Unions
Obama’s Trade For Teamsters Support
The Wall Street journal said Monday Sen. Barack Obama won the endorsement of the Teamsters earlier this year after privately telling the union he supported ending the strict federal oversight imposed to root out corruption. The WSJ contend its conclusion is reached “according to officials from the union and the Obama campaign.”
It’s an unusual stance for a presidential candidate. Policy makers have largely treated monitoring of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters as a legal matter left to the Justice Department since an independent review board was set up in 1992 to eliminate mob influence in the union. Obama is reported to have said he thinks the ongoing effort has runs it course.
The ongoing probe has been a burr under the Teamster’s saddle blanket. Most observers think mob influence over the union has diminished in recent times. The Teamsters if the largest Union in the United States with about 1.4 million members with 32% in the Central state anchored in Obama’s hometown of Chicago; 26% in the West; 28% in the East, and 7% in the South. About 2% are in Canada.
Two-thirds of Teamsters members work in one of five divisions: Warehouse, Parcel, Freight, Public Employees and Industrial Trades. The Public Employees sector is the union’s fastest-growing division, and organizing more Federal employees is a lucative segment for the union, and some say a friendly person in the White House who would block Federal oversight would be pehaps the biggest coup possible for the union at this juncture
PUBLIK EDUKATHUN
To no ones surprise who has watched the dissolving public schools 17 of the nation’s 50 largest cities have high school graduation rates below half. America now spends more per student than almost every other nation and gets less for it. America’s education deficit is forcing jobs off shore where better educated students are available – often for less money and with better work ethic – and without the punishing litigation climate.
One bright spot is when and where families can pick the schools there children attend. Charter school enrollment in the U.S. has climbed to 1.1 million from zero seeded by two tiny voucher programs in Maine and Vermont 20-years ago. Tuition tax credits, once puny and rare, are now sizable and commonplace. Plus, as public education fails home schooling has dramatically increased by parents concerned about poor results, conflicting ideologies, and increasingly dangerous campuses. School choice is clearly making a difference for the better, which justifies expanding it, not abandoning it.” - excerpted from Wall Street Journal editorial, 4/5/08 with additions.
EDUKATHUN WARS
On March 25, the California Court of Appeal granted a motion for rehearing in the ‘In re Rachel L.’ case–the controversial decision which purported to ban all homeschooling in that state unless the parents held a teaching license qualifying them to teach in public schools. The automatic effect of granting this motion is that the prior opinion is vacated and is no longer binding on any one, including the parties in the case.” - Home School Legal Defense Association, 3/26/08
California law requires children between six and 18 to attend a full-time day school. Failure to comply means falling afoul of the state’s truancy laws, which say kids can’t play hooky without an excuse. But kids who are taught at home are less likely to be truants. Their parents choose to spend their time teaching English, math and science precisely because they don’t think the public schools do a good enough job.”…That so many families turn to home schooling is a market solution to a market failure — namely the dismal performance of the local education monopoly. . . . For some parents, the motive for home schooling is religious; others want to protect their kids from gangs and drugs. But the most-cited reason is to ensure a good education.”Home-schooled students are routinely high performers on standardized academic tests, beating their public school peers on average by as much as 30 percentile points, regardless of subject. They perform well on tests like the SAT — and colleges actively recruit them both for their high scores and the diversity they bring to campus.” - Wall Street Journal editorial, 3/22/08
Oregon Speaker Kisses Teachers’ Butts Is Hypocrite.
Oregon House Speaker Jeff Merkley voted against Oregon’s charter school legislation pontificating about fairness in education, what a great job teachers’ unions were doing and other pomposities while grabbing with both hands for teachers’ union money. He lost. Then, he and his wife secretly applied to send two of their kids to a newly forming charter school. The school was late in starting up, so he lost again as the application wasn’t acted on. Merkley denied the report at first but a newspaper produced the application making him look dumber and more hypocritical than usual.
A LOT FOR TOO LITTLE
United States’ taxpayers get the least bang for the bucks spent on education, putting the U.S. at 18th in reading (behind countries like Japan and Poland) and a dismal 28th in math finds an international study. The Center for Union Facts has launched www.TeachersUnionExposed.com, a new campaign to shine the spotlight on the failures of teachers unions.
HOME SCHOOL OWN CHILD AND GO TO JAIL?
A California Appeals Court judge says parents who home school their own children but are not credentialed teachers (don’t have a State teaching certificate) could be sent to jail. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger called the ruling “outrageous” and said, “If the courts don’t protect parents’ rights then, as elected officials, we will.” Teacher Unions see the ruling as a victory for their monopoly on California’s miserable public education establishment. 50,000 to 100,000 California children are educated at home and the number is growing as public schools continue to under perform. This one is headed to the Supreme Court.
California spends more per student and gets less results than almost anyplace on earth. Plus, schools are among the most dangerous of places.
Unionist “Nukes” Obama
Tom Buffenbarger of the Machinists Union, and Hillary Clinton surrogate, blasted Barack Obama by saying Obama is a “Shadowboxer”, “Nose in the Air Pontificator” and “Silver Toungued Warrior.” Buffenbarger said Obama was not with us on the picket line, in the Illinois or U. S. Senate and we are still waiting him to show up. “GIVE ME A BREAK!” he shouted; Obama won’t last one round against the Republicans.
President’s Day All About 3-day Weekend.
In 1968, legislation (HR 15951) was enacted to give federal employees more three-day
weekends – including President’s Day as always the 3rd Monday in February.
3.2 MILLION MEMBER UNIONS TO ENDORSE OBAMA
Two major unions–Service Employees International Union and the United Food (1.9 million members) and Commercial Workers Union (1.3 million members)–are meeting today and they will endorse Barack Obama says Front Page Post reprinted by the Labor Research Foundation.
These are an enormous endorsements. Heretofore these unions have left endorsing to State Chapters but exit polls after SUPER TUESDAY showed solid union member support for Obama.