Union Busting and Dem Resistence Moving to OH

[sharon kinsella]

The state police were sent out to round up the Wis State Senate Dems who refused to attend the Union busting vote so it wouldn't go through. The Fascist governor there sent out the State Police to bring them back but they had left the state.

Huge demos, solidarity walkouts at the schools forcing schools to close. More walkouts expected as county and local employees realize that striking down collective bargaining being eradicated for state workers soon will be reflected into their jobs. An injury to one is an injury to all.

There is a prediction that the movement is working to Ohio.

Expect more organized protests as the federal government seeks to pay for tax breaks for the rich to be paid for by the poor, elderly and disabled.

And I say to myself, it's a hell of a world.

[Tim Liston]

I’m not smart enough to know what percentage the rich should pay in taxes. Maybe the rich should pay more. Certainly the hedge fund folks should as they receive their compensation largely in the form of capital gains that are taxed at 15%. When all is said and done, “ordinary” rich folks pay well in excess of 50% when all the various taxes are taken into account. That’s a lot of one’s income.

But I *am* smart enough to know that when folks assert that public employee pay and benefits might be cut and collective bargaining prohibited so that the rich can have tax breaks, or so that we can be at war in Afganistan, etc., I do know that such assertions are just nonsense, a straw man argument that has no place in a rational discussion of whether public employees should be afforded collective bargaining or in determining their pay and benefits. These are separate issues.

And the simple fact is that public employees should never have been given the right to collective bargaining. For one thing, so much of government is a natural monopoly by its very nature, with no competition. Even George Meany recognized this and was very leery of public sector unionizing. Also, public employee unions have no natural adversary in the negotiation process. The taxpayers don’t have a seat at the table.

Read the following and guess who said it….

“All Government employees should realize that the process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service. It has its distinct and insurmountable limitations when applied to public personnel management.

The very nature and purposes of Government make it impossible for administrative officials to represent fully or to bind the employer in mutual discussions with Government employee organizations. The employer is the whole people, who speak by means of laws enacted by their representatives in Congress. Accordingly, administrative officials and employees alike are governed and guided, and in many instances restricted, by laws which establish policies, procedures, or rules in personnel matters.

Particularly, I want to emphasize my conviction that militant tactics have no place in the functions of any organization of Government employees. Upon employees in the Federal service rests the obligation to serve the whole people, whose interests and welfare require orderliness and continuity in the conduct of Government activities. This obligation is paramount. Since their own services have to do with the functioning of the Government, a strike of public employees manifests nothing less than an intent on their part to prevent or obstruct the operations of Government until their demands are satisfied. Such action, looking toward the paralysis of Government by those who have sworn to support it, is unthinkable and intolerable. It is, therefore, with a feeling of gratification that I have noted in the constitution of the National Federation of Federal Employees the provision that "under no circumstances shall this Federation engage in or support strikes against the United States Government."

I’ll give you a hint. It was not John Kasich or Scott Walker or Chris Christie.

I’m very OK with private sector unions. Knock yourself out! Private sector unions do have natural adversaries: the consumer, who when the unions overshoot, can purchase goods and services elsewhere. If the UAW goes haywire I can buy a Kia. I don’t have the same options with regard to trash collection, firefighting and the like. Once public sector collective bargaining is eliminated in Ohio, salary and benefits will find their appropriate level. Some jobs will pay more, many will pay less. It will take time, but it is the right thing to do.

[sharon kinsella]

Tim - You're an independent business person so I don't know any other reason why you would feel so vehemently about this except that you're a conservative.

Collective bargaining brought us such horrible things as child labor laws - which I hear one of our western states wants to do away with.

Health care benefits. OverTime pay, paid vacations, pensions, the Dept of Labor.

Unions are a leavening agent. Since, in a capitalist system, money is power and is used to hold power over people who don't have as much, employees must band together to take back their humanity.

Let me see, on the subject of taxing the rich, let's get rid of the tax breaks we just extended, tax write- offs except for basic residences. Tax breaks for companies that ship jobs out of the country. How about tax breaks for big business at all.

How about redefining small businesses and make the playing field more even for those earning less than 100,000 a year in their small business.

How about eradicating the cap on Social Security taxes for the rich. Let's make things more equitable and treat the weakest of our members better instead of trying to eradicate them like the Spartans did.

[Roy Pitchford]

The state police were sent out to round up the Wis State Senate Dems who refused to attend the Union busting vote so it wouldn't go through. The Fascist governor there sent out the State Police to bring them back but they had left the state.

How would you define "rounding up"? Depending on your definition, the governor is perfectly within his rights to act and at least one WI state senator acknowledges that very fact.

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9LFAGUO0.htm
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41664858/ns/us_news-life/ (in case you believe Business Week to be biased.)

Senate rules and the state constitution say absent members can be compelled to appear, but it does not say how.

"We left the state so we were out of the reach of the Wisconsin state patrol, which has the authority to round us up and bring us back to the legislature," state Sen. Mark Miller told ABC's "Good Morning America" from an undisclosed location Friday.

