Monday, August 27, 2018

Trump's Fake Trade Deal


The Trump Administration has announced an agreement on Aug. 27,2018,   on some issues of trade between the U.S. and Mexico.  At present this is not a significant trade agreement. It is not a new NAFTA.   There has been no progress on the environment, on labor rights, on special international tribunals for dispute resolution, and on migration.   Without resolution on these issues, the Trump claim is merely fake news
 Why should trade deals include migration ?


Since 1994 trade agreements  have led to the massive increase of trade across the borders.  Imports and capital have moved freely. At the same time the movement of workers has been severely restricted and the border enforcement police have grown from 5,000 to 20,000 and continues to grow.  Relatively free trade for goods and capital while restricting movement of workers and thus their ability to organize to protect their own interests has produced additional poverty,  crises, and inequities in each society. 
We are currently experiencing a major restructuring of the global economy directed by the transnational corporations to produce profits for their corporate owners.  The impoverishment of the vast majority of people in pursuit of profits for a small minority has pushed millions to migrant in search of food, jobs, and security. Global capitalism produces global migration.  Along with wars NAFTA  and other “Free Trade” deals each produce  new waves of migration. 
In spite of the economic boon for the wealthy, working people in the U.S. have yet to receive a significant improvement in their standard of living for over 30 years.  At the same time, democratic forces are once again confronted with anti immigrant campaigns- this time fostered and promoted by a President of the U.S. 
As socialists, we stand with and among the US working class in opposition to the rule of the transnational corporations and their exploitation of the economy and their despoliation of our lives, our society and our environment. 
Socialists support the rights of working people to organize, to form unions, and to protect their rights and to advance their interests. Unions have always been an important part of how socialists seek to make our economic justice principles come alive. Working people- gathered together and exploited in the capitalist workplace-are well positioned to fight their common exploitation.
Current immigration laws and practices, imposed upon us all by the corporations and their control of our government, often prevent working class unity by dividing workers against each other and  by creating categories of workers with few rights to organize and  thus to protect  their own interests. 
The  neoliberal capitalist economic system now being advanced by the relentless merging of the world's  markets also  impoverishes the majority of U.S. workers.  The average U.S. worker has experienced a decline in their real wages since 1979.  Quality industrial jobs have moved to low wage, anti union areas in the U.S. and to Mexico, China, Singapore, Vietnam,  India and other nations. At present the U.S. has no significant controls on capital flight. Indeed, the US  government subsidizes some corporations to move jobs to Honduras, El Salvador,  and  the Caribbean.

Thursday, August 23, 2018

LA Teachers Vote Whether to Strike

L.A. Teachers Vote On Strike

Los Angeles teachers vote on whether to authorize a strike. ThinkProgress: “On Thursday, Los Angeles teachers begin voting on whether to authorize a strike. While an authorization doesn’t mean that the strike will take place right away, if the union chooses to strike, it would be the first since a nine-day strike in 1989. It may also be the biggest action since 2009, when thousands of Los Angeles teachers called in sick after hearing about possible teacher layoffs. The voting process will end on August 30. The teachers union, United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA), says it has been at an impasse with the Los Angeles Unified School District for some time. Teachers are asking for smaller class sizes, reductions in standardized testing, a 2 percent bonus, 6.5 percent salary increases and a $500 stipend for materials and supplies, according to California News Wire Services. Teachers are also interested in expanding charter school accountability, spending more money on ethnic studies and bilingual education, and creating school climate and discipline plans, according to a recent open letter from the union.”

Accountability Mantra in Education is Dying - Opinion

by Jeff Bryant

A Top-Down Agenda
The outcome crowd has been dominant from the top down.
Beginning in the 1980s, politicians, policy makers, and business elites pointed to measures of student “proficiency” in reading and math, a yawning gap between how white students and their black and brown peers score on standardized tests, and mediocre results for American students taking international exams as proof that schools and teachers were failing students and communities.
Gradually, political leaders in both parties made “raise the bar” the mantra for education policy.
The attacks on schools resulted in a federal agenda to govern education based on test scores, an agenda that was both a product of policies in reform-minded states like North Carolina and Texas and an encouragement to historically high-performers like Massachusetts and New Jersey to impose new standards and more stringent accountability.
Their crowning achievement was the bipartisan federal legislation called No Child Left Behind that required states to use quantitative outcomes – mostly student scores on standardized tests in reading and math, but some other measures – to determine whether schools met standards. Results also had to be broken down into racial, ethnic, income, and ability student subgroups. A school “passed” if all of its student subgroups met the academic thresholds and the school’s other measures weren’t declining. A school “failed” when even one subgroup missed the threshold.
NCLB required states to subject chronically failing schools to intervene by either taking over operation of the school, firing all or part of the school’s staff, handing the school over to a charter management firm, or closing the school.
A revision of NCLB in 2016 eased federal pressures somewhat – new legislation known as Every Student Succeeds Act gives states more leeway over school intervention strategies – but governance based on the all-mighty test scores still remains the standard in determining failing schools.
But there are now clear signs the accountability argument has become unsustainable.

