Jeb Bush Loves Pitbull

There are lots of reasons to dislike Jeb Bush - here's another one in this NY Times piece about Bush's alleged "sense of humor":

Jeb Bush had grown fond of Pitbull, the Miami performer gone global, who seemed to share his zeal for education policy. But Mr. Bush, a former Florida governor, had a question: Why the stage name? 

The artist replied that a friend had suggested it years ago while they were en route to a pit-bull fight.

“Well,” Mr. Bush replied at their meeting early this year, “good thing you weren’t on the way to a cockfight.”

Hey, great - Bush is pal's with misogynistic rapper/charter school entrepreneur Pitbull and can make penis jokes.

What a dick.

There - I can make penis jokes too.

One of the delights of this presidential season so far is to see that the more money Bush and his surrogates spend on pushing Bush as a candidate, the more people dislike him and his poll numbers plummet.

If he sticks around much longer, he's going to be in Jindal territory.

Trump: Jeb Bush Should Stop Speaking Spanish

Oy:

Jeb Bush should speak English while he is in the United States, Donald Trump said Wednesday, in the latest escalation of the brewing feud between the two Republican candidates.

“I like Jeb,” the real estate mogul said in an interview with Breitbart News. “He’s a nice man. But he should really set the example by speaking English while in the United States.”

We learned today that nearly 3/4s of Trump's supporters are in favor of mass deportations.

Shouldn't be long until they start handing out the arm bands and uniforms.

At first I found the whole Trump thing disconcerting, then I started to enjoy the circus spectacle (particularly the "Make Jeb Look Like A Twerp" part of the show.)

But quite frankly, there's a lot to be alarmed about here.

George Carlin said when fascism came to the United States it would be wearing sneakers and a smiley face shirt.

It's starting to look like the smiley face just showed up at the door.

That's the uniform this time around.

Wealthy Political Donors Are Sad Some Republican Candidates Are Running Away From Common Core

Some Common Core shills seem unaware that Common Core is about as popular as Ebola these days with a good segment of the population.

Take the editorial boards at the Washington Post and NY Times, both of whom recently wrote up glowing assessments (yeah, I'm using that word on purpose) to talk about the wonders of Common Core and the ancillary tests that go with them and tow warn about the dangers of opposition to the Core (and the tests).

In reading the Washington Post editorial, you'd think it was still 2011 and Common Core opposition was "fringe" instead of increasing by the year.

It's not just clueless newspaper editorial board shills who don't get what's happening with Common Core with the general populace.

The Wall Street Journal today has a piece that says wealthy GOP donors are getting bummed out that Republican presidential candidates are trashing the Common Core.

The Journal reports that wealthy donors are sticking by the Core and pulling support away from candidates like Chris Christie, Bobby Jindal and Scott Walker who initially supported the Core but now oppose it.

Candidates who continue to support Common Core are getting love - and dollars - from the Wall Street Common Core-lovers:

Mr. Bush’s approach is drawing a section of donors who have previously backed education accountability efforts in New York and New Jersey. Daniel Loeb, a New York City hedge-fund manager who encouraged Mr. Christie to run for president in 2012, has given $2,700 to Mr. Bush’s campaign, according to the Bush campaign’s financial disclosure. New Jersey education-minded donors that have given to Mr. Bush include Rick Rieder, of BlackRock Capital, Joseph Amato of Neuberger Berman, and Richard Pechter, the past chairman of Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette, the filing shows.

In July, a fundraiser for Mr. Bush was co-hosted by Mr. Lilley and David Tepper, a billionaire hedge-fund manager who helped cofound the Better Education for Kids organization in New Jersey. Members of the organization that advocates for high education standards have donated to Mr. Christie previously.

Alan Fournier, founder of Pennant Capital Management and co-founder of the New Jersey education organization, gave at least $14,400 to past Christie campaigns, records show. Mr. Fournier gave $50,000 to a super PAC supporting Mr. Bush, disclosure reports show. Mr. Tepper has also given $250,000 to the pro-Bush group, Right to Rise.

Mr. Lilley said his support for Mr. Bush is separate from his official role with Better Education for Kids. A spokesman for Mr. Tepper declined to comment. Mr. Fournier didn’t respond to a request for comment.

So even as opposition to Common Core continues to mount around the country, our "betters" - wealthy Wall Street and hedge fund donors, the newspaper editorial boards that shill for them, and at least two GOP presidential candidates - continue to support it.

As a sidenote, some of those donors backing Bush also back Andrew Cuomo, another lover of Common Core and Common Core testing.

Until the politicians who support the Core are made to pay a political price for that support, we're going to continue to see the political establishment push it.

Christie, Jindal and Walker made political calculations that they would pay a political price for continued support of the Core in a GOP presidential primary race and dropped their support it, with Jindal the strongest in opposition.

There are a whole host of reasons why Christie is losing the backing of donors that have nothing to do with education - he has plummeted in polls (indeed, he may not even qualify for the top ten in the next GOP debate), Bridgegate and other scandals hang around his neck further weighing him down and New Jersey's poor financial health and quality of life have made him a target of barbs from other candidates.

