YOU WILL ENDORSE HILLARY CLINTON IN THE 2016 PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARIES.
Your union has spoken.
Now please donate to the Political Action Committee (PAC).
The National Education Association (NEA) represents 3 million educators. It is the largest labor union in the country. However only about 180 people made the decision to back Clinton.
Thursday the 74 member PAC Council voted to endorse Clinton with 82% in favor, 18% against and some of the largest delegations – California and New Jersey – abstaining.
Check my math here. So 61 PAC votes plus 118 Directors plus one President Lily Eskelsen Garcia equals 180 in favor.
That’s about .00006% of the membership.
And we call that an endorsement.
But wait. It can’t really be that simple. All of these people are voted in by members. Surely they polled their constituencies to gauge how individuals wanted them to vote.
Nope.
To be fair, some NEA directors may have polled state union leaders.
Ronnie Ray James, NEA Director from South Carolina, wrote in to this blog saying he took a straw poll of the South Carolina Education Association (SCEA) board about an early endorsement. He said the vote was close but came out in favor of making the endorsement.
However, that’s a far cry from asking actual card carrying members of the rank and file! Moreover, it is unclear how widespread these straw polls were, if they polled board members about outright support for Clinton and if the leaders of state boards have the pulse of their constituents.
According to NEA by-laws, the organization need go no further to obtain input from individual members for a primary endorsement. Even these straw polls are a formality.
The 8,000 strong Representative Assembly (RA) did not get a say. This larger body representing state and local affiliates will get to vote on an endorsement in the general election when the field is narrowed down to only two major candidates.
But anything like a poll of individual members is apparently not desired by leadership – now or later.
It’s one thing to vote. It’s another thing to do it in the presence of one of the candidates!
This whole process has been a mockery of what labor is supposed to stand for.
Unions are supposed to be about solidarity. The word, itself, means joining together. But this move by NEA leadership has been nothing like that. It has been a top down decision imposed on membership.
It is ludicrous that leaders claim they are representing card carrying rank and file when they haven’t asked us what we think. Nor do they even seem to have the slightest interest in doing so.
Full disclosure: I am not a Clinton supporter. I lean towards Sanders. However, I could accept this decision if it had been conducted democratically – if it really was a reflection of the thoughts of my union brothers and sisters.
Instead, we’ve been treated like sheep. We’ve been herded, fenced in, hushed and placated.
The way I see it, there are only two ways to go from here: we can give up or we can fight back.
It is tempting to become despondent and stop participating in the union. Why bother with people who don’t care what I think? In fact, maybe all those fat cats fighting to destroy us are right. If the NEA won’t include me in something this important, why should I continue defending it? Why keep paying dues?
The problem is not unions. The problem is our leadership. We must fight to take it back.
We must replace those who would silence the rank and file. We must vote in new leaders who actually represent us and have an interest in our input.
We need leaders who will fight for us, not those who are satisfied with a mere seat at the table and an opportunity to enrich themselves at our expense.
This is hard. It’s much easier to just wave a white flag, go home and watch the football game.
A union is not made of leaders. It is made of members.
We’ve put up with 7 years of Duncan’s buffoonery as U.S. Secretary of Education: A man with no practical knowledge of the field. A corporate functionary. A drone. A mouthpiece for all the worst ideas of the 1% to sabotage public schools and replace them with charters.
And who does Obama replace him with!? Former New York State Chancellor King!? A man who was almost run out of his state on a rail!? A man with – admittedly – more experience than Duncan but all of the worst kind.
Lest we forget, this is a decision made by Democrats – the supposed saviors of education.
Progressives have been howling against Obama’s test-and-punish education policies since early in his first term. And now when this liberal lion has an opportunity to show what he’s learned, to demonstrate that he’s taking our concerns seriously, his response is a middle finger salute.
It’s revealing politically.
The Presidential Primaries are only a handful of months away. If the Democrats really wanted to court educators, the party would have put pressure on Obama to make a pick teachers might actually be able to stomach. After all, whoever the President picks will only have a year in office – not long enough to make any major changes one way or another. But at least the Democrats could make a show of listening to an important voting block.
Instead the Democrats have demonstrated their true colors. They don’t care about schools, teachers, parents or students. They figure we have no where else to turn. We’re a gimme. They don’t have to concede anything. We’ll vote for whoever the Democratic nominee is.
I am only one man. I belong to a lot of education groups, but I am speaking only for myself here when I say this: MY VOTE IS NOT A SURE THING.
And that’s exactly why we’re in the predicament we are now. We can’t keep voting for the lesser of two evils, because at the end of the day, we’re still voting for evil.
I am so sick of politicians who smile to my face and stab me in the back. If I’m going to vote, it will be for someone I believe in, and if a Republican bent on destroying public education wins, at least he’ll have the decency to be honest about it.
NOTE:This article also was published in the LA Progressive.
Despite vocal opposition from thousands of members of the largest union in the country, the NEA Political Action Committee (PAC) Council voted to endorse Hillary Clinton.
The council of 74 educators from the organization’s political arm voted Thursday. The NEA Board of Directors is expected to make a final decision on Saturday.
Many details of the vote, itself, are shrouded in secrecy and bad math.
