Teachers Know Nothing About Politics

So says New York Assemblywoman Catherine Nolan.  

In a recent interview, the chair of the assembly’s education committee bemoaned the ignorance of educators, conflating their angst over laws levied against their livelihoods with their Albany naiveté:

"Sometimes I wish teachers would have a better grasp of the political process. Since Race to the Top, we’ve talked about teacher evaluation [sic] every year because we were sort of forced to by Race to the Top."                                                                  
                  Catherine Nolan (D-NY)
                  June 16, 2015

Though New York’s Race to the Top money evaporated high above the Catskill Mountains before any drops could trickle into classrooms, Nolan lamely implies that U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan will soon stride into schools across the state and ask for his money back if more teachers aren’t fired. 

When asked about her bill to inform families about abusive state tests, Nolan pivoted to Duncan’s infamous “white suburban moms” comment, blaming her legislative inaction on some federal monster stalking her in the gloom.

It should surprise no one, however, that Duncan does indeed resemble Dr. Frankenstein’s monster, ready to suffocate your child's school with douchebaggery:     
                                                                                  

Nolan proceeded to praise the “continuing process” of Albany—a state government which has historically been as fluid as a vial of horse manure. The careers of educators everywhere apparently now cling to the calves of leaders like Nolan, who three months ago voted to demolish teacher tenure while hitting our kids on their heads with mallets patented by Pearson.

Sadly, Nolan understands education about as much as teachers understand politics, yet parents, teachers and students suffer when ignorant assholes like Andrew Cuomo pass laws on behalf of billionaires.

When asked specifically about the teacher evaluation law she voted for—which includes a convoluted and clunky “matrix” to determine a teacher’s overall rating—Nolan would only say that she supports the seven six members of the Board of Regents who publicly rejected the ludicrous law.

If only Nolan agreed with the dissident Regents before she decided to enshrine the source of their rebellion into law.  

Though politics is a convenient scapegoat, Nolan and others must understand the educational process before surrendering to the political machine. Bad laws are worse than no laws, and take much longer to repeal. New York teachers will likely wait longer than prohibition before getting tenure back, for instance, and the opt-out movement balances on the border of oblivion, its fate likely residing in the Supreme Court.

If Race to the Top is truly to blame for Cuomo's quest to destroy public education, then New York teachers can expect even less help from Nolan should someone like Wisconsin Governor and Alfalfa's brother from another mother Scott Walker win the White House next year. Walker is determined to crush organized labor from the federal perch, and heavy-hearted, spineless democrats like Nolan will scurry beneath boulders if and when Walker assumes office.  After all, if politicians can’t stand up to their own party, they cannot be expected to stand against other parties.  

  

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker is not as innocent as he looks

Though teachers may not fully understand politics, they are at least starting to stand up for political change within their own union.

At NYSUT’s annual representative assembly in Buffalo last month, it was standing-room only at the inaugural meeting of Stronger Together, a union caucus formed last year to counteract the kowtowing complacency of NYSUT's current leadership. ST caucus seeks to engender an inclusive, proactive union, a union that hopes to see the train's headlights before tasting its wheels. 

NYSUT passed ST caucus-authored resolutions at the RA, for example, which denounce the Common Snore standards and their inane tests, and the UFT's Michael Mulgrew punched no teacher in the face.

Teachers union thugs in Buffalo

ST caucus will also help remind the public that although teachers may not fully grasp the realities of the political process, they do grasp its potentials, and know that a wise and just society does not place process over product.

New York's political process has left its schools with a rotten product, however, and Cathy Nolan and others seem okay with that, for now. 

Don't worry, teachers...the next legislative session is right around the corner...

Andrew Cuomo is No Friend to Labor

Big Jim Larkin: Enemy to Andrew Cuomo

100 years ago next July, 100,000 pounds of TNT permanently shut the Statue of Liberty's torch and shattered the stained glass of St. Patrick's Cathedral, a force felt as far away as Maryland.

The explosion was an attack by German secret agents on munitions barges parked at Black Tom Island in New York Harbor. The 2 AM uproar—which killed seven and approached 5.5 on the Richter Scale—is remembered as "one of the worst acts of terrorism in American history." Black Tom was a black eye for the United States as it ambled toward the Great War.  

With ISIS pissing its way across the Middle East and beyond, terrorism still persists, albeit absent the pickelhaubes and mustard gas.

The terrorists of today could be your next door neighbor, or even your child's school teacher, as Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker recently revealed.  

