OlsonOnline

Are Measure 47 supporters "dumb"?

Since I was one of the supporters, I certainly hope not.

But that's the accusation made by "politicallogic" in response to a post on Blue Oregon by Dr. David Goldman threatening to withdraw his support for those organizations who opposed Measures 46/47 in November's election.  (M47 passed, but M46 , the Constitutional  amendment enabling campaign finance reform, was rejected.)

Here's a portion of politicallogic's initial response:

"I voted against Measure 46 and 47 because, frankly, they were dumb measures put on the ballot by weak thinkers that would have had very bad consequences."

Politicallogic also accused me --and Dan Meek and Tom Civiletti and Andrew Kaza-- of "fuzzy thinking", without "...the vaguest idea of even what the true meaning of "progressive" is... ."

I beg to differ.  I have a fairly clear idea of what a "progressive" is.  I even wrote a post about it.   And I've written several posts about the M47 contretemps in the "progressive" community leading up to the election --(here, here, here, here, and here.)

And then there are the 142 --actually 143-- comments to Loaded Orygun's original post opposing M47.   As I said, I read them all and it's clear to me that the supporters of M47 had by far the better arguments.  Read then for yourself, politicallogic, and then tell me where the "fuzzy thinking" is.

And here's Andrew Kaza's appeal for a yes vote on M46/47.   Maybe I'm a "weak thinker", politicallogic, but not the always eloquent and incisive Kaza. 

Nor is the author of M46/47, Dan Meek, a graduate of Stanford Law School.

The bottom line for me is that I don't equate money with speech.  I firmly believe  there's way too much money in Oregon politics, most from corporations.  That has to have a corrupting influence on Oregon decision making.

The true cost of the war in Iraq

The number of Americans killed in Iraq has now exceeded the number who died in the 9/11 attacks.  And the number of dead American soldiers will soon surpass 3000.

But the "real" cost of the war, without minimizing the military casualties, is the diversion of huge sums of money to the defense establishment, a direct, and perhaps intentional, result of Bush's misadventure in Iraq.  Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz pegs the true cost of the war at $2.267 trillion, not the $500 billion that many consider the war's pricetag. Stiglitz arrives at his multi-trillion dollar figure by figuring in the "hidden costs" of the war:

"... like disability pay for the wounded, the heightened cost of oil and losses sustained by not investing the same money back into our own economy."

That "diversion" of funds to the "welfare" of the military-industrial complex is reason enough to be anti-war.  It's also cause to point out the hypocrisy of  pro-war conservatives who otherwise favor a smaller, leaner government.

**************

Paul Krugman comes close to doing just that in his column, "A Failed Revolution",  criticizing Republican apologists for their recent electoral defeat.  The conservative "revolution", which reached a sort of zenith in 1994, is based on the "lie" of small government, a lie that's been vigorously re-propagated since the November electoral debacle for Republicans. 

I believe, and I think Krugman does too, that the Republican defeat in November was all about Iraq.

"Without 9/11, the Republican revolution would probably have petered out quietly, with the loss of Congress in 2002 and the White House in 2004. Instead, the atrocity created a window of opportunity: four extra years gained by drowning out unfavorable news with terror alerts, starting a gratuitous war, and accusing Democrats of being weak on national security."

*****************
Of course not all conservatives supported the war in Iraq, Pat Buchanan being one of them.  But Buchanan is not an "anti-war" conservative;  he's more an isolationist, who nevertheless continues to defend America's involvement in Vietnam.  Like Henry Kissinger*, who it turns out has advised Bush on Iraq much as he advised Nixon on Vietnam,  Buchanan denies similarities between the two most egregious foreign policy missteps in American history. 

But the similarities are there.  The lessons that the warmongers didn't learn from Vietnam, George W. Bush foremost among them, are being driven home by the "quagmire" of our occupation of Iraq.  In his op-ed piece, "Lesson of Iraq Began in Vietnam", John Graham writes that like "Vietnamization", which he calls a "rigged game", the slow withdrawal of our forces from Iraq is designed to accomplish the same political end --to support the lie that "vietnamization" --or in this case, "Iraqization"-- has some chance of success:

"Now the Iraq Study Group suggests the same strategy for Iraq. The group wants to shift the mission of U.S. forces there from fighting a war to training Iraqi troops and police. The report calls for the U.S. to lay down a series of performance conditions for the Iraqis, including that the Iraqis end their civil war and create a viable national state."

Rational observers realize there's no chance of ending the civil war in Iraq, with or without the continued presence of American troops.  I say it's time to call it good.  Call it mission accomplished.  Saddam has been deposed and executed.  It's over. 

