One Expensive Education

Two stories this week, that deserve to be looked at side-by-side:

You'd have had to have been sleeping to not know this before today, but the government had to conduct an expensive investigation to discover to their apparent surprise: "Army Corps overpaid on Katrina classrooms contract." (We are constantly tempted by the news media to start a blog called the "Duh Files," or the "No S--t Files.") Turns out the politically connected winner of that fat contract submitted an estimate, won the contract, then submitted a hugely inflated estimate, while a local Mississippi contractor had submitted a lower overall bid from the start.

So imagine our surprise (read: total lack of same), when PBS discovered that a school district in Mississippi where the well-compensated contractor was to build portable classroom buildings is actually holding classes in travel trailers, while students and teachers alike sleep in tents and cars.

No criminal investigation planned.

• 124 War & Disaster Profiteering