Walker compared protesters of his anti-union measures to those who like to film themselves cutting off people's heads. Interestingly, Walker's war on workers might propel him into contention for the White House in 2016, where he and his wealthy donors may fight teachers at home and murderous psychopaths abroad. Doubtless Walker and his burgeoning bald spot will find the military industrial complex just as generous to his campaign as the Koch brothers.

Not long after shrapnel struck Lady Liberty at Black Tom, a union organizer from Ireland was also branded a terrorist.

Fresh from leading Dublin's factory workers and their families through a harrowing eight-month lockout—a seminal moment in Irish labor history—James "Big Jim"Larkin traveled to Black Tom just before the explosion to help dockworkers fight for higher pay and better working conditions. Though he denied direct involvement in the attack, Larkin's union activism on the docks certainly didn't help weapons reach the allies any faster.  

It was Big Jim's forceful advocacy for workers and the union movement, however, and not the suspected sabotage at Black Tom that ensnared him in the First Red Scare of 1920, when Russian Bolsheviks were feared much more than ISIS is today. Big Jim's big mouth got him charged with "criminal anarchy" and sent to Sing Sing for three years just for speaking freely in a free country.

Imprisoning unionists for assault with the First Amendment is something Scott Walker and other candidates might consider in the lead up to the presidential auction election.   

Upon his release from prison in 1923, Larkin returned to Ireland and was hailed as a hero for his unionism and contributions to Irish independence. His exploits helped elect him to the newly formed Irish government, but he was not allowed to serve due to his bankruptcy. It seems Super PAC's didn't exist in Ireland in 1927.

Larkin continued fighting for working families until he died in his sleep in 1947, a legend of the labor movement. 

As he celebrated St. Patrick's Day 2015 at his mansion, New York Governor and corporate bootlicker Andrew Cuomo made no mention of Jim Larkin or the struggles of union workers. This should surprise no one considering Cuomo's bromances with billionaires and reckless crusade to "break" public schools.

Jim Larkin's grave shifted, however, when Secretary to the Governor Bill Mulrow thanked the administration's "friends in labor" at the reception.

If Andrew Cuomo is a friend, then who are labor's enemies? Scott Walker? ISIS? 

Andrew Cuomo is no friend to labor. 

Though Cuomo offered praise at the party for his Irish predecessor Al Smith, he didn't mention how Smith pardoned Larkin and deported him back to Dublin, sparing Big Jim from at least two more years in jail.

After all, Cuomo would deport all union members if given the chance, especially teachers.  

Working families throughout New York and the nation must care for their communities and just say no to the likes of Cuomo. Like the bullets and bombs at Black Tom, efforts to divide and conquer must be identified and incinerated before they create craters.    

Larkin's legacy will live on, as long as we let it.

The Oracles of Cuomo’s Orifices

The Pen is Mightier than the Person slogged through the sludge of New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s recent op-ed on education so you wouldn’t have to. You’re welcome.   

Cuomo begins with a long-winded olive branch that only pokes his audience in the ear:

The education system is deeply entrenched, localized, unionized and personal to the families of the state—as it should be.

Cuomo’s correct—public education is in a deep trench. Parents, teachers and students are taking cover against the bayonets of the governor’s billionaire bidders and the pernicious fumes of his budget. 

Cuomo bizarrely claims he prefers “unionized” schools while simultaneously auditioning for Scott Walker’s running mate. The AFL-CIO even passed a resolution demanding the removal of his education reforms from the budget, calling them a "circumvention of the collective bargaining process."
 
Cuomo’s anti-union stench only thickens further down the page:     

Not surprisingly, the teachers unions and educational bureaucracy oppose parts of my plan.

Wrong. Educators oppose all of Cuomo’s plan, including the current teacher evaluation law (APPR). Fueled by greed and hubris, it is a plan designed to undo the same schools Cuomo says are so “personal to the families of the state.”

There is no reasoning or reasons to compromise with someone who also writes:   

The acceptance and implementation of an evaluation system predates my administration.

Just like the state’s email-deletion policy predates his administration, so does the evaluation system Cuomo once wanted to “force down your throats.” In addition to emails, Cuomo would prefer to erase everything he has ever said about education, and it is impossible to decipher from which orifice his oracles are emerging:        

Virtually everyone also agrees that New York's teacher evaluation system is not accurate and is skewed in its construction to provide favorable results for teachers.

Who, exactly, is “virtually everyone”?  Virtually no one supports Cuomo’s plans, however, save those who stand to profit from the destruction of teachers unions.