It's time to stop pouring our money and resources into an obviously failed venture.  For those of you worried about Iran or Turkey or Syria filling the void we've created in Iraq, at least accept Murtha's proposal for redeployment into Jordan or Kuwait.  And don't forget the American military presence in the Persian Gulf. 

Learn the lesson of Vietnam.  The world didn't end after our withdrawal.  In fact, the world's a better place because of it.

**************

* Henry Kissinger on the difference between Vietman and Iraq in a recent CNN interview:

"Vietnam did not have -- at least it didn't have, after 1968, in the last phase of the war, an internal insurrection. Most of the combat was between outside North Vietnamese forces and the local South Vietnamese forces.

The "last phase of the war" lasted another six years, and was accompanied by the massive "secret"  bombing of Cambodia, which led directly to the rise of Pol Pot.   

 

Listen to the experts, Vicki Phillips

Not me, but Gregory Smith from Lewis and Clark:

"The adoption by Portland Public Schools of a core curriculum could well contribute to a similar decline in genuine student learning here."

Smith refers to the top-down, one-size-fits-all curricular mandates from the Portland Public Schools district administration in reading, math, and writing in an effort to close the "achievement gap."  Teachers don't like them, and neither does Smith:

"Although district statements suggest that this policy won't inhibit teacher innovation or creativity, insistence on this degree of centralized control will inevitably restrict school and teacher choice and impose a potentially chilling constraint on educators' ability to respond to their students' and communities' unique characteristics."

Like me, Smith is particularly concerned with the imposition of of "scripted" reading programs.  Although he doesn't name them, he undoubtedly means the "direct instruction" curriculum developed at the University of Oregon and used at the local charter Arthur Academies:

"The adoption of scripted reading programs aimed at eliminating differences in teacher performance in Portland and other U.S. cities has been rationalized for the same reason. Although such programs often contribute to short-term gains in students' capacity to decode text, they don't result in improved comprehension as children move into higher grades."

Classroom instructors view DI --Direct Instruction-- as an insulting effort to "teacher proof" education. 

I linked another of Smith's op-ed pieces to a post I wrote over a year ago about the obsession of "reformers" with academic rigor.  You can read it here.

You too, Vicki Phillips. 

War and the Israel Lobby

The best analysis of the Israeli- Palestinian impasse comes from British journalist  Jonathan Cook based in Nazareth, Israel.  His recent piece published on the  excellent Electronic Intifada website, "The Trap of Recognising Israel", is an example.

The "trap" --meaning the demand that Palestinians "recognize Israel's right to exist" in exchange for a negotiated peace-- is, according to Cook, designed to

"... to ensure that any peaceful solution to the conflict is impossible."

How so?  First, acquiescence to the demand would effectively end the Palestinian struggle to create a "viable state":

"That is because Israel refuses to demarcate its own future borders, leaving it an open question what it considers to be the extent of 'its existence' it is demanding Hamas recognise. We do know that no one in the Israeli leadership is talking about a return to Israel's borders that existed before the 1967 war, or probably anything close to it."

Secondly, the recognition of Israel's "right to exist" carries a subtext --namely, "Israel" as a predominately "Jewish state":

"In demanding recognition of its right to exist, Israel is ensuring that the Palestinians agree to Israel's character being set in stone as an exclusivist Jewish state, one that privileges the rights of Jews over all other ethnic, religious and national groups inside the same territory."

In other words, Israel and it's American backers --like Thomas Friedman-- conflate religion, ethnicity, and nationalism to justify the oppression of the Palestinian people. 

And that brings us to the issue of war and the Israel Lobby. 

Whether or not you agree with those who contend that Israel actively encouraged the American invasion of  Iraq, and is now agitating for a preemptive strike against Iran, many believe that another war in the Middle East, whether in Lebanon, Syria, or Iran,  is inevitable. 

Cook speculates that Israel's "drumbeat of war against Iran" may have less to do with fear of an Iranian nuclear attack than with its overriding concern of ensuring a Jewish majority within the Israeli state whatever the cost.  In other words,

"...a nuclear-armed Iran might make Israel a less attractive place for Jews to live, lead to increased emigration and tip the demographic balance in the Palestinians' favour."

The insistence on maintaining the Jewish character of Israel rather than pushing for a "liberal democracy" where all citizens, regardless of ethnicity or religious belief, have equal rights, is the main obstacle to resolving the Israeli -Palestinian conflict, one which American politicians like Barack Obama, despite the efforts of Jimmy Carter, have refused to acknowledge. 

