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
rafflaw,
Here’s an interesting story for you:
From RH Reality Check (2/16/2011)
GOP: Yes to Contraception for Wild Horses, No for Women
http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/blog/2011/02/16/votes-contraception-wild-horses-women-0
Excerpt:
During a month in which the anti-choice Republican and Tea Party majority in Congress and in many states have made it their priority mission to eliminate access to contraception for women here and abroad, and on the very same day that the House planned to vote to take away birth control for women living in poverty in the US and eliminate funding for international family planning, you will be happy to know that there is at least one group the GOP believes deserves access to contraception.
Wild horses.
Just a little while ago, according to reports from the House floor, a vote was held on an amendment introduced by Congressman Dan Burton (R-IN) to prevent the Bureau of Land Management from holding wild horses in pens and then slaughtering them.
Instead, says Burton, they should pursue “a much less costly and more human option – immunocontraception…”.
The amendment, as stated by Burton, is intended to reduce the Bureau of Land Management’s budget by $2 million and send a signal that the agency must reform its enormously wasteful and misguided program of capturing wild horses and burros and holding them in pens, rather than employing a much less costly and more humane option – immunocontraception to control herd size.
“Despite objections raised by Members of Congress, BLM continues its round up and removal policy, and is currently holding approximately 46,000 horses in pens. Total holding costs in FY10 were $36.9 million.”
Text of amendment: H.R. 1 OFFERED BY: MR. BURTON AMENDMENT NO. 485: At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the following: SEC. ll. None of the funds made available by this Act may be used for the gathers and removals of free-roaming wild horses and burros, except for the purpose of fertility control.
I agree that holding wild horses in pens is cruel and unusual punishment and that it is more humane to use this option.
What mystifies me is this: Access to contraception and other reproductive health services for low-income women and women struggling in poverty in the United States saves nearly $4.00 for every $1.00 spent by the federal government. Programs like Title X, which Burton and his comrades in the House are intent on gutting this same day, offer essential preventive services–detection and treatment of sexually transmitted infections, screening for breast and cervical cancer, contraception to plan families, and a wealth of other otherwise unavailable health services. These programs reduce the need for abortion, allow families to plan, reduce disease, and save countless dollars in reduced mortality and improved public health.
Elaine,
Great work!
Buddha,
I want to know why we should listen to a guy who can’t spell his own “name” correctly? I have been awol most of the morning, but I was amused at how the Right is sending these psyops “individuals” to try to steer the discussion to the Right. Lawerence seems to scoff at the idea that the Left is for the Middle Class. I would like to ask him to name one significant proposal or legislation that was passed by the Bush Administration that assisted the Middle Class. Now, I am talking about a Republican proposal that they passed and Bush signed from 2001 to 2005 when they controlled both Houses of congress and the White House. While you are at it, name one thing that they passed or even proposed that supports or helps women in this country.
SL,
Yep.
Elaine,
Yes, of course what you say is true. Understanding is the enemy of Big Lies. Understanding is the requisite for truth, the biggest of all threats to propaganda.
Elaine & BIL,
Are you two laughing as much as I am over Lawerence’s posts?
Who needs to go elsewhere to watch a comedian when such a clown comes to us!!
I can’t be a fire breathing meat eater when I’m dealing with a boy with a child’s understanding of politics and business.
As to the “people told me”, thanks for revealing your professional troll status and thus ending any credibility you are seeking for your fascist propaganda.
You really aren’t very bright.
That was a declarative statement, Lawrence.
Buddha,
It isn’t about “understanding”–it’s about promoting a far right-wing agenda. Gotta get the opreatives to spread those far right-wing talking points everywhere and anywhere the puppet masters tell them to. Can’t just leave it up to the propagandists on Faux News.
Buddha is Laughing:
That has got to be the biggest bunch of BS I have ever read. Talk about limited understanding. ROLFMAO.
And people told me you were a fire breathing meat eater, more like a cud chewing gas bag.
Elaine M:
the left being for the middle class? That is pure hubris/chutzpah on your part. Very funny stuff. Tell that to the people in Louisiana who cant go to work anymore because the left put a hold on Offshore Drilling. And that is just one thing they have done to hurt the middle class. They love the animals more than the people. A fish in California has shut down huge areas of land to agriculture. Give me a break, you and Evita would get along well. Same ideas ruined that country as well. Ask there middle class how well your ideas work.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Spy3Nd2D6w
No, what the left cares about is union dues that gets sent to the DNC, they are worried it might dry up.
Keep drinking that “red” kool aid. 🙂
Just as an aid to your limited understanding and slow wit, Lawrence, that last question was rhetorical.
