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October 07, 2006
You wish
When I saw this, I laughed so hard I nearly sprayed whatever I was drinking all over my monitor: after going over the school choice movement's so-called "setbacks", Kevin at People for the American Way had this to say.
All this may have proven to be too much for one of the privatization movement’s biggest stars. An Arizona paper announced yesterday that Clint Bolick, president and general counsel for the pro-voucher Alliance for School Choice has taken a position with a Scottsdale law firm. In recent years, Bolick has committed himself to fighting against public education, he first rose to prominence a crusader against affirmative action as a disciple of Clarence Thomas. He was co-founder of the right-wing legal group called the Institute for Justice and a prominent player in the conservative libertarian community.
This news may not indicate Bolick’s outright surrender in the Voucher Wars, but could it be the beginning of a strategic retreat and reorganization at the highest levels of the right-wing coalition against public education?
First off, to give a bit more detail than the Arizona Republic and PFAW reported: starting next June, Clint will divide his time between the Rose Law Group in Scottsdale in an of-counsel capacity, and will also join the Goldwater Institute to launch that organization's Center for Constitutional Litigation. And in no surprise to anyone who knows Clint: he expects to litigate education cases in both capacities. Why is he leaving? Here's his quote:
After helping to lead the school choice movement to an unprecedented 18 new or expanded programs across the nation over the past two years, the momentum is so solidly in the direction of the school choice movement that I feel I can leave the legislative arena and return to the courtroom. There I hope to be an even bigger nightmare for the perversely-named People for the American Way and the other special interest groups that try to destroy educational opportunities for low-income schoolchildren.
If anything, this move should really worry groups like PFAW. As president of the Alliance, he's been so busy with leadership and organizational matters that he hasn't been able to do much in the courtroom. While we'll definitely miss him at the Alliance, this move will free him up to get back to filing lots of lawsuits. Which I daresay he's craving: I've spent the past week at the State Policy Network's K-12 Reform Summit. While there, I listened as Clint fervently extolled the virtues and joys of filing offensive litigation to help speed the school choice revolution. Just imagine--he will now have the time to do more of this sort of thing! And as Eduwonk has pointed out, Clint has racked up a rather lengthy list of court wins. Seems to me if you want to keep school choice from progressing, you would want him as far away from the courtroom as possible.
In short, PFAW: you only wish you've seen the last of Clint Bolick. Bwahahahahahaha!
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