But as the money starts to dry up from CCSS-supporting donors, Christie may start to wonder if he made the wrong calculation in turning rhetorically against the Common Core.

Ironic thing is, since New Jersey still gives the Common Core tests, even though Christie claims he's against the Core, the practical effect is that CCSS will still be taught in schools to ready students for the state tests.

So Christie has the worst of both worlds with the Core - he's really not dropped support for Common Core in effect, since the state tests are still CCSS-tied and schools will have to teach it, but since he's talking trash about CCSS, he's losing some wealthy donors over it.

Jindal was never really a top tier candidate, so I'm not sure his opposition to the Core matters in the GOP money race one way or the other.

Walker, on the other hand, was top tier but has seen his brand and poll numbers drop since Donald Trump entered the race.

He's the guy to watch to see what happens as a result of his "turning" against the Core (I put "turning" in quotes because like Christie, his opposition is more rhetorical than practical in consequence.)

Does Walker pay a political consequence - i.e., have trouble raising money from wealthy donors - because of his turning on the Core?

I'm skeptical that Common Core will be a big reason why Walker has potential money problems, given how the rest of his politics cohabits quite well with the GOP donor base.

If Walker has money problems in the future, it will more likely be due to his poor debate performances and rote campaign stump appearances that give him the reputation of being overly calculated and unable to generate real excitement for his candidacy.

In any case, the Journal piece goes to show that the politics around Common Core remain dicey even for Republicans, where opposition to Common Core is strongest.

The base hates Common Core but the moneyed classes love it and that dichotomy has got even Jeb Bush twisting himself in circles trying to please both.

Jeb Bush - The Gaffer That Keeps On Giving

If Jeb Bush is the nominee, he's a gaffe machine who will keep on giving to Hillary:

Democratic critics of Jeb Bush’s ad-lib Tuesday about cutting women’s health spending were joined by conservatives, who are annoyed that the inartful statement may undermine their efforts to finally score a win against Planned Parenthood.

Despite his swift damage control efforts, Bush’s casual aside Tuesday afternoon that “I’m not sure we need a half a billion dollars for women’s health programs” threw the Democratic attack machine into overdrive.

...

 For Bush, it marked the third time in a month that a carelessly phrased off-the-cuff comment has sparked controversy — causing consternation anew that the party’s best-funded potential nominee has been, in the early months of the primary fight, something of a gaffe machine.

...

Less than an hour after making the comment about the overfunding of “women’s health issues,” Bush posted a statement on his website saying that he “misspoke” and meant only to question the $500 million in federal funding for Planned Parenthood.

It was a swifter reincarnation of Bush’s other explanations in recent weeks of comments in which he seemed to call for the “phasing out” of Medicare — he said later he wasn’t referring to a specific program, just entitlements in general; and his suggestion that “workers need to work longer hours,” which, he later clarified, was an attempt to discuss underemployment, not an insinuation that American workers are lazy.

Good thing Bush has raised $120 million already.

He's going to need a lot of money to explain in campaign ads the stupid stuff he says on the campaign trail.

Jeb Bush Calls For Merit Pay For Federal Employees, Disruption For Federal Government

Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush laid out a plan today to "disrupt" the federal government if he is elected president, saying that he will cut the federal workforce by 10% and institute merit pay for government workers:

In a speech on Monday in Florida, the Republican presidential candidate unveiled his plan for "disrupting" Washington by downsizing the federal government.

Bush's plan takes aim at the federal budget. He proposes cutting the number of federal employees by at least 10% and radically overhauling the budget process to require a balanced budget, a controversial prescription popular with the conservative base.

"It will not be my intention to preside over the establishment, but in every way I know to disrupt that establishment and make it accountable to the people," Bush said.

...

Bush says that he will institute a policy of hiring one employee for every three who leave when it comes to federal hiring, with the exception of national-security related jobs. Bush suggested that federal agencies shouldn't replace many workers who retire — according to the governor, 10% of the federal workforce will retire within the next five years, and "not everyone who leaves has to be replaced."

And then there's this:

• Merit pay. Bush claims too many mediocre federal employees are being paid the same as exemplary employees. Though he didn't delve too far into specifics on this point, the former Florida governor said that he'll make it easier to fire bad federal employees.

It seems both the rhetoric and policies of Jeb's education reform agenda will now be leveled at the federal government and federal workers too.

Can "turnarounds" for federal departments be far behind?

Maybe receivership for some federal departments, with goals to be hit or the whole thing gets turned over to a non-profit charter entity?

Oh, the ideas for bringing education reform ideas to Washington government are limitless.

How exciting! 

Jeb Bush Says Americans Need To Work Longer Hours

This should go swimmingly when we get to campaign ad season:

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush said in an interview Wednesday that “people need to work longer hours” to help grow the economy.

