NBC anchorman Brian Williams says government workers in Wisconsin are “rising up and saying no to some of the most extreme cuts in the nation.”
It’s a glorious revolution.…
Thousands have been descending on the statehouse to protest the new governor’s willingness to curtail the collective bargaining rights of public employee unions.
One demonstrator tells NBC that teachers are fighting for the “same thing” Egyptian demonstrators are fighting for — budget cuts equaling dictatorship, presumably. Others say that the proposed cuts “unfairly penalize union employees.”
Of course, these folks aren’t about to recognize the fact that, in many states, untrammeled splurging on public union employees has long unfairly penalized taxpayers.
The protesters’ assertions get a fair amount of attention from national media. We’re hearing less about the violent rhetoric and even threats that some have engaged in. Governor Walker has been compared to Hosni Mubarak and to Hitler, and one placard shows him being targeted by a sniper’s rifle.
National Review’s Jay Nordlinger reports that the governor and members of his administration have been threatened with violence. “I have heard from people closely connected to the threatened individuals,” Nordlinger writes. “Their letters are hard to take. The last few days have made quite clear that, if you cross the public-employee unions, you run risks: and not merely political risks.…”
Don’t the hazards of trying to reduce the extent to which taxpayers are looted deserve a few moments on the evening news?
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
13 replies on “Wisconsin Whitewash”
Those getting the threats need to keep copies and publish them on the internet if not further. In time a patterb\n may appear.
Of course the ones threatened do not deserve any time in the “old media”. The “old media” is part of the mob doing all the looting!
I’m a little tired of labor movements comparing themselves to freedom movements in non-democracies. Peaceful demonstration by six-figure-income teachers in Madison is not the same thing as demonstrations in which Egyptians, having lived under a corrupt dictatorship for 30+ years, risk their lives. It’s just as bad as US unions co-opting “solidarity” from the Poles when they overthrew communism.
They’ve put the lie to the idea that all they care about are “the children”. Let’s also stop with the idea that they are “public servants”. They serve no one but themselves.
As for the media, who watches them anymore?
Presbo is using his own campaign people and campaign funding, not to “get” elected, but to bus in union and pro-union people from out of state to facilitate and encourage the Wisconsin public employees union against the elected government of the state and that is representing the interests of the whole rest of the state.
In 1981 when unions that ran the air traffic controllers tried to hold the government hostage to catering to their financial demands, Reagan fired the lot of them. 11,000 of them.
Now the teacher’s union is trying to hold the state government hostage in Wisconsin. Presbo has been obsessed with Reagan, even presupposing to refer to himself as “the gipper” during the farewell speech for his spokesman, Robert Gibbs. In this new crisis set off by the unions, Presbo is almost like Reagan. Except.….not
More like… the Anti-Reagan.
“…states, untrammeled splurging on public union employees has long unfairly penalized taxpayers.” I had no idea so many incompetent managers had risen to the negotiating table where they gave away the store! Are we to believe state employees intimidated management? Come on; tell us who approved this “splurging.”
As a retired member of the United Steel Workers I am disgusted with these Government workers . They cannot comprehend that Government is broke . Teachers espically have held the public schools hostage for decades and received wage increases and benifits the real union workers knew were unreasonable . They are the cause of this financial problem .
Wow. There sure are a lot of anti labor people posting today.
Not anti-labor per se, John; just worried that the price of government is becoming a serious drag on the nation’s prospects. Also a little tired of elected officials buying union votes with public money.
Decertify the union
Fire the teachers who went on strike
Charge with fraud and making false official statements those who used phony sick notes
Change the retirement system from Defined Benefit to Defined Contribution
Make them pay the going rate for retirement and health care insurance
the stupid idiot libtards
Milwaukee teachers get $100,000 in compensation for a 9 month job. That’s way overpaid IMHO. Government doesn’t work — it uses force.
The protesters in the middle east are protesting the government oppressing them. The government employees protesting in WI are protesting losing the ability to oppress the citizens by taking money from them via force. And of course the Democrat politicians support it, because they get bribes from the government unions (I mean campaign cash).
Is it a good thing, when I can give a politician who sets my salary some money in return for a higher salary? No, it’s using government to steal.
Here’s a reference on Milwaukee teacher compensation: http://maciverinstitute.com/2010/03/average-mps-teacher-compensation-tops-100kyear/
The media and protesters can’t say cutting their bargaining “unfairly penalizes” them when they make this kind of salary.
Cato also shows some data on government employee compensation: http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/everything-you-need-to-know-about-whether-state-and-local-bureaucrats-are-over-compensated-in-one-chart/