Financial Martial Law Declared in Michigan

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, together with the state's Republican legislature, has passed a bill allowing the governor to dissolve the elected governments of Michigan's towns and cities, and replace them with "emergency financial managers" who can cut services, merge or eliminate school boards, and lay off unionized public employees without recourse. All the governor has to do to justify such action is to proclaim a “financial emergency.” There are no limits to the salaries of these “managers” and they will be given a free hand to govern as they see fit, without any accountability to voters or residents. Republican senator Jack Brandenburg, a supporter the bill, called it "financial martial law."

The actions in Lansing and Madison so appalled film maker Michael Moore that he blathered incoherently to Rachel Maddow, “This isn’t the country I live in.”

This move will make it much easier to impose corporate CEOs at the helm of cities and school boards and thus facilitate the creation of more private charter schools,  as well as general union busting measures. The provision that allows the managers to fire public employees is an end-run around collective bargaining and other worker protections that have been bargained into their contracts, and will likely lead to PACTCO like attacks on Michigan’s public workers. Detroit already has a financial manager, Robert Bobb, who has been joyfully ripping Detroit Public Schools asunder, helping to shutter half of them and raise class sizes to 60.

Hundreds of pro-union demonstrators filled the Capital in Lansing on Tuesday. Their chanting was so loud that it disrupted the legislature. Over 1,000 also demonstrated outside the Capital, including firefighters, teachers, steel workers, and other unionists.

Critically Acclaimed Corporate Propaganda

Here’s another Good One From Chris Guerrieri at Education Matters

You say critically acclaimed, I say propaganda designed to destroy our public schools and to line the pockets of corporate fat cats. 

In a recent article about Micelle Rhee, controversial former D.C. schools chancellor, addressing the Florida Legislature, Brandon Larrabee sited her presence in the movie, Waiting for Superman. I say movie not documentary because many of its dramatic scenes were staged. Mr. Larrabee referred to the movie as being critically acclaimed, I say the movie was blatant propaganda made by a public school hating film maker, financed by billionaires interested in increasing their share in the education market through misinformation, teacher demonizing, charter schools and an increased reliance on standardized testing. In case you blinked, you should know that education has become a multi-billion dollar business.

You know what really gets me? It’s the fact that many of those that embraced Waiting for Superman as the gospel are the same people that will dismiss a Michael Moore movie as Hollywood crap. I share many of Michael Moore’s views but I know when I watch his films to do so with both eyes open and to take them with a grain of salt.

Even if all of what was portrayed in Waiting for Superman was true regardless of the fact much has been debunked, (sadly however that didn’t get nearly the press the film did) it would still only show a miniscule fraction of what is going on in our schools. It would be like looking at three doctors you knew were bad and then condemning the whole medical field nationwide because of their actions.

Friends we do have serious problems in our education system but listening to slanted propaganda, like Waiting for Superman is, and to which Mr. Larrabee contributed to by his choice of words, is not the way to fix them.

Chris Guerrieri
School Teacher