According to ABC News, Bush was asked a question about tax reform during an interview live streamed on Periscope, and said he believes the U.S. can achieve 4 percent growth.

“Which means we have to be a lot more productive, workforce participation has to rise from its all-time modern lows,” Bush continued. “It means that people need to work longer hours.”

Vote for Jeb so you can work longer hours.

Great campaign slogan - for his opponents.

Jeb Bush: Baltimore Riots Are Call For Florida-Style Education Reform In Baltimore

Following in the footsteps of ed deformer Jeanne Allen, who tweeted that the Baltimore riots were a call for more charter schools, Jeb Bush said the riots were a sign Baltimore needs more education reform:

Republican presidential hopeful Jeb Bush on Thursday urged Americans to not lose perspective in the aftermath of the Baltimore riots, and offered his own policy prescription for simmering tensions in poor communities.

...


He addressed the underlying roots of anger in some dominantly black communities by pivoting to a conservative platform – welfare and education reform, mainly – that might start to change “the pathologies being built around people who are poor, that they’re going to stay poor.”

...

Bush on Thursday touted the education reforms he oversaw as Florida’s governor, arguing that expanding school choice is one way to improve opportunities for at-risk children.

“Baltimore is not a model for public education,” Bush said. “You want to see that, go to Florida."

Oh, yeah - Florida's a model for public education:

One of the regulations is that every kid has to take the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test in order for the school to receive state support. That creates a problem, the school administrator tells Stewart. The problem: Michael. He has a disability.

Contacted, state officials cite state statutes. Michael has no options. He has to take the test.

Michael is nine years old. Born prematurely, he weighed four pounds. He has a brain stem but, according to doctors, most of his brain is missing.

No problem, says the state. An alternative version will be sent—pictures that Michael can describe.

Unfortunately, Michael is blind.

No problem, says the State. There’s a Braille version.

Michael doesn’t know Braille, and is unlikely to ever be able to learn it.

Amanda, Michael’s teacher, is frustrated. She really cares about the kids she teaches, and resists deliberately setting them up to fail. She also knows that Florida’s legislature, ignoring the research, has jumped on the merit pay bandwagon,  which requires that teachers evaluated in large part by the standardized test scores of their students. So Michael’s test score—a zero—and the scores of other disabled kids for whom she’s responsible, can set her up for a poor review or even get her fired.

Come on, Baltimore - don't you see how excessive standardized testing and other Florida-style education reforms can improve circumstances in your city?

Jeb Bush Echoes Andrew Cuomo, Calls The Public School System A "Monopoly" That Must Be Dismantled

Let's play a game.

Who said the following?

 “Education should be a national priority...Most of the time, it will require a political fight. Monopolies don’t go quietly into the night.”

“I believe these kinds of changes are probably the single best thing that I can do...that’s going to matter long-term to break what is in essence one of the only remaining public monopolies — and that’s what this is, it’s a public monopoly.”

If you're scoring at home, Quotation #1 is something Jeb Bush said at his education foundation gathering today, Quotation #2 is the infamous Cuomo exchange with the Daily News editorial board before the 2014 election.

Notice how similar in tone and language the two quotations are?

Bush is a Republican in favor of busting unions and expanding testing and national standards so that every child learns the same things and is tested in the same way to ensure that they have learned those things and, should the test scores show they have not learned those things to the satisfaction of Jeb Bush, the teachers are fired.

And Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, is in favor of those things too.

Note To George Pataki: No One Cares If You Run For President

This is too funny:

Former NY Governor George Pataki is privately gearing up for a 2016 presidential run, according to sources, and was spotted meeting GOP kingmaker David Koch last week.

New York Republican Pataki has been publicly noncommittal about if he was leaving the door open for a run, telling Newsmax TV’s Steve Malzberg in August, “It’s still summer,” while bashing the current administration, claiming President Obama is “trashing the Constitution in ways that were only dreamed of.”

But sources tell us now that summer is over, Pataki is getting serious, and was spotted meeting with Koch at the Four Seasons restaurant last Wednesday.

Reps for Pataki and Koch declined to comment.

Pataki was making noises like he was going to run in 2008 but Giuliani was running and there wasn't room for another "moderate" Republican from New York in the race.

Giuliani wrapped himself in 9/11 that year and repeated the phrase "September the 11th" over and over on the campaign trail.

He spent about $20 million on his campaign.

Despite the 9/11 ploy and the money he spent on the campaign, he had to drop out after he won just one delegate.

Now Pataki, who also wanted to wrap himself in 9/11 in 2008 (though I'm not sure why, nobody I know associates him with 9/11 at all), is making noises like he wants to run in 2016 and he's having those noises leaked to the NY Post.

Pataki had no shot to win the GOP nomination in 2008, even if Giuliani hadn't been running, and he has less than zero chance of winning it in 2016.

I know the business interests and party elders in the GOP are worried that they're going to have a Ted Cruz/Rand Paul contest in the primaries and they're desperate to get some establishment conservative like Jeb Bush into the race to take on the Cruz/Paul contingents.

