Saturday coffee.
Popout
Last night was beautiful. A short break in the 90 degree summer we’ve been sweating through.
Anne and I walked up to the Monument where the Milwaukee Avenue Arts Festival is running this weekend.
Our friend Peter has a couple of large-scale photographs on exhibit. Peter used to work for the City and was Mayor Washington’s photographer. He, like me, is retired now and taking his photography is new directions. They’re great.
We stopped at Lula on the way home. We sat at the bar and Anne had a gin and tonic with some locally made gin. It’s made by a little company started by the bartender somewhere on the north side. Anne said it was pretty
Old school.
Carl Perkins.
Arne.
The in box. Those who crafted SB7 regret not making it even more union busting.
Fred, I’m sure those who crafted SB7 just regret not making it even more union busting. I’m sure they wish they’d called for a 99% threshold for a strike vote. I’m sure they wished they’d specified that Michelle Rhee or Jonah Edelman as the fact finder. I’m sure they don’t think this was a failure [...]
To be vindicated on Senate Bill 7 doesn’t make it any better.
Let us go back to the Spring of 2011. When the teachers in our local took a look at Senate Bill 7, we were appalled. In fact, when we went to Springfield as a part of the 2011 Lobby Day effort and were told to push for pension protection and for Senate Bill 7, we [...]
Joe McCarthy goes to summer camp.
Nobody would ever confuse right-wing pundit Tucker Carlson for a progressive Jew. My grandma Esther might have called him a putz. But she would never use such language. Some might confuse him for Joe McCarthy, however. Carlson’s Daily Caller has decided to go after a [...]
The in box. That Governor Quinn – what a swell guy.
Fred, That Gov. Quinn – what a swell guy. He wants grandma to choose between having to sell her house or getting her blood pressure medicine. He wants grandpa to choose between hiring someone to fix his roof or having that dark mole on his forehead looked at by a dermatologist. He wants your elderly [...]
Will Governor Quinn be able to get a pension deal in August?
H/T Roger Sanders. Capitol Fax reported that Governor Quinn still has dreams of getting the General Assembly back in session before the November election. The members of the General Assembly may have other ideas. But in Springfield two things can always be counted on. Either nothing happens. Or it happens before you can do anything [...]
Teacher voice. CTU teachers get to tell their story on my favorite TV show, Chicago Newsroom.
Chicago Newsroom host Ken Davis couldn’t believe a hundred percent of teachers agree on anything. I had to laugh at that. And then cry a little. Team Englewood High School teacher and four-year member of the CTU House of Delegates David Stieber says he’s never seen it happen before. But it happened the other night [...]
Rahm’s CPS budget puts a dagger into the heart of neighborhood schools.
Public Radio station WBEZ and Catalyst analyzed the CPS budget and found: The proposed $5 billion dollar CPS operating budget directs funding to magnet, specialty, selective and charter schools and away from neighborhood schools Nearly 90% of the city’s 100 charter schools will get more money from CPS. 70% of the system’s neighborhood public schools will [...]
The in box. Stephen Colbert on Texas GOP’s opposition to teaching critical thinking skills.
“I blame Galileo.” Stephen Colbert: ..The minds of our young people are being poisoned by knowledge… I have long praised the Texas Board of Education for their valiant work rewriting our nation’shistory textbooks. But now I believe they’ve got some stiff competition from the Texas GOP, who recently put a plank in their 2012 party [...]
Chicago teachers respond to fact-finder: Not just fair compensation. Reduce class size. Not just a longer day. A better day with art, music, foreign language and physical education.
Here is the response from CTU President Karen Lewis following the vote of the House of Delegates this afternoon which unanimously rejected the fact-finder’s report: Thank you. I’d like to introduce Chicago Teachers Union Vice President Jesse Sharkey, Recording Secretary Michael Brunson, Financial Secretary Kristine Mayle, and CTU Attorney Robert Bloch.Today the Chicago Teachers Union [...]
Tony at the Red Line Tap.
“What’s up, Klonsky?” “Give me a bottle of whatsever cold,” I mumbled to Marty behind the bar. We’ve had thirty-one days of 90 degrees and above in Chicago so far this summer. “It’s so hot, the sun makes me woozy,” I told Tony. “The beer will help. Just pour it over your head,” said Tony. [...]