Bad Politics

When teachers in red states across the country walked off the job earlier this year, it sent a powerful message to politicians that the accountability argument had run into a dead end.
The teachers’ actions brought to light to many who weren’t aware that education funding has not recovered from the Great Recession, and the majority of states fund schools less now than they did in 2008, and teacher salaries have been mostly flat or down since the 1990s. Teachers pointed to not only the lack of funding but also to the gross disconnect between the accountability agenda and the deteriorating conditions of their students, their schools, and their communities.
There’s strong evidence some politicians are listening.
In numerous primary elections this year so far, progressives surged to victories in Democratic contests in key House race by discarding the party’s platform crafted by operatives in Washington, DC and Wall Street. Candidates are instead basing their issue campaigns on cues from their local constituents.
The changing dynamic in the Democratic party will undoubtedly shift candidates more toward the funding-input side, as polls consistently show voters want more education spending, even if it increases their taxes.
K-12 funding will be a “wedge issue” in midterm elections this fall, says a report in Education Week by Daarel Burnette. Winners are taking “strong stances on how (or whether) to shore up their schools’ coffers, and their messages seem to be resonating with voters,” Burnette observes.
But the failure of the accountability agenda goes beyond politics.

Bad Policy

The whole idea that more intense accountability will produce greater gains in student achievement, regardless of funding and resources, is not only losing its currency in politics; it’s proving to be bad policy.
According to a new study by researchers at two leading universities, states under NCLB that pushed their accountability agendas the hardest had mostly disappointing results. Setting ambitious goals and putting pressure on schools to reach them led to only small improvements in eighth-grade math and no improvement in fourth-grade reading.
Even among the various subgroups the accountability agenda had been professed to address, more stringent NCLB implementation led to only small improvements in eighth-grade math and possibly in eighth-grade reading achievement, but no effects on fourth-grade math or reading.
This is not to dispense with accountability altogether.
The report finds states that had little to no accountability for schools previous to NCLB were more apt to show improvements after they adopted more stringent standards, and the gains were largest for certain disadvantaged student subgroups. But even these gains eventually plateaued.
The report authors conclude that all the efforts to pressure schools to improve test scores had benefits that were “minor” at best, despite the high expense of the programs and the ill-will they fomented among teachers and communities. “Ratcheting of test-based accountability pressures alone is not enough to sustain improvements in student achievement,” they write. “Schools and teachers also need additional resources to improve instructional practice.”

Breaking Bad

Clearly, it’s time to break from an accountability-only agenda that is both bad politics and bad policy.
But while the authors’ call for a “Goldilocks” solution of getting the balance between accountability and support “just right” is an improvement over the status quo, it’s doubtful that policy leaders who got us into the quagmire over outcomes versus inputs should be entrusted with proposing a better way forward.
New leaders being thrust to the forefront of politics by a surge from the progressive left seem to get that too.
Instead of clinging to the ideas of deeply invested “experts,” they’re listening to voices in their communities who reject the old trade-offs between this agenda or that and call instead for an agenda for the common good. This revitalized populism from the left has united behind policy ideas like Medicare for all, free college, and reigning in Wall Street. Yet it remains to be seen what policies will unify new progressive leaders on K-12 schools. But at least they’re on the right track.
On both the white-hot frontlines of this year’s political campaigns and the cubicles of data mavens and think tank wonks writing education policy, there is evidence of a sea change that may break out of the funding versus accountability dichotomy and re-center education politics on a more holistic vision of what schools and students need.

Breaking Bad

Clearly, it’s time to break from an accountability-only agenda that is both bad politics and bad policy.
But while the authors’ call for a “Goldilocks” solution of getting the balance between accountability and support “just right” is an improvement over the status quo, it’s doubtful that policy leaders who got us into the quagmire over outcomes versus inputs should be entrusted with proposing a better way forward.
New leaders being thrust to the forefront of politics by a surge from the progressive left seem to get that too.
Instead of clinging to the ideas of deeply invested “experts,” they’re listening to voices in their communities who reject the old trade-offs between this agenda or that and call instead for an agenda for the common good. This revitalized populism from the left has united behind policy ideas like Medicare for all, free college, and reigning in Wall Street. Yet it remains to be seen what policies will unify new progressive leaders on K-12 schools. But at least they’re on the right track.



