Jonathan Pelto reports that Donald Trump has chosen Indiana Governor Mike Pence as his running mate.
http://jonathanpelto.com/2016/07/14/breaking-news-trump-goes-anti-public-education-running-mate/
His far-right credentials include dedication to privatization of public schools.
Just on Tuesday, a commentator on CNN predicted that Trump would not choose Oence because he is so far out of the mainstream, far to the right of the Republican Party. He was wrong.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Come on DFER please endorse! CER is absolutely giddy over this:
http://email.edreform.com/t/i-e-krukjdt-driydyjii-j/
Pence is like a DFER dream! Go team!
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HOO-RAH! INDIANA GOT RID OF GOVERNOR PENCE!! (I live in Indiana.) The state is a mess…roads, pollution, schools, economy, women’s health, gay rights and jobs. The state is near the bottom on nearly every poll that is taken. Pence is a Tea Party conservative.
Just hope that Trump/Pence does NOT get elected. I can’t imagine worse things happening to this country. The US does not want to look like Indiana.
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“I sincerely hope, that Mrs Clinton open her eyes and ears to the Bernie Sanders’ and Elizabeth Warrens’ around her, rather than her pocketbook for the free flow of cash from Wall Street and the Corporate billionaires.”
That is her only path to victory being neck in neck in Ohio , Pennsylvania, Florida , Wisconsin. Should open her eyes it won’t
Want to win this election Obama announces that due to opposition from the American people from the base of the Party, he will withdraw the TPP from consideration . He will not .
Sanders can bring his voters in mass, only as someone said here yesterday if he can bring them a snack. . Almost every concession in the platform was meaningless . It required congressional votes that will not happen without a massive political revolution.
Now of course Obama could win the hearts of some of those angry white voters known as “white suburban moms ” by asking Duncan the Second to hand in his resignation. Then asking the other NY-er the one with a bit of knowledge about education to take the King’s thrown. He won’t !
So I am not surprised by anything Trump does and he has no ideology just spouts what ever comes to his mouth. The danger is
on every issue he sides with the establishment wing of the Republican party which will be devastating to the middle class .The Tea Party is a creation of the establishment wing . You don’t get more establishment than Koch and ALEC . So as much as Hillary will drive a corporate agenda . Trumps will be worse . And yes Ellen Lubic he may be approaching senility but we have had a recent President in that condition before .That one was probably telling the truth when he could not remember a thing about sabotaging the release of American hostages or trading arms for hostages. We also had an imbecile that was dancing at a funeral yesterday.
But Obama , Hillary and the Democrats will go down and be thrilled they still have the support of their plutocratic sponsors pouring millions into the party coffers . To come back once again and not offer the “Hope and Change ” that the people are craving.
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So are a progressive is going to win in Indiana???????
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Whoever runs on the Republican ticket for governor has to sign up by today, Friday July 15. Since Pence isn’t running, I doubt that anyone will jump into that slot this quickly. The Democratic candidate is John Gregg. He is more to the left on many issues.
I don’t know how this will play out since Indiana is a solid red state.
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That reply was to Steve B, Are is out , just delete it .
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carolmalaysia: that was my point . It is a red state. The bigger problem is that Neo liberal democrats have turned the entire mid west red.
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California has a new History-Social Science Framework! Check out http://chssp.ucdavis.edu/blog for some more information.
Jo Eberle
Blog — California History-Social Science Project chssp.ucdavis.edu by Beth Slutsky Over the past couple of years there has been a lot of discussion about whether California students should be required to take an Ethnic Studies course …
________________________________
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Mr Trump is in a bit of a pickle here…
He has stated on numerous occasions that he wants to get rid of Common Core.
Now he selects a running mate that has been a cheerleader for the Core, the entire privatization ovement, the destruction of public education and public servants…all the while taking a knife to education at all levels in the state of Indiana.
