Today’s Wall Street Journal once again defends the mayoral takeover of Los Angeles public schools. The editorial board’s argument is that we shouldn’t make “the perfect the enemy of the good.” Fine.

But the pointless is the enemy of both the good and the perfect.

What the WSJ is saying is that it is “good” to substitute one education monopolist for another. In what other field does the WSJ have a preferred monopolist? In what other field would they suggest that simply dividing authority over a monopoly between a mayor and another government agency will lead to meaningful improvement?

The only way of “fixing” monopolies is to break them up and return power to consumers by instituting a level, free, competitive playing field for producers.

C’mon, guys, Adam Smith had all this figured out in 1776 — even with specific respect to education. And the evidence proves him right.