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TechnoratiObama Slam-Duncans Education
Hey, you Liberal Democrats. You may have won the election, but you're getting CREAMED in the transition.
Today, President-elect Barack Obama stuck it to you. He's chosen Arne Duncan as Secretary of Education.
Who? Duncan is most decidedly not an educator. He's a lawyer. But Duncan has this extraordinary qualification: He's Obama's pick-up basketball buddy from Hyde Park.
I can't make this up.
Not that Duncan hasn't mucked about in the educational system. Chicago Boss Richie Daley put this guy in charge of the horror show called Chicago Public Schools where Duncan turned a bad system into a REALLY bad system.
And Obama knows it. Indeed, although he plays roundball with Duncan (who was captain of the Harvard basketball team), State Senator Obama was one of the only local Chicago officials who refused to send his kids to Duncan's public schools. (The Obamas sent Sasha and Malia to the Laboratory School, where Duncan's methods are derided as dangerously ludicrous.)
So, if The One won't trust his kids to Duncan, why is he handing Duncan ours?
The answer: Duncan is supported by a coterie of teacher-union hating Republicans. The vocal cheerleader for the Duncan appointment was David Brooks, the New York Times columnist; the REPUBLICAN columnist.
Hey, didn't those guys LOSE?
The problem with Duncan is not party affiliation. The problem is education philosophy. And Duncan is a Bush baby through and through, a card-carrying supporter of the program best called, "No Child's Behind Left."
At the heart of the program is testing. And more testing. Testing instead of teaching. When tests go badly, the solution is to push the low-test-score kids to drop out of school. If triage isn't enough, then attack their teachers.
Here's how Duncan operates this Bush program in Chicago at Collins High in the Lawndale ghetto. Teachers there work with kids from homeless shelters from an economically devastated neighborhood. Believe it or not, the kids don't get high test scores. So Chicago fired the teachers, every one of them. Then they brought in new teachers and fired THEM too when, surprise!, test scores still didn't rise.
The reward for a teacher volunteering for a tough neighborhood is to get harassed, blamed and fired. Now THAT'S a brilliant program, Mr. Duncan. But Duncan's own failures have not gotten HIM fired. As long as his 20-foot jumpshot holds, he's Mr. Secretary.
In no other cabinet department is the lack of expertise, lack of accomplishment, lack of a degree in the field found acceptable but in Education.
But what horrifies me more than Duncan's lack of credentials is Obama's kowtowing to the right-wing clique crusading against the teachers' union and progressive education. The ill philosophy behind the Bush-brand education theories Duncan promotes, "Teach-to-the-Test," forces teachers to limit classroom time to pounding in rote low-end skills, easily measured on standardized tests. The transparent purpose is to create a future class of worker-drones. Add in some computer training and - voila! - millions of lower-income kids are trained on the cheap to function, not think.
Analytical thinking skills, creative skills, questioning skills are left exclusively to privileged little Bushes at Phillips Andover Academy or privileged little Obamas at the Laboratory School.
For the rest of America's children, instead of hope, we'll have hoops.
107 Comments so far
Show AllGuess what Barack Obama's #1 priority is -- SERVING THE INTERESTS OF THE OLIGARCHIC-FEW!!!!
To all those "soft-left" suckers who voted for Barack Obama, instead of supporting a third party movement (Nader, McKinney, or whatever socialist was on your ballot), what the hell did you expect?
America will continue to move to the right, thanks to the con job pulled off by Barack Obama, the DLC and the political establishment as a whole. ...
And it was so damn easy there's no reason to expect that they won't keep doing it election after election. With of course the aid and comfort provided by the soft left.
Question: What is Obama going to do with all those CHANGE signs? ... ANSWER: Change them to AUSTERITY signs.
Imagine how hard it would have been for John McCain to
a.) continue the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan;
b.) start up other wars (Pakistan, Iran);
c.) allow the military the option of using nuclear weapons in Iran;
d.) increase the Pentagon budget;
e.) reinstate the draft;
f.) continue class warfare against the poor, the working poor and the middle class;
g.) continue underfunding education.
But no problem for Con Man Obama. ("Hey, if Obama and his Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, sez we have to nuke/annihilate the Iranians then, gosh, I guess we do.")
Once "our savior," Barack Obama is now (surprise, surprise!) "hitting the ground running" when it comes to bailing out the economic elite and screwing what's left.
And to those trusting souls who think Obama will all of a sudden become a progressive once in office, dream on. ...
-- See "Obama picks Wall Street insider to head main regulatory agency " http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/dec2008/sec-d19.shtml
-- See "Obama, in a ‘slap in the face,’ invites right-wing evangelist to the inauguration" http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/dec2008/warr-d19.shtml
-- See "Obama’s defence appointee signals continuing US belligerence" http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/dec2008/gate-d16.shtmlthe
The chickens have come home to roost and sadly -- pathetically -- the soft-left is, as usual, in denial.
What do you have to say now Katrina Van however-you-spell-your-last-name (editor of The Nation magazine)?
What do you have to say now Norman Solomon, Obama delegate to the Democratic National Convention?
What do you have to say now Tom Hayden, you remarkable phony?
What do you have to say now CommonDreams.org, lover and advocate of the "lesser-of-the-two-evils" con?
DEMOCRATIC PARTY APOLOGISTS UNITE! YOU HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE BUT YOUR SELF-RESPECT!
Then again, no real hardship will befall the likes of those just named -- after all, they're members of the same privileged class Obama is. ... Or hadn't you noticed?
Why would anyone believe that Obama would appoint an EDUCATOR?
I mean, one of the aspects of the Bush legacy he is ready to bronze is the gutting of education.
Here in the Third World it's always worked that pols can do whatever the fuck they want if they keep the potential voters ignorant, illiterate and too poor to go to school with food in their stomachs.
When no oxygen bathes the brain, it doesn't work.
And the US is clearly oxygen-deprived.
See the idea for a shadow cabinet posted earlier by smendler. Here are the official Cabinet nominees so far. Can we start thinking of Peoples' Nominees or nominees for the Shadow Cabinet? Those would be well informed advocates for the environment, peace and economic well being of the ordinary people. Think of those who have expertise in these areas and whose commentary you would like to see put forward on TV shows or editorial pages to examine and do some reality checking on the opinions and proposals being offered by the official Cabinet members.
