“Education Reform by WalMart” isn’t going to win any awards for marketing slogans so instead the Waltons weaponize their philanthropic dollars by underwriting fronts like Massachusetts Parents United, Educators for Excellence, and Democrats for Education Reform Massachusetts. Here are the latest dollar figures. How about $500,000 to Massachusetts Parents United? Remember their creation story, where…
Japan Dispatches: Thoughts on Public Transportation in the Commonwealth
On Thursday morning, I woke to find a friend and colleague had posted a story on my Facebook timeline about the efficacy of trains versus cars in response to a blog post I had made questioning Massachusetts’s investment in SouthCoast rail. It was the unicorn of all Facebook debates—respectful disagreement accompanied by the infusion of…
DFER Massachusetts’ Policy Luncheon: Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain!
Democrats for Education Reform Massachusetts had a policy conference Wednesday to tout a report it did comparing schools in Boston and Lawrence. It’s a great case study on how wealthy philanthrocapitalists are able to set the agenda on issues. It was timely too because in the morning I was re-reading a book chapter by Aaron…
MassFiscal Makes the Boston Globe’s Hypocrites Hall of Fame
The honors keep rolling in for the Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance which was named today to the Boston Globe’s Hypocrite’s Hall of Fame. It’s not as prestigious as MassFiscal’s Award for Fraud in Massachusetts Politics in 2015, but it shows MFA is still on the bottom of its game. The Globe editorial board took notice when…
Waltons Well Represented at FBRC Hearing
The political capacity for pretending something is what it is not amazes. Take yesterday’s FBRC hearing. Families for Excellent Schools would have been there but for it collapsing in corruption but FES’s funders, especially the Walton family of WalMart bucks were well represented by fronts like Massachusetts Parents United, Democrats for Education Reform, Stand for…
The Pioneer Institute, the Kochs, and Voter Disenfranchisement in Massachusetts
Last Monday in CommonwealthMagazine the Pioneer Institute proposed Massachusetts Tie state funding to school committee seats, partially disenfranchising poor and minority communities. I critiqued the proposal as The Beamer vs. Beater Theory of Democracy. If you’re driving a Beamer you get full voting rights. If you’re driving a beater the state takes away your right…
Pioneer Institute Introduces the Beamer vs. Beater Theory of Democracy
This week Pioneer Institute introduced a two tier structure of democracy for Massachusetts that we’ll call the Beamer vs. Beater Theory of Democracy. If you’re driving a Beamer you get all the voting rights of full citizenship. If you’re driving a Beater, you get some voting rights but don’t get to vote for school committee…
GreenWorks Shows Climate Politics is Local
On Friday Massachusetts House Speaker Robert A. DeLeo unveiled a plan that, if adopted, will allocate more than $1 billion to help municipalities fund renewable energy, energy efficiency, and climate resilience projects. The aptly named GreenWorks program will invite cities and towns to apply for competitive grants administered by the state’s Executive Office of Energy…
Dinner with Cupid: Matching the Boston Globe with Teachers the Editors Can Romance
The Boston Globe yearns for a more submissive teachers union. Its Sunday editorial Time for a Reset on Education Funding included a call for the Massachusetts Teachers Association to acquiesce and “If not, perhaps a group of teachers who don’t share MTA’s combative mentality could contribute some constructive ideas.” Who could the Globe have in…
Misinfo-tainment: The Sarno “Snub” that Wasn’t
I have known Mayor Sarno for more than 30 years. I voted for him when he ran for City Council and were I a Springfield resident at the time I would have voted for him for Mayor. I don’t always agree with him, but I do think he is a good politician and a good…