Report highlights the disastrous impact of the pandemic on public education in California
The Biden administration is deepening the efforts begun under Trump to use the COVID-19 pandemic to restructure class relations, including the further dismantling of the public education system. A report published last month by the Learning Policy Institute (LPI) titled, “California Teachers and COVID-19: How the Pandemic Is Impacting the Teacher Workforce,” highlights the acute crisis of K–12 public education in California, the most populous state in the US.
Parents and students line up to pick up school materials outside the Aurora Elementary School in Los Angeles [Credit: AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes]
Friday is the 18th anniversary of George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq. That misadventure proved to be a humanitarian catastrophe. As well as Washington’s worst geopolitical blunder in four decades. Tragically, America’s involvement is the misbegotten gift that keeps on giving and killing.
President Joe Biden should bring America’s troops home from Iraq. Now.
In 2000 candidate Bush advocated a “humble” foreign policy. However, less than eight months after he took office the 9/11 attacks transformed the U.S. and its role in the world. Two decades later Americans are still paying the price for Bush’s bloody blunders.
Shirk is chair of the Department of Political Science and International Relations at the University of San Diego. He lives in University Heights.
At the start of the new year, it is worth reflecting on the series of global crises that have shaped the early 21st century. The first came when 19 hijackers triggered a U.S.-led “war on terrorism” that resulted in the most dramatic redefinition of U.S. priorities and policies in decades. Prior to 9/11, it would have been unimaginable to think that the United States was on the verge of our ongoing, decades-long Mideast conflict. According to the Watson Institute at Brown University, the continuing turmoil in Afghanistan, Iraq and surrounding countries has cost over $6.4 trillion and killed more than 15,000 U.S. service members and contractors, 100,000 allied troops and 335,000 civilians. The conflict also has displaced an estimated 37 million people, the second highest rate of displaced persons since 1900, contributing to a hostile b