Democrats betray black & brown voters once again

Donald Trump drives our liberal, progressive, and socialist acquaintances nuttier than a Christmas fruitcake. Me, too, some days.

But damned if the Democrats are determined to throw him the election once again. Trump likes to tell minority voters to go his way. “What do you have to lose?” What they’ve got to lose is being taken for granted by a political party that values color and quotas over opportunity.

Because the four leading Democrat(ic) contenders seeking the presidency have vowed teachers union uber alles and kids — welcome to the crumbs. The New York Times headline captures it:

“Minority voters chafe as Democratic candidates
abandon charter schools.”

The front-runners for the presidential nomination are moving away from the charter school movement, and black and Latino families ask why their concerns are lost. … This year, in a major shift, the leading Democratic candidates are backing away from charter schools, and siding with the teachers’ unions that oppose their expansion. And that has left some black and Latino families feeling betrayed.

Government-run and done!

Progressive-socialist heart throb Elizabeth Warren vows to “increase federal funding for public schools by $800 billion, strengthen teachers unions, and halt the growth of public charter schools.”

Which is why the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty calls her plan “The Madisonian Plan.” Schools here in the Emerald City are a progressive utopia, they write in the Wall Street Journal.

According to 2018-19 Forward Exam scores, only 10% of Madison’s African-American students are proficient in English, compared with 57.2% of white students. Only 79% of African-American students graduate from Madison public high schools within five years, compared with 94% of white students. … A recently enacted policy prohibits teachers from telling parents if their child wants to change genders …

Spending per student is the highest in the state for comparable districts but has a gaping black-white achievement gap. There are but two charter schools. Madison schools are continuing the work of departed superintendent Jennifer Cheatham, that being to dumb stupidity down. The WI State Journal reports:

In an effort to keep students who fail early in their high school careers from falling completely out of school, ninth-grade teachers at Madison’s West High School are planning to give classroom grades of no lower than 40%, eliminate extra credit and allow up to 90% credit for late work in required classes.

ACT scores are one of many measures

Reading? Optional

Madison psychotherapist Laurie Frost and UW-Madison senior lecturer Jeff Henriques — no conservatives, they — wrote last December: 

“Being able to read is not a requirement for graduation at Madison East, especially if you are black or hispanic.”

When 70% of your minority students earn diplomas and fewer than 20% of them are able to read at grade level, what does that high school diploma mean?

Rather than focus so heavily on attendance, behavior, and socio-emotional learning, … teachers and administrators should prioritize teaching students how to read. Students who know how to read are more likely to come to school, go to class, work hard, and have a meaningful and rewarding post-high school life.

Blaska’s Bottom Line: Here’s the fly in that ointment: those students are not going to learn to read if they don’t come to class. They’re not going to come to class if they’re out jacking cars and crashing into light poles. They’re not going to halt that journey through the pipeline to prison or oblivion if the Board of Education keeps dumbing down stupidity and excusing destructive behavior by placing the race card. 

For Extra Credit

Animal cruelty — President Trump signed a bill making it a federal felony. Huh? Whatever happened to the concept of federalism?

Bloomberg News and its 2,700 journalisms will NOT do journalism on its owner, multi-billionaire Michael Bloomberg, or his rivals for the Democrat(ic) party presidential nomination. But they will investigate the Republican incumbent. That’s pretty much what The Capital Times has been doing for decades. And much of the mainstream news media, for that matter.

Better late than … The unlettered field hands at the Experimental Work Farm finished raking the leaves, using them to mulch the asparagus and green bean fields. Not looking forward to more soaking rain; ground is already saturated and basement is seeping.

What do YOU think?