Peter Greene reviews a puff piece about Campbell Brown in the Murdoch-owned conservative journal, and woe is Campbell. She wants to be taken seriously, but everyone ignores her. Worse, she has to share office space, because with a $4 million budget, apparently she can’t afford space of her own. We know she hates the unions and she sees them behind every conspiracy to foil her success. We know she also thinks that teachers should have no tenure or any other kinds of job protections because the ranks of public school teachers are loaded with sexual predators, or so she believes. Apparently, she loves to tell the story over and over to everyone who will listen that I once referred to her as pretty, or something like that, because it implied that she was on TV for her looks, not her brains. In other words, she is playing the victim.
It is not easy to see Campbell Brown as a victim. We know that her children attend an expensive Yeshiva (sorry, Campbell, my grandchildren went there too), and that she has a good life, except for her need to slam and belittle people who do work that is far more socially valuable than her own.
Peter notes the recently released FBI tapes of conversations between disgraced and indicted State Senate leader Dean Skelos and his son (also indicted); father Skelos told his son that he was heading into Manhattan to meet with Campbell Brown and some billionaires.
Maybe they were separate meetings. Maybe he wanted to assure Campbell Brown of his admiration for her brains and beauty, while he was meeting with the billionaires to pledge his support for more charter schools. Or maybe they were all at the same meeting, all agreeing that teachers are paid too much, have too much job security, and all public schools should be replaced by charter schools, where there are no unions.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“[Campbell’s] so pretty, oh so pretty…vacant.”
-The Sex Pistols
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Good one dispenser.
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Campbell should know about sexual predators. How they think, where they thrive, and how they behave. She was good friends with Michelle Rhee and her hubby Kevin “Another Suite – Another Settlement?” Johnson. As for Campbell’s seriousness and expertise on the subject of teaching – she’s a former talking head who I bet if she swung her head back and forth you’d hear a whistling sound.
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Great point, Mr. Collins! How would she explain Rhee, mother to two teenage daughters, marrying and obfuscating for a sexual predator?
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Yes, and it’s hard to believe that Rhee’s ex-husband, who has custody of their children, didn’t insist on that, at least in part, because their mother is married to a pedophile.
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FloJo, JLo, CamBro.
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H/B the good soul I am, I’m embarrassed for her. Who pens these headlines?:
Who’s Afraid of Campbell Brown?
Teachers’ unions, and for good reason
http://www.weeklystandard.com/whos-afraid-of-campbell-brown/article/1070546
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We need links to those tapes from Skelos
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The links are in Peter’s article.
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I’m thrilled we’re getting some corruption indictments. Ramp that up, please.
I’m pro government reform. Theft of honest services and quid quo pro are like music to my ears. I think we’ve spent enough time “reforming” middle class working people. Let’s go to the top and look around. The last Perp Walk of the Powerful I saw was ENRON. We’re way overdue.
They may need to hire some more prosecutors, or take some off the “locking up poor people” beat and reassign them 🙂
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According to the latest unconfirmed rumors…
Just like Arne Duncan has the first verses of “If I Only Had A Brain” from THE WIZARD OF OZ taped to the ceiling of his office so he can recline on his fainting couch, pearls in hand, and read those treasured lines over and over again—Campbell Brown has this on the ceiling of HER sadly run-down office and ofttimes reclines in similar pose and circumstances to peruse her favorite three verses from a song in WEST SIDE STORY:
[start]
I feel pretty,
Oh, so pretty,
I feel pretty and witty and bright!
And I pity
Any girl who isn’t me tonight.
I feel charming,
Oh, so charming
It’s alarming how charming I feel!
And so pretty
That I hardly can believe I’m real.
See the pretty girl in that mirror there:
Who can that attractive girl be?
Such a pretty face,
Such a pretty dress,
Such a pretty smile,
Such a pretty me!
[end]
Hey! Even rheephormistas need a reminder now and then about how marvelous they are!
😳
Just ask Donald Trump about the Power of Positive Thinking…
😎
P.S. Please excuse me, one and all, if I ruined a wonderful story and song, but data points—even squishy ones like the above and Michelle Rhee taking “her” students from the 13th to the 90th percentiles—yearn to breath free…
Rheeally! And in the most Johnsonally sort of ways too…
😏
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Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education.
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Oy Vey!
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The WEEKLY STANDARD claims that Campbell Brown’s opponents — primarily those evil teacher unions and their supporters like Dr. Ravitch — are too “afraid” of Campbell to dare even attempt debate her.
