I started this as a comment, but I’m going to “promote” myself: On our previous thread, a commenter writes, “It is very sad how Blue Mass ignored the actual issue of the Hub Politics post.”
Terribly sad. I’m, like, cryin’.
How do we address their point when — like their spelling/grammar — their facts and logic are so confused? They say this is the legislature’s fault, when the public (including me) voted for immersion? They write, “after all, it was the Democrats on Beacon Hill who gave the axe to the voter approved English immersion program.” What? That’s not what the article says.
Four years ago, voters overwhelmingly approved a measure that required public schools to teach students primarily in English. The law, which Governor Mitt Romney campaigned for, requires non-native English speakers to be placed in a separate program that teaches English as a second language for a period ”not normally intended to exceed one school year,” then enter regular academic classes. It did not include money for training teachers.
The Globe found a system riddled with inconsistencies in how the children were being taught.
The article says that in a lot of places, the law isn’t being followed. And in any event, it’s not funded, and there’s no training. And there’s only one year of test results.
It’s true that the legislature “watered down” the law somewhat in 2003; but if you read that Globe story , you’ll see that the “watering down” basically meant a continuation of “two-way” programs, where kids learn each others’ languages:
Boston School Superintendent Thomas W. Payzant said he would be happy to continue two-way courses, even though the city’s school system is prepared to implement the larger English immersion program this fall. ”I believe that keeping two-way bilingual education makes sense, because it works, it gets results, it’s cost-neutral, and it only affects a small amount of students,” said a written statement Payzant issued.
Even Ron Unz, the California guy who funded the MA ballot initiative, didn’t think that was necessarily so bad:
Ron Unz, the Silicon Valley entrepreneur who helped finance last year’s referendum effort, said he was not so concerned with two-way courses, but with courses taught solely in Spanish or other non-English languages that he said masquerade as two-way.
If you read that article from ’03, does that sound like “Democrats on Beacon Hill [gave] the axe to the voter approved [sic, still] English immersion program”? No. They didn’t. They made an allowance for a technique that is thought to be effective.
The Globe article that HubPol cites as proof that the legislature screwed things up, proves no such thing. It proves that there is extremely uneven compliance with the law. Well gosh, isn’t that an issue for the Executive Branch? No tart words for RomneyCo from the sages of Beverly?
… Look, I read Hub Politics, and sometimes I agree with those guys. But they’re hacks. Here’s their formula:
I. Bad thing X happened today
II. Long quote from press
III. Therefore, Democrats are hypocrites.*
*(Can also be applied to Mihos.)
Lather, rinse, and repeat. It’s an easy recipe, it’s fun, and indeed we often follow it — with (III) usually aimed the other direction, of course.
But is everything just an opportunity for a partisan pot-shot? That tends to have a distorting effect on one’s relationship with reality.
That’s one of the big problems with Hub Politics. Their goal is ideological, not constructive and not based in reality. That’s why they cite sources that don’t support their points, as Charley demonstrates above, and spend the vast majority of their time taking pot shots rather than trying to develop tangible solutions to problems we all face. They are sort of the blog equivalent of the current Romney administration. A pity, really, since they have a lot of energy and enough time to cut and paste large chunks of the Globe every day, if not to proof-read and spell check.
Bob – do you really not understand that the Twins are expressing their view of reality? That to those of us in the Other Wing, you are every bit as ideological as you claim the Twins are?
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Perhaps you need to rent ‘Rashomon’ to understand the concept that a single event can – and does – produce different ‘realities’.
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And you are flirting with incivility here, after your excellent post on that matter, over what began as an amusing twitting over a careless spelling error.
Peter, ideology is one thing, but HubPol flat-out got their facts wrong. I’m sorry, but they cannot point to a dog and tell me it’s a cat. And I wouldn’t insult your intelligence by doing the same.
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Facts + ideology = good solid blogging.
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Ideology irrespective of facts = hackery.
The good folks at Hub Politics should take a cue from BMG and actually read about the issues before spouting off about them.
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Hub Politics uses the classic Rove model — which you described in detail above.
Didn’t Romney advocate “axe” part of the referendum proposal? From what I remember, the ballot initiative said teachers could be sued for teaching languages other than english.
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Romney argued he would repeal that provision.
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So even the Governor didn’t completly support the Utz proposal.
You might say the Governor turned himself into a pretzel on that one.
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(It’s Unz.)
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Of course, but as Stephen Colbert observed, “reality has a well-known liberal bias.”