Wisconsin is the New Egypt

[Doug C]

Not as cute as the dog...so I've updated my avatar and the screen name. Thanks,Doug

 

You are welcome. I am humbled that my smartass-fueled moment of inspiration could contribute to such a kick ass name and avatar.

[Sparky speaks]

You never know when genius will strike.

 

Here's a little Wisconsin protest humor I read somewhere...

 

A unionized public employee, a tea party activist and a CEO are sitting at a table with a plate of a dozen cookies in the middle of it. The CEO takes 11 of the cookies, turns to the tea partier and says, "Watch out for that union guy... he wants a piece of your cookie!

[LouieB]

Union Blues

by Hendrik Hertzberg

March 7, 2011

 

“Fifteen million Americans bring you Edward P. Morgan and the news.” From 1955 to 1967, that line, heard on the ABC radio network every weeknight at 7 P.M., heralded the nation’s best news broadcast. Those fifteen million Americans were the members of the A.F.L.-C.I.O., a federation that included nearly every union in the land. Organized labor was powerful and, for the most part, respected. Its economic and political muscle had played an indispensable role in insuring that the benefits of postwar prosperity were widely shared, transforming much of what many had unironically called the proletariat into an important segment of the broad American middle class.

 

Labor has come a long way since then—a long way down. At the outset of the nineteen-sixties, one in four workers had the protection of a union. By the early eighties, after President Reagan destroyed the air-traffic controllers’ union, the proportion was down to one in five. Now it’s one in eight. In a workforce twice the size it was in Edward P. Morgan’s heyday, the A.F.L.-C.I.O.’s onetime fifteen million has shrunk to twelve million, with a couple of million more in unions unaffiliated with the federation.

 

Organized labor’s catastrophic decline has paralleled—and, to a disputed but indisputably substantial degree, precipitated—an equally dramatic rise in economic inequality. In 1980, the best-off tenth of American families collected about a third of the nation’s income. Now they’re getting close to half. The top one per cent is getting a full fifth, double what it got in 1980. The super-rich—the top one-tenth of the top one per cent, which is to say the top one-thousandth—have been the biggest winners of all. What is always called their “compensation” (wage workers lucky enough to have a job simply get paid) has quadrupled.

 

Over the same period, the composition of the labor movement, as it still defiantly styles itself, has radically changed. A few weeks ago, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that, for the first time, more union members are government workers, not private-sector employees. The Times quoted an official of the United States Chamber of Commerce as pronouncing himself “a little bit shocked,” and he wasn’t the only one. Yet this development has nothing to do with some imagined spike in public-sector unionism. It is entirely a function of the collapse of organized labor in the private sector. For the past four decades, the portion of the public workforce belonging to unions has held remarkably steady, at a little more than one in three. In the private sector, just one worker in fifteen carries a union card.

 

The causes of the disparity are many and mostly familiar, the hollowing out of American manufacturing notable among them. Unlike factories, government agencies cannot be relocated to China. Nor can government agencies flout the (notoriously weak) labor laws with the insouciance of private employers, many of whom, guided by anti-union “consultants,” regard it as their fiduciary responsibility to fire troublesome workers illegally now and, in the rare cases where a worker tries to get justice, pay a trivial fine years later. In short, union-busting has traditionally been a matter for private business. But this winter it has suddenly gone public, and its weapon is not flouting laws but making them.

 

Last Friday—in the wee hours of morning, after two weeks of tumult and protest demonstrations—Republicans in the Wisconsin Assembly passed a bill that is breathtaking in its fealty to the ideology of the far right. The bill, dictated by the new Republican governor, Scott Walker, strips the state’s employees of their half-century-old right to bargain collectively—except over base pay, which can never be increased above inflation without a public referendum. It makes union dues purely voluntary and prohibits their collection via paycheck deduction. It requires the unions to face a certification vote every year—and, to get recertified, a union must win a majority of all employees, not just a majority of those voting.

 

The bill has not yet passed the Wisconsin Senate, because all fourteen members of its Democratic minority decamped for Illinois, thereby depriving the chamber of the quorum required for legislation of this type. Governor Walker claims that his bill is needed to close a budget gap. That is false: the unions have already agreed to all the cuts and givebacks he has demanded. Anyhow, Walker has called his dedication to deficit hawkery into question by pushing through large tax cuts for business (with more to come) and a law forbidding tax hikes without either a two-thirds legislative majority or a statewide referendum.

