I agree with Bob Litan that we'll get change, for better or worse. To get rid of dead ideas, and move forward to a good place, I think America needs to have a discussion on the principles for change. For example, Matt argues that schools should not be considered a local activity, citing dramatic inequality of funding among states, and the idiocy of states setting their own standards under NCLB. I think this is only partially correct--I believe in national standards, for example. But successful schools are uniquely a function of their particular culture, which is in turn driven by the personality and commitment of the people involved in that school. (See Chapter 5 of Life Without Lawyers: "Bureaucracy Can't Teach."). So to me the principle here is that "Responsibility for different decisions in schools should be given to the person or institution best able to meet the goal." So the feds can oversee national testing, and perhaps even set pedalogical goals. But the act of teaching and accountability should be mainly local, with federal rules far away from daily decisions.

Other possible principles for change:

1. Streamline governmental decisions across a broad range of activities--Senate confirmation of officials, environmental review, procurement.
2. Replace litigation accountability with nonlegal checks and balances--for example, an environmental review board to consider challenges to impact statements.
3. Overhaul civil service and teacher contracts to restore personal accountability of teachers and officials, with checks and balances by a site-based committee, not mult-year litigation.
4. Appoint a spring cleaning commission to scrape away the excess legal concrete that's accumulated over the past four decades. .
5. Give judges the authority to draw the boundaries of reasonable claims. There's no deader idea than that people have a right to take any claim to trial. We wouldn't let a prosecutor seek the death penalty for a misdemeanor, so why do we let an angry lawyer sue his dry cleaners for $54 million?
6. Create new institutions to restore trust in areas siuch as healthcare--for example, expert administrative health courts.