Submitted by Elaine Magliaro, Guest Blogger
There’s been a lot going on in Wisconsin in the past week. I hope most Americans are aware of the reason why so many Wisconsinites have converged on the state capital to hold demonstrations.
Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, a Republican, claims that the state is in financial trouble. He’s asking teachers, plow drivers, janitors, nurses, garbage collectors, and other public sector workers to contribute more to their pensions and to pay a larger amount of their health premiums. It appears many of those workers are willing to negotiate with the governor and to consider having more money taken out of their paychecks for their pensions and health insurance. What those employees are not willing to do is relinquish their right to collective bargaining.
I can understand why Governor Walker is asking public employees to have more deductions taken from their paychecks during these fiscally difficult times. What I question is his budget-repair bill that would strip public employees of their right to collective bargaining. If the governor believes that taking away that right will help with the state budget shortfall, why isn’t he demanding that police, firefighters, and state troopers give up their right to collective bargaining too? Could it be political payback? Does that sound like a possibility to you?
Here is an excerpt from an article that Todd Richmond wrote for Bloomberg:
Walker has introduced a bill that would strip public employees across the board — from teachers to snowplow drivers — of their right to collectively bargain for sick leave, vacation, even the hours they work. But absolutely nothing would change for local police, fire departments and the State Patrol.
The bill smacks of political favoritism for public safety unions that supported Walker’s election bid last year and sets up new haves and have-nots in Wisconsin government, said Paul Secunda, a Marquette University professor who specializes in labor law.
“That’s called ‘thank you, I got your back,'” Secunda said. “There’s no surprise there. This is the worst type of favoritism there could be.”
Well, Wisconsin firefighters are showing their solidarity with their fellow public employees. There’s a post at Mother Jones about an interview that Uptake’s Oliver Dykstra had with Mahlon Mitchell, president of the Professional Firefighters of Wisconsin. (Mother Jones also posted a video of the interview.)
Here are some of the highlights of that interview—which I’ve taken from Mother Jones:
- “The reason that we are here is because it’s important that labor sticks together. There was a message from the governor’s office to conquer and divide…collective bargaining is not just for us, police and fire, it’s good for all involved. It’s a middle-class upbringing.”
- “When firefighters see an emergency, one thing we do is respond. And we see an emergency in the house of labor, so that’s why we’re here.”
- “Every day, if you notice, we lead the AFSCME employees, the SEIU employees, all the public sector employees into the building, because we are here to fight with them.”
- “Collective bargaining is not about union rights; it’s about rights of workers…We ask Gov. Walker to come back and negotiate with the people, negotiatie with the state workers’ unions, and get things worked out, as opposed to just putting out this bill and we don’t hear from him again.”
- “Us as firefighters, we have been exempted from this bill…There’s a 5.8 percent pay into the pension, there’s a 12.4 percent pay into the health care premium benefits…For the betterment of the government, for the betterment of the state, we don’t mind helping to pay for that. We don’t want to price ourselves out of a job. Ever. What we want to do is have a fair and equitable treatment among our members.”
I have great respect for the Wisconsin firefighters who are supporting their fellow public employees—even though they have nothing to gain politically or financially by doing so.
“We must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.” ~Benjamin Franklin
Sources
Hey, we’ve attracted a Koch-sucking apologist already!
Awesome.
You do know I crush propaganda trolls like bugs, right, Lawrence?
“According to Charles G. Koch, ‘Virtually every engineer he worked with [there] was purged.'”
But Charley didn’t spend a dime of Stalin’s blood money to help get any of those workers out, did he? Charley Koch may have been a lot of things, but he was clearly no Oskar Schindler. More like an Alfred Krupp.
And exactly how Libertarian are you – since Libertarians oppose large government and love their unfettered free trade – if your entire business is built off of government contracts? How Libertarian are you if you buy and manipulate politicians for your own personal profit? That hardly seems like a free market stance. That seems a lot like . . . cheating and graft.
How Libertarian are you if you want to control the agenda of government for solely corporate interests instead of looking to care for the individual liberties of all citizens? Say to get an idiotic greedy bootlicking toady of a governor to assist you in union busting?
There are a lot of fascists hiding in Libertarian clothing. But even the encyclopedia would agree that the Koch’s are fascists in action, not Libertarian. Don’t believe it?
