The Public Trusts Teachers WAY MORE Than Cuomo, King, And Tisch To Do What's Right For Students

The Times-Union has extraordinary results from a Times-Union/Siena poll on education issues in today's paper - the public overwhelmingly support teachers over the governor, the Legislature, the Board of Regents, and NYSED Commissioner King to do what is right for students.

The poll was conducted by Siena and here's the question I want to look at closely today:

Now after thinking about education in New York these past few minutes, I'm going to read you the names of several individuals and groups involved in public education.  Tell me for each if you: completely trust them to do what is best for New York's students, somewhat trust them, only trust them a little, or do not trust them at all to do what is best for students.

Here is how those polled responded:

Andrew Cuomo:

Completely Trust - 9%
Somewhat Trust - 41%
Only Trust A Little - 17%
Do Not Trust At All - 30%

John King:

Completely Trust - 4%
Somewhat Trust - 39%
Only Trust A Little - 16%
Do Not Trust At All - 21%

Teachers Unions:

Completely Trust - 16%
Somewhat Trust - 41%
Only Trust A Little - 19%
Do Not Trust At All - 21%

Local School Board:

Completely Trust - 19%
Somewhat Trust - 52%
Only Trust A Little - 13%
Do Not Trust At All - 13%

Legislature:

Completely Trust - 4%
Somewhat Trust - 37%
Only Trust A Little - 24%
Do Not Trust At All - 32%

Board of Regents:

Completely Trust - 11%
Somewhat Trust - 48%
Only Trust A Little - 20%
Do Not Trust At All - 18%

Teachers in Local Schools:

Completely Trust - 40%
Somewhat Trust - 48%
Only Trust A Little - 7%
Do Not Trust At All - 4%

To put this into perspective, the public either completely or somewhat trusts teachers to do what is right for NY students by an 88%-11% margin, completely or somewhat trusts their local school boards to do what is right for NY students by a 71%-26% margin, completely or somewhat trusts Cuomo to do what is right for NY students by a 50%-47% margin, completely or somewhat trusts King to do what is right for NY students by a 43%-37% margin, completely or somewhat trusts the Regents 57%-37% and completely or somewhat trusts teachers unions to do what is right for students 57%-40%.

In short, teachers are the most trusted individual or group involved in education, the second most trusted group is the local school board.

Trailing WAY BEHIND these two groups are the Board of Regents and the teachers unions.

Trailing behind that is Governor Cuomo, with a 3% plurality of trust over distrust.

Even further under that is NYSED Commissioner John King (he also only has a slim plurality trusting him to do what's right for students but he's well under 50%.)

The one group that is more distrusted than trusted to do what is right for students is the Legislature.

This poll was conducted upstate and there is a lot more to dig into in coming days - including on CCSS, technology spending, parental involvement, testing and teacher evaluations.

But I felt it was important to get a post up today about this extraordinary poll that shows teachers are BY FAR the most trusted of individuals or groups to do what is right for NY students while Cuomo and King barely enjoy pluralities of trust over distrust and King is well under 50% in that trust.

Also, take note of the numbers teachers unions get in the poll - they're tied with the Regents in public esteem (though with slightly higher negatives.)

That's something to be thinking about going into the coming teacher tenure fight here in New York.

One final point I want to bring up here.

Merryl Tisch said a few years ago that the public widely dislikes teachers, but they would like them more once a teacher evaluation system was put into place to hold them accountable for student performance.

The Siena/Times-Union poll shows wide skepticism around Ms. Tisch's battery of reforms, including teacher evaluations, but the one thing it does NOT show skepticism in is the trust the public has for teachers.

Message To Alexander Nazaryan: Teachers Held In Much Higher Esteem Than Journalists

An insult tweet from Newsweek journalist Alexander Nazaryan was sent Arthur Goldstein's way after Arthur jumped into the fray between Nazaryan and Louis C.K. over Common Core:

@TeacherArthurG People like you are the reason teaching isn't respected more.
— Alexander Nazaryan (@alexnazaryan) May 3, 2014

Nazaryan's been getting beaten up for a few days now after he insulted Louis C.K. for criticizing the Common Core while not being an "expert" on education.

Louis C.K. has dispensed with Nazaryan's criticism prettily handily, as is to be expected from a guy who's worked stand-up and knows how to handle drunks, idiots and hecklers in an audience.

