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“Democracy”: Setting the Record Straight, Part 2: Yes, Putin Did Interfere in 2016 to Help Trump

By dianeravitch
June 9, 2024 //
65

When a commenter belittled Russian interference in the 2016 election, Democracy returned to provide the evidence of Russia’s active and considerable interference in the election of 2016. The election of Trump was a major coup for Putin.

Democracy wrote:

“Whatever meager influence Russian may have had …”

I suppose this is an improvement over “The fact remains that there is no evidence for Russian involvement in the U.S. election at all.”

This, written at a time when there was — IN FACT – LOTS of evidence of Russian involvement in the 2016 election, from virtually every intelligence agency in the United States government:

US Intelligence news release on October 7, 2016:  

“The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations. The recent disclosures of alleged hacked e-mails on sites like DCLeaks.com and WikiLeaks and by the Guccifer 2.0 online persona are consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts. These thefts and disclosures are intended to interfere with the US election process. Such activity is not new to Moscow—the Russians have used similar tactics and techniques across Europe and Eurasia, for example, to influence public opinion there. We believe, based on the scope and sensitivity of these efforts, that only Russia’s senior-most officials could have authorized these activities.”

https://www.dni.gov/index.php/newsroom/press-releases/215-press-releases-2016/1423-joint-dhs-odni-election-security-statement

Reuters:  “The Federal Bureau of Investigation, Central Intelligence Agency and Office of Director of National Intelligence agree that Russia was behind hacks into Democratic Party organizations and operatives ahead of the Nov. 8 presidential election. There is also agreement, according to U.S. officials, that Russia sought to intervene in the election to help Trump, a Republican, defeat Democrat Hillary Clinton.”

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-russia-cyber-idUSKBN14H1SR

There are some people who apply the Trumpian tactic on Michael Cohen to this information, suggesting that because, at certain times in the past, some of these agencies have had credibility issues.

Except, here, private cybersecurity experts have confirmed the information. As The Daily Beast reported in 2017,

“it was a respected computer security company called Crowdstrike that examined the servers, and publicly revealed Russian’s involvement in the DNC hacks last year. It backed up the claim with specific technical information far more useful than anything in the DHS report. Crowdstrike competitors, including Symantec and FireEye, have examined the forensic data from the DNC hack themeselves, and endorsed Crowdstrike’s conclusion that two particular hacking groups were the culprits: ‘Fancy Bear’ and ‘The Dukes.’

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/01/06/how-the-u-s-enabled-russian-hack-truthers.html

Here’s how Thomas Rid, formerly at the Department of War Studies at Kings College London, and now the Director of the Institute for Cybersecurity Studies at Johns Hopkins, and who studies and writes about technology and cyber warfare, puts it:

“the evidence is so rich that there are only two reasons not to accept it — one, because you don’t understand the technical details, or because you don’t want to understand it for political reasons… It’s really not controversial that we’re looking at a major Russian campaign.”

Former George W. Bush speechwriter David Frum summarized the whole sordid affair well:

“the outline of the case is no mystery…Democratic and Republican Party servers were hacked by foreign agents, yet the Moscow-friendly folks at Wikileaks somehow only obtained the contents of Democratic servers…Meanwhile, Donald Trump ran a campaign that seemed almost designed to please Russian President Vladimir Putin…The campaign then rewrote the Republican platform in ways sure to please Putin. Trump selected as his principal foreign-policy adviser a retired general previously paid by Russia’s English-language propaganda network, RT…Trump himself publicly urged the Russians to do more hacking of his opponent’s email…Trump endorsed Putin’s war aims in Syria…He suggested he would not honor NATO commitments against Russia…He condoned the invasion and annexation of Crimea…Do Americans really need secret information from the CIA to discern the pattern here?”

Yet there DO appear to be SOME people who still try to play off the Russian ratf*cking as some kind of climate-change-like “hoax.”

Some of them even think that they’re “smart.”

But, hey, I got some news.

Categories Accountability, Corruption, Democracy, Disruption, Elections, Lies, Trump

Thom Hartmann: What Trump Predicted About Hillary Came True for Him

By dianeravitch
June 8, 2024 //
19

There’s an old saying that you should never wish misfortune on others, because it might happen to you. It happened to Trump! Thom Hartmann has an interesting insight about the historic conviction of a former and perhaps future President.

