Once again, we are reminded that charter schools are a Republican cause, and their champion is Betsy DeVos.
Mike Turzai, Republican Speaker of the House in Pennsylvania, was on his way to a meeting with Betsy DeVos when he encountered some public school teachers, who were picketing with signs saying they loved their public schools.
Turzai found this deeply offensive, and he proceeded to lambaste the teachers as a “special interest group” defending a “monopoly.”
In the video, Turzai praised charter schools, which receive government funding but operate independently of the public school system, saying that in charter schools. “you have to care about each child, not about the monopoly.” He then claimed that the public school advocates were part of a monopoly
“What you care about is a monopoly and special interests,” said Turzai, whose district encompasses the North Hills municipalities of McCandless, Pine, Marshall, Bradford Woods, and Franklin Park.
One of the advocates then said, “I am little offended from that,” to which Turzai responded, pointing to the posters they were holding, “Oh, I am offended by your posters.”
One poster read “I love public schools.” The other read “Public Money for Public Schools.”
We
our teachers.
Sincerely,
All of Pennsylvania
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It’s standard trolling to compare a governmental function with a commercial enterprise, confounding the proper concept, Sovereignty, with a semantic sleight of hand, Monopoly.
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Wonder who are “PAYING” him? Always follow the $$$$$.
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None of these sad and disgusting attacks should surprise any of us. The key, it seems to me, is to keep pressing forward with the work of rebuilding and reinvigorating public education. We also need to keep up with our homework. Some suggested readings: 1) Neil Postman’s The End of Education; 2) Ira Shor’s Culture Wars; and 3) Ronald Evans’ This Happened in America: Harold Rugg and the Censure of Social Studies. In addition to following the money (always important), I suggest we continue to sharpen our critical awareness of the larger contexts and actively engage in building knowledge democracies in schools (see Gerald Pine’s classic Teacher Action Research and publish something with Social Publishers Foundation – https://www.socialpublishersfoundation.org/kb-browse/education/. Peace. Lonnie Rowell
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Betsy Devos’ meeting where Turzai was challenged afterwards was held at a Catholic school. One of the views that media quoted, representing the church community was traditional and, consistent with evangelical opinion.
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Mike Turzi never attended public schools. . Even so, he knows they are all bad. He attended Catholic schools. He is a walking, talking example of bias.
He tangled with a retired pubic school teacher telling her she was part of the monopoly and “didn’t care about kids.” If Turzi finds people exercising their First Amendment rights offensive, he is in the wrong line of work. By the way privatizers are “special interest groups” backed by billionaire dark money. This guy is totally out of touch and should be voted out of office.https://www.abc27.com/news/local/harrisburg/speaker-turzai-calls-public-teachers-special-interest-people-who-dont-care-for-students/
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The Betsy DeVos event in Pennsylvania was hosted by Turzai, “the Pennsylvania Catholic Conference and, the Diocese of Harrisburg”, according to the U.S. Dept. of Ed.
Turzai’s bachelor’s degree is from the University of Notre Dame.
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Turzai sounds like a prosperity, Republican Catholic. His ideology is similar to William Barr’s.
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correction: Turzai
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What a jerk !
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Turzai was dismissive of women, which is characteristic of religiously conservative men. His political opponent in the next election is a woman, Emily Skopov. Mike pompously assumes he can beat Emily by getting the Catholic and evangelical women in his district to vote Republican. His campaign chest will be flush with billionaire money. Fifty-four percent of white women voted Republican in the 2016 presidential election.
An interview with Colleen McDonnell, author of, “The Political…Mormon Women”, tells the history of how the women of one religious denomination were stripped of their equal footing. Betsy DeVos is the face of the current attack against women from the evangel/Catho sect . Joseph Stuard’s interview (1-8-2019) in Religion and Politics gives us the cautionary tale of Mormon women.
The abortion issue is a political screen hiding the real agenda of the religious right, a contrivance created by Paul Weyrich, whose political schemes were funded by the Koch’s.
