Timothy Roemer: “two weeks ago, with strong Democratic support, the House of Representatives, in a bipartisan way, passed the education…”

“two weeks ago, with strong Democratic support, the House of Representatives, in a bipartisan way, passed the education flexibility bill. This bill is about old values and new ideas: old values of local control of our schools, new ideas of added flexibility for increased student performance. When we appointed conferees to this bill last night, our leadership did not appoint a single Democrat who supported the bill on the House Floor. We had a majority of Democrats support the bill in committee, a majority of Democrats support the bill on the House Floor, but yet no Democrats who supported the bill were appointed to conference and supported the bill on the House Floor. We can talk about Republican and Democratic civility and fairness, we can talk about better ratios and funding, but we need to practice that fairness with our appointments to conference. In Abraham Lincoln's words, with malice towards none, with charity toward all, these need to be reflected outside our party and within our party.”