“Fascism (pronounced /ˈfæʃɪzəm/) is an authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to organize a nation according to corporatist perspectives, values, and systems, including the political system and the economy . . . Fascists promoted their ideology as a “Third Position” between capitalism and Bolshevism. Italian Fascism involved corporatism, a political system in which the economy is collectively managed by employers, workers, and state officials by formal mechanisms at the national level. Fascists advocated a new national class-based economic system, variously termed “national corporatism”, “national socialism” or “national syndicalism”. The common aim of all fascist movements was elimination of the autonomy or, in some cases, the existence of large-scale capitalism.
Fascist governments exercised control over private property but did not nationalize it. They pursued economic policies to strengthen state power and spread ideology, such as consolidating trade unions to be state- or party-controlled. Attempts were made by both Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany to establish “autarky” (self-sufficiency) through significant economic planning, but neither achieved economic self-sufficiency.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism
If you control both the property and the government officials, why that makes you the puppeteer of a fascist state. Tsk, tsk, tsk. Their power grab is unmasked. The truth hurts, eh, Lawrence?
Unless your check is clearing the bank.
By the way, I don’t know if the Koch’s are paying you directly to come out here and troll or if you work for a third party shop or if you are simply a kool-aid swilling nitwit, but if you are professional?
You might want to call up Andy Breitbart’s operation. They are in the professional propaganda business. Ask for Charley or Kurt. Ask them how easy Buddha is on trolls.
Be sure to come back if you just want another beating.
I’ll be more than happy to administer another.
One lives to be of service.
Hoosier Dragon,
“And I keep asking myself: what is going on with these people? What is driving them? From what I’ve seen, they look too much like borderline sociopaths: no regard for anyone other than a select group (their own ‘tribe’ or their superiors they want to emulate) and no feelings toward anyone outside that group.”
**********
Sounds like a pretty sensible deduction to me.
Koch Dealers: Cenk Uygur talks with Lee Fang of Think Progress about the Koch brothers anti-union efforts and what they’ve been trying to do in Wisconsin
(I think this program originally aired two or three days ago.)
Koch Brothers Behind WI Governor Walker’s Union Busting
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMjO7GW7JEw&w=480&h=390]
@HenMan: apology accepted. And I have to admit that I was a more sharp than necessary (or is my usual want) in my reply.
And all this publicity is putting a lot more negative information about Walker into the public eye. The deal with the security guards is just the most recent one revealed.
And I keep asking myself: what is going on with these people? What is driving them? From what I’ve seen, they look too much like borderline sociopaths: no regard for anyone other than a select group (their own ‘tribe’ or their superiors they want to emulate) and no feelings toward anyone outside that group.
Lawerence,
Right back at ya, sport.
From NPR (2/24/2011)
The Nation: The ‘Koch Caller’ Exposes Scott Walker
by JOHN NICHOLS
http://www.npr.org/2011/02/24/134022123/the-nation-the-koch-caller-exposes-scott-walker
Excerpt:
When someone who Scott Walker thought was a major donor to national groups that aided Walker’s 2010 gubernatorial run — and that gave the Walker campaign $43,000 directly, via Koch Industries’ KochPAC — said he had a “vested interest” in a budget plan being pushed by the governor, Walker replied, “Well, that’s just it.”
The conversation is so stunning in its brazenness that the Center for Media and Democracy, which had already filed freedom-of-information requests for records of contacts between the governor and his aides and representatives of Koch industries, is stepping up those demands.
“One request is for the phone logs and the other is for their e-mails. We are looking for any contacts between Scott Walker and his staff and anyone with Koch Industries or the Kochs (brothers David and Charles),” says Lisa Graves, a former deputy assistant attorney general of the United States who now heads the Madison-based center. “We are interested as well in calls to and from the group Americans for Prosperity, with which Mr. Koch is closely tied.”
Says Graves: “We are interested in a number of things, especially contacts between the financial interests that helped elect Governor Walker and the governor and his staff. We are interested in whether the governor and his staff have maintained faith with the ethics requirements and responsibilities associated with their positions.”
The remarkable conversation between Walker and the Koch caller — actually Buffalo, New York, blogger Ian Murphy — was the talk of Wisconsin Wednesday morning, as lawyers rushed to review the tape and the governor’s office, perhaps even more remarkably, issued a press release saying: “The Governor takes many calls everyday. Throughout this call the Governor maintained his appreciation for and commitment to civil discourse. He continued to say that the budget repair bill is about the budget. The phone call shows that the Governor says the same thing in private as he does in public and the lengths that others will go to disrupt the civil debate Wisconsin is having.”
