In Democrat-run cities across America, teachers' unions have pulled out all the stops to avoid returning to classrooms.  When it comes to the Wuhan virus, no class of workers in America has been as craven as unionized teachers.  The United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA) has been among the most aggressive in avoiding returning to work.  That's why it's huge news when UTLA's private Facebook group plots how to sneak off for overseas travel without parents knowing.

As always, let me begin with my bias: I don't like teachers' unions.  My dad was in one in the 1970s and 1980s and routinely returned from union meetings with stories about crackpot ideas for the classrooms.  I was a public school student who was on the short end of all of those crackpot ideas.

I'm also opposed as a matter of principle to public-sector unions.  In an ordinary union situation, both parties to the table — the boss and the workers — have skin in the game.  While each side wants more money, both have a vested interest in keeping the business afloat.  Neither can get too greedy.

It's different with public-sector unions.  There, the parties' unified interest isn't the institution; instead, it's how to get more money from taxpayers.  While the government negotiator ostensibly represents taxpayers, the unspoken deal with government unions is that the negotiator milks the taxpayers, and the unions hand a substantial percentage of that money to the Democrat party.  Even Franklin Roosevelt recognized the problem and refused to unionize the federal government.  It fell to Kennedy to do that as a payoff for the unions getting him the presidency.

Nowhere is the corruption of government employee collective bargaining more evident than with the teachers' unions.  More than any other union workers, the teachers' unions contribute to the Democrat party.  The party, therefore, dances to the teachers' tune.  But the teachers' unions have an extra ace in the hole: they have enormous power over children.

This is not just the power to educate children well.  In fact, in most big-city districts, teachers educate children horribly.  Instead, the power is to give grades that will get children into good colleges.  Moreover, the higher up the economic ladder one goes, the greater that power is.

Although Bari Weiss's must-read City Journal article focuses on the anti-American race-hatred permeating expensive private, not public, schools, what stands out is the fact that upper-middle-class parents are terrified that teachers will punish obstreperous parents by giving their children the type of bad grades that preclude entry into good colleges.

I know from personal experience that the same attitude is present in public schools.  The more ambitious parents are for their children, the more likely they are to accept whatever nastiness the teachers throw their way.  The parents know that their children (or, rather, their children's grades) are held hostage in those classrooms.  That's how you get this kind of arrogant racism from the president of the United Teachers of Los Angeles:

Myart-Cruz's attitude explains why the UTLA has been one of the most intransigent unions when it comes to returning Los Angeles children (many of whom are poor, with many of those poor being minorities) to the classroom.  The teachers like getting paid their full salaries for the bunny slipper commute.

It turns out it's an even greater gig when you've got some awesome vacations lined up.  The problems start if parents get wind of the fact that the teachers who hold their children's grades hostage — and who are literally driving children to madness and suicide — are running a big grift.

A whistleblower leaked to Bill Melugin, a Fox L.A. correspondent, a post from the UTLA Internal Facebook Group.  The post is a doozy:

If you are planning any trips for Spring Break, please keep that off of Social Media. It is hard to argue that it is unsafe for in-person instruction, if parents and the public see vacation photos and international travel.

Statement from UTLA to @FOXLA when we asked about the post:
"We have a diverse membership and they are able to post their views on personal Facebook pages and in this Facebook group - however UTLA does not monitor nor is responsible for the content." Parents angry. Story at 10pm.

— Bill Melugin (@BillFOXLA) March 9, 2021

(Megulin notes that this last statement is untrue.  UTLA is one of the Facebook page's moderators.)

No wonder that, after the story broke, the LAUSD finally reached a deal with the teachers' unions to re-open schools.

If there's one good thing about the Wuhan virus, it's exposed the teachers' unions corruption for all to see.  Maybe that will finally break the unions' power and allow good teachers to flourish and bad ones to find another profession.

Image: Empty classroom by MChe Lee on Unsplash.