Dear Mr. Colbert, about that interview with Arne Duncan …
Stephen Colbert in 2010. (Scott Gries/PictureGroup)
Dear Mr. Colbert,
You have proved time and again that you are second to none as a satirical interviewer. I wrote back in 2011 about your brilliant skewering of the Wake County (Raleigh, N.C.) Board of Education’s decision to scrap a successful school diversity plan.
But next time you invite Education Secretary Arne Duncan on your show, like you did Tuesday night, could you please talk to your friend Jon Stewart beforehand for some interviewing tips?
Stewart welcomed Duncan on his show in 2012, and while his interview wouldn’t have won any awards for toughness, he at least tried, politely, to get the education secretary to explain policies that many teachers and parents believe are indefensible. And he did it without sacrificing laughs.
You threw fluffballs to Duncan. When you brought up President Obama’s Race to the Top — a contest for states and school districts to win federal dollars in exchange for implementing Duncan-approved reform — you got a deserved laugh by saying, “Why does everything have to be about race with this guy?” But I wished that you had then asked Duncan why the Obama administration is running a contest for funding (based on untested reform) instead of insisting on school funding equity.
You might, too, have asked him about a revolt around the country among teachers and parents against standardized-test based accountability systems, which in some states means teachers get evaluated in part on