Actually, that’s not true.
The governor has not said in public that he is using his budget repair bill to advance the “vested interest” of a billionaire businessman who stands to benefit if the bill is approved.
The governor has not said in public that he is working closely with that businessman to coordinate Tea Party rallies and advertising to support the bill — and that he wants the businessman to use a front group, Americans for Prosperity, to launch a massive advertising campaign to support Republican senators who (despite the fact that they are troubled by the bill) choose to vote for it.
And the governor has not been the sort of accessible official who “takes many calls everyday” from constituents and concerned legislators. In fact, it’s been quite the opposite.
From WISN (2/23/2011)
State Assembly Could Vote On Budget Repair Bill Thursday
Senate Democrats Absent From Capitol For 5th Straight Day
http://www.wisn.com/news/26972414/detail.html
Excerpt:
MADISON, Wis. — It was a day of debate in Wisconsin’s Assembly and a stalemate in the Senate.
The state Assembly continues to debate dozens of amendments to the budget repair bill, numbering at least 100. At some point, the debate could be halted by the Republican majority, but as it stood at 10 p.m., it appeared to again be headed late into the night.
The same, however, could not be said in the Senate.
The state Senate convened for the fifth straight day without a single Democrat on the floor.
Though senators have been unable to have a quorum to act on the special session budget repair bill, they moved ahead with the repeal of a new law requiring police to collect race data during traffic stops.
**********
From WTAQ (2/24/2011)
Wisconsin lawmakers agree to advance budget debate
http://www.wtaq.com/news/articles/2011/feb/24/wisconsin-lawmakers-agree-to-advance-budget-debate/
Excerpt:
MADISON, Wisconsin (Reuters) – Democratic lawmakers in the Wisconsin state Assembly agreed on Thursday with Republicans to limit their amendments on a controversial budget bill that would curtail union bargaining rights, making a vote likely on the measure later in the day.
Assembly Democrats have agreed with Republicans to limit the number of amendments they’ll introduce to 38, and they will stay within the 10-minute limit for arguing each amendment.
The budget proposal by newly elected Governor Scott Walker would strip most collective bargaining rights from many state workers. Walker said it is necessary to close a budget deficit of $137 million for this fiscal year.
Shortly after the 6 a.m. agreement was reached, the state Senate also convened for a call of the house and to direct law enforcement to go to the homes of 14 missing Democratic senators in an effort to bring them back.
All 14 fled the state last Thursday to deny a quorum for voting on the budget proposal, effectively blocking any chance for the bill’s passage through the legislature.
Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald has acknowledged that law enforcement cannot force lawmakers to return to the Capitol, according to website Wispolitics.com.
LindyLou22,
Thanks for your input and that link.
*****
Lawrence,
Knock yourself out–and keep drinking the Koch Kool-Aid!
😉
The New York Times has an article that runs under the headline “Billionaire Brothers’ Money Plays Role in Wisconsin Dispute.” It includes this:
To Bob Edgar, a former House Democrat who is now president of Common Cause, a liberal group that has been critical of what it sees as the rising influence of corporate interests in American politics, the Koch brothers are using their money to create a facade of grass-roots support for their favorite causes.
“This is a dangerous moment in America history,” Mr. Edgar said. “It is not that these folks don’t have a right to participate in politics. But they are moving democracy into the control of more wealthy corporate hands.”
So we have left wing billionaires funding Common Cause which doesnt like libertarian billionaires giving them some push back.
Wow. It would be funny if it wasnt so sad that so many marginally inteligent lefties believe the crap pushed by common cause and other left wing billionaires.
I’m sure Fred Koch would be proud of what his two sons are doing. Fred was a founding member of the John Birch Society.
eniobob
1, February 24, 2011 at 8:36 am
BTW:
Seems to be crys of foul coming from the right on this call issue,forget say,Acorn Mrs Sherrod,just to name a couple of incidents that were hailed as **break through** journalisim and if I remember correctly O’keefe was floated as some kind of hero with the acorn situation.Just asking.
*****
You got that right! And don’t forget Lila Rose and Planned Parenthood.
the Koch Brothers have been invented by the progressives as a boogey monster to give understanding to a world which they do not understand. Much like the ancient savages who could not understand how the wind blows or what caused the tides. So they invented great mythical figures and beasts.