Position------------------------- Cabinet Nominees
1. Secy. of State ___________________ Hillary Clinton
2. Secy. of the Treasury ____________ Tim Geithner
3. Secy. of Defense _________________ Robert Gates
4. Attorney General _________________ Eric Holder
5. Secy. of the Interior ____________ Ken Salazar
6. Secy. of Agriculture _____________ Tom Vilsack
7. Secy. of Commerce ________________ Bill Richardson
8. Secy. of Labor ___________________ Hilda Solis
9. Secy. of Health & Human Services _ Tom Daschle
10. Secy. of Housing and Urban Dev._ Shaun Donovan
11. Secy. of Transportation _________ TBA -
12. Secy. of Energy _________________ Steven Chu
13. Secy. of Education ______________ Arne Duncan
14. Secy. of Veteran Affairs ________ Eric Shinseki
15. Secy. of Homeland Security ______ Janet Napolitano
16. Administrator of the EPA ________ Lisa Jackson
17. Dir. of Office Mgmt & Budget ____ Peter Orszag
18. Dir. of Natl Drug Ctrl Policy ___ TBA -
19. US Trade Representative _________ TBA -
PS - I need Namaste to show me how to control column lineups on these posts
Joe
I never understood why people thought Obama was (still is) some kind of Moses, come to lead them out of the Repug wilderness into a land repleate with milk and honey, or a facsimile thereof.
Both Obama and Bush share a number of traits in common:
a) they're unseasoned political hacks who are naive about the world beyond CONUS...
b) both govern by proxy;
c) both have made empty promises;
d) both are capitalist warmongers;
e) both risen quickly thru the political ranks with nary a stop in between;
f) both have masqueraded as commoners;
g) both never been in a combat zone, a firefight, "heard" the bullet, or felt the pain of a burning wound, fear and loneliness, or seen their comrades blown to smithereens, or been medevaced out to a field hospital....
NCLB is the evil spawn of the globalization of our economy. That process is at the very foundation of business model for schools, charters, vouchers, data driven instruction, merit pay, standardized testing, and most perversely of all, paying students to consume the corporate version of knowledge. It was the reason the Business Roundtable and Bill Gates were so instrumental in getting this absurd and perverse legislation passed. The CEO's wanted a profit making private school system. In the new economy there would be Wal Mart and security guard jobs or the military for the kids that used to go to public schools.
These Reagan revolutionaries had a good run, in fact their campaign appeared ready to bear its bitter fruit. They had public school system wreckers like Michelle Rhee, Joel Klein and Arne Duncan in place. But gosh, just then their rationale for being, their precious global economy, crashed! Why in just the past month they have had to do $326 billion CPR on Citigroup and scrambled to rescue the Big Three. Madoff has made off with their savings. Their pride and joy is on fire. It was supposed to be immutable. It was eternal! Now that attitude's all gone. There's only panic now.
Any talk of NCLB are prayers said over a corpse. Obama's pick for Secretary of Education reflects his inability to yet grasp that the world he used to live in is about to evaporate. He will soon be fighting off the coup makers.
The great transition is coming! And no sorry-assed basketball playing education bureaucrat like Arne Duncan can do anything about it. In fact, he'll be swept away by it.
"Teachers there work with kids from homeless shelters from an economically devastated neighborhood. Believe it or not, the kids don't get high test scores. So Chicago fired the teachers, every one of them.'
Oh the horror, people actually expected to DO THEIR DAMN JOB. Maybe it's a tough job, no doubt it is, BUT YOU FAILED AT IT, so we're going keep firing people until we find someone who can do it.
Oh nwfisher, what do you do for a living? Do you work 60+ hours a week for our nation's children like my colleagues and I do? Your words are clearly spoken by someone completely ignorant of what it takes to master curricula and teach children. Trying to jam facts down the throats of hungry, ill, unhappy children from poverty-stricken homes may sound easy to someone who is clueless about education, but the complexities of so many children's lives make the job of today's teachers a mix of social workers, nurses, therapists, parents, and teachers. You should try it. And NCLB has been a failure on every level, just like the rest of the bush administration's policies. Maybe we should start listening to those of us with 8, 10, 12 years of education IN education and 10, 20, 30 years of working WITH our children... what a concept!
nwfisher if right. Liberals and democrats have been in charge of the education system forever. Their solution is always to throw more money at the problem. That hasn't worked so let's try making teachers responsible.
Not every student is capable of college nor do they need it for jobs in the service industry which provides the most jobs. Maybe teachers should keep their politics out of the classroom and focus on readin',ritin' and rithmatic' for a while.
"Liberals" have NOT been in charge of anything in decades, and sadly, that doesn't appear to be changing. What do you mean "throw more money at education?" Do you know what you're talking about? Money that goes to corporations to pay for standardized tests (very expensive) and teacher tests (very expensive) is NOT money "thrown at education." Money should go to our educational system- smaller classes are KEY, and less testing and more diverse educational tools would help ensure a well-rounded education for our children. Reading, writing, and math are all critically important; so are history, science, art, health, music, technology... You have to know what you're talking about to chime in on this. Maybe you should at least sub for a week to get a feel for it... then you would have a fraction of a clue of what it means to be a teacher. Of course, to teach you need at least a master's degree plus continuous coursework throughout your lifetime, but at least being in a classroom even for 50 hours would give you SOME credibility. I find it ironic that those with the strongest opinions on education are by far the least educated. Also, what do you mean we should keep our politics out of the classroom? What does that have to do with anything? Teachers are the experts here, not pundits.
"Liberals and democrats have been in charge of the education system forever" is more evidence of rote learning from regressive talking points memos by dittoheads (No Conservatives Left Behind). Obviously, "throwing money at problems" only "works" when money is thrown at the Pentagon, corporations, and Wall Street. Then it's OK. But for students and teachers it's bad.
I taught English literature and writing in public junior and senior high school for 32 years and enjoyed most of it. I know from that experience that small class sizes (which means more well-trained and well-supervised teachers are needed), supportive students' home environments, and administrators who truly care about learning (NOT test scores) make the biggest difference in giving students a chance to truly learn. I retired just before Bush's anti-education NCLB program became more widespread, and just before cell phones with text-messaging became ubiquitous among my students.
In our post-literate society in which critical thinking is fast becoming extinct as more and more people are treated as commodities for the empire to abuse, then discard, true education is no longer prized. Democracy is thus endangered while corporatocracy grows more powerful. Obama sadly seems to be heading into this dead-end, as his choice of Duncan (and other regressives) indicates.
gwenhale:I salute you. Happy New Year. I did the hard work for 5 years, decades ago. The beaurocracy was disgusting in NYC Public Schools. I went to my dream of art, did a 2+year art project in a public school for a foundation many years later. People have no idea. My spouse is a teacher in a community college;school loans for his PhD will go on for the rest of our lives.... Teachers are born, but anyone with good intentions can learn to teach, and alas, we never fade away... Tracy Kidder's book "Among Children",1989 is old but still good for folks who want to know what it's like being in a classroom. It's not like our memories of childhood in school.
And so... are the new teachers succeeding? Did the firings fix the problem? Was it the particular teachers or was it a job nobody could accomplish given the time and tools they had?
Joe
Unfortunately, things don't look too hopeful. Obama will never say "change we can believe in" again, by the looks of things. Instead, it's all about the need for the public to sacrifice... sacrifice... sacrifice.
The appointees are so far across-the-board supporters of the privatization of education at all levels, from grade school through graduate school. Larry Summers? Check.
