Just yesterday, I was bewailing politicians’ (and others’) unwillingness to take on fundamental questions about what kind of education system has been—and is now—most compatible with American goals and values. It’s much easier to wax poetic about American public schooling as some time-immemorial backbone of the nation than face the educational truth.

Well, though he didn’t debunk all the mythology propping up public schooling, yesterday John McCain offered one of the boldest challenges to the bunk-based status quo I’ve heard from a politician in a while. In a speech to the NAACP, McCain declared that if elected president he would fight for “school choice for all who want it.”

Unfortunately, one of the implications of McCain’s promise is that the federal government would secure choice under his presidency. But outside of Washington D.C., providing anything in education—choice or otherwise—is beyond the feds’ constitutional purview, as Andrew Coulson explains here. This must be made abundantly clear to McCain and Senator Obama, who promises to throw everything into education including the science-lab sink. It’s also disturbing that in the question and answer period following his speech, McCain promised to “fully fund” the No Child Left Behind Act, a change from previous McCain-camp statements.

Despite these major federalism problems, McCain’s speech is a welcome step forward, at least in spirit. At last, though he might not know who should provide it, a major candidate for national office is declaring that school choice for all is the key to success.