Many on both "the left" and "the right" passionately oppose an outcome-based approach to education, although their reasons are different. A focus on results, on what children actually learn and how well they learn it, enables taxpayers to hold educators accountable for results. But this apparent good idea has led to considerable conflict. A major reason for this conflict is that states turned over the task of defining outcomes to the educational officials most threatened by the process. Educators have proceeded to promote rather vague outcomes, often reflecting politically correct positions, instead of knowledge, skills, and cognitive academic outcomes. Education bureaucrats have taken a sensible idea and distorted its meaning so that accountability is virtually impossible. This has occurred in several states, most notably in Minnesota. The analysis of the controversy in Minnesota leads to two suggestions for escaping the impasse: establishing high and uniform academic standards, with a system of accountability with real consequences for success and failure, and encouraging greater diversity in kinds of schools and types of instruction available through expanded choice programs. (SLD)