Posted on 03/04/2011 7:14:39 AM PST by Titus-Maximus
Do you know why President Obama sends his kids to a non-union private school, because the public schools in DC suck! So can he please stop his hypocritical lecturing of Governor Walker? Obama doesn’t believe in teachers’ unions or else he would have them teaching his kids, which he refuses to do.
Teachers’ unions create a monopoly which is in total contradiction to a teacher’s essence and that is his own individuality as a professional. Collective Bargaining allows them to sell their services as one complete monopolistic force....which is akin to every airline banding together and selling their travel services in complete collusion. As it would be with every grocery store owner acting in concert to set food prices as high as possible, (don’t they deserve a fair wage as well). This monopolistic action had been historically cited as a violation of anti-trust - as unions were found guilty - even FDR opposed them in the government workplace. In classical economic theory monopoly brings about a degradation in service and a raising of prices - and that is what we have been getting year in and year out from our education establishment. Unions protect and foster mediocrity and that is an undying truth. A union monopoly of education is the absolutely last thing this nation needs or wants – it is a complete recipe for disaster and why America ranks near the bottom internationally in education. Private, non-union schools do a much better job – ask President Obama who enthusiastically sends his kids to one – but he hypocritically barred inner city DC children the same privilege by canceling their voucher program!
The unionists claim this is about civil rights – yet they deny the right of any teacher to opt out of the union, they deny the right to work for any teacher that refuses to pay union dues - which is a violation of that individual’s civil rights. So will they please stop their boring, hypocritical lectures about ‘taking away peoples’ rights’. The last thing a labor union is about is freedom, they want total control and to take free choice away from people. It is one of the reasons they want card check – and their desire to attack the ‘right-to-work’ southern states, whose workers are content without unions coming in and ruining their industry!
Why do we need a 1930's style industrial union to represent teachers? Since when does a labor union actually contribute to the intellectual development of a human being? These teachers are not shoveling coal or bolting on fenders where there is a high degree of worker fungibility - teaching is an individual art, like writing or playing music, with a dizzying variation of ability from person to person. Since when is one teacher as good as another? Since when is one surgeon as good as another? Is one lawyer as good as another? Is one chef as good as another? Is one musician as good as another? Is one football coach as good as another? None of that is true - so the unionists’ absurd premise of teacher fungibility as a bedrock requirement for their tenure protection and collective bargaining is a complete lie. Some teachers are far better than others - but don't ask the union system to recognize it because their system destroys innovation, destroys accountability and leaves us only with seniority - leaving our children’s fate to those who have been there the longest. Economic life's rules don't work that way – the efficient allocation of society’s resources is diminished when a manager must abide by the inadequate criteria of simple teacher seniority; the unions are compelling a suboptimal outcome, we are left with no other choice except inferiority. Why do many Wisconsin public school teachers send their kids to non-union private schools? Answer – because the public schools suck, again, just ask President Obama.
The notion of government workers needing a labor union is absurd on its face. The government is not geared towards making a profit, there is no natural adversarial relationship between workers and management – in fact government itself is the monitor and administrator of all employee protection laws that are in effect. Why should government be forced to exist under the threat of a labor union? What have they done in the past to warrant this aggressive action? Are teachers as workers losing limbs, inhaling coal dust or being paid in script? Are they being forced to buy their own pens and paper? Government jobs pay on average better than private sector jobs, and have better benefits with much lower turnover – all things that suggest a labor union is not even necessary, and they are not! This entire government labor movement is a contrivance – created for the benefit of unions themselves and the Democratic Party. President Kennedy by executive order allowed federal employees to unionize – and did this only to garner their votes in the 1964 election. This is ugly cynical politics gussied up in the transparent disguise of “workers’ civil rights” and that is a complete sham. These government unions serve to collect union dues which is funneled to the Democratic Party and create dependent voting blocs of unionized workers who now vote for the Democrats who in turn reward them with higher wages and benefits superior to the private sector – a vicious cycle. Obama needs this union money to win in 2012, he needs these automatic foot soldiers in his campaign, he needs the false accusation of his opponents as the ‘greedy rich’ and that is why he cynically supports unions while hypocritically sending his children to a non-union private school.
How would any private sector employee behave when they have been granted their job for life and it is near impossible for management to fire them? Do you think that situation is a motivation to improve, to innovate and to find better and more creative ways to teach? Absolutely not! It produces a nasty thugish attitude and creates surreal situations like the obscene New York City “rubber room” - full of undisciplined, suspended teachers, getting paid to sit around for months and play cards all day because they cannot be fired – at the cost of millions of dollars. This is the waste that unions bring, at the expense of every kid in the system, and the unions could care less as long as they get theirs.
Why do unions hate testing and teacher evaluations? Why do they resist with every last drop of blood, the ability of administrators to make them account for their productivity? Why do unions seek layoffs of their members rather than all sharing financial pain – because those layoffs are then then used as a political attack – and they could care less as the children suffer.
Why are they dead set against vouchers? Or the funding of private or charter schools? Why are they against testing? They are against every possible measure that proves inadequate teaching. Education in America has gone down in direct inverse proportion to union power rising. The inner city schools are terrible and have been under Democratic rule for decades and not an iota of improvement.
Governor Jon Corzine of NJ who was in bed with the unions, literally and figuratively, had given a speech to the state unionized workers and absurdly screamed ‘I will fight to get you a good contract!’ but it begs the question – who is he fighting? The Man? The taxpayer? The Republicans? Who does represent the taxpayer in the situation with a Democratic governor and a runaway teachers’ union? Corzine couldn’t care less – he raised taxes as labor commanded him to do so – as they now say is the solution in Wisconsin and every other state facing deficits. They say the pain should be shared – yet they have shared none of it and are in a far superior position than private sector employees. Take from someone else is their mantra, into the greedy mouth of their monopoly which, like clockwork, raises prices each year and reduces service. Having a government union that gives huge amounts of funding through mandatory dues directly to the Democratic Party that in turn grants that union huge increases in pay and benefits - creates an enormous and ugly conflict of interest and the nation is finally waking up and rejecting it. Someone needs to represent the taxpayer.
People have done far greater things with far less money in storefront schools, charter schools, Catholic schools and home schooling - all without an extortionist union to ratchet up costs while reducing productivity. (The Democratic Party has done everything in its power to stop vouchers and charter schools as well as their successful attempt to defund Catholic schools - because these outlets eventually disembowel their teachers' union and their money train.) It is time to rip down this expensive and wasteful union monopoly that has done nothing to increase the intellectual development of our students. Fifty years of failure is enough. Let us boldly discard the wasteful and unproductive ways of the past and finally do something ‘for the kids’ in reality and not just as an idle boast. Look where Obama sends his kids and take a lesson from that!
bttt
I never realized that.
The same reason that Baraq will be living in a state with no death tax when he croaks.
Public school teachers should be forced to send their own kids to the schools where they teach.
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