Here is a good overview of the political situation in Los Angeles by Howard Blume of the LA Times. Two billionaires have assembled a campaign chest of $2.5 million to make sure that Superintendent John Deasey has a board that supports his agenda.
Los Angeles has more charter schools than any city in America, and more are on the way.
Mayor Bloomberg’s contribution of $1 million to the pro-Deasey forces is called “a game-changer.”
Steve Zimmer, the prime target of the corporatists, says that he hopes to have a chance to sit down and talk with Mayor Bloomberg.
He thinks the mayor might change his mind.
New Yorkers would advise him not to hold his breath while waiting for that meeting.
Lest we forget, there is a larger question that deserves attention: Is it appropriate for someone who has been fortunate enough to amass $20 billion to use that money to overwhelm the democratic process?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It is completely inappropriate for billionaires to buy elections with their vast wealth. Democracy and great wealth are incompatible. We have an oligarchy now in America with some residual democratic options, like this blog by Diane. Govt and corp 1% have been moving decisively to the right since the famous Powell Memo of Aug. 71, concentrating great wealth to control media, schools, econ dev, foreign policy, and govt at all levels. The only answer to the vast wealth of Bloomberg, Gates, Broad, Walton, and their club, is a multitude from the bottom up consolidating and raising hell and refusing to cooperate or tolerate the theft of our nation, our rights, our earth, and our dreams.
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We have one trump card, Ira. We are many and they are few. Unfortunately they own the mass media and they own the airwaves. What we have is social media and we must alert our fellow citizens and fight off their efforts to buy and privatize whatever is not theirs.
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“Michael Bloomberg threw down the gauntlet today,” said Dan Schnur, director of the Unruh Institute of Politics at USC. “He’s obviously very serious about changing education in America, and Los Angeles is now ground zero for that effort.” He added: “This is a game changer.”
Dan Schnur is the brother of Jon Schnur, who advises Bloomberg on who and what to give money to. The articles should have mentioned the connection. See http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0709/24599.html
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I think we need to recognize that our commitment to “free-market” neo-classical economics over the past 30 years, the very policies and attitudes that enables people like Bloomberg to become billionaires, has destroyed our democracy. The problem, although few recognized it and still fewer spoke out about it, is that neo-classical economics teaches that economic activity is all that is required to run a society, i.e., all human activity is economic activity, and the market–the environment of economic activity–can never be bested by the government. So, Milton Friedman taught in his famous libertarian screed Capitalism and Freedom and before him Friedrich Hayek wrote in The Road to Serfdom. If all we need is unfettered economic activity, then there’s no room for government, hence no need for democracy.
You can also think about it this way: The fundamental drive of capitalism is the maximization of one’s wealth through the profitable employment of one’s capital. Thus, power has to flow to the more wealthy, because they achieve the ultimate aim of capitalism; in other words, to give power to those who are less wealthy would lead to less than optimal capital usage, since that would reduce the profit of the donor. But democracy requires equal sharing of power among those who are eligible to exercise power, regardless of their economic status. These two approaches cannot exist together for long. Sooner or later, the drive of the rich to accumulate more wealth will negate the requirement of democracy to share power equally. Either the votes of the not-rich will be negated by the actions of the wealthy, which is has been happening in Congress for decades now, or the political system will become an outright oligarchy.
Thus, we see that the rich have no qualms about using their wealth, their power, to influence or even thwart the democratic process. Wealth has no need for democracy; it exists to be exercised to the benefit of its holder. Bloomberg is just doing what comes naturally in our neo-classical economic utopia.
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Diane, as regards your question ” Is it appropriate for someone who has been fortunate enough to amass $20 billion to use that money to overwhelm the democratic process?”
Of course not, but if you expect our 3 term, autocratic Mayor to pay attention to majority opinion, then you shouldn’t hold you breath either.
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I stopped holding my breath during his first term.
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I don’t understand why this is such a frantic issue for these people. Until now Bloomberg probably never cared who was on school boards across the country. They want what they want and they want it done now. They are willing to skirt legal, moral and constitutional rights to get their agendas passed as fast as possible. We all know that none of this has to do with helping the children. To many children are getting hurt by what they are doing, and they don’t care.. Our country is based on checks and balances. You want oppposing views so you can make well informed decisions about issues, and that would be good for the children.
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If Mayor Bloomberg can influence the election of three pro-charter, pro-Supt, Deasy, pro-Villaraigosa, pro-standardized test evaluations of teachers, then where does that put the voices of LA’s parents? With Ben Austin and Parent Revolution? Buena suerte a todos.
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Ben Austin and Parent Revolution are on same side as Bloomberg, Broad, and Villaraigosa. LA parents must vote for their children, not the corporate interests.
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The LA Times asked me for a quote on Bloomberg’s $1 Million CSR donation. Here’s my response: “As a community candidate who has raised over $15,000 through myriad small contributions from local parents, community members, and classroom teachers, I find it dismaying that a single out-of-state billionaire has a greater voice in our school board election than all the working families of District 2. Where were these millions of dollars when the incumbent callously cut early childhood education, adult education, and K-12 arts last year?”
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Where can I contribute to your campaign, Robert Skeels?
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http://articles.latimes.com/2013/feb/12/local/la-me-0213-lausd-20130213
One of my former students, a fully credentialed teacher, teaches at a charter school in LA alongside TFA people. (LAUSD wasn’t hiring credentialed teachers.) She told me Tuesday that the LAUSD elementary school that shares the campus with her school has just pulled the parent trigger. Parents now will listen to presentations from various charters and charter management organizations to choose who will run their school. She says it’s a contentious, divisive, and difficult time for the community and the families and the teachers. Here is a link to a short piece about school board approving the parent trigger and the purchase of 31,000 tablet computers.
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Citizens of L.A. hold tight to your wallets. You are about to have your pockets picked by the charter privatizers…. Junky schools with high staff turnover, low wages for staff, and a charter overlord who has a job for life and a growing bank account. Your children won’t receive a better education but the CEO will put up a front and pretend that you’ve entered an education nirvana. It’s amazing how easy it has been to privatize minority schools. Oh it’s all about the kids.
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Bloomburg is one of the boys. He and Villaraigosa have done a good job ruining schools in their cities. Isn’t it fair for Bloomburg to help ruin L.A. when Gates and Broad have helped to ruin N.Y.? They must send out the magic of Laizzez Faire business to the world of education so that we can dehumanize them from the beginning. Then we will have the tools we want for our, not their, use. Not only that they rack in a percentage of the action and determine where the contracts go. Not bad for a days work would you say?
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