Rouge Forum Dispatch: Societies are betrayed by what is false within.
November 8th, 2015 / Author: rgibsonWe Say Fight Back!
Students clash with police as tuition fee protest turns violent
Some protesters burst through the police lines and were chased down Victoria Street by officers, while chanting: ‘What do we want? Free education. When do we want it? Now.’
Several young men appeared to be arrested and were taken by officers into waiting police vans as the protest came to a stop near Victoria station.
In a statement, Scotland Yard said a ‘small group of protesters’ had thrown paint outside the Home Office during the chaotic scenes, and confirmed 12 people had been arrested for public order offences. : www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3303774/Scuffles-break-march-against-university-tuition-fees-shadow-chancellor-John-McDonnell-accuses-Government-betraying-students.html#ixzz3qqaKQWII
Rikowski :
Recapturing Marx on Gender, Race and Colonialism: Beyond Post-Modernism and Orthodox Marxism
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eib32B_KH6M
CUNY Faculty Members Arrested After Staging Protest
Several dozen City University of New York faculty members were arrested on Wednesday when they blocked the entrance to the Midtown Manhattan building housing the administration’s offices as part of a demand for salary increases.
Several hundred faculty and professional staff members participated in the protest outside 205 East 42nd Street, which houses the central administration offices, said Barbara Bowen, the president of the Professional Staff Congress/CUNY, the union representing the faculty and professional staff. They carried signs saying “CUNY Needs a Raise,” “Stop the War on CUNY” and “No More Excuses, Chancellor Milliken” — a reference to James B. Milliken.
Those who were arrested had locked arms and sat down in front of the building in a planned act of civil disobedience, refusing to move until either they received an “acceptable offer” or were arrested, Dr. Bowen said. www.nytimes.com/2015/11/05/nyregion/cuny-faculty-members-arrested-after-staging-protest.html?emc=edit_tnt_20151105&nlid=1526508&tntemail0=y&_r=1
The Little Red Schoolhouse
Obamagoge Put $7 Billion into the False Hope School Shell Game, nearly everyone played, and everyone but the ruling class lost In 2009, the Obama administration saw a chance to tackle a problem that had bedeviled educators for decades.
“Our goal is to turn around the 5,000 lowest-performing schools over the next five years, as part of our overall strategy for dramatically reducing the dropout rate, improving high school graduation rates and increasing the number of students who graduate prepared for success in college and the workplace,” said Arne Duncan, the administration’s new secretary of education in August of that year.
The administration pumped $3 billion of economic stimulus money into the School Improvement Grants program. Six years later, the program has failed to produce the dramatic results the administration had hoped to achieve. About two thirds of SIG schools nationwide made modest or no gains — not much different from similarly bad schools that got no money at all. About a third of the schools actually got worse…… the “federal government needs to be held accountable for spending billions of dollars on a program that all the experience told us wouldn’t produce the changes that they said it would,” Smarick said. “That’s something they’re going to have to explain.”www.politico.com/story/2015/11/failing-schools-education-white-house-214332#ixzz3qqe0tESZ
The 100 Most Militarized Universities in the USA (gentle reminder–the education agenda is a war agenda–class and empire’s wars)
#1 UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND
College Park, Maryland | Public
The University of Maryland University College (UMUC) is the nation’s second-biggest enroller of service members and their families who receive tuition assistance, and ranks second in the nation in post-9/11 GI Bill students. Maryland’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS)-sponsored National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism, and its NSA-sponsored Center for Advanced Study of Language conduct classified work at the University Research Park in Riverdale, which also hosts the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity.
