O'REILLY FACTOR: Children of Military Parents Told by Teachers Their Parents Are Fighting an Unethical War

SHOW: THE O'REILLY FACTOR (20:13)
February 27, 2003 Thursday
Transcript # 022702cb.256
HEADLINE: Children of Military Parents Told by Teachers Their Parents Are Fighting an Unethical War
GUESTS: Rob Carmichael
BYLINE: Bill O'Reilly

O'REILLY: The "Impact" segment tonight, members of the Maine National Guard are saying that some of their children are being harassed at school by teachers who oppose the war. Can that be true?

Joining us on the phone because we can't get a satellite out of Bangor, Maine, for whatever reason, is Colonel Rob Carmichael, the chief of staff at the Maine Army National Guard.

Hey, Colonel, what do you know and how do you know it?

COL. ROB CARMICHAEL, CHIEF OF STAFF, MAINE ARMY NATIONAL GUARD: Well, what came to light a little over a week ago during some what we call some family assistance center briefings -- and this is a process where, when we have deployed units, we bring the families in and we set up a system so that while the soldiers are away, we can help the families deal with this - - the departure.

And in -- in that process, it came to light that children were expressing some problems within the schools from one part of the state to another of varying degrees. And we looked into those and there was some real distress with some of the parents about that.

O'REILLY: All right, now, I've looked at the complaints. And the most serious are that a number of teachers have actually told the kids of military people in the classroom that they are immoral, that their parents are doing things that are immoral and unethical.

Is that true?

CARMICHAEL: Well, I think -- I think the was it was put, at least in one case, and certainly this is not an indictment on all teachers...

O'REILLY: No, we know that.

CARMICHAEL: This is in a number of areas, but it was -- it was basically that this is an immoral war, an unethical war and that to be a part of that was immoral or unethical in itself.

O'REILLY: How -- are we talking about 7 to 9-year-old kids? Are we talking about...?

CARMICHAEL: In some cases, 7 to 9. We also, in a couple of other cases where the parents actually went into discuss matters. They were not treated with the sensitivity and the expectation that you might expect during this time.

O'REILLY: What are you going to do about it?

CARMICHAEL: Well, we've -- so far we've worked with the Department of Education very closely on this. The commissioner of education has issued an advisory to the schools. In that advisory, it appeals to them to -- to consider the distress faced by the children at this point in time, to be sensitive to those needs, to be aware of what's going on.

And since that came out on Monday, we haven't had anything come in at this point in time.

O'REILLY: Disciplinary action against the teachers who do that? Because, look, it's cruel. You know, if your daddy or mommy is going away overseas, and you're 7 years old, you're upset.

And then you're teacher's going to tell you that your parents are immoral? I mean, that's disciplinary action to me, Colonel, you know?

CARMICHAEL: Our focus, from our view, is to make people aware of what's going on, to allow the parents to take this to the appropriate authorities at their discretion.

We certainly don't want to put children or parents in a position where they might feel uncomfortable.

O'REILLY: No, you can't force them but you can get military lawyers to file suits, Colonel. That's what you should do.

CARMICHAEL: Our focus is to make sure that our soldiers who go off to do the work to support the country go without having to worry about their families and so forth.

O'REILLY: Yes, but also the kids, Colonel. Come on.

CARMICHAEL: And the kids, exactly. The children, the students.

O'REILLY: This is brutality to those children. If I were you, with all due respect, Colonel, I would look into getting army lawyers, OK, to go up to Maine to file federal lawsuits against the teachers that did this, all right, for intentionally inflicting emotional distress on the children.

You do you that, Colonel, this problem will solve itself immediately.

I'm going to give you the last word.

CARMICHAEL: Well, we think -- we think that we're working in the right direction. Working with the commissioner, the governor's come out very strongly supporting the right thing to do, which is what the Department of Education is doing now, and, again, to express to people, to be aware of these, to be sympathetic, sensitive. That's what we're doing.

O'REILLY: OK, Colonel, we appreciate your point of view. Thanks very much.

CARMICHAEL: Thank you.

O'REILLY: And as we continue, THE FACTOR was one of the first with a report on NASA's troubling safety apparatus.

Now some NASA e-mails show the agency knew bad things might happen on board the Columbia. Did they tell the astronauts? A full report, coming up next.