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Monday, August 13, 2012

Walmart, Right-Wing Media Company Hold Star-Studded Benefit Promoting Education Reform Film - Working In These Times

Walmart, Right-Wing Media Company Hold Star-Studded Benefit Promoting Education Reform Film - Working In These Times:


Walmart, Right-Wing Media Company Hold Star-Studded Benefit Promoting Education Reform Film

BY JOSH EIDELSON
Viola Davis, shown here with her SAG award for Outstanding Performance by an Female Actor in a Leading Performance for "The Help," will be appearing soon in anti-teachers union propaganda at a theater near you.   (Photo by Frederic J. Brown/AFP/Getty Images)
The world’s largest private-sector employer and the country’s most prominent conservative entertainment company have teamed up to sponsor a fundraiser called “Teachers Rock.” Backed by Walmart and Anschutz Film Group, the August 14 event will feature live performances from musicians like Josh Groban and appearances from actresses like Viola Davis; it will be broadcast August 18 as a CBS special with messages from actresses like Meryl Streep. And it will promote the upcoming feature film Won’t Back Down, Anschutz’s entry in the “education reform” wars.
Won’t Back Down is reportedly a highly sympathetic fictional portrayal of “parent trigger” laws, a major flashpoint in debates over education and collective bargaining. Under such laws, the