McCain's message to NAACP was a fakeout

by: Kathy

Thu Jul 17, 2008 at 15:33:55 PM EDT

I'm fairly certain that reaction is based on McCain's past snubs and votes.

McCain opposed a day to honor Martin Luther King - at both the state and federal level. McCain, at least for a while, supported the flying of the Confederate flag in South Carolina, praising it as "a symbol of heritage." He's even praised Bob Jones University. [...]

Last year, for example, the NAACP invited McCain to speak. He declined. The NAACP held a forum for all the Republican presidential candidates, and McCain didn't show up. PBS hosted a Republican presidential candidates' debate at historically black college in Baltimore, and McCain didn't show up to that event, either. The Congressional Black Caucus Institute organized a debate, co-sponsored by Fox News, and McCain didn't show up to that event, either.

Not surprisingly, the NAACP doesn't think too highly of McCain.

McCain received an 'F' from the NAACP's Civil Rights Federal Legislative Report Card for the 109th Congress (the last date for which a complete report is available), voting with the NAACP only 7 percent of the time and tying with 14 other conservative senators for last place. McCain "also received failing grades from the NAACP in every report card of the last decade."

Losing in the polls, McCain didn't have any choice this year. He had to speak to the NAACP. His message to black voters was that he would expand education opportunities, partly through the use of vouchers, a position McCain has long favored even though evidence shows they don't improve academic performance.

Since McCain first advocated vouchers, a growing body of research has confirmed that they do not improve students' academic performance or help close the achievement gap between affluent white children and poor children of color. Furthermore, the value of the vouchers McCain and other conservatives have proposed -- $2,000 -- is equal to less than half the average annual tuition at an American private school -- $4,689. That means vouchers won't give poor families many educational options beyond inner-city parochial schools, which are far less expensive and exclusive than secular prep schools focused on ensuring college admission.

One top secular school in the Detroit area is Detroit Country Day, where one year of tuition for grades K-2 runs $19,150 dollars. Rates climb as students advance, and tuition doesn't include books once a student gets to middle school. How many poor or middle-class families can afford to give their children a first class education at DCDS on McCain's voucher? Probably zero.

More importantly, vouchers hurt public schools, as Milwaukee's voucher program has consistently shown.

Furthermore, as millions of Wisconsin dollars have flowed from the public system into the hands of 120 private schools -- 102 of which are religious-affiliated -- private schools have refused to educate many students with special needs. In Milwaukee, the percentage of disabled students in public schools is twice as high as the percentage in the voucher program, putting considerable strain on a public system that has been drained of crucial resources.

That's why Obama opposes vouchers.

"We don't have enough slots for every child to go into a parochial school or a private school. And what you would see is a huge drain of resources out of the public schools," Obama said. [...]

"But what I don't want to do is to see a diminished commitment to the public schools to the point where all we have are the hardest-to-teach kids with the least involved parents with the most disabilities in the public schools," he said. "That's going to make things worse, and we're going to lose the commitment to public schools that I think have been so important to building this country."

The bottom line? McCain doesn't have a real committment to improving public education, as his votes show. McCain...

Voted Against Head Start Programs: In 2005, for instance, McCain voted against increasing "federal spending on Head Start programs by $153 million." {Nearly 280,000 African American children are enrolled in Head Start programs that have been shown to improve school performance in early grades and return up to $7 to society for every $1 invested.}

Voted Against Expanding Pell Grants: While 45 percent of African Americans rely on Pell Grants to pay for college, McCain has consistently voted to cut the value of Pell Grants.

Voted Against Title I Education Grants: McCain voted against increasing spending on Title I education grants, which are designed to help public schools that serve predominantly low-income students, by $3 billion.

It's no wonder McCain's speech fell on deaf ears. He's a phony, or as Jill Tubman puts it...

Like George Bush and to crib Kanye, John McCain doesn't care about black people. Going to speak at the NAACP is like Bush kissing Oprah in 2000. Just the fakeout fade.