The American Spectator

Pete| 11.5.10 @ 7:35AM

If the blacks ever wake up to the damage the teachers unions are doing to their children, the Democratic Party will be sunk for then it will have to chose between millions of votes (blacks) or millions of dollars from the teachers unions.

Alert1201| 11.5.10 @ 7:52AM

I agree. More harm is done to the black population by the school system then can be imagined, yet they continually support the whose who have made the school system the mess that it is.

The same is true for abortion.

joli| 11.5.10 @ 8:43PM

My friend told me that her freshman daughter had to sit and listen to her science teacher expound the glories of abortion for the good of the environment. As I think about what to do with my own kids when they begin to enter high school, I'm trying to decide whether the trade-off of having social and performing opportunities outweighs the necessity of having to re-teach science, history (Howard Zinn), and social studies every single day to deprogram them from the lies that are endemic in our schools.

Jocon307| 11.6.10 @ 6:29AM

Joli, I will give you the advice I give all parents, that was passed on to me by my own mom, which she learned by being "schooled" by her own father.

It is the "pound on the table" method.

When your child comes home from school and starts to tell you what teacher said today, and it is nonsense, you pound on the table, and expound the truth, and you keep at it, until the child understands that teacher is spouting nonsense.

It worked for my mom, it worked for me and it worked for my own child.

Although I have to say the schools she attended were pretty good, including the Bayonne, NJ (a very patriotic, Reagen democrat type town) public schools.

But the point remains, I always spent a lot of time with her on her school work, esp. in high school, and I tried very hard to get the larger points across.

Had her schools been dreadful, we would have had to make a change.

As a parent you must pay attention to what other people are attempting to put in your child's "head full of mush" as Rush Limbaugh says.

Hey, I should also give a big shout out to the Salvation Army of Jersey City, where my kid went to day care. Fantastic people, filled with the Love of God. They did a great job and for that they'll never be forgotten by us.

Big D| 11.8.10 @ 3:59PM

Joli - you have two choices: Homeschool or Private School. Neither are easy, and the latter is expensive, considering that you're paying for education twice (my property taxes support public indoctrination / "education", which I refuse to subject my kids to, and then tuition for a good Christian school). It sucks, but it's my kids and well worth it.

SonOfSam| 11.5.10 @ 9:19AM

Forty five years ago, white "progressives" launched the war on poverty. After four decades and trillions of dollars spent, poverty is just as widespread, and the inner cities are far more dangerous. They don't have a "gang problem", since these are far more than gangs: they are PRIVATE ARMIES ON AMERICAN SOIL. Vast swaths of American cities are effectively no longer part of the United States of America.

The only people who have benefited from all this are the upper class bureaucrats who run the programs and dole out the welfare checks, after they have kept most of the money to pay for their own bloated salaries, pensions and lifetime medical -- no ObamaCare for them, they're above all that.

the rich get bailouts
the poor get handouts
the middle class pays for it all

gearjammer| 11.5.10 @ 12:11PM

Now, now do not pick on the rich. Our fearless leader Rush insists we kiss their asses each and every day. So be careful, very careful or they will call you a ,gulp, Rino. Pick on the poor-bash the minimum like Rush's pal did in West Va.-like Rush says " it works every time you try it".

jstwndring| 11.5.10 @ 2:06PM

What the hell are you talking about? I want a specific instance where Rush was picking on the poor. I want a specific instance where Rush's friend (who?) in West Virginia was picking on the poor. I guess most of what Rush says goes right over your head. Defending the private property rights of Americans is the only thing i've heard Rush do regarding the topic of wealth. It sounds to me like you are the one who has the problem. Get past your jealousy. Get past your petty envy. Realise that this is AMERICA and you should be able to keep most of what you make, regardless of economic level. It's called liberty. Without private property rights any talk of freedom is academic. Of course, freedom for the masses always has been hard for the haters of liberty to understand.

geaqrjammer| 11.5.10 @ 5:23PM

His pal Racie lost to Manchon.He came out against the minimum wage and this cost him votes. Rush always says the most conservative candidate wins but Manchon who supports the minimum wage won, thus the less conservative candidate won proving Rush is wrong when he says the most conservative guy or gal always wins. Whether you like it or not the economic fairness issue is a big problem for you natives who dwell in the Rushbo tribe. We can at least be sympathetic to some silly increase in the min wage, which evidence proves is not the end of the world.

