With Democrats like this, who needs Republicans?

August 29th

He likes Obama and vouchers

A while back, Alexander Russo asked the question, "Who the hell is Whitney Tilson?" Turns out he's part of a group of four Ownership Society entrepreneurs trying to make a killing in the charter school business. See my post on this here and Elizabeth Green's story in the New York Sun. He's also a player in KIPP, a union hater, and a Democratic (yes, I said Democratic) Party honcho who claims to support Barack Obama.

Not surprisingly, he is a favorite of Andy Rotherham, who runs Tilson's pro-voucher commentary on his Eduwonk bog.

With Democrats like this, who needs Republicans?

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How the hate campaign worked

Samuel Freedman has a piece in today's NYT ("Critics ignored record of a Muslim principal") about the hate campaign against the Kahlil Gibran International Academy and how it succeeded in driving Principal Debbie Almontaser out of her job.

For anyone who bothered to look for it, Ms. Almontaser left a clear, public record of interfaith activism and outreach across the boundaries of race, ethnicity and religion. Her efforts, especially after the Sept. 11 attacks, earned her honors, grants and fellowships. She has collaborated so often with Jewish organizations that an Arab-American newspaper, Aramica, castigated her earlier this summer for being too close to a “Zionist organization,” meaning the Anti-Defamation League.