A reader responds to Jeff Bryant’s
article by wondering why so many Democrats in office are
ignoring their base by aligning themselves with the free-market GOP
ideology:
“Yes, yes, yes. Lately Democratic operatives have been
moaning and groaning about lack of excitement among their voters.
Supposedly this is a law of nature. Democrats just don’t get
excited about midterms. Yet, “school reform” is demobilizing
important elements of that base vote. This is one of the most
vibrant web sites around these days, and unfortunately, we have to
fight not only the GOP but also our “own” party – from President
Obama to Arne Duncan to Rahm Emanuel to Pat Quinn (who couldn’t
wait to make Paul Vallas his Lt. Gov. Running mate, within days of
Vallas being run out of Bridgeport, CT on a rail). “Stop doing
things to harm your base voters. What a concept! Maybe then we’d
vote. Don’t you realize you’re going to need every vote you can
get?”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Run, Bernie, run!
Yes. Run as a Democrat and force Hillary to acknowledge the fact that her base isn’t the usual circle of Clinton Foundation hedge fund operators she travels around with and that our interests need to be addressed before she gets our votes. And if she gets the nomination I hope Bernie will carry on as a third-party candidate so there is someone this public school teacher and union member can proudly vote for in 2016.
We need a third party now! The American Patriot Party sounds good. No donation over $1000 would be accepted for any candidate for starters. You have to wonder why so many GOP billionaires are supporting their causes in regard to Ed. Reform, but we are not hearing about the Progressive Billionaires doing anything in response!
GST.. yes indeed. I think it is VERY IMPORTANT that any democratic candidate hooked into mainstream politics these days (aka Clinton) realize that many democrats traditionally have stuck with their party and have tended to vote for the nominee even if they were lukewarm on the candidate because they believed that in the end one party better represented their interests. Boy is this no longer even a kernal of reality! In the next election A GOOD MANY FED UP democratic party affiliated voters (aka teachers and other professional union based professionals) will not be voting at all by their party identification. People in America ARE FED UP and all the corporate PR spin in the world is not going to rectify this. I hope this is a message understood by any democrat running for office!
If it is Hillary against any Repub, for the first time in my long life I will not vote for Prez. I do not believe in protest votes for no nothings like Roseanne Barr, but would gladly support Bernie Sanders.
I’ve been asking the same question for a while. Maybe the answer is that there isn’t much difference between the Demmican and Rypublocrat leadership after all.
Guy Brandenburg Sent from my iPhone so full of hilarious errors… ;-€}}
>
gfbrandenburg.. there is no difference currently between dems and repubs. Oh wait.. yes there is maybe… their election campaigns are paid off by different billionaires (depends on which billionaire wants their “candidate to clearly represent their interests if elected to office. Why there are even Billionaires who represent both sides of the fence because they can request one interest be supported by one “party” and pay off the other party’s candidate on a totally different interest thereby not losing out at all… a win-win!
The general run of activist billionaires may call themselves by different party names, but they are all on the same side of might makes right, with all the them calling the shots over everyone else.
Simple answer: Because they know most in base will hold their noses and vote for them anyway.
How many complained about Obama’s ed policies but voted for him anyway in 2012?
Until people on the left make these corporate Dems pay a political price for their sell-outs, they’re going to continue to sell you out again and again, then come around in November and ask for your vote (and probably get it too.)
Say what you will about Tea Party people, they make politicians they consider RINO’s pay a political price in primaries and have much of the GOP establishment running scared (just ask Lindsey Graham.)
There is lots of opposition from left to Cuomo in NY State.
But how much of that opposition will STILL vote for Cuomo despite his selling progressive values out again and again during his first three years in office?
Correction: Because they THINK most in base will hold their noses and vote for them, anyway, as they have in the past.
However, sooner or later people get fed up. The “Green Party” is not an option, but Bernie is.
Let’s think this through again, from a fresh perspective.
Instead of blindly agreeing that the Democratic “base” is the Unions, and the Republican “base” is the Tea Party, lets look at the actual people in the populist wings of both parties. No, we absolutely are NOT going to hold our noses and vote for stooges, because we aren’t anybody’s base. Holy cow, do the math; we’re the people.