First Prez convicted of a Felony in history… At a Reno, Nevada campaign rally in 2016, Donald Trump said of Hillary Clinton, “We could very well have a sitting president under felony indictment and ultimately a criminal trial. It would grind government to a halt.” He elaborated at a campaign rally in Concord, North Carolina, saying: “If she were to win, it would create an unprecedented Constitutional crisis that would cripple the operations of our government. She is likely to be under investigation for many years, and also it will probably end up — in my opinion — in a criminal trial. I mean, you take a look. Who knows? But it certainly looks that way.” He added that, because of the possibility she could become a felon, “She has no right to be running, you know that. No right!” Now Trump has been twice found by juries of his peers to have raped a woman, was convicted of fraud with his phony university, busted for running a fake charity and stealing money intended for kids with cancer, and his company was convicted of tax and insurance fraud. With more to come, should the six corrupt Republicans on the Supreme Court and Florida’s Aileen Cannon ever let his cases proceed. Karma, as the old saying goes, can be a bitch…

And now Trump is running as a convicted felon!

Categories Accountability, Elections, Hillary Clinton, History, Trump

Disgusting! Pennsylvania GOP Legislators Jeer 2 Capitol Police Officers Who Defended Capitol on Jan. 6

By dianeravitch
June 6, 2024 //
21

There is something about the MAGA movement that is corroding the moral and ethical standards of our country. Evidence occurred when two members of the Capitol Police who defended the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, appeared before the Pennsylvania legislature recently. Some members of the GOP booed; some walked out.

What kind of lawmakers are they? Don’t they take an oath to defend the U.S. Constitution? Did they want the mob to seize the Capitol and take hostages? Did they want the mob to hang Mike Pence? Does the oath allow disgruntled people to try to overthrow the government?

No, this is what the Pennsylvania Constiturion says: 

 "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support, obey
     and defend the Constitution of the United States and the
     Constitution of this Commonwealth and that I will discharge the
     duties of my office with fidelity."

The Washington Post reported:

Two former law enforcement officers who defended the U.S. Capitol from rioters during the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection were jeered by state GOP lawmakers as they visited Pennsylvania’s House of Representatives on Wednesday, according to several Democratic lawmakers present.


Former U.S. Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn and former sergeant Aquilino Gonell were introduced on the floor Wednesday as “heroes” by House Speaker Joanna McClinton (D) for having “bravely defended democracy in the United States Capitol against rioters and insurrection on January 6.”
As the two men — both of whom were injured by rioters on Jan. 6 — were introduced, the House floor descended into chaos. According to Democratic lawmakers, several GOP lawmakers hissed and booed, with a number of Republicans walking out of the chamber in protest.


“I heard some hissing and I saw about eight to 10 of my Republican colleagues walk out angrily as they were announced as police officers from the U.S. Capitol on January 6,” state Rep. Arvind Venkat (D) said in a phone interview Thursday. “I was shocked and appalled,” he added. According to Venkat, the commotion lasted about five minutes. Fewer than 100 lawmakers, evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats, were present in the chamber before the chaotic scene unfolded, he said.

Categories Accountability, Democracy, Disruption, Elections, Ethics, Extremism, Justice, Trump

Nicholas Kristof Said It Best: The Moral Dilemma in Gaza

By dianeravitch
June 6, 2024 //
56

I have written it again and again: The war in Gaza is complicated. There is no simple “right side” and “wrong side.” The war should end as soon as possible. Both sides have committed terrible atrocities and crimes against humanity. The only way out is through negotiation. All the hostages must be returned, alive and dead. The end result must include plans for a Palestinian state.

Nicholas Kristof said it best in yesterday’s New York Times:

I’ve been on a book tour for the last few weeks, speaking around the country, and one of the questions I get asked most often isn’t about my book at all but along the lines of: What should I think of the war in Gaza?

The toxic public debate is dominated by people with passionate views on both sides, but most people I meet are torn and unsure how to process the tragedy that is unfolding. That makes sense to me given how exquisitely complex real-world ethics are, as much as we may yearn for black-and-white morality tales.

With that in mind, I’d like to offer this highly personal road map for thinking about the war. Here’s a set of morally complicated, sometimes contradictory principles for a nuanced approach to sort out the issues.

1. We think of moral issues as involving conflicts between right and wrong, but this is a collision of right versus right. Israelis have built a remarkable economy and society and should have the right to raise their children without fear of terror attacks, while Palestinians should enjoy the same freedoms and be able to raise their children safely in their own state.

2. All lives have equal value, and all children must be presumed innocent. So while there is no moral equivalence between Hamas and Israel, there is a moral equivalence between Israeli civilians and Palestinian civilians. If you champion the human rights of onlyIsraelis or only Palestinians, you don’t actually care about human rights.

