Month: February 2019

What Reformers Cautiously Avoid

~ dmaxmj ~ Leave a comment

Previously, several years ago, blogged out here . I am doing some reorganizing of old writing and it brought a tear to my eye.

My first daughter was born five weeks early. I remember that night clearly: we had just got back from some shopping and my wife had sent me out for a Burger King cheeseburger (one of those pregnancy cravings that had to be satisfied occasionally). When I got home, not too many minutes later, I found her in our bedroom on the floor-laying on her side with a stopwatch in one hand, and the book “What to Expect When Expecting” next to her. It was one of those “triple-take” moments…my wife…the stopwatch…the book. Later I was to find out she had sent me out on purpose, and that she had felt “something” was happening.

            Before long we were in the car, and on our way to the hospital, which was maybe 3 small village blocks away (a five minute walk). I was driving like she might give birth in the car and she had to let me know that I could slow down…that the baby wouldn’t come in three minutes, but I had many memories of TV shows and movies where babies were delivered in the backseat of cars by husbands, cab drivers, firefighters, or some other random good Samaritan. It always happened quick with some yelling, screaming, crying, then smiling. Painful, messy, happy…and scary.

            Needless to say, my wife was right and we had plenty of time-but I was right too-it was scary. Not just because it appeared that the moment may have arrived-but because it was five weeks early (at that stage, complications are more likely). But even though there was no backseat birth or waiting room delivery, it became clear that our first baby was coming when they could do nothing to stop the contractions with medication and decided instead to induce labor. The worry was that if birth-weight was too low, our baby would be whisked away to a hospital more than a half hour away, and my wife would remain.

            I’m pretty sure someone had their thumb on the scale-she was so tiny! But she was able to stay in Cortland, close to us. Jen was in recovery, Chloe was taken to the newborn observation room, under a hood with oxygen being pumped into it and being monitored. I went back and forth between Jen and Baby Chloe. Sometimes I would sing softly to Chloe, leaning down close to do “You are my Sunshine”, the same way I did while she was in Jen’s belly and I would sing with my mouth pretty much on her. I can’t remember how long I did this back-and-forth between rooms, singing/ talking/ comforting… but I finally went to one of the nurses on duty and asked if they could bring Chloe to Jen. Jen had just given birth to her first child, prematurely,  and was stressed. Chloe hadn’t really spent any time with her mother and was in a bright impersonal room under a plastic hood. It had probably been a few hours-but time gets warped in situations like this. It was almost as soon as Chloe was in Jen’s arms that both seemed to be better.

            Chloe is 15 years old now, one of three sisters, one of four of the loves of my life. Parenthood is an amazing, painful, wonderful, awe-inspiring responsibility, and as I write this, I am seeing my wife’s post on Facebook. She is home with her own father and family right now. I won’t share details, but home with her father is where she needs to be. There isn’t much time left for that. I am home with our daughters. Jen’s  connection with her father is a powerful one-recognized and respected by everyone in her family (and me). She knows that she’s his favorite, (so does everyone else), and while he isn’t in the mood for much right now-she is the one he wants with him.

Her FB post:

Me: Dad, remember when you used to take me fishing?

Dad: Yeah, Beansie (her younger sister’s nickname, Jen’s is “Ding-Ding”…don’t know where these came from) went a lot too.

Me: How did we ever catch any fish? We sure did talk alot……… I guess is wasn’t about the fishing was it???

Dad: I guess not…

Me: Thanks Dad. 
*****sniff sniff*****

            Chloe is sleeping right now. She’s a teen, but gives us virtually no trouble. She is bright, beautiful, creative. Brenna, 13, could be described pretty much the same (in addition to the sleeping thing)-but is already taller and “leggier” than her mother and Chloe…a fact she enjoys razzing Chloe (and Jen) with. Our youngest, Ella (8), sits on the couch with the journal of letters Jen and I wrote to her when she was only “Little Fetus McConnell”. There are too many great moments to remember, too many awesome things these kids do every day…We have from day one loved them, held them, supported them, encouraged them, and made it clear we love them unconditionally. And I think you can tell. If you are familiar with them, know them, or have seen any of the crazy stuff they do-you can probably get it. I’m not trying to brag, I think we’ve merely fulfilled a minimum requirement that many others do as well.