Now you can see why the “education reformers” in both parties are peeing their pants. Let Fox News explain it to you:
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/03/29/common-core-emerges-as-potent-election-issue-for-fed-up-parents/
Republican operatives who choose to cling to Jeb Bush and his supposedly invincible power pacs are going down to defeat, and if Hillary Clinton stands next to him on this, so will she.
I WAS a “core supporter” until 2012, in that we made deep sacrifices to max out our individual contribution limit to Kerry and Obama, and campaigned intensely and effectively for legislators, governors, and local office.
I didn’t leave the Democratic Party. It left me, and I will definitely vote for Bernie if it doesn’t come back. Several Massachusetts leaders have timidly signaled their possible willingness to stand up, and I’m supporting them.
I think it’s pretty obvious that the weight of MegaMoney in our electoral system is warping our One Person One Vote democracy into a One Buck One Vote plutocracy.
This is the root of the problem: Democrats and Republicans rely on $$$ from a small cadre of “investors” and will not do anything to upset them… that’s why we have no Wall Streeters doing perp walks, no aggressive consumer protection (which, at least landed Elizabeth Warren in the Senate), no action on climate issues, and rampant privatization and deregulation. The oligarchs thank the SCOTUS for giving them the opportunity to get their message out: maybe someday the citizens will unite against Citizens United…
Clearly Dem politicos assume their voters have no where else to go so why not appeal to some of the nondemocratic voters?
I don’t understand it myself. I have no idea who came up with the “plutocrats first!” campaign theme, but they should be fired.
I think they’re doing real lasting damage with young people. I have two in their twenties, both have been Democratic voters, both are employed and doing fine out on their own, and they are just disgusted and repelled by what they perceive as corruption and capture. Not the criminal statute definition of the word “corruption”, nothing “actionable” as we say in law, but their real sense that no one represents their interests.
My eldest son lives in Chicago and he was a Rahm supporter. Until Rahm “reinvented” the payment system for public transportation. My son travels around the city constantly for his work. He thought there was just no consideration given, at all, to the “regular” people who have to use the system every day. He thinks someone somewhere bought a politician and got a contract, and he and everyone else in that city paid the price in lost time and frustration and inconvenience. He’s a tech person, in that industry, and he thinks riders were shanghaied into testing and improving a payment product for the benefit of the contractor. He wasn’t even angry. It’s closer to contempt. I don’t know if he’s voting in the midterms. I doubt it.
It was obvious from Day One who and what Rahm was. No one should have been surprised by the Ventra f(oul) up. (Those three letters in parens should actually be three different letters, but I’m trying to remain civil in Diane’s living room.) For more on Rahm, Read MAYOR 1% by Kari Lyderson.
Both parties are bought and paid for by the billionaire/Wall Street/neoliberal class. Gangsters basically run the federal government now.
It’s been going on since the 1988 election with the establishment of the Democratic Leadership Council to help move Democrats to the “center” because it appealed to business/southern interests, but it wasn’t long before the crooked Rubenites took over the party and turned it into a complete sellout. Today’s party is completely unrecognizable from what it was even ten years ago.
Obama was the perfect puppet for these interests. People would be hard pressed to criticize him for fear of being labeled racist while he would push through policies that completely screwed over the American people and would do not one thing about the crisis in jobs.
Here we are in Chicago, where a governor (Pat Quinn) decided to commit political suicide by choosing Paul Vallas to be his “running mate” (i.e., in Illinois candidate for Lieutenant Governor). They are taking the “base” for granted and have been for decades. Think about how Bill Clinton did his “New Democrat” thing, screwing the poorest children with “welfare reform” and “housing reform” as the prelude to “school reform for everybody” (Clinton was already praising Chicago’s localized corporate “school reform” in two of the last three of his State of the Union messages…). As long as the Democrats can get away with playing lesser evilism, we are going to be played. Most recently in Illinois, because Bruce Rauner (and odious billionaire) was in the race for the nomination for governor on the Republican ticket, a number of otherwise sensible people voted for the ALEC coordinator for Illinois (a guy named Dillard) based because the Billionaire was “worse” than the other guy. As long as people can be played in this “lesser of two evils” game, this is what we get. The “Quinn- Vallas” ticket for the Democrats here in Illinois might make Rauner governor.
