The Conservative Crackup -

[BridgeTheGap]

(I'm posting this, not because I agree with it, but because I think it is necessary to know what the other side is thinking. While we kicked their butts in the electoral college, the election hinged on shifts in 5 - 10% of the electorate. It wasn't the huge shift I wanted to see - something that we make the g.o.p. irrelevant & provide us with a super majority - btg)
From Slate:

What should the GOP, and the conservative movement more generally, be concentrating on for the next few years? Developing, demonstrating, and communicating solutions to the current problems of the middle class.

Most conservatives who propose a return to "Reagan conservatism" don't understand either the motivations or structure of the Reagan economic revolution. The 1970s were a period of economic crisis for America as it emerged from global supremacy to a new world of real economic competition. The Reagan economic strategy for meeting this challenge was sound money plus deregulation, broadly defined. It succeeded, but it exacerbated a number of pre-existing trends that began or accelerated in the '70s that tended to increase inequality.

International competition is now vastly more severe than it was 30 years ago. The economic rise of the Asian heartland is the fundamental geostrategic fact of the current era. In aggregate, America is rich and economically successful but increasingly unequal, with a stagnating middle class. If we give up the market-based reforms that allow us to prosper, we will lose by eventually allowing international competitors to defeat us. But if we let inequality grow unchecked, we will lose by eventually hollowing out the middle class and threatening social cohesion. This rock-and-a-hard-place problem, not some happy talk about the end of history, is what "globalization" means for the United States.

Seen in this light, the challenge in front of conservatives is clear: How do we continue to increase the market orientation of the American economy while helping more Americans to participate in it more equally?

http://www.slate.com/id/2203800/entry/2203801/?GT1=38001

[droidamus2]

1. Huh?

The first option they talk about, funding for school going with the student, sounds a hell of a lot like vouchers to me. I think one of the problems with schools is infrastructure problem many of our schools, especially in the inner cities, have far outlived their expected usefulness. We need to repair, replace or add to the number of schools in this country. I don't like the idea of a National test for each grade. I think emphasis on test results just means the students only get taught what is necessary for them to keep those numbers up so critical thinking, arts, etc. get short changed. Speaking of numbers the whole emphasis on 'market driven' schools and providing numbers for people means that schools will spend all their time trying to figure out how to manipulate the numbers in their favor (ridding their schools of lower performing students perhaps?) instead of developing new methods of producing high quality graduates. I think we may do examine the 'factory' based structure of our schools. I know I questioned testing before but, just an idea, what if we got away from the idea that every child of a certain age has to progress with the rest the children of that age. How about a more modular structure where the children can progress at their own rate. For example, coming into school you would have the rudimentary math and english modules (teaching basic alphabet and numbers, etc) you would have some evaluation method probably including testing to determine if a given student has mastered the material in the module if so they would be allowed to move on to the next module. My idea is the focus shouldn't be so much in forcing a student through to graduation at age 17 or 18 but to do everything possible to guarantee that each and every student has a certain level of proficiency when they do graduate.

The second point on immigration if you look passed the idea of controlling the border sounds pretty much like the system now. There currently are numbers set as to how many immigrants can legally come in each year. I would suspect that part of the process of deciding which ones are given permission is to look into what kind of talents they have.