gearjammer| 11.5.10 @ 5:44PM

I heard one hardworking guy call Rush a few years back. He'd been working hard 40 years but lost his job and looked for work but came up with nothing. He had sadness in his voice that he,d have to take unemployment and in a defeated voice asked Rush if doing this for a bit was ok. The pompous rich a-hole Limbaugh in a less than approving voice said do what ya gotta do but actuallt told the guy that accepting the money might ruin his charactor as a man.Rush is an extremist. Smart and talented full of drive , but smarter people have walked the planet. Look into Aristotle and his golden mean.

Donna| 11.6.10 @ 9:26AM

I noticed many mistakes in your reply including your opinion. You must be product of government schools.

hj hudson| 11.6.10 @ 11:00AM

Man, there are some hateful people on this blog.

Gearjammer made a salient point about Rush, and he is attacked in the rudest fashion.

It makes me sick to read mostof the posts on AmSpec. Rush is a muli-millionaire bigot and braggart with no compassion, except for his buddies--the right-wing super rich.

He has the soul of a hyena.

Louise in MO| 11.6.10 @ 11:28PM

This post made absolutely no sense. What RX are you on? It would be helpful to use sentences and genuine English words.

It has always amazed me how a person will waste time listening and/or watching those they totally disagree with or downright hate. I suggest you get a life and listen to those of your own kind.

Soccerjock| 11.5.10 @ 8:10PM

It may not be the end of the world, but there is a lot of evidence that an increase in the minimum wage costs jobs at the margin. It certainly protects the wages of those under union contract whose wages are connected to the minimum wage. But the evidence I've seen shows that minority group unemployment goes up with every increase in the minimum wage. I think the best way to lower minority group unemployment rates is to lower the minimum wage, or eliminate it altogether. Union contract rates could be tied to some other economic indicator. All the minimum wage does is result in higher rates of unemployment for those people who are unskilled or just entering the labor force.

SeattleBruce| 11.5.10 @ 8:56PM

'thus the less conservative candidate won proving Rush is wrong '

WV has been Democrat since forever, and you're going to point to this one race with a popular Democrat Gov. running for Senate as your example. Bad choice.

Donna| 11.6.10 @ 9:28AM

Wasn't this the Govn'r who told BO to shove it?

Rich D| 11.6.10 @ 7:06PM

The minimum wage was instituted to reduce black employment at the expense of white employment It worked then and still does.

Hoppy| 11.7.10 @ 12:12PM

Well, we could always follow the Democratic party model, sort of a twist on Robin Hood. "Rob the rich, and bullshit the poor." And if you are going to spout off about individual candidates, the least you could do is learn to spell their names.

NegroX| 11.7.10 @ 3:21PM

Nice try troll boy. You are an idiot and your grammar proves it.

Tex Expatriate| 11.5.10 @ 3:51PM

You must be a socialist, Gearjammer. You demonstrate the inability of socialists to be rational or to understand economics. Rush only points out that it is the rich who invest the money that is used to grow business in the world. The rich and the small businessman who stakes everything on his personal business gamble.

gearjammer| 11.5.10 @ 5:36PM

Actually, I fought commies in Viet Nam and enjoyed it. And, actually alot of middle class people own stocks etc too. Not just the rich. Whether you like it or not politics is more than an economics lesson. Emotion plays a role. I am not jealous of Rush-I consider him a troubled and terribly flawed man. The meglomania he demonstates each day is alarming. He is a detached out of touch conservative elite just like Obama and his crowd of swank set elites are. When, do you think is the last time rush spent time with regular people who have a tough life ? I am ok money wise but I stuck with my old friends over the richer and more sophisticaed I know. Not all-alot of my wealthy friends are ok and do not go nuts if somebody gets a minimum wage bump or unemployment insurance. They do get angry when it all goes overboard. But, let a guy get an extra buck a week and Rush goes nuts. the top one per cent making aall that money in income is another matter-we needs answers to thes ecopncern is all I am saying-sorry if I am looking ahead but clas warfare is not dead and the dems will ride it to a comeback, if alls we do is be rude and crude like
ruush is against the poor.

