and education as the two platforms needed to build future competitiveness (that is, the ability to get a fucking job)?
No, you’ll do what you always do.
They all lie about funding when they run
@54
“The thing is, the AME deal isn’t propaganda, it’s an actual scandal, even if it doesn’t fit the left-wing’s preferred narrative.”
I’d say the propaganda aspect is the disproportionate importance given to AME relative to that given to our underfunding education. I actually don’t know enough about AME to decide whether there was foul play.
@seandr: My daughter goes to public school in Seattle and it kicks ass. Everyone in Seattle who has a fucking pole up their ass (like you, for example) and can afford it sends their kid to private school. Everyone other motivated parent just makes sure their kid isn’t lost in the shuffle.
Having gone to a really terrible public school and a very nice private school, I find the Seattle Public School system great. It doesn’t get to cherry pick high performing kids like a private school, so of course it’s got troubles because it’s fucking required to have troubles.
20 percent tuition increases
WA Middle Class is ripped off to give away our tax dollars to Boeing and Microsoft instead of education!