Even the cheers for David Chu for DOE, head of Lawrence Livermore, ring a bit hollow. He may be able to remake the DOE into something other than a nuclear weapons & cleanup program, but it's unlikely. The details of LLNL's agreement with the University of California, Bechtel and BWXT mean that the nuclear weapons production agenda is still firmly in place, by all accounts. Similarly, LLNL is involved in the massive expansion of biowarfare research in the U.S., thanks to the still unsolved anthrax attacks of 9/18 and 10/9 (no, it wasn't Ivins). The Z-division within LLNL is a joint CIA-DOE group that specializes in things like "Red Teaming" biological weapons - i.e., making new biological weapons using the justification that we need to "know what's possible". Chu was the director of LLNL, so he must be aware of and involved in these programs, to some extent.
For more on the reason why it wasn't Ivins who sent the letters, as well as on the strange aspects of Project Bioshield and the DHS / HHS / Army contracts involved, see the Baltimore Examiner, Nov 20:
http://www.baltimoreexaminer.com/local/112008anthrax.html
"The FBI insists Ivins sent the letter, even though several leading scientists say it would have been impossible for Ivins, who died this past July 28 after overdosing on prescription Tylenol, to have committed the crime. (Read Part I of this series at baltimoreexaminer.com.)"
"The case is solved. We are 100 percent sure that Dr. Ivins was the sole perpetrator of the anthrax mailings," said FBI spokeswoman Debbie Weierman.
"While doubt about Ivins’ guilt lingers in the science community, there is strong evidence the attacks saved the program."
"Three months after the attacks, the FDA relicensed BioPort’s Michigan plant, and by the end of 2003, the company (now Emergent BioSolutions Inc.) signed a new $245 million contract with the Pentagon."
"The next year the company built a $95 million anthrax vaccine plant in Frederick and secured a $122.7 million contract from the Department of Health and Human Services to provide five million doses of the vaccine for civilian use in the event of an emergency."
Thus, just as with "The Insider", the FBI appears to be protecting corporate interests who benefited from the anthrax attacks by using the convenient suicide of Ivins to close the case - but who doubts that if Hatfill had also committed suicide in 2002, the case would have been closed then?
One big stinking rotten nest - and they've appointed the new lead out of the upper rank-and-file. No, doesn't look good at all... just more propaganda.
Here's the best take so far on why it couldn't possibly have been Ivins:
http://www.baltimoreexaminer.com/local/crime/Scientific_impossibility.html
Steven Chu (not David) is the director of Lawrence Berkeley Labs (not Livermore) which is a premiere physics research lab. Go look it up: LBL is not the same thing as the Livermore Lab.
This is getting better and better. Old Barry isn't going to be as good as you "progressives" thought or as bad as us "realists" thought.
George Bush couldn't keep a straight thought when speaking but Barry can look you right in the eye and lie, just like Bill Clinton.
Some change, huh?
Whether from Sarah Palin or Lisa Madigan, fake news and especially, fake outrage, is annoying. Journalists, check your facts first, consider the source, then corroborate, before pumping out position statements :
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-duncan-bioboxdec16,0,5858189.story
Greg Palast--the Progressive Drudge cum O'Reiley. It is an indictment of our bad taste that such tackily accessorized writing ("no Child's left behind" and "slam-duncans") is carried without disclaimer in the Nation and at CD.
Poet
Poet:good morning. Another early bird. Good holidays to you and H. New Year. I've enjoyed your comments. I see your point, but I wouldn't equate Palast with the two you did. Have you seen Palast's website? His work on BBC TV news and DemocracyNow is/has been good. He is a bit of a drama queen (but so's my spouse). His book, "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy" is really good.
NYCartist that is exactly my point--
I am no indicting Greg Palast because, as a regular viewer of Democracy Now, I am familiar with his capacity to dig out stuff and think unconventionally. Amy Goodman has even gotten him to lose the hat and drop the tabloid hyperbole of late.
Rather, I am indicting the schlock dumbed-down taste of the reading and viewing public that requires him to wear that silly fedora pulled down too low covering his eyes and engage in such literary stunt writing and speaking as I indicated earlier.
Shalom aleichem and a Joyous Chanukah to you--
Poet
Poet:sometimes I don't get a point. Aha. Translate "shalom aleichem" for me, please. I know Shalom is peace. There's a good Israeli peace group:Gush Shalom Peace Now. I don't celebrate Chanukah (but I sure do appreciate your putting the C on there;I hate the new spelling on cards,calendars with only an H). I skip all December holidays, but give good greetings to those who do. (I don't send cards. Some years I do art for Jewish New Year, an opportunity to do political art.) I do celebrate all New Year's that I know of:Jewish, the CE Common Era, the calendar we all use, Chinese...If you know of others, holler.... PS I think he wears a hat to cover hair loss, not to look like the jerk who is copying Walter Winchell,but who knows...which is, in Yiddish, "ver vase".
.and the proper response is Aleichem Shalom, or , if one is in an Arab nation, Alech'em Salaam....
.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
ardee:I was having a "senior moment". I listen to WBAI www.wbai.org and the latter is of used by callers at times. Good "whatevers" to you in re Dec./New Year's. On another article comment (on Falk being expelled from Israel/not let in; in headlines column), Thomas More told me you,too were in Vietnam. I am so very sorry. But glad you are OK. "Landsman" was for men,I think, so I didn't reply. I once asked someone on another site, what "mensch" was for a woman and he couldn't find it. I'd like good translation from you, for "chutzpah". And when I think of A. Nin, I think of a certain kind of fiction,so I smile at your quote, always.
.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chutzpah
Chutzpah (IPA: /ˈxʊtspə/) is the quality of audacity, for good or for bad. The word derives from the Hebrew word ḥuṣpâ (חֻצְפָּה), meaning "insolence", "audacity", and "impertinence." The modern English usage of the word has taken on a wider spectrum of meaning, however, having been popularized through vernacular use, film, literature, and television.
This might help with the Yiddish..Look up Lantzman and I believe you'lle find it isnt gender specific.
http://www.hebrew4christians.com/Glossary/Yiddish_Words/yiddish_words.html
.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
ardee:I'll have to stick with "gumption". Where'd you grow up? Lantzman was not used much where I grew up in Brooklyn. You are very serious in this comment, ardee. Oy. And in my memory only about someone from the same country. hebrew4christians has both definitions for lantzman,yours and mine. What a website name. And the Mets signed a pitcher named Putz for the bullpen. See Newsday online,sports section of homepage. Article says "it's pronounced puts not putts." Ha ha. Try telling that to NYers!
ardee:I'll have to stick with "gumption". Where'd you grow up? Lantzman was not used much where I grew up in Brooklyn. You are very serious in this comment, ardee. Oy.
.Brooklyn! Brooklyn! That really chaps my hide...I was born in the Bronx, thus we seem to be mortal enemies.....Well, maybe in jest only.
