This should be politically upside down, but isn't

My brother pointed me to this interview Arne Duncan. It's amazing on a number of levels:

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(watch the video)

Here's Arne Duncan, very much a Democrat, using traditional Republican talking points to describe why he, Obama and others in the administration are putting in place mechanism to work around No Child Left Behind. "Get out of the way of the states" could come directly from Bachmann, Perry or Palin.

If that isn't odd enough, consider that No Child Left Behind was instituted by George Bush.

The Republican puts in place a massive government program and the Democrats come by and try wrestle control back for the states.

Like I said, it seems upside. Only, it's not.

These days, the battle cry from the Right is that government is the problem. You'd think, naturally, that the Left is shouting just as loudly, no it's not, it's the solution!. But, as the above clip shows, that's not really what Democrats are touting (or anyone else, for that matter). Government does some stuff well, other stuff poorly. It's our job to figure out what does well, and have it do it (like, say, providing a police force and insuring that your tap water is potable), and remove it from where it doesn't belong. This seems so amazingly common sense, yet, were not even remotely having this discussion.