Arthur's not worked the stand-up mike that I know of, but he's handled his share of Internet trolls over the years, so he doesn't need me to defend him against Alexander Nazaryan, but something about Nazaryan's statement really stuck in my craw, so I jumped in anyway:

@alexnazaryan @TeacherArthurG Actually poll after poll shows people still respect teachers.
— realitybasededucator (@perdidostschool) May 3, 2014

@alexnazaryan @TeacherArthurG Should add that journalists rank well below teachers in respect - http://t.co/JtmuTEWuxi
— realitybasededucator (@perdidostschool) May 3, 2014

@alexnazaryan @TeacherArthurG 72% say teachers add a lot to society, only 28% say same about journalists.
— realitybasededucator (@perdidostschool) May 3, 2014

And here's the Pew poll results backing up that Americans overwhelmingly still respect teachers and think they add a lot to society as compared to journalists, who rank low on the respect and value-added list:

Americans continue to hold the military in high regard, with more than three-quarters of U.S. adults (78%) saying that members of the armed services contribute “a lot” to society’s well-being. That’s a modest decline from 84% four years ago, the last time the Pew Research Center asked the public to rate various professions. But the military still tops the list of 10 occupational groups, followed closely by teachers, medical doctors, scientists and engineers. A solid majority of the public says each of those occupations contributes a lot to society.

...

 Compared with the ratings four years ago, journalists have dropped the most in public esteem. The share of the public saying that journalists contribute a lot to society is down 10 percentage points, from 38% in 2009 to 28% in 2013. The drop is particularly pronounced among women (down 17 points). About as many U.S. adults now say journalists contribute “not very much” or “nothing at all” to society (27%) as say they contribute a lot (28%).

Pew is polling the American public at large, not the elite media and political circles journalists like Nazaryan run in, so he might be surprised to find out that the public at large doesn't share the elite's disdain and contempt for teachers.

He might also be surprised to find out that only 28% of the American public believe he and his journalism colleagues add anything of value to society.

When you live and work in an insular circle the way many of these elitist journalists do, it's difficult to understand that the people you chat with while sipping cucumber martinis do not share the same values as the public at large.

You can apply Nazaryan's tunnel vision over the respect the American public feels for teachers to his esteem for the Common Core as well - it's informed as much by the insular world he lives and works in as it is by anything else.

Daily News: ATR's May Be Returned To Classrooms

The Daily News that reports teachers who are ATR's may be placed back into classrooms under a plan by NYCDOE Chancellor Farina:

A pool of teachers whom principals don’t want to hire may be headed back into the classroom, the Daily News has learned.

City Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña has had internal discussions with her staff about placing most of the 1,200 educators in full-time teaching jobs even though about half have disciplinary histories or unsatisfactory ratings, sources said.

The move would be a sharp reversal of a policy instituted under Mayor Michael Bloomberg in 2005 to have the teachers rotate as subs instead of foisting them on principals who didn’t want them.

But moving the teachers back into classrooms would save the city an estimated $100 million a year — money that could be allocated elsewhere.

The unassigned teachers lost their full-time jobs for a variety of reasons — 25% committed wrongdoing, 25% received an “unsatisfactory” rating, 40% worked in schools that closed or downsized and 10% teach subjects that are no longer offered in schools.

Awful framing of the issue from the Daily News - it's never mentioned that many of these teachers cannot get hired because of their salaries (i.e, no principal wants to take on an ATR high up on the pay scale) or that some of those "unsatisfactory" ratings are bogus (i.e., administrator gave "u"rating to get rid of teacher for reasons other than job performance.)

Still, it's good news if it's true that many ATR's will be placed back into classrooms.

These teachers should be working in classrooms full-time, not shuffled around their districts as substitutes.

Daily News Propaganda Says Public Employee Contracts Will Wreck NYC

You can read it here.

The gist:

Speaking for Bloomberg, Deputy Mayor Cas Holloway recently called on the unions to accept zero raises for outstanding contracts, relinquish back wages and help finance future raises by having workers contribute to health care coverage.

“In any scenario, granting retroactive contractual salary increases for the period covering the recession would open multibillion-dollar budget gaps and force a dramatic reduction of city services,” Holloway warned, while the unions declared that they would make their demands on the next mayor come New Year’s Day.

The powers that be are worried they're not going to get a mayor who automatically insists on 0% increases, no retro and paying for health care, so they're going on the offensive to get that out to the public now.

The public employees unions must agree to these things or NYC will die.

It's interesting how they have money for tax breaks for real estate interests and tech companies that employee 17 workers, but raises for teachers who have gone without for five years - nope.

