What Not to Know About Common Core

Why would South Carolinians take the word of an Associated Press writer to educate themselves on Common Core?

Yet that's exactly what the P & C bruited in its above-the-fold headline, "What to know about Common Core," on Labor Day. The article's first sentence is majorly misleading, if not plain wrong: "Common Core education standards have already been adopted by 40 states and are opposed by conservatives across the country."

Perhaps reporter Seanna Adcox thought pretending only conservatives oppose Common Core would gain it more support among newspaper readers. That scheme would suggest she's just arrived here from Mars. That's the kind supposition. The unkind idea would be that Adcox has no idea of the vociferious opposition that has arisen in liberal circles around the United States.

When the lead sentence of an article purporting to contain knowledge is fatally flawed, stop reading.