I’m glad that there are more movies and, specifically, documentaries coming out about what’s going on in the inner cities with respect to education. One of the better movies to come out is The Cartel. And while I understand that there are two sides to every story, my gut reaction to the entire education reform and the school choice movement is that one option works and one option fails. Put all of the phony baloney math and statistics aside and look at the results – the overwhelmingly vast majority of charter schools in inner city school districts (and the suburbs for that matter) are tremendous successes while the traditional public schools are failures.

The Cartel tries to give us some reasons why this phenomenon occurs. Here is some information that director Bob Bowdon posted on The Huffington Post regarding his movie and education reform:

Education status quo defenders routinely call school choice “simplistic,” and they mean it in the bad way.

Their bullet points go like this:

The problems of American education are dizzyingly complex. There are issues of absentee parents, bad nutrition, and cultural breakdown. There’s an entertainment culture beckoning our kids to hours of videos games, television shows and gross out YouTube videos. Throw in a diminished economy where even some of the best students can’t find work after graduation, and you get a whiff of the enormous complexity. Why on earth do these reformers believe that (Insert: school choice, charter schools, vouchers, scholarships) would be some magic pill to cure this swirling array of ills? These fixes are simplistic.

Indeed, for many of these people, the very concept of “complexity” is comforting. They believe the best solutions to social problems strike ornate compromises between a wide variety of stakeholders, each of which need carefully designed provisions to preserve their interests.

If they hear news of a 2,000 page health care bill passed by the House (that most Representatives don’t read), they shrug and say, “What’s the problem?” If the 9,400 page federal tax code has obvious loopholes, they want to add more pages to plug them. If a 165-page teachers’ contract spells out the Monday through Thursday workday as six hours, 57 minutes, and 30 seconds, and the rest of us say, “are you kidding me?” — they say, “so?”

Running deep in their psyches: “Complexity is for smart people.”

What they forget is that all the great causes in American history were based on simple questions. Should slavery be legal, or not? Should women have the right to vote, or not? Should we remove our troops from Vietnam, or not? Of course entire libraries of scholarship can be collected about intricacies of these issues; yes, we’re aware of that. The point is that the decisions can all be boiled down to elegantly uncomplicated questions.

Parental school choice, in fact, is a simple concept, and just like movements for abolition, suffrage or withdrawal from Vietnam, its simplicity doesn’t make it a bad idea.

I encourage you to read through Bowdon’s entire post over at the other website. And if you have the inclination, I encourage you to buy or rent The Cartel to see what’s going on in the school choice movement today!

Let me make this very clear, folks. There is not one thing in either of these videos that is defensible. Not one. And now, for your viewing pleasure disgust, the hateful, grotesque New Jersey Education Association as presented by the same guy who brought us the ACORN videos last year.

Feeling sick to your stomach yet? Look folks – enough is enough with the NJEA. This hateful organization needs to be dismantled and the local teachers unions need to be empowered. Just like any good bureaucracy, the people at the top of this chain have forgotten their mission and values and need to be removed. Let the local unions handle the local issues – not some filthy, unethical, immoral group of scum in the NJEA’s Trenton office.

How great is Governor Christie? This guy speaks with the voice of all New Jerseyans who are sick and tired of the wimpy, petty bullshit coming out of the pansy teachers who think that because they hold a position of power in front of minors that they can treat the Governor like he’s a piece of garbage. This arrogant, rude woman that began to mock the Governor seconds after he began answering her overloaded question ought to be ashamed of herself! What did she think? That the Governor was some grade schooler that had to bow down and do as she said? Get real, woman! That’s probably why this arrogant, rude woman decided to become a teacher instead of going out into the private market – that type of rude attitude wouldn’t be tolerated for a split second in the job market!

Hey look – I didn’t like Governor Jon Corzine one bit. I thought he was an arrogant, limousine liberal who was completely out of touch with the everyday man and woman on the street. I thought that Governor Corzine was the epitome of arrogant during his time in office. Yet, when I spoke with him and when I went and listened to him talk, I would have NEVER treated him the way these liberal losers are treating Governor Christie. Who do these jerks think they are? Talk about “do as I say and not as I do,” huh? Good grief…

Governor Christie is the man. Thank God he is our Governor.

Christie told the The Associated Press in an interview that he will offer more state aid to all school districts whose teachers agree to a wage freeze for the 2011 fiscal year.

There you go. Anyone who says that Governor Chris Christie isn’t trying to work with those teachers and local unions that are sharing in the sacrifice is lying. Now you know that so when you hear someone saying how Governor Christie is attacking the wrong people (teachers instead of bureaucrats in Trenton), you know that the person saying that is a liar.

