A Fool's Errand - fact-checking FoxNews

I couldn't help myself. I know I should be better than this; I know I should "turn the other cheek." 

I just can't.

I read a column today on FoxNews.com (God help me!) entitled "Here's Why Progressives Hate Betsy DeVos." I knew before I even clicked the link that this column would be chock full of bad-faith arguments.

A few fine examples of the type of sophistry that FoxNews has oh-so-masterfully put on display:

Although Secretary DeVos did struggle to answer some questions on the spot, the substance and tone of the criticisms are inaccurate and unfair.

None of this should be surprising. Secretary DeVos, a Christian grandmother and philanthropist who has spent her career trying to improve the quality of education for poor children, has been criticized and mocked relentlessly. And she is the only Cabinet secretary who travels with a cadre of U. S. Marshals because of death threats she’s received.

So, to be clear, she "struggle[d] to answer some questions on the spot" but the criticisms of the head of public education in America were unfair. Why? Apparently because she is "a Christian grandmother and philanthropist who has spent her career . . .". 

This is clearly the combination of an identity appeal and the fallacy of post hoc herego pro erego propter hoc. In other words, because Betsy DeVos is a Christian, any criticisms of her must be because she is a Christian. 

Note also that the column fails to say precisely what she "has spent her career" actually doing to try "to improve the quality of education for poor children." (Hint: she has been advocating vouchers, despite the poor results in her home state of Michigan).

Interestingly, the column also throws in the death threats . . . for reasons I can't quite fathom. Maybe to demonize opponents of DeVos and her ilk of privateers? Certainly, if FoxNews could connect these death threats, no matter how tangentially, to liberals, they would do so (see the connection they managed to make between Iraq and 9/11).

Though I could continue to criticize the bad-faith arguments presented in the above quote, I need to move on lest this blog post exceed 10,000 words.

So why, as “60 Minutes”’ Lesley Stahl put it, has Secretary DeVos become the “most hated Cabinet secretary?”

One reason—as opinion pieces in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal have argued—is that some of the Democratic party’s most deep-pocketed and powerful interest groups are teachers’ unions who realize that they will no longer have a near-monopoly on education.

A few points:

• As a former public school teacher,  I did not realize that my roughly $40,000/year salary rendered me part of one of the Democratic party's "most deep-pocketed and powerful interest groups." I wish someone would've told me! Maybe we wouldn't have had the bipartisan push for the past two decades to blame teachers for, literally, every one of society's problems. Further, I can't help but note that FoxNews repeatedly characterizes teachers as a well-funded, unionized interest group, while simultaneously referring to arbitrage bankers as "job creators." Interesting priorities you have there, folks!
• I also note, in this quote, an assumption that teacher's unions couldn't possibly actually, you know, care about kids' education. They must be concerned that their monopoly on education (lucrative as that is!) may disappear. Again, I fail to see FoxNews' concern as to monopolies when we discuss NFL owners, telecom giants, Facebook, media consolidation, etc. NO! That's saved for those nefarious teachers who instead of taking jobs in other sectors, took jobs at a reduced rate of pay in order to help kids and teach. Huh.

Moving along:

Another reason, as the New York Times’ Ross Douthat argued, is that the Democratic party’s upper-middle-class suburbanite constituency  - who are big supporters, in theory, of public education – bristle at the idea of DeVos’ charters and vouchers being attractive to poor and minority families (who in their view belong in public schools) or families with ideological or religious convictions that differ from their own.

Well, I can only speak to what I know; let's review what I know.

First off, Ross Douthat is part of the New York Times' cabal of "conservative" columnists. His attribution of bad traits to Democrats, as the house organ for Republican talking points, is utterly shocking! (Side note, the "liberal NY Times" has a cabal of conservative writers; FoxNews has one moderate liberal - Juan Williams - and shouts him down seemingly every time he opens his mouth).

Also, "upper-middle class suburbanite" sounds kind of like Carmel, or Fishers, or Zionsville, or Avon, or Center Grove. How many of these places are represented by Democrats? It certainly doesn't describe Andre Carson's gerrymandered Democratic district, does it?

Further, this notion that it is the liberals who bristle at allowing others to have "ideological or religious convictions that differ from their own" is quite rich. Was it liberals championing a constitutional amendment to prohibit gay marriage? Was it Democrats who prioritized ties to the party over know-how when rebuilding Iraq? Was it all the Democrats in downtown Indianapolis who recently attempted to prevent a mosque from being built?