Like Cook --and Ali Abunimah-- I'm more and more convinced that a one state solution is the only way out of the deadly stalemate in Israel/Palestine.  And perhaps the only  way to avoid more senseless bloodshed in the Middle East. 

Merry Christmas --or Happy Holidays-- to everyone. No exceptions

Just a reminder that nothing I write here should be taken personally.  I really do wish everyone well for the "holidays".  No exceptions.

Even Tom Friedman.  And Hillary Clinton, as well as PPS Superintendent Vicki Phillips and  members of the school board.  Although I've said harsh things about them all, I'm sure they're decent and well-meaning people.  Again, it's nothing personal. 

And that includes local blogger Jack Bogdanski, who apparently has discovered religious scholar Karen Armstrong, one of my favorites.  I'm convinced we'd all be better people, and more tolerant, if we were familiar with her work.

James Kunstler has an interesting take on Frank Capra's "Christmas card to America" --It's a Wonderful Life, which he calls "...a splendid, heartwarming movie in many ways (and I am not being facetious)."   Everyone loves It's a Wonderful Life, Kunstler too, but he sees in it a "perversity of history" that those who love the movie easily overlook. 

The celebration of small town life in Bedford Falls is undermined when George Bailey's Building and Loan provides the financing for one of "...the first new suburban subdivisions of the automobile age."  As we know, now anyway, sprawl kills, and small towns like Bedford Falls are the first victims.

Ah well.  It's Christmas, and Frank Capra is forgiven.  As are libertarians and property rights activists who seem to approve of suburbs and cul-de-sacs and Wal-Marts regardless of their impact on quintessential small town life.

Some people don't like Christmas music, but I do.  I love the religious carols --O Little Town of Bethlehem and God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen are my favorites-- and I love the secular standards as well, even the most maudlin, like I'll Be Home for Christmas, which somehow always brings a lump to my throat, even though I often wish I weren't home for Christmas. 

It would be different if I were a soldier in Iraq.  Then I'm sure I would long to be home for Christmas, in Bedford Falls or Portland or wherever home is. 

Even "if only in my dreams."

So Merry Christmas --or Happy Holidays-- to everyone.  No exceptions.

Why does anybody read Tom Friedman?

Here's the latest idiocy from the "respected" NY Times columnist Thomas Friedman in his column listing  15 "rules" for reporting from the Middle East:

Rule 11:  "The most underestimated emotion in Arab politics is humiliation. The Israeli-Arab conflict, for instance, is not just about borders. Israel’s mere existence is a daily humiliation to Muslims, who can’t understand how, if they have the superior religion, Israel can be so powerful."

Someone ought to remind Mr. Friedman that it's the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  And then ask him who, aside from Iranian President Ahmadinejad, a Persian not an Arab, has suggested that Islam is superior to Judaism.  I frankly don't recall that even Ahmadinejad has made such a claim

From everything I have read, the Palestinian concerns are territorial, not religious. 

Friedman, as usual, conflates what most knowledgable people can easily discern as discrete terms for ethnic, religious, and national entities -- namely Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian.  Not all Muslims are Arabs.  Not all Arabs are Muslims.  And at least a million Palestinians are citizens, albeit second class citizens, of the state of Israel. 

And some are even Christian.

And while I'm on the subject of the Palestinians, let me once again defend Jimmy Carter's use of the word "apartheid" in the title of his recent controversial book.  Or more precisely, let me quote others who have recently risen to the defense of President Carter.

Saree Makdisi writes that Carter's charges "ring true":

"Israel maintains two separate road networks in the West Bank: one for the exclusive use of Jewish settlers, and one for Palestinian natives. Is that not apartheid? ...

"A system of closures and curfews has strangled the Palestinian economy in the West Bank  --  but none of its provisions apply to the Jewish settlements there. Is that not apartheid? ...

 "Persons of Palestinian origin are routinely barred from entering or residing in the West Bank  --  but Israeli and non-Israeli Jews can come and go, and even live on, occupied Palestinian territory. Is that not apartheid?" 

And Chris Hedges, former Middle East bureau chief of the New York Times, says that  Israeli policies regarding the Palestinians are "worse that apartheid":

"Palestinians in Gaza live encased in a squalid, overcrowded ghetto, surrounded by the Israeli military and a massive electric fence, unable to leave or enter the strip and under daily assault.  The word 'apartheid,' given the wanton violence employed against the Palestinians, is tepid.  This is more than apartheid."

