Bevin Moves to Get Rid of Pesky Teachers by Just Eliminating Public Education

Step One:  Strip the state economy down to bedrock and turn the treasury over to corporations.

Step Two:  ???????

Step Three:  Profit!

And give the charter school contracts to the same corrupt contractors taking over the state prisons.  Make that school-to-prison pipeline an express train.

The last public servant standing between Kentucky's schools and the corporate drone factories Gov. I Got Mine Fuck You will now install has been quit-fired and replaced with a charter school fuckhead.

From the Herald:

“Despite the outcry of tens of thousands of Kentuckians, today Governor Matt Bevin continued his offensive against public education, this time through proxies and behind closed doors,” said Kentucky Education Association President Stephanie Winkler, whose group had pushed back against the expected move earlier in the day. “Dr. Stephen Pruitt has been a strong and effective champion for our students and public schools. Forcing an honorable and highly qualified man to resign from his position without any cause is contrary to the best interests of students across the Commonwealth.”

House Democratic Leader Rocky Adkins said that it was “a sad day for public education and the children of Kentucky. This is just another attempt by Governor Bevin to weaken and dismantle Kentucky’s education system and implement his agenda of charter schools.”

Pruitt was hired in 2015, when the board was controlled by appointees of former Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear.

Bevin on Monday issued an executive order appointing seven new members to the board, including Hal Heiner, former Education and Workforce Development secretary, and the governor’s former communications director, Amanda Stamper. Heiner resigned his cabinet secretary job to take the new post. All seven seats were vacant as of Friday because the terms expired.

Bevin previously named four others to the board that develops policies governing Kentucky’s 173 school districts and the Kentucky Department of Education, so his appointees now have full control.

Colorado makes clear that charter school proponents have no place in the Democratic Party.  That's because charter fuckheads are repugs.

Erik Loomis at Lawyers, Guns and Money:

A very short time ago, Rheeists were Democratic Party power players. Remember that charter schools and so-called “education reform” were at the very center of the Obama agenda. Not only was Secretary of Education Arne Duncan right out of that world, but he was also one of Obama’s closest advisors and oldest political friends. But given the utter bankruptcy of charter schools, a movement straight out of neoliberal privatization (which, despite the feelings of some LGM commenters, neoliberalism wasn’t a term made up by Bernie supporters to make Chait or Hillary supporters feel bad) that sought to provide “market solutions” to education problems that busted teachers’ unions and pretend like poverty wasn’t the biggest issue in education, it’s extremely refreshing to see Democrats purge charter school advocates. Take Colorado:

Delegates at the Colorado Democratic state assembly Saturday sent a clear message to the state chapter of Democrats for Education Reform: You don’t have a place in our party.

After booing down the head of the education reform organization, who described herself as a lifelong Democrat, delegates voted overwhelmingly Saturday to call for the organization to no longer use “Democrats” in its name. While it’s unclear how that would be enforced, the vote means a rejection of DFER is now part of the Colorado Democratic Party platform.

…

The platform amendment reads: “We oppose making Colorado’s public schools private or run by private corporations or becoming segregated again through lobbying and campaigning efforts of the organization called Democrats for Education Reform and demand that they immediately stop using the party’s name Democrat in their name.”

SNIP

There simply should not be any place for neoliberals in the Democratic Party. Purge them all. The Democratic Party needs to stand for strong public schools, strong teachers’ unions, and a strong tax base to fund these things. I don’t want Cory Booker welcoming Mark Zuckerberg to talk about funding schools. I want Cory Booker talking about taxing Zuckerberg at 1950s tax rates to fund education. I want Rahm Emanuel to be forced into the Republican Party. The base revolt within the Democratic Party is happening different ways in different places, as Steve’s post from earlier today about New York and California indicates. But all of these revolts are positive. And when the Democratic Party is taken over by people who reject Republican-lite policies, well this is exactly the politics we should be engaging in. This is how conservatives took over the Republican Party and eliminated Nelson Rockefeller types from relevance. We must do the same. And indeed we are.