Can't give them the 4%/4% that every other union got or NYC will die.

Weiner, of course, is already hinting at this kind of tact.

Don't be surprised if that doesn't bring the oligarchs around to supporting him.

They don't care about Twitter photos if the next mayor is willing to force "the unions to accept zero raises for outstanding contracts, relinquish back wages and help finance future raises by having workers contribute to health care coverage."

But What Is Their Value-Added Measurement?

From the Washington Post:

Seven children’s bodies were taken from the obliterated Plaza Towers Elementary School on Monday, said Oklahoma City police Sgt. Jennifer Wardlow. Officials believe more young victims are trapped, and dead, in the rubble. “Unfortunately I think that number’s going to grow,” Wardlow said.

Some youngsters were pulled from the debris, wet and dirty but alive. In television interviews, a few said teachers used their bodies to shield students from airborne debris. Dozens of rescuers in hard hats continued to pick through the wreckage. In all, Oklahoma Highway Patrol spokeswoman Betsy Randolph told CNN, 101 people had been pulled alive from collapsed buildings by early Tuesday.

Again and again, we see teachers doing everything they can to save their students from harm during these horrific events - from the Newtown shooting to the Oklahoma tornado.

Joel Klein and Michael Bloomberg and Michelle Rhee and so many other education reformers like to say that teachers are only out for themselves, that they don't care about their students, that they only care about their pensions and their tenure.

Again and again, as we see teachers use their bodies to shield their students from harm in events from Newtown to Okahoma City, we see that what Klein and Bloomberg and Rhee and so many other education reformers say about teachers are lies.

If Only Bankers Were Treated Like Teachers...

From NBC News, an administrator is arrested for cheating on Regents exams:

A department head at a New York high school has been accused of changing two students' answers on state tests to give them a passing grade.

The Westchester County district attorney says 54-year-old Allison Risoli of Peekskill was arraigned Monday on false-document charges.

A call to Risoli's attorney was not immediately returned.

The district attorney said Risoli altered answer sheets for January exams in history and geography several days after the tests were taken at Peekskill High.

Meanwhile in the HSBC money laundering case:

BILL MOYERS: You’re working on a story right now that’ll come out in a couple of weeks on the HSBC settlement. That’s the, tell me about that, why it interests you.

MATT TAIBBI: Well, the HSBC settlement was a really shocking kind of new low in the history of the too big to fail issue. HSBC was a serial offender on the money laundering score. They had been twice given formal cease and desist orders by the government. One dating back as far as 2003, another one in 2010 for inadequately policing the accounts in their system. They laundered over $800 million for cartels in Colombia.

BILL MOYERS: Drug cartels?

MATT TAIBBI: Drug cartels in Colombia and Mexico. They laundered money for terrorist connected banks in the Middle East. Russian gangsters. Literally, you know, I talked to one prosecutor who’s, like, “They broke basically every law in the book and they did business with every kind of criminal you can possibly imagine. And they got a complete and total walk.” I mean, they had to pay a fine.

BILL MOYERS: $1.9 billion, a lot of money.

MATT TAIBBI: It’s a lot of money. But it’s five weeks of revenue for the bank, to put that in perspective. And no individual had to suffer any consequences at all. There were no criminal charges no individual fines, which was incredible. Incredible.

Incredible indeed.

If only these bankers who laundered the drug money had changed some answers on a Regents exam - then they'd face some accountability.

Michael Winerip Really Gets It

Great column in the Times by Michael Winerip on mayoral control and what is really important in education.

Here is my favorite part:

For five of the last 10 years, I’ve covered education. I’ve been in hundreds of schools, interviewed more children, teachers and principals than I can count. In that time, I spoke one sentence to Joel I. Klein; not one to Ms. Black; and one to Dennis M. Walcott, the man picked to be the next chancellor.

...

There are a few things you actually need to know to cover education in New York City: The mayor is considered to be a national leader in what’s called the reform movement; he believes in the educational market place, standardized tests and charter schools; and it’s almost always the union’s fault.

The one thing the last two chancellors and the presumptive chancellor have in common: They believe the very same things the mayor believes.

I don’t feel I’ve missed much by not talking to chancellors. At the moment Ms. Black resigned, I was in Harlem, touring Public School 241, whose students have been moved into the basement to make room for a charter school.

The thing I love about education — after the politicians have finished micromanaging; after the think-tank scholars have massaged the latest studies; after the scientists in the Education Department have produced data to justify almost anything — good teachers can still go into their rooms, close their doors and teach.