Numerous sources in the NEA say the PAC council voted 82% in favor and 18% against. However, these figures are suspect. Two of the largest state delegations – California and New Jersey – abstained. The percentages being touted by PAC Council representatives do not seem to take that into account. The actual total should be somewhat closer.
When the Board of Directors votes later this week, at least 58% will be needed to give Clinton the organization’s endorsement.
However, the main body of representatives – the Representative Assembly (RA) – will be excluded from voting. The larger RA’s say is unnecessary according to NEA by-laws to give an endorsement in the primary election. However, the RA will get to vote on an endorsement in the general election when the field is narrowed to only two major candidates.
Any additional outreach to card carrying educators and other dues paying members is apparently not needed or desired.
Ohio and Massachusetts delegations voted against it, but full tallies of the roll call vote could not immediately be determined.
Those in-favor of the endorsement claim Clinton is the most electable candidate who supports positive education policies. However, even Garcia is reported to have admitted that Bernie Sanders has better education positions.
Clinton and Sanders are polling neck-and-neck in the first two Democratic primary states. A Clinton endorsement could give her a much needed edge over her political rival.
In education circles, it’s a buzzword meaning opposite things to opposite people. And determined in opposite ways.
Ask a representative of the standardized testing industry, and more than likely he’ll tell you accountability means making sure public schools actually teach students – especially the poor and minorities. And the only way to determine this is through repeated, rigid, standardized assessments. Let’s call that TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY.
On the other hand, determining LAWMAKER ACCOUNTABILITY is easy. Just compare school budgets. Greater than and less than. You’ll find that none of our lawmakers provide equitable funding. Rich kids in wealthy districts get Cadillac funding while poor and minority kids in impoverished districts get bicycle funding. Strangely, this is never discussed.
Moreover, none of this relies on opinion. All it takes is empirical evidence to see the truth. Lawmakers are not accountable at all. Teachers are accountable for too much and judged by unscientific and untrustworthy methods.
Unfortunately, few politicians have fully figured this out yet. Even you, Bernie.
However, under President George W. Bush and throughout the Obama years, it’s become about punishing teachers and schools for low standardized test scores – TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY.
And the champions of TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY this summer have been primarily Democrats including liberal lions like Elizabeth Warren and Sanders.
That’s why a group of respected education professionals and union leaders (including myself) wrote an open letter to Sanders asking him to please explain, himself.
We aren’t exactly a hostile crowd. We like a bunch of things that Sanders represents in his presidential campaign. We want to support him, but we need to know why he voted to keep the worst aspects of the current law.
And Bernie answered! Or his staff did.
I’ll reproduce the entire letter we received from staffer Phil Fiermonte below this blog. But first I want to focus on Bernie’s specific reasons for voting in favor of the Murphy Amendment:
As you mentioned, Senator Murphy introduced an amendment on the Senate floor that would have required states to hold schools accountable for the academic performance of low-income, minority and disabled students. Senator Sanders voted for this amendment because he believes states must do more to protect every student’s right to a quality education, and that from a civil right’s perspective, the federal government has an important role to play in protecting low-income, minority and disabled children. As you pointed out, the mechanism this amendment would have used to identify struggling schools resembles the failed policies of No Child Left Behind. This was a significant concern to the Senator, and one that he shared with the sponsors of the amendment.
Senator Sanders cast his vote on this amendment to express his disapproval with aspects of the bill that were insisted upon by Chairman Alexander and Senate Republicans and that do not reflect the best interests of vulnerable populations, or a progressive view on the distribution of education resources. He has made clear to Chairman Alexander, Ranking Member Murray, and Senate Leadership that his vote was not an endorsement of the accountability mechanism included in the amendment, but rather as a statement of his intent that other measures must be put in place to protect low-income, minority and disabled students.
So Sanders voted for the Murphy Amendment for these reasons:
He was mad that there is nothing about LAWMAKER ACCOUNTABILITY in the ESEA.
He believes in TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY – at least in part. He thinks the federal government needs to make sure teachers and schools are actually educating kids, BUT he doesn’t believe standardized tests are the best way of determining this.
However, I don’t see how voting for an amendment you don’t believe in is going to make a point about something entirely unrelated. How would voting for the Murphy Amendment get us LAWMAKER ACCOUNTABILITY? The Amendment had nothing to do with that. There are places for it in the ESEA but this amendment was focused almost entirely on TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY.
Was Sanders trying to convince Republicans to add LAWMAKER ACCOUNTABILITY elsewhere in the bill by voting against them on TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY here? That seems a stretch. Both parties appear to love TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY, but during this ESEA process the Republicans have been more concerned with stripping the federal government of its power over education. It’s not that they don’t like TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY, they just want to leave it up to the states.
Then we come to Sander’s position on TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY. He’s certainly right that schools need to teach students. However, as a public school teacher, I find it ludicrous to think that there are any schools out there that don’t.
Are there really schools in our country that don’t even TRY to educate their students? Really!? Are there hospitals that don’t try to heal their patients? Are there defense attorneys who don’t try to defend their clients? Are their airlines that don’t even try to get passengers to their destinations?