The offer won’t cost the state any more money. The Republican is offering to give districts all the money the state would save on Social Security and Medicare payroll taxes as a result of the wage freezes.

Sometimes the best solutions really are the easiest ones to accomplish, huh?

Already teachers in several districts, including in West Essex, Boonton, Montclair and Metuchen, have voluntarily offered to freeze wages.

And no one, by any means, who is in favor of education reform in New Jersey thinks that the teachers or the local unions are the problem. A great big “congratulations!” goes out to the teachers in these districts. They are changing education in this state for the better. Thank you!

But if teachers agree to wage freezes, districts could see more than a 7 percent increase in aid. For example, a district that saves $1 million in salaries as a result of wage freezes would receive an extra $75,000 in state aid.

“Maybe that helps to fund another teacher position or two, or a sports program that they might otherwise had to cut,” the governor said.

Are these programs not worth saving? As a former student athlete, I think that they are worth saving and I would hope that local teachers’ unions put their money where their mouths have been (literally) and take a one year pay freeze to support the programs that support their students.

“Gov. Christie is a very shrewd politician, and he’s using crafty political tactics to impose his agenda on the state,” NJEA President Barbara Keshishian said recently in a statement. “But when he turned his attack machine on teachers and school employees, he really stooped to a desperate new low, because our members are not the problem.”

Ms. Keshishian, your teachers are not the problem… the leviathan that your organization has become is the problem. Disassemble the NJEA now and allow countywide and local teachers’ unions to represent the true interests of their members. The time has come for the NJEA to stop getting in the way of the education reform that New Jersey so desperately needs.

Listen up, particularly, around the 1 minute mark when Governor Christie starts talking about the truth about the “it’s about the kids” argument. In the Governor’s own words, “It’s easy to say it’s about the kids when…” Watch the video below to find out how the Governor finishes that line!

Enough is enough of the same old crap in New Jersey’s broken education system. The time has come to fully fund charter schools and to break the unnecessary (and, frankly useless) statewide teachers’ union. There’s no need for a statewide association when countywide and local teachers’ unions are the source of the state group’s power. Break the NJEA now and save the future of education in New Jersey!

And the only point I tried to make was that we ought to have a lot of political dissent — a lot of political argument. Nobody is right all the time. But we also have to take responsibility for the possible consequences of what we say. And we shouldn’t demonize the government or its public employees or its elected officials. We can disagree with them. We can harshly criticize them.

But when we turn them into an object of demonization, you know, you — you increase the number of threats.

But I worry about these threats against the president and the Congress. And I worry about more careless language even against — some of which we’ve seen against the Republican governor in New Jersey, Governor Christie.

Now you can add President Clinton to the long list of people who are growing tired of the end-of-the-world rhetoric and hate mongering that is coming out of the New Jersey Education Association and some of its affiliated local unions. It’s such a damn shame that political discussions in New Jersey come down to end-of-the-world scenarios. New Jersey is the epitome of how partisan politics can fracture a state. However, if anyone can fix this mess, it’s Chris Christie. Governor Christie is one of few politicians out there who bucks the trend of playing to the public opinion polls. And watch – once Governor Christie wins this battle against the NJEA and their hate speech, his numbers will go right back up.

Anyway, here is the actual video of President Clinton’s comment:

Scumbags at NJEA Pray for Chris Christie's Death

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — Amid a state budget crisis, schools across New Jersey are facing layoffs and homeowners are bracing for hefty increases to their highest-in-the-nation property tax bills.

Gov. Chris Christie is blaming teachers unions. Teachers unions are blaming Christie.

The enmity, which goes back to last year’s gubernatorial campaign, intensified with a memo from the Bergen County Education Association to local union leaders that hints about the governor’s death.

The memo, first reported by The Record of Bergen County, reads, in part: “Dear Lord this year you have taken away my favorite actor, Patrick Swayze, my favorite actress, Farrah Fawcett, my favorite singer, Michael Jackson, and my favorite salesman, Billy Mays. I just wanted to let you know that Chris Christie is my favorite governor.”

Association president Joe Coppola said the “prayer” was a joke and was never meant to be made public.

The New Jersey Education Association was more contrite. It issued an apology on Friday, saying the attack wasn’t funny and that it takes away from the more serious discussion the group would like to have with the governor. NJEA President Barbara Keshishian said she would try to apologize personally to Christie.

At an appearance in New Brunswick on Friday, Christie didn’t see any humor in the memo — and used it as another chance to blast the teachers unions.

“They said they didn’t intend it to be public,” Christie said. “So, private prayer for my death would have been OK?”

The message so offended Republican Assemblyman Alex DeCroce that he’s asking the state’s attorney general to investigate it.