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Does Turzai reject public service or just teachers? If public teachers are a monopoly, then so are fire fighters and police officers. They are all public employees, and public education is a public service. Does he reserve his ignorant comments for the profession that is more than 75% female, or would he dare insult them as well?
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My take on this has always been that the school privatizers view teachers as “the help,” akin to low-paid, intentionally voiceless and powerless drudge workers, such as lawn maintenance workers, or domestic workers, cleaning homes and nanny-ing kids or manual car wash workers. As such, the billionaire privatizers believe that teachers are many steps below themselves, and, of course, also below the level of such true professionals such as doctors, lawyers, engineers, etc.
(Perhaps the privatizers take this position a priori because it leads to maximizing profits once privatization has been completed.)
As a Republican “prosperity” Catholic, Turzai likely employs such drudge workers and affords them the same total disrespect which he shows these teachers. (At the very least, one of this class of drudge laborers has parked his car, or bussed his table at a restaurant.)
The subtext of Turzai’s grotesque interaction with these two teachers is the same that he would have, should one of his drudge workers dare to voice any objections to their low salary or difficult working conditions — a facade of total condescension covering and smothering a volcano of barely concealed rage that such lowly scum has dared challenges his views or overall power. (There’s also the gender component that one of the other commenters mentioned. The fact that they’re women further stokes his rage.)
Watch the video again. This guy is totally passive aggressive, with Turzai’s ideology and superiority driving him to seethe with hate towards these two teachers.
Beneath the stock corporate-speak accusations and buzz words/phrases of being part of a “monopoly” or “special interests group” are entitlement and class superiority. If one could hear his interior monologue as he addresses these two teachers, it would go something like this:
“How dare you two lazy unionized workers stand up to me! How dare you question, let along complain about your lot!!! Or claim that you care about children???!!! You’re the lowest of the low, and you’re supposed to just STFU, and just do your work happily and stuff any objections you have regarding salary or working conditions or whatever!! And if you don’t, you’ll be fired and replaced by someone who will!!”
On this score, I agree with the 2011 words (BELOW) from UTLA’s Randy Childs. At the time, the former progressive, then-L.A.-mayor Villaraigosa had just joined the ranks of the school privatizers and made the same slanderous claims that the Pennsylvania governor makes in the video towards the two teachers:
Childs responds:
x x x x x x x x x. x x x x x x x x x
“These allegations come straight from Bizarro World, where the richest and most powerful people in the U.S. are cast as a plucky band of selfless rebels fighting for the civil rights of poor children of color, while dedicated and overworked teachers who can’t afford a house or pay for their children’s college tuition are imagined to be the greedy overlords of the old order.
“However, in the real world, UTLA fiercely supports–and has spent years fighting for–a whole array of school reforms that support student learning and would tremendously shake up the actual status quo in education.
“We have advocated for smaller class sizes, more art and music education, democratic and collaborative school governance models, progressive taxation to increase school funding, reducing the onerous burden of standardized testing, an end to scripted curricula imposed by LAUSD, and even overhauling teacher evaluations with mentoring and peer review, just to list a few.
“Such reforms would dramatically improve student learning, be easy to implement with adequate school funding, and even make the process of teaching and learning more enjoyable for all. The mayor and his corporate ilk know all this–but they don’t want you to know it. That’s because these genuine reforms would also empower teachers, parents and students at the expense of the LAUSD administration, fellow politicians, and big business.
“Meanwhile, the ‘reforms’ that Villaraigosa advocated in his speech are at the opposite end of the spectrum. They include increasing the number of privately managed charter schools, closing or reconstituting ‘failing’ schools, lengthening the probationary period for new teachers from two years to four years, eliminating seniority protections for teachers in job placements and layoffs, using students’ standardized test scores to evaluate teachers and as the basis for a ‘merit’ pay system, and making it easier to fire teachers.
