Over the past several weeks, I have read only a little on the situation of former CNN news anchor Campbell Brown’s sudden interest in forming a nonprofit in order to advance a lawsuit in New York purportedly to “save” public school students of the (surely) inept teachers currently protected behind “tenure” (i.e., due process rights).

I’ll admit, I have only been on the fringes of the affair that is New York’s “Brown vs. Board of Education” (I had to go there, what with hedge-funded nonprofits advancing their takeover of public education as a “civil rights” issue). However, with my second book written and off to the publisher, I am now ready to turn my research and writing attention to this Campbell Brown and her crusade to demolish teacher due process.

Brown has not bothered to demonstrate how, exactly, removal of the due process that promotes job security for good teachers…

Apro una finestra e vedo la gente che a Gaza corre a nascondersi. Ne apro un’altra e osservo persone impaurite che a Tel Aviv cercano rifugio dai missili di Hamas.

Se guardo ancora più lontano vedo bambini che vengono usati come scudi umani a Damasco, solo che in questi giorni se ne parla di meno. Dalle mie finestre vedo qualcuno che a Chicago spara a una ragazzina davanti alla sua scuola. Cosi’ senza motivo.

Le mie finestre sono grandi e danno sul mondo. Le apro ogni tanto per cercare la luce e far entrare aria nuova ma troppo spesso vedo una bambina che corre a nascondersi da qualche parte (come la bambina dal cappottino rosso del film di Spielberg, ricordate?), che ha perduto i genitori uccisi da granate e missili costruiti da noi, gente perbene, che viviamo cosi’ lontano da quelle strade polverose e piene di buche, anzi crateri.

Non illudiamoci: le armi che…

Jersey jazzman has another great piece about tenure. He writes: “I can only hope that Campbell Brown’s appearance last night on The Colbert Report is typical of what she is going to bring to the debate over school workplace protections. Because if this is the best the anti-tenure side can muster, we teachers will easily win the debate — provided we ever get a chance to participate.” –

Watch the priceless video of Stephen Colbert interviewing Campbell Brown, who is leading a campaign to eliminate teacher tenure in New York. Colbert asks her to reveal her donors. She replies that she won’t do that because the few dozen protestors outside with hand-lettered signs might harass them. She says the protesters are trying to silence her, but of course she is on national television and they are not. She doesn’t look silenced.

JJ writes:

“It’s all about the kids.” As…

Jon Lender of the Hartford Courant describes in detail how the embattled candidate for New London superintendent, Terrence Carter, was the very model of a modern school reformer. He graduated from New Leaders for New Schools, founded by Obama and Clinton advisor Jonathan Schnur.

Terrence Carter had deep roots in the world of “reform.”

“To fully understand the Carter episode, it helps to look at him in the context of a national battle over non-traditional school-reform efforts. The high praise that he received from influential voices in recent years sounds almost ironic now – as New London’s school board has its law firm conducting an investigation that could send him packing.

“Terrence Carter represents a new breed of principals who entered the profession from business through an excellent principal training program called New Leaders for New Schools. The program, which operates in Chicago and five other cities and is about…

byRichard Silverstein,  August 3, 2014   richardsilverstein.com

I am the first English language publication to report his major story.  Der Spiegel publishes in today’s edition that Israeli intelligence (likely Unit 8200) eavesdropped on phone calls John Kerry made to his Palestinian interlocutors during the peace talks he conducted for the past year.  Though Kerry usually talked on encrypted phone lines from his State Department office or Georgetown home, when he was in flight to or from the region he had to use a satellite phone, which was not encrypted.  This allowed the Israelis to listen in on everything he said to the Palestinians.  It allowed them to know what ideas he was floating and prepared for them to counter them in the negotiation process.  When the Israelis really disliked a proposal they knew better how to attack it before Kerry had even brought the subject up….. entire article here

“Doctor” Carter, superstar.

In 2007 the Chicago Tribune wrote:

The Chicago Public Schools system has 126 openings for principals next fall, and has only 33 current principals ready to take the jobs. That’s a problem. It’s also a phenomenal opportunity.

Vacancies in about one-fifth of the schools give CPS Chief Executive Officer Arne Duncan a chance to bring in a new generation of leaders to transform city schools. Some of those schools have flailed for years under mediocre bureaucrats. That could change.

Yes, there are enough teachers and administrators within the CPS ranks to fill the spots. But Duncan recognizes that they should not simply have to compete with each other; they should compete with candidates across the nation. “I want superstars,” he said. “There is wonderful talent here, but to think that the Chicago system has a monopoly on talent is simply not the case.”

So, bring on the…