Agreed.  When it comes to education, we can do anything, but we can't do everything.

Coding is like a language, and we all know there are cognitive (let alone employment opportunity) advantages in picking up a new language.  Teaching our kids Mandarin would be good too.  And Spanish.  And Hindi.  And Portuguese.  etc. etc.   

That said, Antares makes a good point: make sure the basics (like the 3R's) are well understood first.  We're not there yet.  Canada's PISA ranking is declining alarmingly.  High school graduates struggle to make change, then dismiss the need for this ability because they use debit cards.