The AP reports that Obama Education Secretary Arne Duncan is “neutral” about the Chicago Treachers Strike. But he’s only neutral if one believes he has no prior experience in the management of education. He’s only neutral if you gloss over and omit his history as “former chief of Chicago’s public school system” and then leave it there. Catalyst Chicago, an independent news magazine created in 1990 to document, analyze and support school-improvement efforts in the Chicago Public Schools, covered Duncan’s record as CEO of Chicago’s public schools, and that history makes clear he’s far from “neutral.”

To the extent that there are problems, it appears clear that they have to do with resources. The schools in the lowest-income areas have no air conditioning. Roofs leak. The cafeteria is full of roaches. Mold sits in the ventilation systems. Kids don’t get textbooks for weeks. Administrators pack classrooms with 40 and 50 students at a time. These are pretty obvious and solvable problems. Worse, there’s apparently money in the system to make these repairs, in the form of TIFs or Tax Increment Financing, that have been re-routed to pet projects, including a Hyatt Hotel and the Chicago Board of Trade.

Vice Presidential nominee Paul Ryan has twisted the knife just a bit more in an attempt to draw out President Obama on the Chicago Teachers Union strike, now entering its second day. He told a fundraiser in Portland, OR yesterday that he endorsed the position in the strike of the former chief of staff of Barack Obama:

I ask anyone who does remotely care about the kids we teach and learn from and triumph and cheer and cry and grow with, to stand with us and fight for a better future for our kids.

See you on the picket line, my friend.

That’s what this fight is about: the larger unified movement against workers. It also encompasses more than just wages, even though new rules in Chicago dictate that the contract negotiations are limited to that. This is about the education reform debate, and it represents the first time that a teachers union has really fought back against these largely untested and unproven ideas about how to turn around the so-called “failing” public school system. (Note: the public school system, and more broadly the US education system, isn’t failing). And so before we concern-troll that long strikes could hurt future economic opportunity for students, we have to address whether education policy that allows for looting by business interests through moving schools into the for-profit sector, or the end of collective bargaining as a meaningful check on management keeping all profits for themselves, hurts that economic opportunity to a much greater degree.

The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) commenced their first education strike in a generation last ight, with 29,000 teachers and school personnel walking out and taking up picket lines.

If you had, at the time, asked a participant in the Stonewall Riots—whose occurrence annual LGBTQ Pride parades commemorate—whether they envisioned a future where their cause was vocally supported by JP Morgan, Doritos, and the President of the United States, chances are your answer would have been a swift and sure “No.” But, in 21st century America…?

The Chicago City Council today voted by an overwhelming margin of 43-3 in favor of a new ordinance to reduce the penalty for simple marijuana possession. The ordinance makes it possible for police to issue only a citation punishable with a simple fine and/or community service. The policy change is expected to go into effect in the very near future.

When President Barack Obama was elected president, he and his administration planned to overhaul Bush detention policies and repair America’s image in the world. This specifically included ending torture, ensuring terror suspects were given due process and no longer indefinitely detained, and closing the infamous Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba.

Recently President Obama and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel each did the right thing on different issues. They adopted two policies that I support, because I believe they are better for society and advance progressive goals.