OVERVIEW
Percent Online: 37%
Top Secret Employment Rank: 1
National Security Funding Rank: 4
DoD Research & Development Funding: $117,491,000
Students on GI Bill/Tuition Assistance: 38%
GOVERNMENT AFFILIATIONS
Conducts Classified Research
National Intelligence
NSA
Homeland Security
FBI
Military ROTC Program
NATIONAL SECURITY CURRICULUM
Intelligence Studies Program
Homeland Security Studies Program
Drone Program news.vice.com/article/these-are-the-100-most-militarized-universities-in-america?utm_source=vicenewsemail
List of states linking scores to teacher reviews States where student test scores are the key factor in teacher evaluations:
Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Hawaii, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Tennessee as well as the District of Columbia.
_____
States where student test scores play a significant role in teacher evaluations:
Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Virginia.
States that require student growth in evaluations, but it doesn’t play a significant role:
Massachusetts, North Dakota, South Carolina, Utah, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming.
_____
States where there’s no formal policy linking student test scores to teacher evaluations:
California, Iowa, Montana, Nebraska and Vermont. www.chron.com/news/politics/article/List-of-states-linking-scores-to-teacher-reviews-6610372.php
Who They Gonna Call? Bias at the New York Times on Education Reform
US Education Department Easily Joins Liberal (fake-pro-empire) Anti-test movement The Education Department took some of the blame for the sometimes stressful, excessive and time-consuming testing at many schools and said Saturday that it hasn’t done enough to help states tackle the problem.
The Obama administration is responding to loud complaints from across the country about how much time students spend on testing and the dozens of consequences now associated with poor results on those exams for students and teachers — policies it had a hand in expanding. Schools have taken on a “test-and-punish” culture, advocates say, a movement that got underway with the 2002 No Child Left Behind law.
“In too many schools, there is unnecessary testing and not enough clarity of purpose applied to the task of assessing students, consuming too much instructional time and creating undue stress for educators and students,” the plan says. “The administration bears some of the responsibility for this, and we are committed to being part of the solution.”
The department issued a “testing action plan” with recommendations and proposals for cutting back on testing that include easing up on the widely criticized use of student test scores in a proposed rule about evaluating training programs for teachers.: www.politico.com/story/2015/10/education-department-too-much-testing-215131#ixzz3qqkJYCut
The International Hot War of the Rich on the Poor
According to the online manual, the “law of war” (i.e., the law of war according to the Pentagon) supersedes international human rights treaties as well as the US Constitution.
The manual authorizes the killing of civilians during armed conflict and establishes a framework for mass military detentions. Journalists, according to the manual, can be censored and punished as spies on the say-so of military officials. The manual freely discusses the use of nuclear weapons, and it does not prohibit napalm, depleted uranium munitions, cluster bombs or other indiscriminate weapons.
The manual might have more properly been titled A Manifesto for Total War and Military Dictatorship.
The manual is an expression of the incompatibility of imperialist militarism and democracy. In the 25 years since the liquidation of the USSR, and especially over the 14 years since the launching of the so-called “war on terror,” the United States has been almost perpetually at war, seeking to offset its economic decline by threats and military violence around the world. www.wsws.org/en/articles/2015/11/03/laws-n03.html
Spectacles to Keep the Rubes Cheering For War: Military spent $6.8M on sports promotions Pentagon officials paid at least $6.8 million over the last three years to professional sports teams for “paid patriotism” events like on-field color guards and “free” seats for troops, according to a final report from congressional investigators.
Arizona Republican Sens. Jeff Flake and John McCain hinted that number could be even higher, accusing the Defense Department of withholding details of many of its contracts with sports franchises in an effort to minimize the embarrassment over the arrangements.
“These teams do a lot of good work for the military,” Flake told reporters on Wednesday. “What is upsetting is that when you see activities like this — activities that people assume are done out of the goodness of their hearts — and find out they’re really paid for by the taxpayers, it cheapens the whole lot.” www.militarytimes.com/story/military/pentagon/2015/11/04/paid-patriotism-dod-report/75158096/
Iraq, Afghanistan, and Other Special Ops “Successes”
America’s Elite Forces Deploy to a Record-Shattering 147 Countries in 2015 They’re some of the best soldiers in the world: highly trained, well equipped, and experts in weapons, intelligence gathering, and battlefield medicine. They study foreign cultures and learn local languages. They’re smart, skillful, wear some very iconic headgear, and their 12-member teams are “capable of conducting the full spectrum of special operations, from building indigenous security forces to identifying and targeting threats to U.S. national interests.” They’re also quite successful. At least they think so.
