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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsSome Good News -- Seriously -- About Politics
By David Leonhardt
Opinion Columnist
June 3, 2018
Its very hard to feel good about any part of American politics today, I realize. When it isnt a circus starring Roseanne Barr or Dinesh DSouza, its a nightmare, with President Trump separating immigrant families, obstructing justice and damaging American interests abroad. I never expected to live through so dark of a period in Washington.
Outside of Washington, however, the picture really is different. In many cities and states, people arent only trying to minimize Trumps damage. Theyre actively using politics to improve lives.
Last week brought two big pieces of news that were obscured by the Trumpian circus. And both are parts of larger trends ways that the political system is responding to public opinion and addressing the stagnation in American living standards over the past generation.
First, Chicago announced that it would make pre-kindergarten universal. By 2021, the citys 4-year-olds will be able to go to school full time. The pre-K classes will have a staff-to-student ratio of 10:1, as experts recommend.
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https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/03/opinion/cities-states-medicaid-pre-k-trump.html
TimeSnowDemos
(476 posts)I'm glad it's happening in one city, but it's been universal around the developed world for a loooong time.
One of many ways America has fallen behind globally.
Hortensis
(58,785 posts)the nation, as they should. They do not represent the will of the people, not even those deluded people who vote for them. They are on the wrong side of history, and if it weren't for funding by billionaire extremists they'd have destroyed themselves as a political power long ago.
VA's Democratic Governor Northam supported the Medicaid expansion and is obviously strongly committed to universal pre-K for VA's four-year-olds. I can't help remembering, because it shocked me at the time, that VA's Our Revolution actually announced on the eve of the general election, a reiteration, not new news, that they would not endorse him against his Republican opponent. I hope some are sorry and have left that group. But: he won because the people of VA rejected extremism from both sides.