{"id":1440706,"date":"2023-11-27T02:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-11-27T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/?p=1440706"},"modified":"2023-11-27T02:00:00","modified_gmt":"2023-11-27T07:00:00","slug":"randi-weingartens-not-so-dandy-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/randi-weingartens-not-so-dandy-year\/1440706\/","title":{"rendered":"Randi Weingarten’s Not-So-Dandy Year"},"content":{"rendered":"

Randi Weingarten’s Not-So-Dandy Year<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Authored by Larry Sand via American Greatness,<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

I have written about Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, <\/strong>many times over the years, as there is an ongoing abundance of subject matter to be explored. And 2023 has certainly not been an exception.<\/p>\n

Picking up where\u00a0I left off in March<\/a>…<\/p>\n

In April, Weingarten exhibited a textbook example of hypocrisy.<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s no secret that she and other union honchos hate charter schools.<\/strong><\/p>\n

These schools are rarely unionized and typically do better at educating kids than the traditional public school variety. Perhaps worse for the union crowd, charters are frequently housed in public schools with extra space due to insufficient funding.<\/p>\n

Weingarten especially has it in for\u00a0Eva Moscowitz<\/a>, who runs the very successful Success Academy chain of charter schools in New York. Under Weingarten\u2019s guidance, her union pressured New York City Mayor Eric Adams to cancel three of Moskowitz\u2019s co-location proposals for the city.<\/p>\n

Yet at the very same time, Weingarten, who sits on the board of University Prep, a unionized charter, convinced the NYC Board of Education to\u00a0approve a co-location<\/a>\u00a0for one of their schools.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Also in April, Weingarten\u00a0testified\u00a0<\/a>before the House Subcommittee on the Covid pandemic.<\/p>\n

She was there to answer questions about her union\u2019s influence on school reopening guidelines issued by the CDC.<\/p>\n

While Weingarten insisted that her main goal was opening schools, it was anything but. <\/strong><\/p>\n

She constantly argued for keeping schools shuttered through the spring and summer of 2020 when her union aggressively lobbied the CDC to adjust its school-reopening guidance. Two of its language recommendations were adopted verbatim.<\/p>\n

Yet, she had the audacity to tell Congress, \u201cWe spent every day from February (2020) on\u00a0trying to get schools open<\/a>. We knew that remote education was not a substitute for opening schools. We know that young people learn and connect best in person, so opening schools safely \u2013 even during a pandemic \u2013 guided our actions, which I will describe in detail.\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

But her \u201cdetails\u201d were really quite undetailed.<\/p>\n

She dodged, obfuscated, and even used the fact that\u00a0she was 65 years old<\/a>\u00a0to explain her memory lapses.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Additionally, Dr. Tracy H\u00f8eg, an epidemiologist,\u00a0blasted Weingarten<\/a>, accusing her of fudging a scientific study to wrongly argue to Congress that\u00a0schools should have been kept closed<\/a>\u00a0during the height of COVID-19.<\/p>\n

In May, Weingarten opined in an article that \u201cCulture Wars Harm Education.<\/a>\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n

She starts off the piece, \u201cNowadays I am the president of a union, but I am harking back to my years as a civics teacher as I write this column. Governors and education officials in Florida and other states are doing exactly what extremists baselessly accuse educators of doing\u2014imposing their ideological agenda on public schools, rewriting history, stifling free expression and creating intolerance.\u201d<\/p>\n