What do we do, George? We are damned with either ticket. I wish they had a place on ballots for indicating the amount of enthusiasm behind a vote. At least we wouldn’t have to listen to someone crowing about the people’s mandate.
Perhaps a hopeful sign. In Pennsylvania all the Democratic contenders for Governor have denounced cyber charters, are calling for taxation of the Fracking in our state to help fund the schools, and are proposing fair funding for the urban school districts. Thank you Governor Corbett for awakening the masses and the politicians who want your job.
When one takes training to be a mediator in Ohio, we’re taught that ANGER between two parties or persons can be mitigated by discussion and compromise and they can reach an agreement. However, if the dispute reaches the point where there is CONTEMPT, a feeling that the party in the stronger position deems the weaker party worthless and there’s no benefit to the weaker party likely to come from dealing with the other party at all, then it’s a waste of time mediating and they should go right to trial.
I think that’s what politicians should be afraid of. Scorn is how the weaker party reacts to a perception that the powerful entity consider them worthless.
We need a third party now! The American Patriot Party sounds good. No donation over $1000 would be accepted for any candidate for starters. You have to wonder why so many GOP billionaires are supporting their causes in regard to Ed. Reform, but we are not hearing about the Progressive Billionaires doing anything in response!
In November, I will be voting for the Republican candidate. I hope other Dems will too. Andrew Cuomo must be made to pay for this budget. I’m not voting Republican, I’m voting against Cuomo. We won’t be able to defeat him. I think he’ll be re-elected, but the best we can do is re-elect him by a very small margin so that he is politically weakened. He may kowtow to Eva Moskowitz but she, as far as I know, is only one vote.
I’m glad you included Governor Cuomo. He very much deserves to be included on this list.
You deserve to lose after you have allowed the destruction of our Public School System and I will never let my grandchildren attend a Public School again. Shame on you and I hope history gets it correct. This party and group of people moved our country back to the 1890’s with their policies of the rich get richer by taking opportunities away for mobility for the lower 95% of the people.
Lower 99%
Well in our case in NY, it’s all about Cuomo grabbing as much $ as he possibly can so he can run for president at some point. I was a lifelong Democrat. No longer. We’ve been sold out. Anybody But Cuomo 2014!
No Mo Cuomo
In NY, Common core has become such a sensitizing issue that Cuomo’s insanely overwhelming support for it and High Stakes Testing is causing a backlash within his own party.
New Yorkers I have seen from both parties will now vote for the Republican candidates for Assembly and Senators because Republican candidates are against Common Core and HST. At least they are against them because Cuomo is for them so strongly.
He is losing teacher votes as well because of his stubborn stance to use HST for teacher evaluation even as he has his hand picked Commish (King) and his henchmen soft pedal the importance of the test for kids.
Every forum and rally I have been to except one has had only Republicans come to endorse the parent push back….
Even gubernatorial and Westchester County executive Rob Astorino came to the I-REFUSE Rally way out in Jefferson Station Long Island I spoke at yesterday to campaign against Cuomo by siding with the 300 parents and teachers there.
What do you do if you are a true liberal in NYS? Vote Republican?
If you wish to save Public Education in New York you may not have a choice!
We need a third party now! The American Patriot Party sounds good. No donation over $1000 would be accepted for any candidate for starters. You have to wonder why so many GOP billionaires are supporting their causes in regard to Ed. Reform, but we are not hearing about the Progressive Billionaires doing anything in response! Bernie Sanders would be a good candidate for President.
Bernie Sanders explains it best: now that corporations are people with the right to give politicians millions, the politicians don’t have to care what we think anymore. We no longer butter their bread. We need a constitutional amendment to give us our own country back!
I am in complete agreement on voting for anyone other than Cuomo. I would rather watch someone who is not a ‘democrat’ destroy public sector unions and the middle class here in NY. Cuomo is a little man, and I am not talking about his physical stature.
