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| Bush declares victory in Iraq in 2003. |
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| New Year's siege on Baghdad embassy. |
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| "Some may accuse me of being Pollyanna-ish — there’s a first time for everything." -- Rahm Emanuel |
If everything in Washington centered on conflict, President Trump and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) would never have been able to align themselves on a major trade agreement. And yet there they were, serving up evidence that division and consensus can sit, however uncomfortably, side by side. What did that moment tell us? Riven though we are, we are also, on many matters, united.From Rahm's POV, there's no longer a need for sharp conflict with Trump over issues like climate change, gun control, or immigration. Why? Because we're all already agreed. There's a national consensus, says Rahm.
We don’t need to tell Americans that the president’s decision to bully Greta Thunberg was wrong — they know that. We don’t need to tell them that his Dec. 18 attack on Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) and her late husband, John, was beyond the pale and beneath this nation — they know that as well.This from the former White House chief-of-staff who called immigration reform, "the third rail of politics" and who warned Obama's attorney general to "STFU" about gun control.
If Trump is going to do his best to deepen the conflict, should we do the same? Or, after three years of enduring the White House’s efforts to pit community against community, should we lean into the exhausted electorate’s desire to embrace a leader who will bind up the nation’s wounds?His rebranding efforts won't work. He's still the same divisive, corporate shill he's always been. If the Democratic leadership follows Rahm's lead and opts for conciliation with Trump as their strategic goal, they will fail again as they did in 2016.
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| Machine boss Mike Madigan & whistle-blower Alaina Hampton |
As for Madigan, the powerful Southwest Side Democrat likely won’t be holding any benefits to pay for the settlement and his own court costs. Since September, labor unions have stepped up to contribute hundreds of thousands of dollars to Friends of Michael J. Madigan, the same fund used to pay the settlement. -- Sun-TimesAnd this from Politico...
The case is now settled, but Hampton says CTU has continued to disparage her on social media, so her legal team filed a cease and desist order. Hampton revealed the legal move Monday in a tweet directed to CTU after a spokeswoman described the case as having "factual distortions, hyperbole and outright lies." The spokeswoman's tweet was deleted, but not before Hampton responded with her own tweet: "You can't hide from the truth. That's one reason my attorneys sent you and CTU a cease and desist for defamation a month ago."Even with reports finding bullying, inappropriate behavior and fear pervasive in Springfield under Madigan's rule, union leaders are reportedly still currying favor from the machine boss and still apparently following his lead on who to hire and fire.
CTU hit with defamation cease and desist letter https://t.co/O2eNh5W3dl— Rich Miller (@capitolfax) December 17, 2019
Can someone please explain to me why @CTULocal1 and @stacydavisgates/@SharkeyCTU1 can meet with Madigan weekly and never criticize him, but relentlessly attack @LightfootForChi at every turn? #twill— Jeff O (@JeffO773) December 16, 2019
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| Erika, Jen, & Joanna from The Girl Talk Show |
A former student alleged that KIPP co-founder Mike Feinberg sexually assaulted her under the guise of a medical exam, and a former KIPP employee said he offered her money in exchange for sex, according to a court filing by the KIPP charter school network.
The filing offers new details on the sexual harassment and abuse allegations that led to Feinberg’s firing last year, a move that shocked many in the charter school movement. The motion, filed in November, asks for the dismissal of a defamation suit Feinberg filed against KIPP, the country’s largest nonprofit charter network.There's still no explanation as to why it took KIPP so long to get rid of Feinberg. He was "involved" with a former KIPP student, employed by KIPP Houston in 2004, which led to a "financial settlement" at the time.
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| Arne Duncan with K12 Inc. founder William Bennett |
At Frazier Prep, a K-8 school in Lawndale, CPS further cited a failure to meet a contractual requirement to implement a successful remediation plan and improve the school enough to get it off the academic warning list. Students in the community have higher-quality options, according to CPS.
Since 2015, the Chicago Board of Education has used a “quality policy” to review charter schools. In accordance with that policy, school officials conducted “comprehensive performance reviews” and said they found that Chicago Virtual and Frazier Prep were failing to provide a high-quality education to students.I generally mistrust evidence of "low performance" based solely or mainly on test scores. But I'd leave this decision to CPS in consultation with the school community.
A K12 Inc. company database that included information for 19,000 students was available for anyone with an internet connection to see for at least a week, according to a report from Comparitech, which describes itself as a pro-consumer organization that offers security services. -- Digital EducationTrump's Ed Secretary Betsy DeVos touts online learning and cyber charter schools as a viable alternative to public schools. But her support for these virtual schools and the private companies that run them may have more to do with her and her husband's investment portfolio than with any positive results for students. Her husband invested in virtual school powerhouse K12 Inc. before she became secretary.