With millions of parents defending their children, the public schools they attend, and their teachers and administrations, the selection of Pence has brought the presidency closer to Clinton, and has turned many who were considering Trump, to run away from him.
This selection by Trump, of Pence as his running mate, is horrific to the middle class which is gasping for economic breath under the Obama administration. Trump has either 1) demonstrated his true colors regarding any concerns for the middle class, 2) shown how displaced he is from the concerns of the American people, or 3) thrown the election to Clinton.
The American political machine has strayed so far from the dream of our Founding Fathers…two presidential options, each one dangerous in its own…these are indeed, scary times.
I sincerely hope, that Mrs Clinton open her eyes and ears to the Bernie Sanders’ and Elizabeth Warrens’ around her, rather than her pocketbook for the free flow of cash from Wall Street and the Corporate billionaires.
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Trump’s entire political career is based on bits of pickles. It’s difficult to think of a smaller pickle than the Common Core. Utterly inconsequential to his candidacy.
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There is actually a third choice, Gary Johnson from NM and a Libertarian. He is as bad or maybe worse then Trump. If Donnie Boy Trump or Johnson get elected, this country will go to hell in a hand basket. Clinton is not much better. Education will take a back seat to every worthwhile in this country. Donnie Boy Trump, Pence, Johnson and probable Clinton do not give a damn about educating our children for the future. They are only interested in lining their pockets NOW!!!!
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No, no, no, no!!! Johnson, in the CNN Libertarian Town Hall, stated that all public services, except the military, should be privatized. If you support public education, you cannot support Johnson.
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I DO NOT support Johnson. I live in NM. He was the worst Governor this state has seen since Statehood in 1912 — except maybe our current Governor Martinez. Johnson is an accident wanting to happen.
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That’s what I’ve heard about him. Another “winner” running. Where are the good, decent people? Where are the statesmen and stateswomen, who care about the country, not the bottom line?
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To Trump I say, smooth move ex-lax.
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If I reply truthfully, I am sure I would get bleeped!
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I could share the email I sent out earlier about Trump and Clinton I would be banned .
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Why not vote for Jill Stein of the Green Party. The MSM and the two wings of the uniparty want you to believe that there are only two choices.
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This.
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In 2009 interview with Chris Matthews, Pence refused to acknowledge the science of evolution. Pence isn’t just a foe of public schools. Pence is a foe of knowledge and rational thought. Republicans have become the party of anti-intellectualism.
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Historically , in some places on this planet those who wear glasses (seen as intellectual) “disappear.”
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Are there any Republicans that aren’t hostile to public education? There are precious few Democratic Mayor’s, Governors, etc. that aren’t hostile to public education.
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Governor Gary Herbert of Utah isn’t too bad on public education. He’s proposed much larger increases in funding than the legislature does, and has seemed to pick up on the problems of privatization in the last few years. However, he does not use the political clout he should to fight a very far-right legislature to truly fund education. So he’s not hostile, but not fighting as hard as he should. I guess that, in Utah, someone who even speaks about supporting education is a breath of fresh air. Sad, huh?
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We cannot allow Trump to become president. There is only one choice and that’s to vote for HRC. There is no other choice. With HRC we have at least a 50-50 chance of a president that will support the public schools. Now it all depends on who HRC’s VP running mate will be. If Trump has a heart attack and Pence becomes president, the entire private sector will be totally crushed —- not just the public schools.
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Lloyd :
If I am the deciding vote in NY, I will vote for Clinton . I get it, I am a coward with a cushy union pension that could be on the line.
But isn’t it the job of the Democrats to win the hearts and minds of the American people . They have that within their prowess.
The dynamic (and its an ugly one) that empowered Clinton’s victory in the primaries does not apply in the general,not in swing states. . She didn’t just lose the youth vote she lost the vote under 45, that’s an important distinction .That age break down is reflective of a dynamic in the economy. Boomers on the whole ,have really boomed haven’t we . Those that have followed us have struggled.Teachers, industrial workers, construction workers…. Most here agree that it is Republican policy that has caused this pain and transfer of wealth. However when Democrats joined the neo-liberal cocktail party they lost their claim to being the party of the people .