.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
ardee:I ended up with a duplicate and after not being able to fix it, found yours. Does it count if I had relatives in the Bronx? Do you mean as in Yankees? I hate the Yankees.
.I ,too, despised the NY Yankees, rooting for front runners is too easy. I was, and still am, a Giant fan! A giant Giant fan! So obviously I hated the Dodgers too! Oh and still do too! I miss the Polo Grounds!
.
You get a pass in the "I hate everything Brooklynese Dept." Just as Thomas gets a pass for being unfortunate enough to live in Texas.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
Shalom Aleichem means "peace to you"--it was also the pen name of a well known Jewish folk author. I do not celebrate any of the winter holidays either, but one never knows and remembering you mentioning you were Jewish I thought I wpould throw it in--I meant no offense.
Poet
Poet:I knew of the author. I like the writing of Isaac Bashevis Singer; it gives me a feeling of knowing the history of my Polish grandparents. My Bubbie (grandma Yiddish) would not speak of the past. She came from Warsaw at the turn into the 20th century. She told me she never spoke a word of Polish after she left Warsaw. She was a Yiddish speaker and wrote in Yiddish. She always voted Dems. Never missed an election. Dear Poet:you never offend. I just didn't remember the translation. Yes, I am a Jew. If you know of any New Years besides the Dec.3l we all "do", Rosh Hashonah, the Jewish New Year, and the Chinese New Year, please let me know. I celebrate all New Years.
Same old same...but in a different colour???
The quickest way to improve your education system? - GET RID OF ALL THE CRAP ON TV! It is part of the dumbing down process!
I got rid of my tv.
If we want to see a progressive Cabinet, it should be clear by now that we're going to have to nominate it ourselves.
For some time now, certain folks have been pushing for the creation of a "Shadow Cabinet" of knowledgable, expert spokespeople in various policy areas who could clearly articulate progressive alternatives in ways that the mainstream electorate could comprehend.
Face it, folks, this is something that's way overdue.
Opposition parties in other industrial democracies do this as a matter of course - since in parliamentary systems, one has to be ready to assume the reins of governance on very short notice.
Some choices are relatively obvious IMHO (you might come up with some better ones than I do). Ralph Nader for Shadow Attorney General, for example. Medea Benjamin for Shadow Secretary of State. Malik Rahim of New Orleans for HUD. Winona LaDuke for Interior.
But others aren't. Take the subject of this essay - how many folks could name someone in the public eye who promotes a progressive outlook on educational issues? (Please, let's see some suggestions!)
This is a great idea for right now. With the internet, there is a platform for shadow cabinet alternate proposals and critiques. It is a wonderful way to continue to raise issues and develop proposals with the public after the spectacle of presidential elections has folded its tents. It could be an avenue toward creating support for progressive platforms and electing some such folks on a local level.
Meanwhile, a groundswell of consciousness and activism around some irresitably sensible progressive ideas could push the current appointees away from corporate type solutions and more toward solving people's daily problems. It has happened before.
Now I am motivated to make a list of actual appointments in column A, so I can dream of who could we could come up with in shadow column B. I am thinking Frances Fox Piven... for what position though?
Joe
jclientelle:Joe, fabulous idea, especially starting with Frances Fox Piven. Ask her which one she'd best fit. You're on a roll. I was calling Obama's choices "Chinese menu", one from column A,etc. to fit various groups he wishes to "favor"/or friends,aka cronies as per use in Bush Admin. by critics. (accurately,too)
The idea of a shadow cabinet, being floated here, is a "great idea" but one that has been under construction for quite some time with the Bill Moyers led Backbone Campaign. You can see the slate of nominees for each cabinet position at http://www.backbonecampaign.org/cabinet/ While most of these lists are long and contain some dubious or whimsical selections, it's interesting to look through these lists for the names of any of the men or women selected by Obama. Look away, you'll look in vain for anyone named H. Clinton, Gates, Geithner, Duncan, Chu, Browner, Daschle, Napolitano, Donovan, Holder or Richardson (for the positions for which they have been selected by Obama). It's almost as if inclusion on this list is the kiss of death for any person likely to get an Obama nomination. With a few nominations yet to be made, maybe the transition team can scour the list to salvage a crumb of "progressive" action on presidential staffing.
You idea of a Shadow Cabinet is brilliant . . . every time one of these lame Obama choices speaks up, the lefty Shadow person can give the progressive critique and analysis of that comment.
Being proactive, too, would give people something to be FOR instead of always protesting the status quo.
Really, it's a GREAT idea!!!
jonabark
How about Jonathan Kozol, or Howard Gardner; they would at least be good consultants for a qualified person.
Kozol is a proven advocate of education for the poor, which is where so many formerly middle class will be heading soon. Kozol knows how to speak and write convincingly.
Joe
jclientelle:Joe, I'm angry at Kozol since I heard him give an interview in the late 1990s or so, with the stupid mis-idea that kids in the South Bronx got asthma because they know people don't think they are of much value. At the same time, he said the pollution in the South Bronx was so bad, that when he visited, he was using an (asthma) inhaler. When Palast is a "drama queen", as Poet's criticism implies,in another comment, Palast is accurate on facts. Kozol was not. I was really p.o.'d at Kozol pushing fake junk about psychological (which is not true) in re asthma just to be dramatic. As for Howard Gardner, mentioned in another comment: I read something totally wrong he said about kids and art in re development (I was working with 900+ kids in a project for a foundation at the time.). I wrote him a long letter, which he never answered.
That was a dumb remark about asthma. Hope he now knows that air pollution, crumbling buildings, roach droppings are causative agents in asthma in poor neighborhoods. Stress contributes, but most of it could be cured or ameliorated to levels found in fresh neighborhoods by clean air, trees, sanitary buildings.
Gardner is OK in terms of promoting curriculum design that would tap all areas in which people can develop. If used in that way, it is useful. His philosophy is strong on looking at different ability types, but can easily be vulgarized to multi-faceted fatalism, rather than unified fatalism.
Our typical way of looking at kids in school is "smart" or "not smart". Gardner's philosophy of areas of ability can easily devolve into "academically smart" or "academically not smart" and "kinesthetically smart" or "kinesthetically not smart", "socially smart" or "socially not smart" etc. Then if a child does not immediately shine in some area, what then?
The categories can also be used hamfistedly pigeonhole kids rather than addressing and developing each type of ability in each child so that every child's development is more rounded and every child has a chance to discover what works for them.
Joe
I read Gardner's book "multiple intelligences" or something like that and was not impressed. It was not based on any kind of scientific evidence but was more based on scientific rumors or themes that seem to make common sense to people (and are therefore true, I guess.)(Here's a field ripe for analytical and critical thinking.)
In my experience, teachers seem impressed by this idea (of multiple intelligences) and do very trivial things with it. "Okay, Johnny, since you can't string two words together in a sentence, why don't you draw a picture instead?" And there it sits; the teacher feels good, the kid feels good, and the kid goes on to the next grade and the next teacher still unable to write. Sigh.
