"Education Does Not Create Jobs"

Thank you, Rep. Andy Biggs for framing the debate for the 2010 legislative elections. Apparently, the AZ Democratic Party is not as grateful. Don't me wrong, the Party put out a press release on the House Ways & Means Committee's vote on the equalization tax repeal, but in doing so they somehow managed to leave out the money quote of the next two years. Perhaps the Party doesn't think the content of their press releases matters, and perhaps they're right. But neither the Republic nor the Tribune printed the Biggs quote as far as I can tell (who knows if either paper even had a reporter there?) and perhaps they would have had someone (anyone!) told them that it was probably the most significant thing that happened in the hearing yesterday. I mean, hell, Tedski just threw the quote up on RRR. Maybe he should be the new Comm Director downtown (he'd certainly be better than what we have now).

I'm not terribly surprised that the Party has dropped the ball so far on this one, but it's still disheartening. What would I have done? I'd be getting in the face of Jan Brewer, John McCain, Jeff Flake, Kirk Adams, and every legislator I could get my hands on asking if they agree with Biggs' sentiment. If we were REALLY lucky, we'd get somebody to agree with him and I'd put the quote on every hit piece of the 2010 campaign attributed to Republican majority. If not, I'd have a follow-up question: so if you agree with the Democrats that education creates jobs, then you'll restore the 2009 ed cuts back to the 2010 budget, right? If not then are you just against education, or are you agaisnt the jobs too? Then the mailer becomes: if the Republican majority really believes that EDUCATION CREATES JOBS, then why did they make such crippling cuts to our schools? The point is, Andy Biggs just offered to make the 2010 election at least largely a referendum on the notion that education creates jobs. I don't get why we're not accepting his offer.