The governor then turns wonky and indignant:

…only 38 percent of high school graduates are ready for college or careers. How can that be?

This nebulous number is allegedly the percentage of students on pace to score 1630 on the SAT.  The national average for the SAT is 1500, but that doesn't stop Cuomo from declaring 62 percent of kids unprepared for life. Though it’s not clear which colleges and careers these students are not “ready for”, Cuomo is not ready for a career as a statistician, or a realtor:

Suffolk County will want to know how its teachers and schools compare to those in Westchester County.

Right, because APPR scores are the first things people check before moving from Patchogue to Pleasantville. In fact, parents around the state have been so curious about how their own teachers rate that a whopping zero parents requested to see the scores in the cities of Syracuse and Rochester last year.

The Lobbyist for the Students next touts his heroism in the face of high-stakes tests:

I have signed a law reducing the significance of testing for students, including eliminating standardized testing for students in grades K-2 and removing standardized test results from students' permanent records for five years.

Cuomo thinks Common Core tests are so flawed that they shouldn’t count for students but should count against teachers. See the above reference to Cuomo’s orifices.     

Local school districts are then blamed, once again:  

My proposed reforms to the evaluation system reduce the amount of testing by eliminating the existing local component of the system that leads to more testing.

Though education should be “localized”, high-stakes tests should come from faceless, monopolistic corporations and be graded by people found on Craig’s List. The same tests Cuomo wants to banish from a student’s permanent record are somehow superior to tests created by that child’s teacher. See the above reference to Cuomo’s orifices.

The op-ed concludes in a fiery ball of ignorance and deception:

I have proposed that testing comprise 50 percent of the [teacher] evaluation. The State Department of Education suggests 40 percent. Still, teachers and administrators prefer that the emphasis be on classroom observation as opposed to testing. Interestingly, whatever percent is assigned to standardized testing will only affect a small minority of teacher evaluations as only 20 percent of teachers are in subjects and grades that have state testing.

The governor neglects to mention that per his budget, teachers rated ineffective on the testing component will be rated ineffective overall, regardless of how well their classroom observations go.  To further ensure failure, observations will be conducted by “independent evaluators” from outside the district. So much for a “localized” education system.

Furthermore, if local tests will not be used and 20 percent of teachers are tied to a state test, will tests comprise zero percent of the evaluation for the remaining 80 percent of teachers?

See the above reference to Cuomo’s orifices.  

Andy, Sandy and Friends

Behind every sociopath is a bad cook.

Just how much money did New York Governor Andrew Cuomo accept from a giant media company? 

News Corporation CEO and Walking Dead extra Rupert Murdoch must know, since the crustaceous oligarch reportedly paid Cuomo $700,000 to publish a book read by less people than this blog.  

Curiously, Murdoch and his Fox News Channel have also been kind to the governor’s live-in girlfriend, smiling TV chef Sandra Lee. Lee’s frequent appearances on Fox and Friends—semi-homemade advertising time for her books and brand—are also brought to you by News Corporation. Cuomo likely has less indigestion these days with Fox Cash lining the cupboards of the Mount Kisco mansion he shares with Lee.

After all, what’s good for the girlfriend is good for the governor.  
 

Sandy Lee: A Friend to Fox (and Andy C.) 

What exactly has Murdoch received from the state in return for his kindness to Cuomo and Lee?

Tax breaks, of course.

One of Cuomo's first acts as governor was to exempt News Corporation subsidiary HarperCollins from sales tax for e-books and online-only publications. While HarperCollins made $53 million in profits last year, the move has cost New York State at least $35 million a year since 2011, with the proportion of books now sold through small, independent book stores at less than ten percent nationwide.

Sadly, Murdoch’s money controls the media and many minds.

Speaking of minds, public schools in New York are due a lot more than $420 million, but Cuomo thinks this amount is better invested in Murdoch and tax breaks for the movie industry. Though box-office bombs like Fox’s Won't Back Down are optional nightmares for movie goers, insolvent school districts are not an option for parents, students and teachers throughout the state, thousands of whom have turned out at forums in recent weeks to tell Cuomo that they won't back down against his insidious need to annihilate their schools.    
     
Cuomo’s palms itch around billionaires, but curl into fists near kids. Withholding billions from their schools is no way for Cuomo to cement his self-created legacy as the Lobbyist for the Students, and neither is stripping teachers of their due process rights.  Besides, every principal knows that bad teachers usually fire themselves before submitting to the taunts of unruly students year after year. Those who do otherwise and still spend the majority of their adult lives helping other people’s kids are most often called former teachers. 