Anyone (any teacher) who votes for the Democrats in the next election is completely crazy! No one has harmed public education than the Democrats. Anyone who votes for either of the two parties is “complicit” in all of this. If you don’t vote, then you can truly say that you didn’t support this plutocracy. The elections are just for people to pretend that they are making a difference. Voting is just for the Proles. I will never vote again, and I feel great about it. There is an even larger part of me that wants Christie or Scott Walker to win and make the American people really suffer for their stupidity.
Mike, you’re either a poor sick puppy or a troll. In either case, there is help for you.
The part of you that hopes Christie or Scott will come and punish America is possibly an expression of long-buried rage at excessive parental demands, punishment and shaming during potty training.
Mike and Chemtchr,
I think both of you are way off target, at least in your exchange here. Both the Democrats and the GOP are mostly corrupt, rotten, and simply don’t listen to their constituent base any more. . . . Mike, there is something worong with you only because elected officials are not put into office to make people suffer. Chemtchr, Mike is not wrong to hate the Democrats, but he is a moron for not hating the GOP as well because they are not in his interest, assuming he is not very wealty. . . .
I’m afraid we are at a crossroads where either path leads to corruption. . . . so the hope we have left – and it is real hope – is that we continue our grass roots movement and vote these fools out of office and replace them with people we know will represent the 98 to 99%. . . .
Mike (not me) admit it, you are a Republican trolling here, trying to get teachers to vote Republican, even for someone so anti-teacher as Chris Christie or Scott Walker. We can see right through you, so forget it.
And I think all you guys doing name calling are being counter productive.
It would seem that much of America believes we have been gamed by both parties and most voters do not know how to protest. There are so few candidates who don’t look at public office as a lifetime money maker, and permanent lucrative career, that we forget how the country (Constitution) was constructed, to have representatives in Congress for a short time, not full time, and then they go back to their communities.
It is the false Austrian/Von Mises/Milton Friedman/monatrist free market conception that has turned our government upside down. We would do better getting into the streets to overturn Citizen’s United, and soon to be McCutcheon SCOTUS ruling, than fighting amonst ourselves.
End Citizens United
Exactly!
ABsolutely, that’s why I’m voting for the Working Families Party in the NYS Governor’s election. I think I’ll do the WFP, right down the line.
I think that’s the right choice, Michael. Is there a candidate yet?
If not, then somebody on the right side, anybody, needs to seek a WFP endorsement and run for governor. Hey, you!
Yes, you.
http://www.workingfamiliesparty.org/2014/
http://perdidostreetschool.blogspot.com/2014/03/poll-shows-cuomo-would-be-vulnerable-to.html
Poll Shows Cuomo Would Be Vulnerable To Third Party Candidate
“A wealthy Democratic activist commissioned a poll that shows a third-party leftist candidate could eat into what Gov. Cuomo is hoping will be a commanding victory this year.
The fact the poll was even commissioned is another sign that Cuomo’s biggest troubles in his re-election year could come from the progressive base of his own Democratic party.”
Careful. WFP has been silent about charters. . . . . but they still might be a better choice.
Working Families Party endorsed Cuomo last time and I’m sure they will do it again. If you want to defeat Cuomo, you will have to vote Republican. And perhaps it will be a good idea to register Republican quickly to be able to vote in a Republican primary. Cuomo is probably already making deals with certain people to run as Republican spoilers to disenfranchise an actual decent Republican candidate who is trying to listen to the people and dump Common Core, high stakes testing, and teacher evaluations based on test scores.
I don’t think it is about party any more. It’s about who has been bought and paid for. Cuomo has a $33 million war chest. But if all of the Democrats in New York are fed up with his baloney….that money will be wasted on silly ads that won’t convince any one of his sincerity. He has already lost.
It is interesting, the folks who write here telling teachers to vote Republican. My guess is, that they are not teachers, not really concerned with education issues, but are writing here solely to try to sway teachers to vote Republican.
Dawn Hoagland, you are a Republican, no? (Not that that is a crime, just be honest about it. And you did not just register republican, you always have been. And I believe you wrote here that you do not believe that climate change is real, you don’t believe in health care reform, etc.