K12 Inc.’s lobbyists helped author model legislation to develop sweeping voucher laws through the American Legislative Exchange Council, a conservative group that provides state lawmakers with template legislation.K12, Inc. initially wanted to open a full-time virtual school in Chicago, but Illinois law prohibited full-time online learning. To comply with the policy, K12, Inc. compromised by adding a mandatory, on-campus attendance requirement and thus the CVCS was born.
A confidential trove of government documents obtained by The Washington Post reveals that senior U.S. officials failed to tell the truth about the war in Afghanistan throughout the 18-year campaign, making rosy pronouncements they knew to be false and hiding unmistakable evidence the war had become unwinnable. -- Craig Whitlock, Washington PostLOOKING BACK...On Oct. 2, 2002, then IL State Senator Barack Obama said in a major speech at an anti-war rally we organized in Chicago that "I am not opposed to all wars. I'm opposed to dumb wars." He referred to the Iraq War as his "dumb war" example in contrast to Afghanistan, which was billed as a winnable and necessary war to topple the Taliban government, drive out al Qaeda terrorists and install a pro-U.S. regime in Kabul.
"We must embrace America's singular role in the course of human events but we must also be as pragmatic as we are passionate, as strategic as we are resolute.Then there was...
Hillary Clinton supported the 2009 increase in U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan. During the administration's Afghanistan War review in 2010, Clinton endorsed General Stanley McChrystal's recommendation for 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan, before endorsing a fallback proposal (ultimately accepted by Obama) for 30,000 troops. -- NYTAnd regime-changer McCain...
Robert Kagan, a former adviser to his 2008 opponent John McCain, warned that a quick withdrawal threatens recent gains against the Taliban - and popular opinion could swing against the president if an emboldened enemy takes the speech as a cue to step up attacks.
Since 2001, more than 775,000 U.S. troops have deployed to Afghanistan, many repeatedly. Of those, 2,300 died there and 20,589 were wounded in action, according to Defense Department figures."This is a political decision, not a military decision," he told POLITICO. "Americans are tired of this war, that's true. But they hate losing more, and if there's the perception that we're being run out of there, the public will turn on him fast."
News of the talks came just before The Washington Post reported it had obtained more than 2,000 pages of government documents that it says show how U.S. officials have for years misled the public about the war in Afghanistan.What an irony it would be if Republican Trump, facing impeachment and a difficult 2020 re-election campaign, ended the war that Democrats couldn't or wouldn't end. Shades of Republican, Richard Nixon in March of 1973, withdrawing his defeated army from Vietnam, only to be impeached in October of that same year.
The Washington Post’s editorial board (1/28/19) was similarly apprehensive at the prospect of US withdrawal. Lamenting what it considered a deal brokered “mostly on the enemy’s terms,” it proclaimed that “an end to the Afghan war is desirable, but not at the expense of everything the United States has helped to build there since 2001.” -- FAIRTell us, WaPo. What exactly has the U.S. built there? The truth, this time please.
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| Linda Ronstadt at the Kennedy Center Honors |
“I’d like to say to Mr. Pompeo, who wonders when he’ll be loved, it’s when he stops enabling Donald Trump.” -- Rolling StoneSam Greisman, son of the actor Sally Field, another honoree
“Linda Ronstadt got up to get laurels, looked the fucker right in the eye and said ‘maybe when you stop enabling Donald Trump’” -- GuardianGreg Hinz on ComEd's annual Mike Madigan fundraiser
Source... “It was put together by a combination of ComEd and Exelon. . . .I went because I understood it was part of the process." -- Crain's
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| Sharkey on Hitting Left |
We characterized Rahm as “Mayor 1%”, you know, as a “corporate shill”. We picketed his house…The thing about Rahm was that he was such a clear corporate figure who had taken a year-and-a-half off from government work to make $16 million as a stock trader or private equity guy. And that’s clearly not Mayor Lightfoot. She’s not in that same category. -- Hitting LeftPete Buttigieg cuts ties with a campaign donor
"I learned about it this morning and within about an hour of that, he's no longer involved in the event or the campaign. Transparency and justice for Laquan McDonald is a lot more important than a campaign contribution." -- CBS NewsTrump tells Jewish group...