It’s absurd. Certainly if there were such places, we should do something about them, but the fact that our education policies are obsessed with something that almost never happens is asinine. It’s like going to Ireland and spending the majority of your vacation budget looking for a leprechaun! (At least, this doesn’t happen in non-cyber, non-charter, not-for-profit traditional public schools. But I digress…)
Then we get to Bernie’s suggestion that he’s against using standardized tests to measure if schools are functioning properly. At least here he is justified. But how will voting for the exact thing you’re against get you what you want? It boggles the mind. I want Pizza, that’s why I’m voting for chicken. Huh!?
However, Sanders is responsible for an innovation in the ESEA along just these lines. He proposed a 7-state pilot program that would allow TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY to be determined on more holistic methods than test scores. Schools could use multiple measures such as student portfolios, classroom projects, or other means to be determined by the states.
This could be a step forward. But even under the best of circumstances, it is limited to a maximum of 7 states. It’s not a long term solution. The majority of the country could still be stuck with test and punish.
So we’re left with some good news and bad news.
GOOD NEWS: Bernie actually took teachers open letter seriously enough to have a staffer answer it. That’s something. I’m sure there are plenty of presidential candidates who wouldn’t even do that much.
GOOD NEWS: Bernie has some thoughtful ideas on education. His pilot program holds – limited – promise. He understands that the measures usually prescribed to determine TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY are bogus.
GOOD NEWS: Bernie acknowledges that LAWMAKER ACCOUNTABILITY is important and says he’d like to address it.
BAD NEWS: He doesn’t mind focusing on TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY when there is very little need for it. Moreover, TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY without LAWMAKER ACCOUNTABILITY is actually harmful. Imagine if NASCAR fired a driver because the Pit Crew didn’t gas up the car. If schools have inadequate money and resources, putting a gun to all the teachers heads isn’t going to help.
BAD NEWS: Some of his answers don’t make sense.
BAD NEWS: He isn’t addressing us personally. Will it take teachers storming his campaign speeches and swiping the microphone before he does more than limited reforms and pays us lip service? It’s one thing to say #BlackLivesMatter. It’s another to make sure our black and brown kids get an equitable education.
The following letter was sent to Arthur Goldstein, one of the teachers who signed the original open letter to Bernie Sanders:
Sen. Sanders views on the Every Child Achieves Act, standardized testing, and school accountability Rand Wilson Add to contacts 4:59 PM Keep this message at the top of your inbox To: Arthur Goldstein Cc: Philip Fiermonte, Cwa Cohen laborforbernie2016@gmail.com
Dear Brother Goldstein:
Senator Sanders has asked me to respond to your email, and share his views on the Every Child Achieves Act, standardized testing, and school accountability.
As you know, Senator Sanders has long opposed the blame-and-shame approach to school accountability embodied in No Child Left Behind. He voted against No Child Left Behind in 2001 because he believed then, as he does now, that the legislation’s narrow focus on standardized test scores ignores a broad range of factors that determine how well a school is meeting the needs of its students. Since the passage of this legislation, we have seen the devastating impact that high stakes standardized testing has had on schools all over the country. In the Senator’s home state of Vermont, nearly every school is identified as “failing,” and is threatened with increasingly proscriptive federally-determined interventions.
No Child Left Behind’s narrow focus on standardized test scores has tragically led to a significant culture shift in our nation’s schools. An obsession with testing and test preparation has taken over in countless school districts in America, and educators are being forced to dedicate hours of class time getting students ready for exams rather than teaching them new material, or strengthening essential skills and qualities like critical thinking, teamwork, and problem solving. And the worst thing is that students from low-income, urban school districts spend more time in test preparation than students from the suburbs. These hours and hours of test preparation have no educational value, and the fact that poor and minority students are disproportionately subjected to test prep at the expense of lesson time is a huge problem that must be addressed.
Last month, the senate passed the Every Child Achieves Act, which would fundamentally reform No Child Left Behind, and end its system of high stakes testing and draconian interventions. Senator Sanders supports this legislation, and believes it represents a very important step forward.
As a member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, the Senator had an opportunity to shape this legislation at every stage of its development. For example, he was one of the leading advocates on committee for the inclusion of a “multiple measure” accountability system that allowed states to include factors other than test scores when determining a school’s effectiveness.
In addition, he worked to provide states with significant flexibility when it comes to assessment. This legislation includes a provision written by Senator Sanders that would create a groundbreaking alternative assessment pilot program which would allow states to implement alternatives to standardized testing. If the legislation passes, these new assessments would eventually reduce the number of statewide tests children are forced to take, while providing educators with timely information on student performance.
However, this legislation is far from perfect, and there are several aspects of the Every Child Achieves Act that have caused the Senator great concern. For example, there is no requirement that states focus resources or attention on schools that are meeting the needs of middle class children, but not meeting the needs of minority, low-income and disabled children. In addition, the Senator is concerned that the bill does nothing to address resource equity, and was deeply disappointed when an amendment offered by Senators Kirk, Baldwin, Reed and Brown to address resource equity failed on the Senate floor.
As you mentioned, Senator Murphy introduced an amendment on the Senate floor that would have required states to hold schools accountable for the academic performance of low-income, minority and disabled students. Senator Sanders voted for this amendment because he believes states must do more to protect every student’s right to a quality education, and that from a civil right’s perspective, the federal government has an important role to play in protecting low-income, minority and disabled children. As you pointed out, the mechanism this amendment would have used to identify struggling schools resembles the failed policies of No Child Left Behind. This was a significant concern to the Senator, and one that he shared with the sponsors of the amendment.
