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1) Please, PLEASE Form a Bloggers Union. There
are a lot of dry spots while trying to write about education and labor
during the dog days of summer, particularly if you entertain any thoughts of
being humorous. That's why I support the idea that was floated at the
YearlyKos convention – a union for bloggers. I would NEVER run out of
material.
I'm not making this up. Shawn Macomber of the The
American Spectator wrote two pieces on it (here
and
here), and the Associated Press has the
mainstream take.
"Bloggers are on our radar screen right now for
approaching and recruiting into the union," said Gerry Colby, president of
the National Writers Union. And why not? NWU has 3,500 members. The U.S.
Department of Labor estimates there are 320,000 working writers. That's 1.1
percent. Colby will be happy to take dues from anyone who can hold a pencil.
Critics are too bogged down in the obvious questions,
like who the heck is management in this arrangement? But why quibble over
trifles when there's a chance of getting on the AFL-CIO payroll?
I'm proud to say that I had this idea years ago,
inspired as I was by a statement from the late AFT President Sandra Feldman,
who after affiliating the New York State Psychological Association said,
"These are mostly people who work for themselves, and yet they need
representation."
It was then I formed the Education Intelligence Extra
Income Organization. EIEIO organized the worker, held elections, staged a
convention, and walked a picket line. You can still find some items on it
in the archives.
2) NEA's Latest Web of Conspiracy. I'm finding
a little hard to get worked up over the blogosphere's back-and-forth about
the
standard conspiracy flow chart that NEA is distributing. The union is
making hay over the Bush Administration's contracting of NCLB funds and
it has drawn responses from
Matthew Yglesias,
Sherman Dorn,
Kevin Carey, and
Alexander Russo, among others, with the main angle being whether NEA is
hurting itself with this kind of stuff.
Let me begin by saying that any uncovering of the
misuse of government funds is near and dear to my libertarian heart.
Cronyism is well-documented in federal spending on defense, agriculture,
transportation, education, and probably everything else. And while NEA might
be slow to admit it, it's a bipartisan practice – one which will benefit NEA
if a Democrat is elected President. So roast away.
Second, I have acquired some knowledge of conspiracy
thinking through my work on
The Hidden Hand and
Conspiracy. Third, this isn't the
first NEA conspiracy flow chart, and I hope this one is better
researched than the last one.
My conclusion is that it's irrelevant whether NEA
really buys what it is selling. Its goal is to poison the NCLB well using
any means necessary, even if single arguments appear to be mutually
exclusive. (If all this money is going to Bush cronies, shouldn't we be
glad NCLB is "underfunded?")
The union is adept at tailoring its arguments to its
various audiences. And this broadside isn't designed for Yglesias, Dorn or
Carey, or anyone else who knows that NCLB was the predictable result of the
convergence of Democratic (more money) and Republican (more strings) federal
agendas for public education. The chart was designed for the Michael Moore
crowd and those who use the dull side of Occam's Razor.
Why spend time persuading people to hate NCLB? You hate
Halliburton, right? Well, it's the same thing!
If NEA's reputation is harmed in any way by this
approach, well, it can set about repairing it after its candidate is
elected.
3) California Reaming. I'm pretty sure you
haven't heard this from your union representatives yet, California teachers,
so be aware that your California Teachers Association state dues will
increase $10 to $611 for the upcoming 2007-08 school year. Your NEA dues
will be $153.
I have no central access to local affiliate dues, but
it seems safe to suggest that somewhere in the state there is now at least
one district where classroom teachers are paying four figures in annual
union dues. Congratulations!
4) Latest on Teamster-NEA Battle in Vegas. The
ongoing fight for representation of some 8,000 education support employees
in Clark County, Nevada, between Teamsters Local 14 and the NEA-affiliated
Education Support Employees Association (ESEA) has stalled yet again.
When last we left our combatants (see
Item #2 here), the state Employee Management Relations Board ruled it
had exhausted its authority after the Teamsters received more votes than
ESEA, but not a majority of eligible voters, as required by state law. This
left the incumbent ESEA in control. But the Teamsters went to court, and a
district judge remanded the case back to EMRB, which, once again, ruled it
could do nothing more.
The Teamsters, naturally, are returning to court in an
effort to compel some sort of action.
5) School Board Logrolling. The
San Diego Union-Tribune looks over an overlooked issue – school
employees sitting on school boards. The newspaper found three employees who
work for one school district, sit on the board of another, and vote on each
other's budgets and salaries.
This is a common practice crying out for quantification
and analysis by some industrious public policy institute with an interest in
education reform.
6) Freudian Headline of the Week. From the July
20 issue of United Teacher, the organ of United Teachers Los Angeles:
"With Michael Moore's Sicko galvanizing audiences nationwide, the
time is right for a singe-payer (sic) plan."
7) Last Week's Intercepts. EIA's blog,
Intercepts, covered these topics from July 30-August 6:
*
This Heartwarming Moment Brought to You by NEA. If your charter or
non-union school burns down, you probably won't be hearing from The View.
*
Winnie Cooper for Secretary of Education. From TV child star to the
co-author of Percolation and Gibbs states multiplicity for ferromagnetic
Ashkin–Teller models on Z2.
*
Help NEA-AFT Find the Bad News. What's wrong with satisfied, committed
teachers?
*
Why Gov. Richardson Needs to Improve the Schools. A gringo in his own
land.
8)
Quote of the Week.
"Throw into that mix visits from 7 Democratic and one Republican
presidential candidates and it made for an interesting week…. They all got
high scores on the Pandometer (it keeps track of the amount of pandering to
the crowd), as is to be expected." – San Diego Education Association
President Camille Zombro and Vice President Marc Capitelli, describing
events at last month's NEA Representative Assembly. (July 2007
The Advocate) |