           But fewer parents can or do these days-cut loose to the free market and investment wind as well as policy makers and the silent hands that guide them.There is our real achievement gap problem. Education reformers avoid this conversation like the plague, because it is impacting factor numero-uno on student outcomes. Finding someone in school to blame (not something outside of school they might have to help fix) is the current agenda because it holds opportunities in a new “education reform” market. But what reformers won’t engage with is a meaningful discussion regarding the quality of the bond that parents and children share, and how significant that is in determining a student’s ability to focus and achieve in school. If their basic needs are met, if they are emotionally secure, they are more likely to succeed.  Reform stars would probably say that they understand and feel this love, this unbelievably strong bond that begins even before the moment you see and hold your baby in your arms. The feeling that parenting is the most important thing you can ever do-to unconditionally love; to put the needs of another first; to give the world the best possible future by laying a loving foundation in your family world first.

            They would say they feel the same way, and that they know lots of others who do as well. Of course they do. That’s likely how they were raised, that’s the world they live in: where families have the resources and background to form these secure and loving bonds. For the sake of public relations, reformers cherry-pick just that type of family to put out front for their lawsuits or enroll in their semi-exclusive schools. What they are NOT getting, or willfully avoiding, is the fact that more children are coming to public school classrooms without that quality family foundation in place. They are unfamiliar with and/or unwilling to discuss a different type of family and dynamic that leads to a different sort of student coming to many public school classrooms. And more of them are coming as we sacrifice real life truths to the demands of market perspectives.

            The arrogance of enjoying a gated sort of existence and undeserved influence over others, then using outcomes of inequity as criticisms of those combating inequity is aggravating. Using influence from within those equity gates to decide on and enforce a brand of generic education for the masses outside is wrong. All kids should have the connections I see in my family,many families I know. and that those driving reform likely have. But fewer and fewer do.

            No amount of testing, no exclusive “public” charter school, no amount of arrogant rhetoric from those who will not take on the real burdens, no posturing from someone who themselves enjoys a gated sort of existence can do it. It is time for honestly “shared sacrifice”. Those who already have sacrificed are being asked for more by those who continue to avoid it.

Think reformers will agree?

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The Kamala Threat

~ dmaxmj ~ Leave a comment

I think the Democrat establishment feels threatened right now, by the gravitational pull of voters from their left, and plans to throw anyone who can be packaged as remotely progressive-ish out there. But Beto is a no-go. He’s a pretender whose claim to fame is that he lost to Ted Cruz. A superficial look at that tells me that must sting worse than losing to Trump (and that’s pretty sad-sorry Clinton fans). Kirsten Gillarybrand? Nah. She tries but doesn’t come off comfortable in her newly found faux-progressive skin. Buttigieg? Hard to tell right now. He is young, energetic, well liked, and supports a lot of the positions progressives hold dear. It could just be that flooding the market and letting competition sort them out is the solution to the immediate problem at hand, but the risk lies in voters falling into that lesser-evilism trap.

One thing that’s obvious: the Democrats will definitely cover the spectrum to distract from and try to dilute the raw energy in what has become, for all intent and purpose, “The AOC wing of the party” that they just can’t deny or control. Not to put pressure on her specifically, it’s just that she has proven that it can be done. She has shown that there are good people out there willing to lead within the Democratic party, and that the entrenched two-party establishment bears ALL the responsibility for denying voters those exciting (non-racist, non-bigoted, non-classist, non-misogynistic…) things to vote for.

So lately, the party establishment seems to be giving the okay (or at least pretending to) for more mainstream candidates to dip their toes into a little semi- Democratic Socialism. Millionaire media talk hosts on cable channels disguised as news shows are still a little reluctant to roll it around the critical-thought centers of their brains, instead grilling any who dare mention free-college or universal health care or living wages… and spitting out some version of “How can we possibly afford that?”  But I have not seen cable pundits respond to this simple counterargument:

“We only have empty pockets when it comes to the morally right things to do, but when it comes to tax cuts for billionaires and when it comes to unlimited war we seem to be able to invent that money very easily,” (Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez)

You would think that the supposed liberal, left-wing “mainstream media” would be pushing this, but Bernie-thought is a threat to THEM (the establishment and the media outlets depending on establishment money) as well. He he gets painted as the spoiler for true Democrats (“Yeah, but he’s NOT a Democrat” is their mantra) because true Democrats, I guess, side with war and tax cuts for billionaires, not with the people?