3. Good for President Biden for pushing a proposal on Friday for a temporary cease-fire that could lead to a permanent end to the war and a release of hostages; as he said, “It’s time for this war to end.” Let’s hope he uses his leverage to achieve that end. It’s also true that Biden’s failure to apply enough leverage over the last seven months has made the United States complicit in human rights abuses in Gaza, because it has provided weapons used in the mass killing of civilians, and because it has gone too far in protecting Israel at the United Nations.

4. We can identify as pro-Israeli or pro-Palestinian, but priority should go to being anti-massacre, anti-starvation and anti-rape.

5. Hamas is an oppressive, misogynistic and homophobic organization whose misrule has hurt Palestinians and Israelis alike. But not all Palestinians are members of Hamas, and civilians should not be subject to collective punishment. In the words of a 16-year-old Gaza girl: “It’s like we are overpaying the price for a sin we didn’t commit.”

6. There was no excuse for Hamas attacking Israel on Oct. 7 and murdering, torturing and raping Israeli civilians. And there is no excuse for Israel’s reckless use of 2,000-pound bombs and other munitions that have destroyed entire city blocks and killed vast numbers of innocent people, including more than 200 aid workers.

7. When Israel began military operations after Oct. 7, it was a just war.

8. What starts as a just war can be waged unjustly.

9. Israel was entitled to strike Gaza after the Oct. 7 attack, but not to do whatever it wanted. In particular, there should be no argument about Israel’s practice of throttling food aid. Using starvation as a weapon of waragainst civilians, as the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court alleges Israel has done, is a violation of the laws of war.

10. Each side justifies its own brutality by pointing to earlier cruelty by the other side. Israelis see Oct. 7. Palestinians see the “open-air prison” imposed on Gaza before that. This goes all the way back to the displacement of Palestinians at Israel’s founding in 1948, the 1929 massacre of Jews at Hebron, and so on. Enough obsession with the past! Let’s focus instead on saving lives in the coming months and years.

11. Hamas’s brutality toward Israeli hostages, such as credible reports of sexual assault and starvation, is unconscionable. So is Israeli brutality toward Palestinian prisoners, such as CNN accounts that some Palestinians have had limbs amputated because of constant handcuffing.

12. War nurtures dehumanization that produces more war. I’ve heard too many Palestinians dehumanize Jews and too many Jews dehumanize Palestinians. When we dehumanize others, we lose our own humanity.

13. Zionism is not a form of racism. And criticism of Israel is not antisemitism. Both sides are too quick to fire such epithets.

14. Each side sees itself as a victim, which is true — but each side is also a perpetrator.

15. “Apartheid” isn’t the right word for Israel today, where Palestinians are treated like second-class citizens but can still vote, serve in the Knesset and enjoy more political freedoms than in most of the Arab world. But “apartheid” is a rough approximation of Israeli rule in the West Bank, where Arabs have long been oppressed under a system that is separate and unequal.

16. “From the river to the sea” refers to the dream of a single state from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, encompassing what is now Israel and the Palestinian territories. The slogan as used by protesters can mean many different things, some peaceful and some the militaristic vision of the Hamas charter, while a parallel vision is in the original platform of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party. Hamas imagines a Palestinian state with no room for Israel, and Netanyahu wants perpetual Israeli sovereignty from the river to the sea to deny a place for a Palestinian state. I think that instead of either version of a one-state solution, a two-state solution is infinitely preferable.

17. Pro-Palestinian demonstrations have too often tolerated strains of antisemitism, which in recent months has shown itself to be stronger than many imagined. How can a movement that claims the moral high ground make excuses for any kind of bigotry?

18. Campus protesters would do more good raising money for suffering Gazans rather than using it to buy tents for themselves.

19. We probably know what an eventual Israeli-Palestinian peace deal would look like. The plan was outlined in the Clinton parameters of 2000 and in the Geneva Accord of 2003. The only question is how many innocent people on both sides will die before we get there.

20. To establish peace, both Israel and the Palestinian Authority will need new leaders with vision and courage. This won’t be achieved tomorrow. But there are peacemakers on each side. To understand how a path toward peace may emerge, consider the words of the Chinese writer Lu Xun more than a century ago: “Hope is like a path in the countryside. Originally, there is nothing — but as people walk this way again and again, a path appears.”

A wise Palestinian from Jenin, Mohamed Abu Jafar, whose 16-year-old brother had been shot dead by Israeli forces, told me last year: “They can’t kill us all, and we can’t kill them all.” That leaves, he said, one practical option for all of us: working for peace.

