Close to meltdown at Fukushima Dai-ichi plant

A destroyed landscape in Otsuchi village, Iwate Prefecture in northern Japan.

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

Unions a Civil rights issue

"Dr. King lost his life struggling to help sanitation workers – public sector employees – achieve their goals for a dignified existence as workers. We think that's an extraordinary backdrop in which to frame the debate over what's taking place in the country today." -- Wade Henderson, president of the NAACP Leadership Conference.

Power shift

"This is a fight for workers, this is a fight for the middle class, this is a fight to try to stave off the shift in power and wealth that is starting to become gross." -- Harold Schaitberger, president of the International Association of Fire Fighters.

Obama keeps his distance

Rose Ann DeMoro, executive director of National Nurses United, the nation's largest nurses union, called Obama "largely a bystander" in the debate over collective bargaining. "I think we're feeling a sense of betrayal from him and not liking it much," she said. -- Huffington

Destroit

"Bobb has set off a vicious cycle undermining even good schools." NYT's Michael Winerip Detroit -- Hope for the Hopeless

IN THE MAILBOX

 Mike,

This is Wisconsin State Senator Chris Larson -- and today, I'm heading home to Wisconsin to join the fight in person.

The last three weeks have shown what progressive strength and worker solidarity look like.
My fellow senators and I know that thousands of PCCC members in Wisconsin and across the nation have been fighting right alongside us -- attending rallies, making phone calls, donating to some great TV ads, and telling your friends about the Republican war on workers.

I want to say thank you. I also want to let you know that the fight's not over.

Republicans need to learn what accountability feels like. It's time for Republican senators to be recalled from office.

The PCCC just opened up an official Recall Committee in Wisconsin -- which will mobilize volunteers and run new ads against vulnerable Republicans. Please chip in $3 to help fund this vital work.

Wisconsin Republicans brazenly stampeded over the will of the people as they engaged in their right-wing attack on workers.

They shut down the public hearings, they shut down the legislative hotline, they shut down debate in the Assembly in the middle of the night, and they tried to lock citizens out of the Capitol. And on Wednesday night, when they had their last chance at redemption, Republican senators chose to bend the rules and join Governor Walker's war on working families.

The citizens of Wisconsin are rising up and engaging in the democratic process like never before. Recalls of the Republicans are kicking into high gear as clipboards begin to replace protest signs in neighborhoods across the state.

Governor Walker and Republican senators refused to listen to the public -- but now the people will be heard all across the state at the ballot box. 

Please help us win this fight by chipping in $3 to the PCCC's Recall Committee. Click here.
Thanks again for standing with us in solidarity, and for being a bold progressive.

-- Senator Chris Larson, Wisconsin's 7th District (Twitter.com/ChrisJLarson)

Maddow was right--just a little early, that's all

Palm trees have become an increasingly common site at the demonstrations at the Capitol to deride the Fox News channel, which during a discussion of the events in Madison aired footage in which palm trees were seen in background. John Hart — Wisconsin State Journal

I'm writing this post about an hour before thousands of Wisconsin high school students are planning to walk out of classes in support of their teachers and other public employees and their unions. Here's wishing them success. Courage is contagious. 

Rachel Maddow was a bit premature in declaring victory in Wisconsin Tuesday night. 

As I pointed out at the time, it was way too early to celebrate. Maddow had assumed that polls showing the mounting and overwhelming opposition to Gov. Walker's assault on the state's teachers and public employees unions had forced Walker to compromise and negotiate. She must not have listened closely to his phone conversation with the Koch impostor where he candidly admitted to using the bait of a compromise only to trick the 14 Dems into returning to Wisconsin. He never had any intention of compromising his attack on the unions.  In fact it was one day after Maddow's "we won" declaration, that the Republicans went into an illegal secret session and passed a bill which essentially eliminates collective bargaining rights for teachers and all public workers.

The period ahead will be a tough one for teachers with massive layoffs on the horizon and swelled class sizes facing those teachers who are still working. On top of that, many will lose their benefits, including health care coverage for their families and possibly, their pensions.

This new gaggle of T-Party Republicans, unlike their more right-centrist counterparts, are ideologically driven and couldn't care less what the voters think. It all reminds me of former vice-president Cheney's response to a reporter who told him that polls showed two-thirds of Americans opposed the war in Iraq. Cheney replied, "So!"