“Each one of these measures weakens teachers’ rights at the workplace, forces students further into the restrictive box of standardized ‘bubble’ tests, and increases the leverage of the rich and powerful to force public education to serve their own narrow interests.
“Numerous education studies have failed to find any consistent positive effect on student learning caused by any of these ‘reforms.’ So it is only natural and completely justified for this business-driven campaign to meet resistance from teachers and our unions. In fact, we need that resistance to become stronger and better organized.”
x x x x x x x x x. x x x x x x x x x
Now while this piece was published at a socialist website and I’m no socialist, per se, I have to agree with it. You can find it HERE:
https://socialistworker.org/2011/01/06/anti-teacher-bizarro-world
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The richest 0.1%’s minions like Turzai, adopt the attitudes of their masters. Jerry Falwell Jr. picked up the condescension and phrases from the donor class like “meeting payroll”, “starting a business from nothing” and applied them to himself, in spite of the fact that he inherited his dad’s job.
A few years ago there was a case in Silicon Valley in which all of the major companies colluded to keep software engineer salaries low.
The rich loathe servants irrespective of the servants’ level of expertise.
Men from the religious right and the majority in the tech field dislike women in the same way Trump does.Recently, it was, I think, the Texas state house speaker who was in the spotlight for calling two of the female legislators, vile and disgusting. He disparaged some men but, chose different adjectives. Trump reserves certain words for women, also.
The rich shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near productive people nor their children.
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Seriously, watch the video again — Turzai’s fulsome hatred for these two female teachers is palpable, and barely kept under wraps:
Of course, Turzai also offers the baloney about charter school “waiting lists.”
These claims have the same credibility and validity as O.J. Simpson’s insistence that he’s still, decades later, searching for the real killers of his wife and that other man (while O.J. spends every damn day golfing.) Every single time someone has investigated and gotten the actual data, the charter school “waiting list’ claims have been thoroughly debunked.
Furthermore, whatever demand there actually is for charter schools has been driven by the systematic financial starvation and sabotage of the existing public schools, so as to make parents think charters are a better alternative.
That’s certainly the case in Philadelphia.
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What’s your thing with Mormons. Linda? You don’t even link the article, and you keep talking about Mormons with no context. Mormons are not evangelicals; in fact, some evangelicals hate Mormons.
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TOW
Thank you for reading my views. I appreciate hearing yours.
A link to a single source of info. increases likelihood of bias. I provide the info. to find an article which is located in the context of the entire search field. It encourages greater investigation and less likelihood of confirmation bias.
I followed a link to an article about homeschooling, which is, on occasion, described by the religious right as a “beautiful revolution”.The commenter’s linked article was supposed to be about child abuse statistics in homeschooling families. When I reversed the process and looked at the search results that included the link, I was shocked to learn how the search engine (Google) had, IMO, been gamed to produce pages of propaganda from related organizations.
There’s evidence that political motives have led the religious right to convince members of churches that Christians are under attack. Right wing PR tends to be effective as it is researched and designed to be with big dollar spending. The PR message gets people to give up their individual quest for what is right and to be led to protect the vested interests of the church leaders, instead. Men like Jerry Falwell provide example.
If the women of the Mormon faith, the women of the Catholic faith, or women of other faiths are standing against American oligarchy instead of voting as a majority for the agenda of the Koch’s, I’m not seeing it. If you reference an article for me, I’m willing to better inform myself.
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and being dismissive of women is a key factor in why so many legislators, religious or not, find no problem in curtailing teacher autonomy
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Yes.
Media reported that factories in Mexico give preference to women in hiring because they are less militant. If women don’t stand up, they get what is given to them not what is their right.
A female acquaintance who votes Republican said she was offended when a colleague of her husband said in front of her that women vote the way their husbands tell them to vote.
When I worked at the polls one year, my co-worker had to block a husband from going into the booth with his wife. The worker heard him bullying the while they stood in line to vote.
Trump has made the situation worse.
