In NJ school cut debate, insults overshadow issues (Teachers Attack Gov. Christie on Facebook)

Google ^ | 4/19/10 | GEOFF MULVIHILL

[Libloather]

In NJ school cut debate, insults overshadow issues
By GEOFF MULVIHILL (AP) – 1 day ago

HADDONFIELD, N.J. — They're the kind of obscenity-laced schoolyard taunts that could get a student suspended.

But the target of this tirade is New Jersey's Gov. Chris Christie — and the perpetrators are the state's teachers, irate over his calls for salary freezes and funding cuts for schools.

In Facebook messages visible to the world — not to mention their students — the teachers have called Christie fat, compared him to a genocidal dictator and wished he was dead. The postings are often riddled with bad grammar and misspellings.

"Never trust a fat f...," read one profane post on the Facebook page, "New Jersey Teachers United Against Governor Chris Christie's Pay Freeze," which has some 69,000 fans, many of them teachers.

"How do you spell A-- hole? C-H-R-I-S C-H-R-I-S-T-I-E," read another.

The rhetoric has become ever more heated as residents of most of the state's school districts get ready to vote Tuesday on property tax levies that support district budgets. And while many of the postings are emotional, most aren't personal attacks.

Christie, a first-year Republican governor who inherited a state in dire financial straits, wants voters to reject the proposals in districts where educators won't agree to salary freezes for the coming school year.

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