But I doubt even those guys think George Pataki is a candidate with a shot to do anything in the primaries.

I'm sure the political consultants are talking Pataki up, telling him he can win.

But they're looking for his money.

Anybody else - including his family and friends - ought to tell him to step back onto Planet Earth, realize no one cares about him or his presidential dreams, and go back to cashing in by sitting on some corporate boards.

Jeb Bush Gets Preview Of What Run For President In 2016 Will Be Like

Yesterday I posted that I was hoping that Jeb Bush would run for president in 2016 because I thought he would get hammered over Common Core and be put on the defensive over his education reform record in Florida and his business interests related to education reform.

Today the NY Times reports Bush got a preview of the opposition he's going to get in the GOP presidential primaries over Common Core:

GREENSBORO, N.C. — In one of his first public appearances of the 2014 campaign, former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida had a vivid preview Wednesday of the challenges he would face with his party’s conservative base should he seek the Republican nomination for president in 2016.

Standing alongside Thom Tillis, the North Carolina House speaker and Republican Senate candidate, Mr. Bush outlined his views on two of the issues he cares most passionately about: immigration policy and education standards. But as Mr. Bush made the case for an immigration overhaul and the Common Core standards, Mr. Tillis gently put distance between himself and his guest of honor, who had flown here from Florida on a dreary day to offer his endorsement in a race that could decide which party controls the Senate.

...

On the Common Core, the educational standards first devised by a bipartisan group of governors, which have become deeply unpopular among conservative activists, Mr. Tillis also sounded far more conservative than Mr. Bush. The North Carolina House approved the standards in 2011, but, facing primary challengers from the right earlier this year, Mr. Tillis backed away from them.

“I’m not willing to settle just for a national standard if we think we can find things to set a new standard and a best practice,” Mr. Tillis said, pivoting to an attack on the federal Education Department as “a bureaucracy of 5,000 people in Washington” who make an average salary of a little more than $100,000.

While criticizing the Education Department is common among Republicans, Mr. Tillis was standing next to the younger brother of President George W. Bush, whose signature accomplishments include No Child Left Behind, the sweeping federal education law run by the department.

Mr. Bush sensed the need to play down any differences and returned to the microphone. “We can argue about what to call these things,” he said, but maintained that the focus ought to be on ensuring high standards.

Good luck pulling off the "We don't have to call it Common Core, let's call them higher standards" pivot in the GOP primaries, Jeb.

I guarantee you the reaction you're going to get is going to be a lot harsher than that Tillis gave you yesterday.

Run, Jeb, run!

Run, Jeb, Run

Jeb Bush is making noises for 2016:

A dozen years after he ran his last political campaign, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush is gearing up for a 2016 presidential bid – a campaign that would open up a new front in the Republican Party’s ongoing civil war.

Mike Allen reports in today’s Politico Playbook that according to Bush’s friends, he’s “leaning more yes than no” on launching a run. He’s campaigning for Republican candidates in Senate battlegrounds like North Carolina and Kansas, and Allen reports, “has headlined several fundraisers where the candidate COMES TO FLORIDA, where Jeb knows everyone.” The fundraisers, Allen writes, give us REASON TO THINK that Jeb will aim for a Bush restoration: “That means that the proceeds are all NEW MONEY for the guest, and the candidate gets to meet new supporters and build his or her own network.”

One of the finest ways to put corporate education reform on trial is to have Jeb Bush, a strong proponent of much of the reform agenda, run for president.

His education policies in Florida will get a much closer look if he runs, as will the money he's made from his business interests.

Both of those could use some more scrutiny.

And of course Bush is a huge proponent of Common Core, so if he runs, he's going to have defend the Core within his party, and given how poorly the Core is held by grassroots Republicans and Tea Party people, that should be worth a lot of laughs.

So run, Jeb, run - nothing better than to shine a little light on your money-making off education reform, your failed education reform agenda in Florida, and the disaster that is Common Core.

WSJ: Jeb Bush Wraps Himself In Common Core Standards Even As Many GOPers Renounce Them

This doesn't seem like a winning strategy for GOP primaries:

Most potential Republican presidential contenders are renouncing the national educational standards known as Common Core. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who has championed measuring academic achievement for two decades, is doubling down.

Resistance to Common Core is growing among the party's activists, who see it as a federal incursion into local schools. Republican governors of South Carolina and Oklahoma last month joined Indiana in opting out. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, who two years ago said the initiative "will raise expectations for every child," recently compared it to Russian centralized planning and on Friday vetoed a pro-Common Core bill.

Mr. Bush, by contrast, is urging states to stick with it. 

"Pressing pause means stopping forward momentum," said a letter released Monday by Mr. Bush's nonprofit Foundation for Excellence in Education. "And when that happens, things can go backwards."

Mr. Bush's embrace of Common Core, as well as his support for legalizing undocumented immigrants, is coming to define his national profile ahead of a possible 2016 presidential bid. These stances isolate him from the conservatives who dominate Republican nominating contests. Last week, they demonstrated their power by ousting House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in a Virginia GOP primary.