WEEKLY STANDARD: “Ultimately, the problem for union spokesmen such as Weingarten and Ravitch is not that they have to contend with refuting some telegenic idiot every time the Washington Post calls them for the union point of view. Brown is eager to publicly debate education reform, but they’re afraid of engaging her. Given the opportunity, she’s going to clean their clocks. And, yes, she’s going to look good doing it.”
Talk about an alternate universe.
With one notable and disastrous exception — the Stephen Colbert show (the old one before he moved to CBS — Brown has steadfastly refused to appear in any forum where she is not surrounded by corporate reformers and politicians who support and agree 100% with everything she says, and who she knows beforehand will not challenge or refute anything she says.
The Colbert show was most likely the last time she’ll venture into an environment where she will face anyone who’ll counter what she says. The Mexican stand-off moment between Colbert and her over whether she’ll reveal her funders, and if not, why not … was truly a “Perry Mason” moment. She justified this on the grounds that if she did, those funders will be targeted by… well … by the protestors outside Colbert’s studio. It was a bunch of parents holding handmade, magic markered signs. Scary!
If you’ve got nothing to hide, you hide nothing.
Ms. Brown claims that both she and her anonymous funders should be immune from suspicion, criticism, or concern, as to
— what their true motives and intentions are;
— what their past actions towards unions are;
— how they may benefit financially should Ms. Brown achieve their goals, etc.
CAMPBELL BROWN: “Oh, hey, American people… you don’t need to know the individuals and groups funding our efforts to ‘reform’ education… Just trust on this—they’re all really super, wonderful noble, well-intentioned folks and organizations who really care about the educations of poor and middle class children. Again, just trust us. They’re donating millions to our gropu with no ulterior motive at all, and won’t stand to benefit from any of our reform efforts. That’s all you need to know, and that’s all we’re going to tell you. You don’t really need to know any of their actual names. Really… you don’t.”
That’s patently absurd.
There were more Perry Mason moments during the Colbert show.
In the middle of the interview, Brown makes a quite damning contradiction. I call attention to her use of the pronouns “we” and “our”.
Watch the interview again at, paying attention to the following:
http://jerseyjazzman.blogspot.com/2014/08/campbell-brown-lame.html
Pay attention to these two snippets:
(NOTE: CAPITALS for “WE” in the first, and for “OUR” in the second clip, … are mine, JACK)
—————————————————————————————-
00:55 – 01:05
CAMPBELL BROWN: “First, let me just correct something you said. WE (Campbell & the other behind-the-scenes leaders of “Parents for Educational Justice”) are not filing this lawsuit. Seven parents who have kids in public schools in New York state are bringing this lawsuit.”
—————————————————————————————-
Now, here come Brown’s slip-up
—————————————————————————————-
03:47 – 03:52
CAMPBELL BROWN: “Can I just mention that some of OUR plaintiffs are out here tonight, too (she gestures to the audience). They’re very happy to be here.”
—————————————————————————————-
Whoa, whoa, whoa… hold on here, Campbell. Three minutes ago, you said that “we”— your group “Parents for Educational Justice”— were not filing the lawsuit, as in that it’s not “our” lawsuit; it’s the plaintiff parents’ lawsuit, and that you’re just giving them a little help. Suddenly, you’re referring to those same plaintiff parents as “our plaintiffs.”
Woopsie-daisy!
Again, notice Brown doesn’t say “the” plaintiffs, as in “the plaintiffs to whom our group is lending support.” She says, “our.” If only Colbert had been quick enough to catch her on that.
Campbell Brown was hoping for a heart-warming, Oprah-show-like cut-away to those minority children plaintiffs sitting in the audience.
No such luck.
However, her attempt to effect that cut-away backfired on Brown as she let loose with the slip-up just described.
SOUTHBRONX TEACHER was also questioning why the parents are not allowed to speak to journalists:
http://www.southbronxschool.com/2014/08/campbell-brown-exposed-by-stephen.html
He offers the follow-up questions that Colbert could have asked Brown when she said it was the parents’ lawsuit, not her group’s lawsuit:
——————————————-
“Are the parents being paid or reimbursed any expenses incurred while in the midst of this lawsuit?
“Are food and hotels and travel being reimbursed by the law firm, Campbell Brown, or PEJ? These questions are important.
“Did these parents seek out PEJ on their own, or were they sought out?
“If they were sought out how many have volunteered and/or have been employed by Students First? We do know that the lead plaintiff, Keoni Wright was employed by Michelle Rhee’s group STUDENTS FIRST at one time.
“Campbell even shares that the law firm, Kirkland Ellis, is representing the parents pro bono, but how did these parents know to seek out this particular law firm?