Tuesday, August 21, 2018

Democrats Move Left


Democrats Move Left 

Max Elbaum, 
What we can learn from the Sixties. He is the author of Revolution in the Air.
Max spoke in Sacramento last month cosponsored by DSA.  This essay focuses on what the Left of today ( DSA) can learn from the turmoil of the Left in the 60’s and 70’s.


Saturday, August 18, 2018

Democratic Socialism is Real

Election pearl-clutching is often related to fears that socialism endangers the wealth and power of America's elites.
BY KATE ARONOFF AND MILES KAMPF-LASSIN [NBC NEWS]

Wednesday, August 15, 2018

Back to School - 2

"The history of social movements makes clear that people want political education in moments of crisis and repression, and that they want to mobilize when they see reasons for hope." (Photo: John Picken Photography/Flickr/cc)
As students and educators gear up for back-to-school this month, more and more of us are asking how we should make sense of public education in this political moment. The history of social movements makes clear that people want political education in moments of crisis and repression, and that they want to mobilize when they see reasons for hope. The Highlander Folk School, for instance, offered such education and hope for the building of the Civil Rights Movement, which then seeded hundreds of citizenship schools and freedom schools across the South.
Freedom schools today would likely be pushing us to ask, “What is happening with our public education system, and what should be our intervention?” One sign to give us hope is that as elites cut, the masses build.
The Washington Post recently revealed a detailed timeline of policy changes and other efforts over the past year and a half by the Education Department to curtail and roll back civil rights protections for students, including policies to refrain from examining possible systemic causes of discrimination. Federal actions have also included renewed attacks on affirmative action, using rhetoric from a quarter-century ago that positioned Asian Americans as “racial mascots.” But in the face of such regression, victories in the courts are accumulating, many led or supported by members of the new national Education Civil Rights Alliance. Several recent examples:
  • The Trump Administration has been pushing to siphon funds from various programs, which would dis-invest in already struggling communities in order to invest billions into expanding school choice and vouchers. But inadequate funding for historically marginalized communities is what lies at the heart of the New Mexico ruling that the state fails to provide sufficient public education, the California ruling that the case against the state for violating students’ constitutional right to literacy can move forward, and the Michigan ongoing case to ban public funds for private schools.
  • The Education Department has rescinded guidance that protects transgender students. But federal courts have repeatedly upheld school or district policies protecting transgender students in FloridaOregon, and Pennsylvania.
  • Newly filed cases seek to protect other groups as well, including children of immigrants in New Jersey, students with mental health disabilities in North Carolina, and students defrauded by for-profit online colleges and loan-servicing agencies nationwide.

Tuesday, August 14, 2018

Back to School



NAME Back to School Statement of Support for Teachers
 
 Before the 2017-2018 school year ended, thousands of teachers in six states walked out of classrooms to protest the woefully low salaries they take home for their efforts to educate the nation’s young people.
The National Association for Multicultural Education knows that low pay for teachers has been a long-standing problem in the United States and urges school districts throughout the country to take the badly needed steps to increase the salaries of beginning and veteran teachers.
   Teacher walkouts and rallies occurred in Arizona, Colorado, Kentucky, North Carolina, Oklahoma and West Virginia. Educators have justly made their appeal to lawmakers for pay improvements. The headline-grabbing action followed dramatic funding cuts in investments in schools, students and teachers at the same time that state lawmakers put in place tax breaks that mostly benefit top income earners and corporations.
   According to National Education Association research, the average public school teacher salary in the U.S. for 2016-2017 was $59,660, ranging from a state average high of $81,902 in New York to $45,555 in West Virginia. The average classroom teacher salary for 2017-2018 was only estimated to increase 1.4 percent over 2016-2017. But factoring in inflation, the average classroom teacher salary has actually decreased by 4 percent since the 2008-2009 school year. As the United States economy crawls out of the Great Recession, unemployment dips to historic lows and the U.S. stock market stretches to new highs, the decrease in teacher pay relative to inflation represents a major backward step for educators.
   As a social justice and equity organization, NAME knows the teacher pay backsliding is shameful and intolerable. 
   NAME is intimately aware that teachers bear a huge responsibility in educating young people from preschool through college. Companies depend on the unsung efforts of teachers for future workers. Our democracy and government rest on an educated and informed citizenry. Teachers each day of class help to forge that foundation. That is no small feat, considering that there are more than 49,878,710 public school students and more than 3,116,550 teachers in the U.S.
   Yet a May 7, 2018, Business Insider article cites OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development)data, showing that the United States ranks fifth behind top ranked Luxembourg, Switzerland, South Korea and Germany in how much elementary school teachers get paid. The U.S. drops to seventh behind top ranked Luxembourg, Switzerland, Germany, South Korea, Austria and the Netherlands in how much high school teachers get paid.
   The Economic Policy Institute additionally reports that accounting for inflation, teacher pay in the United States actually fell $30 a week from 1996 to 2015 compared with pay for other college graduates increasing $124 a week. It should surprise no one that teachers demanding action walked out of classes to protest the public’s unwillingness to provide them with pay equity. Keep in mind that teachers constantly come out of their own pockets to provide needed supplies for their classrooms that school districts just don’t fund.
NAME encourages states and local jurisdictions to begin this school year to make schoolteachers’ salaries equitable with other professions and the top performing Western nations. It will help with teacher retention and go a long way to ensure that educators do a better job preparing students for college and careers, to be lifelong learners and good citizens.
 

