Teachers' Pet Peeves
USA
Today and the Washington Post lead with the rejection of a proposed
merger of the nation's two main teachers' unions by the membership of one of
them, the National Education Association (and this is the off-lead at the
New York Times
and is above the fold at the Los Angeles Times ). The NYT leads with the
retreat of the nation's biggest HMOs from managed care programs for the poor
and the elderly. The LAT goes with the launch in Yugoslavia's troubled
Kosovo province of patrols jointly conducted by U.S., British, and Russian
diplomatic observers. The patrols, explains the paper, were first proposed by
the Russians but have since been embraced by the U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke,
who stresses that the two countries are now working together to defuse the
Kosovo crisis.
Both USAT and the WP explain that had the NEA merged with the
American Federation of Teachers, this would have created the U.S.' largest
labor union. The WP says that the no vote came even though the leaders of both unions favored
the move. The merger idea, says the Post , had gained strength recently
in response to increased attempts to limit teacher rights and to give students
publicly funded vouchers to attend private schools. But, both papers say, the
stumbling block appears to be a fear among NEA members of becoming affiliated
with the AFL-CIO, of which the AFT is a member. The WP mentions an NEA
fear of being aligned too closely with the causes and politics of the AFL-CIO
without specifying what these are. The paper does explain that the NEA tends to
view itself as more non-partisan and more like a professional organization
(like the AMA) than a trade union. USAT says that according to the NEA,
the rivalry between the unions cost $100 million between 1973 and 1992.
According to the NYT , general operating losses and cuts in government
payments have prompted the country's biggest HMOs--such names as Pacificare,
Kaiser Permanente and Blue Cross and Blue Shield--to quit Medicare and Medicaid coverage in many different markets.
The retreat from Medicaid--government-subsidized care for the poor and
disabled--is the more pronounced of the two. Most of the Medicaid withdrawals,
says the Times , have come in the most populous states with large pockets
of urban poverty. With Medicare, it's tended to be rural communities with few
patients, clinics, or doctors. The HMO flight portends, says the Times ,
a return to skimping care for the poor and elderly.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the semiconductor
business--seriously affected by the Asian crisis, a production glut and the
advent of the $1,000 PC--is in a global slump, and that American manufacturers
are certainly taking their share of the hits. U.S. chip companies that have
laid off workers or tipped upcoming bad earnings include, says the paper,
National Semiconductor, Atmel, Cypress Semiconductor and Seeq Technology. Even
Intel has projected a flat second quarter and lower profit margins.
The WP passes along word from a weekend chat show that Kenneth Starr
has decided he will not submit an interim report on his investigation of
President Clinton before Congress recesses for the fall election campaigns. He
will, said an aide, submit a report only if he determines there is substantial
information that crimes have been committed. The aide also opined, reports the
Post , that subpoenaing a sitting president is legally unproblematic, as
is indicting one.
In its editorial advocating that the DOJ and FBI abandon their
current policy against the use of computer encryption technology the feds are
not at least indirectly privy to, the NYT explains President Clinton's
failure to oppose this law enforcement stance thusly: "[S]ince Attorney General
Janet Reno has protected Mr. Clinton from an independent counsel on campaign
finance, the White House is said to be loath to oppose either her or Louis
Freeh, the F.B.I. Director, on this issue." But the reader isn't told who says
this. A recurring theme of the many media post-mortems on the Time/CNN/nerve
gas and Stephen Glass debacles--including of those issued by the
NYT --has been a fervent tsk-tsking directed at unnamed sources. So
shouldn't this apply to the editorial pages too?
