One of the dumbest, and pernicious, obsessions has to be trying to tag teachers for the bad state of a lot of schools. Seriously? It’s just mindless, blind ideological hatred that comes straight from a hostile right-wing that wants to eviscerate the political power of teachers’ unions. In the list of the assault add the bad decision coming out of the mouth of a mediocre Los Angeles judge.

The decision:

A California judge ruled Tuesday that teacher tenure laws deprived students of their right to an education under the State Constitution and violated their civil rights. The decision hands teachers’ unions a major defeat in a landmark case, one that could radically alter how California teachers are hired and fired and prompt challenges to tenure laws in other states.

“Substantial evidence presented makes it clear to this court that the challenged statutes disproportionately affect poor and/or minority students,” Judge Rolf M. Treu of Los Angeles Superior Court wrote in the ruling. “The evidence is compelling. Indeed, it shocks the conscience.”

True, by the way, is a graduate of the impressive University of Redlands (huh?) and an appointee to the Municipal in 1995 by Republican Governor Pete Wilson (you know, the same guy who would launch a vicious campaign in support of a ballot initiative targeting undocumented immigrants).

Randi Weingarten, president of the AFT, has a great statement in reply:

But in focusing on these teachers who make up a fraction of the workforce, he strips the hundreds of thousands of teachers who are doing a good job of any right to a voice.  In focusing on who should be laid off in times of budget crises, he omits the larger problem at play: full and fair funding of our schools so all kids have access to the classes—like music, art and physical education—and opportunities they need.

And:

No wealthy benefactor with an extreme agenda will detour us from our path to reclaim the promise of public education.

The attacks against teachers ignores the serious misplaced budget priorities, at the federal and state level. When parents have to have fundraisers to buy pencils and supplies for classrooms, that isn’t a teacher problem. That’s a social crisis–that has been created by the very forces that attack teachers, meaning the idiots who run around trying to defund government–no, defund society–for the sake of their own personal wealth.