Opinion: The price of carrots

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Did the election show that voters really want gun control? That they are deeply concerned about the price of carrots?

After major elections, groups with a particular interest proclaim that their side issue, which may or may not have even come up in most of the elections, is supported by the election results because X number of successful candidates favor this, that or the other.

The most puzzling of these comes from the Center for Education Reform, a group that advocates private school vouchers and charter schools, which sees a message that tough-on-public-schools reform measures won the day. ‘Voters in 30 states choose governors who support education reform,’ their press release announces.

Well, you can judge for yourself. The center picked three reforms that it felt were central to its tenets. According to its count, of the 30 gubernatorial candidates whose victories have been confirmed:

-- 67% strongly support charter schools

-- 40% are in favor of comprehensive school choice for parents and students

-- 47% want real performance pay for teachers

-- 11 governors-elect are uniformly in favor of these three reforms

So a minority of the candidates favors two of the reforms, and just over one-third of them support all three. (Actually, considering the federal push for charter schools and the recent movie, ‘Waiting for Superman,’ I’m surprised only two-thirds strongly favored charter schools.)

With support like this, who needs detractors?

-- Karin Klein