I just left the NYS, AFL-CIO face book page it is frightening.This used to be the core of the Democratic party. Frankly I think she should step aside while there is still time to win this fight. But I do not expect that . Some very concrete actions have to be taken by the Obama administration that are fully with in his powers, mere policy announcements , that will demonstrate that they have gotten the message. They haven’t .and they wont.
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“cushy union pension”
I see that phrase as fighting words. When I hit those three words, I stopped reading your comment and my anger went volcanic because I get angry every time I see anyone throw out those misleading lies.
I taught for thirty years often working 60 to 100 hours a week, and I retired at 60 in 2005 with a 40 percent pay cut and no medical coverage — and that is a “cushy union pension”!?!?!?!?!?!?
If it wasn’t for the fact that I’m a former U.S. Marine and Vietnam vet, I would have had no medical care when I left teaching. My district offered COBRA but the cost was more than one thousand dollars a month or a third of my monthly retirement before taxes, so I turned to the VA because I am on the Agent Orange list and have a combat related disability.
Let’s look at the other side of the coin – no pension, no social security, no medicare, no unemployment, no food stamps. For the 99 percent that don’t win the brutal and often fraudulent capitalist lottery to wealth and power, do we all just starve and die when we reach the end of our working years or do we slave away for poverty wages in a non-union Walmart without medical care until we drop dead?
In addition, public school teachers that never worked in the private sector do not quality for Social Security so all they have is that “cushy union pension”.
I was fortunate to qualify for Social Security, because I started working when I was 15 and spend 15 years paying into SS before becoming a teacher, but even then, because I was a public school teacher, my SS was cut in half to punish me for working 60 to 100 hours a week for thirty years struggling to teach America’s children and too many of those children resent mandatory education to age 18 and refuse to learn what they are taught or because they are hungry or drugged out or belong to a violent and dangerous street gang, they can’t or won’t learn what is taught.
I earned my retirement through CALstrs and I paid more than 8 percent of my earnings into that retirement plan. The state of California has promised to pay that retirement until the day I die, but those promises have been made by other states and broken so can I rely on California and the federal government? The answer to that question is NO, because states are already starting to cut benefits for retirees thanks to the corporate, non union education privatization movement and the constant cutting of taxes for corporations and the wealthiest Americans through lower rates and more loopholes like non profit foundations. For instance, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/get-there/wp/2016/04/20/one-of-the-nations-largest-pension-funds-could-soon-cut-benefits-for-retirees/
Calculating the Real Cost of Corporate Welfare
http://thefederalist.com/2013/09/30/calculating-the-real-cost-of-corporate-welfare/
In fact, let’s compare those “cushy union pensions” to the $80 billion that Bill Gates is worth.
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If HRC chooses Booker, we are in big trouble
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“I will vote for Clinton . I get it, I am a coward with a cushy union pension that could be on the line.”
The statement was meant to convey that I have too much skin in the game to risk Trump or any Republican. To convey that we better consider what we have to lose.
Perhaps Lloyd you should one, take a chill pill and two continue reading till the end of a comment .
I assure you I have spent more years in the labor movement than most commenting on this blog have been alive. I am on this sight not because I am a teacher or have children of school age, but because I see the assault on Americas teachers as an assault on an American workers and the middle class . I begrudge no one the meager benefits that some of us receive .The Union I belong to Organized the UFT here in NYC . I have been on several teachers picket lines where unfortunately there were to few teachers participating. To few Teachers ever participating with other workers to help lift our standard of living.
Too many Teachers ,as my much older sister in-law Diane’s age, a retired UFT teacher can testify, have no appreciation of what they had at least here in NYC and could care less about uplifting others. Guess who they are voting for. It ain’t Bernie or Jill Stein.
