WSJ

I like the Wall Street Journal. I subscribe. Its reporting is usually generous, its arts pages are limited but do inform me of books that I might never discover and its back-page columnists, while reflexively anti-Democratic, usually provide a coherent perspective and thought on an eclectic variety of content. Plus, its letters page stokes up the most interesting reading from patrons, even compared to the NYTimes. I read its editorials knowing I'll get a combination of business-friendly and politically-rightist cultism. At least, I tell myself, they offer a kind of one-dimensional transparency.

Right.

1. In his review of Rich by Larry Samuel, Adrian Wooldridge writes:

"From 1960 on, the ... rise of the counterculture stimulated hedonistic consumerism even as it eroded Puritan morality."

A facile, almost rote historiography about US social history, that attempts to reify liberalism as a dark path we best avoid.

I am not sure when the "Puritan morality" held (or what it is/was). Maybe during the "dying times" in early colonial history John Smith could call it up - he who does not work, does not eat. By the the post-Civil War gilded age, if not earlier, no morality of any kind seems to have stemmed the greed of corporations and their leaders, not if proliferating tenements, rancid and dangerous food production systems and aggrandizing trusts represent anything. I suppose we could even laughably claim that the Depression was caused by a sudden rise of people not working and still wanting food. But that would miss the greed infused market climb in the 20s, the immoral (at least illegal) speakeasies that sparkled with hedonism incarnate, the cooptation of Jazz and hipster lifestyles, and even the salience of films, like Marlon Brando's "The Wild Ones" (1953). My historical knowledge has gaps, but I use what I do have to make this point. Advertising, a form of history not constrained by fact, is a better culprit, for it has long sought to shake standard comforts, inviting us to put down everyday, conserving practices and try a new way of doing and being. But that argument would be anti-business.

So attempting to center the rise of rapacious consumerism on a brief period of reaction strikes me as cowardly. It blinds us from contemplating a more robust significance of the 60s: transparency hurts. Let's dispel the easy trope of blaming moral decline on a few freedom-actualizing hippies and free-lovers. And it is easier to offer a demagogic version of social illness (perverts pervert the purists' purity and we go to hell). Reconstructing a more evocative historical narrative requires, well, actual history and the willingness to put aside fabricated versions of American beauty. Mirrors are not windows, nor is history escapist literature. We will not regenerate republican virtue by hiding how we came to be who we are.

2. The editors make a mess in their opinon piece "Obama's 'Race to the Top.'"

Data. The editors state that educational spending topped $665b last year. Add in the $100b in stimulus funds staked already this year, and we are talking huge sums of money. The paper, however, plays loose with what this means. For instance, the stimulus money went to states in order to make up for the more than $200b they will not spend on education because of the recession. Next, the paper sees as spurious any charge of "underfunding" by explaining how President Bush increased federal spending on education from $28.3b to $37.5b. $9b sounds like revolutionary step, unless you realize that it increases the fed share by 1.5% of the total amount spent. In fact, the Bush administration increased its share from 5.1% in 2008 ($28.3b/$553b) to 5.6% ($37.5b/$665b). A whopping .5% of the total expenditures.

Third, in next paragraph, the editors write

"It’s also worth noting that the U.S. has been trying without much success to spend its way to education excellence for decades. Between 1970 and 2004, per-pupil outlays more than doubled in real terms, and the federal portion of that spending nearly tripled. Yet reading scores on national standardized tests have remained relatively flat. Black and Hispanic students are doing better, but they continue to lag far behind white students in both test scores and graduation rates."

According to the Census bureau, there were roughly the same number of students in school in 1970 and 2003 (the last figures I could find), around 49m. How out of whack is a doubling of the money spent per pupil? If a comparison works (it may not - forgive my googling), a new house cost around $23k; a new car $3900; bananas were $.12/lb, a tube of Crest was $.77 and Jiffy peanut butter $.59. A 1970 dollar would be worth roughly $5.30; reverse that, and $1 today would buy > $.20 in 1970. While prices have jumped five-fold, the government has up spending two-fold and still achieved the same results. Consider as well that today a greater percentage of the students are English language learners, due to demographic shifts. That would mean that while they have had their total funding cut by nearly 60% in relative dollars and their student population now present greater academic challenges due to second language acquisition, schools and teachers have been just as successful as they were in 1970, at least in terms of test results.

Of course, the editors could have used the same statistics to argue for the abolishment for the Department of Education, due to how little it actually contributes. But their real zeal deal is vouchers.

Bait and Switch. The editors complement the White House for its "Race to the Top" program, which "the Obama Administration claims will reward only those states that raise their academic standards, improve teacher quality and expand the reach of charter schools," then criticize it for "being at the behest of the unions, also shuttering a popular school voucher program that its own evaluation shows is improving test scores for low-income minorities in Washington, D.C."

So the White is trying to improve education through a $4.5b competition to produce the most effective charter schools, something to which the teachers' unions object. Unfortunately, this only sounds good. It is not really good, because money does not go to voucher programs. Put another way, the Obama administration antes up just under 50% as much as Bush did (on top of $100b stimuli), specifically for a program to expand school choice, to the teachers' displeasure, but that is still not good enough, because the money does not go to voucher programs.

The Federal government spends way too much money on education and the Federal government spends way too little money on vouchers.