Those who aid tyrants, aid tyrants. If Koch hadn’t helped Stalin squeeze the last bit of utility out of those people, Stalin would have had impetus to keep them alive until he could get the utility out of them. If he could not get the utility out of them indefinitely, he would have the impetus to keep them alive indefinitely. Since Koch aided in the extraction of that utility and ushered in the end of their usefulness to Stalin, Koch aided Stalin in reaching the state where the purging of the workers in question was utilitarian and ergo desirable to Stalin. Stalin’s purges were manifest acts of tyranny. Those who aid tyrants, aid tyranny.
You’re not very bright, are you, Lawrence?
From Democracy Now (2/24/2011)
Check out the DN video at the link below:
Billionaire Right-Wing Koch Brothers Fund Wisconsin Governor Campaign and Anti-Union Push
http://www.democracynow.org/2011/2/24/billionaire_conservative_koch_brothers_fund_wisconsin
“In Madison, Wisconsin, record numbers of protesters have entered the eleventh day of their fight to preserve union rights and collective bargaining for public employees, inspiring similar protests in the states of Indiana, Ohio and Michigan. The protests have also helped expose the close ties between Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and David and Charles Koch, the billionaire brothers who helped bankroll the Tea Party movement. On Wednesday, blogger Ian Murphy revealed he had impersonated David Koch in a recorded phone conversation with an unsuspecting Walker. We play highlights of the recording and discuss the Koch brothers’ influence in Wisconsin with Lisa Graves of the Center for Media and Democracy.”
Buddha is Laughing:
I dont see how Koch had anything to do with the purges. He was not Russian and had no power.
So put up or shut up, you are making yourself look silly.
Logic, QED.
Keep bustin away, I am quaking in my boots. 🙂
TPMDC
WI Assembly Strikes Deal On Walker’s Budget, Senate Dems Remain Out Of State
Eric Kleefeld | February 24, 2011, 9:51AM
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/02/wi-assmebly-moving-toward-vote-on-walkers-budget-senate-dems-remain-out-of-state.php?ref=fpb
Excerpt:
MADISON, WI — The debate is moving forward in Wisconsin on Republican Gov. Scott Walker’s budget proposal and its controversial provisions weakening the power of public employee unions — or at least, it’s moving forward in the state Assembly. The state Senate remains effectively shut down.
As the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports, the Republican and Democratic leaders in the Assembly have reached a deal to limit debate on the many amendments that Democrats had been offering to the bill — which have been voted down on party-line margins — narrowing the list down to just 38 more, with ten minutes of debate for each.
At that rate, the Assembly could come to a vote later on Thursday.
Meanwhile, the state Senate Democrats remain out of state in Illinois, preventing the three-fifths budget quorum required under the state constitution for a vote on budget matters in the Senate. State Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald again issued a “call of the house” — the procedure to search for legislators and bring them to the chamber — and sent law enforcement to their homes.
Lawrence,
It’s good to know that we have some billionaires in this country who actually care about middle class, working class, and poor people.
Lawerence,
Do you have anything of importance to say, or just to regurgitate what the GOBP and FAUXNewz beats you over your empty melon with? If so, you forgot to throw in Saul Alinsky.
Tsk, tsk. Your pay will be docked for that omission.
Koch worked for the man who had them purged, thus advancing Stalin’s agenda. And when Stalin had no more use for those people? He purged them with all the careless disregard of disposing of an old tool. QED
Logic.
It’s not just for breakfast anymore.
Buddha is Laughing:
your socialist billionaires don’t like my libertarian billionaires. Go figure.
You made a lot of assertions but don’t have any thing to back it up with. So please tell me how the Father had the engineers he worked with purged? I am sure you would be a beacon of light in that situation.
Give me some facts to back all this up. The Kochs are being maligned by the likes of Common Cause, MoveOn.org and other socialist/communist rags supported by leftist billionaires. You buy into their propaganda hook line and sinker. Dance little lefty monkey dance. (Insert organ grinder music here)
It is really funny to watch.
You don’t know squat about the Koch brothers but what your little progressive nud nicks tell you. OOH, you are such a troll buster. ROLFMAO
The dirty secret of public-sector union busting
By Alyssa Battistoni
AP
Kathryn Schulze wears a message written on tape over her mouth inside the state Capitol, Feb. 21, 2011, in Madison, Wis.Amid all the rightful outrage over Gov. Scott Walker’s proposal to do away with collective bargaining rights for public sector unions in Wisconsin, one important point has been neglected: The demise of public sector unions would be most detrimental to women and African-Americans, who make up a disproportionate share of the public sector workforce.