“In the last decade, Green Berets have deployed into 135 of the 195 recognized countries in the world. Successes in Afghanistan, Iraq, Trans-Sahel Africa, the Philippines, the Andean Ridge, the Caribbean, and Central America have resulted in an increasing demand for [Special Forces] around the globe,” reads a statement on the website of U.S. Army Special Forces Command.
The Army’s Green Berets are among the best known of America’s elite forces, but they’re hardly alone. Navy SEALs, Air Force Air Commandos, Army Rangers, Marine Corps Raiders, as well as civil affairs personnel, logisticians, administrators, analysts, and planners, among others, make up U.S. Special Operations forces (SOF). They are the men and women who carry out America’s most difficult and secret military missions.
Since 9/11, U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) has grown in every conceivable way from funding and personnel to global reach and deployments. In 2015, according to Special Operations Command spokesman Ken McGraw, U.S. Special Operations forces deployed to a record-shattering 147 countries — 75% of the nations on the planet, which represents a jump of 145% since the waning days of the Bush administration. On any day of the year, in fact, America’s most elite troops can be found in 70 to 90 nations.
There is, of course, a certain logic to imagining that the increasing global sweep of these deployments is a sign of success. After all, why would you expand your operations into ever-more nations if they weren’t successful? So I decided to pursue that record of “success” with a few experts on the subject.
I started by asking Sean Naylor, a man who knows America’s most elite troops as few do and the author of Relentless Strike: The Secret History of Joint Special Operations Command, about the claims made by Army Special Forces Command. He responded with a hearty laugh. “I’m going to give whoever wrote that the benefit of the doubt that they were referring to successes that Army Special Forces were at least perceived to have achieved in those countries rather than the overall U.S. military effort,” he says. As he points out, the first post-9/11 months may represent the zenith of success for those troops. The initial operations in the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 — carried out largely by U.S. Special Forces, the CIA, and the Afghan Northern Alliance, backed by U.S. airpower — were “probably the high point” in the history of unconventional warfare by Green Berets, according to Naylor. As for the years that followed? “There were all sorts of mistakes, one could argue, that were made after that.” He is, however, quick to point out that “the vast majority of the decisions [about operations and the war, in general] were not being made by Army Special Forces soldiers.” www.tomdispatch.com/post/176060/tomgram%3A_nick_turse%2C_success%2C_failure%2C_and_the_%22finest_warriors_who_ever_went_into_combat%22/
Afghan government turns to militias as Taliban gains strength Back to Warlords
A militia fighter wearing a loose-fitting Afghan tunic and sandals, and with a rocket-propelled grenade launcher strapped to his back, stands at a checkpoint by a rickety bridge. To pass him requires the permission of Nabi Gechi.
To get married here also requires Gechi’s blessing. And to commit a robbery requires a contribution to Gechi’s arsenal. “If a person steals one watermelon, he has to buy me an AK-47,” he said. “If he steals a sheep, he has to buy me a PK machine gun.”
Gechi is neither a district governor nor a tribal elder. But in this sun-scorched territory of northern Kunduz province, where U.S. troops left long ago and there are no soldiers or police, Gechi and his fighters are the only resistance against a resurgent Taliban. And that makes him the most influential man for miles around.