Life in Rahm’s Chicago. Teachers take Rahm to school.
Even the Chicago Sun-Times, which was recently bought by close pals of the Mayor, have pointed out the obvious. Chicago teachers have taken Rahm to school. For a political chess player who never makes a move without thinking three moves ahead, Mayor Rahm Emanuel looks more like a high school clubber than a grand master [...]
The in box. Legislators as Willie Sutton.
Since Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan prefers to see the cost of the pension benefits as the cause of our state’s pension problem, it came as no surprise this past spring that he proposed a solution that called for reducing the cost of the COLA for active teachers and other current public employees. What did [...]
The problem with our underfunded TRS is not investment shortfalls.
When I appeared on the radio show Stocks and Jocks with Tom “The Chief” Hough, our only major difference was on the issue of investment returns. Tom considered this one of the main reasons for the TRS system being only 40% funded. I claimed the underfunding was primarily the result of over 50 years of [...]
The in box. From Hawaii.
Fred, I appreciate your dedication to our schools, students, parents, community, and to the advancement of public education nationwide. I live in Hawaii. We are generally behind the curve of what happens on the Mainland and, more specifically, what happens in traditionally strong teachers’ unions in NYC and Chicago. What your latest blog indicates is [...]
The Chicago teachers movement. The whole world is watching.
On behalf of the Illinois delegation to the NEA RA, I presented NBI 13. I explained the reason that the entire NEA should pass a resolution specifically in support the AFT Chicago local’s current struggle with the Mayor and his hand-picked school board. “It is a special case,” I said. “We didn’t choose it. Stand [...]
Want suggestions on how to curb violence in the neighborhoods? Did you think of asking Margot Pritzker?
Hyatt heiress Margot Pritzker. “She has an idea,” says the Sun-Times. Reading the Sun-Times this morning brought back memories of the classic SNL Gilda Radner character, Emily Litella. On Weekend Update Litella editorialized about violins on television. “Teamwork,” suggests heiress Margot Pritzker of the union-busting Hyatt Hotel Pritzker family. Teamwork? Yes. Teamwork. “It kept the [...]
Collective bargaining works. If both sides want it to. Let the Mayor know we want it to work.
The process of bargaining a contract has mutually agreed upon rules. The process is also is governed by labor laws. From my experience over twenty years of engaging in the process, I can say that it works. If both sides want it to. Everyone expects that both sides will start far apart. If the intention [...]
CNN’s David Gergen defends Romney and Bain. He got paid by Bain.
To call David Gergen a media whore is to give insult to whoring. Gergen is presently a CNN pundit. He started out as a speech writer in the Nixon White House on a team that included the far right-wing anti-Semite, Pat Buchanan. He then went on to work in the administrations of Ronald Reagan and [...]
Stocks and jocks.
I was invited on a local Chicago radio show to talk about teacher pensions. The morning show is called Stocks and Jocks. Luckily they didn’t ask me any jock questions. Or any stock questions, for that matter. Stocks and Jocks is a radio show that is aimed at the small investor. The host, Tom “The Chief” [...]
Mediator’s report due out. CPS and CTU still need to bargain it.
The report from the mediator is due this week. Reports are that it will contain a proposal for a 15 to 20% salary increase. Word is that the CPS board has offered 2%. Jeff Sharkey, CTU VP commented to the press yesterday. On Sunday, union Vice President Jesse Sharkey, who declined to comment on the [...]
New Business Item 13. The NEA supports the CTU.
Photo Credit: Adam Heenan
Where is Penny Pritzker? Too much of an embarrassment for Obama but not for Rahm.
This morning’s New York Times answers the question, “Where in the world is Penny Pritzker?” Penny headed up President Obama’s fund-raising operation in the 2008 campaign. But in appears that this time around she has pulled back or has been pushed aside because she is simply too much of an embarrassment to the Obama campaign. [...]
Sunday links.
In the two years since West Virginia’s Massey mine disaster no federal safety laws have passed and no executives were criminally charged. John Dillon’s vocabulary of the week: Collateral Damage. Who gets hurt by shifting the cost of public employee pensions from the state to local municipalities and districts? You do. Stocks and Jocks. I don’t [...]