When the children of New York City grow up, they will not remember who the chancellor was when they were in school. They will not remember the name of the secretary of education. But until the day they die, they will remember their kindergarten teachers.

That's really well said.

Naming Names

Create any old value-added assessment you want.

Use tests that were never meant to be used for value-added assessment.

Run the scores through a computer and come up with a list of "good teachers" and "bad teachers."

Publish those names in the LA Times on Sunday.

Have the Obama administration publicly endorse the publication through a statement by the Secretary of Education.

Never mind that the tests were not meant to judge teachers.

Never mind that they way the analysis was conducted leaves the end product open to a margin of error the size of Obama's ego.

They're going to go with this Naming Names strategy as a way to publicly shame "bad teachers" out of their jobs.

I think they hope parents will see the names in the paper and demand that the teachers be fired.

Or perhaps they hope parents will take justice into their own hands vigilante-style.

Because that's kind of what this is.

Okay, forget the "kind of" part.

That's what this is.

They publish the names of tax cheats in the papers.

They publish the names of deadbeat dads and parents not paying alimony and child support.

They publish the names of johns arrested for soliciting prostitutes.

They publish the names of people arrested for DWI.

They publish the names of sex offenders.

And now they publish the names of "bad teachers."

Who cares if the analysis used to come to those conclusions is flawed?

The point is to get "bad teachers" out of the system.

And now that the Obama administration has publicly endorsed this action, you can be sure we will see similar articles all around the country.

I bet the Wall Street Journal - exceedingly pro-charter and pro-"reform" since Rupert Murdoch took it over - is working on such an article about NYC right now.

Perhaps Zuckerman has his minions at either the Daily News or US News working on one (US News loves to publish lists - Best Colleges, Best Medical Schools, Best Graduation Schools...Worst Secondary School Teachers fits right in with the rest of the reductionism that passes for analysis at that rag.)

Whenever I have juniors or seniors talk about wanting to go into teaching these days, I always say you might want to rethink that career choice.

Teachers are under attack from all sides - from Bloomberg and Klein here at the city level to Paterson (and soon Cuomo) at the state level to Obama and Duncan at the federal level (and Bush and Spellings before them.)

Billionaire slave labor employers like Steve Jobs want to see us fired and the unions busted.

Predator philanthropists like Bill Gates and Eli Broad put up millions to bring that dream to fruition.

Hedge fund criminals like Whitney Tilson start "education reform" non-profits that work toward the hedge fundie wet dream of a completely privatized public school system open to billions of EMO profits.

And our unions, rather than fight these attacks with all they've got, either stick their heads in the sand and make believe they're not happening or actually collaborate and invite the enemy into the city (as Weingarten did by having Bill Gates speak at the AFT convention.)

These are bad times for the country at large.

The economy has been terrible and it's getting worse even as I write this post.

The unemployment rate is 9.5% and going higher by the end of the year.

The underemployment rate is 19% and going higher by the end of the year.

GDP is expected to slip to 1.2% or lower for Q2 and hover near 0% for the second half of the year.

Foreclosures have increased every month for the last thirteen months and with over a year's worth of housing inventory on the market and prices still needing to fall to get back to a historical home price/income ratio, the housing crisis is going to get worse before it gets better too.

What is being done about any of this?

Not much - other than to blame the public school system and public school teachers for not teaching the skills needed to survive this uber-corporate 21st century economy.

It's not our fault, of course.

The predator billionaires and hedge fund criminals run things on Wall Street and in Washington.

They steal as much as they can from the economy without putting anything back in the form of either investment or hiring.

They nearly brought about economic collapse in 2008 and rather than be punished for their crimes and hubris, they are bailed out by both Bush and Obama and allowed to continue to run the economy like a rigged casino.

And now, rather than just blame teachers for this mess they did NOT create, the powers that be have decided to name names and get some vigilante justice going.

Don't be surprised if that isn't the plan.

Do you think Michelle Rhee or Joel Klein would be sorry to see outraged parents take to a classroom to themselves "fire" a teacher rated "bad" by some newspaper through some jive value-added analysis story?

How about Duncan and Obama?

I don't know about you, but I could absolutely see Rhee shrugging if some crazy parent or parents, angry that their kid has been left back or is struggling below grade level, took to a classroom and punched some teacher exposed as "bad" by the local newspaper.

