In New York City, the U.F.T. Betrays Al Shanker’s Legacy
Two days from now a primary election to pick the Democratic Party candidate for Congress in the 8th Brooklyn-Queens Congressional District in New York City will take place. The two men contending for the spot are New York City Councilman Charles Barron and New York State Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries.
Both men are African-American, but their differences are profound. Jeffries is a moderate centrist who has gone against the grain of his own party by supporting school vouchers and educational reform. In contrast, Barron is a an ultra-leftist who chose opposition to Israel as the major focus of his candidacy and who is in no uncertain terms a black racist.
Last week the former KKK leader David Duke gave Barron his endorsement:
The possible election of [Barron], a dedicated anti-Zionist to the U.S. Congress, has thrown the Zionist-influenced media and the Zio-political establishment in a tizzy.
Duke acknowledged that he doesn’t agree with Barron on everything but stressed that “I certainly agree with Barron that Israel is the worst rogue terrorist state on Earth.”
Among Barron’s most notable statements are his praise of the late Moammar Qadaffi as a hero, inviting the Zimbabwean killer and dictator Robert Mugabe to City Hall in New York, and saying at a rally on behalf of reparations for slavery,
I want to go up to the closest white person and say, ‘You can’t understand this. It’s a black thing’ and then slap him, just for my mental health.
As for Israel, Barron has said that “the biggest terrorist in the world is the government of Israel.” In the New York City Council, he protested about sitting near a statue of Thomas Jefferson, who he said was “a slaveholder, a hypocrite and a racist.”
The opponents of Barron read like a Who’s Who of New York’s Democratic Party establishment. They include Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, Governor Andrew Cuomo, Rep. Jerry Nadler, and others. These Democrats see a Barron victory as an embarrassment to their party and city, undermining the clout of their congressional delegation. They are terrified about the possibility that Barron will win the primary, and hence win a seat in Congress in a district that always votes Democratic.
The problem, however, is that New York City’s major trade unions, led by AFSCME, have endorsed Barron and are actively supporting him. DC-37 represents 25,000 Department of Education employees and backs Barron because of his opposition to charter schools, which the union opposes. Its executive director, the leftist unionist Lillian Roberts, stated that “city workers and their unions have had to fight major battles to protect rights that we fought hard to win as well as to preserve the vital safety-net services we provide to an ever-growing clientele,” which is clearly enough for her to support Barron despite his racism and extremism.
Most importantly, Jeffries has been a strong supporter of charter schools, and opposed a lawsuit against them brought by the NAACP and the United Federation of Teachers. Barron, in contrast, has emerged as the strongest opponent of such schools.
As BuzzFeed reported, “Powerful public workers’ unions are throwing their weight — in public and behind the scenes — behind a Brooklyn Congressional candidate who has allied himself with despots like Muammar Qaddafi and Robert Mugabe.” It went on to report that “AFSCME, is planning to dive into the race on Barron’s behalf.” A smaller group, the Civil Service Employees, successfully blocked attempts to get union support for Barron’s rival, Hakeem Jeffries. Also joining the movement for Barron is the old left-wing stalwart in New York’s union movement, Local 1199, now part of the SIEU, and the once powerful Transit Workers Union, led by “Red” Mike Quill in the 30s and 40s.
With low turnout in primary elections and powerful union support to mobilize its cadre, it seems at present that the black racist Barron will win the contest and be on his way to a seat in Congress.
So, what, one wonders, will be the position of the United Federation of Teachers (UFT), the powerhouse in the union movement and the Democratic Party? The answer soon came. The UFT announced that in the Barron-Jeffries race, they will remain neutral! While the fanatical black nationalist supporters in the union ranks of Barron are furious, the decision of the UFT delegate assembly and its leadership to remain silent and not take a stand is in essence a message to its membership that as far as they are concerned, a Barron victory is acceptable.
If the founder of the UFT, the late Albert Shanker, still lived he would be in the forefront of an effort to mobilize his membership to stand up against Barron. One must remember that Shanker attained his national notoriety and fame as the leader of the UFT’s strike in Ocean-Hill Brownsville in 1968. He went to jail in 1969 for two weeks after refusing to call off the strike. The experiment in so-called “community control,” financed by the Ford Foundation, led local black nationalist leaders to fire largely Jewish teachers from the schools at which they worked. Black activists condemned Shanker as a racist, and regularly used anti-Semitic taunts against Shanker and striking teachers, most of whom were Jewish.
