The Great Society at 50: The backlash against Lyndon Johnson’s grand program has been as enduring as its successes, write Karen Tumulty in the Washington Post. Every political argument that we’re having today, all these years later, can find its roots in the Great Society. As one Johnson aide put it, the America we live in is LBJ’s America.
George Will looks around and argues that just about everything has gone wrong since the Great Society.
In case you missed it: Aurora Daily Sentinel blasts oil-and-gas “kingpins” blew the chance with lawmakers this year to help craft workable local-control laws: “In an effort to provide for growth and exploration, the state essentially rolled over local counties and municipalities with a blanket, one-size-fits-all cadre of rules, regulations and setbacks that could never have really worked or be trusted… There could never be one set of state regulations that could govern a process as varied and complex as drilling and fracking in a state with so many extremely different environments and developments. Aurora is nothing — absolutely nothing — like Rifle. Only Aurora can determine when a process as industrial as oil and gas extraction should be permitted on a particular site in Aurora. The same with Rifle.”
Students, faculty, alums at Harvard’s graduate school of education are not happy that wunderkind edu-reformer Colorado State Senator Michael Johnston was selected to give this year’s commencement speech. Bloomberg News: They object to his “vision of education reform that relies heavily on test-based accountability while weakening the due process protections of teachers.”
The Senate Majority PAC bought $215,710 in air time to run more ads against Republican Congressman Cory Gardner, who’s running to unseat Democrat Mark Udall.
Wyoming rejects national science standards because of all the science involved, starting, of course, with the scientific ideas about climate change. Via the New York Times.
How fracking in Texas didn’t lead just to oil, but also helped the Mexican cartels with the drug trade. Via the National Journal.
U.S. Senate Republicans blocked major tax bill because it contained subsidies for the wind-power industry. Via ThinkProgress. But OK with continued enormous oil-industry tax carve outs.
If you want to know where the now-powerful Koch brothers got started in politics, the New York Times tells the story of the quixotic 1980 campaign in which it all began.
Haverford College commencement speaker rips Haverford students for their campaign against a previously invited speaker, who felt forced to withdraw. Via the Philadelphia Inquirer.
The latest on the literary canon: Some college students want to be warned if something in the book might offend somebody. Via the New York Times.
It’s not clear why Jill Abramson was fired and whether her gender had anything at all to do with it, but there is something that can’t be overlooked: what it means to edit while female. Via Susan Glasser at Politico.