Sunday, August 12, 2018

Racism and Fascists in Charlottesville


DSA nationally echoes our Charlottesville chapter’s call for solidarity on this anniversary and we urge all of our members to join with organizations working on the ground to stop the Unite the Right rallies planned in Washington and other cities around the country. 
One year ago Heather Heyer was murdered and many others were injured and scared by the vicious right-wing attack in Charlottesville. DSA members from Virginia, Maryland, and DC were among those who went to Charlottesville to confront the right, among many other small groups of members, and individuals. 
We stand with our chapters who took up the call for solidarity last year, inspired by their memories and bravery. 
Since Donald Trump’s election, the fascist movement in our country has grown more bold, drawing energy and support from Trump’s xenophobic comments, but at the core of the Right’s agenda is an old racism. While the South has a special history related to race, we know that racism is rampant throughout the United States and must be confronted everywhere. Racism drives the right, both the alt-right and the 'mainstream' right represented by the GOP in congress. This is no accident. Nixon's Southern strategy has resulted in a GOP populated by racists.
We stand with all people of color, immigrants, and communities attacked by the racist current in our country. 
Whether in the streets, by going door-to-door, organizing in the workplace, or even confronting injustice in the home, on this anniversary we urge our members to heed the last words of legendary labor activist Joe Hill --
“Don’t mourn, organize!”
Maria Svart
DSA National Director
The following statement was originally published by Charlottesville DSA on August 9th, 2018.

Sunday, August 05, 2018

Kevin de Leon on Immigration Reform

Immigrant Protection

With a firm understanding in the contributions of the undocumented community to California’s culture and economy, Kevin has led the fight against local law enforcement being commandeered to enforce federal immigration laws. This year, he passed SB 54, the California Values Act, which prohibits state and local law enforcement agencies, including school police and security departments, from using resources to investigate, interrogate, detain, detect, or arrest people for immigration enforcement purposes.
Immigrant Protection.jpg
The bill also directs the state Attorney General to develop model policies to be implemented by public schools, libraries, hospitals, courthouses and other public facilities that would limit “to the fullest extent possible” assistance to Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.
With President Trump's decision to rescind the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival program, Senator de León was instrumental in negotiating $30 million to assist the nearly 250,000 Dreamers in California with legal services as well as “safety net” funding to help DACA students stay in school should they become unable to work to support their education.
In 2015, Senator de León led a bicameral coalition to sponsor legislation that addresses lapses in our justice and labor systems creating serious challenges for the California’s immigrant community, including stronger wage theft laws, securing u-visas from law enforcement, and providing healthcare for undocumented children. In 2013, he brokered a compromise with Governor Jerry Brown to ensure signage of a law which allowed undocumented immigrants to obtain drivers licenses, gain access to insurance, and step out of the shadow economy.
Before joining the Legislature, Senator de León taught citizenship courses to immigrants and led opposition to 1994’s Proposition 187, a voter-approved statewide initiative that denied government services to undocumented immigrants.

Voice for the Working Class

Senator de León was a lead negotiator with Governor Jerry Brown and the state’s unions to secure a $15 minimum wage in California, and then shepherded the legislation through both houses to the Governor’s desk.

Friday, August 03, 2018

Latino Voting in the Trump Era

Wednesday, August 01, 2018

President Trump has made 4,229 false or misleading claims in 558 days - The Washington Post

President Trump has made 4,229 false or misleading claims in 558 days - The Washington Post

LCFF and Charters






A startling report uncovers a systemic failure by California charter schools to meet their obligations under state law. Among the findings, not a single school analyzed properly documented how it was increasing or improving services for high need students. Statewide, charter schools receive more than $900 million annually to provide these services.

Learn more: https://bit.ly/2OCfZD8 #CAcharterschools

No, the Government Did Not Make the Deadline to Reunify Children With Their Parents | Portside

No, the Government Did Not Make the Deadline to Reunify Children With Their Parents | Portside
 
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