During the next 4-6 weeks, CAP will ask that every politician in NYC go on record regarding this issue (especially politicians involved in primaries).
If Randi and Mike are reading this, remember it was ICE that took a stand and not the very leaders who are supposed to protect us.
BTW: The AFT has endorsed HR 676........Hmmmm...the AFT endorses HR 676 and our union leaders are lining up for a piece of the pie of the conversion money from the possible privatization of GHI and HIP. Now that's unionism!!!!
Click this link...
http://www.tomduane.com/news_2008/letters_2008/Emblem%20Health%20Letter.html
State Senator onboard...
John Powers
1 comment:
__________________________________
Credit To People of Courage -
To John Powers Who Embodies Courage
A Fighter for Health Care
A Fighter for Teacher Rights
__________________________________
I must respond to the following, very kind words written recently by John Powers, UFT Chapter Leader at Liberation High School.
Mr. Powers had said of something I wrote: "Thanks for putting into words what I am not capable of doing so beautifully myself.
"You are a breath of fresh air".
Well allow me to say that it is I who must both thank and salute you, Mr. Powers, for your enormous personal courage in Standing Up for what you believe is right.
There was a time in union history, when to be a UFT Chapter Leader at a school in NYC was like working and walking a school's hallways in possession of a veritable "Teflon" suit of armor.
In my early days as a teacher I vividly recall how there was virtually nothing a UFT Chapter Leader was afraid to do or say.
School Principals and their Administrators as well as all their
assorted lackeys, stooges and hack helpers, knew better than to cross swords with a UFT Chapter Leader.
We classroom teachers always knew just how vulnerable we were, (and now more than ever), but we looked up in awe at how everyone in a school building knew, as though it were the Eleventh Commandmant passed down from Mount Sinai:
"Thou shalt not mess with the UFT".
But as the years passed that power that UFT Chapter Leaders wielded gradually began to be dissipated and weakened to the point of now having almost totally vanished.
Witness how many "once powerful" UFT Chapter Leaders have now themselves been targeted by Principals, (with a not small degree of encouragement from Joel Klein. Esq. and his NYC DOE), and have seen themselves openly attacked with ludicrous charges and made to join the other Legions of "Disappeared Teachers" in the growing number of "Rubber Room" gulags.
Yet, despite all the facts enumerated here, you, Mr. Powers have stood your ground, as did Norman Scott, back in the day, so many years before you as a Chapter Leader.
And yes, I have read of your courageous battles to protect the Health Care rights of those who give their all on behalf of this great City. Which of course puts you squarely at odds with quite powerful forces. That takes real guts. That is what I call Courage.
So again, it is I who must salute you, Mr. Powers.
Yes, I was ever a fighter - and still remain one to this very day and this very hour.
But at this point in time I am no longer on the front lines, in the trenches, so to speak, as you yourself are. A former Federal Prosecutor, now masquerading as an Education expert, has seen to that.
That "man" and his lackeys have thrown everything they could at me during five long, unrelenting years of retaliation and venal harassment.
The final showdown for all those events will come in September during the lengthy Hearings comprising my second and final New York State 3020-a Teacher Hearings.
At that time, during each and every one of those "Hearings", Mr. Klein, Esq. will learn, much to his regret, that I am more than adequately prepared to "give" as well as I "get".
But, you still have your whole career before you, Mr.Powers. Yet you are not afraid to be a "Stand Up" Leader. A man who understands that the a Union, any Union anywhere, is simply a chain of loyal Members which can only be as strong as its "weakest link".
So what I write, Mr. Powers, at this point, in my long career, is not nearly so important nor as impressive, as what you do- and do on a daily basis.
It is people like you who are and remain the "lifeblood" of this our Union- The United Federation of Teachers. A Union that was called out on a City wide Strike the very first week I began teaching in the South East Bronx, forty years ago, in that most tumultuous year for our Nation- 1968.
And then, just as now, we were engaged in a War abroad and just as tragically- a "war" at Home.
A most tragic war for the "hearts and minds" of our Nation. May I say our Beloved Nation.
And I have no doubt in my mind whatsoever, that in November of 2008, these United States will witness a Rebirth of our Nation, under a new type of President, who as a man of the People, will rule by our Sacred Laws and beloved Constitution, For the People.
But he will succeed because of people like you- John Powers, who work every day of your life to improve the lot of those around you.
You, John Powers, are a "Doer" in the fullest and most meaningful sense of that word. And what you do is of far more consequence than anything I can write.
I fought "The Good Fight" for 40 years and now I thank the gods up above that there still remain in our midst, courageous people, hard working and dedicated people, a Union Man, such as you are, both brave and bold, to whom I may pass "The Torch" to carry on when I am gone.
It is you,John Powers, who is "the breath of fresh air" of which you spoke when you addressed your very kind words to me.
And your breath of fresh air will soon grow into a mighty wind that in the last months of this year 2008, will blow away forever the forces which almost destroyed this great Republic which so many have defended with their blood and their very lives, down all the corridors of our American history, for two hundred years.
Perhaps it is not some mere coincidence that a man named "John Powers" rose to be the elected Union Leader of a school in New York City named "Liberation".
For surely one can never achieve the one without the other.
It is therefore a source of joy for me to know that such people as you still exist.
I remain with my highest respect for you Mr. John Powers,
Sincerely,
David Pakter, M.A., M.F.A.
once "Teacher of the Year" and
Still Standing
__________________________________
Post a Comment