“But as I am watching this I am wondering to myself, why is Campbell the one being interviewed?
“Why not the parents from Rochester who ‘handled’ themselves so well with Glen Beck? (NOTE: they didn’t come off very well… you can watch this here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJZDrpwi8TQ )
“In fact how did two families from Rochester know to seek out the above NYC law firm?
“(Union agitators) are trying to silence debate? How many people has Campbell blocked (#blockedbycampbellbrown )on Twitter? Blocked from multiple Facebook pages?
“But if the parents should have a role in this debate, and no one is denying that, then why then is Campbell the face and voice of the parents?
“Why not let the parents speak freely?”
————————
Again, here’s the link to South Bronx Teacher’s blog:
http://www.southbronxschool.com/2014/08/campbell-brown-exposed-by-stephen.html
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This WEEKLY STANDARD article sets new standards
in blatant distortion, selectivity, and bias. Reading this,
I’m taken back to Oprah introducing Michelle Rhee
as “the great warrior woman of our time,” or to that
masterpiece ‘WATING FOR SUPERMAN.’
In this article (BELOW) there’s not a
word about who’s funding Brown, let alone
the motives and intentions of those funders.
(SEE FURTHER BELOW for audio that sheds
some damning proof about Brown and her
billionaire backers… but first … )
According to this article, Brown’s just winging it by
herself — fighting the good fight against “the
status quo” and corrupt unions… all because
she just cares so much about kids and their education.
The NEW YORK POST has got nothing on this.
However, you have to appreciate the irony that
the same day this puffery comes out, there’s a release of
a wiretap in the Senator Dean Skelos corruption case …
in which Campbell Brown’s chicanery pops up …
chicanery that is, again, at odds with that godawful
article.
If you read the puff piece above, you’d never think that
Campbell was in high-end meetings with billionaire
privatizers, and that those billionaires are funding her,
meeting about how to “use tax credits” to expand
school privatization.
However, the tapes show otherwise. (And you can
easily listen to these relevant excerpts, as they’re just
22 seconds into an audio file that is embedded
conveniently above the text of the story.)
THE DEAN SKELOS TAPES:
http://wxxinews.org/post/revealing-recorded-conversations-form-part-prosecutions-case-skelos-trial
In many recordings, the corrupt-up-to-his-eyeballs
Senator Skelos was using his various wealthy connections
to score a high-paying, cushy job for his son Adam.
Pursuant to that end, he tells his son that he’s soon
attending a meeting about education reform …
Who’s going to be there?
” … a bunch of billionaires… and Campbell Brown.”
One of those attendees might offer Adam such a job, or
act as a conduit for Adam to obtain such a job.
Therefore, Adam wants their names.
Adam eagerly implores his father, “Dad, you’ve got to take
these names down for me.”
“I got ‘em all. I got ’em,” Skelos assures his son.
“All right,” replies his satisfied son.
So again, who are the attendees at this meeting?
Campbell Brown and a bunch of billionaires
pushing charter schools.
What’s one of the topics of the meeting?
How Campbell and the billionaires can
“use tax credits” to open or expand charter schools,
and ultimately profit from such privatization.
On the audio file embedded in the article:
( 00:21 – 00:51 )
http://wxxinews.org/post/revealing-recorded-conversations-form-part-prosecutions-case-skelos-trial
( 00:21 – 00:51 )
—————————————–
DEAN SKELOS: “I’m going into the city, meeting
with some billionaires … on school tax credit stuff – ”
ADAM SKELOS: “Who are you meeting with?
DEAN SKELOS: ” Campbell Brown.”
ADAM SKELOS: “Ohhh… ”
DEAN SKELOS: “Okay.”
ADAM SKELOS: “Any financial … people?”
DEAN SKELOS: “Yeah, you know the … uhh …
the reporter, former reporter (Campbell Brown)
… a whole bunch of them (i.e. billionaire charter promoters)
and I’m having lunch with a bunch of them.
Then I’m going to – ”
ADAM SKELOS: “Dad, you’ve gotta …
you’ve gotta take these names down for me.”
DEAN SKELOS: (laughin) “I got ’em all. I got ’em.”
ADAM SKELOS: “All right.”
———————————————–
Go here for the article and to listen to
above tape excerpt:
http://wxxinews.org/post/revealing-recorded-conversations-form-part-prosecutions-case-skelos-trial
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Dear Ms. Brown:
I offer to debate you anytime you would like. Please contact me at dswacker@centurytel.net. Cost for your supporters-transportation and lodging-I don’t need much but I can’t afford to pay for luxury items that are outside my meager retired teacher budget.
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