Double taxation?

Payroll taxes, sales taxes, motor vehicle taxes, restaurant taxes. This issue of tax credits for private schools is not about double taxation, as Bob Turner says. It is about undermining the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment’s separation of church and state and further driving a wedge between the “middle class” and poor working class. And it’s about an issue that too many white parents in private schools wish not to discuss: race.

My guess is Turner really isn’t interested in healing our communities and embracing diversity but rather grabbing onto an issue and pandering to a minority of people who are finding it difficult to do all the things they wish to do — in an economy that favors the Bob Turners sending their children to private schools.

The public school system was fought for and won by labor, immigrants who came to America seeking a better life and progressive movements of the time; it is a cornerstone of our democracy. After the Revolution, an emphasis was put on education, which rapidly established public schools.

By the year 1870, all states had free elementary schools. The U.S. population had one of the highest literacy rates at the time, according to the 1911 “A cyclopedia of education.”

Turner admits in the article that the bill doesn’t have much of a chance passing the U.S. Senate with its present Democratic majority. I can only hope he is right in this case.

I should point out that it is very disconcerting to know that a Democrat is also pushing for a similar bill. Assemblyman Rory Lancman “applauded the Congressman’s efforts”. I have the same sentiments for Lancman as I have just expressed for Turner.

Steve Allen once said back in the ‘70s that the mainstream media was dumbing down America. At the time Mr. Allen uttered those words, the Internet was not a household word. I’m sure if he were alive today he would embrace it for the opportunities it holds out for building bridges between communities and exposing opportunism.