The portion that the New York Times printed of Justice Thomas’s concurring opinion on vouchers was a remarkaboe panegyric about the advantages of vouchers:
Thomas seems to imply that school choice is an emancipation and a fulfillment of the promise of Brown v. Board of Education. These are strong words.
Milwaukee Alderman Terrance Herron just switched to Republican over this issue (among others).:
So, what will be the political fallout of the school choice issue?
The full title was supposed to be,
Will the school voucher issue cause African Americans to switch from Democrat to Republican
Mods, is there a way to fix this?
Why would it? The Democrats and the Republicans have had their positions staked out on this issue for years, yet the only two black folk you can point to as examples of this imminent switch are Clarence Thomas and some guy from Milwaukee?
Hand-wringing, rhetorical overkill, union-bashing, religion-bashing–all the usual. And I suppose a few more limited voucher programs will be implemented here and there, but to no great success because ain’t nobody going to put enough money into voucher programs to make them a legitimate choice for most kids in crappy schools. Oh, and most private schools won’t even take them even if the parents can make up the difference out of their own pocket.
Vouchers are the right-wing’s version of communism: lovely in theory, totally unworkable in practice.
Sigh! Here we go again. Just because one black person things school vouchers are ok, does not mean all black people do. Witness, I am a black man who does not support school vouchers, neither does my wife. Now you have a sample size of 4, with 50% in support and 50% against. Now if IRC you work with numbers, what happens when you apply those figures across the rest of the remaining black populace?
I see no study at your link only an offer to sell one, however I’ll counter your non link with this.
The results of Prop 38
A handy population breakdown for Oakland, CA (where I live).
While you’re there note that figure for registered republicans (of whom we can assume as a majority voted for the measure).
And here’s the result by city You see that city showing 78% voting NO, I’ll give you three guesses as to which city that is, and your first two don’t count.
My data and yours appear to conflict.
Stuffy, let it out, Afroman. Admit that you are part of the Afromind. What one member of the Afromind believes, all Afromembers believe.
You’ll feel Afrobetter once you come out of the Afrocloset!
Yours in Afropeace,
AfroSua
why in the world are you assuming that such a large group of people would alter their political views because of one issue?
do you have evidence to support the basis for your question? (ie that those persons who self identified as Afro Americans consider the school voucher issue to be the litmus test for politics?)
<hijack>
SuaSponte My mom has a pic on her wall of me and my sibs, taken around 76, in it I have an afro the size of a beachball. I fully intend to burn it.
<byejack>
Another quick aside while you’re looking at those numbers december, what about the latinos? Since they’re attending the sames schools as blacks , adding those two numbers togoether should have made a huge difference in the outcome, you know since it has all that support.
<hijack the hijack>
Blame it on me being a white boy from the suburbs, but until I was around 7 (also in 1976), I thought an Afro was simply the natural state for black people’s hair. 
<{something witty playing off “hijack”}>
Sua
I don’t know what’s going to happen. So far I’ve provided two bits of evidence:
– A majority of African-Americans support school choice
– Two individuals considered the issue to be highly important.
Stuffy, yes Prop 38 got massacred. There were a number of specific reasons. It was overly broad. It was not well-promoted. You’re probably correct in your statistical judgments on the voting on Prop. 38.
Here are some other cites.
http://www.cnn.com/2001/ALLPOLITICS/stories/01/10/cnn.poll/
http://www.jointcenter.org/selpaper/pdffiles/educ98/00educat.pdf
without getting into statistics, I’d like to say that
because of my disgust at the unequal educational opportunities (where the poor and minorities get the shaft)
I am against school vouchers.
It is a solution that will make the problem worse, and will probably do better for the children of rich, white, conservative parents.
December, you quote Clarence Thomas, the lawn jockey for George Bush and the GOP. Very representative of the black population! 
I am very interested in getting minorities and the poor a good education. They will never rise up to be true equals and true citizens without a good education (Ironically, just as Douglass says in Thomas’ quote), and I think it is disgusting that the public school system has been in such a state for so long.
But, as I said, I don’t think a school voucher program will be of any help in this area, and would probably end up being more detrimental- as in, the inequality of the school system between rich and poor and white and minorities will increase.
colin
I’m about to go home so I don’t have a lot of time to look at these (I still haven’t gotten a new home ISP yet), but looking at just one of your cites (specifically the last) I notice something that I suspected before even seeing it, that the language used when polling changed the results.
Which makes me automatically suspect the methodology. I’ll try to look into it more this weekend.
also pointing out if you ask the question “do you think you should be able to send your child to a school of your choice” will elicit a ‘damn yes’ response quite frequently, as opposed, say to “do you favor tax funded voucher systems allowing parents to subsidize at tax payer expense, their children’s enrollment in parochial schools?”
Vouchers went down substantially in Michigan last time it was tried, and IIRC, the heavily minority districts in Wayne County (Detroit) were substantially against it, vs. the damn that’s pale group up in Kent County and places north of mid Michigan.
So, the data on actual votes seem to disprove your polls.
I have a sincere question.
I don’t know everything about this whole voucher thing, but here’s what I don’t get.
Public schools have had a long time, and plenty of money, to educate kids. Now granted, there are some GREAT public school districts out there, but let’s face it … for the most part they suck.
Why would anyone support giving them even MORE money, so they can screw up another generation, when some of the money they are given can go to people who want to yank their kids out of said schools?
GROAN
Oh not AGAIN!!!
The picture, or the Afro? :eek:
Another negro checking in. Like Stuffy, I’m against vouchers.
Well, if everyone thinks public schools suck and since private schools are the magic panacea, why don’t we just dismantle public schools all together and cut every parent a check for private school tuition? And while we’re at it, why don’t we give people money if they choose to drive rather than take public transportation, or if they choose to patronize private hospitals rather than public?
Will public schools improve if kids get vouchers to go elsewhere? I don’t think so, and I wish someone would tell me why I should.
I am a cautious supporter of vouchers. However I don’t think they will will lead to a big switch of blacks to Republicans because many black supporters of vouchers are in the inner-cities and they will probably have other reasons to support the Dems. What these people could do is to generate grassroots pressure in the Democratic party for vouchers.