Like Doug Henwood, I’ve spent the last few days trying to figure out why people — particularly liberals and pseudo-liberals in the chattering classes — hate teachers unions. One could of course take these people at their word — they care about the kids, they worry that strikes hurt the kids, and so on — but since we never hear a peep out of them about the fact that students have to swelter through 98-degree weather in jam-packed classes without air conditioning, I’m not so inclined.

Forgive me then if I essay an admittedly more impressionistic analysis drawn from my own experience.

Like many of these journalists, I hail from an upper middle class background. I grew up in Chappaqua, an affluent suburb of New York. My parents moved there in 1975 for the schools, which were — and I believe still are — terrific. From elementary school through senior year, I had some of the best teachers I’ve ever encountered.