Let’s get to it.

Categories Accountability, Extremism, Failure, International

Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: Vouchers Are a Disaster

By dianeravitch
June 6, 2024 //
4

The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities is a nonpartisan, nonprofit research organization in D.C. Its reports are widely respected. Earlier this week it released a scathing report about the damage that vouchers do to American education. Vouchers subsidize the tuition of 10% or less of students, mostly in religious schools, while defunding the schools that enroll nearly 90% of all students.

Joanna Lefebvre wrote for the Center:

During this year’s legislative sessions, at least one in three states are considering or have enacted school voucher expansions alongside broad, untargeted property tax cuts. Over half of states have already enacted deep personal and corporate income tax cuts in the last three years. These policies will result in under-resourced public schools, worse student outcomes, and, over time, weaker communities.

Research suggests property tax cuts result in disproportionately less funding for districts serving large numbers of students of color and that school funding matters more for these students’ life outcomes because of historical and systemic racial discrimination. States wishing to ensure a quality education for all children should instead invest in public schools, reject K-12 voucher programs, and pursue only targeted property tax relief.

Property tax cuts reduce funding for public education at its source. Revenue from local property taxes accounted for over 36 percent of public education funding in the 2020-2021 school year, the most recent year for which national data are available. States have a long history of weaponizing this policy design, using their property tax codes to limit education funding for Black and brown students. For example, California’s infamous 1978 Proposition 13, which limited property taxes to 1 percent of a home’s purchase price, passed with primary support from white property owners amid a campaign of thinly veiled racism and xenophobia about paying for “other” people’s children to go to school.

Vouchers Divert Money from Public Schools and Get Worse Academic Outcomes

K-12 vouchers also siphon funding away from public schools. Voucher programs can take many forms, but all use public dollars to subsidize private school tuition. Some voucher programs defund public education directly by siphoning off funding that otherwise would have gone to public schools. Others do so indirectly by reducing revenue available for all public services, including education.

Modern school vouchers have their roots in similar programs created after Brown v. Board of Education to perpetuate segregation and exacerbate inequities. This vision can be seen in today’s programs, where most vouchers go to families with high incomes. Although data on the race and ethnicity of voucher recipients themselves is scarce, white students make up 65 percent of private school enrollment in the U.S. but only 45 percent of public school enrollment. Defunding public schools through vouchers and property tax cuts exacerbates inequities in educational outcomes, which often fall along lines of race and class due to the persisting effects of slavery and segregation.

A trend has emerged of states proposing or enacting school voucher programs while simultaneously cutting, limiting, or proposing to eliminate property taxes.Florida, Texas, and Idaho are leading examples of this trend.

  • Florida: This year, a Republican representative introduced a bill to study eliminating Florida’s property tax system. Property taxes generated $14 billion in the 2020-2021 school year (the most recent for which data are available), equivalent to almost 40 percent of Florida’s K-12 education funding. Meanwhile, the legislature passed a budget in early March that includes about $4 billion for private school vouchers, a significant portion of the $29 billion appropriated for K-12 education.
  • Texas: Last year, Governor Greg Abbott called two special legislative sessions and spent seven months lobbying lawmakers to pass a school voucher system without success. The voucher proposal would have cost Texas school districts up to $2.28 billion. However, the legislature approved over $18 billion worth of property tax cuts, with 66 percent of benefits accruing to families making more than $100,000, putting pressure on future education budgets.
  • Idaho: Last year, Idaho’s legislature passed property tax cuts totaling $355 million, equivalent to over half of property tax revenue for schools. Although some of this funding was replaced with general fund revenue to repair the state’s abysmal school facilities, the overall reduction in revenue jeopardizes the state’s long-term ability to fund education. Meanwhile, this year, the legislature tried and failed to pass a school voucher bill that would have cost the state over $170 million.

Other states where both school vouchers and property tax cuts are being considered this year include Alabama, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, Oregon, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Wyoming.

Broad property tax cuts and caps will not address housing affordability. Property values have risen by about 37 percent since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, and some proponents of property tax cuts argue they will help make housing more affordable. However, most of the proposals being debated would do little to help while stripping resources from public education. Instead of broad property tax cuts or caps, states should adopt “circuit breaker” policies that respond to residents’ ability to pay without limiting revenue-raising capacity.

States should raise revenue equitably and invest in robust public schools. Research suggests the education attainment gap between children from low-income families and those from higher-income families can be eliminated with increased funding for public schools. Raising revenue to invest in public education and resisting calls to dismantle it through school vouchers and property tax cuts is critical to enabling thriving communities with broadly shared opportunity.

