Month: November 2012

Sean Noble and the Center to Protect Patients Rights a major funder of Grover Norquist

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Posted  by AzBlueMeanie:

The Center for Patients Rights, a Koch Brothers funded front group run by GOP consultant Sean Noble, is back in the news again. 

Just a few weeks ago, Center for Patients Rights was in the middle of the "dark money" campaign funds money laundering scandal in California.  Controversial Arizona nonprofit releases name of contributors — more nonprofits – latimes.com:

In a stunning reversal, an obscure
Arizona nonprofit at the center of a legal battle over secret political
contributions released on Monday morning the identity of its
contributors, which it had been fighting tooth and nail to keep secret.

But the disclosure did little to shed light on who was behind the $11-million donation to a California campaign fund. The Arizona group, Americans for Responsible Leadership, identified its contributors only as other nonprofits.

The money was passed from Americans for Job Security to the Center to Protect Patient Rights to Americans for Responsible Leadership,
according to state authorities. From there, the money was sent to a
California campaign committee fighting Gov. Jerry Brown's tax-hike plan,
Proposition 30, and pushing a separate ballot measure to curb unions'
political influence, Proposition 32.

California described this as illegal "money laundering." Something at which they are experienced.

MAS teachers file a response to the Unitary (deseg) Plan

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by David Safier The Special Master in charge of putting together the new Unitary (desegregation) Plan for TUSD has requested oral and written comments on the current version of the plan before it's finalized. A group of students wrote a long, detailed document, Declaration of Intellectual Warriors. Now the former MAS teachers have added their … Read more

The ‘irrelevancy’ of Jon Kyl

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Arizona Republic(an) columnist E.J. Montini nailed it in this post about Senator Obstruction, Jon Kyl, and his bogus ACHIEVE Act. Kyl's irrelevant final act:

What good is introducing a piece of legislation that you KNOW isn’t going to pass while you’re in office?

Because it’s for show.

It makes you look conciliatory. It makes you look statesmanlike.

All the things you should have been doing all those years when you were in office and NOT about to retire.

But that’s how politics works. Not exactly a profile in courage.

Arizona’s
retiring Sen. Jon Kyl and Texas’s retiring Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison
introduced a meaningless piece of legislation that is an alternative to
the Dream Act. Their proposal would offer kids brought illegally into
the country by their parents a chance to remain here, but without a path
to citizenship.

"We
need to have a discussion that is sensible, that is calm," Sen. Kyl is
quoted as saying. "This particular piece of immigration reform seemed a
logical place to begin."

That’s true. We should have a calm, sensible conversation about the Dream Act kids.

We should have had it years ago.

A move to shut down bad charter schools

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by David Safier The National Association of Charter School Authorizers (NACSA) wants to shut down underperforming charter schools around the country, as many as one in five charters. This isn't a new idea. The Arizona Charter School Association has been pushing for some charter school housecleaning for years. The NACSA makes it sound like lots … Read more

Gov. Brewer sued over order denying driver’s licenses to DREAMERS

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Tenther "states' rights" George Wallace in a dress, Governor Jan Brewer, was sued today by a group of
civil-liberties and immigrant-rights organizations in a class-action
lawsuit challenging the Guv's executive order denying
driver’s licenses to young undocumented immigrants approved for federal
work permits under President Barack Obama’s deferred-action program (DREAM Act-Lite). Brewer sued over migrant license policy:

The lawsuit seeks to
block Arizona Executive Order 2012-06, issued by Jan Brewer after the
federal government implemented the Deferred Action for Childhood
Arrivals program, or DACA. The program allows certain undocumented
immigrant youth who came here as children to live and work in the United
States for a renewable period of two years. The lawsuit was filed on
behalf of the Arizona Dream Act Coalition, an immigrant youth-led
organization, and five young individuals.

The lawsuit marks
the first legal challenge against a state for denying driver’s licenses
to young undocumented immigrants authorized to live and work temporarily
in the U.S. under the program.

The lawsuit could
affect other states that have also denied driver’s licenses to
non-citizens protected from deportation under the program.

The suit was filed
by the Arizona and national chapters of the American Civil Liberties
Union, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and the
National Immigration Law Center. The same groups are involved in an
ongoing civil-rights lawsuit challenging Arizona’s
immigration-enforcement law, Senate Bill 1070.