Dear Commons Community,

Reuters is reporting that Pope Francis met with Bernie Sanders in the Vatican this morning and that the two discussed the need for morality in the world economy before the pontiff left for a visit to the Greek island of Lesbos.  As reported by Reuters:

“Columbia University Professor Jeffrey Sachs told Reuters that the meeting took place in the Vatican guesthouse where the pope lives and where Sanders had spent the night after addressing a Vatican conference on social justice.

The Vatican had said that a meeting between the two was not planned, and Sanders said he did not expect to meet the pope during his trip.

“He is a beautiful man,” Sanders said in an interview with ABC News after the meeting. “I am not a Catholic, but there is a radiance that comes from him.”

Sachs said Sanders, who was accompanied by his wife, spoke with the pope for about five minutes. Sachs, his wife, and Bishop Marcelo Sanchez Sorondo, head of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, were also in the room.

“I just conveyed to him my admiration for the extraordinary work he is doing raising some of the most important issues facing our planet and the billions of people on the planet and injecting the need for morality in the global economy,” Sanders told ABC.”

Sanders has campaigned on a promise to rein in corporate power and level the economic playing field for working and lower-income Americans whom he says have been left behind, a message echoing that of the pope.

When Sachs, who has advised the United Nations on climate change, was asked if the meeting could be interpreted as political, he said: “This was absolutely not political. This is a senator who for decades has been speaking about the moral economy.”

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Anyone watching the Democratic Party Presidential Candidate debate on Thursday between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders were treated to a battle between two passionate campaigners.  Trying to determine who won this debate was difficult. I thought it was a draw.  However, I also thought that Hillary seriously stumbled on the moderator’s question about her revealing the transcripts of her Goldman Sachs’ speeches for which she was paid $675,000. Bernie Sanders has brought up this issue many times during this campaign and Hillary fails every time to give a good reason for not releasing the transcripts.  She did it again on Thursday alluding to the need for all the candidates to release transcripts of their speeches which I don’t think the audience either in the auditorium or watching CNN understood.   She actually was referring to the need for Sanders’ to reveal his tax returns.  Regardless, Hillary appeared less than forthright and the Goldman Sachs transcript issue continues to undermine her credibility.  The New York Review of Books has an extensive article commenting on this.   Here is an excerpt:

“Why is Hillary Clinton refusing to release the transcripts of her Goldman Sachs speeches? After losing eight of the last nine contests to Bernie Sanders, Clinton is trying to reassure voters that she is a reform-minded politician who can be trusted. Yet she has repeatedly refused requests to make public the texts of the three speeches she gave to executives of the Goldman Sachs investment bank in the fall of 2013, for which she was paid a total of $675,000. First she said she would look into it; then she said that she would release the transcripts only if all the other presidential candidates of both parties released the paid speeches they had given. What does she have to hide?

In a February 25 editorial, The New York Times argued that Clinton’s “stonewalling” on the Goldman transcripts “plays into the hands of those who say she’s not trustworthy and makes her own rules” and “most important, is damaging her credibility among Democrats who are begging her to show them that she’d run an accountable and transparent White House.” But the Times editorial did not get to the heart of the matter. The larger question is, Why was she giving these speeches at all—and accepting such hefty payments for them—given Goldman Sachs’s record during the Great Recession of 2007–2008?

Set alongside such stricken competitors as Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns, Goldman and its CEO Lloyd Blankfein are the great survivors of the crash: they actually came out ahead in their own derivatives trading during those years. Goldman and Blankfein’s admirers, including many in the financial media, have for the most part ignored the bank’s activities during the crash, despite multiple investigations and billion-dollar penalties against Goldman for its aggressive and deceptive marketing of financial derivatives. This has included a $5 billion settlement levied against the bank this January. How does this fit with Clinton’s self-portrayal as an opponent of the big banks and their excesses who is committed to their reform? 

On the stump, Clinton’s criticisms of Wall Street can sound as radical as Bernie Sanders’s or Senator Elizabeth Warren’s. During a CNN debate with Bernie Sanders in March, Clinton said that she was in agreement that, “no bank is too big to fail, and no executive too powerful to jail” and that she has “the tools” to do it. In its earlier endorsement of Clinton in January, The New York Times itself highlighted her “proposals for financial reform” and her support for “controls on high-frequency trading and stronger curbs on bank speculation in derivatives,” which it cited as evidence that “she supports changes that the country badly needs.”  

