It's the unions

My mother has a tendency to attribute problems to one, simple cause.

Yesterday

A.: This article in the Economist says that 12% of Americans believe Noah (of Noah's Arc) was married to Joan of Arc.
Mom: It's all because of teachers' unions.
A.: It's not that simple...

This morning

A.: It's too bad Martha couldn't join us.
Mom: She's a teacher?
A.: Yeah.
Mom: How is that working out for her?
A.: She likes it, for the most part. We were discussing, just the other night, the decline in critical thinking skills as brought about by early standardized testing.
Mom: It's the unions.
A.: It's the testing.
Mom: They make it impossible to fire incompetent teachers.
A.: I agree that not being able to fire incompetent workers is a problem, but that's hardly the only, or biggest, problem facing the school system.