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My political career, never very promising, has suffered much of late. Until I read the Post one Tuesday morning, I didn't even know that I had been considered for the Libertarian Party's nomination for lieutenant governor.
It sounds like my kind of job. By law, the lieutenant governor chairs the Colorado Indian Commission and promotes Colorado products. Otherwise, there's not much to it, other than checking the governor's health, just in case.
Lieutenant governors often fade into obscurity, but this year the job offers real possibilities for power and glory if the Libertarians win; the party's gubernatorial candidate is Robin Heid, who enjoys guns, sky-diving and other risky activities.
But Heid never got around to calling me, which is just as well, since I took my own venture into politics. Stan Provenza recently resigned from the local school board, which must select a replacement to serve until the next election.
I live in his district and have attended most board meetings for the past five years, so I naively thought the school board would be glad to have such an applicant.
However, even if I own two mortgaged houses and occasionally exhibit other wholesome American traits, the local establishment decided I wasn't good school board material. After I applied, they recruited another applicant, an attorney.
But since two members were absent from the July meeting, the board put off deciding between us until its August meeting. The local establishment may be right that I'm not good school board material, because the proposed voucher system makes sense to me, and the Colorado Association of School Boards finds it anathema.
Vouchers let parents take the tax money that has gone to public schools and spend it at any educational institution, public or private. Randy Quinn, CASB's executive director, says that there will then be no control over the private institutions.
So what? How much control do you have over a private institution like Safeway? But if you don't like Safeway, you can go to King Soopers, Albertson's, a roadside produce stand or your own garden. However, if you're dismayed by the local public school monopoly, your have no options -- unless you're rich enough to enroll your children in a private school, or you have the time and energy for home education. Vouchers just give all parents the rights that wealthy parents have always enjoyed, but Quinn -- and presumably the rest of the CASB -- thinks that parental empowerment is dangerous.
Why can't the CASB look on the bright side?
As it is now, when somebody complains about occult MacBeth, Halloween parties or evolution in the classroom, the board must try to please. With vouchers, the board could tell the complainer to take his money and go find a school that suits him. School boards could devote their energies to building excellence, instead of placating those who want children to be ignorant.
But the CASB is against that. Money is power, and they want to keep power in the hand of school boards, not put it in the hands of parents. I'm for the parents, and obviously, that's no way to advance a political career.
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