To give her her due, Maddow had it essentially right in that the Republican tactical victory on Wednesday is likely to turn into a strategic defeat for them in the upcoming elections. AFL-CIO Pres. Richard Trumka has even thanked the gov for overreaching and waking up the movement:

"We should have invited him here today to receive the Mobilizer of the Year award! Because Gov. Walker's over-reaching has brought us to this moment to talk about jobs. This is the debate we've wanted to have. Well, guess what? Suddenly the debate came to us, and we're winning."

Yes, thank you Gov. Walker for waking us up. Now it's up to us to get organized for the long haul. In Wisconsin it means continuing the protests which have sparked more resistance in Indiana, Ohio and Michigan and to get the recall process started. 

The Republican coup d'etat apparently also awoke President Obama.

According to an AP story in today's papers, the White House is denouncing the Wisconsin Senate vote, calling it an assault on public employees. White House spokesman Jay Carney said President Obama believes it is wrong for Wisconsin to use its budget troubles “to denigrate or vilify public sector employees.” 

Pretty daring for the Great Triangulator. 

Also: Student walkouts are spreading to Illinois

After a decade of No Child Left Behind

We're approaching 100% "failure"

Arne Duncan said Wednesday, that 82% of all schools could now be labeled as "failing" under NCLB rules. The DOE estimates the number of schools not meeting targets will skyrocket from 37 to 82 percent in 2011 since states have "raised standards" to meet the requirements of the law. Yes, we're truly racing towards the top.

The latest news has forced Duncan to re-triangulate. He has been pushing, so far unsuccessfully, for NCLB re-authorization for the past two years. He still praises NCLB for supposedly "shining a light on achievement gaps among minority and low-income students," but now admits, ""No Child Left Behind is broken" and needs to be fixed.

"This law has created a thousand ways for schools to fail and very few ways to help them succeed."  

That's all  true. The law is all about test-and-punish. "Fixing" it, could only mean easing the standards or allowing waivers for charter school or other Duncan favorites. But when we first made this point, he labeled us a "proponents of the status quo." Remember?

Finally, says Duncan,

"We should get out of the business of labeling schools as failures and create a new law that is fair and flexible, and focused on the schools and students most at risk."

Yes, yes. What a great idea! But isn't that exactly what NCLB is all about--"shining the light" on failing schools?

By the way, who are these people who've "been in the business" of labeling schools as failures, anyway? They should definitely get out of the business.

See: 

• "Obama wants to see 5,000 failing schools closed."--MSNBC 

• "Eventually, he [Duncan] said, he hopes to see 1,000 failing schools turned around each year.--NYT

• "In the first round [of Race To The Top] there will be “a lot more losers than winners,” Duncan said, "and the department plans to offer two subsequent rounds of funding for improving failing schools."-- Harvard Magazine  
• Arne Duncan's $3.5 Billion Lever for Turning Around Failing Schools--Edweek

I could go on. But you get the point.

NCLB's stated goal is to reach 100% proficiency in reading and math by 2014.  But the way things are going, if we stay the course, we should reach 100% failure rate some time within the next three years.

Congratulations are in order, I suppose.

The road to Madison

The drive from Chicago up to Madison is about 150-miles, a little over 2 hours each way. Maybe a little longer coming back because of the late afternoon traffic or if you stop for dinner. It's a straight, boring shot up I-90, past Rockford and the Clock Tower Inn, where the Fab 14 Democratic senators have been holding up for the past 23 days. But if you drive it with friends, there's time to catch up on politics and personal stuff. Or just plug in some good sounds, stop at the Oasis for cheaper gas and coffee fill-up. Before you know it you're heading down John Nolen Drive towards the Capitol. You can usually park on the street or in a lot, a block or 2 from the protest march.

I got used to the drive back in the '60s, then again when my daughter was an undergrad at UW. It was also fun making the trek up to Camp Randall for Badger football games when our friend's son was a freshman fullback. Looks like we're headed back up tomorrow to let Gov. Walker and the Koch brothers know what we think about yesterday's fascistic, union-busting coup d'etat.

"You are cowards!" spectators in the Senate gallery screamed as lawmakers voted. Within hours, a crowd of a few hundred protesters inside the Capitol had grown to an estimated 7,000, more than had been in the building at any point during weeks of protests. -- This morning's Detroit Free Press

Duncan does his best John Lennon

Arne Duncan--“Imagine if we could have a digital tutor that could allow a student to catch up two grade levels in a year." -- FOX Newws

Did you watch Maddow last night?

If you didn't, you can watch her here. She's at her very best, with great interviews with Shock Doctrine author, Naomi Klein and former GOP chairman, Michael Steele.

