Ohio's Senate Bill 5 - A Devastating Blow to the Middle Class

Tomorrow, I will go to the Ohio Statehouse to protest with thousands of other teachers, police, firefighters and other public employees the proposed Senate Bill 5 that will outlaw collective bargaining.  As I stated in my letter to my State Senator, Kevin Bacon:

As an educator, I strongly oppose Senate Bill 5, which targets Ohio's teachers through elimination or erosion of healthcare benefits, retirement benefits, seniority, due process rights, and successful collective bargaining practices.  Teachers and other public employees are being erroneously blamed for state budget deficits, and these Senate Bill 5 actions will only serve to harm the health of our state economy and our Ohio citizens.

In a tough economy, we have to focus on the essentials of providing Ohio’s college students with a high quality education that prepares them for good jobs.  I urge you to maintain Ohio's collective bargaining law, which has helped public employees provide high quality services to our schools and communities for decades.  Collective bargaining helps educators advocate for the classroom conditions, tools and support we need to be effective in preparing students for successful careers.

My experience has been that collective bargaining is a constructive tool, not a barrier either for educators or their employers. We are using bargaining for positive change to shape working conditions and improve learning conditions, communicate about issues and tap into educator knowledge, skills and experience.  Collective bargaining and teachers should not be the scapegoat for budget deficits.  In fact, many right-to-work states have much higher state budget deficits than Ohio does.

Legislation undermining collective bargaining rights will upset Ohio's balanced framework in which public employees and their employers have worked to fulfill their mission with mutual respect and genuine collaboration.   Studies show that similarly educated public employees make less than their private sector peers, even accounting for benefits.  Further, a January Quinnipiac poll showed that Ohio voters oppose limits on collective bargaining by public employees by 51% to 34%.

Please keep your focus on job creation and Ohio's economy and oppose Senate Bill 5.  The bill’s sponsor is unable to give an estimate of what cost savings this bill will actually create, while data from other states indicates no positive effect on budget deficit and job creation from the elimination of collective bargaining.  Rather than creating jobs in Ohio, this legislation will hurt local communities stifling job growth.

Ohio needs your astute leadership now to promote quality teaching and a healthy economy.  Oppose Senate Bill 5. 

Workers in Wisconsin are just one step ahead of workers in Ohio, yet this bill is on the fast track in Ohio.  If you want more information about what is happening with this bill, I strongly urge you to view the Plunderbund blog (see my links to the right) or the Ohio Education Association (http://www.ohea.org/).   

The Real Truth about Obama

Subject: The Real Truth About Barack Obama!

As enthusiastic volunteers in the Barack Obama campaign for the Presidency, we have put together a list of facts about Barack so that you will know the truth about him. Please follow the links we have included for documentation of these facts. If you value the truth as we do, please spread this information via email, blog, or any other means, to everyone you know.

1. Did you know that Barack Obama is a devout Christian? He has been a member of the same United Church of Christ congregation for 20 years, and was married there to his wife Michelle in 1992.


2. Did you know that Barack Obama often leads the US Senate in the Pledge of Allegiance?


3. Did you know that Barack Obama is a strong friend of Israel and has spoken out strongly against anti-Semitism?


4. Did you know his grandparents from Kansas were part of the "Greatest Generation?. His grandfather served with Patton's Army during World War II, and his grandmother, a real "Rosie the Riveter", worked in a bomber assembly plant back home.


5. Did you know that Barack Obama was opposed to the war in Iraq from day one, before we invaded, even while he was running for the Senate, and knowing his opposition might be politically unpopular?

   "I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a U.S. occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences. I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world and strengthen the recruitment arm of al Qaeda. I am not opposed to all wars. I'm opposed to dumb wars." --Barack Obama, 2002



6. Did you know Obama favors transparency over secrecy in our government? Did you know that Obama worked with Republican Senator Tom Coburn to pass one of the strongest government transparency bills since the freedom of information act? He's calling it Google for Government and you can see the results at www.usaspending.gov. Sen. Obama has also released his own tax returns for public review.


7. Did you know that after graduating with honors from Harvard Law School, Barack practiced civil rights law and also taught Constitutional Law for 10 years at the University of Chicago, one of the nation's best law schools, where he was consistentl y rated by his students as one of their best instructors? Did you also know that he was the first African-American elected pres ident of the prestigious Harvard Law Review?


8. Did you know that Barack Obama is an outspoken advocate for women's rights and has been a principled defender of the civil rights of women?


9. Did you know that despite the grueling schedule of running for President, Senator Obama remains a devoted family man, making time to do things like pick out a Christmas tree with his wife and two young daughters, or hurrying home to spend Valentine's Day with them? Did you know he hasn't missed a single parent-teacher conference while running for President?


10. Did you know that Barack Obama has a stellar environmental record, including having the highest rating from the League of Conservation Voters (96%) of any Presidential candidate, Democrat or Republican?


