Congressman Obey Denied Access to Wisconsin Capitol

Obama signs bill that could save 300,000 jobs

But 40 million Americans on food stamps may pay the price

Congrats to Pres. Obama, Pelosi and the Dems for passing the Edujobs Bill despite near total opposition of the Limbaugh Party. Doesn't it feel good to stand up for a change? The vote, as expected, was basically along party lines with Boehner and his boys calling the jobs bill, nothing but a "a payoff to union bosses and liberal special interests."

As the Wonk Room explained, this bill is deficit neutral, so there is no “tax hike” necessary. But more importantly, does Boehner really consider teachers, firefighters, and police officers “special interests”? Overall, the funding will save the jobs of about 300,000 workers, including about 140,000 school employees, and according to the Department of Education, 5,000 teaching jobs in Boehner’s home state of Ohio will be preserved. (Think Progress)

But the problem is that nearly half of the "deficit neutral" $26 billion temporary patch on the bleeding public school artery came largely at the expense of poor families who still put dinner on the table only with the aid of  food stamps. Currently, some 40 million people, or 1 in 8 Americans, receive food stamps. Nearly half (49.2%) of this country's children depend on food stamps, including 26.1% under the age of 5.

"The cutbacks in food stamps in the bill are plain wrong,'' said House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey, (D-WI).

Having won the edujobs battle, it's now up to the Dems to "find their spine," as my brother puts it, and come back with a bill to restore the food stamp cuts.

We also need to recognize that the bill remains a limited and temporary fix until some of the more fundamental and systemic issues are dealt with.

Despite those expenditures, the economy continues to struggle. The prospect of layoffs or tax increases by state officials who are almost uniformly required to balance their budgets remains a major worry. The package approved Tuesday represents less than a quarter of the $116 billion shortfall that states face over the next two years, according to the National Governors Association. "This isn't plugging the hole. This is helping to transition," said David Quam, NGA director of federal relations. (WaPo)

Where's the money going to come from? How about $2 billion/week going to the eternal war in Afghanistan, for starters.

Obey spanks Arne

The Fiscal Times' Washington Editor Eric Pianin talked to Rep. David R. Obey, the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, on Tuesday, July 13, in his office at the Capitol. Here are some excerpts:

The secretary of Education is whining about the fact he only got 85 percent of the money he wanted So, when we needed money, we committed the cardinal sin of treating him like any other mere mortal. We were giving them over $10 billion in money to help keep teachers on the job, plus another $5 billion for Pell, so he was getting $15 billion for the programs he says he cares about, and it was costing him $500 million [in reductions to the Race to the Top program]. Now that’s a pretty damn good deal...

We gave [Duncan] $4.3 billion in the stimulus package, no questions asked. He could spend it any way he wants. … I trusted the secretary, so I gave him a hell of a lot more money than I should have....'

My point is that I have been working for school reform long before I ever heard of the secretary of education, and long before I ever heard of Obama. And I’m happy to welcome them on the reform road, but I’ll be damned if I think the only road to reform lies in the head of the Secretary of Education....

We were told we have to offset every damn dime of [new teacher spending]. Well, it ain’t easy to find offsets, and with all due respect to the administration their first suggestion for offsets was to cut food stamps... Their line of argument was, well, the cost of food relative to what we thought it would be has come down, so people on food stamps are getting a pretty good deal in comparison to what we thought they were going to get. Well isn’t that nice. Some poor bastard is going to get a break for a change.

On teachers' unions and education policy:

I have been the leading proponent of funding for education for the last 15 years in this Congress at least. … And I’ve had a hell of a lot of experience fighting teachers unions, school boards, school superintendents, the whole damn bunch when I thought they were wrong. I don’t need any lectures from the secretary of Education or the president of the United States in terms of my willingness to take on teachers’ organizations.

The roll call on Obey's Amendment

"I didn’t come here to be Arne Duncan’s congressman. Who do people think put the money into these programs in the first place? I did ... Welcome to Washington and welcome to hard choices.”-- House Appropriations Committee Chair David Obey (D. Wisc.)

