Michael Steele Meets with Teachers

Here is some news that you won't read anywhere else.

RNC Chairmen Michael Steele met today with a group of Republican teachers at an event hosted by the National Education Association, the largest union in the country. It was perhaps the first time in recent memory that the head of the Republican party met with teachers at the NEA headquarters.

"You are all Republicans?" he asked when he got to the podium. After a loud happy chorus of "yes!" he asked "And you are in the NEA?" The crowd yelled "yes" again, as everyone at this particular NEA gathering was in fact a Republican teacher. "That's freaken awesome!" Steele said in delight.

The Republican National Committee (RNC) is not opposed to teachers- Steele wanted us to all be aware that the RNC and the Republican party is never opposed to teachers, in spite of how they might view or talk about the teachers union. "The RNC would like to thank all you teachers for what you do," he said.

The first thing he talked about was how he viewed healthcare, and he tried to relate it back to teachers. He suggested that our nation not "lurch blindly into healthcare," referring to the speed and secrecy which the Democrat's healthcare bill may be introduced. The most important thing he said though about this issue was that we need to view healthcare through the lens of the patient-doctor relationship, and not to make it a patient-bureaucrat relationship. This healthcare debate, he said, is about choice or orders, the individual or government, cost not access, and we need to keep those thoughts in mind.

Speaking to Republican teachers, Chairmen Steele focused most of his comments on education. He "had the privilage to teach," he said, refering to his time teaching history and economics, and he knew that teachers have "the hardest job in the world." When he was Lt. Governor, he said that he "wanted to get into the classrooms and see what was really going on- and not deal with bureaucrats, or unions, or politicians, but instead deal with the teacher/student relationship." He got into the classrooms and talked with thousands of teachers, and this gave him an insight into how to improve the education system.

But when he sat down with the NEA, it became "all personalities and politics, and not issues and problems." Steele talked about how the NEA and the Republican party need to work together to build bridges and find consensus on issues, and move towards making progress on improving our educational system.

Steele several times looked around in surprise at being at the NEA building, which is usually not friendly to Republicans, but about 30% of the NEA is Republican, and they are becoming more organized and active in their union.

Speaking from his position as head of the RNC, he said that what we need to do as a country is put in place more policies that let teachers do their jobs and let them be the great teachers that they are, and those are the sort of ideas that the NEA and the Republican party should both be embracing.