“Now, no one dares to steal anything in my area,” the militia commander said. www.washingtonpost.com/world/as-taliban-resurges-an-afghan-warlord-gains-power/2015/10/29/5e431aaa-21bf-4713-b681-7226681c18a1_story.html
More $ for Jihadists (the last batch produced 5 people and cost $500 Mil) The U.S. and its regional allies agreed to increase shipments of weapons and other supplies to help moderate Syrian rebels hold their ground and challenge the intervention of Russia and Iran on behalf of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, U.S. officials and their counterparts in the region said. www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-allies-to-boost-aid-to-syria-rebels-1446682624
US. airstrikes in Kunduz destroyed more than a hospital (shall we believe Afghans direct US strikes?) A deadly U.S. airstrike on a Doctors Without Borders hospital last month has triggered an international outcry and investigations by the Pentagon and NATO. But it was not the only U.S. aerial assault during the battle to cause significant damage in this northern city.
Hours earlier, U.S. warplanes zeroed in on a warehouse and a mansion in two densely populated residential areas, according to witnesses and local officials. No one was killed in those attacks, but the targets were pulverized and the walls and windows of nearby homes were shattered.
All three U.S. strikes — on the warehouse, the mansion and the hospital — were requested by Afghan commanders, who say they asked for help because their forces were under attack by Taliban fighters. But residents said that while their neighborhoods had been conflict zones earlier, there were no militants at any of the locations at the time of the attacks. www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/us-airstrikes-in-kunduz-destroyed-more-than-a-hospital/2015/11/04/99ef78ff-468a-4113-ae05-086c3450f065_story.html?tid=pm_world_pop_b
Nearly 60 million people are currently displaced from their homes by war and persecution — more than at any time since World War II. Half are children. This multimedia journey in text, photographs and virtual reality tells the stories of three of them. www.nytimes.com/2015/11/08/magazine/the-displaced-introduction.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news
In security breach, Russian programmers wrote code for U.S. military communications systems
A Pentagon contractor farmed its work out to cut-rate Russian computer programmers, sparking a four-year federal probe www.publicintegrity.org/2015/11/04/18828/security-breach-russian-programmers-wrote-code-us-military-communications-systems?utm_source=email&utm_campaign=watchdog&utm_medium=publici-email&goal=0_ffd1d0160d-a4133664de-100253645&mc_cid=a4133664de&mc_eid=033b0e09bd
IEDs injure U.S. troops deployed on new ISIS front in Egypt
For months, the nearly 700 American soldiers deployed on the ground in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula have weathered a crisis all but indistinguishable from their fellow troops in Iraq.
Living amid blast walls topped with razor wire, riding only in up-armored vehicles, the troops face a constant threat of attacks from extremist groups loyal to the so-called Islamic State.
On Thursday, four of those troops were injured when their convoy rolled out of the “North Camp” just a few miles east of the Egypt-Israeli border and hit two improvised explosive devices.
None of the injuries were life-threatening, but it was the latest indication that the fight against the Islamic State, also known as ISIS and ISIL, is rapidly developing a new front in Egypt, the Arab world’s most populous and historically influential nation. www.militarytimes.com/story/military/2015/09/04/isis–egypt/71711638/
Nearly 900,000 veterans are still waiting to get onto the VA backlog (Nice for Veterans’ Day)
The VA inspector general’s office has confirmed mismanagement of almost a million veterans’ health records. Over 300,000 vets may have died awaiting care. www.csmonitor.com/USA/USA-Update/2015/0903/Nearly-900-000-veterans-are-still-waiting-to-get-onto-the-VA-backlog
The International Economic War of the Rich on the Poor
Labor-force participation stays at a 38-year low
October’s jobs report was full of good news, with nonfarm payrolls dramatically beating expectations and average hourly earnings growing at a faster rate than at any time since the Great Recession.
Meanwhile, the labor-force participation rate remains at its 38-year low, with just 62.4% of American civilians over the age of 16 either working or looking for work: www.businessinsider.com/labor-force-participation-rate-october-2015-2015-11
Reminder:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYm_oEO5iyE
The Emergence of Fascism as a Popular Mass Movement
Report reveals grisly details of deadly U.S. airstrike on hospital
Doctors Without Borders released an internal report Thursday describing the deaths of patients and its workers in a hospital in northern Afghanistan that was bombed by U.S. forces last month.