I've found that the idea of multiple intelligences seems to give educators (who only have to care about your kid for one year) permission not to teach children things that don't come naturally to them.
jclientelle:Joe, You are profound today. I feel the need to point out a couple of things about asthma (which I have,adult onset after childhood mild,family history of allergy/asthma=genetic component). I do not know what you mean about "stress" is a factor. There is no connection between stress and trigger/cause of asthma attacks.
(I know a horror story:a kid with asthma was having difficulty breathing during a family party. One parent, a teacher in a nonpublic school, told the kid to go back to his room, thinking the kid was just doing it to get attention as the parents were having marital problems. The 10year old was found dead, head on window sill of slightly open window, trying to get air, winter. The story was told to me by a cab driver who was crying, the kid's uncle; it was only a few weeks after the event.)
Middle income children living in areas where there are trees, lots of air, houses without roaches and "sanitary buildings"(?) also have asthma. Asthma is an allergy based illness for most. (Industrial pollution in work and living/working in/around the Sept.llth site in NYC triggered asthma for some and exacerbated asthma for those who already have the disease.)
Those of us with pollen allergies are happy not to be living near lots of trees and grass during pollen seasons,which are coming earlier and longer in recent years. (The smell of fresh cut grass is painful trigger, even unseen.) People with asthma are sensitive to many odors/fumes:car fumes, perfume, pine. The odor of the hot "tar" asphalt put on roadways/streets and roofs is an asthma trigger. Tobacco is an allergen for many. Mold, animal dander, foods (peanuts, shell fish, milk, other) are other common triggers.
Pesticides are terrible for kids/adults with asthma. I do not use roach sprays, but use boric acid powder (carefully, so one does not ingest it). Did you know that NYC is the largest user of pesticides in NYS? (source:NYS Coalition Against the Use of Pesticides) The city uses a lot in public housing=sicker kids.
My spouse teaches in a college:I got him aware of asthma in re students, and to ask if a kid looks like s/he is in breathing distress. Also, The formaldehyde solution used in labs is an irritant for many kids. He has had to call for emergency help for students, from time to time, in re students during pollen season are easily triggered. NYC had a school chancellor, Richard R., Green, die of an asthma attack in a May pollen season, I recall(googled it:May 10,1989). (At the time, I was livid when press reports tried to blame the victim, saying he didn't call for help quickly enough. Asthma attacks are so frequent in pollen seasons, for some, and "can turn on a dime", so you call for help when you know you need help.)
Finally,little kids with asthma often do not know why they are feeling ill, some have had it so long they think feeling rotten is normal at certain times of the year. (I was one.) The best book I ever read on the subject was a gov't pamphlet that I found 2 decades ago, in a used bookstore, from the 1940s; it had things people forgot:babies who were given cows milk who are predisposed to allergy/asthma will be more likely to get asthma, and eczema. Removing tonsils in kids from allergy families may trigger asthma. I told that to a pediatrician,who said it is true; he'd watched the tonsillectomy of his nephew, who didn't have asthma. The kid started wheezing on the operating table, the doctor told me. Finis.
Interesting - and I am no expert. I have never used or allowed roach sprays in my home, but like you used boric acid powder and put all food in sealed containers when I lived in infested buildings.
But how does one account for the especially high rates of asthma in South Bronx and other poor urban neighborhoods as compared with more prosperous areas? It is probably some combination of genetics, environmental irritants and overall level of nutrition and health.
One thing I do know from direct observation is that the high levels of asthma contribute to high absence rates in poor communities. Another health factor that raises absence rates is untreated illness (diabetes, mental illness, crippling conditions etc.) among parents. Where there is no home care, nor friends and family able to take daily responsibility, the kids, especially high school age, but even younger, have to pitch in with home care, doctor visits and earning money. You have to see this to believe how often it happens.
No Child Left Behind ignores all of the special material obstacles that poverty creates for children as learners. Instead of making the school a supportive haven, it piles another layer of failure and blame right on the heads of the children, while smugly congratulating itself for creating accountability.
Joe
jclientelle:Joe:I just found your newest comment. You have made some remarkable great comments. On one thing you question, I have some ideas:why kids in poor neighborhoods have such high rates of asthma. One part is environmental pollution (although polluted air moves and circulates). The South Bronx, Harlem also has a lot of kids with asthma. I do know that there are things like a huge bus terminal in E. Harlem that runs the diesel motors all night. Folks fought (and lost) putting it there. There is heavy overspraying in public housing of pesticides. Poor health care. Schools in poor neighborhoods are older and in bad condition. Coal burning boilers in many older schools contribute to asthma in the kids.
I must stress environmental pollution. The only genetic aspect is allergy/asthma is genetically linked, often. As a Jew, there's tremendous affinity with Latinos and African-Americans for me in observing a lot of asthma in all groups, also high blood pressure and diabetes. Affluent areas: school nurse in each school. NYC used to have them in schools. So, if a kid is sick, it gets unnoticed, untreated. Poor kids don't get good health care, medication. I remember looking at schools for someone and one school had leaking walls,with mold, shocking. I wouldn't send any kid there, but there were kids going there. I'll think of more later.
Your observations are really fine. Food allergy is a really unknown area. Not clear how to test and the best way to deal with it is avoidance of foods known to be cause of allergy to a child or adult. School lunch, plus not good medical care, for poor kids can result in not realizing a kid is having a reaction (unless it is severe). A kid with a lot of asthma "triggers", who is not diagnosed, etc. or, not getting medication is probably not uncommon in poor neighborhoods. I got really angry when I heard last year or so, that Mayor Bloomberg announced an initiative for dealing with asthma in kids in poor neighborhoods. His plan was to open store fronts so people could come in and get a referral (information only) to go to someplace else to find a doctor. More later. I am so impressed with how organized your writing is. Final point: decades ago, I was teaching in a junior high school, "changing" from middle class to more poor kids. I had a kid who was falling asleep in class. I realized there was something wrong. Sent him to school nurse (they had them on site decades ago), that the people telling me,"Oh, he just stays up too late" were silly. I was very young myself, idealistic and smart. The nurse sent him for testing:tropical disease putting him to sleep. Treatment was simple;healed quickly. Then he was coming to school in winter with no coat. Found a way to get him a jacket. Nonpoor don't know how hard it is to be poor.
Me, too. I vote Jonathan Kozol. We couldn't do better.
Arne Duncan is not a lawyer. How could you get that wrong? He has a B.A. in Sociology and played Australian league basketball.
The rest of the article was mostly correct.
True education should produce revolutionaries.
* Properly educated people are capable of thinking for themselves.
* An educated person can evaluate information and come to an independent conclusion regarding the truth or falsity of a statement.
* An educated person is not prey to demagoguery (from whatever source -- left, right, or center), but is hip to the ways that rhetoric and logic can be abused.
* An educated person is therefore a tough sell.
* An educated person is also very difficult to govern.