...

Most potential 2016 GOP candidates have come out swinging against the standards, including Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, Sen. Ted Cruz and Gov. Rick Perry of Texas, and former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum. 

"It substitutes an unaccountable federal bureaucracy for state, local and parental decision-making in education," said Jim DeMint, a former senator who is president of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank with an active political arm. "Parents are tired of the failures and excuses from Washington."

Bush has little chance to win GOP primaries with these stances on education, Common Core and immigration:

As the GOP has shifted to the right, it is tea-party activists who are now among Mr. Bush's most ardent opponents. In addition to unhappiness with the federal role in education, conservative activists see a corporate connection to the initiative.

Since 2010, Mr. Bush's foundation has received $5 million from the Gates Foundation, and it gets donations from companies in the education industry, including Pearson PSON.LN +1.27% PLC and News Corp's NWSA -0.64% Amplify, which have contracts related to implementing Common Core. (News Corp publishes The Wall Street Journal.)

"All Common Core roads lead to K Street," wrote commentator and activist Michelle Malkin, one of Mr. Bush's biggest antagonists, referring to the Washington turf of many lobbyists.

Maybe you can't extrapolate the Cantor/Brat race to the country as a whole, but I think it is safe to say that if Tea Partiers are opposed to a particular Republican presidential candidate, that candidate is going to face an uphill climb for the nomination.

Bush will have the backing of the moneyed class in the GOP, especially if Christie is eliminated by Bridgegate and the other scandals plaguing him.

But Bush will also enjoy the animosity and hostility of conservatives on talk radio, from Laura Ingraham to Glenn Beck, conservatives with a huge Internet following, like Michelle Malkin, and activists on the ground.

Good luck trying to come out of that toxic mix a winner.

On top of that, Bush will enjoy presidential level scrutiny of his business record since he left political office.

There's a lot of funkiness around Bush, the agenda he promotes and the money he makes for promoting that agenda.

I can't see that issue being a winner with Tea Partiers either.

Who's Eva Moskowitz Kidding?

Eva Moskowitz raised $7.75 million dollars from her Wall Street and corporate backers at the second annual spring fundraiser for Success Academies.

Think about that number for a minute - $7.75 million.

Then, as she was thanking the governor and the legislature at her spring fundraiser for forcing New York City to either co-locate her schools or pony up money for rent, she said this about the battle between her and Mayor de Blasio:

Then Moskowitz added, without smiling, "We faced an existential threat to our existence."

Huh?

She just raised $7.75 million dollars at her second annual spring fundraiser.

She has a who's who of Wall Street and hedge fund criminals on her board.

Jeb Bush came by to headline her fundraiser.

And she's saying, with a straight face, that Success Academies "faced an existential threat to our existence"?

Who's she kidding?

She might believe her own b.s., and given the $4 million+ dollars pro-charter backers spent on ads pummeling de Blasio over the charter school issue a while back, some in the public may be fooled into believing her b.s. too.

But if you're paying attention, you know she's full of crap.

Nobody who raises $7.75 million at a spring fundraiser or has the backing of the financial elites faces an existential threat to their existence.

No one.

More Evidence Jeb Bush Will Never Be President

From Political Wire:

A new Economist/YouGov poll finds just 18% of self-identified conservatives want Jeb Bush to run for president in 2016.

Other findings: "26% of Republicans want Bush to run. That puts him behind Paul, at 36%, and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie at 30%. Some 35% of Republicans do not want Bush to run."

He's been out of office for years, the Times has already reported he's got some funky business deals in those years since he left office, the Common Core is an albatross around his neck, and he seems to specialize in saying things that piss off the conservative base of the Republican Party.

Good luck being president with these issues plaguing you, Jeb.

Murdoch Says He Loves Jeb Bush For President, Could Live With Hillary Clinton

Says he loves Jeb Bush because of his education policies:

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch says former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and 2012 vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan are two of his top picks to be the 2016 GOP presidential nominee, but he is prepared to accept it if Democratic former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton became the next president.

In an interview with Fortune magazine released Thursday, the 83-year-old executive chairman of News Corp. also said he could even envision himself supporting Clinton but "it would depend on the Republican candidate totally."

...

Murdoch said he also has great esteem for Bush.

"I think he's a man of very fine character. He was a great governor. And I particularly like his policy on education, which I'm hardest on. My number one."

When it comes to the former first lady taking over the White House, Murdoch said he is prepared to accept it.

"I could live with Hillary as president. We have to live with who we get. We don't have any choice," he said.

Murdoch raised money for Hillary Clinton back in the day for her Senate campaign, so not surprised that he could find a way to make an accommodation and support her in the end.

And as for Jeb, well, yeah, I would think Murdoch would love his education policy proposals.

They're the kind of thing that would help Murdoch make millions at his for-profit education division.

