This is amazing. The ink wasn’t even dry on the Janus Decision, and letters from a rightwing policy shop in Michigan were delivered to teachers in New York, urging them to leave their union. The letters came from the Mackinac Center, which has been a recipient of DeVos family funding.
Mackinac says it plans to spend $10 million on its anti-union campaign.
How do these people sleep at night?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“How do these people sleep at night?”
Psychopaths have no problem sleeping. They have no empathy. They have no compassion. Unless they have a Muller on their butt, I suspect they sleep like babies.
Yes, like the title of the great Kurosawa movie, “The Bad Sleep Well.” It’s those of us who understand what is really happening who can’t sleep.
This is hideous and disgusting. These libertarian elites will not be satisfied until there are no unions, no real pubic schools, no Medicare, no Medicaid, no Social Security or no anything that is publicly beneficial to ordinary people. When will the people wake up and stop voting against their own best interests? A good start would be to vote out the GOP and to vote for real progressives whenever possible (like Ocasio-Cortez) and to vote for a D in the general election.
The first thing I did when the primary ballot came in the mail was to sit down and cross off everyone that wasn’t a Democrat. Then I did my homework to determine what Democrats were worth voting for. It took me days to search for information about the remaining options.
In one case, I couldn’t find any info on one candidate and I send an e-mail to her campaign headquarters, an alleged Democratic candidate running for the Senate against Feinstein. I had already eliminated everyone else but those two competing for that position.
When the other candidate didn’t reply with answers to my questions, I wrote her off as a fraud or someone just running to bag brownie points — something to brag about to her friends — or she was a Koch brothers wolf wearing a Democratic label, and that left me with one last choice: Feinstein.
One major factor is that the candidate I voted for had to have a chance to win. In a few cases, there were other candidates that were the better choice but had no chance to win because they were not running a competent campaign and were not getting their message out.
We need people that can get their message out and be understood. I doubt if we will often find anyone that fits what we want 100-percent. If the glass ends up half full, that’s better than empty. If it is three-quarters full that is a lot better than half.
Yes, that’s what I do, too. I voted for a progressive in the NJ primary but will vote for Sen. Bob Melendez in the general election, warts and all. The GOP has to be kicked out, thrown out.
Menendez, darn spellcheck keeps changing it to Melendez.
California teachers have received the same email from an Amanda Burke at Mypaymysay.com–female to female communication. How special.
Same person who contacted NY teachers. If she exists. Maybe a pseudonym for Betsy DeVos.
How do these people sleep at night? As one of my students said, “On a ten thousand dollar mattress.”
Sorry–meant to post that in response to the question of how they sleep at night. On this one, I’d bet a nice chunk of money that Betsy has a minion to take care of that sort of things.
Teachers in Bridgeport, CT received the same email on Thursday. They were ready to “pounce.”
Hey, the Mackinac Center only wanted teachers to “know and understand what their rights are”. Just informing those teachers. Because they care so much.
They stuff their mattresses full of cash and broken dreams of working people.
Welcome to Michigan. The SlackofJaw Center has been attacking Michigan teachers for years. One of our most wonderful nonprofits in the mitten state.
Increasingly my “Rockefeller Republican” friends are becoming “Never Trumpers,” this is a once in a lifetime battle for the vert soul of our nation …. agreed, I vote for Democrats, and “winability” has to be the determining factor – Read Timothy Snyder, “On Tyranny,” chilling and a call to get off the couch and off the computer … and into the streets
It is hard to tell if this is fake news or raw anger. Phone threat to Mackinac Center reportedly from a teacher and union member.
http://www.wsgw.com/25959-2/
NY teachers were ready and waiting..This will make us stronger
My idea to keep the teachers’ union strong is, have the teachers that choose not to join the union, work the initial contract and salary proposal that a school board gave to a negotiating team. The non union teachers do not have the salary, perks, or protections that the district’s union eventually ratified.
Ex: school board proposes 0 % increase, $3000 personal medical deduction, and a longer school day and year. During negotiations the board agrees to, 3% increase, $1500 personal medical deduction and keep the school day and year as it always was. The non-union teachers works the initial school board proposals. No more help for non-union teachers from union efforts.
This just in from LoHud:
https://www.lohud.com/story/news/education/2018/06/28/teachers-emails-mackinac/743033002/
I will get right to the point:
Despite all the corruptions and incompetencies within unions (far more the former than the latter), and despite the utter complacency the AFT, NEA, UFT, and NYSUT have shown when this reform movement first took hold of NY State, we are all better off with unions than not.