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Yes, Turzai’s target is women. When, the ALEC legislation to cripple public unions was making the rounds among states, many governors wanted to exclude the police and firemen.
Irony- Based on data, Turzai prefers plantation women who are TFA’ers, those who didn’t care enough about teaching to major in it and who have high turnover rates. He wants what’s best for the kids (sarcasm).
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Interesting that he would denigrate public school teachers the way he does, and then claim that he has/had public school teachers in his own family. I am sure they are pleased to hear what he thinks of them!
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It is characteristic of the mercantile mind — and this includes politicians who have been bought — to denigrate the People’s Sovereignty over everything the People need to thrive as if it were merely a market monopoly.
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Politicians use words with negative connotations to manipulate the public.
In Andrew Cuomo’s case, it has to do with his desire to spite teachers and public school parents for opposing him rather than a mercantile mind. More like an “infantile mind”.
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Just saying I recognize this monopoly mantra as a standard bit of ALEC/Koch/TeaParty ass/troll/turf from a decade ago. I saw it a lot when the Michigan GOP was privatizing the water supply in Pontiac to a company already under federal indictment. You see it anytime the corporate sector wants to raid the tax dollars in a public sector entity.
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“Turzai found this deeply offensive, and he proceeded to lambaste the teachers as a “special interest group” defending a “monopoly.”
Sounds just like Andrew Cuomo, a “Democrat” who also not long ago called public schools a monopoly that he wanted to bust.
Charters are a Republican cause, but also STILL a Democratic cause, though in most cases , a stealth Democratic cause in which many Democrats use code words to make the public believe they actually oppose charters and support public schools.
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A state GOP politician stated the situation more crassly to me He hatefully said he resented having to work to get campaign donations on his own while his opponent could rely on union contributions.
Rats move to get pellets. It’s their be all and end all.
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OK I’ll refrain from making jokes about this turkey’s name.
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You mean turdkey?
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Turdseye?
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Ok, I will now also refrain.
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The Turdseye view
Turzai has a turdseye view
Bashes teachers till they’re blue
Thinks that schools are cartels too
Praises charters, right on cue
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😀
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In Harrisburg, the combined Catholic/evangelical population is 25%.
Nationally,”Trump’s split was +11 among the voting population who selected
Italian American as the heritage they most identify with.” As corroboration, “In NYC, Trump swept the field in the heavily Italian areas.” Eleven per cent of Pennsylvanians are of Italian descent.
Turzai made a rousing endorsement for the campaign of Rick Saccone. Encyclopedia.com says most Italian Americans are Catholic. The aforementioned source also elaborates on the views of Italian American about race.
The campaigns of Catholic, Italian-American candidates in regard to public education will be interesting to watch as was Paladino’s in Buffalo, N.Y.
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Here’s the refrain
Turzai has a turdseye view.
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That was supposed to go up there after bethrees comment.
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OMG Linda now Italians too. Lay off.
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McConnell attended a class in tribalism at the Kennedy School of Government. It was taught by a Kentucky lawyer who was later, selected by a male, Catholic student to represent him against the media covering the event in D.C. where the school’s students
participated in a Right to Life event. Republican support in the community is more fervent now than it was before. The tribe is among Ky. Gov. Bevin’s core base which explains why his ads drill down on a single point, the position of his opponent on abortion rights.
The dog whistles of the GOP are used because they are successful in provoking implicit bias. Ignoring the religious and ethnicity of whites in patterns of voting, what a novel idea. Wait…been there, done that… more than 1000 legislator and governor seats lost in 8 years
Lots of luck to Beshears against Bevin.
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Another politician beholden to the corporate billionaires who are trying to privatize public education… the true “special interests.”
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Catholic greed for community tax dollars intended for education makes the church a poor steward of democracy and the American Constitution.
Catholic cover-up of priest abuse makes the church a poor steward of rule of law.
Dioceses and DeVos plotting together make them enemies of the common good.
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