When you’re the head of a major urban teachers union, you want to be perceived as a badass. The guy who’ll rough up the superintendent. The guy who’ll fight for every last cent of teachers’ pay. And resist all those “contract reform” initiatives that threaten to water down job protections.

It’s tough to sustain the badass image, though, when the superintendent gushes about what a wonderful guy you are.

For the last year, that’s all that Washington Teachers’ Union President George Parker has heard out of the mouth of D.C. schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee. Words like “progressive” and “visionary.” Or this little soliloquy that aired last month on an episode of Charlie Rose’s nationally broadcast program: “We have a great union leader. This man, George Parker, he wants to do the right thing for kids. He wants to do the right thing for his teachers.”

Later, Rhee called Parker “a great union president” and, when asked by Rose what she can accomplish in the coming year, said, “I know that we can institute the most radical reform-minded teachers union contract in this country.”

Yeesh! What’s a union boss gotta do to get some interpersonal strife around here?

Here’s what Rhee should have told Rose: “We have a very stubborn union leader. This man, George Parker, consistently places the interests of his rank and file ahead of the interests of the children.”... Continued