AFT Endorsement of Hillary Looking Like a Rookie Mistake About Now

NEA /AFT Endorsed Hillary Clinton and a Dear Friend

If the old adage "the friend of my friend is my friend" rings true then I'd like the Presidents of AFT and NEA -- NYSUT too while we're at it-- to explain how it is our great friend Hillary Clinton has just locked us all up in a big sloppy hug with a disgraced shithead like Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. 

Forget that Rahmbo has declared war of Chicago Public Schools, that he's blithely handed out millions in tax breaks and baksheeshes to his wealthy pals while shuttering dozens of public schools in largely minority neighborhoods and cutting working people's pensions. Forget that he's already provoked one teacher strike and is on the verge of forcing another one with his macho take it or leave it offer to teachers that includes massive cuts and layoffs. While balancing the financial mismanagement of his administration on the backs of teachers, Emanuel would tell us these damned teachers are lucky they even have a job in Rahm's Chicago. 

Forget too that Emanuel sat for months on a videotape of  a Chicago cop unloading his gun into a teen ager,  continuing to fire after the kid was on the ground and clearly not a threat to anyone -- if he ever was in the first place. Forget that Homan Square a black site used for "disappearing" people and used for all manner of torture, sexual and otherwise has been in full operation for years on Emanuel's watch. Forget all that ok, teachers, because people like Randi Weingarten and Lily Eskelson Garcia and Andy Pallotta have long ago decided that you needed to endorse Hillary Clinton for President in 2016. 

Faced with the litany of his misdeeds and the laundry list of Rahm's human rights violations -- if this guy was an Emir of some sunblasted Middle Eastern oasis you can bet he'd be catching some serious grief from Amnesty International at the very least -- Hillary, as she has in previous adventures, is standing by her man. The exception here is that her this time man is Rahm Emanuel. Here's what she had to say in support of the Sultan of Lake Michigan: 

“He loves Chicago and I’m confident that he’s going to do everything he can to get to the bottom of these issues and take whatever measures are necessary to remedy them,” Clinton said in Iowa, according to Bloomberg.

Well I guess that settles it. We can pack up our protest signs and call it a day, right? It's that simple really. When union leadership ignores the will of the rank and file and blunders ahead claiming with some fake poll's legerdemain that the members actually voted for Hillary and are just crazy about her, we can expect to end up in bed with a horse's head like Rahm Emanuel. 

And isn't the irony kind of 3-D like in its depth that Weingarten, by playing her self serving Democrat bingo to the detriment of the rest of us, has wound up shackled to a candidate so full of shit that she won't even try to distance herself from the egregiousness of  Mayor Emanuel's atrocities?  Yes Randi here you are all intertwined with Hillary and Rahm trying to pretend you don't notice the stench of your political bedfellows or the anti-union contradiction of your choice in friends. 

And if there wasn't irony enough for us all to have seconds maybe Weingarten and Hillary can take a lesson from the young men at Chicago's Urban Prep, Rahm's crown jewel of charter schools. By rights, the Urban Prep kids should be first in line to kneel and kiss the Mayor's ring showered as they are in support from Emanuel and his ed reform backers. Unlike Weingarten and Hillary though, the guys at Urban Prep were totally willing to tell truth to power when Rahm came for a visit hoping to speed the righting of his Lusitania like administration with a the balm of a friendly public appearance. 

Turns out the kids there know a thing about loyalty that transcends the self serving brand practiced by Rahm, Hillary and Weingarten. At the conclusion of the assembly when they were supposed to recite the school pledge providing Rahmbo with something akin to a healing Hallmark Moment, some students instead began chanting "16 Shots! 16 Shots!" in solidarity with fellow teen Laquan MacDonald. Rahm fled the scene for obvious reasons then hurried back to his office to crank out another heartfelt press release in the desperate hope that he can save face and his administration from the raucous calls for his resignation resonating throughout Chicago as we speak. 

Of course there was nothing any of us could do to prevent Weingarten from throwing the endorsement to her pal Hillary. But we are free to question her motives and her judgement when the person she's given our endorsement to embraces a known son of a bitch and full time shithead instead of condemning him on the spot for a growing number of outrageous offenses.  It really calls Hillary's character and judgement into question to see her putting party loyalties before the loyalties she should have for young Mr. MacDonald, the Chicago Teachers, the torture victims of Holman Square and the people like us currently cringing in disgust to see a person our union has endorsed is placing a premium on party at the expense of the rest of humanity. I am ashamed and disgusted to see a candidate my union has endorsed siding with a serial offender at the expense of his victims. 

Maybe next time Weingarten will ask the rank and file what we think?