MEA Endorsment - a Conflict of Interest
This entry was posted on 10/2/2008 9:28 AM and is filed under County-Livingston,Education.
In the posting here titled "The Dedicated Dricks" I wrote that a school board candidate should not accept an MEA endorsement because it was a conflict of interest. The candidate should be elected to represent the interests of the constituents and increasingly those interests conflict with those of the MEA.
In reply a commentator wrote:"I found an Oath of Office for a School Board Member and pasted it below. It does not say anything about representing voters.....I am interested in knowing if this is a Russell Spencer belief based on conservative dogma? "
Have we are come so far adrift from our roots that it is not recognized as a a truism that elected officials owe their intelligent allegiance to those who elected them. It is the fundamental principle of representative democracy on which this nation was founded. Is this no longer taught in Civics?
Otherwise, it is Thurber's nightmare; government of the chickens by the foxes, for the foxes.
Is it now necessary to enshrine this principle in the oath of office?
If so, do we need to also add an oath to put the elected official's constituents ahead of his/her self-interest?
This same weakness in people's understanding leads to some of our representatives in DC listening to lobbyists rather than the folks back home.
Local school boards were founded to ensure that the citizens have a say in what their children are taught and how. That they learn principles consistent with community standards not those of far off left coast organizations funded by wealthy ideologues or theorized by wacko academics.
They employ teachers, administrators, janitors etc to operate the schools in ways that meet legal requirements and community standards.
They don't intend, for example, that the school be a hatchery for socialists nor the students victims of social engineering experimentation. They expect that socialist principles, if taught at all, be taught in the light of the horrific experience of Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union and China when they were applied.
The commentator finally expressed incredulity at my report that Brighton School Board had authorized a contract with the MEA that granted concessions which were $3.5 million in excess of funds available.
Yes indeed, incredible as it may seem, the board knew this. Clearly the board had placed the interests of MEA ahead of those of its constituency. It was for this reason that I employed strong words like idiocy and buffoonery to describe the situation.
Russell Spencer