When one side is evil and the other sane, neutrality serves only to support those who favor evil. Al Shanker would have understood that, and taken a firm stand in support of Hakeem Jeffries, despite his support of vouchers. How far the UFT has fallen since the days of Al Shanker’s leadership!
Unless a miracle takes place, New Yorkers in the next Congress will be disgraced when Charles Barron represents one of their Congressional districts.
“Al Shanker would have understood that, and taken a firm stand in support of Charles Barron”
typo?
Whenever I hear Shanker’s name, I am reminded of that moment in Woody Allen’s sleeper when he wakes up in the future, and is told the world went through a nuclear war. When asked how that could have happened, he was told it occurred when a man named Albert Shanker got a hold of an atom bomb.
Shanker was a scumbag.
He was also properly named, even though the spelling is slightly different. His major accomplishments resemble a running pustule on the body politic of this country.
David Duke and this black jerk belong together. Maybe they’ll meet in a final race war. Wouldn’t that be nice?
John J’s characterization of Shanker is off base. Shanker brought decent wages to teachers at a time they were way too low and fought for appropriate class sizes and later on he pushed for good discipline in schools and for high expectations of teachers in terms of work output and skills. He also worked to help african american school aides to get further education and become teachers and he courageously stood up to the Ocean Hill Brownsville racists who wanted race to determine who gets a job.
That strike in 1968 severely damaged my education.
The UFT had gone on strike for two months. I was a freshman in high school that year. The semester didn’t start till mid November–two months late. As a result, a lot of stuff in the syllabus didn’t make the cut and didn’t get taught.
Tens of thousands of poor students, who depended on the school lunch program for a hot midday meal, didn’t get any for those two whole months.
Even worse, after school resumed, neither Shanker nor any of his teachers in the rank and file ever apologized for damaging our education or at least sympathized with us students.
Shame on him. A less militant union leader might have found compromise without severely damaging the education of all of New York City’s students. That’s why he became so hated, to the point that the Woody Allen film “Sleeper” cited Shanker as the reason the world would be destroyed in the future.
the blacks made sure to get rid of jewish teachers. replaced them with “their own”. and what a wonderful outcome they’ve enjoyed. truly inspiring.
i liked shanker. he stood up for the public education system and fought for it. public education being one of the great examples of america’s exceptionalism and extraordinary accomplishments. the benefits of which provided us with some of our most outstanding and successful graduates.
I lived in NYC in Queens until 1964. My parents always told me that NYC had the nation’s best public schools. Then, in 1968, the Jewish teachers (who helped make NYC public schools the best in the nation) were fired for racial reasons. (I know others who took early retirement in the 1970s because they feared violence at the hands of the pupils.)
You can imagine how sympathetic I am to complaints that students at inner-city public schools are disadvantaged by inferior teachers, as compared with the affluent suburbs.
This is a tasty morsel for Republicans, indeed. Congressman Barron, meet the independent voters of Ohio, Florida, Colorado, Wisconsin, Nevada, New Hampshire, Iowa and Virginia!
if this hater of white people is elected, the white and thinking people who vote for him are absolutely crazy!
With all due respect, but have you been living under a rock?
All progressive white voters are certifiably crazy; most of us have known this for some time. That they would vote for a black racist who would spit in their faces is nothing new. American Jews have done it for years….
Whites voted for the black racist in the White House. So what else is new?
There aren’t that many white people living in NYC these days.
From Wiki: New York’s Eighth Congressional District for the United States House of Representatives in New York City. It is split into two sections. The northern portion of it includes most of Manhattan’s Upper West Side, and continues south to include most parts of Hell’s Kitchen, East Village, Chelsea, SoHo, Greenwich Village, TriBeCa, and Downtown Manhattan. The southern portion in Brooklyn includes parts of Borough Park, Sunset Park, Bay Ridge, Bensonhurst, Coney Island, Brighton Beach, Gravesend, Dyker Heights, Bath Beach, and Seagate.