I mean, I've been criticized by conservatives for being too open to "ideological or religious convictions that differ from [my] own." People have said, about me, "he's so liberal, he won't even take his own side in an argument." 

Ever heard a conservative insulted like this? Me neither.

According to the writer, Bruce Riley Ashford, here is why Betsy DeVos is despised:

Secretary DeVos wants to liberate American education from encroachment by federal bureaucracy

I don't despise her for that. I thought American education needed to be liberated from the federal bureaucracy for the entirety of my teaching tenure: 2003-2010. Note the years where I taught. When I spoke, from roughly 2003-2009, about "liberating American education from encroachment by federal bureaucracy" I was derided by the so-called Education Reform Crowd (of which DeVos is a leading member) that I was an "apologist for the status quo" who "didn't want to improve kids' lives." Leaving aside how insulting that was, I can't help but note the change in tone and wonder why.

Bad faith argumentation.

Secretary DeVos emphasizes freedom of thought.

Sure. Freedom of thought. From this crowd. Again, and I believe this was addressed above, I don't recall any Democrats directing federal agencies to refrain from using certain well-worn phrases.

she wants to empower financially-disadvantaged families to send their children to whichever school they deem best

Raise your hand if you believe that the "Education Reform" crowd has any intention of allowing you to send your children to Park Tudor. Raise your hand if you believe that the so-called "voucher" DeVos and company are proposing will be worth the roughly $20,000/year it costs to send your child to Park Tudor. 

I tend to believe that the "voucher," if widely used, will be but a state-sponsored subsidy to religious schools that won't come close to covering the cost of attendance. Sure, people like religious schools when they're Catholic or Episcopalian, how will people react when they're strict Islamic madrasas or Church of Cannabis Schools? (Funny thing about that Constitution . . .).

Secretary Devos does not come to her job as a career politician or an educational ideologue. She comes as a lifelong education advocate and philanthropist who has given tens of millions of dollars to public and private educational institutions.

Once again, "They couldn't possibly disagree with DeVos on policy. They must hate her because she has money and cares!" Furthermore, Betsy DeVos is NOT an ideologue? (Betsy DeVos, billionaire founder of the American Federation for Children, the nation's leading school choice advocacy program, is not an ideologue, no matter what the dirty liberals say!)

A final point about this: I note that this is clearly a defense of DeVos and her "policies," such as they are. Interestingly, the piece is largely devoid of actual policy analysis. How have DeVos' preferred policies worked where they've been tried? I am not asking for anecdotes; I'm asking for data.

Do voucher students perform better than students who don't receive vouchers? Do charter schools perform better than traditional public schools?

It's almost like the author of the article either doesn't care to know these stats or hasn't bothered to find out. Huh.

Proponents of “school choice” say that voucher programs – which allow parents to use state education funds to enroll their children in private schools – promote learning by providing access to different types of schools and by fostering competition that motivates public schools to improve.

But there’s no evidence that voucher programs significantly increase test scores, according to a new report by Stanford Graduate School of Education (GSE) Professor Martin Carnoy.

At best, they have only a modest impact on high school graduation rates, Carnoy found – and the risks they pose outweigh any advances.

“The evidence is very weak that vouchers produce significant gains in learning,” Carnoy said. “They also carry hidden costs, and they’re distracting us from other solutions that could yield much higher returns.”

I mean, it's not as though I found this by simply googling "voucher student achievement." It's not as though this was in the list of results either:

Advocates of school choice breathed a sigh of relief last month when a pair of new studies showed that voucher programs in Indiana and Louisiana were performing better than prior research had suggested. But they shouldn’t get too comfortable.

The news that most students recovered the ground they lost when they first enrolled in these programs after three or four years is obviously welcome. But it is unlikely to satisfy critics, who will rightly note that students who returned to the public schools after a year or two lost significant ground, and that so far no statewide voucher program has shown significant benefits for the average participant. To the contrary, the last four voucher programs to be rigorously evaluated—including those in Ohio and Washington, D.C., as well as Indiana and Louisiana—have all shown negative or decidedly mixed effects.

I could go on, but I am getting tired of rebutting this know-nothing FoxNews s*#t thrower.