 

Liberals who applaud the Wisconsin senators’ interstate flight have been accused of hypocrisy, given that these same liberals indignantly reject the undemocratic use of the filibuster in the Senate of the United States. The analogy is as clever as it is flawed. The Wisconsinites are not trying to kill the bill (they can’t stay away forever); they merely want to delay a vote in the hope of mobilizing public support for compromise. And, instead of simply declaring an intention—the only effort a modern filibuster requires—they have to do something; to wit, camp out in cheap motels at their own expense, away from their families. They even have to forgo their own salaries: the Republicans have halted direct deposit to their skedaddling colleagues’ bank accounts. If they want to get paid, they have to come back to Madison to pick up a paycheck. And the Democrats have another point: although Walker now claims that he ran on curbing collective bargaining as well as cutting employee benefits, no one has been able to find any record that he ever said anything of the kind.

 

What’s getting awfully difficult to deny is that what the Wisconsin Republicans are doing—and they have plenty of imitators and admirers—is solely for a partisan purpose, and a potentially lethal one. Of the five biggest non-party organizational contributors to political campaigns in 2008, the top two were unions, both of them pro-Democratic and both composed partly or wholly of public-sector workers. The other three were pro-Republican business groups or PACs. In 2010, after the Supreme Court threw open the cash sluices in the Citizens United case, only one union made it into the top five, and it came in fifth. And from now on, thanks to five Justices, corporate campaign spending will be literally limitless.

 

Yes, unions will have the same freedom. But unions are already maxed out—and their resources, stretched to the breaking point, are diminishing. If, as Anatole France observed, the law in its majesty forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, the Supreme Court, in its majesty, permits both to spend as much as they can lay their hands on. If a Republican Party that has lately become rigidly, fanatically “conservative” can succeed in reducing public-sector unions to the parlous condition of their private-sector brethren, then organized labor—which, for all its failings, all its shortsightedness, all its “special interest” selfishness, remains the only truly formidable counterweight to the ever-growing political power of that top one-thousandth—will no longer be anything close to a match for organized money. And that will be the news, brought to you by a few very rich, very powerful Americans—and many, many billions of dollars. ♦

[Sparky speaks]

Louie, this clip from FDR should accompany this article...

 

[Sparky speaks]

Is tape the new weapon of mass destruction? What a crock of shit. The smearing, the demonizing and the attempted setting up of the teachers and other public worker protesters by the Wisconsin state authorities and some of the media outlets, has been ratcheted up into high gear. Six million dollars of damage from masking tape from signs? Give me a freaking break. Doesn't anyone in the media question these assertions? It obviously sounds like someone went around scattering 22 caliber bullets in places that they would be easily found. No one appears to have been spotted with a weapon. No shots have been fired. No violence has been reported. It seems like they are making an excuse to use force to clear the state house of the protesters. We'll see.

 

Breaking News from Wisconsin: Contempt, Damages to State Building, Ammo Found

 

Damages to the Wisconsin statehouse due to the protesters who have been “camping” inside the the building for two weeks…

 

State officials said Thursday that damage to the marble inside and out the State Capitol would cost an estimated $7.5 million.

Cari Anne Renlund, chief legal counsel for the state Department of Administration, said in Dane County court that estimates of damage to marble includes $6 million to repair damaged marble inside the Capitol, $1 million for damage outside and $500,000 for costs to supervise the damage.

Much of the damage apparently has come from tape used to put up signs and placards at the Capitol.

LIVE AMMUNITION has just been found outside the statehouse in Madison:

 

University of Wisconsin-Madison Police Chief Sue Riseling said in a Dane County courtroom on Thursday that police this morning found 41rounds of .22-caliber ammunition outside of the State Capitol.

Riseling said 11 rounds were found outside the State St. entrance, 29 rounds near the King St. entrance and one round near the Hamilton St. area. She testified that, “I don’t like to see live ammunition when I see significant crowds,” she said before Dane County Circuit Judge John Albert. “The presence of that doesn’t thrill me.”

In light of the disclosure, the Department of Administration may ask Albert for an order to conduct a thorough police search and possibly vacate the inside of the Capitol for a search there.

 

My link

 

My link

[Sparky speaks]

John Stewart crucifies the media for supporting Wall Street and attacking teachers...

 

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-march-3-2011/crisis-in-the-dairyland---for-richer-and-poorer---teachers-and-wall-street

 

Link to "Inside Job" the award winning documentary about the collapse of the American economy brought on by the banksters who run this country. After watching this let me know if you think the public unions should bare the brunt of blame for the crisis...

 

My link

 

After you watch Inside Job watch this and you'll see the difference between the people and the banksters...

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5o3lLJZQr1s&feature=player_embedded#at=98

[Sparky speaks]

I guess the masking tape of mass destruction was a big lie. But aren't most things that government tells us?