“I just left the NYS, AFL-CIO face book page it is frightening.”
Do you think I was there to knock Union pensions or to try to convince other blue collar workers that at the least they can not vote for Trump.
But none of this pardons the despicable neo liberal assault on the American working class that the Democrats have joined in from Trade to Public schools . Sad that this is our choice
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sorry about that
I did think you possibly were being sardonic.
I’ve also walked picket lines as a teacher but when we picketed in the abusive, autocratic, micromanaged from the top down district where I taught for thirty years in California, hundreds of teachers turned out and filled the sidewalk outside the district office. That picketing often resulted in the district compromising from their uncompromising position to negotiate a contract after months and sometimes years of stand offs.
We always picketed on the same day that the elected school board met and then after walking for several hours on the sidewalk outside the district office with our signs, we’d pack the meeting room where the school board met.
The district where I worked had 19 schools with about 19,000 students and 1,000 teachers. The high school where I taught had a teaching staff of 100 back then, and a majority of the teachers were active in keeping class sizes from skyrocketing past an average of 34. The teachers even voted to take a pay cut to keep the class size from climbing higher while keeping drama and other extra curricular classes the dictatorial district administration wanted to close.
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I would have chimed in sooner, but I was too busy celebrating. What a great day for Indiana! (Although I live in Illinois I grew up for a while in Indiana and my parents still live there – I have a certain fondness for the place, red as it is.) And I can’t think of a better fit for Trump.
Now let’s see if Hillary can pick an equally fitting match.
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Here is information from The Times of NW Indiana:
INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana Gov. Mike Pence still faces a deadline to withdraw from his re-election bid even though Donald Trump postponed his Friday vice presidential announcement because of a deadly attack in France.
Indiana law bars a candidate from seeking two offices at once. Pence needs to file paperwork by Friday’s noon deadline to take his name off the gubernatorial ballot so Indiana Republican leaders can pick a new candidate for governor.
Lt. Gov. Eric Holcomb and U.S. Reps. Todd Rokita and Susan Brooks all have signaled interest in the gubernatorial nomination. They face the same deadline to drop off the November ballot in their races, although GOP officials could later restore any of them to a vacancy.
The state Republican committee would pick the candidate to oppose Democratic nominee John Gregg.
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And Obama’s been a friend?
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Neither Clinton nor Obama have been friends in many ares. However I would rather be in the frying pan trying to climb out than engulfed in the flame.
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As a lifelong resident of Indiana and a teacher, I don’t see Pence surviving the scrutiny of the national press. When he has to make any unscripted statement he crumbles, as in this interview with George Stephanopolous: http://abcnews.go.com/ThisWeek/video/gov-mike-pence-religious-freedom-law-29987447
Pence is not very bright, I doubt that he even has two brain cells to rub together, and he has a record to prove that statement. He did nothing, literally nothing in 12 years in the House of Representatives. His campaigns have worked for him only because Indiana has been gerrymandered into a state where the candidates get to pick their voters, and he picked the district I used to live in where the GOP dominates.
Pence has had two disastrous campaigns, in 1988 and 1990. He misused campaign funds, as in using them to make his house payments in 88 and narrowly avoided legal action against him, because of the stronghold the GOP has on Indiana. In 1990 he ran against Democrat Phil Sharp, a long time, well liked congressman. Pence lost the election, but only after he engaged in a nasty negative campaign that turned on him where he had to stomach harsh personal criticism. Needless to say, he did have not stomach for that kind of fight and sat out politics as a crazy right-wing talk show host until Indiana went from blue to purple to red. While he was making himself a media darling to other ultra conservatives, he wrote some very weird essays on the appeal of the movie “Titanic,” how cigarette smoking does hot present a health hazard, and “Global Warming” is not real: http://fusion.net/story/325513/mike-pence-1990s-essays/
Anyone who thinks that Trump is better than any other candidate has to look at this Pence selection as how horrible Trump would be a president. Pence is a vapid, ignorant, empty-headed fool and couldn’t be a worse choice. And the very strong possibility that an elected Trump would not finish his term makes it even scarier that Pence could actually inhabit the oval office.