Senator Sanders cast his vote on this amendment to express his disapproval with aspects of the bill that were insisted upon by Chairman Alexander and Senate Republicans and that do not reflect the best interests of vulnerable populations, or a progressive view on the distribution of education resources. He has made clear to Chairman Alexander, Ranking Member Murray, and Senate Leadership that his vote was not an endorsement of the accountability mechanism included in the amendment, but rather as a statement of his intent that other measures must be put in place to protect low-income, minority and disabled students.
As congressional leaders move toward the next step in consideration of this bill – negotiating differences with the House – Senator Sanders has urged the future leaders of the conference committee to include protections for low-income, minority and disabled students, and to do so in a way that addresses the needs of the whole child. We must ensure low-income, minority and disabled children have the same access to educational resources that their wealthy suburban peers have. In addition, we must ensure that struggling students have access to adequate supports including health, mental health and nutrition services and after school programs that help level the playing field.
For many years, educators across the country have been the loudest, strongest voices against the corporatization of our nation’s education system and for the increased funding and wraparound services that will make a difference for our children. This is a fight that Senator Sanders has been waging at the national level for 25 years, and one that he will continue to pursue.
Sincerely.
Phil Fiermonte
Bernie 2016
NOTE:This article also was published in the LA Progressive.
“We need to change accountability for schools to be more holistic. My greatest frustration is that I can’t do it fast enough.”
–Pedro Rivera, Pennsylvania’s Education Secretary
Parents, you can.
It doesn’t matter where you live. It doesn’t matter what laws are on the books. It doesn’t matter if your state is controlled by Democrats, Republicans or some combination thereof.
No government – not federal, state or local – can trample your parental rights. If you don’t want your child to be evaluated based on standardized tests, your child doesn’t have to be. And if a majority of parents nationwide make this decision, the era of standardized testing comes to an end. Period.
It has already begun.
Across the nation last school year, parents decided to opt their children out of standardized testing in historic numbers. The government noticed and functionaries from New York to California and all places in between are scrambling to deal with it.
In the Empire State one in five students didn’t take federally mandated standardized tests. State education commissioner Mary Ellen Elia responded yesterday by threatening sanctions against schools this year with high opt out numbers. In short, if in the coming year too many kids don’t take the test in a given school, the state will withhold funding.
It’s a desperate move. If the public doesn’t like what its duly elected officials and their functionaries are doing, those same officials and functionaries are vowing to punish the public. But wait. Don’t those people work for the public? Isn’t it their job to do our will? It’s not our job to do theirs.
The message was received a bit better in U.S. Congress where the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) is being reauthorized. Two drafts of the law that governs K-12 public schools were approved – one in the House and one in the Senate. And both specifically allow parents to opt their children out of standardized testing. But can schools be punished for it?
The House version says no. The Senate version says it’s up to each state legislature.
These bills are being combined before being presented to President Obama for his signature. If he doesn’t veto the result, one might assume that at worst the issue will become each state’s prerogative.
But you’d be wrong. The state has as much business deciding this matter as does the fed – which is none. This is a parental rights issue. No one has the right to blackmail parents to fall in line with any government education policy. It’s the other way around.
In my own state of Pennsylvania, opt out numbers this year were not as dramatic as in New York, but they still sent a message to state government.
The number of students opted out of state tests tripled in 2015, according to data from the Pennsylvania Department of Education. PSSA math opt-outs rose to 3,270 students from 1,064 in 2014. PSSA English language arts opt-outs rose to 3,245 from 1,068. Those are the largest jumps in the nine years of available data.
And it’s not only parents who are concerned. Teachers continue to speak out against high stakes standardized tests.
Thousands of teachers have told State Education Secretary Pedro Rivera that school accountability needs to be less about test scores and more about reading levels, attendance, school climate, and other measures, he said. They have concerns about graduation requirements and the state’s current system of evaluating schools.
It’s not like these criticism are new. Education experts have been voicing them since at least 1906 when the New York State Department of Education advised the legislature as follows:
“It is a very great and more serious evil to sacrifice systematic instruction and a comprehensive view of the subject for the scrappy and unrelated knowledge gained by students who are persistently drilled in the mere answering of questions issued by the Education Department or other governing bodies.”
-Sharon L. Nichols and David Berliner, Collateral Damage: How High Stakes Testing Corrupts America’s Schools, 2007
Corporate education reformers complain that testing is necessary to hold schools accountable. However, the results are not trustworthy, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Education, itself! In 2011 and now again in 2015, officials are cautioning against using test scores to compare student achievement from year-to-year.
“The 2015 assessment should not and cannot be compared to the 2014 and 2013 assessment,” Rivera said. “It’s apples and oranges. Schools are still working on aligning curriculum to standards. They’re still catching up to teaching what we’re assessing.”
Each year students and teachers are told to hit a moving target, which was the reason also cited for caution four years ago.
While Rivera laments the issue and his inability to change anything soon within the government bureaucracy, parents are not thus encumbered.
All you have to do to save your child from being part of this outdated and destructive system is opt out.
But don’t stop there. Talk to other parents. Talk to classroom teachers. Organize informational get-togethers. Go to the PTA and school board meetings. Get others to join you.
