So the Little Lying Yellow Flier is Out

As is usual with our local group of ne’er-do-wells, their little list of complains and whines appeared today, and probably in district mail-boxes, and it’s full of deceptions and mischaracterizations, half-truths and propaganda designed to terrify people into voting “no” on the contract.

I don’t even know where to begin. “The Wall Street Journal reports that oil prices will be over $6.00 a gallon”? I’m sure they did—in July. What are they reporting now, since oil has started to fall?

And does that even matter? The teacher’s contract will lead to less than $100 increase on a $100,000 home—not the astronomical amount they claim—and what it does is the right thing. But then, who wants to do what’s right? Even the Monadnock Taxpayer’s Association admits teachers need a contract, they just don’t want to pay for it.

Lovely people.

Their statements about early retirement are full of lies. The Monadnock Taxpayer’s Associationmakes it sound as if this contract keeps the early retirement clause: “early retirement and large longevity raises are excessive benefits by anyone’s standards. They must be stopped now, with a NO vote on September 9th.”

I can’t say this enough: Voting “no” will keep the clause in the contract. The taxpayers are hoping that the Sullivan lawsuit will sweep it all away, rather than allow the democratic process to go forward. Judicial fiat is so much nicer than actually honestly informing the population and letting them vote.

If the taxpayers are certain they’re right, they should be able to tell the whole truth. Instead, they lie.

The truth is that this contract removes early retirement. It will run it’s course, and I and most every teacher in the district will never see it. Why, if the taxpayers are so dead set against it will they not vote to remove it?¹ Why will they not tell the public that, if they has passed the March contract the cost for early retirement would have been 2 million? By not passing it then, 5 more teachers were allowed to retire, increasing the cost. They can’t even get their numbers straight—$25,000 is not how much a teacher receives from early retirement. More misleading figures, more misleading lies.

If this contract is not defeated, then it will go even higher. If the early retirement is not fair, then vote “yes” and be done with it.

Why do they lie about the evergreen clause? This was what they demanded be struck from the March contract, and it has been. The district has stated, very clearly in the mailing that has gone out, that this contract will not be subject to the evergreen clause in the state law. This was what they wanted in March, and now they’re citing it as a reason to vote against the contract? The Monadnock Taxpayer’s Association see-saws more than a the busiest children’s toy in the world’s largest elementary school.

This is the only way to pass a contract now without an evergreen clause. They should be leaping on it, and instead are fighting it. Hypocrites and vicious, greedy monsters. They don’t want anything other than to stab in the back every individual working in the district.

I wouldn’t mind so much if they could do it to my face. I wouldn’t mind it so much if could stand up, be counted, and tell the truth. But when they lack even that…When they lack even the guts to admit their own culpability in the situation facing the district…

Utterly frustrating. Utterly unbelievable. Utterly sickening.

Utterly typical. I could go on and on, ripping to shreds every lie, everything I and everyone else has written and they’ve never refuted, that they never could refute, but I’ve got work to do. I’ve got a host of kids who are looking for feedback on their schoolwork, and they’re going to get it tomorrow because it’s best for their education—and I’ll swallow the anger at every seething comment about how little I work and how little I do as I finish another fifteen hour day for someone else’s flesh and blood.

Because right now, I’m too sick over it all to even pretend to be civil. And I don’t like sinking to their level.

1 Aside from its use as a cudgel to spread lies about the district, I mean? ↺

Gregarious