11. Did you know that Barack Obama has been an elected legislator longer than Senator Clinton?


12. Did you know that Barack is a member of all of these Senate Committees: Foreign Relations; Veteran's Affairs; Health, Education, Labor & Pensions; Homeland Security and Government Affairs?


13. Did you know that Senator Obama has sponsored or co-sponsored 15 bills that have become law, and has introduced amendments to 50 bills, of which 16 were adopted since he joined the Senate in 2005?


14. Did you know that Senator Obama sponsored legislation working together with Indiana Republican Senator Richard Lugar, to keep Americans safe by keeping dangerous weapons out of terrorist hands? The two senators also visited the former Soviet Union to inspect the decommissioning of nuclear weapons. Sen. Lugar said of Sen. Obama, "He does have a sense of idealism and principled leadership, a vision of the future."


15. Did you know that Barack Obama is the only candidate running for president who voted against using cluster bombs in Iraq and the only candidate who supports banning the use of landmines?


16. Did you know that, as an Illinois state senator, Barack Obama succeeded in passing legislation requiring the videotaping of police interrogations, gaining the respect and support not only of fellow legislators but that of the police, who had initially opposed the legislation?


17. Did you know that Theodore Roosevelt, Grover Cleveland, Ulysses S. Grant, John F. Kennedy, and Bill Clinton were all younger when they took office than Barack Obama will be?

During election season many emails are circulated about the candidates. Some are true, some aren't. It's often difficult to determine the truth. We encourage you to visit the following non-partisan sites that do a good job of fact checking the candidates.

http://www.snopes.com/
http://www.factcheck.org/

Rhetoricians for Democracy

I attended the annual Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC) last week and was part of a panel presentation on labor union identities. My colleague Deb presented on working as union rhetoricians and focused on the importance of members of our labor community taking the time the use rhetoric as a means of communicating values and getting results.

I am a participant in such rhetoric, though it seems to ebb and flow. In fact, I have been absent from blogging since the 2006 elections, and I haven't written a letter to the editor in quite some time.

Deb's invitation to participate through rhetoric inspired me to get back into the use of writing for the sake of democracy. After a conversation with friends about the federal prosecutors who were fired, and after reading an editorial printed in today's Dispatch, I wrote a letter to the Dispatch newspaper. The letter follows:

What does it mean to "seek justice?" Justice implies equity, moral rightness, and fairness related to standards, honor and law. I agree with the March 27th editorial that states the core of this issue of the fired federal prosecutors is whether they were fired for not supporting political agendas.

However, this issue is no less important than legislation involving Iraq-war funding, health care and Social Security, as the editorial's author implies. Responsibly investigating the lack of justice should not be a scapegoat for our elected Senators and Representatives to stop their focus on war funding and other domestic issues. Focusing on justice does not negate the accomplishment of the others.

To suggest that "level-headed people are working for compromise" implies that those of us who do not believe in compromising justice are not exercising good judgment and are on a partisan "witch hunt." That is a great leap of logic, a fallacy, to say that investigating breaches of equity, moral rightness and fairness - instances of unlawfulness - is a narrow-minded, partisan action. Those truly seeking justice are the level-headed citizens of democracy.

We all need to be rhetoricians for our labor organizations, for our communities, and for democracy.

5 Minutes' Worth of Money

I was stunned and saddened today to read the ending of Howard Dean's email to American Democrats about the war in Iraq and national security. He said:

"When it comes to national security, the Republicans have not led.

We will.

Governor Howard Dean, M.D.Chairman, Democratic National Committee

P.S. -- We are spending $8 billion a month in Iraq. That's $2 billion each week, $267 million each day, or $11 million each hour. For what we spend in three weeks, we could make needed improvements in order to properly secure our public transportation systems. For what we spend in five days, we could put radiation detectors in all of our ports. And for two days in Iraq, we could screen all air cargo."

In the five minutes it took me to post this blog entry, we spent $750,000 in Iraq! What we could do with five minutes' worth of money! (Hmmmm - hurricane relief, domestic safety, national healthcare . . . . for starters!)

"For the love of money is the root of all evil."

In 1998, ExxonMobil came up with a written plan to stall action on global warming, in part, because they found the Kyoto Protocol to be bad for US development, domination and capitalism. So, they have spent over $12 million dollars since then by donating to various think tanks, media outlets, and other groups that will be vocal about their skepticism of global warming. The actual report simply amazes me - in a very sad way. Premeditated greed, is what is wreaks. The report reads like a marketing campaign, which I guess it really is, but it is so disgusting when you think they are trading future human lives for a current profit. They are the modern-day Nazis, seeking to dominate the world at the expense of human lives. Here’s the link to the memo/report: ExxonMobil Action Plan to Stall Action on Global Warming.