States are defunding public education by reducing revenue available for schools through property taxes and by diverting public dollars to private schools.

Categories Accountability, Corruption, Cruelty, Disruption, Education Industry, Elections, Privatization, Research, U.S. education, Vouchers

Stephen Dyer: Public School Funding in Ohio Drops Dramatically as “Choice” Expands

By dianeravitch
June 4, 2024 //
3

Stephen Dyer, former state legislator in Ohio, wrote in his blog “Tenth Period” that the 85% of Ohio’s children who attend public schools are being shortchanged by the state. First the state went overboard for charter schools, including for-profit charters and virtual charters and experienced a long list of money-wasting scandals. Then the state Republicans began expanding vouchers, despite a major evaluation showing that low-income students lost ground academically by using vouchers. As the state lowered the restrictions on access to vouchers, they turned into a subsidy for private school tuition.

He writes:

Since 1975, the percentage of the state budget going to Ohio’s public school students has dropped from 40% to barely 20% this year — a record low.

This is stunning, stunning data. But the Ohio General Assembly and Gov. Mike DeWine today are committing the smallest share of the state’s budget to educate Ohio’s public school kids in the last 50 years. And it’s not really close.

What’s going on here?

Simple: Ohio’s leaders have spent the last 3+ decades investing more and more money into privately run charter schools and, especially recently, have exploded their commitment to subsidize wealthy Ohioans’ private school tuitions. This has come at the expense of the 85% of Ohio students who attend the state’s public school districts. 

Look at this school year, for example. In the budget, the state commits a little more than $11 billion to primary and secondary education. That represents 26.6% of the state’s $41.5 billion annual expenditure. However, this year, charter schools are expected to be paid $1.3 billion and private school tuition subsidies will soar to $1.02 billion (to give you an idea of what kind of explosion this has been, when I left the Ohio House in 2010, Ohio spent about $75 million on these tuition subsidies). So if you subtract that combined $2.32 billion that’s no longer going to kids in public school districts, now Ohio’s committing $8.7 billion to educate the 1.6 million kids in Ohio’s public school districts. That’s a 21.1% commitment of the state’s budget. 

Some perspective:

  • That $8.7 billion is about what the state was sending to kids in public school districts in 1997, adjusted for inflation.
  • The 21.1% commitment currently being sent to kids in public school districts is by far the lowest commitment the state has ever made to its public school students — about 7% lower than the previous record (last year’s 22.2%) and 20% lower than the previous record for low spending in the pre-privatization era. 
  • The voucher expenditure alone now drops state commitment to public school kids by nearly 10%.
  • The commitment to all students, including vouchers and charters, represents the fifth-lowest commitment since 1975. Only four years surrounding the initial filing of the state’s school funding lawsuit in 1991 were lower. The lowest commitment ever on record was 1992 at 25.2% of the state budget. Don’t worry, though. Next year, the projected commitment to all Ohio students will be 25.3% of the state budget.
  • What is clear now is that every single new dollar (plus a few more) that’s been spent on K-12 education since 1997 has gone to fund privately run charter schools and subsidize private school tuitions mostly for parents whose kids already attend private school. 

What’s even more amazing is that even if charters and vouchers never existed and all that revenue was going to fund the educations of only Ohio’s public school students, the state is still spending a smaller percentage of its budget on K-12 education than at any but 4 out of the last 50 years. And next year it’s less than all but 1 of those last 50 years.

Ohio’s current leaders have essentially divested from Ohio’s greatest resource — its children and future — for the last 30 years.

Please open the link and finish reading the post. Ohio has also slashed funding for public higher education.

Does this disinvestment in children and higher education make any sense? Who benefits?

Categories Accountability, Budget Cuts, Charter Schools, Corporate Reform, Corruption, Education Industry, Ethics, Extremism, For-Profit, Fraud, Funding, Ohio, Privatization, Religion, Separation of church and state, Vouchers

Jan Resseger: Why Do Ohio Republicans Hate Public Schools?

By dianeravitch
June 3, 2024 //
11

In Ohio, as in every other state, most children go to public schools. You would think that their elected officials would work hard to ensure that their district’s public schools are well-funded. In red states like Ohio, you would be wrong. Safe in their gerrymandered districts, Republicans are shoveling money to charters and vouchers, not public schools. Their generosity to nonpublic schools ignores the long list of scandals associated with charters, as well as their poor performance. Nor are Republicans concerned by the lack of accountability of voucher schools, not to mention their discriminatory practices.

