Fixing Wilmington’s (And Every Other Inner City’s) Education

The problem with inner-city education everywhere is too much need for too few resources.

Though rather common-sensical when stated so bluntly, it has taken America 50+ years to reach this point.  Our slowness comes from the dichotomy of realism.  Science tells us that when born, most for our brains are 99.9% identical. (Occasionally an environmental effect or gene flip can impede one before birth, but missing that, all people if placed in the same environment can perform at very close levels of performance through out their lives). However reality of what enters a school system at age 5, presents an entirely different perspective.  We see children of affluence entering at very high levels of recordable intelligence, and children of lower affluence when compared to those of high, look just plain dumb.

That appearance of dumbness comes primarily from their inability to express their thoughts (ELA), as well as their lack of a broadened world perspective.

It is a rare person among us who enjoys seeing this dichotomy.  We all wish it would get fixed…

If children were businesses, here is how we’d fix them.  We would create an insurance fund.  Calamities do befall us all at random moments, often with catastrophic consequences.  In order not to ruin companies, an idea evolved that if all parties would pay into a fund as their “insurance” they would not lose everything. That fund would reimburse a business if calamity struck them.  The assessment for that fund would be affordable to all, written into the costs of what they sold, and thusly, calamities could be economically handled.

Bussing was a clumsy attempt at emulating this system.  We shut down an inner city’s district and made four suburban districts split up the costs incurred by those inner city children.  We moved children out to where affluent people lived….

With hindsight, it has become apparent that perhaps moving the money in would create less hassle than moving the children out.

Talk of making New Castle County one single school district has been another ongoing attempt to address this issue. The prime idea being that all revenue collected from Talleyville to N. Smyrna would be such a huge pool, students within that geographical boundary could all get proper funding… The suburban money could be averaged out to something that was more equitable to students in Wilmington.

But politically,… schools are a local community issue and parents in urban Wilmington have little concern over the needs of exceptional students on the Maryland-Delaware boundary, and Greenville doesn’t really care that much about people in Port Penn. So having one district handling all decisions, especially those non-financial ones which would now be decided from far-far away, never took off.

Which brings us to the insurance model…

Just as each business runs itself however way it wishes, each district will continue to do the same.  No change from how they are now. But each school system pays funds per student they have that go into an insurance fund which gets used to fix calamities in education..

Those calamities would be priority-type schools in areas in areas where there is no seed to cultivate blooms.  In a priority school one must buy the seed, as well as tend to its cultivation….  In more affluent districts that seed money is primarily handled by the parents of each child. They teach the basics like alphabet, numbers to twenty, and colors. But in priority schools, where everyone enters at the bottom level, there is no seed to speak of. Teachers have to start where affluent children have been learning since birth.  Teaching the 26 letters. Applying phonetics to each of those symbols, basic numerical philosophy (counting), as well as names of colors.

Obviously this would require more teachers.  One can’t say “read this book tonight and we’ll discuss tomorrow”. One needs more personalized attention when one is supposed to teach the book, but instead has to simultaneously teach a child how to read at the same time.

Which is why to achieve success in a priority school (which if correctly titled would be any school that has 50% or more of its students listed as low income), one MUST have an 11:1 student teacher ratio.

If one is currently at a 33:1 student teacher ratio then obviously, one needs to hire 2 more teachers just for that one class… Which at $40,000 a teacher, is not cheap. But necessary.

When one is trying to stretch budgets, having one teacher disappear to save $40,000 is the simplest solution. However, it dooms those far-behind children who would readily learn in an 11:1 environment but not in a 22:1 or 33:1 classroom

The reason today we have such problems with inner city education is that across the careers of most of our students, adequate funding for the 11:1 ratio was not available.

But if we had an insurance fund that was culled from all districts, which could be applied to hire additional personnel in poverty schools, that issue would disappear.

Today there are multiple problems with inner city education. We can only tackle them one by one.  This idea would take care of one of those problems.

Does It Make Them Any Smarter? Does It Make Them More Balanced?

They were 39 days late… but we got them… The preliminary Smarter Balanced Assessments….

The big takeaway was:  is that all there is to it?

