True To Republican Form, John Kasich Advocates Punishment Just So Somebody's Punished

And don't get him started on bathroom breaks

Gov. John Kasich: 'If I were king in America, I would abolish all teachers' lounges'

Some presidential contenders have big dreams: building a solid concrete wall along our entire southern border, for example, or cutting wealthy Americans' taxes to zero percent while rebuilding our national infrastructure using only the power of rainbows.

Others, like Ohio Gov. John Kasich, prefer to focus on the little things. Like how teachers these days complain too much about their crap pay and crumbling classrooms.

"I’ll tell you what the unions do, unfortunately too much of the time. There’s a constant negative comment, ‘They’re going to take your benefits, they’re going to take your pay,'" Kasich said. "So if I were, not president, but if I were king in America, I would abolish all teachers' lounges, where they sit together and worry about, 'Woe is us.'"

A little small-ball, perhaps, but it does hit the essential Republican note of finding some lowest-rung public worker and blaming their poor attitude as the reason why none of your previous policy promises have worked out.

In context, Kasich was explaining at a New Hampshire education summit that too many teachers think people like John Kasich are going to cut their pay and take their benefits and bust their unions, just because people like John Kasich keep proposing and then doing exactly that. Not so, says John Kasich, and if he were in charge he would make damn sure teachers couldn't assemble in one place to spread such negativity.

For the record, in a recent survey 96 percent of Ohio teachers said they wouldn't support John Kasich for president, with nearly 80 percent of Republican educators rating his impact on state education as "extremely negative." That's how despised he is.

Also for the record, this isn't Scott Walker. Yeah, I know, what are the odds?