If you want to know how much disdain progressive legislators in Sacramento have for the people they represent, look no further than Assemblyman Berman

April 22, 2022
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Dear John,

If you want to know how much disdain progressive legislators in Sacramento have for the people they represent, look no further than Assemblyman Marc Berman (D-Menlo Park) who dropped the F-bomb on citizens speaking out against AB 2098 during a public hearing this week.

That bill would allow state medical boards to discipline doctors for “unprofessional conduct” if they say anything related to COVID-19 “contradicted by contemporary scientific consensus."

Berman, who is Chair of the Assembly Business and Professions Committee, snapped at members of the public who were testifying in opposition to the bill, ironically displaying an extreme lapse of professional behavior for a legislator.

“Hey! Check it out! I need everybody to follow the f***ing rules!,” Berman yelled ([link removed]) , through his mask no less.

The assemblyman from Silicon Valley apparently didn’t expect much public resistance to the bill. Rather than just state their name, affiliation and whether they were for or against the bill, which is routine, the “people” were giving Berman an earful.

“They’re saying the quiet parts out loud,” said ([link removed]) Lance Christensen, CPC’s Vice President of Education Policy and Government Affairs. “Every voter should understand the visceral contempt the majority party has for them. It’s not just that they want to eliminate free speech, but they don’t want the public to speak out against these prohibitions. 1984 is their guidebook.”

Civil rights attorney Laura Powell, who testified against AB 2098, eviscerated ([link removed]) the bill as unconstitutional on its face.

“Speaking personally as a lifelong Democrat and a civil rights attorney, I am dismayed that Democrats are bringing forward bills that undermine civil liberties,” Powell said. She added that the purpose of AB 2098 “is to restrict speech based on its content. And our Constitution simply doesn’t allow that broad infringement on speech.…”

Powell went on to explain that the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that regulating the content of professional speech poses the inherent risk that the government seeks to "suppress unpopular ideas or information.”

Despite Berman’s hostility toward free speech in a hearing over free speech, the bill passed the committee on a 12-5 vote.

To contact your local legislator regarding AB 2098, you can use CPC’s Take Action portal here ([link removed]) .
Take Action on AB 2098 Now ([link removed])
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California Teachers Union honors teacher fired for “racism”

The California Teachers Association just gave a Human Rights Award to a teacher who was fired not long ago for teaching a “Mexican supremacist agenda” and “racism.”

The award is supposed to go to “especially notable” teachers who promote “inclusion, teaching truth, and empowering students and peers” and for their “efforts to unify.” But according to the Whittier Daily News, Guadalupe Carrasco Cardona, a United Teachers Los Angeles member who now serves as the intervention coordinator at Roybal Learning Center in downtown Los Angeles, was fired from teaching ethnic studies at Ellen Ochoa Prep Academy in Pico Rivera.

The reason cited for her 2018 termination: among other things, her ties to Union del Barrio, a group of teachers focused on the reunification of Mexico to land it inherited from Spain.

Union del Barrio describes itself as “‘militant’ and ‘socialist,’ seeking ‘to advance the liberation and reunification of Mexico under a revolutionary government, immediately accountable to the people,’” wrote the Whittier Daily News.

Once made public, Cardona’s curriculum drew criticism from the school district’s ethnic studies facilitator. The official noted that “ethnic studies is about celebrating people, culture and humanity, not about pushing an agenda or raising any one ethnicity over another. That, my dear friends of the community, is called racism — not ethnic studies.”

What exactly was Cardona’s underlying philosophy of ethnic studies? On her personal website, she moderates one panel titled: “Beautiful White Co-Conspiratorship,” where she discusses the difference between “white allies” and “white co-conspirators,” which is essentially the difference between having a Black Lives Matter Facebook profile picture and having a “long-term, lifetime commitment to changing the social structures of racism and inequality,” as one guest put it.

The urging of White co-conspiratorship is in the same vein as anti-racism philosophy and critical race theory. Of course, the national narrative is that CRT is not being taught in schools. But in a presentation titled “Critical Race Theory: What It Is and What It Isn’t,” Cardona was introduced as about to “share with you how she taps Critical Race Theory without naming it in her classroom.”

While the CTA applauds divisive ethnic studies like that which Cardona teaches, a majority of California public school students can’t read or engage in science at grade level, while math competency is, as the liberal EdSource put it, a “five-alarm fire.” It’s no surprise that the worst results occur among the state’s poorest kids.

Critical Race theorists tell us that we must denounce as “racist” any institution that produces unequal outcomes for poor and minority communities. By that measure, California’s public education system is racist. It’s time we call out the people running this failed system, people like Guadalupe Carrasco Cardona and the California Teachers Association that promotes them.

Read the full article ([link removed]) by CPC president Will Swaim in the Orange County Register.
Support the California Policy Center. Donate Today. ([link removed])

Quote of the Week

“At its heart, wokeness is divisive, exclusionary and hateful. It basically gives mean people a shield to be cruel, armored in false virtue.” — Elon Musk ([link removed])

More from CPC
* National Review’s Radio Free California Podcast: Non-Virtue Signaling ([link removed]) — CPC president Will Swaim and CPC board member David Bahnsen discuss the media’s push to paint Kamala Harris as a Wordle-loving, New York Times Crossword enthusiast after being called out for her latest round of vacuous speeches. Plus, why some are speculating Gov. Newsom might have himself in mind for Dianne Feinstein’s seat in the not-too-distant future.
* California union honors teacher fired for ‘racism’ ([link removed]) : CPC president Will Swaim shines a light on the California Teachers Association bestowing its Human Rights Award to a teacher who was fired for teaching racism.
* TK is not okay ([link removed]) : Larry Sand, president of California Teachers Empowerment Network, explains that teachers unions are salivating over the thousands of new dues-paying teachers needed to staff California’s universal TK, but studies show that pre-K doesn’t help young kids.

CPC and allies in the news
* School choice backers fail to put measure on California’s November ballot ([link removed])
* Assemblyman Berman drops F-bomb at public during hearing ([link removed])

Classroom headlines
* The fight for school choice must go on ([link removed])
* More pandemic fallout: The chronically absent student ([link removed])
* California’s rural far north grapples with declining enrollment ([link removed])

Union news
* Calpers plans to vote to replace Warren Buffett as Berkshire Hathaway’s Chairman ([link removed])

Other things we’re reading
* Kraken shuts down HQ because 'San Francisco is not safe' ([link removed])
* Elon Musk blames Netflix nosedive on 'woke mind virus' and 'wokeness' ([link removed])
* Cut cost of living, not more government checks ([link removed])


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