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Secretary of Defense
Please read more.OK: Is it dumb, or is it evil? (Recall Occam’s Dull Razor: Never ascribe to evil what stupidity will explain just as well.) The implication is that unions are NOT composed of voters, that they are anti-democratic and somehow bullying our “political system.”
And that’s the quintessence of the Evil campaign to destroy the last vestiges of the union movement, using hired thugs like John Fund to do it. Fund is merely an asshole and sycophant. (As discussed in “In Which We Use Our New Word,” 7 Feb 2011) What is more disturbing is the manner in which the secret Masters have engaged in an endless campaign to dissolve and destroy unions. And their catamites roil [sic] themselves out in front of the media, and explain how nobody likes unions and how public employees are the problem with the budget, and not the greatest financial ripoff in American history. Or, as Matt Taibi termed it:
The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it’s everywhere. The world’s most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money. In fact, the history of the recent financial crisis, which doubles as a history of the rapid decline and fall of the suddenly swindled dry American empire, reads like a Who’s Who of Goldman Sachs graduates.
Here’s the short version of the Battle in Madison, Wisconsin: Governor Scott Walker is a Koch-sucker. Mother Jones reports:
And one prominent beneficiary of the Koch brothers’ largess is Scott Walker.
According to Wisconsin campaign finance filings, Walker’s gubernatorial campaign received $43,000 from the Koch Industries PAC during the 2010 election. That donation was his campaign’s second-highest, behind $43,125 in contributions from housing and realtor groups in Wisconsin. The Koch’s PAC also helped Walker via a familiar and much-used politicial maneuver designed to allow donors to skirt campaign finance limits. The PAC gave $1 million to the Republican Governors Association, which in turn spent $65,000 on independent expenditures to support Walker. The RGA also spent a whopping $3.4 million on TV ads and mailers attacking Walker’s opponent, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett. Walker ended up beating Barrett by 5 points. The Koch money, no doubt, helped greatly.
[...]
Walker’s plan to eviscerate collective bargaining rights for public employees is right out of the Koch brothers’ playbook. Koch-backed groups like Americans for Prosperity, the Cato Institute, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, and the Reason Foundation have long taken a veryantagonisticview toward public-sector unions. Several of these groups have urged the eradication of these unions. The Kochs also invited (PDF) Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, an anti-union outfit, to a June 2010 confab in Aspen, Colorado; Mix said in a recent interview that he supports Governor Walker’s collective-bargaining bill.
You really should read the whole article. And who’s supplying logistical support for today’s COUNTER demonstration?
Cheese Whizz, or The Empire Strikes Back | his vorpal sword
to live is to suffer-Fritz lang
Secretary of State
Originally Posted by Moonglow
The GOVERNMENT either state or federal government is a NOT for PROFIT enity. What they get comes from the taxpayers of that state.
Having uniions involving government workers--is like letting the fox in to guard the hen house.
It should have never happened. FDR wouldn't let government workers organize into unions--and there are millions of Americans that agree.
Citizen
You mean 80% of the money spent on education goes to labor? How much of the budget is education?
Secretary of Defense
All posts like this are really just talking a strawman. The issue is union busting by the newly elected GOP Walker, who gave large tax breaks to large corporations to create this deficit. Then only demanding that those unions that did not contribute to his campaign be saddled with a yearly vote to stay current, loss of negotiation power.
Meanwhile, those 3 public unions that did contribute to his campaign, are not saddled with the extra yearly expensive voting, nor loss of their bargaining power.
Those are the issues, not the strawmen being brought up by so many.
fiscal conservative, Constitutional Neo-liberal democrat
"I am not a member of any organized party — I am a Democrat," Noted humorist Will Rogers
http://politicalcorner.org/index.php
http://www.realchange.org/bushjr.htm
Secretary of State
Yep, when all else fails, blame it on FOX. Good one.
Secretary of State
The unions don't hold much ground these days. Their only saving entity is sucking on the tits of governments. And even their getting testy and seeing how unions have destroyed our education system.
Secretary of State
You keep saying the same old BS, and you talk about strawman. Back up what you claim.
Secretary of State
80% (for teachers) goes for salaries and benefits-in Wisconsin-which would mean that only 20% goes for equipment--books--administration, etc.
Secretary of State
Opinion polls across this country--shows that unions have the most unfavorable low ever.
Only 7% of the private sector belongs to a union. And just 1 out of 3 government workers belong to the union.
Really it's about the union bosses and how much union dues they collect. What is bad--is that you have republicans belonging to the unions--who do not have a choice to donate part of their dues to the republican candidate they like.
Millions of unions dues goes out to the Democrat party--and that's why we see democrats cutting and running in Wisconsin. (It's all about the campaign money--and NOT for the GOOD of the state and it's citizens.)
Secretary of State
CORPORATIONS IN THIS COUNTRY CAN ALSO BE SPELLED--J.O.B.S
Without J.O.B.S in the private sector their would be no government employees--teachers--firefighters and police.
Wisconsin is already a high taxed state. And what encourages business to expand into another state--bringing 1000's of jobs with them is a LOW state tax rate--giving them an opportunity to compete in the global market.
Corporations in high taxed states have been moving out of them--and laying off thousands in the process. Look at California--a steady unemployment rate of about 13%. Why? Because of their state tax rate--while they're looking down the barrel at a 48 BILLION dollar deficit.
I just don't understand why you liberals can't look 1/2 inch beyond the tip of your nose? Higher taxes means more lay-offs--it's just that simple.
Joint Chiefs of Staff Member
Basically the shitty mortgages were categorized in levels, and the least shitty ones were packaged as AAA or some shit, and the next shitty bunch was AA or some shit, and so on. They were all shit. What's a bank supposed to do with a bunch of shitty loans?
"The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money." - Margaret Thatcher
Secretary of State
If you have owned a home in the last 15 or so years--you'll note that as soon as you closed on the loan--it was then sold to another banker. I had one mortgage loan and within a 4 year period--3 banks had traded it off.
Joint Chiefs of Staff Member
I hope you are right. It would certainly be a simpler problem to fix. Unfortunately I think it's a set of more complex & interrelated problems requiring more than just fixing fannie/freddie.
Vision without implementation is hallucination.
-Ben Franklin
Joint Chiefs of Staff Member
I agree, if you look at the bill, it's not a temporary measure to prevent collective bargaining, it's permanent. It's opportunistic or may be seen as an example of the 'Shock Doctrine.' (read Naomi Klein's book, except for the Part 1, Chapter 1 (not so good), however the rest is excellent).
None of the endangered jobs can be outsourced (obviously) like many other US jobs. It's more than troubling.
Vision without implementation is hallucination.
-Ben Franklin
Secretary of Defense
So many strawmen in this posts, when the thread is about the WI newly elected governor doing union busting for the GOP big bosses, large manufactures. The Koch brothers being one of Walker's largest contributors is surely an indicator, even to the most simple minded in the GOP.
This union busting has nothing to do with taxes. In fact, the Walker had to give tax breaks to large manufactures to create this state deficit, and now blames that on all public unions, except of course, for the 3 unions that supported him. If you're so gung ho about this, why don't you go there and demand that Walker also include those unions that contributed to him?
fiscal conservative, Constitutional Neo-liberal democrat
"I am not a member of any organized party — I am a Democrat," Noted humorist Will Rogers
http://politicalcorner.org/index.php
http://www.realchange.org/bushjr.htm
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