SeattleBruce| 11.5.10 @ 8:59PM

'When, do you think is the last time rush spent time with regular people who have a tough life ?'

When did this become about Rush? He's not the one spending us into oblivion, or didn't ya notice? We need to oppose those people. To that degree, who cares about Rush's weaknesses??!

DBinNJ| 11.5.10 @ 10:24PM

You sound like a logical guy so I let you determine the what is the correct answer.

You like the minimum wage so much why isn't the minimum wage $20.00 per hour or maybe $35.00 per hour? After all shouldn't the minimum wage be living wage?

Interested Conservative| 11.5.10 @ 11:01PM

Here's an even better one, DB - How about letting a company building a factory in a city set the workers' annual salary at twice the cost of an average home in that city?

In San Francisco, that would somewhere around $1million, but in Detroit it would be somewhere between $10,000 and $20,000?

What's a living wage if not the means to buy a home?

Think GM or Ford would take that deal? The UAW? Think it would repopulate Detroit?

Pragmatist| 11.6.10 @ 2:25AM

Why stop there. Why not set the minimum wage at $250,001 a year. Then everyone who has a job would be "rich." Then again, people without a job would be much poorer. People with a job, would be happy and gladly re-elect their representatives for the great favor of their guaranteed minimum wage.

Of course, everyone who could not generate goods and services for their employer in excess of $250.001 plus another 20% or so in mandated benefits would loose their jobs. [But, hey, you've got to break some eggs...] Either they would be laid off, or their employers would go bankrupt operating at such a loss. Industry would have to automate much more and lean how to operate without depending on all those low skilled less than $250K employees. But at some point an equilibrium would be reached with a small population of very higher earners, paying very high taxes in order to support a larger population of people unable to obtain legal employment reduced to living off of government assistance. Many jobs would disappear entirely. There would be fewer taxicabs in New York, but those cabbies would all earn over $250K a year, charging higher fares to a smaller population of passengers. Everyone would be much poorer with the employed taking home after taxes a very small portion of their 250K wages and the remainder living of subsistence of perhaps a fraction of that. Government would sponsor massive training programs so that the motivated could lift themselves from poverty by learning the skills needed to produce 250K (+20%) of value for their employers. Some would succeed, but there would be no way to enter at some lower salary, say 40K, and work your way up to 250K. That would be illegal. Even so, there would be an illegal shadow economy of people paying undocumented sweatshop workers to program computers under the table for sub-minimum wages. Many would languish in the ranks of the permanently unemployed.

Even those making $250K a year would be living at very low standard. Organizing society in such wasteful way would mean many fewer goods and services would get produced and the GDP pie would be much smaller for everyone, regardless matter how it was sliced.

Of course this thought experiment is extreme to illustrate a point. But the principle is the same. It differs only in degree.

The minimum wage creates no new value in the world. It produces nothing. If someone can produce value in excess of the minimum wage, the minimum wage is a wage they could have negotiated with their employer, anyway. If someone cannot produce value in excess of the minimum wage, they loose their job and it becomes illegal to employ them. Any perceived benefit is an illusion.

thinkerfan| 11.7.10 @ 12:51AM

Rush is not against anybody making money. Rush is against the government setting the wages. Rush wants the market to set the price. If the market thinks $20 is a fair wage for burgerflippers then it is fine with him.

JJ| 11.7.10 @ 12:00PM

From a fellow Vietnam Vet: Dear gear, uh, you might want to check back with your shrink for further treatment of an obvious PTSD. Here in America we only expect that the average person will "desire" to work for a living and do the best that they can on a daily basis. For the truly needy there is no more generous nation on earth than the one you and I served for. "Rush hates the poor?" This is Rushspeak filtered through a liberally sick mind.

NegroX| 11.7.10 @ 3:23PM

Geartroll, take your class warfare scam somewhere else.

Nolann Ryann| 11.6.10 @ 8:59PM

You're proof that veterans shouldn't be universally revered. And before you wave your combat experience in front of my face; one tour in Iraq and two in Afghan. Quite frankly you are mentally challenged. A combat veteran does not give you the instant credibility that you seek when you wave a flag and right sleeve patch.

