A great NY Daily News editorial about the show trial:

A hearing into the merits of charter schools, convened yesterday by Harlem state Sen. Bill Perkins, lived up to expectations that the session would be a kangaroo court as wild as the Australian outback.

The testimony, if you can call it that, was so one-sided and irrationally nonsensical that the proceedings amounted to an attempt to create public policy by raging non sequiturs.

Perkins got things off to a bouncing start with a statement that referenced, in quick succession, Wall Street, "illegal or unethical business practices," Goldman Sachs, "massive fraud," "gaming public pension funds," Enron and segregation.

Boing.

Then Perkins refused to permit Long Island Sen. Craig Johnson, the one panel member who supports charter schools, to make opening remarks. And when Johnson did try to speak, he was heckled by an audience packed with Perkins backers in the teachers union.

Boing. Boing.

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