Trump is a William McKinley Protectionist, Not a Bernie Sanders Populist

This post was written by Bill Scher for the daily Progressive Breakfast newsletter of the Campaign for America’s Future [http://ourfuture.org/], which has become a driving force behind the New Populist Movement. The group’s report, Organizing to Take Back America: The New Populist Movement, is available at: http://y.ourfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/New-Populist-Movement-Organizing.pdf. Prepared by Roger Hickey, the co-director of the Campaign…

The Shared Discontent of the Working Class and Recent College Graduates

Writing for the World Socialist, Patrick Martin reports the findings not only of UC-Berkeley economist Emmanuel Saez report on recent income growth for the Washington Center for Equitable Growth, but also a report from the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce: “A second report issued this week, by the Georgetown University Center…

Trickle-Down Economics in a Half-Decent Economy

Writing for the Washington Post’s Wonkbook blog, Jim Tankersley reports some good news for the American middle class, but it is wrapped inside some continuing bad news about growing income inequality: “The vast majority of American workers are finally seeing their incomes rise from the depths of the Great Recession, a new analysis from…

Berkeley Faculty Demands New Probe of Controversial Coach

BY HANK REICHMAN A series of highly publicized sexual harassment scandals is not the only embarrassment facing the University of California at Berkeley. The university’s athletic program is also in the spotlight for abuse. A report yesterday by the San Francisco Chronicle revealed that a 2014 inquiry clearing coaches and trainers of employing abusive and…

Happy Canada Day!

If you are not especially familiar with this holiday, it’s not entirely your fault. Canadians themselves were very slow to embrace it. The following is a succinct history provided by Mental Floss: “Happy Canada Day! On July 1, 1867, the nation was officially born when the Constitution Act joined three provinces into one country:…

Mismanagement and No Meaningful Oversight [Item 3]

In the initial item in this series, I mentioned that my statement to the Wright State Board of Trustees was preceded by two open letters to the bargaining unit faculty represented by our AAUP chapter at Wright State, letters which were then also posted to the faculty and staff listserves and to our social…

Global Survey of Academic Freedom Issues in 2015 [Post 9 of a Series]

New Zealand In New Zealand, Jarrod Gilbert, a sociologist at the University of Canterbury, claimed that he was “being muzzled by the police” (Bootham). Gilbert said police asked researchers “to sign contracts when they released data, and a standard clause gave them the right to veto any findings being published” and that “he had been…

“Right-to-Work” Bill Introduced on SB 5 Anniversary

Five years ago, a tractor trailer carrying 1.3 million signatures on petitions for a referendum on Senate Bill 5 made its way through downtown Columbus, Ohio, to the Ohio Statehouse. Officials at the Statehouse were not sure that the lobby of the building could structurally support the weight of the petitions, adding to the…

WMU-AAUP on Tenure and Shared Governance

In March I reposted from the WMU-AAUP blog comments delivered to the Western Michigan University (WMU) Board of Trustees by WMU-AAUP President and AAUP national Council member Lisa Minnick. Below are comments delivered today, June 29, to the same board by Professor Minnick. They offer a truly eloquent and effective defense of fundamental academic values…

On Sanctions and Governing Boards

BY HANK REICHMAN Yesterday the Chronicle of Higher Education published an article by Peter Schmidt entitled “AAUP Rethinks How It Fights Governing Boards.” In a nutshell, the piece argues that as college and university governing boards, often overseeing multiple state institutions, increasingly overreach and interfere in governance matters best left to faculty and administrators, the…

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