JJ| 11.7.10 @ 12:02PM

From a fellow vet. Double ditto's. :)

Bob K.| 11.5.10 @ 7:44AM

One can only hope that you are correct. But these changes are also going to have to take place at the state level where the local teacher's unions contribute very heavily to legislators who play ball with them.

The continual rise in school taxes hasn't seemed to made them any weaker at the state level.

Money trumps votes in many cases.

Donna| 11.6.10 @ 9:40AM

Where I live (ultra conservative) N. Georgia our state won money for the “Rush” to the Top or whatever BO’s program was. Guess where 75% of the money is going? TEACHER’S SALARIES. The remaining; computers and technology. UGH!!!!
My child spent two years in a public school and it was all we could take. Like the one writer in these comments, I kept having to de-program him on ecology, environment and teach him to write papers and read something other than poetry.
Public schools are a mess and I pray every day for the children of America in these schools. They are hostile breeding grounds for the “No Child Left Behind”.

JJ| 11.7.10 @ 12:08PM

Here in NC they finally threw the progressive school board bums out. We are now attempting to move back to neighborhood schools and away from busing for diversity. The NAACP is shouting racists. So be it.

Alert1201| 11.5.10 @ 8:01AM

The answer is at the state. In Texas there are no teachers unions, whe have federations that provide health insurance and legal protection without the heavy handedness of union.

gypsy| 11.5.10 @ 9:24AM

sounds good to me. As a teacher in a frost-bitten bluestate gulag, all I want is my for union to protect me from kids who want to take a swing at me when they fail because they refuse to do any assignments, and administrators who tell me that somehow its all my g-d fault because somehow I'm not "understanding" enough. I don't need them -- or anyone-- telling me how to vote. I also sure as hell don't want them hi-jacking a big chunk of my union dues to give to politicians I would never vote for, and who wouldn't cross the street to shake hands with me unless there's an election going on

Sheila| 11.5.10 @ 1:25PM

Not completely true, and not that big a deal anyhow. There are no branches of the national teachers' unions, but there are in-state unions here in Texas. Regardless of union affiliation, the teachers are all trained and certified by union-run ed schools. Even in Christian schools, in order to gain state accreditation (useful if you want your child's achievements to transfer to public high school, for example), all the teachers are "certified" - i.e. graduates of the same lousy ed programs. Because of the salary differential, many of them shift between public and private teaching. It's easy to differentiate those who've taught Christian school their whole career from those "perky" and "casual" younger teachers who began in public schools - avoid them like the plague they are. Most teachers are perfectly nice individuals - and thick as two short planks.

School of Hard Knocks| 11.5.10 @ 2:27PM

Ooops. Yes Texas has teachers unions, with names like The National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers, just like the article states. Unless of course Texas has once again seceded from the Union? (pun intended).

dal| 11.7.10 @ 6:43AM

Alert I have seen no evidence of unions not being in texas. There is so much documentation to get rid of a teacher in texas. I also see plenty of incompetent educators in my childrens classroom, plus there global warming crap agenda.

ND teaparty lover| 11.5.10 @ 8:12AM

As a resident of north dakota, supporter of hoeven, husband of a teacher, the teachers of north dakota were split of supporting hoeven when he ran for governor. My wifes school were about 75% for him and the union was told to stay nuetral in the race. But the teachers union in the last weeks of the election spent its money to defeat him. he promised the teachers everything they wanted(nd teachers basically have a 401k so they dont need state or fed bailout) but they hate republicans here also. If you want to see how education pensions and results of childrens test scores nan improve(teachers get no health care at retirement) look at nd

MikeD| 11.5.10 @ 1:50PM

I mean no personal disrespect, but I sure hope you don't teach English, grammar, or spelling. I taught for the first 10 years of my career, and I was surrounded by people (mostly women) who constantly told me that they taught for three reasons: June. July, and August. When I told them I supported vouchers they cried that: "It's easy for YOU to say! You like to teach and you know your subject. The kids even like you! What about us? The kids hate us and we hate them." It sounds nothing more needs to be said.