 

Officials back off $7.5 mil protester cleanup estimate, now say it's $350K

 

Wisconsin officials now say the cost to repair damage at the state Capitol could be as low as $350,000.

 

Department of Administration Secretary Mike Huebsch says the original $7.5 million estimate to repair marble damaged by tape was a "high-end" estimate. An updated report from DOA says a majority of the nearly $350,000 would cover a crew to perform "very limited" restoration on marble as well as landscape restoration.

 

My link

 

Another myth exposed. This one speaks for itself...

Study: Over 16-year span, Wisconsin teacher salaries lag private sector wages

 

New research by a University of Illinois expert in employment relations and labor economics shows that, for more than a decade, Wisconsin teacher salaries have fallen behind changes in the cost of living as well as wage growth in the private sector.

 

Craig A. Olson, a professor of labor and employment relations, says the salaries of Wisconsin teachers have lost ground to those of their private sector counterparts over the last 16 years.

 

The paper compares the earnings of an average college graduate employed in the private sector in the U.S. versus the earnings of an average college-educated teacher in Wisconsin through public data from 1995 to the present.

 

Olson's analysis shows that, after accounting for inflation, the average private sector college graduate saw weekly earnings increase by 10 percent from 1995 to 2009. By contrast, the average teacher in Wisconsin saw salary decline by 10 percent, not counting fringe benefits.

 

"Not only did Wisconsin teachers not keep up with inflation, their earning power also fell behind their private-sector counterparts," Olson said.

 

In 1995, the average college educated private sector worker in the U.S. earned 17 percent more than a Wisconsin teacher; in 2009, this gap had increased to 36 percent, according to Olson's research.

 

Olson's research also discovered that while the salaries of public sector workers have not risen dramatically, expenditures on their benefits, especially health insurance benefits, have increased. In Illinois, the average inflation-adjusted premium for a family health insurance policy for Illinois teachers increased from $5,758 to $10,905 from 1993 to 2008.

 

Not surprisingly, health insurance premium costs for the private sector also have risen sharply during that time, increasing from $5,742 in 1999 to $13,770 in 2010, adjusted to 2009 prices.

 

My link

[Smokestack Joe]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7gLveCVhjw

[jff]

I guess the masking tape of mass destruction was a big lie. But aren't most things that government tells us?

 

Officials back off $7.5 mil protester cleanup estimate, now say it's $350K

 

Wisconsin officials now say the cost to repair damage at the state Capitol could be as low as $350,000.

 

Department of Administration Secretary Mike Huebsch says the original $7.5 million estimate to repair marble damaged by tape was a "high-end" estimate. An updated report from DOA says a majority of the nearly $350,000 would cover a crew to perform "very limited" restoration on marble as well as landscape restoration.

 

My link

 

 

Even that seems like it's about $300K too high. Two janitors could goo-gone the tape residue in four hours. Landscaping isn't high dollar work, and the city probably already has landscape crews on salary.

[Guest Speed Racer]

That's a rough time of year to have that many people trekking outside though. They might have to re-sod/replace some shrubs depending on the kind of foot traffic they got. And depending on how much salt protestors trekked in, that could add up too.

 

Having narrowly escaped biking under this, I'd support a structural assessment after that many people were in there for so long.

 

No sense in getting panties in a knot over an estimate.

[Sparky speaks]

I'm sure landscaping damage will take care of itself in the spring. The alleged damage to the marble was an attempt to discredit the protesters, as was the discovery of bullets in conspicuous places. That issue seems to have gone away. Napster, did you actually regularly ride your bike under that bridge? I would guess they have replaced it by now, am I correct? We had a similar incident on I-95 in Connecticut a few years back. Folks drove right off the collapsed section in the dark not knowing a whole section of the highway had fallen into the river. I had driven over that section the day before.

[Guest Speed Racer]

I'm sure landscaping damage will take care of itself in the spring.

 

Not really. Broken shrubs usually die, and trampled sod often needs to be reseeded or replaced.

 

Napster, did you actually regularly ride your bike under that bridge?

 

I had just ridden under the bridge and across a neighboring pedestrian bridge. On my way up the hill onto the U of M campus I felt a huge rumble and the sound equivalent to 12 dumpsters being dropped by trucks. Missed the collapse by 2 minutes, max. I live a mile from there, and often bike and run along the river. Yeah, they have a new bridge and it's quite nice.

[jff]

I'm sure landscaping damage will take care of itself in the spring. The alleged damage to the marble was an attempt to discredit the protesters, as was the discovery of bullets in conspicuous places. That issue seems to have gone away.

 

I agree with this. I used to work in a 100 year old government building (almost exactly the same age as Wisconsin's capitol building) with a bunch of marble everywhere. Tape doesn't damage marble, nor does a group of people standing or sitting on it. But marble does get damaged over time from certain everyday occurrences, such as deliveries of furniture, paper, equipment, etc.

