Peanuts over Kids

Late last month, Sonny Perdue, the governor of Georgia, ordered the state's public schools to close for a couple days to save allegedly-scarce diesel fuel that would be better (?) used by the state's farmers to bring in their crops. Turns out ol' Sonny didn't think this one up. Acccording to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution,

Just hours before Gov. Sonny Perdue decided to close public schools to save fuel, industry lobbyists met with top administration aides to suggest sacrificing the school days to make sure farmers in South Georgia had enough diesel fuel to harvest their crops.

"The suggestion they made was to call for school snow days or holidays to free up diesel fuel supply in the region," according to a summary of the conference call reviewed by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

"They feel that the farmers should take priority over the schools in use of fuel."

According to the summary, which was e-mailed to the governor about noon on Sept. 23, the lobbyists said closing schools would save about 225,000 gallons of diesel a day. Perdue cited that figure at a 4 p.m. news conference to announce that schools would close to conserve fuel.

I'm not sure any of this really matters as an instance of regular capital trumping social capital, as more proof that our elected officials are beholden to corporate interestes more than voters (see this for the Minnesota equivalent: school-year start dates versus resort owners' need for cheap labor), or even as a tempest in a teacup, but it's kinda funny and suggests some good campaign slogans: "Sonny Perdue: He's for kids, but not as much as peanuts."