Please God Grant Georgia Its Wish For Statewide School Vouchers.

When Republican legislators in Utah thought they knew best how to spend taxpayer dollars on private school vouchers, the citizens there were outraged, quickly repealing the purely ideological law via a statewide referendum that saved their public school system.

That meant waiting a little longer for another Republican state to take the plunge, to take their informed electorate and dumb them down, at the cost of destroying their state economy. That wait may be over. According to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

Georgia would be the first state to offer vouchers to all public schools students under a Republican plan introduced in the state Senate on Monday. The bill from Sen. Eric Johnson (R-Savannah) would allot parents about $5,000 in taxpayer money to use toward private school tuition. Senate Bill 90 also would allow parents to switch their children from one public school to another.Georgia’s education ranking is “near the bottom,” Johnson said.

While the bill is not a “silver bullet,” he said, “Georgia is a conservative state that understands the free market.” Nine states, including Georgia, offer vouchers, but those programs focus on low-income students or children with disabilities.

Voters in Utah defeated a universal voucher referendum in 2007.

Johnson says Georgia has a chance of passing such a measure now because the state’s education record is abysmal and people are sick of it. “We’re at the bottom year, after year, after year,” he said.

Yes, please, bring the free market system of private unaccountable schools to Georgia. Allow them to advertise their claims of smarter kids, better courses and higher graduation rates. Sure we can trust them for being honest and factual in their glossy presentations. All you have to do is...BELIEVE. Does in matter really how they spend our money? Of course not, they're private, and they would never waste taxpayer dollars on anything wasteful or deceptive. And if they turn out not to be very good, hell, it's was only a few years out of your child's life when they didn't learn anything at all. Don't forget, you saved the state some money, and isn't that worth the risk?

Please Georgia, give every other state a leg up on attracting businesses due to an educated work force, while you save a little cash diverting children away from those expensive public schools.