MikeD| 11.5.10 @ 1:50PM

I mean no personal disrespect, but I sure hope you don't teach English, grammar, or spelling. I taught for the first 10 years of my career, and I was surrounded by people (mostly women) who constantly told me that they taught for three reasons: June. July, and August. When I told them I supported vouchers they cried that: "It's easy for YOU to say! You like to teach and you know your subject. The kids even like you! What about us? The kids hate us and we hate them." It sounds nothing more needs to be said.

Bruce| 11.5.10 @ 10:46PM

What the hey, what happened to my post ? As a winner of 4 man to man gun fights, it's not good for someone's health to do that !

Clinton nee Publius| 11.5.10 @ 9:14AM

The reality is that public-run anything gives you an exclusive monopoly wherein the provider avoids accountability. Without accountability, failure is the only outcome. If we are to ever solve the issues of worker security, pay, performance and quality we will have no choice but to admit that public education has been a complete failure. On the bright side of things, we now spend enough on public school pupil tuition to be able to afford to send every primary and secondary school child to private school and pay to send them to a 4-year college and still save some money to boot. That's how big of a debacle public education has become.

Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 11.5.10 @ 9:23AM

Well said!

Pedagogue| 11.5.10 @ 9:59AM

Since 1958 education has been the most expensive component of municipal abudgets. This is actually before the NEA became a union. Schools don't work (especially in inner cities) because the single parent doesn't care. The gangs inthe street are gangs in the school. One almosts suspects they have crew served weapons. Meanwhile teachers of varying ability work long hours doing paperwork. Most of the paperwork is
ridiculous but it has to be done. None of this has
anything to do with civilizing the next generation
who's only use will be as organ doners.

mames| 11.5.10 @ 10:48AM

So much to kill so little time to do it! The GOP must muster up the kind of courage they have not displayed in over 40 years (Reagan does not couNt - he was undermined by the Rinos all the way). No more half assed Rinos like the Bushes, Mc Cain and the rest of spinal deprived. The NEA and all public unions must be outlawed. They have no business using our funding to lobby for more bennies from us. No more state, NEA, Fed unions, period. And while they are at it no more government schools either - aren't we forced to buy education whether we want it or not????

SeniorD| 11.5.10 @ 10:55AM

In the minds of Teacher's Unions, the music composer turned High School Music Teacher from Mr. Holland's Opus should be viewed as the archetype teacher. This icon of dedication saw one student become Governor, another a successful businessman and a third a star athlete. Would the reality even faintly echo the movie.

How many unionized teachers send their children to private schools? How many unionized teachers work to the rule and not to the interest of their students? How many unionized teachers see their union dues go to supporting Socialist dogma spawned from the Communist-follower John Dewey?

MikeD| 11.5.10 @ 1:59PM

SeniorD... WELL SAID! How many of you remember that the very first thing J.F.K. did the day he was inaugurated (After the ceremonies) was to sign an EXECUTIVE ORDER giving the public employees the right to collective bargaining and to strike. That absolutely needs to end! Public employees make more than those of us who actually work for a living. And that's just the first step. We need to cut the Federal budget 10% all across the board each year for the next five years. No exceptions. All federal employees, including elected officials, must be put on Medicare immediately, and get no other pensions than Social Security.

Who the hell do they think they are setting themselves above all of us WHO PAY FOR THEM! They all need to know that "We're mad as hell and we're not gonna take it any more!"

TomB| 11.5.10 @ 11:47AM

"The education of all children, from the moment that they can get along without a mother's care, shall be in state institutions at state expense."
- Karl Marx

Albert| 11.5.10 @ 12:17PM

You should add the after-the-fact "co-authors" names as well: President Bozo, Hillary Clinton, Harry Reid, Jerry Brown, Barbara Boxer, etc... There names are legion.

Sheila| 11.5.10 @ 1:32PM

Interesting, isn't it, how none of our Founding Fathers (dead White men, every last one of them) went to public schools? Sending one's children to public schools is defacto child abuse. http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/index.htm

MikeD| 11.5.10 @ 2:02PM

There is absolutely nothing in the Constitution about public education. The federal government has no business having anything to do with schools. That is a local responsibility, with selected state involvement in certain cases. I do not think the state should be in it either.