The memo — even if it was a joke — escalates an ongoing war of words.

During the Republican Christie’s run for governor last year, he didn’t mind offending the teachers union.

He refused to meet with the NJEA as it interviewed candidates to consider whom to endorse. And he attacked the union on the campaign trail. In July, he said: “Frequently, the leadership of the NJEA has been a strong advocate for the status quo, whether the status quo is succeeding or failing.”

The union endorsed incumbent Democrat Jon Corzine in the election — and paid for fliers, staffed phone banks and knocked on doors on his behalf.

This year, the state education association has aired television commercials critical of the governor.

It intensified last month when Christie proposed a state budget that called for state and federal aid to school districts to be cut about 11 percent.

Most districts will lose more state aid than that for their main programs — including some that won’t any. The majority of school districts are planning layoffs as part of their budgets. On top of that, many are planning to hike their property taxes by close to the legal limit of 4 percent.

Christie, though, says that he’ll give extra aid to any district where educators agree to freeze their salaries for the year and start paying a portion of their health insurance costs. Any layoffs, he says, will be the fault of the unions — not him.

The governor said this week that school employees in 115 of the states’ 590 districts have agreed to wage freezes. But in most of those districts, the concessions came from administrators rather than teachers. The NJEA has not encouraged its locals to make the deals.

Steve Baker, an NJEA spokesman, said the group hopes the memo dustup will create an opportunity for the group to meet with Christie to talk about the future of the state’s schools.

“Frankly, we have been talking at each other and we haven’t been talking with each other,” he said.

The NJEA is just a bunch of scumbags. You see stuff like this in the news and you do a little bit of research and find out that everything is confirmed and you just hate these people. The NJEA sucks.

But as I said yesterday, most people are getting sick of this fight because of the phony horror-stories-to-be coming out of the NJEA and the consistent pressure being put on them by the Governor. Well, it seems like some teachers and educators out there in overpaid public employee land have gotten the point and are ready to share in the same financial sacrifice and join the same real world as the rest of us in New Jersey.

According to a late afternoon release issued by the governor’s office, the type of freeze varies district by district, according to data from the state Department of Education.

“Teachers in 11 school districts have accepted wage freezes for a year or part of the year (nine for a full year; two for partial year). In five school districts, teachers have accepted a reduction in pay,” according to the governor’s office. “Administrative and support staffs have been more willing to step up and take action to protect jobs and education resources: Of the 115 districts reporting wage freezes or reductions, administrators in 101 of them have taken a full-year or part-year salary freeze (most by far were full-year freezes). Support staff in 40 did the same. In more than 16 districts, administrators and/or staff took a reduction in pay.”

“Unfortunately, these figures illustrate the obvious: that the teachers unions overwhelmingly believe everyone else should share in the sacrifice, but they alone should be held harmless in the middle of this fiscal crisis,” said the governor. “The sense of entitlement is incredible and reveals the belief that they should continue, even now, to get 4 and 5 percent salary increases year after year and pay nothing for health insurance. Meanwhile, younger, less senior teachers are losing jobs. Frankly, I just don’t understand this; nor do I believe that the public does either.”

This information was taken from a post on PolitickerNJ.com and I think it shows that there is some degree of hope in the battle between the NJEA and the Governor. What it comes down to – as always – is that public employee unions are too strong (and arrogant) in New Jersey and their unchecked strength has led to an unsustainable public benefits system. Where else in the world (besides dictatorships) does it make better financial sense to work for the government instead of private enterprise?! That’s crazy.

I’m not saying that we shouldn’t pay good people for good work. We absolutely should. However, I am saying that when the rest of the people in this state are struggling to make ends meet and when the private sector is shedding jobs left and right – who are the public employee unions to say that they are above the Great Recession? Who are these unions to say that they are untouchable by the whims of the free market?

Get real. Public employees should be taking pay freezes and public employees should be taking wage reductions and public employees should be getting laid off in these economic times. This is what happens when times are tough – everyone suffers…public employees, too!

And since this blog is mostly read by New Jerseyans, I’m sure that you’re probably getting sick and tired of the back and forth between Governor Chris Christie’s completely logical, financially-fundamentally sound budget proposal and the cries of “save the children!” coming from the people at the New Jersey Education Association (NJEA aka “the teachers’ union”). Well, since we’re all pretty much disgusting in this state, I thought I’d share something that I received in my inbox earlier today. It comes from a group out of Washington DC called the Center for Education Reform and I think it accurately summarizes why each day more and more New Jerseyans are getting sick of hearing from the NJEA.

