Reply #9: One of the ringleaders of the assault on public education? Jeb Bush.

[seafan]

And there's nothing on the immediate horizon to shut him down. Only us.



October 8, 2008, with more from this thread and this thread.

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) lavished praise on President Barack Obama’s education policies on Thursday, telling ABC News that the Democrat who succeeded his brother in the White House has broken from the teachers’ unions and should be applauded by conservatives.

“The fact of the matter is, the guy is on the right track, and his (Education) Secretary is as well,” said Bush.

.....

Shortly after Obama took office, Bush told the Wall Street Journal that the new president should break with an interest group allied with the Democratic Party.

“I hope it’s the teachers’ union,” said Bush.

Since Bush made those comments, union officials have alternately criticized and praised the new president’s education policies.

"It looks like the only strategies they have are charter schools and measurement," Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, told the Washington Post last month. "That's Bush III."

Tampa Tribune: Jeb Bush leads move to reduce teachers union's influence, April 14, 2010





The following remarks from a speaker at the NEA last week perfectly illustrate for those who don't *get* why this overt assault on public education is so corrosive to our country.

(Hat tip to Hannah Bell for the link to this speech.}



NEA Friend of Education Diane Ravitch's Speech, Delivered at the 2010 Representative Assembly of the National Education Association, New Orleans, July 3, 2010



excerpt:

.....

SB6 was wrong in Florida. Thank you to the Florida Education Association and to all the parents and friends who stood with you who defeated that pernicious piece of legislation. And thanks to you for persuading Governor Charlie Crist to do the right thing by vetoing it. Now you have got to make sure that whoever is the next governor will veto it again if it dares to come back again.

.....

The current so-called reform movement is pushing bad ideas. No high-performing nation in the world is privatizing its schools, closing its schools, and inflicting high-stakes testing on every subject on its children. The current reform movement wants to end tenure and seniority, to weaken the teaching profession, to silence teachers’ unions, to privatize large sectors of public education. Don’t let it happen!

So here’s a thought for NEA. Print up four million bumper stickers that say, “I am a public schoolteacher, and I vote — and so does my family.”

Do not support any political figure who opposes public education. Stand up to the attacks on public education. Don’t give them half a loaf, because they will be back the next day for another slice, and the day after that for another slice.

.....

Teachers are the backbone of our country's future. They are under furious, untethered assault by privatization-driven jackals who want to destroy them.


It is yet another ramification of thirty years of right wing attacks on the middle class.



This is a massive wake-up call.