We’ve been arguing over this for 4 years.  (I’ve been doing it for 3). We’ve spent $119 million dollars of Race To The Top Money to bring this to fruition. And we’ve been promised so much good would come from this test that we had no choice BUT to go forward with it…

But looking at the scores, it is the same as it ever was….  Nothing changed.  Kids didn’t learn more. Kids may have learned less. If one takes the word of students and teachers, each student spent 8 hours taking this test spread over an average of 3.25 days…

At 70,000 Delawarean students taking the test, a total of 560,000 learning hours were spent on this actual test… One has to ask if that is worth the cost…

Over half a million hours were spent on this test…  just so we can fire teachers.  Is that the best use of our students time?  Or should every parent be concerned with this, and insist that we return to the DCAS, one which took far less time and unlike this test, gave teachers feedback they could give students immediately afterwards.

Because we all know.

If experts say 8 years olds should be able to jump over a 3 foot high bar and you raise it to 5 feet, you are going to have fewer successful jumps… So anyone who says “see, how terrible education is today?: by looking at these scores, needs to be laughed out, ridiculed, and then ignored….  Because they don’t mean anything… Nothing at all.

The real question that needs to be asked is this…  By raising the bar to 5 feet, did more people jump over the 3 foot bar then before…  That data would tell us if this program was a success or failure…

But we don’t have that data… All we know is that fewer people “passed” because we made “passing” beyond the capabilities of all but our most developed and well trained….

So.. parents… is this truly worth $119 million dollars?  So teachers…. is this truly worth $119 million dollars… So administrators… is this truly worth $119 million dollars?

Money that was taken from reading coaches that the Minner administration placed in every school.  Money that was taken from math coaches that the Minner administration placed in every school.  Money that was taken from having a policeman in every school…  Money that was taken from supplying classrooms.  Money that was taken from extra curricular activities.  Money that was taken from the libraries.  Money that was taken away from field trips. Money that was taken away…  .. from you… After all, it is your money now being spent on this…

Did you get all the worth over what you paid?   Are your kids Smarter?  Do they seem more balanced?

If yes, we can’t knock the program … It appears to have worked… But if no, then as many of us have pointed out, this is a boondoggle of epic proportions….

So, when you looked over the preliminaries… did you too say…. “Is that all there is?

Someone is getting rich… somewhere…

Reinterpreting Title 14; Chapter 1; Subchapter 3: State Public Education Assessment and Accountability System

With what we currently know about the Smarter Balanced Assessments, it puts the rule of law in danger.  IF we take the Smarter Balanced Assessment, here is what the current law says will happen to our children……

(d) The assessments required in subsections (b) and (c) of this section shall measure:

(1) Student performance as required by any federal mandate; and

(2) For grades 3 through 8, the academic progress of individual students.

Pay particular attention to (2).  Then tell me how the lower score of the Smarter Balanced Assessment fits the tenor of the law above, since it rates children on this test with a completely different one last year… How can you determine the academic progress of students who scored well on the DCAS in 2014 and completely fail the poorly executed Smarter Balanced Assessment this year(2015)?

Obviously… there is zero accountability on progress made by any of these children this year.,…  Which, ironically, breaks the law above….  Some lawyer should have caught this long ago… but I guess the assumption was that test would be so similar passing one would be like passing the other….  Not so.  70% passed the old test… 70% will fail the new test.  We will at the end of this summer, have no clue how well any of these children learned over the 2014-2015 year….. (based on these tests; hopefully the classrooms still functioned regularly).

This shows exactly how Common Core damages education… How much time was wasted preparing precisely for these tests that will be meaningless; time which could have been better spent teaching older curriculums that even parents could understand?

Next:

(1) A 3rd, 5th or 8th grade student whose performance on the reading portion of the assessments administered pursuant to § 151(b) and (c) of this title is Below the Standard, Level II on the statewide assessment, shall not advance to the next grade….

An estimated  number of up to 70% of Delaware’s students will show up in the fall and be told they have to repeat the last grade they thought they just finished…. 70%….

How can that be?  How can we promote only 30% of our students, hold back 70% and still take in a new crop of student at the bottom… Where do we put all of them?

Since this is impossible.  we are going to break the law… We really have no choice… The law says they shall not advance, but we have no choice but otherwise, and the law is thereby broken…

(3) An 8th grade student whose performance on the math portion of the assessments administered pursuant to § 151(b) and (c) of this title is Below the Standard, Level II on the statewide assessment, shall not advance to the next grade

Same argument holds here as well.  The law will be broken.