Jan Resseger wonders whether Republicans care about the education of the state’s children. Answer: No. They have higher priorities, religious and political.

She writes:

On Tuesday, the Ohio Capital Journal’s Susan Tebben reported: “Ohio House Democrats have laid out a plethora of bills targeting the education system in the state, impacting everything from teacher pay to oversight of private school vouchers and the overall funding of the public school system…’Our principles are pretty clear on that front,’ said House Minority Whip Dani Isaacsohn, D-Cincinnati. ‘There is no better investment we can make in the future of our state than investing in the education of our students, and that every kid, no matter which corner of the state they grow up in, deserves a world class education.’

There is a problem, however, blocking most pro-public school legislation. Only 32 of 99 Ohio House members are Democrats, and in the Ohio Senate, only 7 Democrats serve in a body of 33 members. Due to gerrymandering, the Ohio Supreme Court rejected the district maps that are being used today, but the Court did not enforce its ruling. This means that, except in the state budget where compromises sometimes are demanded, most of the Democratic priorities languish.  In the recent budget, the legislature enacted a second stage of the three-budget, phase-in of a new public school funding formula, but it was accompanied by a universal private school tuition voucher expansion.

Here, according to Tebben, is what has happened to a bill to prioritize and protect the new public school funding formula:

“At the top of the (Democrats’) list is House Bill 10, which seeks to hold legislators to the six year phase-in plan that was assigned to the Fair School Funding Plan, legislation that funds public schools based less on property values and more on the needs of individual school districts.  HB 10 is a bipartisan bill which simply ‘expresses the intent of the General Assembly to continue phasing in the school financing system,’ which was inserted in the 2021 budget bill, ‘until that system is fully implemented and funded,’ according to the language of the bill.  The bill was introduced in February 2023 and quickly referred to the House Finance Committee, but has not seen activity since.”

Ohio’s gerrymandered Republican supermajority won’t commit to the eventual full funding of the state’s public school system because, they say, revenue projections are unsure in the context of growing privatization and years of cutting taxes in budget after budget.

Ohio’s gerrymandered Republican legislators instead operate ideologically and far to the right.  After Governor Mike DeWine vetoed a bill to deny medical care for transgender youths last winter, legislators immediately overrode the veto.  Far-right bills from the American Legislative Exchange Council and other bill mills, and bills endorsed by the extremist but powerful Columbus lobby, the Center for Christian Virtue, now housed in the building it purchased across the street from the Statehouse, dominate legislative deliberation and get lots of press.

Please open the rest of this important post.

Categories Accountability, ALEC, Bigotry, Charter Schools, Disruption, Education Industry, Elections, Ethics, Extremism, Failure, For-Profit, Funding, Ohio, Vouchers

A Contest: What Should D.J. Trump’s Punishment Be?

By dianeravitch
June 1, 2024 //
126

Former President Trump will be sentenced by Judge Juan Marchan on July 11. What should be his punishment for the 34 counts on which the jury found him guilty?

Please offer your idea.

Here are a few suggestions.

My partner—a retired history teacher— thinks he should be required to spend 1,000 hours studying the Constitution, civics, and American history. She thinks the course should be taught by Liz Cheney and Jamie Raskin. Since neither has 500 hours to spare, their teaching could be supplemented by noted scholars and high school teachers. Trump would be tested periodically to measure his progress.

I think he should be sentenced to 1,000 hours of community service, working in facilities that serve the poorest and neediest in society. He might serve meals to the homeless. He might assist in places that care for the most severely disabled children and adults. He could change their diapers, clean up after them, do whatever staff asks him to do to ease their days. Maybe he would learn empathy.

What ideas do you have?

The winner will be announced before the actual sentencing on July 11.

Categories Accountability, Civics, Corruption, Democracy, Equity, History, Trump

Pasadena, CA: School Board Votes Against Including Charters in Parcel Tax

By dianeravitch
May 29, 2024 //
4

The board of the Pasadena Unified School District debated whether charter schools should share in the receipts of a new tax. The board voted 4-3 not to include the charters. The three members who voted in favor of including the charters said that the votes of the parents of 2,000 charter students would help meet the 2/3 majority needed to pass the tax. The four who voted “no” held that charters are independent of the district and should not benefit from its taxes. The members opposing the sharing said that the charters could affiliate with the district but they choose not to.

The Pasadena school board considered a resolution to approve an education parcel tax for the ballot in the November 2024 election. The resolution was moved for approval and seconded. The board discussed and voted down an amendment in the ballot language to add charters as beneficiaries of the measure.

