We're throwing money down a rat hole drain of public education!

Host: The rain had turned the city into a mirror of discontent. Each streetlight shimmered in puddles, each reflection fractured, each echo doubled. Inside an empty public school gymnasium, the dripping ceiling tapped a slow, steady rhythm — like the heartbeat of something once vibrant, now barely breathing.

On the stage, a banner hung crooked, half torn: “Invest in the Future — Support Public Schools.” Its letters, once bold red, had faded to rusted pink, the color of frustration left too long in the sun.

Jack stood beneath it, hands in his coat pockets, his face sharp in the fluorescent light, his eyes tired, angry, but not cruel. The kind of anger that grows not from hatred — but from heartbreak.

At the edge of the gym, Jeeny leaned against a stack of old desks, her arms crossed, her expression calm, but her eyes fierce, ready for another of Jack’s storms.

Jeeny: quietly, but steady “Rush Limbaugh once said, ‘We’re throwing money down a rat hole drain of public education! We lead the world in public education spending. We lead the world in getting the least for it.’”

Her voice hung in the air, sharp and clear, like a bell tolling in a place too long deafened. “You’ve quoted that before, Jack. But you always say it like a curse, not a warning.”

Jack: snaps, turning toward her “Maybe because it’s both. Look around, Jeeny. Peeling paint, broken windows, teachers drowning in paperwork instead of passion. And every year, we throw in more money — more bandages on a corpse — and then act surprised when it doesn’t come back to life.”

Jeeny: softly, measured “You think the problem is money?”

Jack: laughs bitterly “No, the problem is what we’ve built around it — the bureaucracy, the testing, the political theater. The whole damn system has become a machine that eats resources and spits out mediocrity. It’s not a school anymore. It’s an industry.”

Jeeny: steps closer, her voice firm now “And yet — every morning — kids still show up. Teachers still show up. Not because of the system, but in spite of it. You call it a rat hole. I call it a battlefield. The money doesn’t matter as much as the meaning behind it.”

Host: The rain intensified, drumming on the gym roof with the sound of a thousand restless thoughts. Jack’s reflection shimmered in the puddle near the stage, distorted, as if his very certainty were being washed away.

Jack: angrily “Meaning doesn’t fix failure, Jeeny. We lead the world in spending, and we lead the world in regret. What does that tell you?”

Jeeny: meets his gaze, unflinching “It tells me that money can’t buy what leadership fails to inspire. You can’t fund hope. You can’t legislate care. And you can’t measure learning by how much you spend — or save.”

Jack: paces, restless, his tone sharp “So what, you’re saying money doesn’t matter? Tell that to the teacher buying crayons with her paycheck, or the kid who has to share a textbook five ways. Don’t give me poetry, Jeeny — give me a plan.”

Jeeny: her voice rising now “The plan is the same as it’s always been, Jack: put the human being before the budget. Stop treating education like an investment portfolio and start treating it like a promise. The problem isn’t how much we spend — it’s what we’ve forgotten to value.”

Host: The lights flickered, humming softly, their glow fighting the storm’s shadow. Jack stopped pacing, his face half-lit, half-hidden, the tension in him breaking slowly, like thunder receding into exhaustion.

Jack: quietly now “You really think it’s that simple? That if we just believed in the system, it’d heal itself?”

Jeeny: shakes her head, softly “No. I think belief is the only place to start. Reform doesn’t begin with money — it begins with memory. With remembering why education mattered before it was measured. We’ve turned classrooms into data centers, teachers into technicians, and kids into metrics. That’s why we’re losing, Jack — not because of how much we spend, but because of what we’ve stopped believing education is for.”

Jack: leans against the stage, exhaling “And what’s that, Jeeny? What’s it for?”

Jeeny: steps closer, her voice soft but piercing “It’s to build citizens, not customers. To teach conscience, not compliance. To grow minds, not markets. You can’t fix that with a check — you fix it with courage.”

Host: The storm softened, the rain slowing, the sound of dripping water the only thing between them. The silence was thick — not of defeat, but of reckoning.

Jack: after a long pause “You think I’m angry because I hate the system. But that’s not it. I’m angry because I loved it once. I believed in the idea of public education — that it could lift anyone. And now I feel like I’m watching that idea die in a pile of paperwork.”

Jeeny: gently, her eyes kind “Then maybe it’s not dying — maybe it’s waiting. Waiting for people like you to stop being angry at the ashes and start building again.”

Jack: half-smile, rueful “You make it sound so easy.”

Jeeny: smiles faintly “It’s not easy. But it’s necessary. The children don’t need perfect schools — they need honest adults. And if we don’t fight for that, we’re the ones throwing more than money down the drain — we’re throwing away their future.”

Host: The rain stopped completely, leaving the sound of dripping like a metronome of persistence. Jack walked toward the broken banner and straightened it, his hands trembling slightly. For the first time, the words didn’t look ironic. They looked like a mandate.

Jack: quietly “Maybe Rush was right about one thing — we’re wasting too much. But not money. Potential.”

Jeeny: steps beside him, softly “Then stop wasting it, Jack. Spend it — your voice, your fire, your faith — on the kids who still believe the world can be better. They don’t need a genius to save them. They just need someone who hasn’t given up.”

Jack: looks at her, his voice calmer now “Someone who still believes the door can open.”

Jeeny: nods gently “Exactly. That’s how real revolutions in education begin — not with funding, but with faith in the young.”

Host: The sun broke through the clouds, its light flooding the gym, turning the puddles to glass, the walls to mirrors, the words on the banner glowing once more. The world looked cleaner, but not cured — only ready.

And as they stood in the light of that fragile morning, Rush Limbaugh’s provocation twisted into something deeper —

that a nation’s failure in education
is not a question of funds,
but of focus;

that the real drain is not in spending,
but in cynicism;

and that the only way to stop wasting what’s precious
is to remember who it’s for —
the young, the curious, the unbroken —
and to spend not money,
but faith, patience, and resolve
until they inherit something worth believing in.