Now… here is the joke:

(5) With respect to a student whose performance continues to be deficient after completion of the retention year, the Department may not require that the student’s district retain the student at grade level for another year, but shall require that the district develop an individual improvement plan.

So we are going to hold them back one year for failing the test, but then promote them anyway the second year if they still have not passed the test…. Meaning that classes will still have people who can’t grasp the subject now but who are just one year older than they would be otherwise.  So…. what’s the point of taking the test?

So what happens to all these failing kids?  Glad you asked.

• an individual improvement plan  (153 (d) (1) a)
• an individual improvement plan  (153 (d) (2) a)
• an individual improvement plan  (153 (d) (3) a)
• an individual improvement plan  (153 (d) (6) a)

For every failure there is the option to enroll in a private individual improvement plan, paid for by the parents of the student…. It is all about money….  $$$…

How much is it worth to you to have your child keep up with his class and not be held back?  $100?  $200?  $500? $1000? If you are indigent, you can even get a government secured loans to cover all education expenses.  The quasi- governmental institution pays the vendor, and over time you pay back the institution…  All loans secured by your tax refund if you ever renege.

Free public school is free no more…

That is why your child is taking  this horrible test and as all smart people have been saying, will fail  and you the parent, will still pay lots for them to graduate on time.

Thereby, for the quick fix, we need this following bill put on the table….

This act removes Subchapter Three of Chapter One of Title 14, in it’s entirety.   (The numbers for all subsequent ones shall be move up by one)

We can add a new bill later… But this piece is so huge, so corrupt, so full of holes, it is better to remove it completely and continue forward with something brand new next year…..

Why, Why, Why, Why, Why Does The Delaware DOE Always Lie?

When you want something good for the benefit of all, and expect a minority to disagree but have enough votes to override them, you tell the truth.  You trust that your telling of the truth will trump the lies they tell, and that the public who is genuinely concerned with getting things right, will jump on both your side and truth ….

ON THE OTHER HAND…….

When you have something that will benefit you while hurting the public, then telling the truth is out… You won’t go far by being honest.  “Oh, I promised a donor that I’d get his money invested in me, back through state funding before my term was out.”  Truth like that won’t get people on your side…. So, you have to .. trick them…. into letting them in….

“I’m cold” said the big bad wolf… “Please, little pigs… Show some compassion.  You have a nice fire purring and crackling; Let a tired old stranger warm his bones a spell, and then send him on his way…”

When what you propose will hurt other people, you HAVE to trick them… Which boils down here to trying to persuade them to allow you the permission to eat them alive,  In such cases you have no choice but to lie to them…

So if we see the Delaware DOE telling what are known to be lies (which even the News Journal (in their pocket) has called out.) we must ask ourselves:…. Why, why, why, why, why, does the Delaware DOE always lie?

What is so bad that they have to lie to cover it up?  Are you aware of the lies?  Do you want a reminder?

Jack Markell twice told Nancy on Sept.4th, there was nothing written up yet.  The next morning 126 pages of memorandums were plopped down on two districts desks…

All these are failing schools moving in the wrong direction;  yet an audit praised the progress of two of those schools as being exemplary.

We need to fire teachers; they are bad and we shall only rehire half and replace all those fired with substitute teachers from the substitute teaching pool called TFA.   Yet last year, 99% of Delaware’s teachers were rated highly proficient in what they do, based on test scores which are the worst judge of progress. How much better would they have ranked with more pertinent methods of evaluation?

We need to bust the union in these schools.  All they do is smoke cigarettes on the playground and send those things called twitters to Kilroy while they are supposed to be inside teaching.  Umm, hello! , None of the teachers smoke…. WTF (unless they roll a big fat one at home while grading 180 student’s Common Core essays)…

These schools are our worst.  They need turned around right away… There are other schools worse in the state. These were picked only because their students come from walking distances to the new Mega Charter School being put in the old MBNA building which will make a lot of Greenville rich.