The report is long, so here are a few highlights:

• "Victory will be achieved when those promoting the Kyoto treaty . . . appear to be out of touch with reality."
• "Identify, recruit and train a team of five independent scientists to participate in media outreach. These will be individuals who do not have a long history of visibility and/or participation in the climate change debate."
• "Conduct briefings by media-trained scientists . . . ."
• "Convince one of the major news national TV journalists (e.g. John Stossel) to produce a report examining the scientific underpinnings of the Kyoto treaty."
• "Establish a Global Climate Science Data Center [that] will become a one-stop resource on climate science for members of Congress, the media, industry and all others concerned."

Millions of Americans are buying into what this heavily-funded Global Warming Skeptics campaign is spewing. Generally, it is the greedy corporate America that is behind nonsense like this. “For the love of money is the root of all evil.”

The True Cost of War

As of July 6, 2006, 2,549 US soldiers have been killed in Iraq, 53% under 25 years old. Another 18,786 have been wounded, 20 percent of whom have serious brain or spinal injuries. Thirty percent of soldiers develop serious mental health problems within their first three months back in US. Many receive mental health treatment while overseas. Do you have a relative or friend 17-25 years old? Think of that person serving, being injured, or being killed in Iraq. Did you know that only four members of Congress had children in the military at the time they voted in favor of the war?

Incidentally, the total number of soldiers killed in Iraq is only 200 less than the total of 2,749 people who died in the World Trade Center on 9/11/2001. Remember the outrage that we felt at being attacked in our country, in New York City, and the loss of so many innocent lives. Why do our leaders not feel the same outrage for the lives lost in Iraq? In fact, the total number of Iraqi civilians killed during this conflict, while rough estimates, greatly surpasses 40,000 human lives. That does not include the estimate of roughly 55,000 Iraqi insurgents killed as well as the 4,886 Iraqi military and police killed.

Our invasion of Iraq, while touted as a war to decrease terrorism, has only increased terrorism and the hatred for Americans by those throughout the world. Data from the National Counterterrorism Center shows that terrorist attacks have increased since our attack on Iraq. In 2003, there were 208 terrorist attacks causing 625 deaths and 3,646 injuries, and in 2005 there were 11,111 terrorist attacks causing 14,602 deaths and 24,705 injuries. That’s a 5000% increase in terrorist attacks and a 2000% increase in deaths.

The human cost of war is not only apparent in the numbers of deaths and injuries; the human cost of war can also be computed through the taxpayer dollars spent and the lost opportunities for countless taxpaying American citizens. The money spent so far or approved to spend in Iraq surpasses $435 billion dollars of taxpayers’ money. Unfortunately, $9 billion of those taxpayer dollars are unaccounted for in Iraq, lost. Over $500 million dollars worth of spare parts have also been lost. The Pentagon classified $1.4 billion dollars of Halliburton charges as “unreasonable and unsupported.” Incidentally, Halliburton, the company Dick Cheney used to run, has been awarded more than 50% of all contract work in Iraq. Columbia University economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and Harvard University adjunct lecturer Linda Bilmes released a study that conservatively projects costs of the Iraq war to US taxpayers at more than $2 trillion dollars.

Our national debt is now more than $8.4 trillion dollars. In 2005, the U.S. government spent $352 billion dollars of taxpayers’ money on interest payments to the holders of the national debt. So far in 2006, the total is more than $338 billion in interest payments. Meanwhile, the U.S. government spent only $61 billion dollars on education in 2005, and Congress cut student aid by $12 billion in the proposed 2007 federal budget and decreased special education funding by 49%, allocations to school improvement programs by 75%, and adult vocational education funding by 74%, according to the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities.

Most of the discussion on the war in Iraq tends to center on the reasons why we invaded Iraq. Weapons of mass destruction, a ruthless dictator, breaking a treaty, connections to Al Quada – take your pick. No weapons were found. The government was caught in lies about their knowledge of false intelligence. The United Nations did not sanction the invasion of Iraq. There were no actual known ties between Saddam Hussein and Al Quada, so the idea that Iraq was partly responsible for 9/11 was falsely propagated. The United States played the big bully of the world and unilaterally decided to start a war under false pretenses.

At what cost?

Ohmmmm.....Ohmmmmmm

After several conversations this evening with people who obviously don't share my views of living in harmony and helping others to live in harmony on this planet, I must commit to the Dalai Lama's suggestion as listed in a previous post. I will repeat the following:

I am happy that I am not a racist or bigot and that I care about people regardless of their skin color, religion, educational background, sexual preference, ethnicity, or political persuasion (the last being the toughest sometimes).

I am happy that I act on my beliefs and dreams of a better democracy by campaigning for the Democratic Party and such platforms as healthcare, education, voting reform, peace and social responsibility.

I am happy to be a person willing to look at issues and evidence to create my own opinions rather than parroting others such as relatives, friends, news personalities, or politicians.

I am happy that I am loved by many people just because I am who I am.

Finally, I am happy that I have people and pastimes in my life that I love and that motivate me - especially my children and my work as a teacher - and that my primary motivation in life is not money.