Really funny stuff you guys, thank Zeus I am not able to do a Vulcan mind meld on one of you.
Buddha is Laughing:
“The company was renamed Koch Industries in honor of Fred Koch, the year after his death. At that time, it was primarily an engineering firm with part interest in a Minnesota refinery, a crude oil-gathering system in Oklahoma,[10] and some cattle ranches.[14] In 1968, Charles approached Union Oil of California about buying their interest in Great Northern Oil Company and its Pine Bend Refinery but the discussions quickly stalled after Union asked for a large premium.[9] In 1969, Union Oil began trying to market their interest in Great Northern by telling potential buyers that Koch’s controlling interest could be thwarted by currying favor with another owner, J. Howard Marshall II. When Marshall discovered this he threw his lot in with Koch, they together acquired a majority interest in the company and ultimately bought Union’s interest.[12] Ownership of Pine Bend refinery led to several new businesses and capabilities, including chemicals, fibers, polymers, asphalt and other commodities such as petroleum coke and sulfur. These were followed by global commodity trading, gas liquids processing, real estate, pulp and paper, risk management and finance.[9]
In 1970, Charles was joined at the family firm by his brother David H. Koch. Having started as a technical services manager, David became president of Koch Engineering in 1979.[9]”
Buddha is Laughing:
“In 1925, Fred C. Koch joined an MIT classmate Lewis E. Winkler at an engineering firm in Wichita, Kansas, which was renamed the Winkler-Koch Engineering Company. In 1927 they developed a more efficient thermal cracking process for turning crude oil into gasoline. This process threatened the competitive advantage of established oil companies, which sued for patent infringement. Temporarily forced out of business in the United States, they turned to other markets, including the Soviet Union, where Winkler-Koch built 15 cracking units between 1929 and 1932. During this time, Koch came to despise communism and Josef Stalin’s regime.[9][10] In his 1960 book, A Business Man Looks at Communism, Koch wrote that he found the Soviet Union to be “a land of hunger, misery, and terror.”[11] According to Charles G. Koch, “Virtually every engineer he worked with [there] was purged.”[10]”
BTW:
Seems to be crys of foul coming from the right on this call issue,forget say,Acorn Mrs Sherrod,just to name a couple of incidents that were hailed as **break through** journalisim and if I remember correctly O’keefe was floated as some kind of hero with the acorn situation.Just asking.
Elaine M:
“The billionaire Koch Brothers themselves are able to push their polluter agenda through tens of millions of dollars in campaign contributions, lobbying, and funding fronts groups and think tanks. Greenpeace obtained tax records that show that Koch foundations have given a total of $54.9 million to climate denial organizations since 1997, including $31.3 million in recent years of 2005 – 2009. And our 2010 report Koch Industries, Secretly Funding the Climate Denial Machine documented the millions more that Koch Industries spends on lobbying against climate and clean energy policies, and campaign contributions to polluter-friendly politicians.”
you are kidding right? I guess they are doing it to counter the blatant lies the CRU promulgated under the guise of science.
You all do really make me laugh, the ignorance is palpable.
Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s Prank Caller, Ian Murphy, Appears On MSNBC’s ‘The Last Word With Lawrence O’Donnell’ (VIDEO)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/24/governor-walker-prank-call-msnbc_n_827494.html
Blouise:
“You know … enemies always seem to underestimate the American people … because they watch our movies, read our gossip magazines, and listen to our politicians, they seem to think we are a weak-willed, pleasure-seeking people who have no guts and certainly no ability to withstand hardship. Hitler thought so, Japan thought so, Obama thought so… ”
you got that right, just look what happened in November. You all have been trying for 100 years to turn America into your progressive utopia and you haven’t done it yet. But keep trying it is working out real well for those of us who don’t think that way.
And we are now reading Saul Alinsky, you know fight fire with fire. You all make me laugh.
Brought to you by the Koch Brothers. 🙂 (and other conservative groups) Put that in your conspiracy pipe and take a few hits.
Its the 60’s, its the 60’s oh boy, yippee, I can relive the glory days of sex, drugs, rock and roll, irrationality and dirty clothes. I’m free again. Peter and Paulette Pan rise again.
This story will continue until 2012. If Obama loses and the US Senate goes republican, the Koch Bothers will win and their agenda will be enacted throughout the country with the exception of a few very blue states.
MSNBC just announced a deal has been reached between parties to debate this atrocious bill starting today. Trying to find confirmation.