Test Scores are the only way to rate whether a student is doing well or not… Wrong.  Test scores only rate how well a student was prepared for that particular test.  The Smarter Balance Assessment is on target to fail 70% of our children… Which is pretty good since it currently fails 98% of professional adults who take the test….  If Delaware’s most successful and affluent lawyer cannot pass the English portions of the Smarter Balanced Assessment, then those poor black children who also fail, are not being let down by their teachers or their schools.  They are intentionally being black-balled by Governor Markell and Mark Murphy…. Just like blacks were in the South, where in order to have any of rights of a white citizen, you had to answer impossible questions in order to take that right as your own.  “How many angels are on the head of a pin?  Sorry, wrong answer, you can’t vote. ”

Christina District turned their back on $3.3 million in  RTTT funding.… Well, as those of us who read the newspapers, heard Mark Murphy speak, heard Jack Markell speak, read both op-ed piece they put in the News Journal, and had to deal with the one they slapped former Mayor Baker’s name on to give it a sliver of credibility, Christina turned down $300,000 that would have cost them an additional $400,000 of their own money to fully implement, and Mark Murphy and Jack Markell punished them by taking $2.9 million away from the kids who desperately needed it!

“Oh, we don’t worry about black people… They are just thugs.  Hard to expect results from kids dodging bullets” –Penny Schwinn (paraphrased)…  Well, that is not really a lie… From all of the actions listed above, it is pretty clear that once all the necessary politics have their “t’s” crossed and “I’s” dotted, black people are the furtherest worry from their minds….

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So do you trust those who blatantly lie to you, thinking you are too stupid, scared, or ignorant to contest them? Or do you pull the rug out from under their feet…

If you are looking for the best way to pull that rug, it is to have a state-wide boycott against taking the Smarter Balanced Test this spring!…  That will give our children’s education back. That will fire the irresponsible DOE we now have, and replace it with an older, more experienced human being who has taught, principal-ed, district-ed, and superintended…. For that across the test of time, is true leadership;  not someone hypnotized then propagandized to throw out pithy gym phrases like one squirts water on a fire.

Heard From Red Clay; Thinking About Christina

Red Clay voted for the MOU… Christina is still debating.   Red Clay caved to power…

I’ve been thinking over how Christina should handle this… And I believe it is well on its way to doing just that.

And power has a lot to do with it.  The billion dollar question is this:  whether it is better to “go along to get along” and always be the slave to whatever gets passed down, or to fight for the freedom to do what’s best for children, and make the other side have to listen to what you say for a change….

And the crux of that argument comes down to this: (which as is usual in a democracy) boils down to how its effects parry across those people who are directly affected by this decision.

The question: is whatever action soon to be taken by Christina in the future, the best option for all the children who will pass through its doors, as well as the best option for all the residents who fork over half their property taxes to fund these schools?….

History shows that what is best, is decentralization… Especially letting those involved who have to deal with the consequences of life-or-death decisions be the ones to determine those decisions in the first place. Things usually work out better that way.

In all cases where centralization has occurred, when poor policy gets decided at the top, it gets forced downward through intimidation or stealth…

Let us examine the state’s record over these past 6 years.   The extra $119 million given by the Feds for education, was squandered…  Where are the new books?  Where are the new classrooms?  Where are the new supplies?  They are not there…. Instead all Delaware has to show for the money, is a $119 million dollar test, one that the entire nation is now up in arms over…  This one little test is all we have to show for $119 million…

Not a proper track record to be given for taking over public schools… I and most Delawareans think someone else should be in control.

The University of Delaware’s report shows 2 priority schools are doing extremely well. This report is a very good case to highlight exactly what is going on here.  These schools were put on probation several years ago, and under the Christina District board, they appear to have tackled the problems so well that according to experts of the University of Delaware inspection team, they have made excellent progress….

It is like firing the coach of the University of Delaware team after they’ve won the championship… (like that would ever happen). But that is exactly what Penny Schwinn implied… That since they happened to be the “coaches” who were hired back when the teams were rebuilding, they can’t possibly remain the head coach now that after all taht hard work, they are in a winning season….

Everyone knows the reason they are being fired, is that like K. C. Keeler, they have a new coach already picked and have already promised her the job.

If the University of Delaware football team can be used as a good example, firing a really good coach and replacing them with a close personal friend, is not the best thing for either a competitive team, or for a school district…

But that is exactly what is being done… This year’s Delaware’s Fighting Blue Hen record was  a dismal 7–5 (4–4 CAA) btw…   yet after the 86 wins and the 2003 National Championship, a good coach was canned to be replaced by this at best mediocre 7-5 coach.  Likewise, after bringing two schools back, those principals are being sacked to make room for someone who doesn’t have a similar track record of success….

