OG commenter/AFT guy Martin on Arne Duncan

from 11/20/2008, back before Obama tapped this bleeping "CEO" for the Education Sec. gig:

As a Chicago Public School teacher, I get very worried when Arne Duncan is mentioned as a possible Secretary of Education. The number of CPS students who have been murdered continues to rise on his watch. The number of neighborhood public schools who are closed (and replaced by charters) continues to rise each year. The only schools in CPS which are not segregrated (mine is 99.7 % African American) are the magnet schools. Working in this system, I see very little the federal government can do to actually help inner city schools (policy-wise anyway, we haven't received money from the state of Illinois to build or maintain school buildings in 6 years. That's for the entire CPS district. So, some infrastructure money might help). If Arne Duncan is put in this post, he offers no real education change.

Praise to Martino for being way out front on Arne Duncan. But heaven help those galldarn teachers' unions! [update, as of 12/16, Wobs tells me some higher-ups say it could be a lot worse. and Ezra Klein has a nice summary post that portrays Duncan as a sort of "Switzerland" between/among the unions and the reformers.]