The article goes on to raise many other questions about the Goldman Sachs issue.  I don’t think it will matter much to her in winning the Democratic Party’s nomination but it will be a liability during the general election when she goes up against the Republican opposition whether it be Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, or anyone else.

Tony

Dear Commons Community, 

A California appeals court ruled on Thursday that the state’s job protections for teachers do not deprive poor and minority students of a quality education or violate their civil rights — reversing a landmark lower court decision (Vergara v. California)  that had overturned the state’s teacher tenure rules.The decision stymies a national movement, financed by several corporate-affiliated philanthropies, that challenged tenure  protections for teachers.  As reported in the New York Times:

“Two years ago, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge struck down five California statutes connected with the awarding of tenure, as well as rules that govern the use of seniority to determine layoffs during budget crises. Ruling in a case brought by a group of nine high school students — four of whom have since graduated — the judge, Rolf Treu, said the statutes violated the students’ rights to an equal education under the California Constitution because they allowed poorly performing teachers to remain indefinitely in classrooms.

In reversing the trial court’s decision, a panel of three appeals judges wrote that if ineffective teachers are in place, the statutes themselves were not to blame because it was school and district administrators who “determine where teachers within a district are assigned to teach.” The laws themselves, the judges wrote, do not instruct districts in where to place teachers.

“The court’s job is merely to determine whether the statutes are constitutional,” the panel wrote, “not if they are ‘a good idea.’”

Teachers unions immediately welcomed the ruling.

“I consider this a victory for teachers and a victory for students,” said Eric C. Heins, the president of the California Teachers Association. “What these statutes have done is, one, they bring stability to the system, and for many students they bring stability to their schools and to the teachers in their schools. For many kids, the school environment is the only stable environment that many of them have.”

Tom Torlakson, the state superintendent of public instruction in California, said the appeals court decision would allow districts to recruit and train teachers at a time of shortages in the state.

“All of our students deserve great teachers,” Mr. Torlakson said in a statement. “Teachers are not the problem in our schools — they are the answer to helping students succeed on the pathway to 21st century college and careers.”

The plaintiffs in the case, known as Vergara v. California, said they would appeal to the state Supreme Court.”

A good day for teachers and students in California!

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Yesterday, doctors reported that they had developed and tested microchip technology that allowed a paralyzed man to regain control over his right hand and fingers.  The technology transmits the individual’s thoughts directly to his hand muscles and bypasses his previous spinal injury. The report, published by the journal Nature, is the first account of limb reanimation, as it is known, in a person with quadriplegia.  As reported:

“Five years ago, a college freshman named Ian Burkhart dived into a wave at a beach off the Outer Banks in North Carolina and, in a freakish accident, broke his neck on the sandy floor, permanently losing the feeling in his hands and legs…

Doctors implanted a chip in Mr. Burkhart’s brain two years ago. Seated in a lab with the implant connected through a computer to a sleeve on his arm, he was able to learn by repetition and arduous practice to focus his thoughts to make his hand pour from a bottle, and to pick up a straw and stir. He was even able to play a guitar video game.

“It’s crazy because I had lost sensation in my hands, and I had to watch my hand to know whether I was squeezing or extending the fingers,” Mr. Burkhart, a business student who lives in Dublin, Ohio, said in an interview. His injury had left him paralyzed from the chest down; he still has some movement in his shoulders and biceps.

The new technology is not a cure for paralysis. Mr. Burkhart could use his hand only when connected to computers in the lab, and the researchers said there was much work to do before the system could provide significant mobile independence.

But the field of neural engineering is advancing quickly. Using brain implants, scientists can decode brain signals and match them to specific movements. Previously, people have learned to guide a cursor on a screen with their thoughts, monkeys have learned to skillfully use a robotic arm through neural signals and scientists have taught monkeys who were partly paralyzed to use an arm with a bypass system. This new study demonstrates that the bypass approach can restore critical skills to limbs no longer directly connected to the brain.

“It’s quite impressive what they’ve shown, this sequence of movements to pick up and pour something and pick up a stirrer — it’s an advance toward a goal we all have, to provide as much independence to these patients as possible,” said Rajesh Rao, the director of the Center for Sensorimotor Neural Engineering at the University of Washington.”