If the Christina board succumbs and says to the state DOE, “we will do it your way”, then mediocre must be the best one can ever expect out these students.  It appears the best option is to now stand by those who have done well, and work to better those who can improve…

So if the Christina Board says no to the MOU and puts the ball into the state’s hands, there are two further alternatives. One is a legal injunction; the other is legislation negating the authority of the DOE.  Both bring outside eyes to the entire takeover and make them highly public affairs….

Like sacking K.C. Keeler, if the DOE does override the district and fire principals, teachers, and bring in someone else, the entire world will be micromanaging that person to see if she succeeds or fails… With the entire world looking at her down the wrong end of the telescope, fail she will.

As every mis-step is broadcast across the blogs, WDEL, WDDE, thereby forcing the News Journal to tell the truth for once as well, there is no way the DOE wins… They fired a winning coach and put in a loser. In fact, their very visible missteps here could remove all future DOE interference in public schools for years to come….

Christina District has two options.  Accept the terms being forced upon it and lose all, or, take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing, end them…

Only the latter choice creates any resolution. It may not go your way, that is possible, but you can never be blamed for the corporate selling of the children in your charge, back into slavery. They were taken from you.

Three Worst Things That Can Ever Happen To Children In A Public School

• Charters come into their area
• Common Core gets taught
• Smarter Balanced Assessments are used to rate teachers, schools, and students.

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Our poor children.

Markell Is “Ridin’ On The City Of New Orleans” (School System That Is)

Don’t Turn Wilmington Into New Orleans. Here we have no Saints to come marching in…  (at best just some Blue Rocks and ’87’S)….

New Orleans is held up as “the” model by reformers. Rodel, Markell and Murphy all cite it.  It is “the” model being used by the current Delaware administration to allow the advent of large corporations to teach our kids, for a price…. for a price….

We can look at New Orleans and know what to expect for Wilmington…..

(Coincidentally a new book outlining the steps has been published on this and is review by Diane Ravitch here..) Those steps are:

“first steal their democracy, then steal their schools”

• Some 7,500 veteran teachers, three-quarters of whom were African-American, the backbone of the African-American middle class in New Orleans, were abruptly fired without cause,
• They were replaced by 6000 inexperienced young TFA recruits.
• Public schools were eliminated, even those that were beloved in their communities, some with fabled histories and vibrant ties to the neighborhood.
• Black teachers were erroneously blamed in newspapers opinion pages and multiple letters to editors for being somehow responsible for the poor condition and poor academic results of the public schools…
• Those in power in the state systematically underfunded the schools until the charters came; then the money spigot opened.
• New power elites distrusted local school boards as “politicized and ineffective,” and first undercut, then bypassed, preferring either state control, corporate boards, or appointed leadership.
• From corporate boards and state officials there was always the underlying assumption that “African Americans have no capacity for self-government.”
• The clearest beneficiaries are upper-class white (and a few black) entrepreneurs who seek to capitalize on public assets for their own advancement while dispossessing the very communities the schools are supposed to serve.
• Local African American communities tried to save the schools, which was important to the neighborhood, but with democracy no longer part of the solution, over their objection schools were handed over to KIPP.
• Charter schools did not hire veteran teachers, and none formed a union. They prefer to rely on the fresh recruits, “mostly “cheap” and white, who came with their carpet bags from outside the community.”
• State officials and education entrepreneurs used newspapers and media releases to shift the blame for poor academic results onto the city’s veteran teachers…
• White capitalists once again took power to control the children of African American families and took possession of schools that once belonged to the black community and reflected their culture and their aspirations.
• Inexperienced white recruits hired by the TFA would undermine the best interests of black working-class students and veteran teachers just to leverage a more financially stable and promising future for themselves.
• New Orleans is not a model for anyone to follow unless one is an entrepreneur. The entrepreneurs grow fat while families and children lose schools that once were the heart of their community.
• Once the heart of their community, neighborhood schools under corporate ownership have only one function: spit out test scores (which are worse now then before the transition).
• Consequently, after all of these: New Orleans’ Recovery School District is one of the state’s bottommost performing districts.
• Inner city schools are, or should be, democratic institutions, serving the needs of the local community and responsive to that community’s goals.  Not some investor in New York City.

