Education Secretary Arne Duncan spoke at a conference in Texas last week, and his speech gives us some interesting insight into American government education.

First of all, the newest entitlement is universal internet access.  He says, "The future of American education undoubtedly includes a laptop on every desk and universal Internet access in every home.”  This access will, no doubt, be provided for free to low-income students in the name of “evening the playing field.”

Then we learned that Duncan believes that our education system is “decentralized,” and this is bad for his goal of spreading technology in schools.  He says, “American education is decentralized,” consisting of 15,000 school districts and 95,000 public schools “independently deciding how to teach, and in many cases, what to teach.”  The horror!  Independent local school districts can decide what to teach, versus the imperial federal government.  It’s an outrage!

Finally, Arne Duncan revealed the “heart” of our imperial federal government’s role in education.  He says “[i]nsuring educational equity is at the heart of the federal role in education.”  There you go – equity.  Or in other words, fairness.  That is the goal of government’s role in education.