The Ed Deform Movement Post-Bloomberg

The Post sends out the alarm:

Three mayoral wannabes are now openly promising to perpetuate failure in the schools. That’s right: Ex-Comptroller Bill Thompson, Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and current Comptroller John Liu are vowing, if elected, not to shut failing schools.

They’re also pledging to make it harder for good schools — i.e., charters — to open.

No joke: Shutting schools is “an admission of failure,” Thompson says, vowing to ban the practice. Better, we guess, for folks to just hide their eyes, admit nothing and keep depriving kids of a decent education.

Love the straw man arguments they use.

Closing "failing schools" is always a good thing.

Nothing about how the city failed to support those schools or used them as dumping grounds when other schools were closed or systematically set the schools up for failure so that Eva Moskowitz or some other charter entrepreneur could have the space.

There's never any nuance in the Post or News editorials - it's always, shut the schools, stick charters in them, fire the unionized teachers and hire non-unionized ones.

That most of the "mayoral wannabe's" seem to be stepping back from those policies seems to scare the ed deformers.

Now I am under no illusions that whoever replaces Bloomberg won't be bought off by the hedge fundies and begin to pursue ed deform-friendly policies.

But you can see how scared the ed deformers are, because even if they are able to buy off whoever replaces Bloomberg, he/she won't be the true believer of the "Shut Schools/Fire Teachers" philosophy of education that Bloomberg is.

The ed deform movement has been very spoiled here in Bloomberg's NYC, and suddenly they're realizing that some of the gravy is going to come off their gravy train.

You can bet the propagandists at the News and Post (and Times too, for that matter) will work extra hard to sell their straw man arguments for ed deform policies.

The shrillness has already started - look no further than the b.s. in this Post editorial.