Rep. Obey's amendment, includes $10 billion in aid to state governments and shifts $500 million out of Arne Duncan's $5 billion Race To The Top pool and into putting thousands of laid-off teachers back into their classrooms. But despite Obama's veto threat, the amendment passed overwhelmingly. The vote showed how thin support is for Duncan's reform among House Dems. They voted in favor of Obey's amendment 236-15. The Republicans, on the other hand, voted 3-167. (Roll call vote here)


The bill, attached to a war-funding measure (ugh!) still has to pass in the Senate where Blue Dog Dems & Republicrats still hold sway. 

"The competition has a lot of critics, who argue that the championed reforms -- for example, increasing the number of charter schools and linking teacher pay to standardized test scores -- have no basis in research." (Valerie Strauss, Answer Sheet)

What Duncan still has going for him is desperate state governments worried about getting badly-needed federal dollars even though only a few of them have a shot at RTTT money. Duncan has them over a barrel if they don't play ball. We'll have to wait and see how this thing is reconciled.

'The secretary of education is somewhat unhappy' -- Rep. Obey

Rep. David Obey stood up to threats of an Obama veto Thursday and pushed through a piece of legislation that will help prevent thousands of teacher layoffs. The House bill includes Obey's amendment which will force some $800 million in cuts to Arne Duncan's pet reform program, Race To The Top. The money will be used to prevent teacher firings and exploding class sizes.

"The secretary of education is somewhat unhappy," Obey acknowledged. "One of the secretary's objections, evidently, is the fact that last year in the stimulus we provided him with a $4.3 billion pot of money to use virtually any way he wanted to stimulate educational progress--$4.3 billion. He has spent a small amount of that." Even if this legislation cuts $500 million, "that still leaves him with $3.2 billion that he can spend any way his department wants. ... The secretary is somehow offended because he only has $3.2 billion to pass around," Obey said. "To suggest that we're being unduly harsh is a joke." (Edweek)

Support Obey's Amendment

I hate the whole idea of school funding being attached to a war spending bill. It's obscene and degrading to educators. But here we are.

Wisconsin Rep. David Obey, who chairs the House Appropriations Committee, is pushing an amendment to the bill that would cut Race To The Top and related programs like "merit pay" by a modest $800 which will be used instead to prevent more layoffs and keep class size increases within reason.

Obey is a long-time school reformer (in the real sense). He is also a critic of the massive troop build-up in Afghanistan. He was the force behind the Small Learning Communities initiative in Congress and helped save that program year after year in the face of Republican assaults during the Bush years. Ironically, it looks like it will be tougher to rescue SLCs and most other progressive funding under under Obama/Duncan and the Democrats.

Obey's amendment has plenty of support from educators, but is coming under fierce attack by some House Republicans as well as from Duncan. Corporate reformers like former Gates honcho Tom VanderArk, right-wing think tankers like Checker Finn and Fordham Institute as well as the National Alliance for Public [lol] Charter Schools are joining in the attack.

Race To The Top funds are the only lever they have to force resource-starved states to go along with their top-down, test-and-punish reform agenda, which includes mass teacher firings, merit pay, and single-minded support for privately-run charter schools.

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FairTest's Monty Neill writes on the Rethink Learning Now Partners blog:

It is important for you to weigh in with Mr. Obey: You can call the committee office at begin_of_the_skype_highlighting (202) 225-2771end_of_the_skype_highlighting. As usual, no email is provided for the committee  - phoning is better anyway and takes about the same amount of time. At least as important is to tell your own Rep. Go to www.house.gov, search for your Rep, call her/him (or email - they ususally have a form on the site). If your rep is on the Committee, it is very important to call her/him. And I am told by a knowledgeable lobbyist that Republicans and conservative Democrats esp. need to be called. (202) 225-2771.

I am told by several sources that Obey dislikes the Dept's preference for competitive grants (he told Ed Week some time back that the time for such grants is when funding overall is solid, not in a crisis - the opposite of those such as Fordham's Checker Finn who want to use the crisis to attack unions, cut the number of teachers, lower wages of
educators, etc.). Gary Orfield is one of those weighing in, in favor of Obey's approach, noting the great devastation the recession/depression has wrought in CA, where he lives. Educators generally favor this approach.

Let your voice be heard.

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More irony. Yesterday Obama traveled to Obey's home state, which has higher-than-average unemployment, to give speech blasting Republicans for opposition the extension of unemployment benefits and his job creation programs. NPR calls it, "a preview of what is likely to be his 2010 campaign speech." But he didn't explain how putting 300,000 teachers on the unemployment rolls would be good for the economic recovery.