July 3, 2016

Senator Eleanor Sobel

2600 Hollywood Blvd.

Hollywood, FL 33020

Senator Sobel,

“Teaching is a profession, and teachers

Should be treated as professionals.”

The Sun Sentinel

Today

You

It would be like pole-axing a baby seal if I were to point out that no other profession, none whatsoever, takes July and August off from the swift completion of their appointed tasks. Plumbers, jet pilots, dermatologists, lawyers, hookers, ZIKA inspectors, loan sharks, community activists, saloon keepers, undertakers, beer salesmen, disc jockeys, politicians, literate curmudgeons, and columnists have to face the vagaries of a 12 month work schedule. Therefore I shan’t do it.

Here’s one way to make the profession better and more rewarding.

Napoleon would pick 3 poilus before a battle and charge them with cowardice. He would court-martial them, find them guilty, and execute them.   He said it “encouraged the others”. Try that in a “failing” school. After all, “it’s for the children”, isn’t it?

“Nuclear” Jack Welch, “Chainsaw” Al Neuarth, and Abraham Lincoln were professionals who did what they had to do to advance their agenda. In the case of Lincoln it took him 3 years and much blood before he found the right generals. When he did he repealed the Dred Scott decision.

The Sun Sentinel, having just emerged from bankruptcy, and faced with a hostile takeover, will shortly begin the practice of journalistic defenestration. The bleeding hearts will soon enter the world “where stones are hard and water is wet”. It is a world where professionals endure, prevail, and prosper. Or they don’t. It’s why score is kept. It’s why no Super Bowl will ever end in a scoreless tie.

Meantime here is another suggestion. 

Ulysses S. Grant said the best way to get rid of a bad law was to enforce it. Here’s my plan. All elected members of any governing body anywhere in Florida plus any government employee who earns a living in the educational morass must, with no exceptions, have all his children enrolled in the nearest public school. 

Watch how quickly the needle turns up.

Kevin Smith