So who are you trying to kid?
Dawn Hoagland: Who is this “actual decent Republican candidate who is trying to listen to the people and dump Common Core, high stakes testing, and teacher evaluations based on test scores”?
If I lived in New York, and there was actually such a candidate, and good on other issues too, I would likely vote for them, regardless of party. But I think you are talking about a fictional candidate, and telling people to “register Republican anyhow”.
Every actual Republican governor and ex-governorI have heard of (Christie, Walker, Jeb Bush, etc.) have been worse on education than democratic governors. The only Repubs against Common Core are the Teabag wingnuts, and they are very much against teachers and public education as well.
Cuomo does sound bad though. Don’t know what I would do if I lived in NY. (We have a better governor (yes, a dem) here in CA-Jerry Brown.)
http://vimeo.com/90498744
The GOP does not truly have a “free market” ideology. That is more in the libertarian camp. But the pure unfettered markets are historically characterized by booms and busts coupled with massive income inequality or slavery. The existence of a strong Middle Class is rare and takes a conscious, guided effort. Many of the people I listen to who rail against “socialism” or “tyranny” are on Social Security or work in protected industries. Some make their living working in government.
The Republicans are not against Big Government. Rather, they eagerly use goverment to achieve their goals and enrich themselves.
I watched with amusement as Tesla Motors tried introducing a new sales and distribution model into red states like Ohio and New Jersey. Suddenly, the “free market” business owners and proud members of that bastion of American Free Enterprise the Chamber of Commerce went running to their gerrymandered Republican representatives crying for government to prohibit Tesla from entering the market. But these same people demand teachers be stack ranked and publicly humiliated in the name of “accountability” and “competition”.
The “Democrats” believe in the same thing. They are all neoliberals, that despite the fact neoliberalism has been discredited and debunked. They tenaciously hang onto it because their benefactors benefit from the ruination of entire countries.
Let us teachers do everything we can to make sure the Democrats lose at all levels. Our end goal should be to get rid of the Department of Education. Teachers can vote for anyone but a Democrat. Let’s send them packing!
Mike, no teacher is going to vote for Jeb Bush or Bobby Jindal. Republican teachers need to exercise due diligence, also.
Mike above (I am a different Mike), it seems you are a Republican thinking you can write here to get teachers to vote Republican. No way. That won’t work. We are not stupid.
I’m also afraid liberals are going to get rolled again on pre-K. I’ll be curious to see if there turns out to be any net gain education funding when the reality hits, as opposed to the political rhetoric.
I think the can just move money around, out of public schools, out of social services to children, and put it in pre-K.
Arne Duncan @arneduncan Mar 28
Preschool’s bipartisan expansion continues! Congrats to Indiana on the Hoosier State’s first-ever funding of PreK http://indy.st/1ft7gcZ
All Indiana did was take 10 million from social services and put it in a “pilot” program for pre-K. 10 million is not very much, but if they skimp on social services and fund expanded pre-K on that down the road, I don’t see any net gain for kids.
I’d be really wary of “here ya go, liberals! here’s your pre-K! Now vote for the Democrat!” If it’s just further gutting of public ed funding to re-allocate elsewhere, it’s at best a wash and probably a loss.
Also, if the ed reform free marketeers are directing the pre-K allocation of funds, we already know it’s all going to private entities.
That’s what Obama touts as “public-private partnerships.” Translated these means pilfering public funding to enrich private interests.
Run away if you hear any “Democrat” spewing this.
Mitch Daniels led the privatization and anti-union effort that swept the Great Lakes states. They all followed him, lock step; Kasich, Snyder, Walker. It was like watching dominoes fall. The one and only reason Ohio still has collective bargaining rights is labor put it on the ballot.
Daniels is no longer the governor, but I would bet 10 dollars right now that not one dime of that 10 million will go to a public entity, like (God forbid!) a ‘government” school that wants to run a pre-K program.
It’s not how they roll. They pioneered privatizing child welfare agencies. The idea that they’re gonna put public ed money in public schools is laughable. It’ll all be contracted out.
