Mike Pompous v. Randi

First things first.

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo must be condemned for his revolting and inflammatory slander of AFT President Randi Weingarten, whom he called "the most dangerous person in the world.” 

He's lowered the bar of bottom-feeders to new depths. His comments were a bitter personal attack that could appeal only to the unhinged.

Weingarten is a national leader. She has not thrust herself onto the stage or sought to gratify her own ambition or ego, as flailing critics say. Instead she is demonstrating the power of education as a vital asset for national debate and destiny.

"Hate speech" is a term that is sometimes too broadly applied. But Pompeo's words were explosive and calculated. They are a threat and a warning. Ignorance is no excuse and neither is errant "patriotism.”

He was first in his class at West Point, editor of the Harvard Review when he attended the university's law school, a member of Congress and a director of the CIA. Corrupted intellects are especially menacing, history has taught us.

He's a man who professes to be guided by profound religious faith. How could such a person then target one of America's foremost champions of social justice as a greater enemy to our nation than the leaders of China, Russia, North Korea, Iran et al?

Pompeo has gathered, like pus, his fears and loathings about public schools. 

He blames them for exposing children to "fifth" and "crap,” which is Pompean code for Diversity and Inclusion — restorative justice, independent thinking, revisiting (not revising) history for balance and accuracy, instilling a spirit of activism as custodians of the planet, research-based testing of students, wrap-around services for communities, a more embracing worldview as a path to the American Dream, compliance with scientific guidelines during a pandemic of a million fatalities and everything else from the New Math to due-process rights for teachers.

And for all this, Randi Weingarten is the “most likely to take this republic down,” Pompeo said, adding that "America's decline" would be largely the legacy of the public schools and their union-backed curriculum.

"‘If our kids don’t grow up understanding America is an exceptional nation, we’re done,” Pompeo said, and he plainly identifies the same culprits. It was not a slip of the tongue. When he wags his, calumny and context are one and the same.

Lost on Pompeo is Forbes contributor Peter Greene's awareness that "history is a conversation, not a declaration.”

Vanity Fair magazine calls Pompeo's remarks "bold and insane.” His remarks, however, "resonated" with one New York Post's columnist (Nov.24) who accused Weingarten of "gaslighting,” "extortion of billions of dollars from the country,” “pulling the strings of America's education and political establishments" and having "irreversibly wrecked the public-education system."

Pompeo is kindling a bonfire to finely cook his own career marshmallows.

Indignation and repudiation against him was swift, intense and not limited to the expected allies of unions and public education. In this respect, his remarks were paradoxically somewhat unifying.

Weingarten replied to media inquiries with an analysis of Pompeo's mindset and its  potential encouragement of  "stochastic terrorism,” which The Guardian defines as "the public demonization of a person or group that incites an individual's violent act against the demonized group>”

Scientific American magazine notes that  Pompeo's language can be "affecting our humanity" and "fuel violence.” Being a "national treasure" (as Washington State Congressman Pramila Jayapal calls Weingarten) doesn't confer immunity from demagogues, but may be an enticement to them.

It is entirely possible that a decent, thoughtful person may not be on all issues perfectly aligned with the positions of Randi Weingarten. But it is inconceivable that her contributions and motivations could by accident be so ludicrously misinterpreted.

She's a union leader. And she aims to make this country a more perfect union.

As for the other labor news this week, it's easy to be all over the map and simultaneously well-focused, because the stories tend to share a common thread: workers' rights and managements' wrongs.

The New School has been a fearless bastion of progressivism for over 100 years, but it finally found something to be afraid of: part-time faculty who don't take kindly to being kicked out just nanoseconds before they would have been entitled to crucial benefits. 

That practice is reminiscent of the old days when employers would find a petty pretext to sack loyal employees after decades of exemplary service just days before their eligibility for a pension.

After a brief strike, negotiations on this and other matters appear promising.

The New School’s part-time faculty, tens of thousands of University of California academic workers and hundreds of employees at HarperCollins (one of the five biggest English-language publishers) all have walked the picket lines as members of the United Auto Workers. 

The UAW's expansion into the realm of traditional "culture" is perfectly natural, since all workers are united by blood and cause.

That's why even media-deprived, sports-phobic couch-potatoes should celebrate the building of a new 25,000 stadium in Willets Point for the New York City Football Club. It also explains why we endorse a substantial minimum wage increase for app-based delivery workers beyond that proposed last week by the city's  Department of Consumer and Workers Protection. And the demands of the musicians of AFM Local 802 for a fair contract.

"What, you want to eat again? But you already ate yesterday!"

That's the spirit of people who are shocked by the temerity of those who yet again are seeking an increase in the minimum wage. State Senator Jessica Ramos will introduce legislation to raise it to $21.25 an hour in New York City and $20 elsewhere in the state by 2026.

Even the most "generous" existing minimum wage is extravagantly insufficient. This added "disposable" income would indeed be disposed of faster than UV light kills Covid.  It would not allow luxury to tiptoe for a second into the lives of wage-slaves.

But at least it would cut down on the deferment of past-due bills and maybe delay evictions for a string of milliseconds.

Yet even such relief is resisted by groups such as The Business Council of New York State and the Partnership for New York City, whose CEO is the ever-vigilant Kathryn S. Wylde.

Wylde has established a pattern of getting into a raging tizzy whenever it appears that some sun may break through the clouds of the firmament for workers.

Wylde is distressed that a proposal to expand the "Just Cause" law that currently protects fast-food workers from being fired for no reason will be a refuge for city employees also. "This would be the last straw for many employers. It is essentially the end of 'at will' employment,” she cried.

Much of the business community is all for massaging the backs of workers, provided they can, in so doing, snap their spines.

The New York Post reports that there is some union opposition to the proposal. Perhaps the situation is more complicated than on its face. But we can be sure that objections from organized labor are intended for the sake of union-building, not busting, which is the consuming desire of a phalanx of extremists.

No matter how unique the details and disparate the issues that workers and their unions confront, they are connected by a common bond. We see it over the globe, the centuries, the workplaces, even though scenarios and rules of engagement change.

But the battle persists. And we endure to fight another day. And another. And another.