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Trump is terrible but guess what he survived “the scrutiny of the national press” to be neck and neck with the Smartest person in the room.
Ronald Reagan, W . this isn’t “Jeopardy” this is gaining the confidence of the American people that you have their interests at heart. It truly is about “Hope and Change” and Hillary/Obama better get on board real soon. Because the other guy is promising change by pointing fingers at people and saying its their fault . From undocumented immigrants to Hillary and Obama .
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Trump ran against the Republican party leadership and he also ran against the media. They are not finished with him.
As Mitt Romney said eloquently, this election is about the future of the nation.
If the Republicans are going to allow themselves to become the party of exclusion, of torture, of white male supremacy, they are finished.
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I am one not enthused about Tim Kaine…but I do believe he has the capacity to look beneath the surface….“One of the weaknesses of the ESEA and the Virginia Educational Initiatives beginning back in the mid-90s to focus on curriculum standards was that there was sort of a definition of what a ‘core curriculum’ was, and it was usually social studies, science, English and math and it really gave some school districts an incentive to — since the testing was kind of high-stakes and a lot was on the line — really downgrade arts, music and physical education,” Kaine said……core curriculum is not simply those four subjects but arts education needs to be an important part of a well-rounded educational experience,” Kaine said. He cut funding related to college loans in 2012…not sure how significant it was…http://www.breezejmu.org/news/sen-tim-kaine-discusses-major-topics-in-education-with-students/article_0ae4bda2-a1c3-11e5-b0fe-cf866d8b3be6.html
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Trump picks FOE of public schools as his running mate.
As if a FRIEND of public schools was his other option. HA!
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Not sure the leaders of the Republican Party include ANY friends of public schools, even though there are many friends of public schools–parents and educators–who are Republican
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Yet they all want the best schools for their own children, and God knows that would never be a charter school.
Its getting harder by the day to be proud to be an American.
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And in Kansas they are voting for leaders willing to push out public schools altogether.
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Does anyone really want Mike Pence to have any federal power? Look at his “achievements” in Indiana.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION: INDIANA IS FALLING BEHIND THE REST OF THE NATION
Overall State Economy
Indiana’s economy had a sluggish growth at 1.7% real GDP, below the national average of 2.4% GDP. – [Route Fifty, 6.14.16]
Indiana economic growth lags behind neighboring states Illinois and Ohio. – [Bureau of Economic Analysis, 6.14.16]
Indiana ranks 38th in per capita income, down from 34th in 2004. – [NWI Times, 03.26.16]
Median Incomes: Wages have dropped from $53,500 in 2000 to $46,900 in 2013. – [U.S. Census]
Hoosiers make 86 cents for every one American dollar earned. – [Indianapolis Star, 6.1.15]
Indiana ranks 46th in quality of life, 42nd in workforce. – [CNBC]
About two thirds of minimum wage workers in Indiana are women. – [Forbes, 7, 2015]
Hoosier women make 75 cents for every dollar a man makes. – [AAUW, 2015]
African American households earn on average $21,000 less than white households. – [Indianapolis Star, 4.11.15]
Hispanic households make $15,000 less than white households. – [Indianapolis Star, 4.11.15]
Mike Pence’s RFRA
Mike Pence signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act in a closed door ceremony [FOX 59, 3.26.15], throwing Indiana into a $250 million economic panic. – [The Advocate, 7.10.15]
Pence Repeals Common Construction Wage Law
Mike Pence and Statehouse Republicans repealed the common construction wage laws, allowing union worker wages to go down and the expanding wage gap continues to grow in our state. – [NWI Times, 5.6.15]
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