First, Maddow declares a victory for the people of Wisconsin in their 22-day struggle to defend the collective-bargaining rights of teachers and other public employees. Maddow says that Gov. Scott Walker, "has started to crumble," that at least 3 Republican senators are breaking ranks from his caucus, and that the whole Republican union-busting strategy is coming apart at the seams. The GOP national "disaster capitalism" strategy of using the budget crisis as an excuse for outlawing unions is galvanizing massive opposition nationwide, with all polls showing growing and overwhelming opposition to Walker's "no negotiations" strategy. Even the most conservative papers in Wisconsin are raking Walker over the coals for his divisiveness.

I hope Maddow is right. But it's way to early to celebrate.

In another segment for example, Maddow lays out the disaster-capitalism scenario, already playing out in Michigan, where the house has already passed legislation and a Republican senate will likely pass it today, whereby state officials can declare a budget "state of emergency" and turn whole municipalities, deemed "insolvent" over to private management companies (much like we are doing now with public schools) and removing elected public officials. It's an ownership society dream come true -- a nightmare for democracy.

Reforms with no merit

If you need any more evidence that so-called "merit pay" is a crappy idea, here it is, right from the horse's mouth:

New York City’s heralded $75 million experiment in teacher incentive pay — deemed “transcendent” when it was announced in 2007 — did not increase student achievement at all, a new study by the Harvard economist Roland Fryer concludes.“If anything,” Fryer writes of schools that participated in the program, “student achievement declined.”-- Gotham Schools

Teacher evaluation

Over at the teacher-free National Journal, a panel of experts rehashes test score-baed teacher evaluation and the B.S. continues to pile up. Here's more on the continuing saga of Bill Gates, the man who nobody would listen to if he wasn't rich. EPI's Rich Rothstein looks into Bill Gates' claims and finds them to be "misleading" and "demagogic."

"It is remarkable that someone associated with technology and progress should have such a careless disregard for accuracy when it comes to the education policy in which he is now so deeply involved." -- National Journal

Michael Winerip's NYT headline sums it up best: Evaluating New York Teachers, Perhaps the Numbers Do Lie  Ah, So it's not just Bill Gates.

Why blame teachers?

A much better discussion--"Why blame the teachers?"-- is taking place at, NYT's Room For Debate featuring some bright lights like Pedro Noguera, Jeff Mirel, and Diane Ravitch, to name but a few. And to offer the view from far right field is AEI's hired gun Rick Hess who's basically arguing -- teacher bashing? Where? What? I don't see any teacher bashing.

Ravitch says, "It all started with No Child Left Behind" and she ought to know. Noguera warns: "If measures are not taken quickly to slow down the push toward sweeping, ill-conceived reforms, the damage could have long-term consequences for American education."

Michigan prof, Mirel, who anticipated Ravitch's book some 20 years ago, with "The Rise and Fall of an Urban School System: Detroit, 1907-81, sums it up nicely:

"Recent right-wing attacks have described teaching as a “part-time job” or a glorified form of “baby-sitting.” This characterization of teaching is simply wrong, and the initiatives that it supports -- cutting salaries, benefits, tenure and collective bargaining -- are maliciously wrong."

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

Anthony Cody

"President Obama last week proved his point. Education is not a partisan issue. Both Democrats and Republicans are pushing terrible ideas." --Washington Post

Obama on Bush

Jeb Bush “is someone who championed reform when he was in office, someone who is now championing reform as a private citizen.”-- Politico

Florida teacher Jennie Smith

"I told him [Pres. Obama] directly that I and so many other teachers were very disappointed to see him on stage with Jeb Bush, considering the assault on public education he has led in this state and how his foundation has continuously tried to eliminate our contracts and our collective bargaining" -- Miami Examiner.com

New definition of reform = who to fire first?

“It is really cynical for the political vultures to make this about a victory against the unions,” said Michelle Fine, a professor at the City University of New York who testified for the plaintiffs as an expert witness in the case. “This is really just about how we distribute the pain. The remedy itself is very sad.”--New York Times

Book shed new light on Lincoln's racial views

“For the sake of your race, you should sacrifice something of your present comfort for the purpose of being as grand in that respect as the white people,” Lincoln said, promoting his idea of colonization: resettling blacks in foreign countries on the belief that whites and blacks could not coexist in the same nation. -- Sun-Times

Ravitch hits it out of the park

The Daily Show - Diane Ravitch
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Duncan's Croissants

I'm really pissed at my friend Arne Duncan. He never even thought to invite me to his Breakfast With Bloggers over at the DOE. He knows how much I love those croissants and coffee, ordered up fresh from the department commissary. I guess he's not quite ready to reach across the other aisle. That's OK, Arne. I'm patient.