A lot of you are in the real estate business, because I know you very well. You’re brutal killers. Not nice people at all, but you have to vote for me you have no choice...“You’re not going to vote for the wealth tax. Yeah, let’s take 100% of your wealth away,” Trump said, slamming Democratic presidential hopeful Elizabeth Warren during his speech at the Israeli American Council-- Market WatchAtty. Gen. William Barr...
If communities don’t give that support and respect, they might find themselves without the police protection they need. Barr didn’t specify which “communities” he meant, but his comments were interpreted by many to refer to groups that have protested police violence against people of color. -- Washington Post
Protestors come to @chicagosmayor home, she leaves them doughnuts #CTUstrike @CTULocal1 @ChiPubSchools pic.twitter.com/OQapV2p7cO— Mary Ann Ahern (@MaryAnnAhernNBC) October 18, 2019
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| Democratic presidential hopeful Julian Castro joins Black Lives Matter co-founder Melina Abdullah and others in calling for two LAPD officers to be fired in the police shooting of Grechario Mack. |
On Tuesday, Castro joined a Black Lives Matter protest in Los Angeles, demanding before a crowd gathered outside LAPD headquarters that two officers be fired for killing Grechario Mack. This would’ve been unthinkable for a presidential hopeful four years ago, writes Zak Cheney-Rice at New York Magazine.Fred Hampton was only 21 when he was murdered by Chicago Police 50 years ago today.— Julián Castro (@JulianCastro) December 4, 2019
He fought for better education and housing, to end hunger and police violence.
He taught that where there's people, there's power. We can live that lesson today.https://t.co/7SZeGgtejT
...he’s done himself few favors by pursuing a platform of dubious popularity aimed at helping a small subset of suffering people who have negligible political influence.But the cards were stacked against Castro and against any non-white candidate in a race so controlled by the party hierarchy and corporate power. All the remaining anointed Democratic debaters are white and all of them seem to me, to be misreading the "negligible political influence" of that so-called "small subset of suffering people." Democrats will do that at their own peril.
Madam Speaker, on a cold December morning, 4:30 A.M. Nobody was moving on the streets. They came into that west side community, in Edison trucks. They came into that community with machine guns with the single purpose of killing Fred Hampton and everybody else who was in that apartment. They came using public utility trucks. Not police cars. And in that hour of the of morning. They knocked on the door when they got to that apartment.
Half of the police officers went to the front door, half went to the rear door.They knocked on the door and they said and one of the gentlemen inside the apartment, he asked who is it, at 4:30 in the morning. And he got a response from one of them police officers and answered by saying, Tommy. And when he said Tommy, he came in shooting.I was out in L.A. that night and we got the call around 4 a.m. west coast time telling us that Fred and Mark Clark had been murdered. It was a call that will stay in my memory forever.
“I have to confess that I was slow to realize ― I worked for years under the illusion that our schools in my city were integrated because they had to be because of a court order,” the Democratic presidential candidate said at a North Carolina talk with the Poor People’s Campaign. . -- Mayor Pete ButtigiegThere's no need for me to beat up on Pete Buttigieg any further, now that the master of the white blindspot has all but eliminated himself as a serious presidential candidate.
In South Bend, "...black and Latino students are disproportionately punished, suspended and dismissed from schools, crippling chances of academic achievement and obstructing efforts for “equitable and supportive learning environments for all students.” Black students are disproportionately arrested in public schools as compared to white students, resulting in a school-to-prison pipeline fueled by zero-tolerance policies. Beyond school discipline, residential segregation and the ill effects of concentrated poverty further disadvantage minority students trapped in segregated schools.The road to Democratic victory in 2020 runs through the black community, and I suspected the Buttigieg campaign was a loser when I watched his announcement to run back in April, in a cavernous South Bend former Studebaker factory, filled almost entirely with white supporters.
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| Sen. Elizabeth Warren at Chicago's Broadway Armory |
"Only in Chicago is the big Saturday night entertainment politics." -- TribuneMayor Pete Buttigieg hasn't got a clue
"I was slow to realize" South Bend schools were not integrated. -- Interview with Rev. William BarberAlaina Hampton settles sexual harassment suit
““Since speaking out publicly nearly two years ago, we have seen positive changes in this state,” Hampton’s statement said. “The legislature has passed sweeping legislation to deal with sexual harassment, which achieves important gains — although there is still more to be done." -- TribuneAld. Daniel La Spata
"Of course that’s a win. One Chicago workers had already been struggling toward."La Spata was one of the 11 aldermen who voted against passage.
