“I want to tell you about my idea for assault rifle vending machines,” said Fester Trim, one of the candidates for City Council in Pawnee, Indiana. Fester’s solution to car theft is that we should all mount shotguns on our dashboards that kill anyone that tries to steal our car. Fester also believes that the way to end schoolhouse slaughters is to arm our teachers. Thank Goodness Fester is just a character in a sitcom; a caricature of an NRA Gun Nut, and that his over-stated suggestions would never be made by real politicians in real life.

What? The last suggestion isn’t from Fester? It’s from whom? Are you sure?

America’s best, by and large, do not go into teaching. There was a time when the smartest of half the population became either a teacher or a nurse. Women that wanted to and could work had few other choices. For America’s kids, it wasn’t a bad deal – competence at school and at the doctor’s office. As the 70s dissolved into the 80s and female presence in the workplace gradually expanded, many women began to choose not to teach, instead pursuing more money, prestige or both.

In a world of self-made billionaires, IPO fortunes and T-shirt bonanzas, going into debt to get a Master’s Degree in order to land a low-paying job in which:

you will have to work many more than forty hours per week

you will sometimes be appreciated but just as often be really hassled by selfish parents

you will never be given enough time to do the job as you’d like to do it

you will be constrained from seeking to achieve excellence because all kids must be treated the same, no matter how dissimilar they are.

We need to find ways to incentivize our best and brightest to become teachers, and adding target practice to the curriculum is most surely going to steer them in the opposite direction

… and they will be running, not walking. To add insult to probable injury or death, you can bet your sweet bippy that if teachers were given guns they would be required to buy their own ammunition!

It has been said many times, but it is worth saying again: The person in the White House is not out of touch, he is out of his mind; truly.

Nothing small is going to change things. We need a massive social uprising. The NEA must declare a general strike. The NEA must send a message to Congress that our teachers will not return to work until they are provided a safe work environment. Everyone in this nation is entitled to a safe work environment except our teachers, where our kids are. How messed up is this? Is there not one mention of ‘safe work environment’ in teachers’ contracts that some hotshot lawyer can use to figure out a way for these teachers to strike without losing paychecks?

If teachers don’t go to school, kids can’t go to school. If kids can’t go to school, parents can’t go to work. If parents can’t go to work, the country starts grinding to a halt. How long do you think that will go on before Congress opens a dialogue? Be forewarned that even if a miracle happened, and stricter regs were put into place, it would only be a first step, because laws aren’t always enforced. But it would be a giant step for America’s Mankind.

You have the power NEA, and it looks like you are the only group that does. Use it.

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– REENO –

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