I could absolutely hear Rhee say "If bad teachers refuse to step down themselves and teachers unions try and protect bad teachers from firing, then maybe parents have to take action themselves."

The point, apparently, is just to get rid of "bad teachers."

Doesn't matter how you do it. Doesn't matter how you measure it.

Just that it happens.

These are bad times indeed.

Principal Excesses 28% of Staff

Wow - I bet Michelle Rhee is impressed by the evil doings of the principal at PS 222:

An embattled Jackson Heights principal gave seven of her roughly 25 teachers the boot - even though the city had approved only two layoffs at Public School 222 because of budget cuts, city officials said.

Now, some teachers at the pre-K-through-second grade school are claiming the layoffs had less to do with cost-cutting and more with weeding out faculty that Principal Yvonne Marrero didn't like.

"It's horrendous," said kindergarten teacher and union rep Giuliana Miscella. "People are so scared of the principal and they're in such fear of retaliation."

On the last day of school late last month, teachers presented the district school superintendent with a letter accusing Marrero of using "intimidation techniques" to foster a work environment of "fear," faculty said.

"The morale of the school is very low," said first-grade teacher Patricia Santora, who was not laid off. "There's a lot of mistrust between the staff and the administration."

By that point, seven teachers had received letters from PS 222 stating they were to be "excessed."

Teachers who are excessed lose their positions because their schools can no longer afford their salaries, said city Education Department spokeswoman Anne Forte.

If they can't find a new teaching job elsewhere, they can continue receiving paychecks while working as teacher aides, tutors or substitute teachers in the district, she said.

Excesses are not that unusual as city schools have had their budgets slashed by roughly 12% over the past two years, Forte said.

But PS 222 teachers became suspicious of the layoffs when they didn't receive formal letters from the city. When several called the department, they learned they had actually not been excessed, teachers said.

Those faculty members can return to the school in the fall, Forte said.

"They are currently employed by the school and they still have jobs at the school unless they choose to transfer to another school," she said.

Two of the seven teachers who were told they were laid off have found jobs at other institutions, staffers said. Two other teachers, who were not among the excessed, have left the school.

In fact, the school is looking to fill two bilingual staff positions. Education officials said the new hires are federally mandated, because the school has seen a spike in foreign-born students.

Marrero did not return calls seeking comment.

Forte said Marrero maintains that the layoffs were a "budget mixup."

Uh, huh.

Have you noticed how the more power you give to some of these principals, especially the ones from the Jack Welch Scumbag Academy, the more "mix-ups," "controversies," and "firings" you get?

A study was released this week showing that schools with leaders who treat their staffs with respect and share power with teachers actually do better than the ones run by petty dictators.

Unfortunately, with school districts being run by the likes of Klein (Satan) and Rhee (Satan Jr.) and pro-firing policies being enshrined in federal law by the President of Accountability (that's other people's accountability, of course, not his own), that study will not give much pause to all the firings and other abuses.

Especially not when the union in place to protect teachers is actually in bed with management and allows these changes to happen, then throws their hands in the air and says "Gee, we can't believe they would use the new rules this way to abuse teachers."

That goes for Weingarten at the AFT, Mulgrew at the UFT, and all the Weingarten cronies around the country.

If you allow the ed deform people to frame the issues, you are going to be on the defensive on every issue.

The ed deform people will continue to get more and more concessions until finally teachers will be like Burger King employees - subject to firing right there at the frialator as we're asking the kids if they want fries with those standardized tests.

No tenure protections, no seniority protections, just FedEx letters home saying "THANKS FOR PLAYING! YOU'VE BEEN FIRED!"

Obama, Duncan: Will Veto Teacher Jobs If Money Taken From Race to the Top Boondoggle

As an update to the story where we learned the Obama administration wanted to cut food stamp subsidies in order to use the money for an education jobs bill instead of cutting $500 million from Secretary Arne's FIRE TEACHERS/CLOSE SCHOOLS Race to the Top competition, I present you with a post from David Dayen at Firedoglake who was on a Thursday reporter conference call with Arne:

I just got off one of the stranger conference calls of my conference call career. Education Secretary Arne Duncan and White House Domestic Policy Adviser Melody Barnes joined others on a call to argue for an immediate education jobs fund to save the careers of teachers facing layoffs. They laid out all the reasons why teachers must stay in the classroom and why we risk failing our students without this funding. They were very passionate about this. They rejected the notion that the White House has been unclear or aloof on the issue, noting in painstaking detail all the times that the President on down have advocated to save teacher jobs.

