This article in the Star Tribune about opposition to the International Baccalaureate was interesting and frustrating. It was interesting because the opponents of the IB are right in a limited, general way; that the IB's externally graded examinations are a somewhat different approach to instruction and assessment than American education typically takes. But it was frustrating that the article sets up this even-handed conflict between opponents of IB and supporters.
When you read on, you find that the only people opposing it are some fruit loops in suburban Republican conventions, and that those notorious anti-American pinko terrorists Tim Pawlenty and major business leaders support it. This is the kind of faux-balance that gives American journalism a bad name. It would be fairer and more accurate to write that the opposition to IB is marginal.
Curious to find out more about the group opposing the IB, EdWatch, I checked out their website. You'd think if you were going to bemoan the faltering standards of American education as it falls prey to the centralizing grasp of the "Nanny State" you would want to give at least the appearance of competence with the English language. Apparently not ... Here on just one page I found the following spelling and grammatical errors in a minute's reading:
It's hard to take people like this seriously when they can't even write proper English.