Of course, Cuomo’s war on union members is red meat for Murdoch and Fox, with the governor one Koch brother donation shy of sharing a ticket with Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker in 2016. Walker stood up for Murdoch recently when he promised to protect the elderly Aussie from ISIS, just like he protected other billionaire assholes from union members soon after assuming office.

Rupert Murdoch's Dream Ticket?

Walker stopped short of calling the brave unionists who stormed the Twin Towers on 9/11 terrorists, however. At least some middle-class workers are off limits these days.     

With their governor seeking to subsume public schools on behalf of his benefactors and pass ethics reforms aimed at his enemies only, New Yorkers have no choice but to resist Cuomo's reforms and refuse his tests. Though it's looking more likely by the day, they cannot wait for the U.S. Attorney to cart Cuomo away in cuffs; civil disobedience is a more direct path to democracy anyway.
         
Let Andy and Sandy know they are not your friends.

Don't take their tests, buy their books, or multiply Murdoch's money.      
      

Divide and Conquer—Cuomo Style

Part-time progressive Bill DeBlasio and full-time douchebag Andrew Cuomo are hearing it from unions these days in New York. Members of the Patrolman’s Benevolent Association (PBA) turned their backs on DeBlasio in Brooklyn, while leaders of New York State United Teachers (NYSUT) called Cuomo “clueless” and challenged him to a series of education shit shows town halls across the state. 

Cuomo, ever eager to bask in DeBlasio’s political fallout, has auditioned for peacemaker between the cops and the mayor, especially after PBA President Pat Lynch used the phrases “educate our children” and “blood on the steps of city hall” in back-to-back breaths following the recent murders of two uniformed cops.

In an interview before the shootings, Cuomo called Lynch a “friend” who was only doing his job as union president in moving to bar DeBlasio from police funerals:

"He was venting that emotion. He is standing up for the police, which is his job, and making the point that police need protection, too, in situations like this, and need respect and consideration in situations like this,” Cuomo told public radio’s “Capitol Pressroom” program.

 

On the other hand, Cuomo was outraged when NYSUT President Karen Magee vented her emotion and accused the governor of “doing the bidding of billionaires” when it comes to public education. The cowardly Cuomo responded through his spokeswoman, denouncing Magee’s statement as “mind-boggling” and “hostile.”

 

What would Cuomo have said if Magee had accused him of having the blood of public schools on his hands? 

The metaphor works in this case, since Andrew Cuomo has done more to destroy public education in New York State than Bill DeBlasio will ever do to destroy the New York Police Department.

Cuomo will never call for the same “respect and consideration” for teachers as he does the police. While public schools are a “monopoly” he’d like to “break”, the cops are the only ones blocking the barbarians from breaking down Cuomo’s gates.  

One can only imagine what Pat Lynch would say, for instance, if Cuomo threatened to break the PBA’s monopoly on law enforcement in New York City.    

It should surprise no one that the governor—who visited a whopping two public schools during his first term—was outraged more by comments aimed at hedge funders and their dystopian visions for public education than comments aimed at a fellow democrat and mayor of the nation’s largest city.
DeBlasio has at least attempted to stem the privatization of public education, and that alone quickly earned him a spot on the governor’s enemies list. 

A vindictive sociopath, Cuomo governs on personal vendettas, caressing his donors while plotting revenge against those who refuse to caress his fragile ego.      

Cuomo recently bemoaned being able to control education only through the state budget, even calling requests for more school aid “political correctness.”  With schools across the state slipping toward insolvency, Cuomo’s only objective is to repay his donors with more privately-run charter schools and pink slips for teachers.  

As this blog has urged again and again, NYSUT must move beyond strongly-worded faxes and petitions and take the battle for public education to Cuomo directly. 

It remains to be seen if the Lobbyist for the Students will show up and share his pernicious bloviations about public education at the NYSUT town halls. Though Cuomo apparently has no difficulty speaking to billionaires about education, he’s apt to retreat to his cave at the whiff of educators and parents who actually know what they’re talking about. It seems Cuomo is comfortable talking about education only with those who have more money and less expertise than he does.    

Though Cuomo will likely ignore NYSUT’s invitation to the town halls, Magee must push for this and other specific actions, calling out Cuomo in the press and trailing the governor and his slimy associates across the state. NYSUT spokesman Carl Korn recently offered a speck of hope this might happen: 

What worked for the anti-frackers will work for NYSUT, since public education and our environment each face existential threats.  

