PrintApril 26, 2014
ObamaCare and Common Core - both are bad to the bone
Medical insurance and public education might seem to be two different worlds with different problems. But the proposed solutions by the left were essentially the same. Here are ten descriptions that apply equally to ObamaCare and Common Core:
1) Huge federal power grab: The obvious result from both ObamaCare and Common Core is that Obama and his Czars get a bigger government to administer, more money to play with, more jobs for their loyal troops, and more control over people’s lives.
2) Unresponsive to popular demand.:ObamaCare and Common Core were massive, top-down interventions demanded by leftwing politics and ideology, not something the public asked for. Alleged problems were used as an excuse for adopting solutions that would grow government. The big question was, what can they get away with? (We see the same dynamics playing out in climate change.)
3) Incomprehensible by design: A sentence was not used if a paragraph could be concocted. Thousands of new requirements, regulations, laws, and standards were contained in dense verbiage that neither Congress nor the public would ever read and couldn’t understand if they did. Almost every paragraph includes expanded powers and hidden consequences. Citizens would be further reduced to a childlike dependence on bureaucrats.
4) Public excluded from legislative process. The complexity of the political process, plus the density of jargon and propaganda, ensured that John Q Citizen was ignored. These programs were passed by stealth, chicanery, arm-twisting, and bribes. The Cornhusker Kickback put ObamaCare over the top. Similarly, so-called stimulus money earmarked for shovel-ready jobs was used as grants (i.e. bribes) to persuade the states to embrace Race to the Top, a precursor of Common Core. The fix was in.
5) Dishonest marketing. The Obama administration made endless promises that turned out to be endless lies, all symbolized by Obama’s promise that if you like your plan, you can keep your plan. States were told that if they liked their schools the way they are, they can keep them that way. In fact, these programs require changing everything.
6) Media complicit The mainstream media became cheerleaders. News reports were not critical or analytical. Try to find a newspaper in America which opposed these radical programs. The average local paper wrote editorial after editorial in support of ObamaCare and Common Core.
7) Very expensive and would get more so. The propaganda for these programs emphasized that the government would save money and individual citizens would get more for less. In fact, medical costs immediately went up for individuals, as did the outlays to implement Common Core. Improvement, if any, will be negligible, not that improvement was ever the primary goal.
8) Fundamental transformation. Both programs embody what Obama meant when he talked about “a fundamental transformation of the country.” Translation: his socialist way or the highway. Socialists have been seeking this “transformation” for 100 years. (John Dewey's education agenda, according to Robin Eubanks, leads to Common Core.)
9) Totalitarian intent: Both programs prescribed in detail how everyone must think and behave. Both programs allow the government to collect far more information and to meddle in more aspects of everyone’s life. It was like giving the EPA two more sectors to regulate.
10) Instant train wrecks: Both programs, once they left the station, became train wrecks. Of course it was too late by that time to stop them. As things continue to go wrong, Obama will simply declare: “It’s a big success. Everything is just like we planned.” Yes, that might, grimly enough, be exactly true.
All the similarities mean that once you understand one of these things, you understand the other. They are two facets on the same zirconium. They are two fronts of the same coup.
Rahm Emanuel is famous for saying that you don’t want to “waste” a crisis. A crisis, in his world, is any excuse for doing what you already wanted to do. Many people suspect that Obama, if he needs a crisis, is perfectly capable of fabricating one.
There is a miasma of fraud, malfeasance, and bad faith hanging over both these schemes. The logical thing for the country is to repeal both ObamaCare and Common Core, or get ready for the worst.
Bruce Deitrick Price explains education theories and methods on his site Improve-Education.org.