And then, Barnes said, “We don’t have to make a choice between reform and making sure teachers are able to stay in the classroom,” and that if the education jobs fund got paid for with a sliver of stimulus money dedicated to the Race to the Top program, they would recommend a veto.

Then I got whiplash.

There are actually three stimulus programs that would get a cut in funding under the bill passed in the House as part of the war supplemental: Race to the Top, the Teacher Incentive Fund (which is about performance pay and encouraging teachers to work in hard-to-staff, low-income areas) and the Charter Schools Fund. Barnes and Duncan want to find other means of offsetting the jobs fund. The Education Secretary said that he would “work with Congress” on that. “I’m happy to have skin in the game,” Duncan said. But he gave no specifics of potential offsets, likely to come from the Education Department.

It’s important to recognize what the Race to the Top program is. It’s a pot of money. The Education Department dangles it in front of the states to get them to change their education policies to what they prefer. And then it slowly dribbles it out. $4.3 billion dollars was appropriated in the stimulus for RTTT. Only $600 million has gone out, to two states (Tennessee and Delaware), 18 months later. So Arne Duncan has already cost teacher jobs by holding back $3.7 billion for a year and a half to try and entice more desperate states to change their policies.

Incidentally, increased class size, which comes with the firing of teachers, LOWERS THE AMOUNT OF MONEY states can be eligible for under the RTTT program. So denying the education jobs fund by vetoing the bill over a $500 million cut to RTTT (less than a 20% decrease) actually lowers the amount states can receive. It’s a cut EITHER WAY, and arguably a larger one if the education jobs money doesn’t go through.

Barnes and Duncan could not explain why a $3.8 billion dollar Race to the Top program would somehow be less successful than a $4.3 billion dollar program. He said that 36 states are applying for Round 2, and the cut in funding would mean “a couple states would lose out.” Um, 48 states lost out in Round 1, and as a result lost money for their education budgets that led to worse outcomes for students. I cannot fathom how a sliver of reform money is seen as more important than the biggest reform to schools you can make, namely “giving them enough teachers.”

Some of Barnes and Duncan’s willing minions have a Wall Street Journal op-ed today that makes a similar case, and I can’t make heads or tails out of it either.

Barnes said that cutting RTTT is a “decision we don’t have to make.” Well, they can come up with something tangible, then. But I don’t see any logic to holding a slush fund to blackmail states when we’re in the middle of a state budget crisis.

Indeed.

And I like how Daven calls RttT what it is - a slush fund for Arne to blackmail states in the middle of the worst budget crisis since the 70's.

I'm going to go with that terminology from now on.

Bloomberg Wants LeBron

Mayor Bloomberg says there is no money for raises for teachers. Not even the measly 2% he offered after cutting the 4% from the pattern bargaining in half.

Oh, but there IS money to spend on p.r. to get LeBron James to sign with the Knicks:

LeBron James is the Big Apple of New York's eye, and the city is pulling out all the stops to let him know.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg is part of a group that launched a promotional campaign to convince the free agent to play for either the New York Knicks or New Jersey Nets.

"New York City is fit for a king -- there's no better place in the world to live, to play or to win," Bloomberg said in a statement. "New Yorkers want LeBron to come to the greatest city in the world, and we're launching the C'mon Lebron campaign to capitalize on their energy and creativity in making their own cases for why he should choose New York. There are terrific cities all over the country, but none match the excitement of the greatest City in the world."

Street ads and online promotions will feature New Yorkers and celebrated public figures trying to convince the Cleveland Cavaliers star to choose New York when free agency begins July 1. C'mon LeBron T-shirts will be distributed in the city, while messages will appear on taxis and in Times Square. The website cmonlebron.com carries the group's message.

Boy, I am so glad he's got money to spend on this thing, but not for a lousy extra $1500 a year for me.

Or for that matter, money to fix the holes in the ceiling of all the classrooms on the ninth floor in my school.

The ones spewing dust and crap into the air.

The dust and crap that sent one teacher to the ER with an asthmatic attack.

The dust and crap that may have caused me to have an allergic reaction and lose hearing in my ear for a few days.

Yeah, I am glad Bloomberg has his priorities straight.

And those priorities are - SCREW TEACHERS! HOW CAN I HELP CORPORATIONS?

Even odious ones that he really hates - like Cablevision.

Remember, Cablevision owns the Knicks.

Bloomberg hates Cablevision because they fought him on the West Side stadium issue.

Yet he is spending money to help them out.