Quite a feat.  Over the next ten or so years, we will see many more man-machine technologies that improve, extend, or enable brain function.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

The Republican and Democratic nominees are all over New York City drumming up support for the upcoming primary next Tuesday.  The candidates can be seen walking in neighborhoods acting like New Yorkers to show their affinity for the Big Apple and its people.  John Kasich had lunch at an Italian deli on Arthur Avenue scoffing down the pasta.  Ted Cruz was at a matzo making bakery in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn learning how to roll dough.  Unfortunately, during an interview, Bernie Sanders, failed the ultimate New Yorker test.  As reported in The Huffington Post:

“In truth, what makes us New Yorkers is that “We know how to ride the subway”.

Bernie Sanders, on the other hand, doesn’t anymore. In a recent sit-down interview, the Brooklyn-raised politician was asked a simple question: “How do you ride the subway today?”

“What do you mean, ‘How do you ride the subway?’” he responded.

“How do you get on the subway today?”  

“You get a token and you get in.”

“Wrong.”

…As any real New Yorker knows, the way you get on the subway in 2016 is this: You fork over a percentage of your paycheck in return for a small MetroCard. You then slide that card through the turnstile.  That is how it goes now, day in and day out, ride after ride … And if you don’t know that, then you aren’t a New Yorker, even if you were once; it’s really as simple as that. 

Up until 2003, the beloved token of yesteryear would have been an acceptable-enough answer. But it’s not anymore. New York changes, and if you can’t keep up, you’re out.”

Knowing how to ride the subway is an important New York rite of passage.  As youngsters, we were cautioned about riding the subway by our parents but at some point, they allowed us to ride it by ourselves.  We have not stopped riding them since.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

While estimates are stilling being calculated, it seems that the opt-out movement in New York State is alive and well again this year even though a number of reforms and revisions to the tests were made for the 2016 cycle. One estimate has it that approximately 15 percent of all eligible students opted out of one or more standardized tests during the recent April testing period.  The NYS Allies for Public Education are conducting a school district by school district tally of the number and percentage of students opting out of standardized tests.  According to their estimates as of April 11, 2016:

“With 51.4% of districts reporting, 171,808 students refused statewide for an estimated 15.2% of eligible students. An estimated 326 districts have exceeded 5% refusals.”

These are pretty high numbers.  NYS education policy makers have a problem on their hands and will have to do a lot more to address parents’ concerns about the standardized testing policies promulgated for the past dozen or so years by the New York State Board of Regents.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

The New York Times editorial this morning calls on Governor Andrew Cuomo to stop playing politics with the City University of New York (CUNY).  It takes special aim at his proposal to combine the administrative structures of the State University of New York (SUNY) and CUNY.  This issue has reared its head several times since the creation of CUNY in 1961.  The editorial quotes colleagues Stephen Brier and Michael Fabricant regarding proposals from Governor Nelson Rockefeller in the 1960s.  There was also another proposal during the height of the New York City fiscal crisis in the 1970s that called for the creation of a unified Empire State University that never gained traction.  The editorial correctly comments that:

“If Mr. Cuomo has concerns about CUNY’s administrative costs, he has all the power he needs to address that. State law gives him the right to appoint 10 of City University’s 17 board members, including its chairman. Only last week did he nominate a new chairman, even though the current chairman’s term expired in 2013. In February, another trustee whose term expired last summer resigned his post, criticizing the governor for being too slow in nominating a successor.

Cutting administrative costs is one thing. But threatening the special character of the city system and its 550,000 students is quite another.”

The full editorial appears below.

Tony

==============================

New York Times 

Don’t Dilute CUNY’s Urban Mission

By THE EDITORIAL BOARD

APRIL 11, 2016

The New York State Legislature rebuffed Gov. Andrew Cuomo last year when he proposed that the State University of New York, which has 64 campuses, and the City University of New York, which has 24, develop a plan for combining their administrative functions.

Legislators correctly saw this as a stealth plan for merging two systems with dissimilar cultures and different educational missions and, in the process, undermining City University’s historic commitment to the urban poor.

Nevertheless, the merger idea reappeared this year in news reports and again when Mr. Cuomo, complaining of administrative bloat at City University, tried to cut its state allotment by nearly half a billion dollars.

The merger idea has been around for quite a while. As the City University professors Stephen Brier and Michael Fabricant explain in their forthcoming history, “Austerity Blues: Fighting for the Soul of Public Higher Education,” Nelson Rockefeller, who essentially built the state’s public higher education system, wanted to absorb New York City’s colleges into the state university system at the beginning of the 1960s.

The proposal met fatal resistance from alumni, business leaders and education officials who had great affection for the city system. They understood the city to be different from the rest of the state, in civic and cultural terms, and considered free tuition essential to much of its population. (Mr. Rockefeller had also proposed charging tuition in exchange for state aid.) The merger idea was dropped, and the city system — renamed The City University of New York in 1961 — remained independent, even though it would receive state support.