I recently finished reading The Lemon Tree.  I recommend it to anyone who wants to develop a deeper understanding of the history --and the reality-- of the half century long conflict between Israel and the Palestinian people.

Is Barack Obama really the "anti-war" candidate?

Or more importantly, is Barack Obama the anti-war alternative to Hillary Clinton?

Perhaps not.

Like many progressives, I've been dazzled by Obama's charisma, his rhetorical skills, and his 'putative' stand against the war in Iraq.  I say 'putative' because unlike Clinton, who actually cast a 'yea' vote in 2002 authorizing Bush's invasion of Iraq, Barack Obama was not yet a Senator.  Had he been in the Senate, would he have voted no?  We have only his word on that.

A look at Obama's actual record hints that he may not be as anti-war, or even as liberal, as the public assumes.  For example, an exhaustive Harper's profile entitled "Barack Obama Inc." reveals that Sen. Obama supported Joe Lieberman over the clearly anti-war Ned Lamont, both with a personal endorsement and with money from his
"leadership" PAC. 

That same PAC --the Hopefund-- donated $10,000 to Tammy Duckworth in her primary battle with the vocal war opponent, Christine Cigelas.   Duckworth squeaked out the primary win, but lost in the general election. 

As a Senator, Obama's record on the war is tepid at best:

"Since taking office, Obama has become far more measured in his position. After Pennsylvania Congressman John Murtha called for withdrawal from Iraq last fall, Obama rejected such a move in a speech before the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations, saying the United States needed 'to manage our exit in a responsible way—with the hope of leaving a stable foundation for the future.' ”

In 2007, Sen. Obama voted against a timetable for withdrawing troops from Iraq.   In that same speech to the Council on Foreign Relations, which I watched on C-SPAN, Obama said that the military played an important role in Iraq.  He called for a

"...more effective counter-insurgency strategy.. [to] take steam out of the insurgency. … I believe that U.S. forces are still a part of the solution in Iraq."

How is that anti-war? 

Then there's his Hillary Clinton-like knee-jerk support for Israel:

"Like most congressional Democrats, he bowed   before the Israeli war machine and praised the IDF's brazen aggression in Lebanon,   going so far as to visit northern Israel during the war in a show   of support. He opposed a cease-fire – 'I don't fault Israel for wanting   to rid their border with Lebanon from those Katyusha missiles that can fire   in and harm Israeli citizens, so I think that any cease-fire would have to be   premised on the removal of those missiles... .' "

That's hardly the record of an anti-war liberal Democrat.

In the Los Angeles Times, Ezra Klein says it's way too soon to get overly excited about an Obama presidential bid.  Klein calls Obama a "cipher" who has yet to take a stand in the Senate on a "single controversial issue", including the war in Iraq.

David Sirota in the Nation summed up the Obama phenomenon best.  He wrote that Obama (like Bill Clinton)

"...has shown a rare ability to mix charisma and deference to the establishment."

I for one am beginning to have second thoughts about a Barack Obama Presidency.  But who knows?  I believed that John Kerry, once elected, would have been a better and bolder President than he was a candidate --despite his continued support for the war.  And I still have the Kerry-Edwards campaign sign up in my window.

But this time around, especially without Bush running, Dennis Kucinich is beginning to sound like the right alternative to nearly a half decade of war.

Lessons from KIPP

I've been fairly critical of those darlings of the charter school movement, the KIPP --Knowledge Is Power Program-- Academies, so allow me to say something positive about them.  And their two founders, Mike Feinberg and Dave Levin. 

Jay Mathews of the Washington Post writes that newly hired Washington D.C. KIPP/AIM Academy 5th grade math teacher Lisa Suben politely refused to use the prepared math lessons that have been so successful at most KIPP schools.  She wanted to use her own approach.

The results?  Suben's students "achieved the largest one-year math score jump* ever seen at a KIPP school... ."

To their credit, Feinberg and Levin, along with AIM's principal, allowed Suben to go her own way.  As Mathews reports, that's one of the keys to the KIPP success with inner city minority and disadvantaged students:

"... one of the secrets of KIPP's success in attracting the brightest young teachers and raising achievement for low-income children throughout the country is its insistence on letting good teachers decide how they are going to teach."

That's a lesson that Portland's school administrators have yet to learn.  In Portland, district leaders simply don't trust the teachers.  The attitude here, and it's palpable, seems to be that teachers need to be told what to teach and how to teach it.  And that lack of trust leads to teacher insecurity, dissatisfaction, and even alienation.

To be fair, the KIPP model, with its ten hour days and five-and-a-half-day weeks, is hardly replicable.  As I've written before, KIPP teachers are "running for sainthood."

