Battle4Liberty

The headline in my local paper (The Morning News) was an eye-catcher: S.C. AIMS TO KEEP MILLIONS—STATE RACES TO KEEP $75 MILLION IN FEDERAL FUNDS FOR SPECIAL EDUCATION. The story opens, “South Carolina has lost $36 million in federal matching money and is scrambling to avoid losing another $75 million for not spending enough on special education the last two years.”

[read the entire story at http://www2.scnow.com/news/pee-dee/2011/jun/23/sc-loses-36m-scrambles-avoid-losing-75m-more-ar-2019306/]

Apparently, Washington requires states to spend a certain amount of special education and withholds matching funds to those that don’t. SC lost $36 million last fiscal year, prompting the Department of Education to send $75 million earmarked for special education to local districts by July 1. The author of the piece (Robert Kittle) then posed the following question: So why didn’t the state spend what it was supposed to on special education students? I seems that bureaucratic problems were to blame, but “lawmakers are taking steps to try to prevent this from ever happening again.”

Mr. Kittle has asked the wrong question, and I must wonder if any of my neighbors picked up on it. When he asks why SC didn’t “spend what it was supposed to,” he neglects to question the federal government’s right to make that determination in the first place. Washington’s figure—whatever it is—is presumed to be correct. To the left, Washington is the conscious that many states—especially more conservative ones—just don’t have. Never mind that our Constitution left education to the states in the first place, but I digress.

Kittle also fails to assess the intrusiveness of this scam. Let me simplify, using SC as an example. Washington confiscates the earned wealth of South Carolinians (or incurs debt on their behalf), ostensibly to support special education. Washington sends funds back to SC only if SC meets Washington’s requirements. If SC decides to spend less than the magic number, then a portion of its funds is redistributed to other states. To avoid this drain, state legislators must tax their citizens even more to pay for projects it would not otherwise support, compounding the waste.

I have nothing against special education, and I am aware that the left will castigate anyone who opposes this type of scheme as anti-children and/or anti-special education. Nonetheless, the underlying program is fraudulent, and our reporters should have the insight and courage to ask the right questions. It’s also time that we elect a President and Congress that will put an immediate halt to this type of fraud and leave states to address their own budgetary concerns as they see fit. This is the leviathan we must fight at every turn.