[lbo-talk] Fighting NCLB, etc.

Carrol Cox cbcox at ilstu.edu
Wed Apr 14 10:36:05 PDT 2010


The first line of defense (and unfortunately for the time being a very weak one) are the teachers themselves and their unions. But the ultimate defense must come from a new mass movement in defense of workiing people. In fact, I would suggest the "conceptual source" of this attak on the schools is to be found in th '70s: the weakening of the grocery-chain unins, the wars in East Timor, the assassination of Bishoop Romero, the presidential declaration that "the world isn't fair," deregulation of the airlines, the breaking of PATCO, the appointment of Volcker, and so forth -- the whole tangled story of the neoliberal assault and the the u.s. becoming the semi-official 'policeman' maintainint through endless wars a global climate 'friendly to business.'

See Max Boot's op-ed of a couple weeks ago declaring that decent health care for its citizens was incompatible with the u.s. remaining a global power. The Austerity DRive being launched by the Obama Administration, which inlcudes breaking the teacher unions, is a more flexible equivalent to that.

Carrol



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