 

I think they're trying to blame the damage on the protestors and inflating the price of repairs in an attempt to villify them. Repairs which were pre-existing and which they were perfectly content to either leave unrepaired, or to repair them as general maintennance without feeling a need to anounce the costs to the public.

[Guest Jules]

I think the "protestors" should have to do the cleaning.

[Guest Speed Racer]

"Giving back to the community."

 

Again, don't see why people are getting their panties in a knot over a quote for estimated repairs.

 

But marble does get damaged over time from certain everyday occurrences, such as deliveries of furniture, paper, equipment, etc.

 

You don't think that time would be accelerated by 5,000 extra people filling the building to the gills for a few weeks?

[jff]

 

You don't think that time would be accelerated by 5,000 extra people filling the building to the gills for a few weeks?

 

No, I do not think time would be accelerated.

 

I'm sure the floors need a good scrub, wax and polish now that all these people are gone. Big deal. The capitol already has people on staff who do those things regularly and they don't get paid very much.

 

The problem with the estimate is that they were hoping we'd believe (and, unfortunately, many people are so stupid/gullible/rabidly partisan that they DO believe) that it will cost millions to repair the "damages" to a building that is designed to last hundreds, if not thousansds, of years.

 

If the repair estimate was accurate, how is it possible that concert and sports arenas (which are comparatively disposable) are able to stay in business after hosting thousands of rowdy attendees every night, spilling beer, stomping hot dogs and nacho cheese into the floor, pissing and puking all over the bathrooms, etc? Shouldn't it cost them milions to clean and repair their facilities after every event?

 

It's simply laughable and absurd on its face.

[Guest Speed Racer]

Shouldn't it cost them milions in cleaning and repairs after every event?

 

What are milions?

 

No, it wouldn't necessarily cost them millions.

 

* When is the last time you saw marble in an arena?

* When is the last time you were in a not-new arena and your shoes did not stick to the floor?

* When was the last time you were in an arena and actually wanted your skin to touch any part of the inside of the arena?

* How often do you go to an arena and see food or trash that had been there since the previous event?

* When is the last time you were in an arena that was stuffed over its acceptable capacity?

* Do arenas staff enough maintenance to clean up after an average event, or after a three-week long, 24/7 event that filled it over capacity?

[jff]

What are milions?

 

No, it wouldn't necessarily cost them millions.

 

* When is the last time you saw marble in an arena?

* When is the last time you were in a not-new arena and your shoes did not stick to the floor?

* When was the last time you were in an arena and actually wanted your skin to touch any part of the inside of the arena?

* How often do you go to an arena and see food or trash that had been there since the previous event?

* When is the last time you were in an arena that was stuffed over its acceptable capacity?

* Do arenas staff enough maintenance to clean up after an average event, or after a three-week long, 24/7 event that filled it over capacity?

 

You seem to be saying you believe that it will cost millions to clean and repair the capitol.

[Guest Speed Racer]

Of course not. I'm saying it probably costs a lot more to clean an arena than a capitol, and oh look, they're dirty as shit. So your analogy doesn't really fly.

 

I don't know how much it costs to clean a capitol, so I'm not going to say $350,000 is OMIGOD SUCH A TRAVESTY SHUTUP!!!!!1111!!

[Guest Jules]

billions

[Guest Speed Racer]

You're probably right. I hear Bill Gates is making a donation.

[jff]

Of course not. I'm saying it probably costs a lot more to clean an arena than a capitol, and oh look, they're dirty as shit. So your analogy doesn't really fly.

 

I don't know how much it costs to clean a capitol, so I'm not going to say $350,000 is OMIGOD SUCH A TRAVESTY SHUTUP!!!!!1111!!

 

Fair enough. I apologize for misinterpreting your post.

 

With regard to the second portion of your post, I don't think I ever said anything like what you're pretending I said. I'm simply commenting here. Calmly, and rationally. So I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't use hyperbole (or pointing out typos) in an attempt to discredit what I say or think.

[Guest Speed Racer]

So I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't use hyperbole (or pointing out typos) in an attempt to discredit what I say or think.

 

Not talking about you necessarily. Just any post here that's getting wound up over an estimate. All caps might be hyperbolic, but so is getting wound up over an estimate.

[jff]

The International Painters Union has offered to clean and repair the damage from the tape for free.

 

http://wispolitics.com/index.iml?Article=229057

 

Anyone think they'll be taken up on their offer?

[Doug C]

I think the "protestors" should have to do the cleaning.

Some might call this douchebaggery at it's finest.