I have been trying to figure out whose cause the party truly champions. My N.Y. Assembly person (D) was a bit irked when I met with her following H.C.’s loss and I suggested opening up primaries to independent’s (if “big tents”, unity, and pulling in votes/voters is the goal). Indies tend to go “D”, I told her. She got a little angry, griping about providing “him” with support and infrastructure when he’s not even a Democrat. I understand that on the national level, the electoral college was the deciding factor (more so than bodies, because Clinton had the numbers on her side), but build a base and inspire buy-in at the state level, and that increased number of voters will statistically push the electorate towards the left.

I almost said “then Democrats don’t have any reason to get their hands on his email/donor list”, but we have generally had friendly meetings in the past and I wanted to try and keep it that way. Seems the party really resents him, both for his courage to push policies they dare not, and for his ability to inspire voters they will not. They have no interest in winning votes, just demanding them I guess. But they aren’t stupid, so they figure on suckering Berners in.

Which leads me to Warren.

An existing Dem office holder with that high of a profile does not run for the presidency without some strategic thinking; some meetings with leaders/insiders; discussions regarding platform; surrender of some principles, etc. Warren is acceptable progressive-bait, and while her antagonizing finance-sector creeps is fun to watch, loosening the nuts and bolts of their crimes has led to no substantial restructuring of the economy, no repeal of citizens united, minimal consequences (e.g. job loss and/or jail time) for the wealthiest and tip-toppiest of the criminal executives whose wealth and position are created (not earned) by soaking the nation and the masses. Lots of lefty talk, but small threat to the system that is.

Still, though, my dream ticket is a Warren/Sanders or Sanders/Warren. I don’t care who’s on top, but the Democrat establishment has not indicated honesty or consistency of will in tackling the issues AOC, Sanders, and Warren have made their names speaking out on. Quite the opposite, I think. Sputtering, pretending, deflecting, and denying the will of the voters on those issues while still feeling either entitled to the votes, or willing to sacrifice America to the greater evil instead of holding themselves accountable to the greater good.

That’s why I honestly think a Trump presidency was their 2016 fallback plan. They figured, worst case: after suffering through a Trump presidency, the Democrats could play hero and offer up to their voters someone slightly more center-right than Obama or Clinton and have it feel like that is a totally acceptable “lesser evil”.

Which leads me to Kamala Harris.

Her status as the party’s pick for 2020 seems pretty obvious. 20,000 people do not just show up in Oakland for a campaign kickoff . What is she, like the friggin’ Beatles doing an impromptu rooftop concert in the middle of London? Like people just hear her Kamala noise and wander inspired into the streets?

Hardly.

And this is why SHE’S the threat. Clearly there is an apparatus that would like to paint her to be the presumptive. She is smooth enough to say the almost right thing, and she ticks the superficial demo check list in enough places to get the resentful identity politic-ers heartily on board to push back the progressives.

But has it been so long since she laughed about cracking down on the poor parents of truant children? So long since she was dismissive of people wanting more schools and fewer jails, describing her need to have three locks on her door as evidence that you need to put people and keep people in jail. Stayed tough on low level/poor criminals and not-so-tough on banker crimes? Oversaw lawyers from her office who argued against early release for good behavior and time spent fighting wildfires for indentured servitude wages?

When the Supreme Court ordered California to reduce its prison population because of the terrible conditions created by overcrowding, state attorneys argued that “if forced to release these inmates early, prisons would lose an important labor pool.”  (Nonprofit Quarterly, August 10, 2018)

Disclosure, Harris claims to have been unaware of this, but her willingness to incarcerate and to prioritize prisons over schools makes me wonder.

We need transparency to fully vet her as a candidate. We need to see her donor list. We need to know who chartered buses and got permits to bring in the crowd that showed up.

AND we need to go beyond that.

If freshman lawmakers are being oriented to their jobs/expectations by a string of CEOs and bankers, and being told “You’re in over your heads” and “You don’t know how the game is played” by rats like Gary Cohn, then we need to know who puts that schedule and list of speakers together and the first people we ask are Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer. Then we go to Cohen and have him describe the game and how it’s played in his estimation.

Once we know the game, we decide whether on not we like it, want it and/or want to scrap it or change the rules. I’m not sure that Harris would be on board with that.