Nevertheless, there are lessons to be learned from the KIPP approach, especially when it comes to attracting talented young teachers.  And then treating them with RESPECT.

(* bear in mind that the "jump" is a  reference to a single standardized test score, which is not, as I've argued many times before, an adequate or sufficient measure of student learning.)

Yet another assault on the public schools

The latest is from an organization called the New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce.   It issued this rather ominous warning:

"... US workers will lose more jobs overseas and will see their standard of living drop unless major steps are taken to improve how children are educated."

What "major steps"? 

For starters, how about scrapping teacher pension plans and replacing them with 401(k)'s?  Or abolishing school boards altogether in favor of "limited liability corporations" which would operate schools with the "help", possibly, of "for-profit" organizations?

Read it all here in the executive summary of the Commission's report, Tough Choices or Tough Times.

But... wait a minute!  Haven't we heard similar predictions of a catastrophic future if we don't drastically overhaul our "failing" public schools?  Well, yes indeed, we have.  We heard it a mere five years ago with No Child Left Behind.

Sixteen years ago with the original Commission's first report.

Twenty-three years ago in A Nation at Risk.

And sixty years ago after the Russians launched Sputnik. 

In fact, such warnings have been issued in every decade of this century, as Richard Rothstein documents in his 1998 book, The Way We Were?  Chapter 1 of the book, appropriately enough, begins:

"Everyone seems to know that our schools are in desperate need of reform. The quality of public education seems to have declined, and schools are not up to the task of readying young people for
the challenges of the next century.

In 1974, Vance Packard asked, "Are we becoming a nation of illiterates?"

In the 1950's, Hannah Arendt wrote that "academic standards 'of the average American school lag . . . far behind the average standards in . . . Europe.' "

In the 1940's, the New York Times Benjamin Fine warned

"Education faces a serious crisis. ...We will suffer the consequences of our present neglect of education a generation hence."

During the Depression, it was claimed that "teachers . . . conspire against pupils in their efforts to learn."   And in the 1920's, business leaders were concerned that "educational  preparation had become inadequate for the job market."

Even in the first decade of the 20th century, poor schools were linked to a potential incapacity to "compete" globally:

"In 1909, Ellwood P. Cubberly, the dean of Stanford’s education school, wrote that, in an ever more interdependent world economy, 'whether we like it or not, we are beginning to see that we are pitted against the world in a gigantic battle of brains and skill.' "

A century later, it appears we've come full circle.  The New York Times Thomas Friedman is saying essentially the same thing today. 

On the brighter side, way back in the late 40's, Sloan Wilson, the guy who wrote The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit, published an essay  --in Life Magazine, I think-- entitled "Public Schools Are Better Than You Think."  He wrote in part:

"The schools have never been anywhere near as good as they are today, but the gap between what they are and what people want is greater than ever before.  Nobody really wants to provide the money, time, and thought necessary for closing that gap-- the hope is that it can just be argued away.  Most of the controversy over public education stems from a strong desire to get something for nothing."

Hemstreet and Hunnicutt: What a team!

Why am I not surprised that Mark Hemstreet of Shilo Inn notoriety has joined the ranks of the fat cats attempting to cash in on Dave Hunnicutt's Measure 37, the property rights intitiative that was sold to Oregon voters as protection for little old ladies and family farmers? 

The other local high rollers filing M37 claims include Jay Zidell and Charles Swindells.  Oh yeah, and theater mogul Tom Moyer and Howard Dietrich, who has threatened to lease his property on the edge of Sellwood to Wal-Mart. 

Hemstreet, the former sugar daddy of conservative candidates and causes, may be the least deserving of M37 largesse.  Not legally, but ethically.  Here's a list of Hemstreet's sins:

• He's a poacher, and has been charged by the Oregon State Police for his "crimes" against wildlife.
• He's cashed in, big time, on the state-sponsored Lottery.
• Hemstreet teamed up with Loren Parks, Bill Sizemore, and the Cascade Policy Institute to defeat state funding for the voter-apporoved North-South light rail line back in 1998.
• In 2001, Hemstreet attempted to swap a parcel of land he owned in the Eagle Cap Wilderness for 2500 acres of federal forest land around his Shilo Ranch.
• He closed off an access road through his ranch to the public.
• He refused, for a time, to pay property taxes on some of the Shilo Inns in his far flung hotel empire.

Someone ask Dave Hunnicutt is Mark Hemstreet is the kind of property owner he had in mind as he pushed for the passage of Measure 37.