First off, no one is more involved with\u00a0\u201cimposing their ideological agenda on public schools\u201d than she is. <\/strong>From all the sex and gender craziness to inviting Ibram X. Kendi \u2013 probably the most vocal and aggressive CRT proponent in the country \u2013 to speak at an AFT conference. His talk was touted as, \u201cHear from Dr. Ibram X. Kendi in this free-ranging\u00a0discussion with student activists<\/a>\u00a0and AFT members on his scholarship and on developing anti-racist mindsets and actions inside and outside classrooms.\u201d\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Regarding Weingarten\u2019s \u201cyears as a civics teacher\u201d \u2013 more hooey. Yes, she taught history at\u00a0Clara Barton High School<\/a>\u00a0in Brooklyn for a few years, but\u00a0in 2011,\u00a0EAG News<\/a>\u00a0obtained her\u00a0personnel file<\/a>\u00a0via a Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) request. According to the New York City Board of Education, she was hired as a substitute teacher in 1991, received a provisional license in 1993, and a certificate to serve as a substitute in 1994. Additionally, \u201cA 1997 letter indicates she didn\u2019t submit documentation showing she\u2019d met requirements for licensure.\u00a0No record indicates she ever served as a full-time teacher<\/a>\u00a0or was evaluated by a principal or other school official.\u201d\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Yet she has never acknowledged these details or corrected the record. When she ran for president of New York\u2019s United Federation of Teachers in 1998, her opponent\u00a0Michael Shulman<\/a>\u00a0suggested that that she was not a \u201creal teacher,\u201d\u00a0explaining, \u201cShe worked\u00a0five months<\/a>\u00a0full-time that I\u2019ve been aware of, in 1992, at Clara Barton High School.\u201d He added, \u201cSince then, she taught maybe one class for\u00a040 minutes a day<\/a>.\u201d\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Also, in May, it was revealed that despite her very brief stint as a teacher, she earned\u00a015 years\u2019 worth of pension benefits.<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

The New York City teacher union collective bargaining agreement allowed her to have over 11 extra years counted toward her service even though she wasn\u2019t in the classroom. This likely came from \u201ctime spent\u2026on union leave as treasurer and then president of UFT (the AFT affiliate in NYC) from 1997 until her election as AFT president in 2008,\u201d Freedom Foundation\u2019s Director of Research\u00a0Maxford Nelsen<\/a>\u00a0notes.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

In June, national security took a hit when Weingarten was appointed to a new Department of Homeland Security\u00a0school safety advisory council<\/a>\u00a0tasked with making recommendations on \u201cemergency management,\u201d \u201cpreparedness measures,\u201d and \u201csafety and security\u201d in schools.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cLeaders of our academic institutions<\/a>\u00a0and campus life have a great deal to offer in helping us counter the evolving and emerging threats to the homeland,\u201d DHS Sec. Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Senator Rick Scott<\/a>\u00a0(R., Fl.),\u00a0venting<\/a>\u00a0his frustration with the appointment, declared Weingarten \u201cis the last person who should be advising anyone on school safety.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

July saw Weingarten\u2019s union hold its\u00a0yearly convention<\/a>, in which it tackled such matters as \u201cAffirming LGBTQIA+ Identities in and out of the classroom,\u201d <\/strong>\u201cEducation for Liberation: The Role of the Racially Conscious Educator in Combating Oppression,\u201d and \u201cStrategies for Integrating Climate Change into Your Teaching.\u201d<\/p>\n

In September, Weingarten\u2019s union launched a\u00a0major ad blitz<\/a>\u00a0to \u201chighlight the important work educators are doing in America\u2019s public schools to help kids, which is in stark contrast to the toxic attacks by extremists trying to weaken and destroy public education.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yup, with no sense of irony, the union that is obsessed with race and sexual engineering \u2013 think \u201cAffirming LGBTQIA+ Identities in and out of the classroom,\u201d \u2013 refers to those of us who are a wee bit more traditional in our approach to education as \u201cextremists.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also, in September, Weingarten trashed House Republicans\u2019 \u201cSham Impeachment Inquiry.\u201d <\/strong>Her\u00a0press release<\/a>\u00a0stated, \u201cWhile President Biden gets up every day and does the people\u2019s business\u2014strengthening the economy, advancing our national security interests, and bringing back stability and honor to the workings of government\u2014House Republicans have done little other than pursue spurious, fact-free investigations. Not one major initiative, other than a\u00a0budget bill averting default\u2014which they are now disavowing\u2014has become law.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNational security interests.\u201d The porous southern border?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cStrengthening the economy.\u201d Record inflation?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cDoes the \u2018people\u2019s\u2019 business.\u201d He was doing business all right, but hardly the \u201cpeople\u2019s.\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n

