Outside the Beltway

Mississippi Governor Blames Education Problems On Women Going To Work

Doug Mataconis
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Phil Bryant, the Governor of Mississippi, blames the decline in educational quality on working mothers:

Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant (R) said Tuesday that the country’s problems with education began when mothers “got in the workplace” in large numbers.

During a Washington Post Live event on children’s literacy, Bryant was asked why the country’s state of education had become so “mediocre.”

“I think both parents started working,” Bryant said. “The mom got in the work place.”

The Republican immediately sought to clarify his remarks, according to the Post, noting that “both parents are so pressured” in modern households. Bryant also pointed to a lack of investment in schools as a reason why other countries have surpassed the United States in educational outcomes.

Yea, this is gonna help win the women’s vote, isn’t it?

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20 responses to “Mississippi Governor Blames Education Problems On Women Going To Work”

  1. Anderson Avatar
    Anderson

    Thankfully we have this moron as our governor, rather than letting him work in an occupation where he might cause serious injury or death.

  2. Dave Schuler Avatar
    Dave Schuler

    I wonder how you’d quantify “problems with education”? Unacceptably low on-time graduation rates in large cities precede women entering the workplace in large numbers by well over a decade. It might be that more women entering the full-time workforce contributed to the problems. I honestly don’t know.

    Unfortunately, I strongly suspect that most of the discussion will revolve around “how awful it is that he said it” rather than on “what are the factors that need improvement in our educational system”. The latter would be more interesting and productive. IMO lack of a full-time parent in the home is only a contributing factor to a much larger problem.

  3. OzarkHillbilly Avatar
    OzarkHillbilly

    Yea, this is gonna help win the women’s vote, isn’t it?

    As Phyllis Schlafly herself said, they need more white male votes cause the others don’t count as much.

    Bryant also pointed to a lack of investment in schools as a reason why other countries have surpassed the United States in educational outcomes.

    I wonder, who’s fiscal policies are responsible for that lack of investment in schools? Hmmmmmmmmm……

  4. Dave Schuler Avatar
    Dave Schuler

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I wonder, who’s fiscal policies are responsible for that lack of investment in schools?

    That’s a very good question. Here in Chicago only about 20% of the voters are Republicans and they don’t really have much say in fiscal policy. Both of the houses of the Illinois legislature have Democratic supermajorities and Illinois scrapes the bottom in proportion of educational funding coming from the state.

    Attributing bad priorities, bad policies, and just plain incompetence to partisan politics may be comforting but it really does not ring true when you’re sitting in Chicago. Here the problems are as much attributable to intraparty squabbling for influence, power, and money as they are to interparty issues.

  5. Matt Bernius Avatar
    Matt Bernius

    Unfortunately, I strongly suspect that most of the discussion will revolve around “how awful it is that he said it” rather than on “what are the factors that need improvement in our educational system”. The latter would be more interesting and productive. IMO lack of a full-time parent in the home is only a contributing factor to a much larger problem.

    This mirrors a lot of my feelings about the IRS EO investigation. The challenge, though, is that all parties involved have their “easy answers” to what is causing the problems. And it seems like no one wants to acknowledge that the data really doesn’t support those assumptions.

    All that said, I also think its fair to point out the more idiotic of these assumptions and suggest how they might reveal far more about the person who presented them than they do about the actual roots of the problem.

  6. Latino_in_Boston Avatar
    Latino_in_Boston

    Exhibit #54667 to show why they are losing the vote of women. Nothing to see here though. Move along.

  7. Rob Prather Avatar
    Rob Prather

    Republicans would be wise to just stop talking about women.

  8. bill Avatar
    bill

    @Dave Schuler: true, like it or not there is some merit to the statement. the yuppie era really brought out the dinks, they finally decided to have kids while in their 30’s-40’s and could not give up the lifestyle that 2 careers afforded them. on the other side of the fence you have those who really need 2 incomes just to get by, and their kids are basically raised by the school to the point that the parent(s) blame everything on the system. schools can’t teach everything, especially what’s right/wrong. there’s my $.02.

  9. stonetools Avatar
    stonetools

    The point here is that he is simply saying openly what most red state Republicans believe. He committed a gaffe-an honest statement of belief. He didn’t say anything that most Republicans think is wrong

  10. Sam Malone Avatar
    Sam Malone

    clearly Republicans don’t have policy problems…just messaging problems.
    what a collection of fools.
    and there is bill…rationalizing the idiocy of his “team”.

  11. anjin-san Avatar
    anjin-san

    @ bill

    there’s my $.02

    Seems a bit high. Perhaps you have adjusted for inflation.

  12. Caj Avatar
    Caj

    Are we to be surprised about that? Republicans have absolutely no respect for women. How any woman can belong to that party is beyond me! Have they no pride? Being put down and dictated to left, right and centre with their outdated policies! It blows my mind, it really does.

  13. DC Loser Avatar
    DC Loser

    The answer is more prayer in schools.

  14. Gromitt Gunn Avatar
    Gromitt Gunn

    Its a particularly boneheaded statement considering that school teacher has been a traditionally female occupation in the US for as long as there have been public schools.

  15. the Q Avatar
    the Q

    Why is this a boneheaded statement? LIberals are missing a huge oppportunity to really explore and exploit this common belief among wingnuts.

    The next questions should have been this from the liberal media,”Do you think the GOP, in the past, has supported things like the minimum wage, living wage, limiting offshoring of jobs, in order to help the average family wage earner make enough money to sustain a family without the wife (or husband) having to earn a second income just to make ends meet? Do you think, because of conservative policies which have decimated household income over the last 30 years that your party could contribute much more to the average family’s income by not skewing fiscal policy so heavily toward the wealthy elite? Do you think these two issues are totally separate from each other, or do you think that declining middle class incomes force the wife to work to the detriment of the kids?

    The comments here miss the point that the wingnut morons who have held hegemony the last 30 years with the “supply side, lower taxes, feed the rich greed” policies should be held to the fire for the misery they have created and how it manifests in just about all facets of our society.

    FDR and those true liberals of the 40s – 60s would have eviscerated this idiot purely on the economics of the Reagan revolution.

    But then, what do you expect from a now flaccid Dem party that allowed Hank Steinbrenner to inherit all his wealth without nary a penny in federal inheritance taxes.

  16. Barry Avatar
    Barry

    @anjin-san: He meant ‘two sh*ts’, not ‘two cents’.

  17. matt Avatar
    matt

    @Dave Schuler: Chicago is a great example of both sides do it corruption..

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