In brief: Biden touts party to teachers union

CHICAGO – Vice President Joe Biden says the “new Republican party” doesn’t believe in public education the way Democrats do.

The Democrat spoke Sunday before thousands of educators at the National Education Association’s annual convention in Chicago. The association bills itself as the largest labor union in the nation. The speech came a day before the union’s vote on whether to endorse President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign.

Biden said Republicans in states like Wisconsin and Ohio would once have negotiated better with teachers and labor unions. But he said there’s now an organized effort to place blame for budget shortfalls on their shoulders.

Biden’s speech largely praised teachers, but he drew applause when he briefly acknowledged there’s widespread unhappiness among them for the Obama administration’s education policies.

Lightning strikes war re-enactment

GETTYSBURG, Pa. – A lightning strike at a camp of Civil War re-enactors in Gettysburg, Pa., has sent five people to hospitals.

The Gettysburg Anniversary Committee said in a statement that during a severe thunderstorm about 2:45 a.m. Sunday, lightning struck a tent pole in the Confederate artillery camp, resulting in moderate injuries to two people and minor injuries to three others.

The five were taken to Gettysburg Hospital. One is in stable condition. Two others in stable condition were treated and transferred to York Hospital. Two others were treated and released.

Guards allegedly warned at pool

FALL RIVER, Mass. – A 9-year-old boy told two lifeguards that a woman had not resurfaced after entering the murky waters of a public swimming pool and appearing to struggle, his mother said.

The body of 36-year-old Marie Joseph was found in the Veterans Memorial Pool two days later, on Tuesday night.

Officials have been investigating how she could have been in the pool for so long without being noticed.

The boy’s mother told the Boston Herald for its Sunday edition that the woman had bumped into her son on a pool slide before she disappeared underwater.

“He did tell two lifeguards – one said she was on break and had to leave, and the other told him they were going to do a pool check,” the woman told the newspaper. “But he told me they never did.”

The state Department of Conservation and Recreation is investigating.