Board President Kim Kenne and Members Patrick Cahalan and Tina Fredericks voted to add charter schools as beneficiaries of the parcel tax on the November ballot.

Member Cahalan appreciated the public comments from charter supporters whose families have students in both regular PUSD schools and charter schools. The district’s survey about the November measures showed the potential support for passing this measure and the facilities bond is very close to the ⅔ needed for passage. He wanted the support of the approximately 2000 charter school parents to get it over the threshold. He proposed a board resolution to spell out the sharing of monies…

Those voting against the amendment were Michelle Richardson-Bailey, Patrice Marshall McKenzie, Yarma Velazquez and Jennifer Hall Lee.

Vice President Hall Lee spoke about having charters in the district authorized by other entities, not PUSD, like the L.A. County Board of Education. She spoke of the history of charters. While initially founded to help the public schools, they have become competitors and have become anti-union. She said she is a union-supporter, and she believes there is competition between charters and PUSD schools, like in Altadena. She spoke against the argument that charters are needed to be cutting edge options. PUSD is recognized in state education circles as a cutting edge district of excellence. Later in the meeting she mentioned that members of the California Charter Schools Association (CCSA) were present earlier. She found that CCSSA is funded by the Walton family, and a director of CCSA is also an employee of Walton Enterprises. The wealth of the Walton family is problematic when the CCSA threatens legal action against the district.

Member Marshall McKenzie introduced herself to the charter supporters in attendance, who had referred to her by a shorter version of her name not used by her. She spoke about her deep roots in the community and in PUSD public schools; her parents attended PUSD schools. She spoke of her university training in state public universities, her full commitment to public education as democratic, a creator of society, a lever of economic mobility, and a center of community. These things are really important to her and are why she ran to be on the board of education. She was not prepared to entertain or accept any amendments tonight, as those are longer conversations.

Member McKenzie said that she was clear on the nature of charters as separate Local Education Agencies (LEAs), which have the ability to raise money from their parents, and which get their own Average Daily Attendance (ADA) money from the State. These funds do not go to PUSD. She pushed back on the charter supporters’ comments about inclusion and building community, saying, “If you are willing to convert your charters to be affiliated charters or dependent charters, let’s have that conversation about how we build community and how we serve all of the students in the area of the Pasadena Unified School District because now we’re all public schools.” She said she has been consistent on this point.

Member McKenzie made the same argument back in 2019 at the joint meeting of the City Council and the PUSD Board, when charters wanted some of the Measure J sales tax monies. At the time she said, “Since charters are their own LEA, that would be like PUSD giving Measure J money to Glendale Unified. We would not do that. So why would we give these dollars away as well?  I just don’t understand the logic in that.  So right or wrong, I’m going to be consistent in my position on that.” She struggles with the situational alliance with PUSD. “When it’s convenient for you, you want to be PUSD kids, you want to be public school kids, and when it’s not convenient for you, you’re very happy to divest… I feel like right now you’re not with us; it’s for your personal benefit and not for the greater good of the community.”

Like Vice-President Hall Lee, she referred to the origin of charter schools as being the center of innovation and providing flexibility for educators in curriculum development and with staffing, but charters have gone far away from those principles in the current charter and school landscape. “We simply just cannot afford to fund two systems out of one pot of money, and what you’re asking us to do is to dilute this one small pot of money even smaller.” She referred to the parcel tax amount being small compared to PUSD’s state funding and budget challenges. Yet she said she was very supportive of the bond and the parcel tax as a voter and a property owner who is happy to make the investment in public education. She reiterated that charters could have the same flexibility in curriculum development and staffing and special programs if they were PUSD-affiliated charters, but if they aren’t willing to have that conversation, she stated that she’s  not willing to go down this road of sharing funding. Member McKenzie ended by saying she can’t support the amendment without a longer dialogue and a building of community with those in charters.

Regarding the argument about losing the votes of many parents with children at both a charter and a PUSD high school, Member Velazquez said, “They have the choice to support our public high schools. I support our PUSD teachers; I support our PUSD staff. I am a proud CFA (California Faculty Association, the faculty union for the CSU system) member. I am a proud educator in the public education system in this beautiful state of California. I am a ‘NO’ on the amendment.”

Categories Accountability, Budget Cuts, California, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Education Reform, Funding, Walton Foundation

Politico: Explosion of Choice in Florida Dooms Many Public Schools

By dianeravitch
May 29, 2024 //
17

Ron DeSantis has been determined as governor of Florida to privatize the funding of schools, and he has had a compliant legislature to help him achieve his goal of destroying public schools.

