Thank you NEA.
You are more accurate than you may realize.
I taught for 10 years at the Clarks Public Schoolx, a K-12 school 10 miles west of Central City on hiway 30. It was where I was a deputy marshal. For nine of those ten years I was the principal negotiator for the Clarks chapter of the NEA. Among other things my job was to represent teachers who were threatened with dismissal by the school board. A first year art teacher, fresh out of college and with a wife and family, was informed that his contract would not be renewed. Now, in Nebraska school boards have the right to fire a teacher without having to show cause and for any reason whatever during the first two years of a teacher's employment with the school. This teacher's "crime" was that he had long hair. In fact, with his beard (before he shaved it off) he looked like Jesus as portrayed in 1979 "The Jesus Movie". Check at around 58 seconds.
http://youtu.be/E9gaH2SU1bo?t=30m38sMost of the time the board members are reasonable and often back out of what is a clear "knee jerk" reaction if they are given an opportunity to do so without losing face. But, this teacher looked too much like a hippy (my Jesus comparison didn't work) and they were sure he was going to corrupt their children's moral and political values. After all, wasn't he teaching them how to draw human forms? The next thing you know he be showing them how to draw nudes!
Well, I finally got them to agree to an outside arbitration with a representative of the NEA from the Lincoln head office. The guy came and immediately asked for a closed executive session. After 30 minutes he came out and announced that John had lost his job but the school board agreed to replace the history and civics books with the "Education 2000" series. (This happened around 1979.) I wasn't aware of what that series was about, and did some research. It turns out that by being afraid of a kid with long hair the board jumped out of the frying pan into the fire. The editorial board of the books included people who were known "Progressives", and the psychiatric advisor was one who had stated that "religion is a mental disease and Christian parents should not be allowed to teach their children anything, much less religion, and leave their education and moral upbringing totally to the public schools. The themes in the material included the now familiar "dead white guys" complaint about who (DEWMs) wrote the Constitution, etc.... The series was essentially a Marxist propaganda tool.
We can now see the results. Most high schools graduates today have very little understanding of our Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. They do not understand the separation of powers principle, or the roles defined in the constitution for the three branches of our government. And, based on their voting records in the last 20 years, neither do most of Congress or the Senate or the President, or if they understand it their votes show they disagree with it.
BTW, John was a wonderful person with a high moral character and was an excellent artist. His primary reason for accepting a job at Clarks was so that he could get close to nature with his art. I lived 5 miles outside of Clarks, in the country, 1/2 mile from the Platte River, and hunted and fished both for fun and to put food on the table. John lived a further 2 miles west of me and even closer to the river. All the kids loved him except for one, a child of a board member who didn't get an A in art.
This article sums it up nicely:
http://adinakutnicki.com/2012/08/07/barack-hussein-obamas-deconstruction-plans-green-wise-via-the-economy-disarming-the-citizens-via-gun-control-connecting-the-dots-addendum-to-the-second-term-plans-of-an-obama-presidency-c