Much has been made of Walker’s decision to exempt from his plan firefighter, police and state trooper unions — conveniently, the only three public sector unions that endorsed him. But as Dana Goldstein points out, not only are the exempted unions largely Republican-leaning, they’re also overwhelmingly male — over 70 percent of law enforcement personnel are male, as are over 96 percent of firefighters. On the other hand, many of the non-exempt unions represent professions that are disproportionately female — approximately 80 percent of teachers are women, for example, as are 95 percent of nurses.
African-Americans are also disproportionately employed in the public sector: According to a report by the nonprofit United for a Fair Economy, blacks are 30 percent more likely than the overall workforce to hold public sector jobs. Kai Wright reports that preliminary data from a study by Steven Pitts of U.C. Berkeley’s Center for Labor Education and Research shows that 14.5 percent of all public sector workers in the nation are black, compared to 10 percent in most other sectors, and around a quarter of black workers are employed in public administration, as compared to under 17 percent of all white workers.
A Republican proposal that hurts women and people of color? I’m shocked, shocked! All jokes aside, I’m not arguing that Walker intentionally targeted women-heavy professions for union busting, or that he’s secretly trying to undermine one of the remaining sources of stable employment for blacks, who are unemployed at nearly twice the rate of whites. But it doesn’t need to be intentional to have serious effects.
Some of those effects are economically tangible. Despite high rates of public sector employment, black women working in the public sector make less than others, with a median wage of $15.50 an hour compared to the sector’s overall median of $18.38 and a median of $21.24 for white men. Yet weakened public unions will make it more difficult for black women to bargain for better wages. Furthermore, as the Shriver Report finds, “nearly 4 in 10 mothers (39.3 percent) are primary breadwinners, bringing home the majority of the family’s earnings, and nearly two-thirds (62.8 percent) are breadwinners or co-breadwinners, bringing home at least a quarter of the family’s earnings.” Making women’s jobs more precarious has serious implications for the well-being of millions of families — especially for families in the bottom two income quintiles and black and Hispanic families, where female breadwinners are particularly prevalent.
Others are subtler: As Wright points out, the portrayal of public sector employees as overpaid and underworked, taking advantage of hardworking taxpayers, carries echoes of racially charged caricatures — the welfare queens of the ’80s behind a desk in the Capitol. And politically motivated though it may be, the continued elevation of traditionally male professions like public safety and law enforcement over traditionally female ones like public health and public education is part of the reason women still earn only 77 cents for every dollar men do.
The events in Wisconsin are just one example of a larger trend of Republican efforts to make it more difficult for women, and particularly low-income women, to go to work (for example, by proposing significant cuts to childcare benefits and preschool programs) while simultaneously slashing services that women need to care for themselves and their families (for example, proposing to cut nearly a billion dollars from programs aimed at promoting the health of low-income pregnant women and mothers). And if that weren’t enough, when public budgets are cut, women often make up for the cuts by volunteering at schools and providing unpaid childcare.
Likewise, public sector unions have garnered especial criticism for their pensions, which Republicans claim are bankrupting the state. Such lack of concern for elderly well-being is sadly consistent with Republicans’ efforts to cut funding for programs providing the elderly with support for meals and housing. Incidentally, women make up two-thirds of the poor over age 65, while 60 percent of black seniors rely on Social Security for more than 80 percent of their income. So women and people of color aren’t just paying for the cuts once, they’re paying over and over again.
Of course, public sector cuts hurt people across the board, but they nearly always end up hitting the most vulnerable members of society the hardest. As Paul Krugman pointed out earlier this week, unions are important in part because they’re some of “the few influential players in our political system representing the interests of middle- and working-class Americans.” Indeed. But public sector unions are especially important representatives of middle- and working-class black and female Americans, who continue to be vastly underrepresented in every branch of government.
Republicans will surely protest that their efforts to undermine the public sector, whether by busting unions or slashing services, aren’t sexist or racist — they’re just what needs to be done to balance the budget. And honestly, I suspect the gender and racial impacts of union-busting never consciously crossed Gov. Walker’s mind. But not knowing exactly whom your policy decisions will hurt means you’ve never thought about the actual people who are affected by political maneuvering. If Republicans don’t know who’s paying for their attacks on public sector employees, it’s because they just don’t care.