Andrew Atterbury of Politico wrote about the fiscal crisis of many public school districts as they lose students to private schools, charter schools, religious schools, and home schools.

Most vouchers are claimed by students already enrolled in private schools—a subsidy for the rich and upper-middle-class—but the public funds are causing serious enrollment declines in some districts. Those districts are now considering closing public schools as tax money flows to unaccountable private schools.

Atterbury writes:

Gov. Ron DeSantis and Florida Republicans have spent years aggressively turning the state into a haven for school choice. They have been wildly successful, with tens of thousands more children enrolling in private or charter schools or homeschooling.

Now as those programs balloon, some of Florida’s largest school districts are facing staggering enrollment declines — and grappling with the possibility of campus closures — as dollars follow the increasing number of parents opting out of traditional public schools.

The emphasis on these programs has been central to DeSantis’ goals of remaking the Florida education system, and they are poised for another year of growth. DeSantis’ school policies are already influencing other GOP-leaning states, many of which have pursued similar voucher programs. But Florida has served as a conservative laboratory for a suite of other policies, ranging from attacking public- and private-sector diversity programs to fighting the Biden administration on immigration.

“We need some big changes throughout the country,” DeSantis said Thursday evening at the Florida Homeschool Convention in Kissimmee. “Florida has shown a blueprint, and we really can be an engine for that as other states work to adopt a lot of the policies that we’ve done.”

Education officials in some of the state’s largest counties are looking to scale back costs by repurposing or outright closing campuses — including in Broward, Duval and Miami-Dade counties. Even as some communities rally to try to save their local public schools, traditional public schools are left with empty seats and budget crunches.

Since 2019-20, when the pandemic upended education, some 53,000 students have left traditional public schools in these counties, a sizable total that is forcing school leaders to consider closing campuses that have been entrenched in local communities for years.

In Broward County, Florida’s second-largest school district, officials have floated plans to close up to 42 campuses over the next few years, moves that would have a ripple effect across Fort Lauderdale and Hollywood.

The district has lost more than 20,000 students over the last five years, a decline that comes as charter schools in particular experienced sizable growth in the area. Enrollment in charters, which are public schools operating under performance contracts freeing them of many state regulations, increased by nearly 27,000 students since 2010, according to Broward school officials.

Broward County Public Schools claims to have more than 49,000 classroom seats sitting empty this year, a number that “closely matches” the 49,833 students attending charter schools in the area, officials noted in an enrollment overview.

These enrollment swings are pressing Broward leaders to combine and condense dozens of schools, efforts that would save the district on major operating costs. So far, some of the ideas are meeting heavy resistance…

Enrollment among charters has increased by more than 68,000 students statewide from 2019-20 to this school year, according to data from the Florida Department of Education. More than a third of that rise happened in Broward, Duval and Miami counties alone.

Private school enrollment across Florida rose by 47,000 students to 445,000 students from 2019-20 to 2022-23, according to the latest data available from the state. Much of that growth is from newly enrolled kindergartners, with only a small fraction of these students having been previously enrolled in public schools, according to Step Up for Students, the preeminent administrator of state-sponsored scholarships in Florida.

A growing number of families also chose to homeschool their children during this span, as this population grew by nearly 50,000 students between 2019-20 and 2022-23, totaling 154,000 students in the latest Florida Department of Education data.

As all of these choice options ascend, enrollment in traditional public schools across the state decreased by 55,000 students from 2019-20 to this year, state data shows. But enrollment isn’t down everywhere. While Duval County has lost thousands of students, enrollment is up by more than 7,700 students at neighboring St. John’s County, the state’s top-ranked school district…

The state’s scholarship program is expected to grow, which could lead to more students leaving traditional public schools. While most new scholarship recipients previously attended private schools already, there is space for 82,000 more statewide — nearly 217,000 total — to attend private school or find a different schooling option on the state’s dime next school year.

Across the state, public schools are facing budget cuts, layoffs. and school closures, all to satisfy Gov. DeSantis’ love of school choice. Over time, billions of public dollars will flow every year to unaccountable private schools that are allowed to discriminate. And the outcomes will be worse, not better, as students flock to low-cost schools whose teachers and principals are uncertified.

It the main win for DeSantis is to subsidize the cost of private schools for parents whose children were already enrolled in private schools.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Competition, DeSantis, Disruption, Education Industry, Extremism, Florida, Funding, Home Schooling, Privatization, Religion, Separation of church and state, Vouchers
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