Stephanie| 11.5.10 @ 12:12PM

I live in rural eastern Virginia and I just read in our local paper that our schoolboard has just voted on getting rid of the validictorian award. They said it causes too much anxt for those who don't stive to do well. I am stunned.

Sheila| 11.5.10 @ 1:38PM

In my district they carry out the GPAs to as many as six decimal places to determine the valedictorian - always an Asian. Because of all the Chinese and Indian kids with their obsessive grade-chasing and cram school attendance, White kids with GPAs between 3.5 and 4.0 can't even make it into the top 10%, which has become a problem for many trying to gain admission to the best in-state colleges (I have no personal dog in this hunt; kept my kids in private school). The district is considering dropping class ranking because of this issue; the immigrant parents are up in arms - they want that number to brag to their friends about and to bludgeon the Whites with.

Texas Mom 2012| 11.5.10 @ 1:55PM

I don't care what the race of a valedictorian is, if you EARN it you deserve it. We have Valedictorians at our school but they also honor magna cum lause and summa cum laude graduates. My son, who is autistic but always mainstreamed and took some honors classes as well, ended up with a 3.12 and in the forth quintile or bottom 40% of his class. The upside is that his SAT scores would get him in any school in the country so his public school seems to have done its job. We moved to Sugar Land because of the excellent public school system willing to pay the higher real estate taxes for the privilege of better schools.

fetoau| 11.6.10 @ 10:04PM

AMEN!!!!

Hoppy| 11.7.10 @ 12:24PM

I suspect that his Mom and Pop had more to do with his SAT scores than his public education did.

Al Adab| 11.5.10 @ 12:14PM

What the Left is about to learn is that they have exhausted their ability to buy votes both with taxpayer dollars and with promises. The well frankly is dry, yet the Left constituancy demands ever more. That will prove their undoing. Let us all hope that it does not mean riots in the streets when the "drugs" of other people's money is cut off.

Albert| 11.5.10 @ 12:19PM

"Let us all hope that it does not mean riots in the streets..." Unfortunately, hope is all we have on this point. Experience and history tell us otherwise. Be armed. Be prepared.

Al Adab| 11.5.10 @ 2:30PM

Indeed. See Greece, see France.

CalMark| 11.5.10 @ 12:35PM

Flawed basic premise: the Feds have a place in the education arena.

No! The education system is in such awful shape because of Washington meddling with what should be local decisions. That's the kind of meddling that leads to big-bucks polarization of a basic function whose only political struggles should be at local school-board level.

Seek| 11.5.10 @ 12:35PM

Test.

Jim | 11.5.10 @ 1:00PM

Grow up, Gearjammer. The rich no more caused your or anyone else's misery than the man in the moon did. Of the people I personally know who have come to ruin, the reasons were credit card debt twice their annual income, all kinds of toys (snowmobiles, $50,00o "trucks" that will never see as much as a gravel driveway, vacations, eating out daily, etc.) and other such poor decision-making. It's really time for the "middle-class" to start taking responsibility for their own success or lack thereof, if only because the "screw the rich" nonsense it buys into each election cycle hasn't helped one bit. Wise up.

shelflife| 11.6.10 @ 6:14AM

so true. judging their lives by what they don't have rather than being grateful for what they do have. you can't spend your way to happiness.

Christopher Manion| 11.5.10 @ 2:36PM

"About 75 percent of the country's 17- to 24-year-olds are ineligible for military service, largely because they are poorly educated...." (link below);.

Meanwhile, the retiring head of the NEA schoolworkers union (I can hardly call them "teachers") admits that they're not there for the kids, but for the teachers. (Link #2).

As Bob Dole, would say, "where's the outrage?"

Link 1: http://www.foxnews.com/printer.....51,00.html (1 of 2) [11/6/2009 5:24:50 PM]
FOXNews

link 2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqn1rvv7Fis

shelflife| 11.6.10 @ 6:24AM

"About 75 percent of the country's 17- to 24-year-possibly they would be rejected" - a bite of reality to those who rag on the military. most of them would be rejected and not because they're elite.

