I rather like the charter-school idea myself. But since the mode of analysis here consists of reading the expressions of people-in-the-background, I thought I'd call attention to the rich vein of material provided by this high-resolution photo of the recent inaugural address. Zoom in enough (and wait for the image to load completely) and you can see the facial expressions of many important folks. Look behind Obama for Clarence Thomas, who looks like he's either dozing off or praying, and an inscrutable Antonin Scalia, and many others.

From The Washington Post:

"Congressional Democrats want to mandate that the District's unique school voucher program be reauthorized before more federal money can be allocated for it. It is a seemingly innocuous requirement. In truth it is an ill-disguised bid to kill a program that gives some poor parents a choice regarding where their children go to school. Many of the Democrats have never liked vouchers, and it seems they won't let fairness or the interests of low-income, minority children stand in the way of their politics. But it also seems they're too ashamed -- and with good reason -- to admit to what they're doing."

The Democratic Party is pretty much owned by the blob--the people who run and profit from the public schools in their current state. Meaningful reform would require tremendous political courage and leadership on Obama's part, and I'm not convinced that he believes in anything (other than his own political ascent) enough to take serious risks for it. Most likely, we will wind up with something *called* "merit pay" (but just about everyone gets it) and something "called" "charter schools" (but with most of the restrictions and procedures that now hobble the ordinary public schools)

... or we could create a program *called* "No Child Left Behind" (and then renege on the funding). Wait... we already did that.

Peter...it may be news to the public school crowd, but it is indeed often possible to improve the performance of an organization in ways other than giving it more money. Measurement and accountability is usually a good start.

David,

Agreed. But my understanding was that federal funding was the primary mechanism for holding schools accountable.

And by the way, I don't think any of this is news to public school crowd... at least not anymore.