Why Jeb Bush Will Never Be President

Ben Smith says he'll never make it through the GOP primary:

The notion that Jeb Bush is going to be the Republican presidential nominee is a fantasy nourished by the people who used to run the Republican Party. Bush has been out of a game that changed radically during the 12 years(!) since he last ran for office. He missed the transformation of his brother from Republican savior to squish; the rise of the tea party; the molding of his peer Mitt Romney into a movement conservative; and the ascendancy of a new generation of politicians — Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan, Scott Walker, Ted Cruz, among them — who have been fully shaped by and trained in that new dynamic. Those men occasionally, carefully, respectfully break with the movement. Scorning today’s Republican Party is, by contrast, the core of Jeb’s political identity.

In that, Jeb is like ex-Republican Mike Bloomberg and like the failed GOP apostate Jon Huntsman: He’s deeply committed to centrist causes — federalized education, legal status for undocumented immigrants — that alienate key Republican groups;

...

Jeb would have to defend his association with Bloomberg in a campaign, though his defenders will cry that it’s a kind of guilt by association. (Fairness isn’t the core value of political campaigns.) Fairer is to judge him on two issues to which he’s deeply committed, education and immigration.

On the former, Jeb is one of the nation’s leading champions of Common Core standards, a move toward nationalizing America’s patchwork education; his foundation recently launched an ad campaign promoting them. The move is driven by a broad consensus of labor and business groups, as well as philanthropists like Bill Gates, but it has proven intensely unpopular with a Republican base generally suspicious of federal control and specifically focused on local autonomy in education.

I think Smith is absolutely right about this.

The CW over Jeb used to be that his positions on education issues would help - but not anymore, not post Common Core.

CCSS will hang like an albatross over his head, as will his stances on immigration reform and his connection to former NYC mayor Michael Bloomberg (who is roundly hated in GOP grassroot circles for his gun control efforts.)

Smith notes that Mitt Romney, contemporary GOP governor with Bush from back in the day, managed to win the nomination last time around, but had to shift to "movement conservative" in order to do it.

And that's absolutely true - the Romney of 2012 sounded nothing like the Romney who had been governor of Mass.

Bush doesn't have the time or the ability to make that kind of transition.

Jeb can replay Mario Cuomo's "Should I Run/Shouldn't I Run?" act all he wants - the Republican Party of 2016 look nothing like the Republican Party did when Bush still held elected office and no matter how much money he can raise and how much the party elders want him if Christie is destroyed by Bridgegate, he will not win the GOP nomination.

Not with statements like this one he made about Common Core, at any rate:

“I guess I’ve been out of office for a while,” Bush told Fox News this week. “So the idea that something I support that people are opposed to, it means that I have to stop supporting it if there’s not any reason based on fact to do that? I just — maybe it’s stubbornness, but I just don’t seem compelled to run for cover when I think this is the right thing to do for our country.”

Good luck winning the nomination with that kind of stance.

Look How Common Core Gets Characterized In Mainstream Media Political Accounts These Days

From John Dickerson's Slate column on why Jeb Bush may have trouble running for president:

The final problem is that Bush has taken policy stances against his party’s grass roots on the hot button issues of immigration and education. Bush is an advocate for pathways to citizenship and residency for illegal immigrants, positions that House Republican leaders didn’t even want to debate in this election year for fear they would cause too big a rift in the ranks. Bush is also an advocate for Common Core education standards, which advocates like Bill Gates say are designed to make the United States more competitive in the world. Grass-roots conservatives are passionately opposed to the standards, arguing that they remove local control of education and dumb down teaching of crucial subjects like math. In Indiana, activists have just convinced GOP Gov. Mike Pence to withdraw the state from Common Core.

Notice how the CCSS are characterized in the Dickerson piece - standards which "advocates like Bill Gates say are designed to make the United States more competitive in the world."

Opponents, on the other hand, "are passionately opposed to the standards, arguing that they remove local control of education and dumb down teaching of crucial subjects like math."

Remember when mainstream media journalists like John Dickerson used to copy and paste the boilerplate description of the Common Core State (sic) Standards from proponents like Corestandards.org?

The Common Core is a set of high-quality academic standards in mathematics and English language arts/literacy (ELA). These learning goals outline what a student should know and be able to do at the end of each grade. The standards were created to ensure that all students graduate from high school with the skills and knowledge necessary to succeed in college, career, and life, regardless of where they live.

Not anymore - now we're getting this into the description:

Grass-roots conservatives are passionately opposed to the standards, arguing that they remove local control of education and dumb down teaching of crucial subjects like math.

No wonder Common Core proponents are getting so shrill in their attacks against CCSS critics and opponents.

When even mainstream media figures like Dickerson frame the CCSS as something that advocates "say" will make the U.S. more competitive but opponents "argue" that the standards are dumbing down America and handing over control of the nation's schools to the feds, you know they have lost control of their message.

And as any student of politics can tell you, it isn't long after you lose control of the message that you lose the war.