UNION PLOY. To fight having to share in the state’s fiscal burden, the New Jersey teachers union (among others) is hiding behind what we in Washington call “The Washington Monument Ploy.” In days of old, when lawmakers would threaten budget cuts, those opposed would pull out the old “Well, now we’ll have to close down the Washington Monument.” That would create a fierce public outcry, causing legislators to go hiding behind increased spending. Same in New Jersey, where students were recently counseled at one high school that they’d no longer have arts or music or even literature because of “that” Governor. Nice lesson.

This is the type of crap that needs to be removed from our schools. Any publicly paid employee (in this case, educators and employees of school districts) who sees no problem in taking a strong political stance in front of their students and their young, impressionable minds should really not be in education, period. If that isn’t a bastardization of “civic engagement,” then I don’t know what is!

Enough is enough with bad teachers and self-righteous union bureaucrats. Everyone in this state is suffering and it’s high time that these public employees came and joined the party. In the next few days I hope to get some information up on the blog about the report that came out the other day about the Council on Affordable Housing. Among other issues, it cited how in the 1990’s in New Jersey, private sector jobs grew at a rate of 22 to 1 when compared to public sector jobs. During the 2000’s? Public sector jobs grew at a rate of 2 to 1 when compared to private sector jobs. That’s a horrifying, disgusting statistic.

And if you don’t know why that’s a horrifying statistic then you probably don’t have the economic or financial background necessary to make a decent argument in the NJEA/Christie battle anyway.

However, I’m sick and tired of hearing the ignorant bullshit flowing out of people regarding the end result of these spending cuts. The biggest load of crap comes out of the legions of young professionals who will likely be let go because of these cuts. These morons spout on and on about how Governor Christie is costing them their jobs. Bullshit. First of all, anyone who spews this crap clearly doesn’t know how the government works and I strongly question whether or not they should be employed by a school district in the first place. Governor Christie is not costing you your job since he does not control local property taxes. Period. End of story. Done. No questions asked.

Second, I’m sick of hearing these young “professionals” (and I use the term “professionals” lightly since if you read some of their online posts, they are anything but professional) bitch and moan about how education cuts lead to more students in each classroom and a lower quality of education. Folks, if you want to define what it means to be “brainwashed,” then try to follow this ridiculous train of logic. If you ever hear anyone saying this particular line of crap, then you automatically know that you’re hearing someone who either can’t think independently (and thus shouldn’t be a teacher) or you’re talking to someone who can’t make logical, financial connections (and thus shouldn’t be a teacher) or in some cases, you might be talking to someone who is a coward. I’ll explain.

The true cause of these young professionals losing their jobs is the excess and waste embedded in the current education system in New Jersey. There are administrators making six figures who are secretaries to assistants to secretaries to assistants, etc. There are administrators who are the second, third, or fourth assistant superintendent in some of these districts (completely unnecessary). There are administrators who don’t do shit, but collect a salary that should be going to a young teacher who actually wants to be around students. Any of these soon-to-be laid off teachers and young professionals that spew the bullshit false choices listed above, but do not scour the set up of their local school districts (and I mean look at each line in the budget as well as using Data Universe to find the salaries of the district administrators) is a coward. Just like the whole world knew that New Jersey spent too much money and this day was coming, the whole world knows that the excessive waste that goes on in New Jersey’s local governments and local school districts is unsustainable.

If you’re a young education professional who has either already been laid off or will be laid off, then I want to hear about your research into the local district and what you’ve uncovered in terms of waste. What percentage of a raise did your fellow teachers get in the last year (hint – anything other than 1% – 2% is excessive in this economy)? What about the administrators and their percentage raise? Where did that money come from when the economy grew at 0% last year (hint – the answer is increased local property taxes)? What about your administrators? Does your district have excess administrators that are taking up dollars from the budget that would have better been spent paying you and your teaching colleagues?

And here’s the key question – what did you do about what you found out?! The most that Governor Christie can do is advocate on your behalf and he’s doing that (I heard him say it with my own two ears at last week’s New Jersey Charter Schools Association conference). But what have YOU done to fight for what’s right? If your answer is, “Well, I complained that Governor Christie is costing me my job because he is costing me my job,” then you just don’t get it.

Further, if you work for a school district, then you have a government job. What did you expect to happen in a state where government spending has been out of control for over a decade?! And this wasn’t a big secret – everyone knew that government spending was out of control and that a day of reckoning was coming sooner rather than later. In fact, Governor Christie ran on a platform where he essentially said that he was going to bring this day of reckoning to New Jersey! Are some of these people who have now turned on Governor Christie so stupid that they didn’t think that he was actually going to do what he said he was going to do?!

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – I hate that some of my friends will be losing their jobs. I would never begrudge anyone a job or the ability to make a living – never. However, Governor Christie is doing exactly what he said he would do, which is exactly what New Jersey needs right now!