Obama, though, is the one who started it with him and Arne Duncan giving the green light to this. I feel both should be impeached.
The Hegelian principle.
What may I ask is the Hegelian principle? Please explain!
http://www.naturalnews.com/023727_power_government_butter.html
There are lots of explanations online. Here is one that gives some good examples including the final one related to education.
Problem. Reaction. Solution.
Read Richard Dawkins most famous book The Selfish Gene in which he describes the Hegelian principle and how humans evolved to reach this state of greed and selfishness. This strain of genetic material gave us the generals, captains of industry, and leaders of nations….while those without it became teachers, doctors, nurses, and nurturers of the human condition.
He wrote this book in 1972 and had worldwide recognition for it…but now too many only think of him in terms of his being an atheist. But I can see his humane and Sociologist self understanding the fallacies of religous myths. After all, since Jimmy Carter, every Democratic president has been a Born Again Christian, while they decimated our society in league with Wall Street and the Republicans.
The word , “patriot”, was hijacked for propaganda by the Tea Party, who we all know hate taxes for anything, including education. At every opportunity they try to drive down wages. They disparage public education just like Duncan. I like the “working families” nomenclature.
I contacted the Center for American Progress because of their pro Common Core campaign. The Center’s Board has former Clinton appointees.
I wrote that if the “bi-partisan” tent included Bill and Melinda Gates, John and Laura Arnold, the Waltons and the Kochs, I need to find another tent. That said, if it came between the Tea Party and a Democrat, I’d have to take a leap of faith for the latter.
Ohioan-the Kochs, along with the Tea party, hate Common Core, and the Kochs are funding a major campaign against it. So they are not in a tent with Gates and Walton. However, they could not be in a tent with us either, for as you say, Koch and the Tea Partiers are against public education, want to get rid of education funding, want to destroy teacher tenure, etc.
In fact, I am afraid that the Koch’s (and Tea Party) opposition to Common Core could drive most liberals to support it.
Let’s be honest about this. Most people, the average voter, do not know much about this stuff. The people alienated by this “school reform” stuff are we teachers, and only a small number of knowledgeable parents, not the general Democratic “base”.
Perhaps we need to do a better job of educating the public so that the voters en masse reject this “school rheeform” BS. Once that happens, politicians will not so eagerly go down that road.
As of now though, most people do not know much about it, and buzz words like “accountability”, “improve our schools”, “close the achievement gap”, etc., sound good to people, without really realizing what is involved.
As of now, though, looked at honestly, no, advocating “school reform” will in no way hurt Democratic politicians with their base. (And were we teachers to leave them–where could we go-to Republicans?)
It could actually hurt some Republican politicians with some aspects of their base–the far right tea partiers, who hate Common Core. But we really have no common ground with those types, who also would like to do away with public education, teacher tenure, etc.
We need to do a better job of educating the general public, and politicians as well, about what is really involved.
“Perhaps we need to do a better job of educating the public so that the voters en masse reject this “school rheeform” BS.”
Absolutely, but how? Six major corporations own pretty much all the media outlets, which six corporations are very much in favor of rheephorm, so no help there. I think we all are doing as much as we can word-of-mouth. The problem is so many people are working so hard just to get by that they don’t have time or energy to pursue these sorts of issues. They just go along to get along. I guess the good (?) news is that the rheephormers have pushed it so far that a lot of people (and their children) simply can’t get by any more and one way or another they’re going to have to wake up.
True, Dienne. I didn’t mean to be critical of anyone in saying “we need to do a better job…”. Our best spokesperson, Diane Ravitch, is certainly doing a great job. We are teachers very busy teaching our students. While the billionaires own mass media and hire PR firms to spread their lies.
It is a very difficult task to get the truth out.
The most important thing would be for more parents to wake up about this, and have a mass revolt. The “opt-out” movement is great, but still quite small I think. If it were to greatly spread, it could make a huge difference.
” Most people, the average voter, do not know much about this stuff. The people alienated by this “school reform” stuff are we teachers, and only a small number of knowledgeable parents, not the general Democratic “base”.”