“first steal their democracy, then steal their schools”….
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We can see it plain as day as was outlined on September 4th, 2014 with the Warner “show for the press” over their announcement of the takeover of 6 schools.

And so It begins.

Moral Quandary? When All Legal Options Are Closed To You, Must One Explore Illegal Ones?

WESTMINSTER, Colo. (CBS4) – There’s no school for Standley Lake High School or Conifer High School on Friday.

Many teachers at both schools called in sick overnight, so school officials decided to cancel classes.

This follows debate at Thursday night’s JeffCo School Board meeting over two controversial issues, including the creation of a review board to look at how American history is taught and changes to how teachers are compensated….

In recent weeks, conflict has centered around a new teacher compensation model the board adopted earlier this month that bases teacher raises on their evaluation ratings, as well as around a proposed new committee to review curriculum on criteria such as whether it promotes patriotism…..

When teacher’s feel compelled to take action of perceived wrongs, the administration has the perfect manipulation at their disposal.  Immediately, Dan McMinimee, Jeffco’s superintendent began to use the classic manipulation technique that has been popularized by abusive spouses for generations...

“While I respect the opportunity for free speech and expression, I think there are other ways to work through these differences without putting kids in the middle,” said Dan McMinimee, Jeffco’s superintendent, at a press conference today.

No.  No there isn’t… At least as far as Common Core goes.  Refresh time.

• Delaware signed onto Common Core through the signature of the Governor and Secretary of Education with zero input from parents, teachers, legislators, lawyers, or experts.
• Common Core policy change was rammed through Delaware’s Senate in a 5-0 committee hearing and a 21-0 in under one minute; no discussion encouraged or allowed. It was not on the agenda, but offered as a surprise.
• Common Core was rushed on the next legislative day to be put up in the House, and had 4 out of 41 in opposition.  That low number corresponded to 4 who had been alerted over the weekend as to the damage that Common Core was capable of fostering.
• Common Core was signed days later by the Governor before any controversy could be stirred up against it…
• The Charter School changes made policy in HB 165 (EARL JACQUES) were created in a top secret, private meeting of hand picked proponents of Charter School takeover,  No public awareness was ever given, and the Attorney General’s Office upon review, said the entire arrangement was ILLEGAL under Delaware State Law. The judgment was passed, long after the bill had been rushed through and become law…  But with more vocal opposition this time.
• When the Smarter Balanced Assessment was defeated, Delaware legislator Republican Greg Lavelle from the Senate 4th District in the Brandywine Hundred, sold out all children when he switched his vote for the chance to be on Chuck Todd’s weekly broadcast featured as a “rising Republican STAR”
• The DSEA, the teachers’ own union, has been in bed with the current administration and sold out all teachers supposedly for a place at the governor’s table..  Teachers cannot even turn to their union anymore.  It is corrupt.
• The News Journal turns a blind eye to the damage this program will do, ignoring by now, thousands of teachers’ letters, choosing  only to publish what the Governor’s office tells it that it must say.

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So what does a teacher do, with full support of every parent in their district, when they can no longer trust their administrator… they can no longer trust their union…. they can no longer trust their legislator…. they can no longer trust their state-wide elected officials…. they can no longer trust their local press….

What avenue is left for a teacher to follow when they see children being manipulated, bullied, mutilated, abused, punished for poverty, and smashed against hard stupidity???

They do what every human being SHOULD do…. They protect the children….  by the only way they have left…. They get sick and the children are saved.

While a ‘sick out’ is illegal for teachers, such actions are very difficult to prove.  It’s hard to demonstrate which teachers were actually taking an approved sick day, and those that were not.  Such measures are therefore a very peaceful way of taking a stand, and involve a very low risk factor.

Delaware Governor States That 95% of Teachers Are Solidly Behind Common Core

DSEA  New Business Item #6 – A vote of no confidence in the implementation of the Common Core State Standards.
MOTION PASSED

Oops.  truth shows it’s face… AGAIN….

Union’s Aren’t Bad: They’re Good

Every once in a while a dumb Conservative will fall off the wagon and start blabbering about how bad unions are… Since Conservatives are today’s equivalent  of yesteryear’s Communists, and since the more they talk (as did those communists), the more the real truth emerges about their horrid ideal for America, it is my sincere wish that they keep it up.

