Teachers' union thugs

 Clarice Feldman:

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I have no doubt that local, state, and federal governments, including school boards, are under the control of teachers unions which contribute significant amounts of time, campaign workers, and money to left-wing politicians.

Teachers unions have steadily amped up their political involvement: From 2004 to 2016, their donations grew from $4.3 million to more than $32 million -- an all-time high. Even more than most labor unions, they have little use for Republicans, giving Democrats at least 94 percent of the funds they contributed to candidates and parties since as far back as 1990, where our data begins.

Two organizations account for practically all of the contributions made by teachers unions: The National Education Association (about $20 million in 2016) and the American Federation of Teachers (almost $12 million). Both groups -- which compete for members, but also collaborate with each other through the NEA-AFT Partnership -- are consistently among the organizations that contribute the most money to candidates and political groups. 

In turn, collective bargaining with the unions is carried out by persons selected by those same politicians whom the unions support to give the unions what they ask for. The true employers -- the parents and taxpayers -- are not at the table. This has allowed these unions extraordinary power to be free of any meaningful parental control of teaching materials and school operational policies. Any school board member who dares to disagree can expect a well-funded targeting by the unions in an atmosphere where too many parents lack enough interest to defend the member’s actions and work to retain him.

The outrageous directive by Attorney General Merrick Garland that ordered the FBI to investigate as “domestic terrorists” parents who objected to the public-school boards’ policies had only highlighted the overweening power of the unionized teachers. As I explained last week, operatives in the White House colluded with left-wing officers of the National School Boards Association to draft a letter to Garland seeking such federal chilling of the growing parental dissatisfaction with curricula (particularly sex education and Critical Race Theory), failed disciplinary procedures, library offerings of clearly pornographic materials, and transgender restroom policies. Garland admitted in congressional hearings this week that his sole basis for targeting parents as “domestic terrorists” for demonstrating their concerns about what their kids were being taught was the very letter from the NSBA which the White House had had a big hand in instigating.

Friday, a day after Garland’s testimony, the Association apologized for that letter. The apology was addressed to the members of the association and not to the parents or the general public.

It’s rather mealy mouthed, saying that the process involved was faulty and they will try to do better in the future, but the apology means more than just protecting the Association from further criticism and withdrawals from the Association by local and state school boards around the country. It seems to me they just pulled the rug out from under the attorney general and his ill-considered directive to the FBI. His was a policy that has infuriated parents, including suburban housewives who so often blindly vote Democrat without fully appreciating the effect Democrats' policies have on their families and lives. (I think it infuriated some DoJ attorneys, too. Where do you think the reports that they’d objected to this directive came from?)

What do you think is the backstory? I think Terry McAuliffe’s surprisingly tight battle -- in which he sided with the unions, saying parents had no right to decide on school library offerings and curricula and the outrageous lies and the conduct of the Loudoun County, Virginia school board and superintendent -- has scared the dickens out of the Democrat-Teachers Unions cabal, and they’re trying to tamp down the flames they self-destructively set.

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I have argued in the past about the lack of balance in public employees negotiating with politicians.  Unlike employees bargaining with a company, there is no one at the table representing the taxpayers of the parents who send their kids to school.  Politicians just raise taxes to pay for the false bargain.  The taxpayers are not there to say that the teachers are not worth what they are asking for.  They are not there to bargain for better teaching and do away with worthless programs like CRT.

The parents' rebellion has shaken those responsible for the corrupt bargains of the past and that is why the teaches' unions are panicked as well as the politicians who agreed to the bad bargain.