Tex Expatriate| 11.5.10 @ 3:47PM

I've never had much respect for teachers, even though the public schools I attended 61 years ago were truly public schools. However, most of the teachers I talk to today don't vote the way their unions donate their dues.

ton| 11.5.10 @ 3:53PM

The education establishment, like any other vast, bloated, and insulated government apparatus, exists ultimately for the perpetuation and aggrandizement of the institution. In other words, it exists for the personal benefit of adminstrators and teachers, not for the education of students. That is why tax monies inevitably are directed to salaries, benefits, extravagant retirement packages, lifetime health care, excessive vacation, non-work days, perks, travel (ie. "conferences), programs, initiatives, coordinators, directors, assistant directors, superintendents, ad infinitum. And since the union leadership as well as the academic establishment are fundamentally leftist, students are subjected to ever more strident proselytizing in the popular delusions of the left, from "queer studies" to "global warming," while basic literacy and mathematical competencies are neglected.

The answer to the crisis is simple, though not palatable to those who prefer to abdicate their parental responsibility and hand over their children to highly-compensated baby sitters: PRIVATIZE THE SCHOOLS. There are many options: home schooling, parochial schools, church schools, private neighborhood schools and academies. Support private voucher and home schooling tax credit initiatives; reduce property taxes and other levies that currently fund the behemoth. Rescue your children. They are your children; and it is your money.

keyboard jockey| 11.5.10 @ 4:20PM

Classical Fail, A Look At The Fall Out From The Midterm Elections. Falling From Great Heights – A Cautionary Tale Of Son Worshiping.

Icarus Syndrome.

http://youhavetobethistalltogo.....onary.html

Pat| 11.5.10 @ 7:57PM

During FDR’s New Deal and WWII over 60 years ago, American farmers were fed up with the way Democrats clamped ceilings on prices for their crops but adamantly refused to do the same for wages. The Democrats and the unions, a reasonably happy, long lasting marriage which didn’t start with and won’t end with the teachers. And Walter Reuther, iconic labor leader of the UAW, unashamedly explained exactly how the game should be played, you collect dues from members, you give some of their money to the Democrats while keeping some for yourself, they pass those laws which help your union.

But let a teacher pat your kid on the head and tell the other Moms how bright she is and it’s “Walter Reuther who?”. It’s just not the same you say, young Miss Sweetsmile or old Mrs. Sternly, they’re not “real” union members, they don’t support crass union political practices, they think only of the children, teaching your kid is their life. When school children start paying union dues, your kid’s best interests will become important to the Teacher’s Union and the Democrats. Trouble in their marriage, the Teacher’s Union divorcing the Democrats – dream on, this isn’t the first grade and we’re too old for Story Time.

jawin| 11.5.10 @ 8:58PM

Public employees should not be allowed to unionize. Teachers are public employees. Teacher unions should be abolished. Education costs will decrease. Education will increase.

Jade| 11.5.10 @ 10:05PM

“Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted.”—Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

“Education is a weapon, whose effect depends on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed.”—Josef Stalin

"The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all: it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed a standard citizenry, to put down dissent and originality."
H.L. Mencken

"And what is a good citizen? Simply one who never says, does or thinks anything that is unusual. Schools are maintained in order to bring this uniformity up to the highest possible point. A school is a hopper into which children are heaved while they are still young and tender; therein they are pressed into certain standard shapes and covered from head to heels with official rubber-stamps."
H.L. Mencken

dadfly| 11.5.10 @ 11:40PM

item 5 from the contract from america:

Create a Blue Ribbon taskforce that engages in a complete audit of federal agencies and programs, assessing their Constitutionality, and identifying duplication, waste, ineffectiveness, and agencies and programs better left for the states or local authorities, or ripe for wholesale reform or elimination due to our efforts to restore limited government consistent with the US Constitution’s meaning. (63.37%)

if this is done then the federal involvement in education will be found to be both duplicative and unconstitutional. there will be no alternative but to defund it.

GavInTucson| 11.7.10 @ 3:26AM

We can go back and forth about the Constitution, the Left, the Right, Democrats, and Republicans.

It doesn't matter.

The people that are really in control of this country (it ain't us), have decided that we're ripe for the picking. And pick us, they will.

Put down your ideology for a moment... there's a certain bearded man by the name of Bernake that, in collusion with others of his ilk, are about to run this country into the ground.

