From The Washington Post...

Link to Original Story

The Answer Sheet
By Valerie Strauss

BP, Bloomberg and teachers: A parody

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg recently said that top executives at BP should not be blamed for the gadzillions of gallons of oil spewing into the Gulf of Mexico from the damaged offshore well.

"The guy who runs BP didn’t exactly go down there and blow up the well," the mayor said on his WOR radio show.

Bloomberg also recently backed away from his proposal to lay off more than 4,400 New York teachers, saying he would freeze salaries instead. The Department of Education still plans to cut nearly 2,000 teacher positions through attrition.

Here’s a news parody that Gary Babad, a clinical social worker, wrote on the NYC Public School Parents blog. Considering how nutty the actual news has been, you can forgive people who read this and thought it was true.

(GBN News): NY City Mayor Michael Bloomberg today reiterated his assertion that BP executives should not be blamed for the ongoing Gulf oil spill. But this time he went even further, telling reporters at a City Hall news conference that accountability should be laid squarely on the shoulders of those who are truly responsible– the teachers unions.

Asked by a reporter how teachers could be held responsible for the disaster when they have nothing whatsoever to do with oil drilling, the Mayor snapped, “I’ve had enough of their whining about accountability.”

As the reporter was hustled out of the room by the Mayor’s security detail, Mr. Bloomberg continued, “Good teachers can make up for problems in children’s environment, like poverty, poor nutrition, lack of parental involvement, absenteeism and drug use. If their unions weren’t blocking reform, c’mon, teachers would certainly be able to deal with a little environmental problem like oil in the Gulf.”

Reaction to the Mayor’s statement was swift. A NY Post editorial praised the Mayor’s stance towards the teachers unions as “courageous”, and went on to say that, “If the teachers had spent as much energy capping the well as they did on capping the charter schools, this whole thing never would have happened.”

Meanwhile, Education Secretary Arne Duncan suggested that Mr. Bloomberg’s statements point up a bright side to the oil spill. “This situation might be even better for our school system than Katrina,” Mr. Duncan told GBN News.

“Because now the teachers unions will finally have to stop making excuses and realize they can’t avoid true accountability.”

In a related story, newly released e-mails suggest that at the urging of charter school magnate Eva Moskowitz, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein has reportedly promised to relocate some New York City public schools to offshore oil rigs to make room for Ms. Moskowitz’ Harlem Success Academy schools.