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Other news about New York today includes the revelation that school closings have not been transparent. Schools were close to meeting standards and perhaps close enough to remain open. Mayor Bloomberg spoke about the taxes he saved recently on the John Gambling show, taxes that could have been used to save teachers, schools from being closed. Yes talking about transparency. This is the mayor who has done an undercover operation in another state because of the sale of illegal guns (Am I right about that?). He needs an undercover operation of the Department of Education and the well performing schools to find out what really is going on.

The schools will be making calls to students in the morning, students who are truant (or who just have long term absences), using celebrities such as Jose Rios (we thank Jose and the others), the baseball player, and personalities from entertainment. This can help, but where is the initiative to improve the instruction in those schools for the truant students. Where is the beef?

Around the country people running for office or who are not running for office are crying poverty and taking it out on teachers and others. LIFO or Last In First Out is in the news in Chicago as Rahm Emmanuel tries to change teacher tenure. My friends, I lived through the toughest days of that rule and survived. I and others had a deferment to go into the military for years because my school district was one of the worst in New York City. My friends, the school would not have been made better by hiring a few teachers who the principal liked in an interview. My friends, the school operated on a daily basis using substitute teachers because of high absenteeism. My friends we did not have the police all day long and other staff controlling the entrance the way I see things being done today. My friends, we were poorly paid. My friends, the administrators put an entire other class of students into our classroom because they had no subs and no one else to help cover classes. My friends, they put groups of students into auditoriums to cover for lack of substitutes. My friends, even Catholic school teachers (the ones called the dedicated ones because they did the work for much less pay) in the city were getting tired and frustrated by that system and its low pay. My friends, we hired teachers from Spain and other countries, because we could develop our own (read what I wrote again at the beginning). My friends, the White House has it wrong and maybe that is where Rahm Emmanuel picked up his ideas. My friends, the elected officials are asking for more transparency in this system when they are the ones we need transparency from (polls show that people have little faith in our elected officials and government). I think if the cities throw out LIFO, in five to ten years you will see no difference in those cities, but the payroll will be cut by anti-union people. The middle class that was built up by that system will continue to shrink and teachers will be looking to reside in public housing projects (the same place they were living in back in the 1950's before they were able to make more money. The same teachers who will be hired next year will be fired over the next ten years by arbitrary and capricious acts of people in charge and that means people who will be practicing discrimination and reverse discrimination. We saw much of that on the Lower East Side and other communities in the early 1970's and it will repeat itself (I am sure there is lots going on today that is being pushed under the rug).

My friends, take a look at this. The more things change, yes, the more they stay the same. Here it is from the inauguration speech of Ronald Reagan back in 1981. This is thirty years ago and since 1970 the worker has lost wages as the people at the top have gotten richer. So you see it is not just about lowering taxes for people. We have seen pension systems destroyed by business, mid management taking money from hard working people in stores and businesses across America, and half-truths from elected officials and radio talk show hosts. Every conservative talk show host is repeating that we are mortgaging our children's future. What future do they have if they have not been adequately educated by the education mayor of the Big Apple, the man who took control and lost the war to educate the children? What chance do they have if wages keep going down and the rich keep getting richer.

People are constantly telling you what a great city New York is. The unions have helped make it great. They have been in battle and won many battles, but unions are really declining in New York in many areas, but the media makes it sound like the unions are totally in control. The rubber room is gone for teachers, but the media makes it appear that it still exists. The unions built up the middle class in New York and gave people living wages and not just minimum wage. And sometimes or often union wage was much less than the person was worth. I noticed that in another job I had back in the 1960's. We are all in competition with each other, rich and poor, children and their grandparents. That is really what is going on.

This was taken from Reagan's speech.

The business of our nation goes forward. These United States are confronted with an economic affliction of great proportions. We suffer from the longest and one of the worst sustained inflations in our national history. It distorts our economic decisions, penalizes thrift, and crushes the struggling young and the fixed-income elderly alike. It threatens to shatter the lives of millions of our people.
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Idle industries have cast workers into unemployment, causing human misery and personal indignity. Those who do work are denied a fair return for their labor by a tax system which penalizes successful achievement and keeps us from maintaining full productivity.
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But great as our tax burden is, it has not kept pace with public spending. For decades, we have piled deficit upon deficit, mortgaging our future and our children's future for the temporary convenience of the present. To continue this long trend is to guarantee tremendous social, cultural, political, and economic upheavals.

We can build a better system, but it means a much better dialogue. I appreciate leadership more than anyone, but not the kind of leadership that I see.

MARTIN N. DANENBERG
7 BLAZER DRIVE
ISLANDIA, NEW YORK 11749
631-348-1341
martin@mygedhotline.com
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