And if the government threatens to withhold funding, lawyers are waiting in the wings to start the class action suits. Withholding taxpayer money expressly put aside to educate children because those same taxpayers disagree with government education policy!? Just try us!
Governments are tools but we hold the handles. If enough of us act this year, there will be no testing next year. Functionaries can threaten and foam at the mouth, but we are their collective boss. If they won’t do what we want them to do, we have the power to boot them out.
A multi-billion dollar industry has sprung up around high stakes standardized testing. Lobbying dollars flow from their profit margins into the pockets of our politicians. But we are more powerful.
Because you can’t serve your corporate masters if you are voted out of office.
It’s the question everyone seems to be trying to answer.
Marissa Johnson and Mara Willaford, two women of color fighting for the destruction of white privilege.
Sanders, a 73-year-old Jewish former Civil Rights activist-cum-Presidential candidate.
You’d think they’d have plenty in common. You’d think they’d be on the same side.
And even after this weekend’s confrontation, you might still be right.
But the questions remain: Why shout down Bernie’s speech on social security? And why did they do almost the same thing to him and fellow Democratic presidential candidate Martin O’Malley at Netroots Nation a few weeks ago? Why haven’t they targeted the Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton? Why not Republicans? What do they hope to accomplish? Is someone putting them up to this?
Frankly, I don’t know the answers to most of these questions. But I can make some educated guesses.
So here goes.
Is someone putting Black Lives Matter up to this?
No. I don’t think so. All you have to do is watch the video of this weekend’s action to see these two women weren’t playing at anything. They weren’t following anyone’s orders. They’re either really good actors or they believe in what they’re doing.
What do they hope to accomplish?
Here I don’t need to guess. Black Lives Matter’s Seattle chapter put out a press release explaining this very thing. In short:
“BLM Seattle… held Bernie Sanders publicly accountable for his lack of support for the Black Lives Matter movement and his blatantly silencing response to the #SayHerName #IfIDieInPoliceCustody action that took place at Netroots this year.”
The activists are protesting Sanders because they think he isn’t supportive enough of their cause.
However, the U.S. Senator from Vermont probably has spoken more on this topic than any other Presidential candidate of either major political party.
“Sandra Bland, Michael Brown, Rekia Boyd, Eric Garner, Walter Scott, Freddie Gray, Tamir Rice, Samuel DuBose. We know their names. Each of them died unarmed at the hands of police officers or in police custody. The chants are growing louder. People are angry and they have a right to be angry. We should not fool ourselves into thinking that this violence only affects those whose names have appeared on TV or in the newspaper.”
Why haven’t they targeted Hillary Clinton?
I don’t know. My guess is access. As a former First Lady, Hillary is protected by the secret service. Sanders isn’t. Moreover, both events where activists shouted down candidates had minimal security. They weren’t even individual candidates’ events. They were rallies with multiple speakers.
I don’t think they’re ignoring Hillary. It’s simply that they can’t get to her.
Some people, however, are inferring from this that her campaign may be behind these disruptions. Black Lives Matter is aligned with the Clintons and she’s using them to take out her biggest rival, they say. There are even a slew of articles accusing BLM of taking money from liberal billionaire George Soros, a long-time Clinton backer.
Here’s the problem with this theory: it’s completely unsubstantiated. There is not a shred of evidence linking BLM and Soros or Clinton.
I don’t doubt that Hillary would like to get BLM’s support. She’s clearly made overtures to them, changed her campaign rhetoric and otherwise tried to get them on her side. However, all the changes she’s made don’t amount to the degree BLM is already in line with Sanders. All Hillary really did was stop saying “All lives matter.” That’s not exactly a lot.
Moreover, BLM is not a political party. It is not nearly as organized as some people seem to believe. There are many chapters claiming to be part of BLM. There are many activists who consider themselves part of BLM. But there does not appear to be any major central organization sending out formal marching orders to these chapters.
I know it would be comforting to believe this is a political power grab by Clinton, but that just doesn’t appear to be the case.
Why not target Republicans?
This would make political sense, wouldn’t it? If you watched the GOP Presidential debate last week, you saw plenty of targets. There was lots of white privilege on display but very little talk about it. Dr. Ben Carson, the only African American candidate, even rhapsodized about how much society is over all that racial disparity nonsense these days. In an interview with Meet the Press, he called BLM “Silly.” You might expect activists to go after him or his colleagues.
Here’s why I think they haven’t done that so far. They know Republicans don’t care. Seriously. Why would they waste their time going after people who won’t listen, never have listened and never will? Unless you were doing it to make a bigger political point. Unless you were trying to contrast the Republican view with another one. But what other view is there to contrast it against?
Which brings me to…
Why target Bernie Sanders?
I think the answer is that Bernie almost gets it. He’s accessible, he’s mentioned these issues before and he seems willing to listen and evolve.
Think about it. When activists took the microphone this weekend, he could have called the police. He could have had them forcibly removed. But he didn’t. He gave them the podium and when it looked like they weren’t going to give it back, he left.
Do you think Chris Christie would have done that? Heck No!
So What’s Going on?
I think it comes down to this: the Obama Presidency is ending.
When he ran for office the first time, his campaign was transformative. It was a moment of incredible optimism. He wasn’t promising some tired old party agenda. He was promising Hope and Change. And his very candidacy and people’s reaction to it were proof that change really was coming.