The Old Paradigms For Education Cannot Work In This World Anymore

The editorials from the NY Post about de Blasio and Farina get more vicious and ridiculous by the day.

Today's is about how ruthless competition among schools and putting extra stress on students is the key to success for children:

In the course of admitting he didn’t have a good reason for taking a good school away from kids in Harlem, Mayor de Blasio said that to fix a “broken” city school system, we have to “shake the foundations.”

Today, some 1,500 students and teachers from Success Academy charter schools will be doing that at the Armory on the Hudson. They are holding a giant pep rally as they head into next week’s tests. It’s called “Slam the Exam!” And it’s a terrific example of how to “shake the foundations” of a public-school system mired in low expectations and even lower performance.

This Empire is centrally organized, overly bureaucratic and failing 85 percent of our black and Latino students.

Yet it has its defenders. Look at Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña. She’s already made clear charter children are not her concern. So what does she tell principals of the children who are her concern? Not to go overboard on “test preparation.” Hmm. Wonder if that’s the approach in Singapore or South Korea, whose students score well above ours in reading, math and science.

Fariña worries about “stressing” students. She should go to the armory today. These kids believe they can compete with the best of them, and that tests give them an opportunity to prove it. So their approach to testing is simple: “Bring it on.”

Then there’s Mayor de Blasio’s idea of shaking it up, which is to take away good schools for kids if they are charters and keep failing schools open if they are traditional schools. That’s the instinct of the old guard who put teachers union above student performance.

The mayor complains about competition. But competition is the key to shaking the foundations. Because charters are showing kids can learn, and in so doing, deprive failing public schools of excuses. And they invite comparisons important to parents.

Our students need more of this, no matter how much the Empire of the mayor and his schools chancellor may strike back.

I figured when the Post published the story a few days ago about Farina talking about the rash of suicides that has struck New York City school students the last seven weeks, they would look to use her statements against her.

And they are - they're mocking her for worrying that the current system is "stressing" students, that she should instead be teaching these kids the kind of "grit" and "determination" the Success Academy students show while trying to "Slam the Exam!"

The sociopath who wrote this editorial clearly does not understand that teaching kids to divorce themselves from their feelings and use external events and extrinsic motivation to get through works to make for a good and healthy life in the long run.

Neither does Jeb Bush, who defended the Common Core this week by railing against people who worry that the current battery of education reforms isn't healthy for children.

The refrain from the reformers is always the same here: "Screw what you think or feel, do what you have to do to succeed the way we tell you to succeed!"

One of the reasons we have such a screwed up culture these days is because so many people are divorced from their inner selves, so many people are leading lives of distraction and isolation, alone with their technology and their material things.

This is the sort of culture sociopaths like Jeb Bush and the Murdoch people like because it keeps them in the money, everybody playing on their field with their rules, with competition and materialism the highest order of the day.

One of the best lessons we can teach students these days is to be able to judge if they want to live by these rules the Bushes and their ilk make for them or if they want to find their own way in life, find their own sources of value and beauty.

I dunno, might be the Jesuit education I received as a teen, but I come from the school of education that looks to teach kids to have the confidence that they can find their own way in a society and a culture that is clearly troubled and getting worse by the year.

I'm not a big fan of teaching them to "slam the exam!" or telling them to get some "grit" to outcompete everyone else.

According to the sociopaths at the Post, that makes me a bad educator.

I'm supposed to be teaching children to "slam the exam!", to learn "grit" and "determination" to succeed no matter the cost.

But looking around at what is left of our dying ecosystem, deteriorating economy and dreadful culture, I think we need to find a different way for education going forward that emphasizes collaboration over competition, intrinsic motivation over extrinsic, and new ways of looking at ourselves and our world that take into account not just the material but also the emotional and, dare I say, the spiritual.

How's that for "shaking the foundations!"?

Oh and about South Korea and their terrific education system?

It leads the world not just in test scores but also suicides of children and adults.

Jeb Bush Channels David Coleman In A Defense Of The Common Core

College Board President David Coleman, one of the architects of the Common Core State Standards, famously told an audience in New York State that one of the things you learn in life when you get older is that nobody gives a shit what you think or feel about stuff.

Jeb Bush channeled that Coleman sentiment in a recent defense of Common Core:

Bush has repeatedly explained the standards, implemented and controlled by the states, are designed to make the United States more competitive with the rest of the world. He said those who oppose the standards support the “status quo,” oppose testing and are worried too much about children’s self-esteem.

“Let me tell you something. In Asia today, they don’t care about children’s self esteem. They care about math, whether they can read – in English – whether they understand why science is important, whether they have the grit and determination to be successful,” Bush said.

“You tell me which society is going to be the winner in this 21st Century: The one that worries about how they feel, or the one that worries about making sure the next generation has the capacity to eat everybody’s lunch?”

We've covered how the education system is in China just a bit here at Perdido Street School blog, but I'm going to revisit two recent posts as a rebuttal to Jeb Bush's jive:

Tell Me Again Why The U.S. Should Mimic The Chinese Education System?

