Schools Matter: Peas in a pod: Koret Foundation, The Hoover Institution, and Democrats for Education Reform

"I tell you, my friends, the trouble with this whole country is that so many are selfish! Here's a hundred and twenty million people, with ninety-five per cent of 'em only thinking of self, instead of turning to and helping the responsible business men to bring back prosperity! All these corrupt and self-seeking labor unions! Money grubbers! Thinking only of how much wages they can extort out of their unfortunate employer, with all the responsibilities he has to bear!" ... "Then was revealed the New American Education, which, as Sarason so justly said, was to be ever so much newer than the New Educations of Germany, Italy, Poland, or even Turkey." — Sinclair Lewis [1]

It's no secret that the malicious types running Democrats for Education Reform (DFER) hold the same ideological positions as the furthest-right think-tanks around. Starting with their founder Whitney Tilson, [2] who channels American Enterprise Institute's (AEI) Andy Smarick at every opportunity, DFER is a bastion of right-wing thought that amounts to an enormous serving of Milton Freidman's free market fantasies finished with a healthy dollop of Ayn Rand's infantile insistence that "Big Business" is "America’s Persecuted Minority."

My recent Schools Matter essay, Peas in a pod: Koret Foundation, The Hoover Institution, and Democrats for Education Reform, looks at a recent event DFER's Gloria Romero did with arch-reactionaries Terry Moe of The Hoover Institution and Lance Izumi of Koret Foundation. The connections between both funders and shared ideology are frightening and not for the feint of heart.

Published 2012-01-26 on Schools Matter, please read it there and share widely.