“This vote is easy for me,” Ald. Susan Sadlowski Garza, 10th, said, because it closed the gap without layoffs, increased the minimum wage and opened libraries closed on Sunday.Chicago's city council has approved by a 39-11 vote, a budget that will raise the minimum wage for city workers to $15/hr and it won't take six years to fully implement as it does under the new state minimum wage law. The city's minimum wage will rise to $15 by 2021 and apply to youth, people with disabilities and other groups that historically have been paid less.
There are many good policy reasons to abolish the tip credit, including ensuring that workers have pay stability and combating the problem of sexual harassment in the service industry. Women working in restaurants with lower minimum wages than other industries in the state were twice as likely to report being sexually harassed by a customer than women who were paid their state’s minimum wage.But tipped workers will see their minimum increase to $8.40 an hour on July 1, from $6.40 currently, and the city is directed to study the impact of tipped wages on working-class families so it can revisit the issue in the future. The tipped wage will be set at 60% of the minimum wage — meaning it will rise to $9 in 2021 — and increase accordingly as the minimum wage rises annually with the consumer price index.
The vote should have been easy — and it was for 39 council members — but 11 progressives voted no.Well, that's not exactly right. Six of the no-votes came from the council's socialists who blocked with a handful of what's-in-it-for-me and anti-Lightfoot aldermen to try and stop passage of what is arguably the most progressive budget in the city's history.
"No" voters: Daniel La Spata (1st), Anthony Beale (9th), Raymond Lopez (15th), Jeanette Taylor (20th), Michael Rodriguez (22nd), Byron Sigcho-Lopez (25th), Rossana Rodriguez-Sanchez (33rd), Carlos Ramirez-Rosa (35th), Andre Vasquez (40th), Matt Martin (47th) and Maria Hadden (49th)This from Crain's:
Supporters said Lightfoot’s proposal pointed the city’s ship in the right direction and closed a projected $838 million gap without raising substantial taxes or fees. Most aldermen praised a brand new budget team—Lightfoot, Budget Chair Pat Dowell, and Finance Chair Scott Waguespack—for conducting a transparent process that included community input.
“This vote is easy for me,” Ald. Susan Sadlowski Garza, 10th, said, because it closed the gap without layoffs, increased the minimum wage and opened libraries closed on Sunday.While I'm elated that there's finally some real debate in the council, I'll leave it to the 11 to explain their votes on this one.
While New Orleans has long been home to struggling schools, the data released this month are concerning. There was an increase of nearly 11% percentage points in the number of schools that received the state's lowest grades from the 2017-18 school year to 2018-19.
"It makes me angry and hurt. Because these are the children of our city," said Ashana Bigard, a parent of two children in Orleans Parish schools and a longtime critic of the post-Hurricane Katrina education reforms that rebuilt the district as a network of charter schools.Me too. I'm angry and hurt by the great privatization scam that's been run on the citizens of post-Katrina New Orleans. As far as "failing" schools are concerned, as long as there's concentrated dire poverty in the city, there will be schools that are labeled "failing", whether they are charter or regular public schools.
Biden last night: I think we should decriminalize marijuana, period. And I think everyone -- anyone who has a record should be let out of jail, their records expunged, be completely zeroed out.Me: Biden is the sole Democrat in the 2020 field who opposes legalizing marijuana at the federal level. Just five days earlier, speaking at a town hall meeting in Las Vegas, Biden said he opposed the legalization of marijuana claiming, there is not “enough evidence” as to “whether or not it is a gateway drug.”
Biden: I come out of a black community...Me: Really? Who knew?
Biden: I have more people supporting me in the black community that have announced for me because they know me, they know who I am. Three former chairs of the black caucus, the only African-American woman that's ever been elected to the United States Senate, a whole range of people...Kamala Harris: No, that's not true. The other one is here.
Biden: No, I said the first. I said the first African-American woman. The first African-American woman.Me: No, you didn't. You said, "the only." Maybe you meant to say, "the first."
Biden: The fact is that right now the vast majority of Democrats do not support Medicare for all.
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| Republicans aren't disputing the facts. They're telling Democrats where to shove them. |
“The weak response to these hearings has been, ‘Let the election decide.’ That dangerous position only adds to the urgency of our action, because the President is jeopardizing the integrity of the 2020 elections.”-- Nancy PelosiPelosi's pessimism is understandable, especially given the slumping of her favorite candidate, Joe Biden. But I'll leave that for a future post.