A lot of these suicide stories are coming from South Korea, another country with a high stakes education system that leads to an awful lot of stress and pressure on children and teens, but this one's from China:

Surveillance cameras have caught the shocking moment an under-pressure Chinese student jumped to his death during class.

Heart-stopping footage claims to show the at first motionless boy suddenly leaving his desk, running over to a ledge and leaping out.

His actual jump occurs out of shot, and was not filmed due to the camera's angle.

But the devastated reaction of his fellow classmates, who sprint over to see what's happened before pacing up and down with their heads in their hands, appears to suggest he had tried to commit suicide.

A commenter at the Daily News writes:

How much longer are we going to pretend that children are something to ignore, mistreat, and mis-educate..... This child was coerced into believing this test was so important that combined with the rest of the stress he was feeling he ended his life. Here in the US the children are equally mistreated but they are ignored and mistreated along with being misled.

The older you get the more you realize it's not that big of a deal, and that you should be focusing on aspects of education that actually aren't in the curriculum. This common core crap and the overstressing of test results are completely destroying our children's futures.

And that's absolutely what the plutocrats in power want.

 

And this one:

Many In China Hate The Chinese Education System - Even If Arne And Barack Love It!

From The Guardian:

The streets surrounding Shijia primary school in Beijing were mobbed by a crowd of parents so dense that cars were obliged to beat a retreat.

At 3.45pm on Friday, 11-year-old Zou Tingting, five minutes late, bounded through the school's west gate and into her waiting mother's arms. Tingting's classes were over, but her day was just beginning – she had an hour of homework, plus lessons in ping pong, swimming, art, calligraphy and piano.

Tingting's mother, Huang Chunhua, said that, like many Chinese mothers, she once considered Tingting's academic performance her top priority; now she realises the importance of a well-rounded education. "I've seen British curricular materials, and I'm actually kind of jealous," she said. "British teachers guide students to discover things on their own – they don't just feed them the answers, like in China."

In recent weeks British parents and educators have been in a panic about the discrepancy between the Chinese education system and the UK's. In December the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) released the 2012 results for its triennial Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) test – a reading, maths and science examination administered to half a million 15-year-olds in 65 countries. Shanghai students topped the rankings; the UK ranked 26th.

Next week education minister Elizabeth Truss will lead a "fact-finding mission" to Shanghai to learn the secrets of China's success. She plans to adjust the UK's education policy accordingly.

Yet Chinese parents and educators see their own system as corrupt, dehumanising, pressurised and unfair. In fact, many are looking to the west for answers. Huang said that some parents bribe Shijia primary school to admit their children (though she declined to say whether she had done so herself).

Tingting attends an expensive cramming school at weekends, leaving her tired. She will probably have to abandon extracurricular activities in high school to devote more time to the college admission exam, called the gaokao. Many parents consider the gruelling nine-hour test a sorting mechanism that will determine the trajectory of their children's lives.

Chinese experts are also less impressed than Truss by the Pisa scores. "Even though Shanghai students scored well on the test, this doesn't mean that Shanghai's education system doesn't have any problems," said Lao Kaisheng, a professor in the education department of Beijing Normal University. "In fact, it's the opposite."

As long as China's education system remains vast but resource-constrained, Lao added, its schools will default to testing as a reliable indicator of competence. "The education system here puts a heavy emphasis on rote memorisation, which is great for students' test-taking ability but not for their problem-solving and leadership abilities or their interpersonal skills," he said. "Chinese schools just ignore these things."

Read the whole article - this is an important piece of journalism that gets at the lie that Asian education systems like the one's in China or South Korea, are vastly outperforming public schools in the United States or Britain.

We keep hearing from Duncan, Obama, et al. that the Chinese or the South Koreans are vastly outperforming us.

We hear the same from Michelle Rhee, Joel Klein et al.

But the truth is much more complex than the test scores these deformers hawk.

Later we'll take a look at the epidemic of suicides in South Korea and the misery many children in the South Korean education system feel over their circumstances.

I've asked this before, I'll as it again - is this the kind of education system we want to mimic here in the United States?

Jeb Bush Is Sad About De Blasio's Plan To End School Report Cards...

...As are some fellow rich people on the Upper East Side:

Jeb Bush doesn't think much of Bill de Blasio's plan to end the city's letter-grade system for evaluating schools.

“We were the first state to grade schools ‘A’ through ‘F,’" said Bush, the former Florida governor, who made education reforms a key part of his tenure, in an appearance at the 92nd Street Y on Monday night.

"New York City did it, and it was helpful to focus attention on underperforming schools," Bush said, adding that "the lowest performing schools and the lowest performing students saw the greatest gain.”

“Apparently the mayor-elect looks like he’s going to kill that. That’s a dumb idea," said Bush, to applause from a generally supportive crowd on the Upper East Side.

Who do you think would pay to go see Jeb Bush sling his crap at the 92nd Street Y?

People predisposed to like Bloomberg's school report cards and other education reforms, that's who.