There\u2019s plenty of evidence that Biden\u2019s son Hunter and others in his family\u00a0received millions of dollars<\/a>\u00a0from foreign partners who believed they were buying influence with his father.<\/p>\n

In September, Weingarten really stepped in it when she compared the rhetoric of school choice supporters to that of segregationists.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cI was kind of gobsmacked when I was talking to Southern Poverty Law Center<\/a>, and they showed me the same words: choice\u2019, \u2018parental rights\u2019 and attempts to divide parents versus teachers, and at that point, it was white parents versus other parents. But it\u2019s the same kind of words.\u201d<\/p>\n

What is truly gobsmacking is that the union boss actually takes the comment and SPLC seriously. The widely discredited group recently smeared parent activist group\u00a0Moms for Liberty<\/a>, equating them to neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan, and labeling them an \u201cextremist group\u201d that is \u201canti-government.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Weingarten then dug a bit deeper into her hole, stupidly averring that pro-school choicers \u201cwant to have, basically, a\u00a0Christian ideology<\/a>, <\/strong>their particular Christian ideology to dominate the country as opposed to those that was born on the freedom (sic) of the exercise of religion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Talking about religion, she furthered her descent into dumb this month.<\/p>\n

Weingarten, who once stated that she was a \u201cdeeply religious Jew,\u201d was perplexed as to why video footage of an Orthodox Jewish prayer service\u00a0only showed men<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

On X, she asked, \u201cWhere are the women?\u201d<\/p>\n

She received a quick \u201ccommunity note\u201d which explained that Orthodox Jews have had gender separated prayers for thousands of years and added, \u201cThe women were on the other side praying and would not be visible from someone recording in the \u2018men\u2019s section.\u2019\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

The video footage, supplied by conservative commentator Mark Levin, who is not known for his subtlety, tweeted back to Weingarten, \u201cYou\u2019re such a contemptible moron. Get off my timeline you idiot.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also, this month,\u00a0Axios<\/em><\/a>\u00a0reported, \u201cHomeschooling is now the fastest-growing form of education in the U.S.,\u201d<\/strong><\/em> citing a\u00a0Washington Post<\/em><\/a>\u00a0analysis. Weingarten was\u00a0castigated<\/a>\u00a0by many on X after she questioned why this is happening. <\/strong>Typical was Manhattan Institute\u2019s Ilya Shapiro,\u00a0who<\/a>\u00a0told Weingarten in a tweet\u00a0that the\u00a0growth of homeschooling<\/a>\u00a0is due to \u201cthe policies you\u2019ve advocated, Covid-related and otherwise. Just like you\u2019re behind much of the increased support for school choice and educational freedom. Congratulations!\u201d<\/p>\n

As Mike Antonucci noted in 2022, Weingarten\u00a0has averaged about 47 tweets a day for more than 11 years<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Maybe if she spent a little more time researching the issues instead of shooting her mouth off willy-nilly, she would be less likely to keep stepping in dog stuff, which she does practically on a daily basis.<\/p>\n

To Weingarten\u2019s credit, she recently asserted, \u201cAll of us do stupid things<\/a>, and you know, I\u2019ve done stupid things and I made misjudgments,\u201d but gave no examples.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019m not sure just what stupid things she is referring to, but there is clearly an abundance to choose from.<\/p>\n

Perhaps even sadder than Weingarten\u2019s irritating and gaffe-prone nature is that there are 1.7 million teachers who keep her in office and pay her over\u00a0$500,000 a year<\/a>\u00a0for the privilege. Now that is really stupid.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Tyler Durden<\/a><\/span>
\nSun, 11\/26\/2023 – 21:00<\/span><\/p>\n

\u200bhttps:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/political\/randi-weingartens-not-so-dandy-year<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Randi Weingarten’s Not-So-Dandy Year Authored by Larry Sand via American Greatness, I have written about Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, many…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1440706","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","wpcat-1-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1440706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1440706"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1440706\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1440706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1440706"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1440706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}