You’re so wrong here, I wonder how you can call it “honest”. The general public with kids in school already knows and has begun to hate the crap the corporate education venturists are dishing out on their actual kids! They just don’t know there’s anybody here to turn to. Turn they will, though. No matter how much press the billionaire misanthropists control, they can’t get away with beating down people’s children.
The messages coming out of the media don’t mean much when your kid is crying, hiding when its time to go to school, and pulling out little wads of her own hair all the time. Parents are actively hunting for advice, and pulling their own kids to safety.
It’s education spring out here – pull out all the stops, and break through the media blockade to let parents know they aren’t alone. We’re helping our students, families and communities opt themselves out of the sickening dead end of corporate reform.
That’s the message. Tweet it, follow it, participate in it, and spread it everywhere. There’s gotta be a way to vote for it.
I’m so wrong? Really chemtchr? Education Spring? I sure would wish so! But what percent of parents nationwide are “opting out” of standardized tests? I sure would like it to be a large percentage, but doubt it is. (If it were, the whole system would collapse, and you could bet that politicians would change their tune. That would be fantastic, but I don’t see it happening.
Certainly not the case here in LA, the nations’ second largest school district. Unfortunately, I have not heard of any opt-out movement at all here.
I sure would like to think that what you wrote in that message is true. But honesty means realizing the facts of how it actually is, not how one would like it to be
Of course though, good to talk about how to spread the message, and work towards a goal.
Teachers can’t really openly advocate opting-out to parents though, or would risk losing their jobs.
97,800 results (in about .29 seconds). Whose narrative? The parents’ narrative. It rises above the formulaic dither of the paid hacks.
https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&gl=us&tbm=nws&authuser=0&q=common+core&oq=common+core&gs_l=news-cc.3..43j0l9j43i53.2829.5499.0.6586.1
Thanks to Obama and $106M man Bill Clinton, they’ve turned FDR’s party into the Rockefeller Democrats.
They left me, I didn’t leave them.
Btw, the New Deal Progressives (NDP) stand on Education is completely opposite the current DINO party:
http://newdealprogressives.org/education.html
Nelson Rockefeller actually had far more liberal views in terms of both public education and of societial needs than Obama or either Clintion.
Obama conspired with Big Pharma (as did Bush), and also left out of the health care reform loop those many Americans who believe in Single Payer Universal Health Care. He is a major corporatist like his buddies, the Clintons.
The Clintons sadly are what their opponents said of them, and Obama joins them in fooling so many of us who are lifelong progressives.
Elizabeth Warren for Prez!!!
Most teachers voted for and campaigned for Obama – both elections — healthcare – great and long overdue, but education? – how will we reverse the damage done by Duncan ?
You still think the AFA is a good thing? Amazing. Put AFA together with inBloom and you have the most sophisticated all encompassing data collection system ever attempted….to be accessible by all levels of government, law enforcement, future employers and the IRS. Just research IBM and Hitler sometime and see if you are still so excited about government health care for all after that trip to hell.
Just a reminder, our unique Constitution was created to protect we the people from our own government….not foreign enemies. Wake up and understand, the people in charge right now do not have your best interests in mind, especially Obama. I can understand being fooled into voting for him once…..but twice?
Correction: Damage done by Obama.
Dawn Hoagland–again your Teabaglican affiliation is very clear. By AFA I assume you mean ACA-Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare? Correct?
Am I glad it passed? You betcha!
Is it the health care reform I would have liked to see? No way! I would like to see a single payer system. Would you also like a single payer system, Dawn? Or would you call it “socialized medicine”? (You probably even call Obamacare that, although it is actually very much a free market plan.)
Unfortunately, single payer could never pass the US Congress, with the immense power of the health insurance lobby.
But is the ACA an improvement over what we had before? Absolutely! More people covered, who could not get health insurance before? Yes, and that’s a good thing.
If you think that due to the fact that many of us here are disappointed with Obama about education that you can convert us into teabaggers, think again!
Mike, I have to go to work now, and it took a while for this link to load.
http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2014/03/the-work-of-change-stakes-some-history.html
New York’s dedicated, progressive teachers have worked long and hard to get the truth out, because they saw it early and close-up. I’ve been following Ednotes Online for six years, and they just didn’t quit.