For a few months there it seemed like White America actually cared about black people’s problems. We were all going to walk hand-in-hand into the promised land together.
There’s a great moment in Richard Wright’s Native Son where the main character looks at a plane flying in the sky and can’t imagine how a black person could ever be up there at that height. For many people, Obama’s highest function has been a symbol. The most powerful man in the world is black. He shows that, yes, black folks actually can attain those heights undreamed of by past generations.
But it’s coming to an end. The next President will almost certainly not be African American. And those who do have a chance don’t even seem to be talking about issues that are important to the black community.
It’s as if American society is getting ready to sweep black folks back under the rug for another 200 years.
So yeah. I can understand why Black Lives Matter protestors are angry. People of color are still locked away in prison much more frequently and with much harsher sentences than white folks. That’s if they even make it to prison. Too many are being gunned down in the street and their killers are left to walk away free and clear. They’re even murdered in their own churches.
And we’re doing next to nothing to help.
Everywhere you look white privilege cages them in, and all these smiling, well meaning white faces don’t seem to care enough to do anything about it.
So here comes Bernie Sanders. Is he a man who seems to kinda get it? Does that make him more attractive or more infuriating?
Because though Bernie will talk about these issues, his main focus is not racial equality, it’s economic. He’s most concerned with balancing the scales monetarily.
Certainly this is important, but it’s not the same as destroying white privilege. You could reform the tax code and make sure everyone pays their fair share, but there would still be police officers barrel rolling on top of black teenage girls with the audacity to go to a mostly white swim party.
These are related issues, certainly, but not identical. In fact, if American society were a wall, the bricks might be income inequality, but the mortar would be racism. Why do poor white folks put up with the 1% trampling on them? Because the powers that be have given those poor whites someone they can trample – black folks. If you’re a white person working three jobs just to make ends meet, at least you can look at a black man and know you’ve probably got it better than him. You don’t have any money, but at least if the police pull you over, you’re probably going to survive the encounter.
That’s why I think Black Lives Matter activists are angry. That’s why they’re targeting Bernie.
It’s not that they hate him or want him to fail. He represents the one thing in which it is most painful to believe – hope.
I know people are angry on both sides. I know we can argue about tactics and timing, but we’re missing a real opportunity here.
Imagine if Bernie worked WITH Black Lives Matter. Imagine if he made dismantling white privilege a major plank of his campaign. Imagine if we were all united again.
And this time, imagine if we stayed that way well past election day.
I must deserve it. My colleagues – most of whom are women – and I must be asking for the NJ Governor to bop us on the nose.
Well come on, Governor. Hit me with your best shot!
One day historians may look back on Christie’s statement as a new low in electioneering. And this campaign season, that’s really saying something!
A candidate from one of the major political parties actually thinks threatening teachers with physical violence will gain him votes.
Why?
Look at it from his point of view. Christie is one of 17 Republicans running against each other for the party’s nomination. The first GOP debate is coming up and they’re only going to let the top 10 Republican candidates participate. And Christie’s popularity is low enough that he might get left out in the cold.
Heck! If it worked for them, might as well try the same thing, Christie style! Let’s punch teachers!
This is strange for two reasons: (1) the governor of a populous state is actually resorting to the schoolyard rhetoric of an 8-year-old to characterize his presidential policy, and (2) who he’s targeting.
Can you imagine a U.S. President – not a candidate but a duly elected Commander-in-Chief – speaking to the nation this way?
“Today the state of our union is strong because my administration has punched the teachers in the face. We’ve also thrown welfare moms off the top ropes, put illegal immigrants in a sleeper hold and kicked planned parenthood in the groin!”
But notice that Christie isn’t talking this way about Welfare, Immigration or Abortion. As usual, he’s saving his most bitter rancor for teachers.
Can you imagine him speaking like this about any other public employee? Would he challenge postal workers to a knife fight? Would he threaten to pistol whip firefighters? Would he dare promise to drop kick police officers?
A psychologist might easily look at Christie and say he’s overcompensating.
A 52-year-old who probably couldn’t beat up an egg with an egg beater continues to talk as if he’s a street tough. A grown man who is still apparently intimidated by people with any kind of learning or book smarts continues to attack education and educators.
It would be pathetic if the stakes weren’t so high.
Ultimately the success or failure of such tactics is up to the voters. Do they really want presidential candidates to talk this way?
Once upon a time, politicians ran for office based on what they were going to do for you once they won. Now they generate as much contrived reality TV drama as they can in the hopes this will get a nation of couch potatoes to go to the polls.
It’s as if campaign managers are taking their cues from the most thriving kind of democracy we have left – the televised kind. They’re emulating shows like American Idol or American’s Got Talent. Make a big noise, put on a freak show and try to start a fight. We used to justify this as truth. Remember one of the first shows in the genre, The Real World, used to begin every episode with the line, “What happens when people stop being polite and start being real?”
But it was never real. It was always pre-packed, pre-planned, pre-arranged crap that could only exist because we pretended that’s how people really act!
Now that’s how we run for president.
We used to have Kim Kardashian, Kate Gosselin and Snookie.
Now we have Donald Trump, Mike Huckabee and Chris Christie.
Cynics say these kinds of shenanigans will just serve to make far right ideologues like Jeb Bush look increasingly rational because they have more self control.
