At the El Paso County Democratic Party 2012 Hall of Fame banquet on Friday night, former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi delivered a razzle-dazzle keynote address filled with profound and unprecedented ideas. A sampling:

• This is “the most important election of our generation.”
• “The American people want jobs.”
• “They want us to work together.”

Actually, she did manage to say something highly original — but I’m still not sure what she meant by it. First, the quote, then the context.

“Nothing brings more money to the Treasury of the United States than the education of the American people,” Pelosi said.

How so? She doesn’t explain. Perhaps she means that a correlation exists between education and income and, thus, between education and the amount of taxes a person pays. In general, the higher the level of educational attainment, the higher the income. The higher the income, the higher the tax bracket.

But she made the statement as part of an argument for greater “investment” in education at every level, including early childhood education, which suggests she thinks “increased spending” and “improved educational outcomes” are also correlated. Unfortunately, they’re not. Plus, her mention of early childhood education puts me in mind of her promise to “do for childcare what we did for healthcare.” She might as well say it: Let the brainwashing begin as soon as possible!

Do I care about education? You betcha. Do I want more of my taxpayer dollars to go to top-down educational programs? Sorry, no. If and when Nancy Pelosi and other progressives want to engage in a parent-and-teacher-driven discussion of what kind of educational reform is needed, I’ll begin to listen to what she has to say on this subject. Until then, she’ll continue to sound like Charlie Brown’s teacher to me.