It’s official G.I.-speak: Bus drivers are bureaucrats

by David Safier

The long wait is over. I can now declare officially,

According to The Goldwater Institute, Bus Drivers are Bureaucrats.

Also maintenance workers and food service workers. They're bureaucrats too.

And equally officially,

Teachers are not bureaucrats.

How do I know? G.I.'s Matthew Ladner tells me so.

Ladner says, since there are a more-or-less equal number of teachers and non-teachers in Arizona's school districts, there is "an almost 1-to-1 teacher to bureaucrat ratio."

And if all non-teachers are bureaucrats, then bus drivers are bureaucrats. No getting around it.

When I questioned that assertion, G.I.'s Starlee Rhoades wrote,

"We believe the term bureaucrat accurately describes many of the employees in question and is a fair use of the term."

And when I emailed Ladner and asked him, If bus drivers are bureaucrats, why aren't teachers bureaucrats too? he answered,

All baseballs are balls, but not all balls are baseballs.

I take that to mean — well, it means Ladner doesn't plan to give me a straight answer, because he can't give me a straight answer and maintain even a scintilla of logic.

So here we are. It's official, bus drivers are bureaucrats. And it seems, I am officially persona non grata at the Goldwater Institute.

But that doesn't mean others can't ask Matthew Ladner, or Starlee Rhoades, or Darcy Olsen, or Byron Schlomach, "Is it true you think bus drivers are bureaucrats?"

Maybe you'll get a zen koan of your very own.