But I wonder if these are really optimists. Given the choice between the fake adult and the clown, the public may pick the clown.
Politics may really have sunk that low.
If only we had spent more time listening to our teachers instead of punching them.
First, it’s awfully early. The initial Democratic primaries aren’t scheduled for half a year yet – February of 2016 to be exact. And the general election isn’t until Nov. 8, 2016 – more than a year away.
Second, the manner in which this endorsement was reached is somewhat mysterious.
This much seems certain:
1) The AFT executive board invited all of the candidates to meet with them and submit to an interview. No Republican candidates responded.
2) Democrats including Bernie Sanders, Martin O’Malley and Clinton were interviewed in private.
3) The executive committee voted to endorse Clinton.
4) NOW the interviews are scheduled to be released to the public.
This is a perplexing timetable. Why would the AFT endorse BEFORE releasing the interviews? Ostensibly, the executive council used these interviews to help make its decision. Shouldn’t that same information have been available to rank and file members of the union before an endorsement was made?
Which brings up another question: were AFT members asked AT ALL about who to endorse before the executive council made the final decision?
The AFT has conducted a long, deliberative process to assess which candidate would best champion the issues of importance to our members, their families and communities. Members have been engaged online, through the “You Decide” website, through several telephone town halls, and through multiple surveys—reaching more than 1 million members.
Additionally, over the past few weeks, the AFT has conducted a scientific poll of our membership on the candidates and key issues. The top issues members raised were jobs and the economy and public education. Seventy-nine percent of our members who vote in Democratic primaries said we should endorse a candidate. And by more than a 3-to-1 margin, these members said the AFT should endorse Clinton.
So the AFT claims union members said to endorse Clinton on-line, on telephone town halls, surveys and a scientific poll of membership.
Teachers are fed up with Obama’s education policies. Why would they overwhelmingly endorse someone for President who seems bound and determined to continue them?
So I hope I’ll be excused if I ask for a bit more proof than a press release.
Where exactly are the polls, surveys, etc. that show the Clinton support AFT leadership claims?
For instance, which polls produced which results? The press release says AFT members prefer Clinton 3-1. But even if Clinton came out on top consistently, surely the results weren’t identical on every poll. Maybe she got 75% on one and 65% on another.
The AFT hasn’t released everything, but the organization’s website gives us a memo about ONE of these phone surveys. This national survey of membership planning to vote in Democratic primaries found 67% picked Clinton. However, only 1,150 members participated! That’s a far cry from the more than 1 million cited in the press release.
Moreover, there is no mention of what questions were asked. For instance, there is a world of difference between “Who would make the best President?” and “Who is most electable?” Is it possible there was selection bias present in the questions used to make this determination?
But that’s only one survey. Where is the rest of the data? Where is the raw information from this survey? Where is the data from all these other outreach attempts and on-line activities? How many took phone surveys? How many took on-line surveys? And what were the results in each case?
If union members really did endorse Clinton, that’s fine. But many of us would like to see the proof.
I’m not a member of the AFT, but I’m on the mailing list. I never received any survey.
A lot of my friends are AFT members, but none of them recall any survey.
As a member of numerous education and teaching groups, I know of no one else who admits to being polled either. In fact, I haven’t been able to find ANYONE who was polled on this issue!
I admit that’s not exactly scientific. But that’s why I want to see the data! Blind me with science, AFT!
I believe in teachers. I believe in Unions. I believe in Democracy.
Please release the raw data, AFT, so I can believe in this endorsement, too.
Ellie borrowed my car last week without my permission. She went off-roading and flattened all my tires.
So I’m understandably mad at Ellie, but we’ve been friends for a long time. In fact, we have plans to go on a road trip next weekend.
So I tell Ellie I’m not going to go with her unless she pays for new tires.
Sounds fair, right? And she agrees.
Well the day of the trip arrives, and Ellie shows up with my car. We tow it to the garage and the auto technician puts on brand new Michelins.
I turn to Ellie and say, “May I please have money for the tires now?”
She says, “Yeah. I already paid for them. I filled up the car with gas before we got here.”
“Wait a minute!” I reply. “You promised to pay for new tires!”
“I did,” she reassures me. “I used the tire money to fill up the tank.”
“But the technician still needs money for the tires?”
“Yep.”
“Do you have any extra money to pay him with?”
“No. And you should be thanking me. I filled up the entire tank. It was on empty. I gave you more tire money than I’ve ever given you before. I’m not giving you another penny.”
Do you have a friend like Ellie?
Well everyone in Pennsylvania does. As the license plate used to say, “You’ve got a friend in Pennsylvania,” and her name is Ellie. Ellie Phont.
She’s your Republican party, everyone!
And she’s been pulling shit like this for years.
She slashes money for public schools but pays for pensions. And she’s suddenly thinks she increased school funding!
doesn’t tax natural gas drillers (something every other state abundant in gas does.)
offers no property tax relief.
Poor Ellie. She looks so sad. How could she have known mean old Gov. Wolf would ruin her fun (Except that he told her he would do this if she tried anymore of her nonsense)?
So she turns to all her friends – all her friends in Pennsylvania.
With tear streaked eyes she cries about how much money she wanted to add to schools. She cries about how much her typical Ellie schemes would help the Commonwealth.
