Saturday, August 26, 2023

Gary in St Cloud thinks DeSantis can sell vouchers per the invented term "parental choice" where Florida has vouchers. And, what about the banks?

 Whether Gary is correct or not, time will tell. Gary has touted Ron and Florida and vouchers before. The thought here is that vouchers undermine public education in its fundamental universality where childless people pay a part because universal general public education is viewed as a bedrock for democracy to succeed and prosper, as new generations grow into citizen maturity.

Banks: What is perhaps more of interest than that Florida-like voucher plan Ron may likely be pushing is uncertainty where possibly all bets are off.

There have been recent mid-sized bank failures and bailouts of deposits exceeding the nominal $250,000 cutoff, but not too recently. Crypto has been part of those failures, but also the Silicon Valley bank splat had regulators mouthing that high tech dominance was at stake if the depositors, some as young viable tech ventures, were not given a hundred cents on the dollar for deposits exceeding the cutoff.

Not too big to fail. Too important to fail. Modified story, same result. Moral hazard of knowing a government bailout will happen. 

That Wallstreet on Parade item - S & P with an across the board downgraded banking sector outlook is an invitation to speculate over whether the economy might suffer a hit between now and the primaries, or between primaries and the general election, to where the reaction among members of the public can be guessed, but is unknown.

Clearly, banks can remain stressed but not plunge over the brink in any great number, and the speculation of something of that kind affecting an election outcome can prove wrong. The point is to recognize the possibility, and to watch for any economic bounce which might impact citizen outlook and add worry.

Back to vouchers -

The guess here is Trump will not take to pushing vouchers, while the push could hurt DeSantis when people see through "parental choice" wording as being public subsidy of children of the elite attending private schools, or being subsidized into narrow dogma indoctrination, such as Western Reserve Academy (the private elite school where Kashkari graduated), or the parochial schools a disproportionate bloc of Supreme Court Justices went to. 

Regular folks subsidizing the children of the elite to gain a K-12 leg up is fundamentally undemocratic. Public money should be solely for public education. Private money should buy private schooling. That rational status quo is under persistent attack, the "parental choice" shibboleth being a current flavor, but maintaining strong public education spending is a fitting way for a nation to democratize itself in preparing a next generation of citizen-voters.

Public education works, so preserve it, nurture it into best ways, but do not surrender it to glib phrasing meaning vouchers.

UPDATE: Matt Birk and Dr. Scott Jensen tried to sell vouchers to Minnesota, and Tim Walz was reelected. That was last election. Subsequent elections can differ.