Just goes to show, so long as your corporation, Bloomberg is willing to let bygones be bygones...

It must be in his blood - all blue, these days.

Bill Maher Changes His Tune On Teachers

OK, I didn't see this one coming.

Bill Maher attacked teachers last year on his HBO show. He said teachers unions were "corrupt," tenure was bad and unions perpetuated a terrible education system by protecting "bad teachers" and moving them from school to school the way the Catholic Church moved pedophile priests.

Not exactly an endorsement of teachers.

But then, almost one year to the day that he attacked teachers and teachers unions, he said this last night on his show:

New Rule: Let's not fire the teachers when students don't learn - let's fire the parents. Last week President Obama defended the firing of every single teacher in a struggling high school in a poor Rhode Island neighborhood. And the kids were outraged. They said, "Why blame our teachers?" and "Who's President Obama?" I think it was Whitney Houston who said, "I believe that children are our future - teach them well and let them lead the way." And that's the last sound piece of educational advice this country has gotten - from a crack head in the '80's.

Yes, America has found its new boogeyman to blame for our crumbling educational system. It's just too easy to blame the teachers, what with their cushy teachers' lounges, their fat-cat salaries, and their absolute authority in deciding who gets a hall pass. We all remember high school - canning the entire faculty is a nationwide revenge fantasy. Take that, Mrs. Crabtree! And guess what? We're chewing gum and no, we didn't bring enough for everybody.

But isn't it convenient that once again it turns out that the problem isn't us, and the fix is something that doesn't require us to change our behavior or spend any money. It's so simple: Fire the bad teachers, hire good ones from some undisclosed location, and hey, while we're at it let's cut taxes more. It's the kind of comprehensive educational solution that could only come from a completely ignorant people.

Firing all the teachers may feel good - we're Americans, kicking people when they're down is what we do - but it's not really their fault. Now, undeniably, there are some bad teachers out there. They don't know the material, they don't make things interesting, they have sex with the same kid every day instead of spreading the love around... But every school has crappy teachers. Yale has crappy teachers - they must, they gave us George Bush.

According to all the studies, it doesn't matter what teachers do. Although everyone appreciates foreplay. What matters is what parents do. The number one predictor of a child's academic success is parental involvement. It doesn't even matter if your kid goes to private or public school. So save the twenty grand a year and treat yourself to a nice vacation away from the little bastards.

It's also been proven that just having books in the house makes a huge difference in a child's development. If your home is adorned with nothing but Hummel dolls, DVD's, and bleeding Jesuses, congratulations, you've just given your children the gift of Duh. Sarah Palin said recently she wrote on her hand because her father used to do it. I rest my case.

When there are no books in the house, and there are no parents in the house, you know who raises the kids? That's right, the television. Kids aren't keeping up with their studies; they're keeping up with the Kardashians. We're allowing the television, as babysitter, to turn us into a nation of slutty idiots. By the way, one sign your 9-year-old may be watching too much One Tree Hill: if she has an imaginary friend with benefits.

Last night Bill Maher got it right - teachers are not the problem with the system.

We are the scapegoats.

And by saying so, he echoed what Diane Ravitch wrote on Bridging Differences last week:

I absolutely do not agree that our schools are overrun with terrible teachers; part of the goal of my book is to discredit the current knee-jerk reaction of editorialists and public officials, who blame teachers for everything that goes wrong in the schools. Blaming the teachers lets everyone else off the hook: families, the media, the popular culture, policymakers, and students themselves. The overwhelming majority of our nation's teachers are doing the best they can under difficult circumstances, with not enough support from society, parents, or the media.

I dunno if this message will resonant with too many people in the media.

It seems like every time I turn on the TV and watch the news, I see "experts" on MSNBC or CNN or CNBC talking breathlessly about our "education crisis" and blaming teachers, teachers unions and teacher tenure for the problems in education.

And every time I look at a newspaper or magazine these days, I see "journalists" like Elizabeth Green or Evan Thomas rewriting Gates Foundation pamphlets about how bad teachers are and including liberal quotes from "education reformers" from foundations funded by Eli Broad and Michael Bloomberg and founded by Michelle Rhee to support their anti-teacher themes.

So I am not too optimistic that the tide has turned in the message war and people in the media will stop being reductionist about the problems with the public education system.

But it is good to hear somebody who slammed teachers just last year say this year that by scapegoating teachers, America is letting the real culprits off the hook - the culture, the parents, and the students themselves.

