Two Days -- Two American Leaders

On Friday, President Obama went down to visit a high school in Miami, Florida, to talk about how education was an integral part of his “Winning the Future” policy. Oddly enough, he took along one of the most anti-education governors in the U.S. – former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.

When he was governor of Florida, Bush waged an unrelenting assault on public education in general, & on teachers in particular. As governor, he moved money from public education to private, for-profit institutions & as an ex-governor, he has set up a “foundation” to continue to promote the trend. Florida is known for having some of the worst charter schools in the country; Obama’s own government is conducting criminal investigations of 40 of them. Jeb set up a teacher-grading system with untrained Kelly Services employers as “the deciders.” His regimentation of school standards has, according to educators, had its worst effect on ethnic minority schools, but as a curriculum template, it’s bad all around. While governor, Bush vehemently opposed a state constitutional amendment that mandated reduced class size; when it passed, he was caught on tape plotting to undermine it. In 2010, he promoted a repeal of the amendment, which failed. Finally, Jeb worked long & hard -- he's still at it -- to reduce the power of teachers' unions. Last year he campaigned for legislation to eliminate teacher tenure. The Florida legislature passed Jeb's anti-teacher bill, but then-Gov. Charlie Crist vetoed it. (We’ll get back to teachers’ unions in a moment.) For more on Jeb's attack on public education, see this post by Karen Garcia and my comment on it.

What did President Obama have to say Friday about Jeb Bush’s sustained assault on public schools & teachers? --

  We are also honored to be joined here today by another champion of education reform, somebody who championed reform when he was in office, somebody who is now championing reform as a private citizen -- Jeb Bush.... And we are so grateful to him for the work that he's doing on behalf of education. So, thank you, Jeb.

Moving on to Saturday, President Obama took the day off to go golfing with his friends at Andrews Air Force Base. He could have played at the nearby U.S. Marines Medal of Honor course at Quantico, but I guess he didn’t want to run into accused WikiLeaker Bradley Manning. Oh, wait, that wouldn’t be likely. Manning is being held under conditions that qualify as torture, which is certainly no secret to President Obama. UCLA Prof. Mark Kleiman -- who last year called Obama "the greatest moral leader of our lifetime,” now writes,

The United States Army is so concerned about Bradley Manning’s health that it is subjecting him to a regime designed to drive him insane.... This is a total disgrace. It shouldn't be happening in this country. You can't be unaware of this, Mr. President. Silence gives consent. [via Glenn Greenwald]

Besides, Manning is only allowed out of his Quantico basement cell for one hour a day, & I doubt that hour is spent on the links. The President & his buddies could have golfed to their hearts content without encountering prisoner Manning. So much for the greatest moral leader of our day.

Now, let’s look at what Michael Moore was doing. On Friday, he was at home in Michigan, writing a blogpost in support of Wisconsin teachers & their continuing effort to save their union. After he had finished writing, he read the post back to himself, and he thought, “You know, you should just go to the airport and get on a plane & go to Madison, Wisconsin, and read this to them.” So he did. 

Here’s a taste of what Moore said in the freezing cold to the crowd in Madison. See a video of his full speech under Sunday's Commentariat below:

Four hundred obscenely rich people, most of whom benefited in some way from the multi-trillion dollar taxpayer "bailout" of 2008, now have more loot, stock and property than the assets of 155 million Americans combined.... Wall Street, the banks and the Fortune 500 now run this Republic -- and, until this past month, the rest of us have felt completely helpless, unable to find a way to do anything about it.... If those who have the most money don't pay their fair share of taxes, the state can't function…. The truth is, there's lots of money to go around. LOTS. It's just that those in charge have diverted that wealth into a deep well that sits on their well-guarded estates.... They control the message. By owning most of the media they have expertly convinced many Americans of few means to buy their version of the American Dream and to vote for their politicians.... But there was no revolt. Until now. On Wisconsin! ... America ain't broke! The only thing that's broke is the moral compass of the rulers.”

This is the speech those of us who voted for President Obama hoped he would make. We believed he would stand up to fatcats the way Michael Moore does. Obama has not. Instead, he has repeatedly kowtowed to Wall Street & big corporations at the expense of the rest of us. His White House has a revolving door than opens onto Wall Street.

We believed Sen. Obama when he said he would stand up for the unions & collective bargaining rights. But instead of standing with the unions, as Michael Moore did this weekend, Obama stood with union-buster Jeb Bush and praised him for “championing education reform,” reform that centered on gutting public schools, maintaining large class size & undermining teachers and their unions.

We believed Sen. Obama when he said that after he became president he would “put on a pair of comfortable shoes” and walk with union members if anyone threatened their collective bargaining rights. Republican governors & legislatures across the country are doing just that. But Obama didn’t put on those comfortable shoes. The shoes he put on were golf cleats.

Which one of these leaders -- Barack Obama or Michael Moore -- do you think is working for you & your family?

-- The Constant Weader