I know this headline is harsh. I feel a measure of shame about it. I think about what my pastor would tell me about such utterances and I do feel a twinge of guilt. I do feel ungracious and I do recognize I have some repenting to do.

I also feel tired…and angry…and great sadness for the children of Chicago. Reason is no longer a viable tactic against the union cabal. It’s time for some brutal honesty, and honestly speaking, the Chicago Teachers Union is nothing more than the mafia dressed up as an advocacy group. The difference is that the traditional mafia didn’t take hits out on children; that was the one group of people that were off limits, because even the traditional mafia has some type of principle. The teachers unions are completely devoid of principles at this point. They are willing to take out an entire generation just to satisfy their own greed.

These criminals voted in the dead of night – on a school night – to cancel classes…immediately. Unsuspecting parents woke up to the news that there would be no school for their children on Wednesday. Talk about a punch to the gut. Happy New Year.

There are no good explanations here. There is nothing that can make this make sense for the parents who have already been through hell trying to maintain the learning progress of their children while simultaneously trying to figure out how they go to work and care for their young ones. There are some people who have had to make the brutal decision to leave their young children home alone, even as they are forced to listen to union shills drone on and on about how they care about their students above everything.

These people are liars, they are greedy and it’s time to call out teachers unions for what they are…wicked money laundering enterprises. Remote learning has been an utter disaster, both educationally and socially. There are no available metrics to tell us anything otherwise. By all measures, remote learning has been more disastrous for students than COVID has. The union has the nerve to sell this as a safety measure for the children, but anyone with half a brain can look around and see the children have never been the ones in danger. If teachers feel their health is at risk, they have the obligation to find other work. It is not the obligation of the children to destroy their own lives for the health of their teachers. The unions have made children responsible for the health of adults around them. That is a heavy, and unfair, burden to place on the shoulders of a child, and the dark consequences of that blame will reverberate for years to come.

These swamp monsters didn’t even have the decency to end education in the light of day. That should tell you all you need to know. The statement from the union only added insult to injury.

“Let us be clear. The educators of this city want to be in their classrooms with their students.”

Pardon my very clear English, but bullshit. If you wanted to be in the classroom, that’s where you’d be. Even the mayor, no stranger to COVID fascism, has said the same.

“We believe that our city’s classrooms are where our students should be. Regrettably, the Mayor and her CPS leadership have put the safety and vibrancy of our students and their educators in jeopardy.”

Again, if you believed the kids should be in the classroom, you’d all be there right now. What is regrettable is the lie that the CTU cares one iota for the “vibrancy” of their students. Have they seen the skyrocketing suicide rates among school-aged children? What a choice of words! “Vibrancy” is exactly what their antics have robbed our youth of for the past two years.

“To the parents and guardians of this city, we want you to know that when you put your children in our care we put their well-being and safety first. We fight for your children like they are our own, because they are.”

A)That’s creepy…B) You damn well do not consider the children of Chicago “your own” because if you did, they’d be in class, getting the education the taxpayers’ $27,000 per student, per year purchases.

“As this pandemic continues, we will do everything in our power to ensure that our classrooms are the safest and healthiest places for your children to learn, thrive and grow.”

No one is thriving. No one is growing. The city of Chicago has done everything to ensure classrooms are as safe as possible. Outside of encasing every building and every student in plastic bubble wrap from here to eternity, there is no more “safety” to be meted out. Life comes with risks, kids come with germs, schools come with flu and cold seasons. Deal with it or quit.

“We also understand the frustration that is felt by tonight’s decision, and assure our families that we will continue to work diligently, as we have for months, to encourage the Mayor and her CPS leadership team to at last commit to enforceable safety protections centered on the well-being of our students, their families and our school communities.”

Did you catch that? They’re not going to continue to work diligently to educate your children, or hear your concerns, or deliver on their obligations. They’re going to “work diligently” to bully the Mayor.

The average Chicago teacher’s salary is $80,000/yr. They are currently in their third consecutive week of paid vacation (are you?). COVID deaths and hospitalizations continue to plummet. The Omicron variant has turned out to be not much more than a cold. There is absolutely no logical reason to be shutting down schools right now. If parents do not demand an end to this madness right now, it will never end, because cold and flu season will never go away. If everything we know about viruses and their transmission holds true for COVID too, we will simply count it as another form of the flu very shortly.

Of course, they don’t want that. As Mayor Lightfoot herself said, they are politicizing this virus for their own personal gain.

If you feel unsafe teaching in a classroom, quit. You are not entitled to your job. If you disagree with your union and wish to be in the classroom, go teach in your classroom. You do not have to pay your union dues or be beholden to your union in order to teach. That is the law of the land. Ask the Supreme Court. I don’t want to hear one more teacher complain about not being in agreement with their union and feeling helpless. Do something!

This is selfishness. This is criminal. This is wicked. The Chicago Teachers Union and every union like it can go straight to hell for what they are doing to children.