Feb 23 2011
Republicans Roll Out Nationwide Assault on Working and Middle Class
Tens of thousands of Wisconsinites rallied yesterday morning inside the Capital Rotunda in Madison against Republican Governor Scott Walker’s union-busting budget proposal. Former Guitarist for Rage Against the Machine, Tom Morello, performed at the rally and afterward told Rolling Stone Magazine “[w]hat’s happened so far might be the most remarkable twenty-four hours of my life…I’ve never seen this kind of outpouring of unapologetic, steel-backboned support for union causes in the United States. The Madison police were delivering bratwurst to the protesters inside the capitol, and the kids were thanking them. It was unbelievable.” For more than a week members of all the major unions in Wisconsin, a state known for its strong pro-labor history, have assembled, protested, conducted sit-ins, sleep-ins, and more, capturing national attention. At stake is a budget proposal that would gut the rights of many unions to bargain collectively. But what’s happening in Wisconsin is not an isolated incident. Republican lawmakers have rolled out similar pieces of anti-union and anti-worker legislation in several states including Idaho, Indiana, and Ohio. Inspired by Wisconsin, and some would add, Egypt, Americans have raged in the streets in those states too. In Idaho, teachers have protested a set of three anti-teacher, anti-union bills proposed by Education Superintendent Tom Luna. In Ohio, teachers have organized against Senate Bill 5, introduced by Republicans and targeting union organizing rights. After being shut out of the Statehouse in Columbus by Republicans, protesters were finally let in to express themselves after threats of a lawsuit. And, in Indiana, Democrats took a page out of the Wisconsin book by fleeing the state to stall votes on a so-called “Right to Work” bill which would again undermine unions. Hundreds of union workers and students have been conducting sit-ins at the State House in Indianapolis.
GUEST: Darold Johnson, Legislative and Political Director of the Ohio AFL-CIO, Sherri Wood, President of the Idaho Education Association, Jane Slaughter, Staff Writer with Labor Notes
Find out more about Ohio’s struggles at www.fightforafaireconomy.org
Find out more about the Idaho teacher’s struggle at www.idahoed.org.
Read Jane Slaughter’s writings at www.labornotes.org.
10 Responses to “Republicans Roll Out Nationwide Assault on Working and Middle Class”
WRONG HEADLINE YOU CHUCKLEHEAD!
AMERICANS ARE IN SUPPORT OF SCOTT WALKER AND THE END TO UNIONS… REMEMBER EASTERN AIRLINES?????
I’ve got an idea! Lets keep spending billions of dollars that we don’t have. Then we’ll pretend everything is okay and that we aren’t insolvent. Then the world will be a better place, in our pretend world…
Brice, perhaps we should do what’s right by not punishing the middleclass and tax the rich. After they got their wealth from our hard work.
Hmm, not what I’m hearing. Comments around my neighborhood are more along the lines of “If all those people actually have jobs, how come they can take so much personal time off on a lark? Must be government union (snicker).” And the metaphorical comparison to Egypt is absolutely laughable – let’s see, protesters tired of a 30 year dictatorship with a history of severe repression putting their very lives at stake, or public union protesters complaining because they are reaping the just desserts of their unions over-reaching at nice safe negotiating tables (without risking anything except a bad diet of pizza and bratwurst, and maybe a sore back from sleeping on the floor).
What you are hearing depends on whether you are listening to the entire band or just your section blowing in each others ears.
LOL! And Obama’s taking the unemployment rate from 5% to 20%, increasing the number of people on the poverty level and food stamps to the highest in the nations history by the democrat party is called what in your leftist intentionally uninformed skull? Oh, and the number of businesses shuttered, jobs pushed offshore, historical records for bankruptcies and foreclosures would be what kind of assault on the “working middle class”? I get a whiff of socialistic, communistic, Marxist sloganeering by the leftoid dummies! Of course, facts speak for themselves which is why you want to change the discussion and avoid reality! Remember, on Jan 20, 2013 Obama will be recorded as thee worst one term president in the nation’s entire history, and his record will never be broken!
Rivergirl,
The funny thing is that I am textbook middle-class. I simply don’t believe that my employer has made their wealth at my expense. Maybe the hard truth is that my employer has better ideas and is willing to work longer hours and endure more financial risk than I am. You know that is how a free society is supposed to work.
Or I could blame everyone with more money than myself. Saying that they are bad and evil slave drivers.
Poor, poor pitiful me.
The only argument that conservatives, such as the tea party, have is the brute force of lies, money, and violence per se. It is commonly understood that unions keep in check the power of business and big government in collusion with big profit-seeking capital. Collective bargaining is part of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Article 23 identifies the ability to organize trade unions as a fundamental human right. And, Item 2a of the International Labor Organization’s Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work defines the—freedom of association and the effective recognition of the right to collective bargaining as an essential right of workers.
So, all the lies, unethical money, threats of and actual violence will not keep people from their rights. As seen in the civilized developed world, strong unions do work in the best interests of all, which include owners and the budgets of governments. Putting the blame on workers is a worn out relic from the 19th century and Reaganomics. The actual culprits are the financial industry let loose as deregulated, insolvent bailed-out banks, and other too big or too profitable to succeed corporations, and our insatiable military industrial psychosis, which always “wins” because wee the peep sheep allow it to always lose. Our military industrial psychosis has and will continue to be the ultimate lose/lose if wee continue our self-deception, our pointless charade of ignoring the sad, plain facts and certain truisms about our collective dementia, dysfunction, delusive view of ourselves as Americans, and our complex of guilt, paranoia, and self-loathing.
thank God for the previous five comments! i’m so ph****** SICK of hearing only the liberal slanted whining about this. what we are seeing (legislatively) IS the WILL OF THE PEOPLE. ALL the people–not JUST the Socialist Union mouthpieces! What we are seeing in action, is the absolutely APPALLING behavior of Libs, Dems, and ELECTED OFFICIALS! How DARE they skip town!! they should be F.I.R.E.D. upon return, for dereliction of duty, conduct unbecoming an elected official, and, possibly, TREASON.
The Cato Institute found that the U.S. Federal Government spent $92 billion on corporate welfare during fiscal year 2006. Major recipients were Boeing, Xerox, IBM, Motorola, Dow Chemical, and GE. One estimate reveals that state and local governments provide $40-50 billion annually in economic development incentives, which many critics characterize as corporate welfare.
David, the only relic from the 19th century in sight is the industrial union movement, still solving 19th century problems with 19th century bully tactics.
And distracting attention from one problem – the unsustainable demands and entitlements demanded by public employee unions and their overpaid bosses – by bringing up another problem – how government interacts with private business – is a classic tactic of misdirection.
The bottom line is that unions in general and public employee unions specifically are NOT popularly supported and are an anachronism in today’s economy, no matter how much the unions protest otherwise.