What happens when a state elects a superintendent of public instruction who opposes public education?
Most states would prefer to avoid finding out, but Arizona voters -- ever intrepid when it comes to self-destruction -- just can't stand the idea that our schools don't quite rank 50th out of the 50 states, so let's finish our sprint to the bottom!
All during the recent political campaigns, media muppets wondered why Diane Douglas refused to campaign and refused publicity when her opponent, David Garcia, was eminently qualified and being praised from every quarter -- including by some Republicans.
Well, now you know!
The moon-howling wingnut chupacabras out in Nuevo Cactus Grande already knew all they needed to know -- she's the Tea Baggin' Gov. Evan Mecham of public education and she's here to burn the house down.
(Mecham was Tea Party before the Tea Party was Tea Party, and quicker than the voters' recall process had time to work, he got his ass impeached by his own Republican cohorts in the Legislature as well as indicted for obstruction of justice -- oh, it was a fun time in Arizona politics!)
More mayhem after the orange cocoon.
There was a moment of humor last week when a group formed to recall Douglas the day after election results were announced, but what the hey -- her only elected office has been on the Peoria Board of Education, and Peoria residents tried to recall her then, too, for opposing school funding. They couldn't get enough signatures.
Now her critics are faced with a statewide recall, and it won't be easy to come up with 364,000 signatures when they'll basically have to come from two counties.
It's not like we haven't already had a nut job running our schools and needed to rush out and find somebody weird for a "change."
You do remember John Huppenthal, right? I mean, he's still in office for a few more weeks. Loser in his re-election primary ... misogynist extraordinaire ... nasty human flotsam and ... OH! Arizona superintendent of public instruction -- what a resume!
Well, boys and girls, brace yourselves. As blogger AZ BlueMeanie wrote at The Blog for Arizona, "If you think John Huppenthal is a piece of work, you're going to love this gal."
The only issue Douglas ever seems to have mentioned during her campaign is killing Common Core, which she then admitted on KTAR radio that she'll have no influence over.
She was a "presenter" at Koch brothers seminars in both 2012 and 2013 and her election is a wet dream for Americans for Prosperity, one of the many Koch front groups.
Contrast that with her former opponent, an educator of national stature.
Now let's see: If I were an Arizona voter and had to pick between an actual candidate and a scary clown, which one would I want running my kids' schools ... I dunno, it's damn close, but let's go with scary clown.
A recent check of dueling Facebook pages showed "Recall Diane Douglas" with more than 8,000 likes vs. "Standing Strong for Superintendent Scary Clown" with ... oopsie ... 500 likes.
The thing is, in Arizona, you have to assume that most of those 8,000 "recall" people thought they were voting for a recall when they clicked, and the issue will not enter their minds again.
Under Arizona law, the recall can't get formally under way until she's been in office six months. Regular folks won't even remember her name by then.
Now, it's true what the Arizona Republic said: "It's unclear how much damage Douglas could do."
There's another way of saying that: "Before we dropped the bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima, it was unclear how much damage they could do."
Even so, we knew it would be horrendous if the bombs performed as expected.
The few photos I've seen of Douglas project the charisma of a fence post, but you don't have to look very far to see the mushroom cloud on the horizon: Her campaign adviser was Sandra Dowling, the former Maricopa County schools superintendent.
For those of you not familiar with Dowling, let's just say she never met an elected official she couldn't goad into a hair-pullin' barroom bitch fight.
The main reason Dowling eventually collected $250,000 in her lawsuit against the county is that Sheriff Joe Arpaio did something dumb when Dowling's public escapades started generating more publicity than Arpaio's were getting at the time.
With Dowling working behind the scenes and Douglas trying to gut what's left of true public schools (we've already cut school funding more than any other state), about the only thing I can say for sure is this:
When Republican legislators look for the next expense to cut, they may as well start with the money we'd waste trying to recruit major corporations to locate plants in Dogpatch, U.S.A.
There are too many places seriously building for the future; why would a company hitch its future to a place where the voters are into ritual wrist-slashing just to see what happens?