People with clear, strong views usually attract critics as well as admirers, and Bill Evers is no exception. Seven months after his nomination by the President to succeed Tom Luce as the Education Department's assistant secretary for planning, evaluation and policy development-a post of considerable significance, the more so as the NCLB reauthorization cycle intensifies--the Senate education committee owes him a proper hearing. There, critics and admirers alike, as well as the articulate and forthright Evers, can present their views and, if called for, respond to one another. Then the Senate can "advise and consent" on his nomination. Gadfly has known Bill for years; he's an inspired choice to fill a challenging role (one that many folks would eschew in the administration's waning days). But courage is among Bill's many virtues. If he could handle Baghdad (he helped develop new curricula for Iraqi schools), he can handle Washington. What's inexcusable isn't the existence of opponents. It's the Senate's procedural dithering and the critics who, via innuendo, whisper and back-stab and seek to "Bork" Evers without ever looking him--or Chairman Kennedy--in the eye.
"Educator Tapped for Planning Post Finds That Old Foes Have Surfaced," by Paul Lewis, Washington Post, September 11, 2007