However, just to make sure that not all conversation is one way, I wanted to give everyone a pat on the back who is Union, and thank them, by reminding them just of the powerful role they play…  When facts are on the table, the only way one can really be against unions in general, is if one shoots themselves up with heroin and looses all contact with reality … Today, you really got to be “on something” if you are anti-union…. For all realistic facts point in the opposite direction…

First, let us dispel the mentality that unions force people to be in them…. Once past that rhetorical device, one realizes there are no “forced unions” and therefore there can be no “worker’s choice” involving union ownership..  Or put in layman’s terms,  both forming, and disbanding a union operation, ARE the worker’s choice… As everyone knows,  (my goodness, I hope everyone at least knows)  it takes a majority of workers to form a union. Likewise as everyone knows, it takes a majority of workers to opt out of a union, should they find that union membership really doesn’t “do it” for them.

Workers have plenty of choices.  They can choose to make their shop a union. They can choose to undo their shop as  a union.  They can individually choose to work there under existing  union shop arrangements.  They can individually choose not to work there under existing union shop arrangements.

The argument that workers cannot choose is bogus.  It is based solely on the principle that a union has to cater to the whim of every prospective employee.  In today’s corporate world, would we expect Bank of America to have to cater to the whim of every single employee?  I wish.. huh?   So the entire argument behind “right to work” laws are about the  employer’s rights and the hirer’s rights… as in their right to be able to hire someone willing to work on the cheap, instead of what was called for in the contract he signed with the union….

Worker’s rights have never changed… if they don’t like it, they have always had the right to quit.  They are not being forced to do anything.  They have worker’s choice… The union laws don’t make unions compulsory; they merely prevent free-riding, whereby workers could get the benefits of a union contract without paying for it. ..  Would a corporation like Bank of America  keep free riders on their payroll who were getting paid and doing nothing?  I wish, huh?..

Most employers do prefer the consistency of having contracts over that of having strikes which are very expensive and are not penciled into the long term plan. Even employers are supportive of having closed shops, because only that provides the consistency they need and makes planning more accurate.

However, in attempting to close down unions in America, conservatives have stirred the ire of the American people…. “No matter their warts, unions ultimately reflect their members: typical Canadians just trying to earn a decent income, support their families, and (hopefully) retire with some security, in an economy which rewards the rich and powerful more than ever before..”

Unions represent America. After all, none of us really identify with the CEO making $1,000,000 an hour.  If he doubles his salary, it does nothing for us…  if he doubles his salary and we are the ones paying for it in lower wages, that does affect us.  Unions are the only defense America people have.

Wage gains have been small, strikes are historically rare, and even much-maligned public sector contracts have been rolled back substantially. In such a lopsided context, it’s simply impossible to convince most voters that unions are really Public Enemy Number One..

All those of us making less than $1,000,000 annually, innately understand that if the only institutional voice speaking for working class priorities is silenced, then the whole social contract will become even more tattered in the years ahead. Unions, to their credit, effectively emphasized their broader social impacts in their responses to ridiculous conservative fabrications of reality.

Every attempt to destroy unions, whether in the public or private sector, is now viewed a simply the rich, trying to take what does not belong to them, to make themselves even richer at our expense….  America can see.  It sees conservatives as mean spirited harbingers of middle class poverty.  We are on it’s doorstep now.

America can see.  it can see our fathers hard negotiated benefits they thought would one day help their children, get pulled back, and back, and back.  Health benefits, pensions, insurance,  all those things their fathers chose to take in lieu of more salary, are now clutched back into the hands of those who at one point in our father’s past, had to grudgingly fork them over… .

America can see.  Conservatives are mean spirited, hateful, selfish, brutal, and self-serving.  America can see.

Their anti Union views have pissed off moderate conservatives, who do see the benefits of being able to stand up to ones boss when he is wrong.  They blatantly offend labor unions and their families, by equating their representation with that of organized crime when the actual real criminal is the CEO running the economy into the ground. …

I hope Conservatives speak up all the louder.  For every time they open their mouth, America again realizes that Conservatives do not speak for the 99% of us… They may sometimes fool us with a quick turn of phrase.  But we’ve lived with them long enough, to know, that what they propose, and who they are, and what damage they will do to both the middle class and America… was not accurately reflected upon their original application to us for employment.

It’s past time  to fire Conservatives, for lying on their application…