{"id":10480,"date":"2011-05-16T11:03:58","date_gmt":"2011-05-16T18:03:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/?p=10480"},"modified":"2011-05-16T11:10:21","modified_gmt":"2011-05-16T18:10:21","slug":"why-is-the-nsea-afraid-of-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/why-is-the-nsea-afraid-of-me\/","title":{"rendered":"Enemy Of The State…Teachers Union"},"content":{"rendered":"
(Michael Chamberlain\/Nevada Business Coalition<\/em>) – Saturday I was kicked out of the Nevada State Education Association, the state teachers union, convention for, well, for being a conservative at the NSEA convention. Not only did they kick me out of their meeting but, later, one of the directors called me and the others who attended as guests of one of the delegates \u201cenemies\u201d of the organization.<\/p>\n One of the people who escorted me out of the meeting is a former Executive Director of the ACLU of Nevada, to boot! How\u2019s that First Amendment working for you?<\/p>\n After being invited by and accompanying one of the delegates and following all of the proper procedures, I received a legitimate guest pass when registration opened in the morning. Hours later, during the afternoon business meeting, I was asked to leave my seat in the designated guest area and led out of the building by three members of the NSEA.<\/p>\n As I was walked out the door I was photographed by what I assume was the convention\u2019s official photographer. Maybe they\u2019ll put me on their Facebook page! I can see the caption now, \u201cAnother subversive infiltrator is perp-walked from the premises!\u201d<\/p>\n My offense? I was not being loud or disruptive and I was seated in the designated guest area. In fact, the only person in the room I spoke with before being approached by event staff was a lady whose phone I promised to give safe-keeping as it charged.<\/p>\n While I was using a digital recorder and taking notes on my laptop there were no signs or announcements indicating such things were prohibited. Though I was asked to erase my recording there were many others recording the meeting as well. In fact, I\u2019ve since obtained a copy of the full meeting from someone else. If this were the reason for my dismissal it was both highly selective and very ineffective.<\/p>\n Furthermore, the rationale I was given at the time had nothing to do with any of my actions. The reason I was escorted out of the convention, I was told, was that I was not qualified to receive a guest pass. Two different people, one of whom was Debbie Cahill, NSEA Deputy Executive Director, informed me that only family members of NSEA delegates and members of NSEA who were not delegates were eligible to be guests at the convention.<\/p>\n If this were truly the case, if their objection to my presence were merely a question of credentials or qualifications, was there not a better way to deal with the situation than to perp-walk me out of the building?<\/p>\n The size of the contingent, which included NSEA Executive Director Gary Peck, who is also a former ED of the ACLU of Nevada, would seem to be evidence against it being due to them just then realizing an error in granting credentials. The \u201cenemies\u201d comment also appears to indicate there was more to it than that.<\/p>\n