The current Representative from the Eighth District is Jerrold Nadler.
YOU MEAN TO TELL ME THAT THIS AREA CAN’T ELECT A REPUBLICAN AGAINST A RACIST?
The Congressional Districts were redrawn and renumbered. The renumbered 8th District is mostly within the district now reporeented by Ed Townes who is retireing. That’s what led to the primary between Dirtbag Barron and Jeffries.
By the way a miracle happened–Jeffries won 75-25.
Just a DAN, nothing but a DAN .
As a former NY city Resident (I used to live in that district) I have to wonder why they believe Barron has a chance. Quite simply those areas are liberal Democratic, but they aren’t majority black. In addition, you need to understand, yes, the public worker unions in NYC are powerful, but many of their members neither live nor vote in NYC. What’s the use of having a good government job if you can’t get a house out in the burbs?
Dismayingly but unsurrisingly, the left does not let blatant and open anti-Semitism deter it from its aims. And yet Jews still hasten to support the left. I wonder why.
You should ask Leon Trotsky about that.
Of course, since they whacked him with the ice pick, he doesn’t hear so good….
Let the 8th district of NY secede from the union and form a new country, Farrakanistan. No one will object. Good riddance. Set up high walls and a fortified border for the new Gaza
Let the 8th district of NY secede from the union and form a new country, Farrakanistan. No one will object. Good riddance. Set up high walls and a fortified border for the new Gaza
Secession NOW
The district Barron is running in is mainly composed of northern Brooklyn and parts of the Southeast and South-Central sections that current are part of NY-9, which was carved up in Albany last year in the wake of the Anthony Weiner scandal. A bit of the South Central part of Brooklyn can lean Republican, but the rest of the District is lock-step Democrat, to the point that whoever wins this race will be in office for at least the next decade.
It’s kind of a shame New York isn’t in play in the presidential election. If it was and Barron wins on Tuesday, it would present President Obama will the conundrum of having to campaign in the city to boost turnout but at the same time staying as far away as possible from Barron, less he juice up Jewish voter turnout for Mitt Romney, in the same way not disavowing Sonny Carson and Al Sharpton in 1993, helped cost David Dinkins his election rematch with Rudy Giuliani.
I dont know how accurate it is that “New York is not in play” (I have heard that even California might be able to be “in play”). I know in a special election in the past year a Republican, Bob Turner, won in a Democrat stronghold. There are many who are disatisfied with the current administration. Unfortunately the current Governor, Andrew Cuomo, who has done a decent job on balancing the budget and going against the public sector unions supports Obama. I think much of it depends on how effective the Republican campaign is and how ineffective Obama’s campaign and Presidency contnues to be.
And the upshot of it all will be that white David Duke will continue to be reviled while his black counterpart will be an up and coming media darling. There needs to be more “democrats” like Barron finding a natural home in the democrat party. The dims are fast becoming the party of nutjobs, misfits, and thugs, and losers a process of natural selection if there ever was one.
Just another clown in a monkey suit doing his best to destroy what once once a great city. New Yawkers are nuts.
And so NYC moves yet one step further towards becoming Detroit.
If anyone slaps me, no matter their reason, or the color of their skin, that would be a huge mistake on their part. I will respond with EXTREME prejudice.
Barron lost big time. So people should stop getting too hysterical and be happy about that. The Democrats are a big enough problem without their fringes getting more deeply entrenched, and no conservative should wish them to have Barron on board. Meanwhile, this election is another victory for Scott Walker, in a way. The death knell is sounding for public employee unions and that in my view is a good thing.
Barron may have lost “big time” but what he stands for is STILL in the black hearts of all too many black people, which is why they vote Democ-rat. I’m sure that if one examines the returns in the black dominated election districts one will be able to see that Barron ran more strongly in them than in the district as a whole. Survey after survey of black people shows that they are more anti-Semitic than white people and far more than white Republicans, and that’s the bottom line!
For individuals such as my personal, working and living overseas along with small get in touch with to the world except for the internet, your internet site is gold for all of us, we can keep updated and stick to the information by way of your excellent weblog, continue the great work as well as tell me basically can do anything for you!