Of all the political issues dividing left from right one of most viscerally upsetting is the decades-long collusion of liberal politicians with teachers’ unions to deny black kids an escape route from the inner city and a shot at a better life. The implacable efforts to scuttle both voucher programs and charter schools for these kids has all the elements that make it an unforgivable exercise of brute force against the vulnerable.

It injures children. But not just any children; it targets those who are poor and trapped by their life circumstances and hasn’t even the semblance of a credible rationale to justify it. It is unvarnished obeisance to power and money at the expense of the real lives of powerless people.

And it is the epitome of hypocrisy on two levels. First it is a betrayal of every principle these politicians purport to stand for. And a great many of those politicians have the money and connections to enable their children and grandchildren to attend tony private schools and avoid the colossal failure known as the urban public school system to which they condemn thousands of less fortunate kids in their own supposed voter base.

First there was the Opportunity Scholarships voucher program in Washington D.C. which Democratic politicians from Clinton through Obama have tried to close. But the Clinton and Obama kids Biden’s grandkids and numerous Congressional offspring have attended institutions like the elite Friends School just a hop skip and a stabbing away from the DC public schools that rank among the nation’s worst.

Then there’s the ongoing attempt by Eric Holder’s Justice Department to shutter the Louisiana Scholarship Program for supposedly increasing racial segregation. The only two cases cited in support of that claim involved a predominately white school that lost six black students and a majority African-American one that lost five white students totaling less than a 1 percent drop in either school’s racial minority. But more importantly writes Scott Beyer in City Journal

Researchers have found that school-choice programs actually improve integration both nationally and in Louisiana… [In] the Louisiana Scholarship Program… 83% of student transfers away from existing schools have increased diversity in those schools. This means that Louisiana’s poor minorities are overwhelmingly using vouchers to leave public schools where most students already look like them — an outcome sought by desegregationists.

And now this raw power play on the backs of poor kids has come to New York courtesy of Bill de Blasio defender of equine rights but denier of equal rights at least to education and safety. He’s seeking a moratorium on the ability of public school buildings to house charter schools which are parent-run public schools not subject to the usual rules and curricula. How does it look after all when as the New Yorker reported “Last year 64 percent of Harlem [Success Academy]’s third-graders passed the state English exam and 88 percent passed the state math exam. At P.S. 123… which is located in the same school building… only 18 percent of students passed the English test and only 5 percent passed the math test”?

Mayor de Blasio also unilaterally revoked a promise of space made by his predecessor to three new charters associated with the Harlem Success Academy leaving 700 students without an option for the next school year. As Mona Charen writes in National Review

The Harlem Success Academy is typical. It received 2665 applications for 125 spots last year making it more selective than the Ivy League. When the results are announced a lucky few are jubilant. The faces of the remainder of the children are tear-stained and devastated. Those tears are haunting — unworthy of a great nation….

Not every charter posts such dramatic results and there are a few whose students don’t perform as well as those in comparable public schools but most charters outperform public schools. They feature longer school days higher standards more parental involvement… and an atmosphere of safety and respect. Many of the 53 000 New York students currently on waiting lists for charters just want a safe and quiet atmosphere for learning. As Marcus Winters of the University of Colorado has found far from harming the public schools the presence of a charter school tends to improve the performance of neighboring public schools. Competition works its magic.

But here’s what people don’t understand: They assume that the word “teacher” in a union’s name must mean it cares about what works for students’ success what promotes integration and what improves public schools’ own performance. What a mistake.

BLOCKAGES Happy International Women’s Day! A Times of Israel piece by former Meretz MK Naomi Chazan to mark the day presents a dismal portrait of how “Israel in 2014 still boasts glaring levels of gender inequality on a broad spectrum of measures ranging from income and occupational distribution to power and personal status:”
During the past decade (2004-2013) the situation of women on most scores has improved substantially; at the same time the gap between men and women has remained constant (and in some instances has actually increased). The most marked deterioration exists in the labor market. Although women constitute 47% of the workforce in Israel… [they earn] roughly 66% that of men.…
Male representation far outdistances that of female in high income high status occupations such as engineering and architecture.… In medicine and related fields on the other hand women’s representation has grown in comparison to men but the average income has actually dropped — a sign of the feminization of the profession.…In low status and low income positions women are an absolute majority.
For Chazan the “problem is clear: the Israeli economy is gender-segregated both in terms of occupation and in terms of major fields.…” Strangely though only the gender segregation on a few bus lines in Jerusalem sparks the outrage of the media and politicians.
She writes that the “patterns evident in the economic sphere are replicated in other fields as well.” Female representation in the national legislature ranks at the “lowest end of democratic countries” and the “number of female ministers in the present government four is the highest in Israel’s history and among the smallest in the Western world. At the municipal level the situation is much worse.… In the past ten years the power dimension of the gender gap has actually grown. Similar data have been recorded in many other areas such as health family status and — sadly — violence against women.”
She then notes a fact that has more than a bit of relevance to the issues now roiling Israel in regard to the Torah community: “Put together Israel has not succeeded in reducing the gender gap during the past decade. This is particularly puzzling as the only dimension in which women outscore men is education.… Israel thus emerges as one of the few countries in the world in which educational qualifications are not translated into improved economic prospects and inclusion in decision-making positions.”
Apparently then vocational training and higher education for Torah Jews isn’t quite the magic elixir which if only they’d drink it would solve their economic woes and land them excellent positions tomorrow. Ingrained systemic prejudices which may be at least as great with regard to such Jews as they are towards secular women also play a significant role and perhaps a determinative one in whether jobs and certainly high-ranking ones are to be had.
So what did Israeli feminists do this International Women’s Day to act on Chazan’s disturbing description of the deep and pervasive bias in Israeli society and fight for their sisters’ rights? A JTA story fills us in:
In advance of International Women’s Day on Saturday [Women of the Wall] came to Tel Aviv Friday morning and set up a small stand at Star of David Square.… Then they started asking women if they wanted to put on tallit and tefillin. Most ignored the offer or politely refused but a handful said yes to one or the other repeating the blessing word for word along with a Women-of-the-Wall member.
Wouldn’t you know it? Typical religious zealots these WOWies are with their priorities skewed focused on their fellow Jews’ fulfillment of mitzvos — even egging them on to adopt chumros such as mitzvos they’re exempt from — while ignoring those same Jews’ dire physical needs like employment opportunities and equal pay.