Jim Gibson's children were harassed by union thugs, Guffanti charges

Our old ANTI friend, Dr. Stephen Guffanti was allowed to publish inflammatory charges against school teachers in our district. The charges were contained in a sour grape Community Forum Guffanti wrote decrying his election loss in November 2008. Guffanti's inflammatory charge claimed that school teachers harassed and intimidated Jim Gibson's wife and children.
http://www.nctimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/article_f2cc26d6-7dfc-5583-8aa2-74d07fd92b74.html?mode=story

I know it is silly on its face. Yet the biased editorial fact checker at the North County Times allowed these inflammatory charges to be published without checking to see if they were in fact backed up by any evidence. No surprise there. Any time any one no matter their knowledge level wants to publish something derogatory about unions and the middle class wages and health benefits they bring, the NCTimes editors publish it on the editorial page. The folks who run the NCTimes just hate paying workers a living wage or providing benefits for them.

Back to harassing Jim's children. Ridiculous. At the time he was quoted in the paper as saying the ill advised picketing of his home was, "entertaining."* He made no mention to the reporter about anything rude happening to his children. A reasonable person would wonder why Jim Gibson would not mention to the reporter anything about his children and spouse being harassed at the time it happened. This would have been just the kind of news that the North County Times is most happy to publish. Jim has never been shy before or since with hurling accusations against the good teachers of VUSD, so why didn't he mention this terrible harassment by those terrible VUSD teachers at the time this harassment supposedly happened?

*http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2002/10/02/export19603.txt

I personally have heard Jim make things up that were not true. In the late 1990's (1998?), I happened to attend a Republican women's meeting at the Shadowridge Country Club. It was shortly before a school board election where Letha McWey was one candidate. I was there as one of her supporters. Jim Gibson also a VUSD school board candidate was invited to speak to the group. (Letha who was a registered Republican was NOT allowed to speak even though she asked to).

Now Jim is a rousing speaker. He tells great stories of his uphill struggle against the terrible teachers of VUSD. One of his stories at this meeting concerned an incident at a school board meeting the previous week that I had also attended. He fabricated a tale of rowdy teachers and harassment that did not happen. I was there. Yet the Republican Women's group ate it up. They applauded wildly for his courage. It seems Jimmy has found that if he makes up the right kind of story, he gets attention and Jimmy really likes attention (think Carrie Prejean).

I have good reason to suspect that his tales of his spouse and children being harassed is another made up story. This is not to say that I do not strongly condemn any harassment of children or spouses of even ANTI board members like Jim Gibson. If I see it, I will call anyone out for it. But I have pretty good reasons to suspect that Jim and his group of ANTIs just made the whole thing up.
(1) he is quoted AT THE TIME as ONLY saying the picketing at house was entertaining and ineffective. AT THE TIME he said nothing to the reporter about harassment.
(2) He made no report to the sheriff's office. He made no report to VUSD. Both should have been notificed if harassment of children by emplyees of VUSD really happened. In fact AT THE TIME he did not mention harassment at all. Only years later did the tale of picketing at his home morph into a story about harassment of his spouse and children.
(3) I personally have heard him make things up (see above).

Here is how I answered those charges of harassment in Guffanti's Forum:

http://www.nctimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/article_f2cc26d6-7dfc-5583-8aa2-74d07fd92b74.html?mode=comments


con no more (that's me) said on: February 10, 2010, 9:59 am

Dr. Guffanti makes three specific accusations against members of the Vista Teachers association using inflammatory language 'little children' 'screaming' " threatening' 'yelled' if there was any truth to any of these charges it would be the basis for filing charges of assault especially when 'little children' are involved.

Let's ask the question Judge Judy asks when one side brings up inflammatory charges against the other, "Did you call the police?". Well, did Jim call the local peace officers? Did he make a complaint? No and no. I wonder why?

Could it be because the ANTI urban myths about abusive teachers was not created until LONG after the ill advised picketing occurred? In fact what did Jim Gibson say at the time? In an article for the North County Times, from October 1, 2002 entitled "Teachers Launch Public Campaign on Contract Dispute" NCTimes reporter Michael J. Williams wrote the following, "Gibson said he found the picketing to be "entertaining," but questioned its effectiveness."*
http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2002/10/02/export19603.txt

Gee, why didn't Gibson say anything AT THE TIME of the picketing about the supposed harassment of his children? He has never previously hesitated for a moment to say vilify teachers or the VTA. Why didn't he this time?

Could it be because NOTHING happened? Could the stories of his children being harassed have been created for political reasons at a much later time?

It is important to also note that there were NOT hundreds of teachers at his home NOR even dozens, according to the article there were exactly nine. That's right nine middle aged women and men who have dedicated their lives to helping children.

Also should be noted that according to the article the leader of this picketing was Keith Grauman. I was not there but I know Keith. He is a very soft spoken man, probably the gentlest, least combative person I have know in my life. He is a very committed Christian who is active in his Evangelical church. To accuse a man of his character of organizing an event that harasses children would be laughable if it were not so slanderous.

*NOTE: The above URL no longer works as the NCTimes archives passed about 2004 seem to be broken. However anyone who would like to read the full text of the article can contact me at my blog, www.vistaschools.blogspot.com, and I will happily email you the entire article