DFER Tries To Swing A Primary
We live in interesting times. So many folks are sure they know what "most people" think or "most people" want, but it's hard for anybody to have a clue because the great American industry is the business of trying to sell a particular opinion. Even when the Russians mess with us, their disinformation campaigns focus not on lies about policy (free college will make your hair fall out) so much as on creating impressions of what certain people think (Miners for Trump, faking angry Blackinternet commenters).
So if you have a policy that you want to plug, you could try to argue the merits of that policy with a candidate or their staff. But if you want to do something other than just argue the merits, then you argue that the policy is hugely popular and a political winner. And a good tool for that is a poll.
Democrats for Education Reform (DFER) is definitely for reformster ideas, but not all that Democraty. They are one of those groups that is interconnected with many other reform outfits, and who operates on the theory that they should have a seat at the education table because they say they should. Education Reform Now is the advocacy side of the group. And since the advent of Trump, and really, since the groundswell of insistence that the Democratic Party stop backing the privatization of public education, they've been working hard to maintain their clout.
How About A PR Poll?
All of this brings us to DFER/ERN's newly released polling data. Right now all we get is this slick pamphlet of results, put together by Charles Barrone, Dana Laurens, and Nicholas Munyan-Penney. Between the three of them, we find connections to 50CAN, Fordham Institute, Teach for America, and assorted consulting and government jobs.
The poll focuses on Presidential voters and Democratic primary voters, because the target audience CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: DFER Tries To Swing A Primary