Dearest Melissa Harris-Perry …

It’s me, Betsy, one of your many Twitter followers, a viewer of your program, and a person who was honored to hear you speak at the last Rebuild The Dream Convention. As an Educator, I am grateful for your sharing what is so real for our children. I too wonder how we as a society think that a child whose stomach is empty can possibly problem solve. I feel as if I know you, or at least you speak for me, which brings me to the subject of your Letter to Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Rahm Emanuel, there’s a good reason people are mad at you .

I understand your cynical reference to Rahmbo. I was not surprised that the Time magazine cover 2013, Chicago Bull evoked the sentiment “what you’re full of.” Although, admittedly for me, the comment comes too easily and could easily be dismissed as divisive rather than informative. However, that you saw The New York Times’ less frequent characterization of Rahm as “The Merlin to the President’s King Arthur” as definitive and delicious baffles me. In the another Times article Rahm was deemed “The leading practitioner of the dark arts of the capital.” I think this reference tells the more consistent tale. In the latter essay, the selection of Rahm Emanuel for the position of the White House Chief of Staff was termed a “Faustian bargain.” I believe this speaks to what is seen today in Chicago. Mayor Emanuel makes decisions or offers policies that benefit friends and family. He has little regard for the consequences and how these affect the common folk or the greater good.

During what you saw as Rahm’s deliverance of “special magic” Emanuel, was portrayed as the “provocative and profane White House chief of staff, who “slammed his hand down on the table and shook his head with seething exasperation.” He swore. He tore into staffers. “Emanuel has emerged as the leading foil, the easy and most popular target for missiles flung at the White House from all sides.” Back in what your Letter might suggest were “the good ole days,” the former Speaker of the House, Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi told Rahm to “Cool it.” Might we recall the refrain that I will not repeat here. As an Educator, I choose not to use the stu*** word. Nor would I wish to place the “F” word on a printed page, especially when referring to people, Progressives or not.

I am not one who grades based on what I might see in a “student’s” permanent record. Nor would I presume to judge Mayor Emanuel based on his past. I believe anyone, be they in my classroom or in a high office must be assessed on their growth, their progress, and their portfolio of work. We all have stumbled once or twice. I acknowledge that. My question is when the past is visible and viable in the present, what might we think?

Rahm Emanuel has a history. Decades of doings seem to suggest that the Mayor is more interested in a “win” than he is in the people. When I think of Mayor Emanuel being titled “The Chicago Bull” I observe as you do, in respect to the Chicago Schools the term is apt. Rahm Emanuel is the Schoolyard Bully.

Immediately upon taking office, Rahm cut the purse strings to the Chicago Public Schools. Longer bus rides for students and dirtier schools, no matter. Mayor Emanuel’s children do not attend the public institutions. He steals lunch money, robbing the Teachers and Tax Payers to pay for his new sports arena. Most noteworthy is his recent decision to close community schools. Parents are well-aware that closures will further erode troubled neighborhoods. Moms and Dads in these neighborhoods are distraught. Not only will their children be forced to attend schools that have not performed as well as their current learning centers do, students may have to cross gang lines to sit in overcrowded classrooms Few can ignore that the schools slated for closure are all elementary schools and are in overwhelmingly Black, Brown low-income neighborhoods.

Professor Harris-Perry, I reflect on your own thoughts on bullies and bullying. From my many experiences of you it would seem that you, as I, think bullying is a problem. You spoke of the bullying the Steubenville survivor experienced. Your program took time to give a bullied Anchorwoman a platform. Even your daughter Parker addressed the issue when on your program, she interviewed Gabrielle Douglas an Olympic athlete. Had her peers bullied her, you and Parker asked thoughtfully. It seems this has been a topic of discussion in your family. Bullying is a concern especially in Chicago classrooms today.

Knowing this I ponder. Why might it be that Rahm’s bullying ways are fine when these serve a Progressive or a President’s interest? Why might it be that only when Mayor Emanuel bullies parents and Teachers and threatens school do you call his actions into question?

As Teachers we each know the danger of having favorites or assessing one child more favorably than we might another. Thus, I ask, can we applaud a bully who serves us well and when he does not we scorn him?

I agree, “The people of Chicago need a mayor who is a fighter” a fighter for fairness and social justice. A Mayor who fights the people, rather than for them, is I think not a Mayor at all. In the Windy City, I would call him a “Chicago Bull

[y].”

Sincerely, 
Betsy

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