You’ve gotta hand it to Rob Reiner, he certainly knows how to tax a minority segment of society to get money to fund his personal socialist fantasies. I guess almost everyone thought it would be fun to over tax smokers to pay for education, so now let’s see how the upper income folks feel about his new tax initiative to pay for a pre-kindergarten program for 4 year olds. Karin Klein has some reservations in an Op-editorial in today’s LA Times, Scary Preschool Utopia.

The value of universal preschool is one of those unquestioned nostrums sweeping the country. The way the question is framed for the public isn’t whether we should love universal preschool, it’s solely whether we’ll pay for it. Now Rob Reiner — actor, director, gadfly — is planning an initiative for the June 2006 ballot. He wants to raise $2.3 billion a year by taxing the well-off and establishing a free, voluntary half-day preschool system for all 4-year-olds in California.
(…)
But universal preschool isn’t simply “more preschool” or “more affordable preschool.” It’s a species unto itself. Reiner’s initiative would create standardization where now there is parental choice. It would insist on bachelor’s degrees and credentials for teachers — and require, insanely, that they be paid on par with high school science and math teachers, though there’s little evidence that the education or expense is necessary. It would not raise test scores. And it would almost certainly push more and more academic work into the laps of younger and younger children.

Reiner’s preschool utopia would force the state to set “content standards.” and take oversight on such matters as whether to read “Pet the Bunny” or “Goodnight Moon” away from parents and preschools and hand it to education officials.
(…)
The Reiner initiative’s “statewide preschool content standards” would be devised by the state schools’ superintendent. These would be “aligned with statewide academic standards” and carried out and supervised by county education departments. It makes you want to weep for those tots.

You really want the administrators of the number 43 ranked state to determine the content standards of this new program? Yeah, that’s real smart! And instead of allowing our youth to have some time for childhood, let’s put ‘em in the ol’ educational gulag that seems to be undermining their older siblings. And especially for you upper income parents that will be funding this whole nightmare, we’ll standardize it and make those standards mandatory so that you can’t benefit from your hard work and send yours to a better thought out and run program. Always makes me wonder, why do these rich leftists like Reiner seem to want to eat their own young?

Well, maybe this is the reason. Can’t you just hear ‘em in Reiner’s back room meetings? “Yeah, if we get ‘em started thinking right at 4, then keep puttin’ it to ‘em for the next 14 years, then finish them off at a good correct-thinking “U”, we’ll never have to worry about gettin’ another Bush ever again!”

And you thought these people actually have you and your kids’ best interest at heart? I remember as a youth reading an interesting novel about a society where all the children would come out of their houses and bounce a ball in unison. It was very orderly, and everyone was conflict-free, if not exactly happy or satisfied, actually they were controlled by the power of the state. Then the love of one child for her brother enabled her to break the control of the overpowering force, allowing at least the two of them to escape . . . the book, A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle, was published in 1962.

Many Utopian concepts have been proposed, especially in the last century. Funny how most of them turned out: the Third Reich, the Soviet Union, Castro’s Cuba, Mao’s China, Pol Pot’s Cambodia, today’s France (heh, just kidding about France) . . . well, maybe not .

I kinda like the way things have happened on this side of the pond myself, at least if we can keep those persistent rascals like Hillary and Reiner out of our pockets and out of our kid’s heads! (db)

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 5th, 2005 at 11:30 am and is filed under Focus On Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.  |   Print This Post  |   Email This Post

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