In an attempt to understand how we got here and where we're headed I picked up a book on the (modern) history of education. It briefly talks about how national standards for history were attempted in 1994 and the HUGE controversy that erupted.
Trying to learn more about why it didn't work I came across this site:
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/10/index-f.html
Nobody has really tried to come up with a national curriculum in any subject since then.
Maybe it will be easier with math. How to best teach math is sometimes controversial but math in itself is not.
Science and literacy could get gluey. There has already been a lot of noise over common core reading. Apparently they think fiction is a waste of time so they won't be including much of that on reading lists.
The explosions as they try to develop this curriculum could be very interesting to watch!