Or maybe the breakfast was one of those Race-To-The-Top-type deals where you have to submit your blog posts in advance. Then Arne could look you right in the eyes, like he did with Arizona's Sen. McCain and Gov. Brewer, and determine who was most deserving of this meal on the taxpayer's dime. (Oops, put your guns away, T-baggers. I may be wrong about that. He probably paid for the croissants with private foundation dollars.)

Anyway, I'm not really grousing or complaining (I got my own coffee & muffins Letizia's in Logan Square). I also got a full report on the eat-in this morning from Edweek's Michelle McNeil and from my favorite teacher/union-bashing blogger, Rick Hess, who probably had only a short cab ride over from his AEI think-tank office. You can read both of their accounts for yourself, but here are my highlights.

From McNeil:

First off, the department released two guides for states: one on "smart ideas to increase productivity and student achievement" and another on flexibility states have in using existing federal dollars. [But, adds Michelle] there's a footnote the Education Department has inserted saying it doesn't guarantee the "accuracy, timeliness or, completeness" of the ideas in this document, nor does the department pass judgment on their "importance or success." So, I'm wondering how useful these "smart ideas" really are?

ME: You know, Michelle, I've been wondering the same thing.

From Hess:

Duncan firmly pushed back against reflexive small-class mania. He suggested that it doesn't make sense to insist that a great teacher can only teach 22 kids--even if she feels like she can handle 29 and would gladly carry the larger load if she'd be compensated accordingly. He said, "Class size has been a sacred cow and I think we need to take it on. Give me and my wife a choice of putting our kids with a great teacher of 28 or a mediocre teacher of 23, and I know what I'd choose every time."

ME: Isn't it great that Arne is sticking it to all those maniacs who listen to those lazy teachers and who believe all that class-size  research and stuff. They are making such a big deal over a measly 60 of the nation's poorest kids being packed into Detroit classrooms. Surely there are great teachers over there in Michigan (who haven't already been riffed) who will gladly race to the few remaining inner-city Detroit schools to shoulder such a burden.

As for Arne himself, I feel badly for him and his wife, sitting there hoping against hope for a chance for their kids to have a great teacher and a 28-student classroom. The Duncan's don't send their kids to inner-city schools where many class sizes have swelled to 40 or more as a result of the economic crisis and mass teacher firings. To avoid D.C. schools (even when Michelle Rhee was  running them), the Duncans moved across the river to suburban Arlington, where schools and class sizes remain relatively small.

PLEASE SOMEONE. ANYONE. Help the Duncan's find a school with 28 per class and a great teacher for their poor kids.

Congressman Obey Denied Access to Wisconsin Capitol

IN MY MAILBOX -- Cutting WIC

Dear Mike ,

In case you missed it: The budget legislation passed by the House of Representatives would slash $747 million -- about 10 percent -- from the 2011 budget for the Special Supplemental Feeding Program for Women, Infants and Children. It's commonly known as "WIC."

WIC was created in 1974 to provide a very modest but crucial measure of food assistance to low-income moms and little kids who are at "nutrition risk." To qualify for this modest assistance, recipients must be poor -- very poor. Some 68 percent of WIC beneficiaries live at, or below, the poverty line. That's about $22,000 for a family of four.

Congress was quick to slash a food program for poor kids during the worst economy in 80 years, but it cut not one penny from the country's farm subsidy programs -- at a time when the farmers who receive the subsidies are enjoying record-high crop prices and incomes.

By cutting just a fraction of what we spend on farm subsidies, the House could have held WIC harmless and continued to give a little help to deserving poor little kids at serious "nutrition risk."

I wrote a Huffington Post column on the cut to WIC and how it symbolizes an unacceptably lopsided and wrong-headed approach to food and agriculture policy. Please read the column (it's below) and then stand with EWG Action Fund and let your representative know that you want a fair, equitable food system that begins to help the country heal its dietary and environmental woes.
Sincerely,

Ken Cook
President, EWG Action Fund

Robt. Gates' epiphany

'In the ensuing decades, a large, permanent military establishment emerged as a result of the Cold War — an establishment that forged deep ties to the Congress and industry.' -- Robt. Gates in 2008

Sec. Gates, the successor to Donald Rumsfeld, has led our ever-expanding military-industrial complex through both Bush and Obama regimes, the "surge" in Iraq and the escalation of the war in Afghanistan. Prior to that, Gates served for 26 years in the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Council, and under President George H. W. Bush as Director of Central Intelligence.