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| COUNTING VOTES -- 81% of the teachers who voted backed the contract. |
...called the contract, "a powerful advance for our city and our movement for real equity and educational justice for our school communities and the children we serve." -- Channel 3000Ald. Ed Burke "Diminished and preoccupied"
That's how Sun-Times Fran Spielman describes indicted Ald. Edward Burke. "He's no longer the center of attention at council meetings he once dominated. He occupies the front-row seat closest to the door, arrives late, leaves immediately and seldom if ever, speaks." --Illinois Playbook
He tells wealthy donors: “The average American doesn’t think we have to completely tear down the system and remake it.” -- New York TimesNow contrite former N.Y. Mayor Michael Bloomberg
“I got something important wrong. I got something important really wrong. I didn’t understand back then, the full impact that stops were having on the black and Latino communities.” -- New York Times
Bill Russell accepts HOF ring 44 years after his inductionUnder Bloomberg, NYPD increased stop and frisk from 100,000 stops to nearly 700,000 stops per year. 90% of those impacted were people of color - overwhelmingly black and brown men. Bloomberg personally has the money to begin paying reparations for this harm. “Sorry” isn’t enough. https://t.co/kF1n9nLhfT— Samuel Sinyangwe (@samswey) November 17, 2019
In a private ceremony w/my wife & close friends A.Mourning @AnnMeyers @billwalton & others I accepted my #HOF ring. In ‘75 I refused being the 1st black player to go into the @Hoophall I felt others before me should have that honor. Good to see progress; ChuckCooperHOF19 @NBA pic.twitter.com/2FI5U7ThTg— TheBillRussell (@RealBillRussell) November 15, 2019
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| Why were faces blurred in this Facebook photo used in the Sun-Times story? |
A routine news story became a viral controversy Sunday night after the editors of Northwestern University’s student-run newspaper issued an apology for interviewing and photographing campus protesters. Journalists from around the country quickly took to Twitter to attack the paper’s staff, saying they shouldn’t apologize for doing their job. -- WBEZIt reads like a Who's Who in Chicago news reporting. I'm referring to the list of TV and newspaper reporters who have been lining up to teach a lesson to the students who staff the Daily Northwestern. The hubbub and overkill is about the paper's recent editorial apologizing for the way they covered the campus protest over the university's speaking invitation to arch segregationist and former Trump Atty. General, Jeff Sessions.
/3 One of the first things I was told when I came into this position was that I was the third black EIC in The Daily’s more than 135 years of publication. I knew that would come with a lot of pressure, but didn’t realize how much until over the past two weeks.— Troy Closson (@troy_closson) November 12, 2019
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| Bolivians take to the streets in support of overthrown President Evo Morales after the U.S.-backed military coup. The placard reads: ‘Evo you are not alone.’ |
Calls it “a significant moment for democracy in the Western Hemisphere”. -- GuardianA twisted view of the latest U.S.-backed military coup in Bolivia
For a socialist president who was until recently hailed as the great success story of the Latin American left, this unseemly end serves as a cautionary tale of what happens when world leaders remain in office for too long. -- New York Magazine
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| Chesa Boudin |
Many of Boudin’s policies, though, are even more progressive than those of Gascón, who was one of the country’s most liberal district attorneys. One departure, Boudin said, is he will no longer charge gang enhancements, which greatly increase the penalty for crimes if a defendant is found to have participated in a street gang. The law has faced criticism over the disproportionate number of black and brown people who are charged with gang crimes. A 2016 audit of the state’s gang database found that only 8% of documented gang members are white. -- San Francisco ChronicleCTU Pres. Jese Sharkey
...leaders knew it was time "to start thinking about ending the strike and counting up what we had achieved. We began to realize that we had gotten as much out of CPS as we thought that we were going to get," Sharkey said on the union’s podcast, CTU Speaks!
The CTU later published a series of tweets about the veteran pay issue and implied some people “are looking to manufacture a crisis" about it. -- TribuneR.I.P. Noel Ignatiev
In time his view that whiteness is a social and political construction — and not a phenomenon with a biological basis — has become mainstream. The resurgence of white identity politics and white nationalism in recent years made Ignatiev’s arguments relevant to a new generation of readers who argued the notion that race is more about power and privilege rather than about ancestry, or even identity. -- L.A. Times
"‘Can we just get rid of the judges? Let's get rid of the f-cking judges,’" Trump fumed one morning, according to an anonymous senior administration official's new book. "‘There shouldn't be any at all, really.’" https://t.co/VJ8DNGc2eV— The Hill (@thehill) November 11, 2019
Mayor on NYPD arrest of churro seller in subways: "The facts are she was there multiple times and was told multiple times that’s not a place you can be and it’s against the law and it’s creating congestion and she shouldn’t have been there.” pic.twitter.com/sniorGb7Ns— Yoav Gonen (@yoavgonen) November 11, 2019