Your (almost despairing) sense of how far we have to go was accurate until about 2 years ago, when the very victory of the corporate bullies brought us to this stage. The call for leaders is coming from the people themselves, who see and feel a threat to their own children. The wind itself has shifted. Hoist sail, move, move, move.
Norm Scott says, blogging is a means, not an end. We have to get people in the same room together. Working Families Party is a possibility, becasue “they” are organized to respond to membership. Unfortunately, their web page sets my virus alarm off.
Have a good day at work, all of you colleagues, and let’s meet here at the end of it.
Reblogged this on Rickarcher1959's Blog and commented:
This goes to show you we can’t trust any political party today. Both parties are bought and paid for. I’m voting for Bernie Sanders for president in 2016.
Susannunes, it is so refreshing to hear the word impeachment on this blog. Yes. It is time for the impeachment of Obama. And with him should go Duncan and Holder. They are destroying this country from within more effectively than any foreign invader possibly could.
Both the DEMs and REPs poticians are lightweights and have their heads in the sand. They politicos in both parties support those who give huge dinero to their campaign coffers. I have no confidence in either party. Their actions show me they don’t like kids, teachers, parents, equity, and democracy.
I think we have to look at the reality of what’s going on, not how we would like it to be.
I saw one poster here write disparaglingly of “lesser evilism”. Well voting for the “lesser evil” is the reality of politics. And no, both parties are not the same.
In 2000 I voted for Al Gore for president. I didn’t like him much, but considered him a lesser evil to George W. Bush.
Some others who wanted to be purists and not “lesser evilists” voted for Ralph Nader instead.
That election was extremely close between Bush and Gore. If the Nader voters had voted for Gore, we would not have had eight years of George W. Bush. Would everything have been the same in this country if Gore was president from 2000-2008? I don’t think so. No Child Left Behind? I don’t know. I hope not. I think we certainly would not have had the Supreme Court we had now, which just passed a second decision giving big money more control over politics, which will hurt everything in this country, as well as education, for decades to come, or even forever. And many more bad decisions as a result of the Bush court. Would we have had the war in Iraq, costing so many lives, if Gore had been elected in 2000? Perhaps, but I doubt it. I doubt we would have had the same economic meltdown later in the decade either, although impossible to say for sure.
Those of you who voted for Nader in 2000, are you glad you were a purist and did so, and threw the election to Bush? How did that vote help anything in this country?
Similarly, although I voted for Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary in 2008, I am glad that I voted for Obama in the general election in 2008 and 2012. I am very disappointed with his education policies, and have written to tell him so. Yet, would things be better if McCain or Romney had been elected? Probably education would be still worse, certainly not better. Furthermore, rather than Sonia Sotomayor we would have still more bad Supreme Court justices appointed, tilting its balance yet farther to the right. No health care reform, etc, etc.
So yes, it makes a difference to vote for the “lesser evil”.
One has to realize that there are Republicans (Dawn Hoagland, for example) who write here specifically for the purpose of trying to get teachers to vote Republican, due to our dissatisfaction with Obama’s education policies. (They may even be paid staffers of Repub campaign groups.)
Is the “Democratic base” unhappy with Obama’s education policies? Truthfully, no. Most don’t know much about it, and fall for the buzz words and PR, including the fake “civil rights” rhetoric of its proponents. Even some who consider themselves quite “progressive” fall for it. (Who remembers Al Sharpton touring with Duncan and Gingrich, and praising those policies?)
In the heavily Democratic state of New Jersey, a Republican governor, Chris Christie, who made so-called “education reform” a major part of his platform, won re-election overwhelmingly, and was considered at the time the front-runner to be the Republican candidate for President in 2016. (Now due to “Bridgegate” I think his political career is fortunately over, but that is a different story.) If most dems were opposed to “ed deform”, would he have won re-election?
Frankly, the only part of the Democratic base opposed to “ed deform” are we teachers, and only a very small percentage of informed parents, and we are a very small part of that base. We need to do a better job of getting our message out.