Hey, here’s a bold new idea for a teachers union resolution: How about “teach students to read, write, do math and think”?
Here is what the Marxist Chicago teachers union, which isn’t much different from other teachers unions except that they are louder, announced as its resolution for 2026 with that graphic above on “X”:
“Our New Year’s resolution: Speak truth to power. We do it in our classrooms by teaching the truth. We will protect academic freedom and ensure students learn honest, inclusive history that reflects their lives and communities. We’ll also speak truth to power by defending Black and brown and immigrant communities who are targeted by federal agents. From Know Your Rights trainings to walking school buses to rapid response teams, we will continue to create spaces where students can learn without fear. And we speak truth to power by fighting back against an administration trying to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education and roll back civil rights protections that generations have fought to secure. Speaking truth to power means refusing censorship, rejecting criminalization, and choosing solidarity every time. In 2026, CTU recommits to telling the truth, protecting our communities, and organizing for a future rooted in dignity and care.”
Pro tip: when an organization feels it has to emphasize that it is teaching “the truth” five times (with another evocation of “honesty”) in a 148 word statement, it’s lying.
Further providing all the evidence we need to conclude that the Chicago teachers union isn’t particularly concerned with promoting education rather than leftist ideology, the union has announced an “emergency protest” against the U.S.’s military action in Venezuela to remove Nicolás Maduro. The same union visited Venezuela in 2019 and praised the dictator, saying, hilariously, “We didn’t see a single homeless person!” At the time, Prof. Jonathan Turley noted, “Venezuela is a humanitarian and civil liberties disaster. The repressive regime of Nicolás Maduro has been condemned around the world for its campaign of killings, arrests, and torture with the help of hundreds of Cuban intelligence officers. The free press and any dissent has been brutally destroyed as the nation itself [was] reduced to pre-industrial standards. Beyond Cuba, North Korea, and other authoritarian regimes, Venezuela has few friends . . . . except union teachers from Chicago.”
A wag on Twitter/”X” commented, “You fools orchestrated “No Kings” protests a few months ago and now you’re defending a dictator. You can’t make this stuff up.”
Socialist/Communist teachers unions are core supporters of the Democratic Party and substantially responsible for our education system becoming a political indoctrination machine that no longer educates. Ultimately, however, the blame for this disaster rests on apathetic parents and voters who allow it to continue, perhaps because their own critical thinking skills were stunted in their own education.
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Pointer: Legal Insurrection
Ethics Alarms 
It’s often difficult to determine, but typically, when text repeats itself, it’s a sign that it was written by an AI. I checked anyway. It is labeled that the second half was likely written by AI.
It flagged this part:
From Know Your Rights trainings to walking school buses to rapid response teams, we will continue to create spaces where students can learn without fear. And we speak truth to power by fighting back against an administration trying to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education and roll back civil rights protections that generations have fought to secure. Speaking truth to power means refusing censorship, rejecting criminalization, and choosing solidarity every time. In 2026, CTU recommits to telling the truth, protecting our communities, and organizing for a future rooted in dignity and care.”
Oh, that’s nice: teachers using AI and representing it as their own output.
Since all they’re doing is spouting Democratic Party Talking Points, using AI is basically six to one, half a dozen to the other.
AM! Did you know my father-in-law? “Six of one, half a dozen of the other” was one of his favorite tag lines. (“For cryin’ out loud” was right up there.) You and he are the only two people I’ve ever heard use that expression! He was of Scottish descent and from Massachusetts. Where did you, or your forebears, pick it up?
Well, to be honest…I picked it up from an episode of “Hogan’s Heroes” I saw as a teenager. Blame Bob Crane!
Hilarious! My father-in-law was a WWII Navy vet, Purple Heart, crew on a PBY forced to crash land over New Guinea. So, maybe he picked it up in the Navy or the Merchant Marine before the war broke out. I’ve only heard the “of” version rather than “to.” Cheers.
All of these expressions are familiar to me–I’m in my 70s and all of my parents’ friends used them. This was in the San Francisco area and all were children of immigrants so what does that tell you. The one expression I ever heard growing up came from my father-in-law, a doctor who started in Georgia, then moved to Miami. He was particularly annoyed by anyone who started a sentence with “I thought” followed by an excuse for doing something stupid. The saying goes as follows: If you think in one hand and shit in the other, which one gets full first? I have used this expression many more times than I would have ever expected–surprisingly, many people seem to think “I thought” is an adequate excuse. I love the grit of the expression which seems to cut through unnecessary verbal exchanges.
And here’s another of Charlie’s favorites: “[He or she] couldn’t find Kate Smith in a phone book.” I doubt that could have made it into ’60s TV dialogue.
Phone booth! Sheesh.
My late grandmother had a plethora of old sayings: “You’re the bee’s knees”, “You’re the cat’s meow”, “That’s hotter than a pepper pot”. “Richer than a cranberry merchant”
Even Google doesn’t know what that last one means.
My favorite, though, was “You look like the south side of a cow going north.”
I use it regularly
I use it, too! My father always said it. I had no idea it wasn’t a common expression
I’ve never heard of “walking school buses.” Or are they “walking [verb transitive] school buses to rapid response team?”
My great aunt Margaret Haley was a founder of the Chicago Teacher’s Union. Margaret Haley – Wikipedia She succeeded in getting the powers that be in Chicago to properly fund the Chicago schools with the property taxes the Wrigleys, et al., weren’t paying.
“I’ve never heard of “walking school buses.” Or are they “walking [verb transitive] school buses to rapid response team?””
According to a quick Google search, a walking school bus is simply a group of schoolchildren chaperoned on their walk to school by two adults. It often has a structured route with preplanned stops, similar to an actual school bus.
Every week, I see political cartoons lambasting the CTU’s cozy relationship with Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson, and their pursuit of power and leftist causes at the expense of their job of educating the children in the Chicago Public Schools.
Here’s a piece on how the CTU has gone off the rails. Chicago Teachers Union
The gerund ‘teaching’ appears once, the verb ‘learn’ appears twice, the noun ‘student’ is absent? This screed from self proclaimed educators would not have passed the muster of my 6th grade teacher, Mrs. Tailfer. She would have red penciled it. She would have asked, what is a ‘walking school bus’? Or how does one engage in ‘walking school buses to rapid response.’
My 7th grade social studies teacher, Mr. Scala, taught that if you cannot say what you need to say in three well constructed sentences, then it is not worth saying at all.
“Speaking truth to power means refusing censorship, . . . .”
Riiiiiiiiiiiight . . . . I’m SURE that when conservative voices want to speak, you’ll be right there defending to the death their right to say it, even though you oppose it. OF COURSE you will.
–Dwayne
“Speaking truth to power” means spouting whatever talking points have been issued on any given day by the DNC.
See, eg., Jack’s next post.