The United Teachers Los Angeles is the collective bargaining agent for teachers in the LAUSD. As a bonus, they have a foreign policy.

The LA Daily News reported this week that “On Oct. 14, the L.A. chapter of the Movement for a Democratic Society was to hold a rally and Israeli boycott, divestment and sanctions planning meeting at UTLA headquarters, hosted by UTLA’s Human Rights Committee.”

Oops. “SoCal MDS” — a modern incarnation of 60’s radical group SDS — has posted that “… the war against Arab people being waged by Anglo-American-Israeli imperialism in Palestine, Lebanon, Gaza, the Occupied Territories and Iraq is … a brutal war of terror directed against all Arabs (Christians, Sunnis, Shias) to kill their hopes and dreams for liberation, freedom and unity … We support a new internationalism founded on unity and solidarity with popular, mass-based resistance movements such as Hamas and Hizbullah struggling against those who oppress us all.”

The Jewish Journal (yes, they have a dog in this hunt, but that doesn’t make them wrong) wrote that the meeting was “officially endorsed by the Los Angeles Palestine Labor Solidarity Committee and by Cafe Intifada.”

When word got out, UTLA yanked the rug out from under the committee. UTLA’s President, A. J. Duffy, said in a message on their website — since removed, but we have the cached copy above — that “this committee meeting does not in any way imply UTLA support” and “I do not schedule these events nor are they organized by UTLA.” The chair of the Human Rights Committee wrote the LA Times that it was the MDS that claimed in a flyer that UTLA was co-hosting the rally and supporting a boycott against Israel. They did this, he said, without UTLA approval. Their contribution, he said, was solely meeting space.

But is it any wonder that the union got itself into trouble here? After all, the UTLA Human Rights Committee website says that it “… advocates that UTLA and its state and national affiliates work for public policies that reduce violence, promote diversity, increase awareness of basic human and civil rights, support the rights of all workers, protect the environment, oppose the privatization and militarization of schools and society, reduce the military budget, and increase funding for education and other social programs.” You can see why they wouldn’t find MDS objectionable.

While Duffy says “This committee meeting does not in any way imply UTLA support,” he’s wrong. It’s in the UTLA offices and facilitated by a UTLA committee. That is support.

Here’s a modest proposal: how about the union focus on its goal of maximizing the welfare of its members, and stay out of everything else? If it doesn’t have to do with pay, benefits, or job security, it doesn’t get any help from the union.

After all, it’s all about the kids, isn’t it? And worker rights, and the military budget, and funding social programs …

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The Movement for a Democratic Society is a sister organization to the 60’s-inspired radical group Students for a Democratic Society. Policies of the self-described radical group seem to include branding President Bush as a war criminal and hating Wal-Mart.

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This entry was posted on Friday, October 13th, 2006 at 5:56 am by A Senior Administration Official and is filed under (Un)education, Loons. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.