[sharon kinsella]

Maybe they will send the cops after you next time you miss work. What they protestors are doing by leaving the state is called "passive resistance" which is what Gandhi preached.

[ryan costa]

it would have been more productive for them to just stay and vote for or against. Get it over with.

[Roy Pitchford]

Maybe they will send the cops after you next time you miss work.

I doubt my position is important enough to warrant use of the police to find me.

What the protestors are doing by leaving the state is called "passive resistance" which is what Gandhi preached.

I disagree.
First, Gandhi did not run and hide from the British while trying to fight for India's independence. He walked the country, growing support from his people by showing strength in the face of adversity.

Second, as I recall, he decried violence from amongst his followers. I don't hear any of these state senators asking the unions to tone things down. I don't see President Obama calling off the DNC or his own Organizing for America group.
Instead, I've seen signs equating the governor to the likes of Hitler and Mubarak.
[sarcasm]Wait, I thought only the Tea Party did that?? I'm confused now.[/sarcasm]

[Bryan Schwegler]

Except those are protests Roy, they're not violent say like Sarah Palin's bulls eyes or the guy who shot Giffords. So let's keep this all in perspective shall we?

Of course as has been proven over and over, pesky truth facts don't seem to ever get in the way of tea party followers. Back to Glenn Beck now....

[Roy Pitchford]

Except those are protests Roy, they're not violent say like Sarah Palin's bulls eyes or the guy who shot Giffords. So let's keep this all in perspective shall we?

Not one single bulls eye or target...



in...
the...
crowd??

Hmmm. What do you know?

[Bryan Schwegler]

Roy, there's been no actual violence, which is more than I can say about the tea party adherents. Talk to me if something actually happens.

Or shall we just pretend the Gifford's tragedy didn't occur because it's inconvenient to the rhetoric?

[Roy Pitchford]

Roy, there's been no actual violence, which is more than I can say about the tea party adherents. Talk to me if something actually happens.

Or shall we just pretend the Gifford's tragedy didn't occur because it's inconvenient to the rhetoric?

First, you obviously didn't pay much attention regarding Jared Lee Loughner...
What Does Jared Lee Loughner Believe?- CBS News
(This article is a good summary of various sources.)
He was not a tea party member, nor was he a fringe leftist. He was just plain crazy. He had issues with Giffords back to 2007.

The only tea party violence I am aware of has been against members of the tea party.
A 65-year-old man losing his finger, bitten off by a supporter of Obama's heath care legislation.
A black man beaten by SEIU members in St. Louis.

Now, if you want to find and post some links so I can read about some actual events (rather than such blanket statements), I would love to read them. Until then, I consider anything you say to be highly suspect.

Now, haven't we derailed this discussion enough?

[Bryan Schwegler]

Roy you're too funny. I love tea party mouthpieces...never get tired of hearing propaganda.

Highly suspect? Pot meet kettle.

Too funny.

[Roy Pitchford]

Roy you're too funny. I love tea party mouthpieces...never get tired of hearing propaganda.

Highly suspect? Pot meet kettle.

Too funny.

And yet you refuse to refute anything I've said. If I'm not telling the truth, prove it. Make me look like a fool before everyone here. Everyone loves to laugh at a fool. I'm sure Sharon would love it.

[Bryan Schwegler]

Roy you're too funny. I love tea party mouthpieces...never get tired of hearing propaganda.

Highly suspect? Pot meet kettle.

Too funny.

And yet you refuse to refute anything I've said. If I'm not telling the truth, prove it. Make me look like a fool before everyone here. Everyone loves to laugh at a fool. I'm sure Sharon would love it.

No there's really no point in trying to refute you, since you wouldn't pay attention to it anyway. I just throw my 2 cents in here in order to get your dander up honestly. I love seeing what rhetoric will come out. I could honestly care less about needing to prove anything to you because it's just futile to go through the effort.

I mean if Glenn Beck thinks that slavery was good before the "evils of regulation" made it bad and Fox News thinks it's credible to have an analyst talk about the Wisconsin union fight who writes articles about Obama literally being the anti-christ and that the unions are are just the arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in the US, then there's not much hope of dialog with anyone who likes the tea party.

In fairness though, the far-left annoys me just as much. Extremists on both ends are what's ruining this country, not one side or the other. It's just easier to pick on the far-right, tea party, Fox News crowd because most of them are literally crazy and unbalanced. Too much material to work with.

[David Lay]

Last year, Mark Williams was tossed out of the Tea Party Express for his racially insensitive NAACP parody. (Three weeks later, he took the helm of an upstart tea party group.) Now, he wants to sow mayhem among “the union goons in Wisconsin” and elsewhere. According to a post on his blog today, Williams is seeking volunteers to pose with him as members of the Service Employees International Union at a Sacramento, California, rally, to act like angry fools and get the union workers bad publicity from “lazy reporters.”

http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/02/tea ... iu-wiunion