Marion Barry's new reality show; also, new president of the DC teachers' union

[Recursion]

From Kojo Nnamdi at WAMU
http://thekojonnamdishow.org/shows/2010-12-10/politics-hour

The second story is the only one of national interest, as we all watch DC start to move forward from the Rhee Years. But, former mayor and current councilman Marion Barry's reality show seemed so whimsical I had to plug that part too.

Nathan Saunders is the new president of the Washington Teacher's Union (an AFT union). His predecessor, George Parker, was viewed by Saunders and his supporters as too willing to collaborate with Rhee (and now Henderson). I do not think the appearance went well.

He misused "comprise", but I'll give that a pass because I'm one of the 0.00002% of the population that cares about the usage of "comprise" vs. "constitute".

For the fourth time on this radio program in less than a year, a WTU representative came on and talked for twenty minutes without ever mentioning students. He talked about the importance of these jobs to the community, how hard they work, and how few disruptions there are. When a caller called him on that fact, he said "my job is to represent the teachers, not the students" (ouch; true though it is, wrong way to say it) and worse, "the teachers pay union dues".

When asked what percentage of DC public school teachers he would rate as "excellent" he said "95%".

I believe in teachers' unions. They are a good thing. They improve the quality of education. But crap like this has to stop; there's a reason so many DC parents are furious about (among other things) the teachers' union and claiming it's some corporate spin campaign is hiding your head in the sand. It does have to do with a union leadership that will seriously say 95% of DC teachers are "excellent" (what does "excellent" even mean in that case? And anyways, I've worked in that school system and the simple fact is there really are quite a few very bad teachers working there; when the above-mentioned Mayor Barry ran DCPS as a personal fiefdom and Ward 8 jobs program, a lot of people were hired who shouldn't have been, and many of them are still there, though not as many as before receivership.)

Anyways, the Marion Barry reality show sounds cool, too. It's called "Mayor For Life" (a title bestowed to him by a column in the Citypaper), and has already gotten a few staffers fired. The theme song is catchy, and is the opening of the podcast.