Every weekday, get thought-provoking commentary from Op-Ed columnists, The Times editorial board and contributing writers from around the world.

The state Legislature took the same view. It gave the state formal control of the city system while recognizing fundamental differences: on the one hand, a loose federation of 64 campuses scattered about the state; on the other, a city system described in state law as an engine of advancement for the poor and disadvantaged and having “the strongest commitment to the special needs of an urban constituency.”

Beginning with programs in high school and continuing through community colleges, the CUNY system aims to develop upwardly mobile students who will eventually graduate from a four-year college. The city’s effort to improve community college graduation rates among disadvantaged young people and move them on to four-year colleges has been praised by President Obama and is widely seen as a model for the nation.

If Mr. Cuomo has concerns about CUNY’s administrative costs, he has all the power he needs to address that. State law gives him the right to appoint 10 of City University’s 17 board members, including its chairman. Only last week did he nominate a new chairman, even though the current chairman’s term expired in 2013. In February, another trustee whose term expired last summer resigned his post, criticizing the governor for being too slow in nominating a successor.

Cutting administrative costs is one thing. But threatening the special character of the city system and its 550,000 students is quite another.

Dear Commons Community,

Elaine and I are back in New York after a week in Italy meeting with colleagues and spending time with my daughter Dawn Marie’s family who live in Seattle, and joined us for a brief Roman holiday.  We are especially happy that our flight was not cancelled because yesterday there was a one-day air-traffic controllers strike at major Italian airports.  However, the unions (thank you UNICA, ANPCAT and Fata Cisal) agreed to allow most international flights to arrive and depart.

While in Italy, we had several serious conversations about American politics and the presidential primaries with local associates as well as fellow tourists.  The people with whom we spoke were fairly well-informed about American issues although they did not quite understand the popularity of a Donald Trump. Terrorism was also on people’s minds.  A couple from Belgium who were sitting at a table next to us enjoying a wine on Thursday night commented about the attack on Brussels. They expressed the same resolve as most New Yorkers did after 9/11 not to let the terrorists win.

The grand kids, Michael (11) and Ali (9) had a good time seeing the sites.  They also enjoyed the nights in the Piazza della Rotunda where our hotel was located.  They ran around as if they owned the place and with other young children would launch these small, thin-plastic, blue-lit toy helicopters (see images below) which you can buy from local street vendors in Rome for a couple of euros.  They are about five inches long and when launched about 40-50 feet in the air with a rubber band flutter about gently while emitting a flickering blue light in the night sky.

A good week of conversation, sightseeing, and most important being with family.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

We spent the afternoon yesterday visiting St. Peter’s Basilica and the nearby Castel Sant’Angelo.

St. Peter’s Basilica is generally regarded as one of the holiest Catholic shrines and one of the  great churches in Christendom. There has been a church on this site since the time of the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great. Construction of the present basilica, replacing the Old St. Peter’s Basilica of the 4th century AD, began in 1506 and was completed in 1626.  Within its walls are burial places for a number of popes including St. Peter and John Paul II.  The sculptures and paintings both inside and outside in St. Peter’s Square are stunning.  The largest line of visitors by far is for Michaelangelo’s  Pieta.

Castel Sant’Angelo was built originally in 123 AD by Emperor Hadrian as a mausoleum for himself and his family. During the Middle Ages, its function changed totally: the enormous mausoleum was transformed into a fortress. Its strategic position on the Tiber River controlling northern access to Rome made it a fundamentally important defensive bastion during the time of the barbarian invasions.   

Tony

Colonnade in St. Peter’s Square

Main Altar

Castel Sant’Angelo

Catapult

View of the Tiber River from Castel Sant’Angelo

Dear Commons Community,

Yesterday the family went to see Il Vittoriano and the Colloseum.  Il Vittoriano is the massive (some would say “bombastic”) monument in honor of King Victor Emanuel II, who unified Italy.  It is one of the highest structures in Rome and an elevator takes a visitor to the top for fantastic views of the city. We also walked by the Imperial Fora, which contain ruins of a series of ancient public squares and meeting places.  Unfortunately a major road built by Benito Mussolini in the 1930s cuts right through the center of the Fora.  The day trip culminated with a visit to the Colosseum which was surely a favorite with the grand kids.

Tony

Il Vittoriano

Imperial Fora

Colosseum

Colosseum