Neither of these two regimes have much to show show for all that except mounting body counts, loss of American prestige and credibility around the world, and deepening financial crisis here at home. The U.S. has become a superpower in decline, largely because of its growing militarization replacing real productive growth and wealth within our national economic structure. It's this economic collapse which has precipitated the crisis in public education--not the other way around as claimed by the corporate reformers and power philanthropists.

As he nears retirement and makes his farewell tour of the military academies, Gates tells his followers what he has learned from all that experience:

"In my opinion, any future defense secretary who advises the president to again send a big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa should 'have his head examined' as Gen. [Douglas] MacArthur so delicately put it."

Amen! But too little, too late.

More "reform" Rhode Island style

"It's for the kids," say Providence officials

About 1,500 people jammed the street in front of City Hall in Providence, R.I., on Wednesday to protest last week's dismissal of the city's entire teaching force. "I thought the only insanity was in Wisconsin, not in Rhode Island," Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, told the crowd, which raised signs and banged drums... Providence officials say their goal is to cut the budget while doing the best they can for city schoolchildren.--NPR

It was a year ago that mass teacher firings began in this state, lauded by President Obama and Sec. Duncan. 

Assault on teachers continues in Idaho

State schools superintendent Tom Luna said Wednesday that his bill to eliminate 770 teaching positions to pay for expanded technology in the classroom — and fill a public education funding hole — still has life. “The reports of the death of that bill have been greatly exaggerated,” Luna told a group of reporters at a lunchtime press conference in Boise.-- Press Tribune

Reform?

Whenever you see the words, OBAMA, JEB BUSH, and SCHOOL REFORM together in one headline, DUCK KIDS!

“Because of high expectations for students, hard-edge policies that focus schools on learning and an array of choices for families, the Sunshine State is leading the nation in rising student achievement,” Bush said. “I look forward to sharing Florida’s model for student success with President Obama and Secretary Duncan.” -- Political Wires

Matt Damon calls out Pres.Obama on ed policies

Damon in "Good Will Hunting"

"He's doubled down on a lot of things, going back to education... the idea that we're testing kids and we're tying teachers salaries to how kids are performing on tests, that kind of mechanized thinking has nothing to do with higher order. We're training them, not teaching them." -- Huffington


For the full interview, tune into Damon and the rest of the cast of the new film, "The Adjustment Bureau" on "Piers Morgan Tonight" at 9 PM EST on Thursday.

Last night's forum in Chicago

If last night's forum at UIC is any indication, mayor-elect Rahm Emanuel won't have much of a honeymoon, especially when it comes to his role as boss of the public schools. Emanuel's school plan, which sounds a lot like Mayor Daley's and the Civic Committee's Renaissance 2010, was under assault by last night's panelists  before an appreciative, standing-room-only crowd.

The panel was organized in response to a statement on Myths & Realities of Chicago School Reform, written by a group of Chicago researchers called CReaTE (I was one of the signers to the statement). Last night's panel   included some of the city's top ed researchers and academics as well as community and union union activists, parent and student and community organizers.

The main message was, talk is cheap. Let's get organized.

Stewart warns teachers...

The Answer?  "Outsource our Children's Education"
How?  "Disassemble our Children, Ship Them, and Re-Assemble Them Over There"

The Daily Show - Crisis in Dairyland - Message for Teachers
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Obama defends public employee unions

Responds to pressure from below

It shows what happens when the base starts holding politicians accountable. A half-million union workers and supporters marched around the country last weekend to defend their rights to organize and bargain collectively. Their main targets were Republican and T-Party governors and billionaire backers like the Koch brothers who thought the time was right to pull a Reagan/PATCO-style union-busting move. But the protests, along with polls showing increasing support for the protesters, also pushed an embarrassingly quiet Obama to finally come out strongly in support for union rights yesterday at the National Governors' Assoc. conference.

"I don't think it does anybody any good when public employees are denigrated or vilified or their rights are infringed upon. We need to attract the best and the brightest to public service. These times demand it. We're not going to attract the best teachers for our kids, for example, if they only make a fraction of what other professionals make. We're not going to convince the bravest Americans to put their lives on the line as police officers or firefighters if we don't properly reward that bravery."

That followed weekend remarks by Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, who fired up the crowd at the winter meeting of the Democratic National Committee by shouting that the “fight is on” for "our brothers and sisters in public employee unions."

Lots of lessons here.