Teachers have an opportunity to answer Cuomo’s questions about education in-person this New Year’s Eve at his mansion in Albany. Though Cuomo will likely filter public employees from the visitors list—a driver’s license number is required to register—teachers could take a big step toward Cuomo in 2015 by stepping through his door on the final day of 2014.

Like the anti-frackers did, New York’s teachers must get in Cuomo’s face—even if he tries to hide behind the police. After all, when Cuomo calls for us to protect the police, he’s really calling for the police to protect him and his wealthy donors. 

And as long as the police are on their side, Cuomo and others will keep attacking labor. For as both Cuomo and Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker understand, workers must be divided before they can be conquered:

As Labor Lays Dying

For the first time in anyone’s memory, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo recently met with actual public school teachers. Sandwiched between three vociferous rallies against the Lobbyist for the Students and his slimy associates, Cuomo played the “Who, me?” card at the meeting, feigning ignorance about the slow-bleed of his tax cap and charter schools. While the governor may indeed be clueless about the pedagogical implications of his asinine reforms, he’s well-aware of whom his policies benefit—the richest Americans presently pilfering public education and splintering his campaign war chest. With Wisconsin Governor and collective-bargaining slayer Scott Walker jetting into New York City next month to fund raise for Republican candidate Rob Astorino, teachers across New York lack any reason to vote for either major party in this year’s gubernatorial farce election. The Working Families Party could soon add itself to this list should the party of so-called progressives vote to endorse Cuomo at their convention this weekend.  

Similar to Walker and other plutocratic politicians, Cuomo views labor as a nuisance, wishing for nothing more than a Supreme Court ruling against public sector unions in the case of Harris v. Quinn. Unlike Walker, however, Cuomo needs unions (for now) to help inflate his ballooning political ambitions should they hover toward the White House. As a Democrat, Cuomo seeks the support of labor in order to tout his liberal credentials on the national stage. Since New York’s largest teachers union (NYSUT) dictates the AFL-CIO's endorsement for governor, expect to see more sit-downs between Cuomo and teachers in the coming months. The union should work to make these meetings public, inviting any other "thought leaders" to attend.    

Christmas could come early for Cuomo, however, as the Supreme Court will soon rule on Harris v. Quinn. With the swing vote in the hands of conservative Justice Antonin Scalia, who recently seemed to argue in favor of collective bargaining, the Court is poised to castrate the labor movement with the stroke of a pen. Like a zombie infestation, free-loading union members would stagger from the shadows, desperate to save a few dollars on dues with charter school CEOs salivating on the sidelines.  Public sector unions and the horses they rode in on would soon wither and swirl beneath the shadow of Cuomo’s presidential balloon. With labor no longer a political factor, politicians of all parties would now compete for the highest corporate bidder. Workers would lose what voice they had amid a system representing the few instead of the many.

Quick to issue ultimatums to teachers about how they should be evaluated, Cuomo and others have failed to issue similar ultimatums about one of the most important issues of our time—campaign finance reform.  After all, why should they? Those in power realize the game is rigged for the richest, and only flirt with reform in hopes of winning the devotion of political parties and unions across the spectrum. In the end, Cuomo knows he only needs the support of the rich to survive, and will throw up as many roadblocks as it takes before a bill to truly get money out of politics arrives on his desk. 

Sadly, many of the working families who proudly support teachers have succumbed to Cuomo’s fiscal succubus, buying into his bloviations while inadvertently deepening the chasm of inequality across the state. Rather than cowering before Cuomo, these families must rally for public education.  Cuomo views education as merely a means to an end, however, and should unions come to an end, he’ll find other means. 
 
With crucial issues at stake in the election, NYSUT leadership continues to pace the sidelines, serving tepid cups of tea to membership about Cuomo.  Now is the time for NYSUT to lead the charge against Cuomo, Astorino, and all other voices on the take. New York’s teachers are poorly served by labor leaders reluctant to even shout Cuomo’s name at a rally, or print his name in a newspaper.

The power of unions resides in the voices of the many, drowning out those of the few. It is within labor's power to raise a candidate to political office willing to fight for workers. Unfortunately, NYSUT and other unions today see it as the other way around, pleading for a seat at the kiddies table instead. Those truly fighting for kids should be the adults in the room, however, and it is up to them to advocate for public education before our democracy no longer permits it.