* An educated person understands and appreciates the acheivements of his or her race, class, gender, or nation -- but also understands his or her place in relationship to other groups and to history, and knows that the strength of others does not come at his or her expense. The educated person also appreciates and is not threatened by diversity of culture or of opinions.
* An educated person understands the wider effects of his or her actions, and is neither insular nor uncaring about those effects.
* An educated person knows injustice when he or she sees it.
* An educated person understands how to analyze situations, and can plan and execute creative, appropriate, and effective responses.
* An educated person does not accept things as they are, but always questions the status quo.
* A truly educated person would be fully equipped to design, promulgate, and implement new and more effective ways of doing things.
* An truly educated person is therefore ipso facto a revolutionary, in the best sense of that term.
There is nothing wrong with the public education system in this country. It is working exactly as it was designed to work. It is effiently producing unquestioning workers and loyal consumers just as the Prussians designed. The elites send their kids to private schools. Free public education's motive has always been to educate the working class, to produce good laborers. Period, end of story. Those who control the resources send their children to private schools so they can learn to control the means of production.
I have a question. Why do we raise our babies with lies and then get upset when they deceive us as adolescents?
We surprise them with gifts from Santa Claus, hide candy from the Easter Bunny, and sneak dollars under their pillows from the tooth fairy while they are asleep. Then we wonder why our teens are sneaky liars who do not trust us?
A man's trust is a valuable thing. Once a person is proved a liar they have a hard row to hoe to regain trust. We should stop the lies.
Perhaps that would fix a few things. Perhaps not.
debi
Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars
Well stated in your first paragraph.
If I may quote Zappa: "It pays to make the US school system a crock of shit because the dumber the people are that come out, the easier it is to draft them, make them into docile consumers, or, you know, mongo employees."
For example of the shallowness of Palast's article, he says, "Duncan is supported by a coterie of teacher-union hating Republicans."
Well, many people who are not Republicans, including myself, are very critical of the unwillingness of teacher's unions to make it possible for schools to get rid of ineffective teachers. Also, many people (some in these alliances between liberals and conservatives) are trying to change "business as usual" by proposing merit pay for teachers, which is opposed by most teacher's unions. This seemingly radical idea would allow good, effective teachers to be rewarded at a higher level, therefore helping to retain and motivate them. Even "Rethinking Schools" which is a liberal/progressive education org has a series of articles somewhere on their site debating the whole idea of teacher's unions as industrial unions versus professional unions or other approaches. Palast's broad brush doesn't do justice to the complexity of the issue.
In the shallow approach to ed reform, those taking the "progressive" side assume that all teachers are highly qualified, hard-working, committed, effective, etc. etc. Some assuredly are, but many are just so-so and some are terrible. A lot of principals may be effectively leading their schools, but many are just taking up space (and a generous salary.)
A serious approach to education reform has to take into account teaching effectiveness, teacher training, school leadership and administration, school funding, and must include accountability. If we demand accountability from the users of the $700B bailout funds, why are we so up at arms about accountability when it involves our children's future?
OK - There is the UFT, which is not especially enlightened on children's needs. There is the NEA that is better socially. My children went through public schools. Teachers vary - most are trying, some are great, and some I cannot figure out why they are in that profession. All of them are struggling against a situation filled with obstacles and in which they get little help.
Teachers need some protection from the boards of education and school boards, which are frequently staffed by bureaucratic numbskulls who know little and care less about what works in education. They need some protection from arbitrary and brainless grandstanding moves from budget cutting politicians. They often need protection from principals, who all too frequently can be somewhat bizarre. Sad to say I tell the truth.
Neither the NEA nor the UFT is primarily responsible for spotty and often stingy budgets. Very few politicians in cities send their own kids to the public schools, which is the best indication of how committed they are.
But I agree, the whole method of recruiting, training, apprenticing, supporting, evaluating and rewarding teachers should be overhauled. But not by corporate suits or bureaucrats, or grandstanding pols. The effort should be led by people with experience, ideas and some evidence of success in improving education. The effort should include major input from parents and teachers. Also some commentary by employers, job training specialists and college admissions officer. The effort should lead to some immediate steps and a step-by-step long term written national program for improving and stabilizing public education.
Then there is the matter of funds. You can't just give out billions of dollars. Oh, yes you can!!
Joe
jclientelle:Joe, I was involved in the teachers strikes in NYC,the first strike to be allowed to have collective bargaining and the next year,we struck to get a decent contract, the first ever for teachers in NYC. So I was one of the first members of the UFT. Teachers fight for kids. I think parents and teachers are natural allies. I love your last 2 sentences.
For 31 years, I worked in a low income district.
For 31 years, I knew that class size and teacher qualifications were the two most important ingredients for successful teaching:
1. 20 students per classroom was the maximum.
That never existed in Chicago. Chicago liked
thirty five students per class.
2. Teachers certified in the area they were teaching: If you
were a reading teacher then you needed 30 semester hours
in reading and teaching reading. If you were a science teacher then you
needed 30 semester hours of science and teaching science.
Those requirements were often overlooked in Chicago. Chicago preferred
to hire substitute teachers and finance a large non functional
administration and lots of "Life Safety" construction projects
for Mayor Daley's friends.
As for "Bad Teachers", you have "Bad (Political) Superintendents" and "Bad Principals". Most states have a three year tenure law. During those three years, "Bad Principals" are supposed to observe and evaluate teachers. One of the best ways to evaluate is to take over the classroom of that teacher and teach their lesson. From my experience, Principals love to hide in the office and look busy. There is no reason Principals can not organize their day: mornings should be for daily classroom observations and afternoons should be for phone calls and business.
If you have a "Bad Teacher", you document it and you let that teacher go. When you are non tenured, no reason has to be given for your dismissal. If you are tenured, the documentation has to be based on evaluations and corrective measures. If you fail to remediate your teaching, a hearing can be held and you can be let go. Yes that requires that the "Bad Principal" be qualified and is in that teacher's classroom several times. But, the "Bad Teacher" can be let go.
No, Duncan is one of Obama's cronies. He is not a qualified educator. If a principal is like a conductor in an orchestra, then Mr. Duncan never learned to read music. Unless you have been a classroom teacher, you have no idea what must be done to educate our young. Testing is not the answer!
You say, "Unless you have been a classroom teacher, you have no idea what must be done to educate our young."
How about, "unless you have been an effective classroom teacher with a proven track record, you may not have that much useful to contribute."
Actually, I strongly disagree with the common notion that only teachers can have anything to contribute to how to improve public education. Do I have to have been president to know that Bush is a lousy one? Do I have to have been a doctor to have a reasonable, considered opinion on healthcare? Actually, there are things that classroom teachers are understandably too busy to find out, that a good principal would know, such as trends, what works on a broader scale. A bad principal wouldn't know this, of course. People who do research on education may not know how to teach someone to read (lots of teachers don't know this either) but they may be able to analyze data on the relationship between curriculum choices and results.
.Lest we forget.
