Back Home Again

ONE of the small pleasures of the Indiana political season--there aren't any large pleasures, unless you count Richard Mourdock's moment in the national limelight--is the campaign of Dr. Tony Bennett, Ed.D, State Superintendent of Public Instruction and Union Busting. This was, by the way, an appointed position until Mitch Daniels came along and improved everything. For people who sell ad time.

Bennett is Just Another 21st Century Public Education huckster. He's got ads everywhere; his opponent has none. He's not only raked in boatloads of "campaign contributions" from every Reform Pirate out there, his wife was puling down large green consulting with the charter school industry until they decided that looked bad when people exposed the fact. He's a transparent liar and a bureaucratic bully who, unlike most public education "reformers", actually taught school, and administered one, and so knows just how full of shit the whole thing is.

Bennett came to town yesterday to inspect the schools he took over a year ago. The occasion was the state handing out its phony Letter Grade to Schools bushwah. (Which, by the way, is now causing Indianapolis' suburban school superintendents to howl like the wind about the unfairness of the system. Those're the same superintendents who were absolutely silent while that system was used to muscle local control away from inner-city schools two years ago.)

My Poor Wife's Failing School miraculously received a B, and Bennett was on hand to stage a pre-election photo op congratulate them on suddenly educating our youth. She was heading to the auditorium for his appearance when she was passed by a colleague headed the other direction.

"You're not going to hear Dr. Bennett?" she asked, fully enjoying the "doctor" part.

"Don't have to. I already have a dick," he said.