Arizona List endorsed candidates for 2018 Primary

Arizona List is a statewide network supporting pro-choice Democratic women running for office in Arizona. Here’s their list of 2018 endorsed women candidates: https://www.arizonalist.org/our-women/our-candidates/ (including statewide races for Attorney General, Secretary of State, and Corporation Commission), City/County, Arizona State & House, school boards). And they also issue a list of recommended candidates. “Being a Recommended … Read more

Great News from the State Board of Education

Great News from the State Board of Education. The agenda item pertaining to possibly disciplining participants in the Red for Ed Walk Out has been pulled from Monday’s Board Agenda. This is a victory for the power of the people and all the advocates, led by the two Democratic Candidates for Superintendent of Public Instruction (Kathy … Read more

What comes next after Trump’s executive order

President Trump’s recent executive order allegedly ending his family-separation policy (illegal under the Flores Settlement Agreement), by ordering families to be detained together indefinitely (also illegal under the Flores Settlement Agreement), did NOT end his zero tolerance enforcement policy. It rather directed his Department of Justice to move the court for revisions to the Flores Settlement Agreement to allow the administration to do what is doing in order to make it legal ex post facto.

On Thursday, the DOJ went to court to do just that. Trump administration seeks approval from judge to detain immigrant families together:

The Trump administration asked a federal judge in California on Thursday to permit federal agents to detain together those families suspected of illegally entering the country, in the wake of an outcry over the government’s recent practice of separating children from their parents.

The Justice Department filed court papers Thursday seeking a modification to a judge’s order in a long-running court case about how immigrants are detained.

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We Shall Overcome.

The trends we are experiencing today in the United States has happened before in our country and past generations overcame them. There have been earlier periods in our history when people in this country (from both political parties)  have had a maniacal fear and prejudice towards “the other” be it groups like the Irish, the … Read more

Arizona Fails Another Test

Cross-posted from RestoreReason.com.

Yesterday, the Network for Public Education and the Schott Foundation for Public Education, released a report titled “Grading the States” that serves as a report card on our nation’s commitment to public schools. At the onset, they challenge the belief in privatization as the solution and write,

Although the public school system is not perfect and has continual room for improvement, it is still the cornerstone of community empowerment and advancement in American society.

Therein, I believe, lies the rub. Those driving America’s economic engine, don’t want everyone aboard the train. Instead, those who most “have”, are working very hard to leave the “have nots” at the station. As Stephen Brill writes in his new book “Tailspin”,

Conservatives have always preached self-reliance while liberals favored an activist government that assures the common good. However, [what we are seeing now] is a new, wider, and more dangerous divide – between those at the top, who enjoy unprecendented power, and everyone else. For those at the top, the common good is no longer good for them.

Even though many Americans have become polarized into either the Conservative or Liberal camps, the real fight isn’t there. Increasingly, it is between the MEGA “haves” and the “have-nots”. Truth is, for these MEGA “haves”, political ideology and allegiance to our nation, are likely much less important than maintaining and improving their status. After all, in our global economy, our country’s borders are no barrier to their multi-national interests and in their gilded worlds, not only do they increasingly not care about the common good, they don’t even need it. And nothing, is more all about the “common good” than public education. It provides opportunity to all and is largely responsible for building the strongest middle class in the world, once making the American Dream a possibility for many.

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