But we are best off with reinvented unions. Unions, besides working with labor issues, also protect so many times the learning conditions of children and address health, safety, and educational compliance issues.
But it MUST be stated that if unions behave any more like Weingarten and Ianuzzi did – cooperating, experimenting, dancing, and practically sleeping with their reformers (Ianuzzi conceding to people at the One Nation Rally that reformers were more powerful than us, have more media resources than we do, and that “we can’t resist militantly” . . . . Weingarten taking money from Bill Gates and having him as key note speaker at an AFT convention . . . Muglrew embracing CCSS and the current APPR system, stating that he would “punch anyone in the face” who would try and take away such excellent policies . . . . ) and if unions don’t blow with this current wind for their constituents and if they don’t stay only on the side of teachers, children, AND FAMILIES, they stand not to survive.
I will continue to pay my union dues through thick and thin without signing any commitments (unless the union endorses Cuomo and not Nixon), but it’s also important for people to voice themselves within their unions and become part of the solution. In these especially volatile times, it’s important for unions to openly endorse pro-public school candidates and candidates would want to redistribute wealth in NY State for the public commons, and by that term, I don’t just mean public schools and public servants, but all services and products that ALL people benefit from (roads, tolls, bridges, mass transit, medical, etc.).
I think what Mulgrew said was that he would punch “anyone in the face who tried to take away Common Core.” Correct me if I am wrong.
Yes, CCSS. But he also favors the APPR the way it is, and it’s no good. NO test score should be tied to an evaluation, Diane. If it is, it should be but a very small percentage and never, ever rise above that. Kids are more than numbers.
Does UFT President Mulgrew expect people that want to take away is beloved Common Core to just stand there and let him hit them in the face?
I have a friend I’d pay $1000 to walk up the Mulgrew and tell him he wants Common Core gone. But Mulgrew must know ahead of time, he gets to throw the first punch but my friend is allowed to defend himself. I don’t have dental insurance but he has full coverage although I suspect Mulgrew would be on the ground and out in less than 2 seconds and his punch would never land.
“Teachers union honcho Michael Mulgrew unleashed a venomous screed directed at anyone who would dare threaten his beloved Common Core agenda.”
“When Mulgrew gets up there and does his Hulk Hogan routine and says he’s going to punch people for taking away Common Core. … It’s insulting,” he said.
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/education/michael-mulgrew-defends-common-core-punch-face-tools-article-1.1895301
Lloyd,
Mulgrew is a complete fraud. He’s Randi Weingarten in pants and balding hair.
… with a mouth that was cloned from Trump.
It’s happening in NJ, too.
They should be fined for sending political emails through public email systems. What’s even worse they’re unsolicited. Disgusting creatures. We are calling them to ask them to cease and desist. The people on the phone are confused and don’t know what to say. Slime.
If anyone wants to join us in telling them to get out of our business:
1-833-336-9729
mcpp@mackinac.org
They may have awakened a sleeping giant however. Their attempts to control teachers will most likely backfire. People are angry about so many things, that this is just one more thing that may push them over the edge.
The new voucher law in Arizona Includes a provision where “brokers’ get a cut of each voucher:
“There’s also no mention that the law Republicans want voters to approve allows for voucher “brokers,” third parties who could help families find money in exchange for keeping a percentage of whatever state dollars they get.”
https://tucson.com/news/local/democrats-object-to-gop-controlled-explanations-for-voters-of-ballot/article_c6288f36-5a93-590a-a7bc-766cac5d1f0f.html
It’s all about the kids!
Chiara,
This is not new in Arizona. Voucher groups keep a 10% Commission. One of the best paid voucher Leaders is in the Legislature. He passes the law, then cashes in.
Read here: https://dianeravitch.net/2017/03/08/kevin-carey-explains-how-tax-credit-vouchers-enrich-their-sponsors/
There’s a whole new genre of ed reform editorials:
http://educationpost.org/a-union-that-has-to-earn-its-members-and-their-money-is-a-union-i-can-support/
Where they pretend to support labor unions after 20 years of trying to destroy them.
They “support” labor unions, but only in theory – very much like how they support public education. The abstract concept, not the actual schools, students or teachers.
They will rejuvenate us:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jul/01/teachers-unions-supreme-court-janus-ruling
Here’s another article with a bit more detail: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/supreme-court-conservative-groups-workers-ditch-unions_us_5b3a733be4b07b827cb99d7b