CNN: States, GOP go after teachers unions in budget crisis

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/02/17/teacher.budget.crisis/

By Carol Costello, CNN
February 17, 2011 6:22 p.m. EST

Washington (CNN) -- As angry teachers in the Midwest shut down more than a dozen school districts in protest Thursday, Republican officials across the nation have made teachers' unions "public enemy No. 1" in a battle to trim budgets and rewrite the rules on how unions and states work together.

In Wisconsin, Ohio, New York and New Jersey, governors are taking on the unions -- who they see as guilty of demanding excessive benefits and causing out-of-control waste -- in their quest to cut spending and regain control over the educational system.

Some feel overly generous union contracts are busting state budgets, and many are using the current fiscal crisis to do something about it.

"I'm attacking the leadership of the union because they're greedy, and they're selfish and they're self-interested," New Jersey's Republican Gov. Chris Christie told a conservative conference Wednesday.

FULL story and video at link.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

* Governors in Wisconsin, Ohio, New York and New Jersey are taking on teachers unions
* Many school districts used federal stimulus dollars to make up shortages in state funding
* In Wisconsin, more than 100,000 public employees held a giant sick-out
* Wisconsin lawmakers are no-shows to stop vote on collective bargaining bill

[Reader Rabbit]

1. "Some feel overly generous union contracts are busting state budgets."

Only because the whores in the the media keep pimping this falsehood. The money is there, it's just that a depressingly tiny number of politicians will point that out and even fewer with suggest taxing the minority who've got it in order to solve our problems.

[Loki]

2. This is very simple.

When the GOP attacks our teachers, they are attacking our children. They will be sorry they every started this one.