They actually don’t care if the kids are religious. They just need them to be uneducated, pliable, and poor. Then when the religious mood shifts, the owners can just move public opinion wherever they want it.

This isn’t about ideology: It’s about money. They want the tax dollars in the private schools because they own those schools. They don’t want the Catholic Church or the UMC getting their hands on that money. They want it going into standardized tests and “accredited” curricula–nice, private, for-profit industries the owners can use to fatten their portfolios.