Randy Shaw: Instead of becoming a vital training incubator for young teachers committed to improving schools, TFA is just as likely to demoralize young people and turn them away from schools and activism.
A Teacher’s Message to President Obama: Teachers Not the Problem, Poverty Is
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Mark Naison: “For anyone who says teachers are to blame for our students failing, I have one thing to say: How DARE you? Teachers are heroes to a lot of children who have none!”
Fixing the Economy’s Real Problem
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Robert Reich: The President needs to deliver the same message to the public, loudly and clearly. The biggest problems we face are unemployment, stagnant wages, slow growth, and widening inequality — not deficits. The major goal must be to get jobs and wages back, not balance the budget.
Latinos Voting Early, Enthusiastic in Final Week
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Matt Baretto: The latest impreMedia-Latino Decisions tracking poll shows that Latinos are more enthusiastic and more likely to vote than ten weeks ago when the initial poll was fielded.
Obama’s Debate Mission
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Brent Budowsky: Obama does recognize the pain that afflicts too many Americans, but he should also be the champion of an agenda of optimism, aspiration and achievement that will be the hallmark of a second Obama term.
Is the Digital Divide a Defunct Framework?
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Jenna Burrell: Connectivity is not a simple binary and the world cannot be neatly divided anymore (if it ever could) into the digital ‘haves’ and ‘have nots.’
Unions: Our Last, Best, and Final Hope
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Steven Mikulan: Labor’s losing streak means that unions are now locked in a spiral of existential battles for survival in which every election drains them of resources and morale.
Karl Rove’s Grand Slam
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Brent Budowsky: The president and Democrats seem befuddled by how to react to the Citizens United decision, while Karl Rove understands with crystal clarity.
Michigan Pushes Plan to Welcome Immigrants and their Revitalizing Power
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Seth Hoy: Welcoming Michigan brings together community, city and business leaders, clergy, and charitable organizations to raise the level of discourse around immigration.
Two Triggers: One Stuffed, One Deflated
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Although I have to admit I found it a bit creepy, the stuffed remains of Roy Rogers’ beloved steed was displayed on a Rose Parade float honoring Roy’s 100th birthday. Dangerously wobbling at the front of a somewhat over-the-top float, this Trigger, though dead, looked fat and healthy. The state budget Triggers, on the other [...]
A Growing Civilian-Military Gap, and its Consequences
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Mary L. Dudziak: As Americans become more isolated from the costs of war, military engagement no longer seems to require the support of the American people. Their disengagement does not limit the reach of American military action, but enables its expansion.
The Ganas Gap: Obama’s Latino Challenge
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Victoria DeFrancesco Soto: The big worry for the administration regarding Latinos is not that their disapproval will push them into the arms of the GOP but rather that they will not have the same ganas that they did in 2008.
Democrats Score More Victories in Wisconsin Recalls
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Paul Hogarth: Republicans are so concerned about what will happen on August 9th – when six GOP state senators are subject to recall – that they have gone full speed ahead to pass a hyper-partisan gerrymandered map, while they still control the legislature.
California Budget Deficit Not a Real Problem
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Adam Eran: The bottom line here is that State spending disproportionately goes to lower-income people, while recent tax cuts have disproportionately favored the wealthiest taxpayers.
What’s the Matter with America? The Big Disconnect
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Charles Hayes: If America is going to have a better future, we need to put our Stone Age feelings of exceptional identity aside and intellectually guard ourselves against emotional manipulation while reasoning our way forward.
“Enthusiasm Gap My Ass!”
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Dick Price: Certainly, a recent tour through packed political venues around Los Angeles will tell you that there’s no lack of enthusiasm among Democrats, at least in this part of the world.
Repubs Winning, Dems Whining
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Michael Sigman: The Right’s genius for manipulating people’s sense of grievance — combined with liberals’ weak brew of tepid policy proposals and corporate coziness — leads ordinary voters to cast their ballots against their own economic interests time and time again.
Why There’s An Enthusiasm Gap: An Illustration
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Robert Reich: Super-rich financiers on Wall Street and top corporate executives have grown richer, though most Americans are getting poorer.
The Crackpot Gap: Why It May Be A Boon To Democrats But A Danger To America
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Robert Reich: We’re in the midst of an ongoing economic emergency that requires clear thinking, intense work, and practical ideas. It also requires that we join together rather than be pushed apart. The loonies who are taking over the GOP pose a real and present danger.
The Enthusiasm Gap or He’s Just a President
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Tina Dupuy: The fact is: Obama is a good president. He’s a centrist who is somewhere between what mouth-foamers on either extreme say about him. He does listen to all viewpoints, which makes people of some viewpoints – ironically – dislike him. He’s not the villain the insane Right says he is, nor is he the do-nothing turncoat the insane Left says he is.
Labor, Enviros Share Blame for Democrats Enthusiasm Gap
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Obama can narrow the enthusiasm gap by aggressively campaigning, but it will be up to labor and environmental groups to rouse their disaffected supporters to the polls.
The Enthusiasm Gap and You
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Robert Reich: Average Americans are hurting. But their pain isn’t coming from government. It’s coming from an economy whose benefits are concentrating ever more at the top, whose giant corporations are controlling ever more of our democratic process, and whose costs and risks are becoming ever more burdensome for the middle class and the poor
Origins of the Enthusiasm Gap
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Robert Reich: Whatever the outcome of the upcoming midterm elections, the activist phase of the Obama administration has likely come to a close. The President may have a fight on his hands even to hold on to what he’s already achieved because his legislative successes have been large enough to fuel strong opposition but not big enough to strengthen his support. The result could be disastrous for him and congressional Democrats.
Why We Really Shouldn’t Keep the Bush Tax Cut for the Wealthy
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Robert Reich: Restoring top earners’ marginal tax rates to what they were during the Clinton administration (36 and 39 percent) won’t inhibit their spending. That’s because they already save a large portion of what they earn, and already spend what they want to spend.
Labor Fights Back for Living Wages, Jobs For All
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Shamus Cooke: Employers are exploiting fears of joblessness by demanding workers take wage cuts and reductions or eliminations in benefits. The millions of unemployed are giving corporations an excuse to slash wages, since desperate workers will work for almost anything.
Why We Can’t Rely on Foreign Consumers to Rescue American Jobs
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Robert Reich: Trade can’t possibly be a source of new American jobs. To the contrary, it reduces overall demand in the United States.
The Vanishing American Consumer and the Coming Trade War
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Robert Reich: We’re unlikely to see a repeat of the disastrous Smoot-Hawley tariffs that worsened and lengthened the Great Depression. But you can forget trade-opening agreements. In Toronto last week, the G-20 leaders dropped their 2009 pledge to finish the Doha round this year. In the U.S., agreements with South Korea, Panama, and Columbia are languishing.
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Sexual Harassment Law Murker Than You Think
Marian Wang: In some cases, a person may be able to show that advances were unwelcome even though he or she didn’t protest or say so at the time. “Consensual” isn’t the same thing as ”welcome,” experts say.