The international medical charity, known by its French acronym MSF, also said wounded Taliban fighters were being treated in the hospital, but there were no armed men or fighting in the area at the time.
The charity confirmed that U.S. forces had the exact coordinates of the clinic before launching an aerial assault on Oct. 3 that killed 30 people, including doctors and patients.
The bombing lasted for more than an hour, during which time “patients burned in their beds, medical staff were decapitated and lost limbs, and others were shot by the circling AC130 gunship while fleeing the burning building,” the report says.
“We lost our ability to treat patients at a time when we were needed the most,” MSF general director Christopher Stokes said in a statement posted to the charity’s website. “We were forced to leave patients to die on the operating table and others burning in their ICU beds.”
According to the report, a hospital worker was decapitated by shrapnel while running for safety. Shrapnel also killed a patient in a wheelchair who was trying to escape from the hospital’s inpatient department.
MSF doctors and other medical staff were shot while running to reach safety in a different part of the compound,” the report says.
President Obama apologized for the attack. The U.S. military said the airstrike, requested by Afghan forces, was a mistake.
But Stokes said “a mistake is quite hard to believe and understand.” The report, based on interviews with around 60 MSF staff, confirmed earlier accounts by the group. www.cbsnews.com/news/afghanistan-airstrike-report-doctors-without-borders-victims-decapitated-on-fire/
Solidarity for Never
Lawmakers Call For Army To Investigate Misconduct Discharges Of Service Members
A group of 12 U.S. senators, led by Christopher Murphy, D-Conn., is calling for the Army inspector general to investigate the discharges of tens of thousands of service members diagnosed with mental health disorders, such as post-traumatic stress disorder or traumatic brain injuries.
The formal letter sent to top Army officials Eric Fanning and Gen. Mark A. Milley was motivated by last week’s “Missed Treatment” investigation by NPR’s Daniel Zwerdling and Colorado Public Radio’s Michael de Yoanna, which revealed that since January 2009, the Army has separated 22,000 soldiers for misconduct after they returned from Iraq and Afghanistan and were diagnosed with mental health problems such as PTSD or TBI. As a result, many of those soldiers won’t receive benefits or have access to the treatment they need. www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/11/04/454675053/lawmakers-call-for-army-to-investigate-misconduct-discharges-of-service-members
GM Skilled Workers Reject UAW Sellout GM’s contract has not been ratified. The UAW said in a statement Friday that it will hold meetings with skilled trades members at each plant to determine “what reason(s) they had for rejection of the tentative agreement. www.detroitnews.com/story/business/autos/2015/11/07/uaw-ford-reach-deal-gm-hits-snag/75336830/
Education rat finks Garcia, Ravitch, Weingarten–all for the empire at all costs
Sellout NEA Boss Easily Subsumes Anti-test (pro-empire) “movement” and calls for less testing
The question Lily Garcia gets a lot is “what single thing” will improve our schools. She says there is no single thing but in 2002 Congress decided there was.
“ No Child Left Untested.”
Garcia refers to the George W Bush “No Child Left Behind” legislation as “test and punish” education system. She says the best turnaround schools instead allow teachers to use their creativity to foster a passion for learning in kids.
Everywhere we’ve seen it work it’s because we’ve humanized education not mechanized it, not standardized it.” stateimpact.npr.org/ohio/2015/11/06/national-education-association-prez-calls-for-equity-among-schools/
Chicago Teacher Union Bosses Afraid to Hold a Real Strike Vote–hold “Practice” one: Chicago public school teachers, negotiating a new contract amid severe statewide budget troubles, plan to take a practice strike vote on Thursday to prepare for a possible walk-out in response to budget cuts, a union official said.
The purpose of the vote in the nation’s third-largest city is to test both the process of collecting the vote and teacher sentiment as negotiations with school officials continue, said Jesse Sharkey, vice president of the Chicago Teachers Union.