The only way children can be well educated is when the parents participate in that educational process. I have known great and inspirational teachers and I have known abysmal and disinterested ones as well. The thing that kept me going was my parents on my case....
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We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
Thank you for working in a school in a low income district.
I agree that it is almost impossible to understand what will work without having spent time in a classroom. The teacher is educating children - not cardboard cutouts. Testing is not the answer. Better tests are not the answer. A test is an evaluation of a program, it is not a program.
In defense of principals - I believe the amount of useless BS paperwork they have to do to report to higher ups, the amount of time they have to spend applying for grants (begging) for programs they need, etc. takes away from their participating in developing teachers and programs.
I think some of them eventually go nuts from the ridiculous bureaucratic pressures on them. Meanwhile they are supposed to satisfy parents with wide ranges of ideas and levels of assertiveness and marshall teachers, some of whom have their own peculiarities. (But I could be wrong - I wonder if there are any figures on job stress among principals.)
Joe
Greg Palast, like many of us on the left, takes a common shortcut and tries to portray education reform as a monolithic left versus a monolithic right. This is simplistic and simply does not apply to public education in this country in which different groupings of Democrats and Republicans both love and hate NCLB and have varying friendly and hostile relationships with the teachers unions. The education reform landscape is bumpy and confusing, peopled with extreme ideologues of many stripes as well as principled alliances between liberals and conservatives.
Education cannot be dismissed this way, especially when the terminology is so misleading; I would have assumed that I would support what is called "progressive" pedagogy only to find that it tends to include things like "constructivist" math and whole language reading, both methodologies that are condemning generations of poor students to academic failure.
There are a lot of things wrong with public education and with the NCLB and its implementation, not everything wrong with the schools can be realistically blamed on that. Anyone who has attended or has children attending an urban school, for example, knows that public schools have always been intractable -- not designed or administered for anything but the convenience of the adults who work there. Right now, I'm trying to get a report on my child's progress towards IEP goals, but the school doesn't want to give it to me because it doesn't fit on a form they have. This is typical -- consistent with their reluctance to teach a dyslexic child how to read -- and can't be blamed on rightwingers; I live in a predominantly Democratic county where the schools commemorate MLK, Jr. and Cesar Chavez.
Accountability is a key requirement for transforming public schools, and the standardized test results have shown that our public schools a) don't know what to do with data, b) try to kill the messenger ("it's the test's fault") , and c) spend more time pointing fingers ("it's poverty", "it's the dysfunctional families", "it's the students' culture of poverty") than examining teaching effectiveness or school leadership or teacher training or school funding.
I've always loved Palast's biting sarcasm.
Obama did swear his allegiance to AIPAC and Israel...so don't squawk...enjoy
the benfits of this extreme liberal like we did during the Vietnam war, with
all those crazy looney lefties. They are mostly lobbyists in training masquerading
as Change agents.
I see nothing wrong with Obama wanting a baller in the WH. I even think he deserves something like this, and that it might improve his administration in that it'll keep Obama relaxed and cool.
I listened to the news conference where Duncan was introduced and he sounded like he was hugely successful in the education field. Obama had all kinds of statistics to back-up his praise. Greg seems to have a whole different perspective. I'd like to see some links to his claims on Duncan
David Brooks, and what school Obama's children attend do not concern me at all...
You ask for "some links." The best proof of Duncan's "credentials" to head the U.S. educational system is in what he has done with Chicago's public school system, under the Renaissance 2010 program that he has headed. Among others, Mike Klonsky describes the "beggar's feast" that Chicago schools have become under this program. http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-6z6IhP08cqXp9kfshYQPv87gCfJyFg--?p=206 When film-makers wanted to film a school system killed by the NCLB, they found a great example in Chicago and shot the thirty minute film Renaissance 2010 that you can google and find. I rather think that the Senate committee that considers whether to confirm Duncan's appointment should plan to spend 30 precious minutes of their time to study that preview of what American schools could become.
.Gee, if our new President Elect chose to send his kids to Duncan's alma mater, rather than to the schools under his care, and if the numerous complaints about the Chicago school system are true, then perhaps concerned folks should worry....
If you are serious about wanting links, and half as intelligent as I believe you to be, you could find a thousand in a minute....I did.
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We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
I think I'm only 1/4 as intelligent as you believe me to be.
.That is still pretty high up in my estimation. Especially when compared to some posters here, sheeesh! I do not conflate a shared political opinion with intellectual ability, you have the latter but not yet the former...I'll keep working on that.
.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
Naw, you're wrong, Greg. The real sell-out move would have been appointing Joel Klein or (gasp) Michelle Rhee, who are the real teacher haters and union-busters. Arne is a crony, so no point there, but he is not a capitulation to the privatizers (major point there) and Obama has put Linda Darling-Hammond in charge of policy review on education--and that's where the real work lies. She's the one who will be giving Obama his real education agenda, and, in the meantime, the bloodbath that was forming up between alleged "reformers" vs. "status quo-ites," both sides predictably oversimplified and miscategorized by the press, has been averted.
Chicago may be a mess, but so is every other urban district in the country, and lots of the smaller ones besides. It's going to take collaboration, synergy, and a lot of hard work to move our dying behemoth of a public education system out of the tarpit and back up onto dry land again--way beyond the usual whining, carping, and blaming. Wake up, Common Dreams, we may all have to work together to get this done--and schools may be the one arena where we can all agree long enough to actually make something positive happen. Seems to me that would be a great example for the kids, teachers, and parents who are now being held hostage by an out-of-date, industrialized, and paralyzed system. Patricia Kokinos, www.ChangeTheSchools.com
This news about Linda Darling-Hammond is encouraging. I like your positive energy. I am looking forward to a time when all of our elected officials feel confident and comfortable putting their own children in the DC public schools or any other large urban school system. That is the acid test of school reform.
Joe
Thank you for your post. We talk about "holding Obama's feet to the fire" - Maybe we ought to form a roastie-toastie brigade - and keep our own in there. The education "system" is not a stand alone proposition.
Another point is that as with civic concerns in all areas, we're at the point where shaking off the big brother has to be followed with engagenment. Appointments can change - particularly with an activist coalition constantly pressing critique and documenting failings and options.
OUCH!!!
Screwed yet again!!!
You liberals sure must be getting tired of this nonsense by now!!!
The man behind the curtain gave us the choice of his AIPAC candidates.
What shall we do now? Dante said to Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.
Too bad. The "comments" at this website are as predictable, unuseful, and boring as they possibly can be.
.Too bad you cannot raise up the level....
.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
LOL. Great response!
What a hateful condemnation of my president. Well, on CD the Obama hate-fest should find fertile ground.....did you all vote for Ralph Nader? Pride your righteous selves on your corazon de alma.....congratulations, you are so so smart.....right? By the way oh better than other people, I have a question...has Ralph divested his investments in cluster bombs via Fidelity Magellan????????????????? Cause check this Ardee, Sir, we see ourselves in the mirror through our pupils, on 400 mic's of L' and other Heroes-Barack Obama has no money in MUNITIONS-but you worship Ralph to the altar while he kills children for a return on his investments.
