John Kerry: “we are currently gridlocked over the most important issue in the country today. I don't think anybody in this Chamber…”

“we are currently gridlocked over the most important issue in the country today. I don't think anybody in this Chamber would question that what the U.S. Senate and the Congress chooses to do with respect to education is going to have more to do with determining the long-term transformation that can take place socially and politically in the long run in this country. We hear countless references within almost every political speech today to the impact of globalization, the impact of technology, the changes that have taken place in the marketplace and, indeed, the extraordinary numbers of challenges that people face in the workplace today. It is almost axiomatic to say that if you are going to earn a decent living in the United States, or anywhere in the world today, you have to be able to manage information; you have to be able to develop your thinking skills. We live in an information age. Most of the good service jobs and even good light manufacturing jobs, technology-oriented jobs, and certainly the kinds of jobs to which most people aspire at the upper levels of income are absolutely dependent on the maximization of that skill level. The truth is, however, that in the United States of America today about two-thirds of our high school graduates are handed a diploma although they can read only at a basic reading level.”