Geithner Implicated In Lehman Mess: Where's The Accountablity?

President Accountability is very big on holding teachers accountable and firing as many as possible under his Race to the Top initiative, bur he surely doesn't plan on holding his Treasury Secretary accountable for anything - not paying AIG's counterparties 100 cents to the dollar for the toxic crap on AIG's books that was worth at best 15 cents to the dollar, and not for Lehman's collapse.

And that is so even though the NY Fed under Geithner KNEW Lehman Brothers was falsifying its books and lying to investors about it:

Quite a few observers, including this blogger, have been stunned and frustrated at the refusal to investigate what was almost certain accounting fraud at Lehman. Despite the bankruptcy administrator’s effort to blame the gaping hole in Lehman’s balance sheet on its disorderly collapse, the idea that the firm, which was by its own accounts solvent, would suddenly spring a roughly $130+ billion hole in its $660 balance sheet, is simply implausible on its face. Indeed, it was such common knowledge in the Lehman flailing about period that Lehman’s accounts were sus that Hank Paulson’s recent book mentions repeatedly that Lehman’s valuations were phony as if it were no big deal.

Well, it is folks, as a newly-released examiner’s report by Anton Valukas in connection with the Lehman bankruptcy makes clear. The unraveling isn’t merely implicating Fuld and his recent succession of CFOs, or its accounting firm, Ernst & Young, as might be expected. It also emerges that the NY Fed, and thus Timothy Geithner, were at a minimum massively derelict in the performance of their duties, and may well be culpable in aiding and abetting Lehman in accounting fraud and Sarbox violations.

We need to demand an immediate release of the e-mails, phone records, and meeting notes from the NY Fed and key Lehman principals regarding the NY Fed’s review of Lehman’s solvency. If, as things appear now, Lehman was allowed by the Fed’s inaction to remain in business, when the Fed should have insisted on a wind-down (and the failed Barclay’s said this was not infeasible: even an orderly bankruptcy would have been preferrable, as Harvey Miller, who handled the Lehman BK filing has made clear; a good bank/bad bank structure, with a Fed backstop of the bad bank, would have been an option if the Fed’s justification for inaction was systemic risk), the NY Fed at a minimum helped perpetuate a fraud on investors and counterparties.

This pattern further suggests the Fed, which by its charter is tasked to promote the safety and soundness of the banking system, instead, via its collusion with Lehman management, operated to protect particular actors to the detriment of the public at large.

And most important, it says that the NY Fed, and likely Geithner himself, undermined, perhaps even violated, laws designed to protect investors and markets. If so, he is not fit to be Treasury secretary or hold any office related to financial supervision and should resign immediately.

There's more - read it all.

And the point stands - Geithner was derelict and incompetent in his duty as NY Fed head at best; at worst, he was an out-and-out crook who helped Lehman commit fraud.

And yet we hear nothing from President Accountability about Geithner's actions as head of the NY Fed.

Not one thing.

Just another example of hypocrisy from this most hypocritical of presidents.

I can't wait to see how many seats Dems lose in November.

And I can't wait to see President Accountability held accountable himself in 2012.

And if things don't change soon, he will be.

UPDATE: Cunning Realist points out how another architect of the financial crisis has just gotten rewarded by President Accountability.

That would be Janet Yellen of the San Francisco Fed who Obama just nominated to be Vice Chairman of the Federal Reserve:

Yellen has her fans, but I'm not one of them. One of the most important issues in monetary policy right now is the debate about whether the Fed should short-circuit asset bubbles in real time or wait to clean up the expensive mess. Yellen's position was clear as early as 2005, an important year in the chronology of the bubble:

This brings me to the debate about how monetary policy should react to unusually high prices of houses -- or other assets, for that matter. ... In my view, the weight of a decision to deflate an asset price bubble rests on positive answers to three questions. First, if the bubble were to collapse on its own, would the effect on the economy be exceedingly large? Second, is it unlikely that the Fed could mitigate the consequences? Third, is monetary policy the best tool to use to deflate a house-price bubble? My answers to these questions in the shortest possible form are, "no," "no," and "no."

If there was any accountability for policymakers who played a role in the crash, Yellen's disastrous and date-critical underestimation of the bubble and its consequences would be enough to keep her in the Pacific time zone.

Yet one more example of Obama rewarding failure, short-sightedness and outright incompetence and yet one more example of how in Obama's America, only teachers are accountable.

To paraphrase Mel Brooks, it's good to be in high finance!