Doubt me? Google Ralph Nader Fidelity Magellan Cluster Bombs. Merry Freaking Christmas.
I've heard this same BS repeated for over eight years about Ralph and investments in Cluster Bombs. Problem is, nobody can prove this. Yeah, Google this and you won't find anything except other posts saying the same exact same thing without any proof. And having a fund with any one source, like Fidelity Magellan, doesn't reveal what you are actually invested in. I had investments that were bought and sold several times and I couldn't keep up with what was being invested where. And even if his investments were in any of these companies, that was over EIGHT YEARS AGO.
What the hell does this article have to do with Ralph Nader? Is that what you're going to say the next four years every time Obama is criticized for doing something, appointing someone to something, that makes the rightwingers swoon in ecstasy? "Oh, it's all you self-righteous Nader lovers' fault! If Nader didn't have [alleged]investments in cluster bombs (so say some Nader-hating web sites, at least), then Obama wouldn't have to appoint unqualified Republican friends to his cabinet. It's all because of that devil Nader!" I suppose if Obama surges into Afghanistan, and later nukes Iran, and when things don't turn out quite as planned, you can always blame it on Nader.
.I would imagine that this clown's mother was frightened by an independent while pregnant with him....Facts do not matter only the amount of testosterone induced adrenalin he can get his fix with.
Nader is guilty of not greening his portfolio to be sure, he holds about $200,000 in that fund that so enrages our friend above. A fund, of course, holds many differing offerings, and the one in question does have some shares of military industrial stocks among its numerous holdings. They have divested themselves of Halliburton and others yet the truth remains that they do have such stock......
Now back to the topic at hand....
.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
Dear Shanmarie: I don't care if Arne Duncan is a convertible with a pull out throttle. He's a class enemy, and his shit's going to get peeped. It's on.
Obama is a sell-out, but the Sec. of Education never matters much. The contempt and derision for teachers and brainy kids is deep in American culture. In Korea, the word for "Sir" or "Mister" or "Madame" is the same word as "teacher". Educators and scholars command the highest respect, or they did historically. You can't change attitudes with a change of ceremonial bureaucrats.
jonabark
I hear there is actually a hot market in Korean Parents. They're worth their weight in A's.
I left my usual vote for a third-party candidate behind to vote "against" Mr. Bomb-Bomb-Iran and his cheerleader. I guess this is the painful price. Hope it buys us something in terms of ending the war, closing Gitmo, or green technology.
Sad.
Don't hold yer breath, dude!!
You guys got screwed, blewed, and tatooed.
Too bad.
At least we conservatives KNEW that McCain and Palin were pieces of Republican SHIT and that they were going to bone us. You guys actually thought Obama could make a difference.
Howzzit feel now?
Phyllis Schlafly,
how good to hear from you again!
Those who held their noses and voted for Obama and now feel betrayed, I'm sorry but you can't say you weren't warned about voting for the lesser of two evils.
Even with truthful information it is hard to make the right decision, much less with the 'filtered' information we get from the media, including Common Dreams.
Yes, Obama will do a few 'right' things, but the status quo won't be changing.
And if we are going to prevent or minimize the impending catastrophe (environmental, economic, food supply, militarism etc) the status quo will have to change.
I guess what we have here is a SNAFU (situation normal, all f*cked up)
"The shepherd always tries to persuade the sheep that their interests and his own are the same." ~Marie Beyle
I left behind my own "usual vote" for every Democratic nominee from Stevenson to Kerry to vote for a third party candidate (McKinney).
I too am sad, genuinely sad, for all my progressive friends who did as you did in this election, and voted against Mr. Bomb-Bomb-Iran in the only way (for Obama) that they thought they could stop Mr. B-B-I by voting for Mr. Might-Bomb-Iran. Sad that they (and I) have to cling to a forlorn "hope" that "something" good might come from a presidency in which HOPE was presented as a joyous possibility if not an inevitability with Obama's election. Many will still go to D.C. on January 20 to "celebrate," but how do you celebrate such a piteous remnant of hope that is all the "transition team" has left for us?
GEE ! I thought liberals were "smart" but instead they play go-along-get-along like abused wives ! Quit begging for big government to help you as they'd rather say FUCK YOU ! Take your kids to another country with better education and then come back with them when they're grown up. Then there'll be room for real education REFORM !
Isn't Arne Duncan's nomination the "last straw" for anybody who harbored any hope for change from an Obama administration? In the campaign he criticized No Child Left Behind and then appointed one of the more egregious practioners of that agenda to leave no child's behind intact, as Palast so well put it. Google and look up the 34 minute video on Renaissance 2010, Chicago's version of the NCLB electric chair for public education. So what else has Obama promised? He won't "have any lobbyist" in his White House. He's already chosen Daschle for HHS who, though technically not a lobbyist, was a "consultant" for a lobbying firm with many health care corporations as clients; and his pillow partner wife is still an airlines lobbyist. He's already chosen Carol Browner, Clinton's EPA person, to the new climate "czar" post (what's with it with all the czars?), and she is a proto-lobbyist connected with several "consultants" to energy businesses during the "civilian" part of her revolving door career from government to business and back to government again; not to mention that her husband, a long-time congressman from New York, is explicitly a lobbyist with his own firm among the top lobbies on K Street? He's promised to be a very environmentally friendly President, then passed over for Interior Secretary several good progressive prospects to light on "centrist" (to be generous) Ken Salazar, who is little more than a "drill baby drill" Palin-clone when the drilling is anywhere outside Colorado. But wait a minute, he's just waiting to assume the presidency for his true progressive colors to emerge. So I'm being pre-mature in my judgments; better to give the guy "a chance." Or would that be a hundred chances?
.The last straw hell, that came much earlier for me. Unlike far too many I guess, I actually listened carefully to the oh so demagogic speeches of candidate Obama, speeches filled with airy and impassioned phrases but absolutely devoid of substance. I listened to the way his positions began to alter after obtaining the nomination and embarking on the campaign itself. All the while I noted how so many "progressives" were drinking the Obama kool aid, though I understood that, after eight years of Bush/Cheney, folks were begging for a hero to lead them out of the wilderness.
I thought, frankly, that the re-appointment of Bob Gates to Defense might, at last, puncture the balloon of faith, but apparently not. I wonder what it is going to take for Americans to awaken to the truth of the two party sham of a system? But wait, folks, Obama hasn't even taken the oath of office yet, I am being way to harsh here. Well, you study on this list of appointments, you look up the records of those he has surrounded himself with, and you find the path to progressivism among the trees of status quo. I certainly cannot.
Oh, and don't blame me, I voted for Ralph.
.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
Reminds me of the joke, looks like crap, tastes like crap, good thing I didn't step in it.
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
Albert Einstein
also voted for Nader