From Jack McHugh’s blog:

In Us vs. Them: The People and the Political Class I argued that true representative government has been supplanted by an inbred, self-serving, self-perpetuating political/government class and as a result, the government has escaped the control of the people.

Alarmist? Extreme? Consider this news item: The MEA teachers union has organized a recall campaign against two members of the Wayne-Westland school board following an illegal MEA-inspired strike against the district in October. The strike was at root over whether MESSA, the MEA’s money machine, would get the district’s health insurance loot, or whether school employees would obtain essentially the same coverage from another insurer at lesser cost.

Making MESSA a bargaining issue is itself prohibited by state law, but set that aside. The deeper meaning of this recall is that a group of lavishly compensated public employees and their union is using resources that at root are provided by taxpayers to fire the district’s managers, who were selected by citizens to be the stewards of their school and tax money.

This is not just a cynical manipulation of the political system, it’s a perversion of the very concept of democracy. If the union’s recall is successful and becomes a common tactic then are not just approaching the tipping point where the government class amass such power and resources that efforts to dislodge them become futile – we will have passed it.

Here’s an analogy. Imagine that some residents of Wayne-Westland pooled their money and started a restaurant. They hired a manager, who hired cooks and waiters. Over time the waiters became surly, the food mediocre and the costs excessive. The manager cracked down, and in response the employees fired him.

Whoops – employees don’t hire and fire managers. That’s the owners’ prerogative. Apparently not when it comes to the management of an even more important institution, our school system. Not anymore, that is, if the MEA is successful.

Given the union’s deep pockets and rippling political muscles the recall may well succeed. Just last week the MEA succeeded in recalling four members of the Reed City school board who exercised their fiduciary duty by voting to privatize food and custodial services. That will the district some $300,000 taxpayer dollars a year, or about $200 per student, as reported by the Education Action Group. (Incidentally, privatization decisions are another prohibited bargaining area, but the House has passed a bill to repeal that.)

Of course the union will argue that the final recall decision is in voters’ hands, so there is no corruption of the democratic process. Sure - the same way a 95-pound weakling going into the ring against the heavyweight boxing champion is a fair fight. Most school board members are political amateurs with little campaign savvy or ability to raise money - their adversary here is exactly the opposite.

Motivated and empowered by its concentrated benefits, in regular school elections the MEA already has outsized advantages over the dispersed interests of taxpayers. These recalls are showing the whip to school board members pressured by the realities of the job, reminding them to always place the union’s interest ahead of the taxpayers.

I’ve noticed since I was a kid that there are two things that make a person completely reviling, detestable, base, nasty, perverse and evil: not liking dogs and criticizing teachers.

I’m only going to comment on one of these today, as tackling both at once may result in my death or imprisonment by angry mobs of dog-loving teachers.

Why are teachers treated different than every other profession when it comes to criticism? Have you ever criticized the service at a fast-food joint and had the person you’re dining with defensively say, “You have no idea what they go through each day”, or, “How could you hate the hands that feed the nation? The hands that feed our children?” Me either. Same goes for retail workers, salesmen, contractors, business people, lawyers, accountants, even college professors – all can be legitimately criticized without social ostracism. But not K-12 teachers.

I have nothing against teachers. I have nothing against fast food workers, salesmen, or any other professional group. I have problems with problems; and if I see them, I often criticize what I think is the source – whether the individual, the system they operate in, the culture or all of the above. But why is it that criticizing movie-makers when they generate poor content is seen as a right of passage into polite society, but criticizing teachers when they do the same is inhumane?

I really don’t know. Maybe I’m alone in this experience, but I feel I’ve never met a more defensive industry than teachers. Any slightest commentary on their profession is seen as an attack that must be motivated by hatred for children (and puppies and rainbows). Not just by teachers themselves, but by nearly everyone.

Maybe it’s because there are lots of teachers, and nearly everyone is related to or knows one. Then again, nearly everyone is related to or knows someone who’s worked a fast food joint. Maybe since they are paid by taxpayers, there is a fear that widespread criticism will lead to a pay cut. Of course this is hardly the case for other government-funded positions – lawmakers, and various other bureaucrats receive round criticism in the course of everyday conversation with no violent reactions or defenses.

Maybe it’s the combination of the two factors above. Everybody personally knows, and loves, a teacher. Everyone knows that teachers are paid by taxpayers. If teachers are criticized, than they risk losing taxpayer approval and funding. Everyone thinks of that underpaid loving teacher they know, and the shudder to think of them getting a pay cut or getting fired. But even these do not seem sufficient conditions to elicit the type of hot reactions to teacher criticism that often occur. After all, if you know a teacher who is really good, why would criticism of a bad teacher be harmful? Wouldn’t it help illustrate just how good the good teacher is compared to others? Wouldn’t that make the case that they should get paid even more? Aye, here’s the rub.

In a typical job market, this may be the case. But most teachers are members of a teachers union, and they are paid as members of a group, not as individuals. Therefore, to criticize one bad teacher is to threaten the funding of all. If education loses funding schools are often unable to fire or give pay cuts to the bad teachers; they are forced to do so across the board.

The combination of everyone knowing and loving a teacher, teachers being paid by government, and teachers being mostly unable to negotiate pay on an individual basis seems a likely culprit for this fierce anti-criticism environment. This incentive structure definitely lends itself to a fear of criticism.

Or maybe I’m just vile and nasty, and opposed to everything nice. After all, I’m not a dog person.