The Rouge Forum No Blood For Oil web page is updated. There you can find key articles, dating back to 1999, on education, war, the economy, and whatever there is of the left.
Of special interest is this note from a Rouge Forum organizer who attended the recent Brecht Forum on the state of the antiwar movement. Here is a short excerpt: “now I can understand how they have taken a movement with millions in the streets at one time to a “movement” today that can’t muster even a few thousand people…”
Substance News covered the NEA and AFT conventions this year. While both unions’ leaders sought to restrict press passes for Substance journalists, no other resource can come close to the coverage Substance gave to the most unionized sector of the US, education workers.
On the whole, NEA and AFT bosses got what they wanted from the conventions. They deflected nearly everything into the electoral arena, dodged around on Iraq and other wars, and ducked on the crux of NCLB while they criticized NCLB….and they all got raises to boot.
However, there was a little surprise about one thing from each convention. From NEA, it was a surprise that Dennis Van Roekel remained a nonentity. Many people expected DVR, who is not utterly inept like past NEA boss Reg Weaver, to be far more assertive and, to some degree, militant. They felt he had been biding his time inside the bowels of NEA and that the “Real” DVR was far to the left of the one that had slogged along being number two and three for all those years. It is pretty clear that AFT’s Randi Weingarten will, if DVR does not change fast, eclipse the NEA (again) in the national spotlight, and that DVR will not be the stealth militant so many people hoped he would be. NEA is, by the way, about three times the size of the AFT and is the largest union in the USA.
From the AFT, it was a bit of a surprise that outgoing president McElroy called for abolition of NCLB. The Rouge Forum, Substance, and others created the pressure for that. Of course, he is lying. AFT is doing merit pay, stealing money from members wherever they can. Local leaders are attacking one another out of sheer opportunism. AFT continues to work with the reactionaries in the Business Roundtable, and the National Endowment for Democracy, and is going to go right along with the Obamagogue project to continue the regimentation of schooling through high stakes exams and to offer national service as a middle class offset to the draft.
Here is Street in Z on the demagogue, Obamagogue And more to come from his hometown, Chicago, in Substance.
On a cheerier note:
An invitation to all to an August potluck in lovely San Diego:
Who: Anyone interested in getting together
Where: Rich and Amber’s house in San Diego
When: Saturday, August 9, 2008 at 6:00 PM
Why: Socializing and fun
How: Call us at 619-287-2322 or email rgibson@pipeline.com for directions and then bring yourself and something to share
The Rouge Forum Steering Committee will meet on September 27 in Detroit to plan our coming year. Suggestions and comments always welcome.
And we will host a social gathering at AERA in San Diego in 2009. Be there or be square.
All the best
r
Follow