“We’ve told people to be prepared for a long strike if that’s what it comes to,” Sharkey said. “We’d prefer there be no strike at all.”
The district, which serves about 400,000 students at more than 600 schools, faces a $1.1 billion structural deficit.
Its former chief executive, Barbara Byrd-Bennett, pleaded guilty last month to a fraud charge related to the awarding of a no-bid contract to her former employer, infuriating parents and teachers who had already seen budget cutbacks.
The Chicago Public Schools’ recently approved $5.7 billion budget counts on $480 million in aid from the state of Illinois it has not received. If the money does not come, thousands of teachers could be laid off after Christmas.
Due to an impasse between the state’s Democratic-majority legislature and new Republican Governor Bruce Rauner, the state has no budget. www.reuters.com/article/2015/11/05/us-education-chicago-strike-idUSKCN0SU2IV20151105
90% White Jefferson County Col votes out Testisto “conservatives” so DSA’s Rethinking Schools goes wild www.thedenverchannel.com/news/politics/recall-vote-results-for-jefferson-county-school-board-members-julie-williams-john-newkirk-ken-witt
Problems with the results of Cuban Social Nationalism Many younger Cubans feel the weight of the revolution as a challenge to their future rather than as its foundation. The evidence is clear on the streets of Santiago, where young people take their fashion cues, their backward hats and baggy clothes, from the country that was long portrayed as Cuba’s nemesis, the United States.
“What can I say, I don’t really believe in politics, and the revolution is purely political,” Rubén Suarez Romero, 24, said. “My main concern is my family, not party politics.”
Many Cubans his age have little patience for revolutionary rhetoric, and they are frustrated by the dearth of economic opportunity in the country, despite the diplomatic thaw with Washington. They want to see change in their lives, and revolutionary talk sounds to many like a distraction from their struggles.
“The youth want everything now,” Mr. Mato said with a sigh, running his hands along the legs of his pants. “They think that everything will fall from the sky.” www.nytimes.com/2015/11/08/world/americas/cuban-revolutionaries-hope-their-legacy-wont-fade-away.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region%C2%AEion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=1
Spy versus Spy
The Magical Mystery Tour
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zg5zSVxx9JM
MA–Boston–SNAP to Cardinal O’Malley
The Church needs to do more to protect children, help survivors, as well as live up to its promise of being open and transparent.
WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, Boston clergy sex abuse victims will be speaking out after the premiere of the movie “Spotlight” here in Boston this weekend, and giving their personal feelings viewing it, along with what action the church needs to take to protect children and help wounded survivors.
They will also urge Cardinal O’Malley, as the head of the Pontifical Commission, to urge Pope Francis to take concrete action punishing, firing, and defrocking known Cardinals, Bishops, and Supervisors, who are responsible for the cover-ups and destruction of children’s lives by protecting criminal clerics in their care, as well as other actions, that will protect children.
These are actions that will protect children, and send the message that the church is serious about children’s safety.
WHEN
Sunday, Nov. 8, 2015 at 11:45 am
WHERE
Outside the Cathedral of the Holy Cross, Boston
1400 Washington St, Boston, MA 02118 www.snapnetwork.org/ma_boston–snap_to_cardinal_o_malley
The Best and Worst Things in the History of the World
What America’s immigrants looked like when they arrived on Ellis Island
So Long
Real ‘Norma Rae’ dies of cancer after insurer delayed treatment
“How in the world can it take so long to find out [whether they would cover the medicine or not] when it could be a matter of life or death,” she said. “It is almost like, in a way, committing murder.”
Though Sutton eventually received the medication, the cancer had already taken hold. She passed away on Friday, Sept. 11 in a Burlington, N.C. hospice. www.southernstudies.org/2009/09/real-norma-rae-dies-of-cancer-after-insurer-delayed-treatment.html
Dead Rat Chalabi
