US Education Secretary Arne Duncan loves mayoral control, and thinks it needs to be replicated elsewhere. Duncan got involved in NY state politics before to make sure that PEP appointees would not have fixed terms. This is very important, because if they were to have them, Mayor Bloomberg would be unable to fire them for the egregious offense of exercising their free will.
He also said this was good for children. After all, children grow up, and if they get mixed up with this free will thing, they might vote the wrong way. With enough dictatorship-based policies, perhaps votes will be irrelevant anyway. After all, Mayor Bloomberg managed to subvert the term-limits referendum that voters twice affirmed, and if Duncan could only do whatever he wanted whenever he felt like it, his job would be a lot less stressful.
For Secretary Duncan, free will is a real bugaboo. If only he could steer those nasty bloggers and reporters away from that nasty free will thing, he could get them to stop telling people what happened when he was in charge of education in Chicago. Perhaps he sees a kindred spirit in Mayor Bloomberg and thinks, "If they believe he did a good job, maybe they'll believe I did a good job too."
The only sure thing is that Duncan has become a cheerleader for the Bloomberg PR machine, not bothering to question it for a minute. He asks fewer questions than the NY Post editorial board, and doesn't want to hear anything about objective, contradictory or reality-based information that might burst his bubble.
Thank you, President Obama. Mayor Bloomberg couldn't be happier if he'd picked Duncan himself. And who's to say he didn't?
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