Now that the budget’s been vetoed, Ellie will have to come back to work on her vacation. She’ll have to sit down with Wolf and come to some sort of compromise.
And the taxpayers? We’re in the same position as the hypothetical narrator above with the busted tires.
Are we going to let Ellie get away with just filling up the tank? Or are we going to force her to do what’s right and pay for those darn tires she destroyed!?
It’s up to you, Pennsylvania.
But I, for one, am tired of her bullshit.
If you’re state representative or senator is an Ellie, please get on the phone, send an email, and/or make an appointment to tell her to stop playing games with our children’s future.
Instead of doing the responsible thing and paying off the state debt, Republican legislators are trying to rip up the bill and pay whatever they want.
If you or I did that, they’d put us in jail. But I guess the rules are different in Harrisburg.
As a public school employee, I work for the commonwealth. So do the state’s troopers, judges, university staff, etc. When I took this job, I signed a contract. I agreed to certain things (i.e. teaching, keeping up my certification, etc.) if the state agreed to certain things (i.e. pay, benefits, etc.).
But now GOP lawmakers – I don’t mean to be partisan but it is ONLY Republicans – want to renege on that deal.
Let’s say I came into school one day and said, “You know what? I just don’t feel like teaching today. But you still have to pay me.” No reasonable person would expect the state to cut me a check.
I need to live up to my end of the bargain. Otherwise, the state doesn’t have to give me one dollar.
And I have no problem with that. I love teaching. There’s nothing else I’d rather do.
But the state has to live up to its end, too. That goes beyond common sense. It’s one of the key principals of any civilized society. Each party to a contract has to abide by the agreement.
That’s really the issue – breach of contract. Legislators want to reduce benefits for both new employees – which is shortsighted but legal – and current employees – which has NEVER been permissible.
This isn’t just my interpretation. When lawmakers in Oregon and Illinois tried to rip up their state employee pensions, their state Supreme Courts ruled it unconstitutional.
State constitutions in both Oregon and Illinois specifically prohibit violation of contracts. Pennsylvania’s state constitution has an almost identical provision.
1+1=2.
That is not serious lawmaking. It’s theater.
This legislation has already passed the state Senate with all Democrats and one Republican voting against it. If it somehow were to pass the state House (which is by no means a sure thing) and if Gov. Wolf signed it into law (which he has said he would NOT do), it would go straight to court.
There would be no cost savings. In fact, the state would have to spend additional taxpayer money to defend legislators’ disdain for their own laws and 370,000 state workers.
So why do it?
Politics.
Gov. Wolf has proposed a budget that would right the wrongs of the previous Republican administration. Among other things, Wolf would restore $1 billion in annual cuts to public schools.
With this, we could reduce class size by rehiring the 25,000 teachers we unnecessarily sacked four years ago. We could ensure all children get arts, music, science labs, foreign languages, sports and extra-curricular activities. Even amenities like school nurses and guidance counselors could be restored.
The commonwealth spends only 36.1% of the cost to educate students. That’s far below the national average of 45.5%, and ranks 45th in the country. The remaining cost is absorbed by local property taxes. Not only does this put an enormous tax burden on residents, it ensures schools in richer communities are better funded than those in poorer ones.
In fact, Pennsylvania has the worst disparity in the nation between dollars spent on rich vs. poor children.
But our Republican lawmakers are refusing to do anything about that…
Unless!
Unless the Democrats allow them to pilfer state workers pensions.
Republicans are holding the budget hostage to this criminal pension scheme.
Realistically, they need no help in the House and Senate. They control both bodies and in theory could pass whatever they want. However, this is the first year we have a Democrat in the governor’s mansion, so they need to bargain with him.
Funny when Republicans controlled both the executive and legislative branches, they didn’t have the guts to do this alone. Once it failed, who would they have had to blame?
That’s the reason for this elaborate hoax of a bill. They know it’s illegal. They know it won’t make it through court. They know it won’t save the state a dime because it will never be enacted.
But they are putting on a show for the voters.
Look how hard we tried to save the state money, but the Democrats (i.e. Wolf) wouldn’t let us do it. Look how hard we tried to increase school spending, but the Democrats (i.e. Wolf) wouldn’t pass our pension bill so we just couldn’t do it.
Excuse me while I go vomit all over myself!
How did we get in such a situation?
Basically, the legislature stopped paying the bills for 17 years.
Both the state government and commonwealth employees are responsible for paying into the pension system. And state workers made all their payments. They put aside 7.5% of their salaries every year to pay for their retirement.
But the legislature didn’t make its payments. It pushed them off to the future, and now that the future’s here, lawmakers have the gall to act like they have no idea where this cost is coming from!?
You ran up the bill! Time to pay! But instead of doing that, you blame the hardworking men and women who do all the state’s actual J.O.B.’s. And you practice Al-Qaeda tactics against labor, teachers and students!
Is that too harsh?
Who else holds people hostage to their demands?
This is terrorism as governmental policy. Our course of action should be the same with guerrilla extremists at home as it is with those on foreign soil: We don’t bargain with fanatics.
Gov. Wolf has a plan to pay off the pension debt. It’s nothing fancy. It’s the same kind of advice you might get from your accountant – or your mom. Refinance, reduce costs elsewhere and pay your bills.
That’s certainly a more sound strategy than holding a knife to workers and kids.
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