Alyssa Battistoni is a writer and graduate student in geography and environment at Oxford University. More: Alyssa Battistoni
http://www.salon.com/news/wisconsin/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2011/02/24/battistoni_public_employees
From Salon
WEDNESDAY, FEB 23, 2011 16:24 ET
Scott Walker punks workers
Bragging to fat cats that “stereotypical blue-collar worker types” support his union busting shows his hypocrisy
BY JOAN WALSH
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/joan_walsh/politics/2011/02/23/scott_walker_punks_workers/index.html
Excerpt:
I rarely disagree with the Washington Post’s top wonk Ezra Klein, but I do today. Klein is right that the most politically “lethal” thing about Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s 20-minute conversation with a prankster posing as right-wing moneybags David Koch is that it happened at all. But he’s wrong when he says “the transcript of the conversation is unexceptional” and that “to Walker’s credit, he doesn’t say anything incriminating.”
I think Walker’s comments are hugely incriminating, maybe not legally, although the governor does seem to say yes (“That would be outstanding!”) to a Koch-funded trip to California to reward his work supporting the super-rich, which could be construed as the promise of an illegal gift. But listening to Walker lay out his plans to trick Democrats into returning to Wisconsin, brag about his national popularity, compare himself to Ronald Reagan and joke about the “stereotypical blue-collar worker types” who support his union busting, I thought the conversation incriminated Walker as an enormous hypocrite: someone who pretends he’s protecting state taxpayers and beleaguered private-sector employees, but is really part of a cynical fat-cat movement to pit workers against one another while insisting “it’s all about gettin’ our freedom back!” You really have to hear it (audio here) or read it all (transcript below) to believe it.
My favorite part is when “Koch” suggests that if Walker meets with Democrats he should “bring a baseball bat, that’s what I’d do,” and the governor chirps: “I have one in my office; you’d be happy with that. I have a slugger with my name on it,” like he’s talking to his daddy. Which makes sense, since Koch is at least Walker’s political sugar daddy.
But the saddest part is when Walker brags that the supposedly liberal New York Times “has a great story,” in which the writer interviews “every stereotypical blue-collar worker type” and finds that, just like a guy repeatedly laid off by General Motors, they all support his taking on the public workers’ unions — unless, of course, they’re a public worker or married to one. Oops. The Times story in question is tragic, as victims of the economy blame their troubles not on employers, but on public workers’ unions. “There are a lot of people out of work right now that would take a job without a union,” a bar owner in Whitewater told the Times. A woman who works at a billboard advertising company opined: “I know there was a point for unions back in the day because people were being abused. But now there’s workers’ rights; there’s laws that protect us.” Laws that unions fought for, of course.
Part of the massive business crusade to reverse the economic gains of the ’60s and ’70s involved busting unions where they existed, and making it hard for workers to join them where they didn’t. That’s why the percentage of private sector workers who are unionized dropped from over a third of the American workforce to just 7 percent today (more than a third of public sector workers still enjoy union protection). Unions aren’t perfect, and public sector unions certainly aren’t. They’ve protected bad apples in schools and other public agencies, they can make system change harder, they’ve fought to hold onto generous health plans the private sector can’t touch. They still have pensions, even if they’re less generous, at a time when most people are lucky to have a 401K plan, let alone one that’s matched. Of course the same forces that want to strip away pensions also want to cut Social Security, putting the traditional ways we’ve supported senior citizens at risk.
I’ve noted before that the dominance of public sector unions is a problem for workers, and for Democrats. Reviewing Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson’s great “Winner-Take-All Politics,” I wrote last year: “The only gains for unions have come in the public sector, and that’s politically problematic for Democrats, as it seems as though ‘our’ tax dollars pay for worker protections and benefits that the rest of us don’t enjoy.” Clearly Republican governors, funded by the Koch brothers and other plutocrats, have figured that out, and decided to strike workers, and Democrats, where they’re vulnerable.
That’s why, despite my occasional frustrations with public sector unions, I shake my head at supposed liberals like Joe Klein, who’s come out against the Wisconsin unions, and Charles Lane, who heinously purported to channel Gabrielle Giffords when decrying the Wisconsin protesters’ alleged lack of “civility.” I can’t even agree with my friend Michael Lind, who says Walker’s breaking the public sector unions might have a silver lining for liberals, because “the right would deprive itself of an enemy. And the divide-and-rule tactics of the right might be less likely to succeed if all American workers — private and public — were in the same situation with respect to benefits and workplace rights.” Lind acknowledges that “liberals would have to create a popular political movement capable of replacing the lost legions of organized labor at the polls.” In other words, American liberals would have to organize. But he’s silent on who would do that organizing, and around what issues. Plus, if I had a dime for every time a liberal has suggested a political setback — Ronald Reagan’s election, or George W. Bush’s — could be a blessing in disguise for liberalism, I’d be as rich as the Kochs.