The American public school system is analogous to a lobster in a pot of water, where the heat is turned up very slowly, a click at a time. The rising heat is so gradual that the lobster does not realize that it is being boiled alive until the last moments, when it is too late.

No Child Left Behind initially put public schools in the pot. And while the path to boiling was clearly laid out in the legislation, school leaders, teachers and boards either did not read the ominous legislation or acted like ants in an ant farm, dutifully carrying out the precepts of the cook without objection because the water was still cool. What should have been obvious to anyone is that the NCLB legislation started out by saying that whatever you are doing now is basically ok, but we want you to improve over time. What people did not seem to recognize is that, “improve over time,” really meant that we will require that you make scholars out of all children in all schools. In other words, we will demand the impossible.

And why would our Congress vote for such a sinister bill? That's easy. Because they have a well orchestrated plan in mind. Their plan is to eventually provide vouchers for all children in the United States and turn over the education of our children to the private sector. And since private schools will compete with each other, the types of accountability and oversight demanded of public schools will not be required because the planners will tell you that competition will take care of that.   Click.

Last year, Congress approved a widespread voucher plan for Washington , D.C. This was a warm-up to acclimate the public to the voucher concept. Who could object to that? Click. This year, Congress is proposing a relatively small, relatively unobtrusive $100 million voucher plan for about 28,000 children “trapped” in failing schools, whether the children themselves are doing poorly or not or whether some small subgroup of children performed poorly. All of the children in the school will be eligible. Who could object to the growing criterion for vouchers?  Click.

Each year, between now and 2014, about 5% more students in all of the 14 or more subgroups in each school must become excellent students. This will result in a growing number of schools labeled failing. Click. Then, Congress will demonstrate that a larger number of vouchers will be required because of the growing number of failing schools. Thus, the voucher money will also grow. And this will be a justification to reduce the funding for public schools, because private schools will be taking on a larger proportion of the load. Click. By now the pot is really heating up. By 2012, over 60% of all schools in the United States will probably reach failing levels and by 2014 that percentage will likely grow to 95%.

Will the last one out of the public schools please turn out the lights? Click.