Sell your stocks. Get out of the U.S.Dollar. Be prepared for the whirlwind that's about to come. You ain't seen nothing yet.

Rmm| 11.8.10 @ 8:02PM

Where does G. Soros come in ? He supposedly turned a cool billion $ by shorting the British pound. Could it be that he is at it again and Bernake just played into Soros's bet.

uchu| 11.7.10 @ 7:07AM

I agree. More harm is done to the black population by the school system then can be imagined

NHThinker| 11.7.10 @ 10:05AM

Read John Taylor Gatto's "The Underground History of American Education" and John Holt's "How Children Fail". The public school system was never intended to deliver education in the classic sense of the word but rather was engineered as a method of creating an artificial national concensus. You can remove your children from this institution of social engineering by sending them to private schools (as do the nation's eliete) or better yet by home schooling them yourself, as we did.

ton| 11.7.10 @ 7:17PM

You are correct; except that the "national consensus" to be created has always been a secularist, statist perspective (see the earlier quotes from Lenin).

Government schools were created in this country to advance a Dewyite agenda AND as an antidote (originally WASPish but now totally secular) to the growing influence of parochial schools among a burgeoning Catholic immigrant population in the early 20th century. For Christian parents, the choice is simple: who will direct the formation of your children, the secular state or the Church? The position of the state is equally simple: give us your children and your money.

Perusha| 11.7.10 @ 3:05PM

After fifty years of dutifully trying to stay an informed citizen by paying regular attention to the American experiment in education, particularly K-12, by reading the Wall Street Journal et al, I long ago got the message.

It’s a waste of my time!

When the USA was started, the haves understood that the country couldn’t work if the have-nots could access their wealth. So, a voter was required to have a minimum amount of property.

Say you’re going to play a game of poker. In order to be able to join in the action, you have to have something to LOSE.

No chips = no game!

So, as soon as the “poor” got into the pockets of the “rich”, it was inevitable that “public” this or that would grow, like topsy!

A truly egalitarian schooling system would be based on the initial voting one---

The mother and father, would be SOLELY responsible to pay for their progeny, because, hey---they PRODUCED him or her! THEY did, not other people!

Now, if they had relatives and/or friends who they could convince to help, fine.

The public education racket is simply one of the expressions of that hoary ruse advertised back in the day, when “investing” in real estate was the hot subject---

Always use OPM---OTHER people’s money.

Nomdepoof!| 11.7.10 @ 4:11PM

Blinded by self interest.

Teachers unions and the NEA (all other unions screaming for special deals) need to get edjumacated on the ramifications of Obamacare.

States most very likely will go bankrupt under the unfunded mandates, lack of tax revenue from business closures and slashed federal medicare funding. What happens to teachers and other public employee pensions should/when bankruptcy occurs? Poof! Pensions all gone.

Marc Jeric| 11.8.10 @ 1:22AM

All strong unions destroy the industries in which they "work" - steel, automobile, textile, electronics, apparel, etc. The advent of teachers unions in the 1960's predicted with certainty the fall of our education to the level of Zimbabwe. We have now a nation of zombies full of self-esteem, illiterate, and voting for more of the same, i.e. Democrats.

Rmm| 11.8.10 @ 9:40AM

The wife and I were discussing this issue the other day and I had the question about this tenure thing trickling down to the grade school level. When did this happen and was the NEA behind it? I think there might be a causal relationship between poor education and tenured teachers who cannot be fired.

REB| 11.8.10 @ 9:32PM

Education has become the last bastion of fools and freeloaders for the most part...I pay crazy taxes and almost all of it goes to schools,I sent my own kids to private school for a couple years and then we homeschooled them they graduated 3.8 and a 4.0 I paid for it on less than 5000$ a year and still had to pay for the commie schools.How is the present system good or fair?...if I dont pay the extortion monies they steal my property...the mob has nothing on govt and union thugs,time to make an education count for something...to make it worth something and we all know that which you get for free you dont value very highly...make people pay for their own education!

business | 11.11.10 @ 8:34PM

Teachers unions and the NEA (all other unions screaming for special deals) need to get edjumacated on the ramifications of Obamacare.

wholesale beads| 4.1.11 @ 3:46AM

nice