I would agree with you, but American government probably wouldn't want chemistry sets to wind up into more people's hands. Think of how many potential terrorists we would have!
Joking aside, I am an industrial chemist and I truly support more science education. But as we have all seen in the aftermath of Fukushima, politicos do not understand science. They think it is something that is democratically worked on, but science isn't democratic...nature is nature. Now vetting of scientific theories is somewhat scientific in terms of peer review and replication, but understanding that would require actual work and research on the part of our representatives. I wouldn't count on public school teachers to understand science enough to be able to teach it well to future generations. I think we, as nerds/scientists, should do more to educate young'uns to become our replacements.