The Belmont Club has an interesting piece covering how Chicago political elites game the public education system, and how Daley uses this as a means of consolidating power.
Daly discovered the great rule of demagoguery. Convince those who’ve never eatenpâté de foie gras that the swill they are eating is it. Serve the real pate to those who already know what it tastes like. It was a system that would have been instantly familiar to former Soviets. World class academies for the nomenklatura, shacks on the banks of the Volga for those on the outs. Mayor Daley has indignantly denied the special list was used for playing favorites. He argued that just because there was a VIP entrance doesn’t mean anyone actually used it. The Chicago Sun Times reported that “Daley said there was nothing wrong with former Chicago schools chief Arne Duncan’s office maintaining such a log because ‘no favoritism’ resulted from it.†One official, Office of Compliance Chief Anthony Boswell, whose children qualified for a magnet school after moving in from Denver said that while it made him look bad, he didn’t actually know if he received preferential treatment.
As Richard Fernandez points out, these are the same people who just took over our Health Care System. God Help us! All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.