Scott Walker survives recall vote

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You are 10 to the 10th power more partisan than I am. Lastly, I'm saved. I know where I'm going. And it's not the hell you wish me to be in.

Longshanks

In your own mind anything is possible.

Maybe it's your time to go sit in the dunce chair.

(Thread moved from News and current events to PPR)

Do you really want me sitting on your lap.........since the dunce chair is your usual seat?

Pity you don't use yours.

Instead of blaming the unions, I'll blame former Governor Gaylord Nelson for allowing the state's public sector, against the reasoned advice of FDR, George Meany and so forth, to unionize in the first place back in 1959 - the very first USA state to allow it. Several USA states still have not - and I congratulate them for their foresight and restraint!

For those other states that followed Wisconsin's misguided lead (ie, California, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, etc) - we've got a new lead for you to follow.

(And how's that recall attempt against Michigan's Republican Governor, Rick Snyder, going?)

My home State of Wisconsin and our Governor Scott Walker - leading the USA *FORWARD*!

Mike

Irony overload

You know, there had been plenty of times when Democratic state governors had negotiated with public unions to scale down their demands - successfully, might I add - and never had to resort to breaking said unions.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

I think you're a bit old for that. Poor baby, parents won't play peekaboo with you anymore.

The polls were trending in the right direction though, from an advantage for Barrett to a Scott Walker victory. I goes Scott Walker honestly persuaded the people of Wisconsin that he was right on collective bargaining issues with these uber-relevant to the issue ads.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icGujXPWhDo[/youtube]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpq4koa8mO8&feature=relmfu[/youtube]

Weak, really weak.......

The problem with that statement is public employee unions bend over backwards with Democrats. They hate Republicans and will not listen or deal with them. Walker put it to the unions this way: Guys, we have a deficit problem that we need to cut it. I've cut everything else down to the bone. That leaves employee benefits. We can either cut them or lay off 15,000 workers. The unions' response - to a person - was "Screw you - lay off 15,000 workers." Walker said, No, I've got a better idea. You don't want to bargain. Fine. We won't bargain anymore." If the public employee unions would have worked with the Republicans this would not have happened. Ironically, more state employees are being hired because of the savings that have been made and our budget is STILL balanced. And really, why should I pay ALL of another person's pension when so many of us can't afford to contribute to our own. It might alos interest you to know that the private employee unions are now backing Walker - one of the reasons the recall fizzled out.

You're just upset because your lazy union boss friends will only be able to afford 3 BMW's instead of the original 5 they were driving.

Longshanks

Yes, it's just me being sensitive and imagining things when you personally address me like this:





Those aren't statements about the topic at hand, they're about me, and they're right there in your post. If you really want, I can go back further to other disagreements we've had that have followed the same pattern; you quite often try to deflect my criticism by making claims of hypocrisy and using tortuous logical back-flips trying to prove it. I'm not particularly interested in digging up semi-ancient history, but I'm even less interested in knowingly false characterizations of me being made.

Finally got a bit of time on my hands for an in-depth response.

Even if I grant you the entire premise that conservatives by and large want to gut the public education system, and I'm by no means doing so, my response remains: So? The public sector unions need to be reformed, I don't particularly care if the Republicans involved have some ulterior motive so long as what needs to happen happens. It's like fighting a just war for selfish reasons, its the results that matter more than the motivations.

Also, I'll point you to Ohio, where a similar law that went further in eroding public sector unions was overturned by voters; avoiding that fate seems to have been the primary reason that the Walker law was tailored in the manner it was, not some conservative antipathy towards teachers in particular. I'll further point out that teachers were no so much singled out as police and firefighters deliberately excluded from the bill, as many other classes of public sector workers other than teachers were also affected by the bill.



I'll answer this one again; People have freedom of association, they don't have a right to a specific job. I don't have to be for arresting anyone to oppose the existence of public sector unions, I just have to be in favor of firing people who try to organize them, which I am. It's against an employer's freedom of association to force him to employ a specific person or people, though I suspect this whole line of reasoning is just another tortured attempt to make me look hypocritical. Let me level with you for a second here, Marshall; I could be the biggest hypocrite in the world, and it wouldn't make you any more or less wrong, so why don't you try and focus on the issues and not on me. Anyway... On with the show.




For point one, why are my concerns over a slippery slope so easily dismissed for you? I can certainly point to examples of regulation creep springing from such regulations, the case that sparked Citizens United being just one, and I can also point to evidence that buying elections is much less effective than liberals and progressives seem to think, e.g. the last California gubernatorial election.

For the second, see my earlier reply. I'm not calling for the state to suppress anyone's right to speak or associate, I'm simply calling for them not to do business with a certain type of organization in their function as an employer. There are different rules applied to the state when it's in the role of shopkeeper, and freezing out the unions wouldn't run afoul of any of them, or my libertarian principles. Again, nice try with the false equivalencies.



I don't see the world in black and white, I see it in many, many shades of gray, and I think you know that when you're not trying to score political points. It's pretty obvious to anyone who knows anything about me, reads my posts here, etc.



If we were just talking about campaign contributions, I'd agree with you , but that's not what we're talking about. It becomes a much greyer issue when we're talking issue adds, because then it really does become a question of free speech. If I make a ton of money and want to use some of it to say, using myself as a personal example, promote firearms education and a more truthful depiction of them than is typically seen in politics, who are you to say that I can't because it may or may not help one candidate or another? That's what sparked Citizens, a company wanted to air an unflattering documentary about Hillary Clinton and had it suppressed by an elections law, a law that could also have been used to ban books or other media according to the whims of the people in a bureaucracy. Now I may not like political carpet bombings, but I like censoring bureaucrats even less.

I'll answer this one again; People have freedom of association, they don't have a right to a specific job. I don't have to be for arresting anyone to oppose the existence of public sector unions, I just have to be in favor of firing people who try to organize them, which I am. It's against an employer's freedom of association to force him to employ a specific person or people, though I suspect this whole line of reasoning is just another tortured attempt to make me look hypocritical. Let me level with you for a second here, Marshall; I could be the biggest hypocrite in the world, and it wouldn't make you any more or less wrong, so why don't you try and focus on the issues and not on me. Anyway... On with the show.




For point one, why are my concerns over a slippery slope so easily dismissed for you? I can certainly point to examples of regulation creep springing from such regulations, the case that sparked Citizens United being just one, and I can also point to evidence that buying elections is much less effective than liberals and progressives seem to think, e.g. the last California gubernatorial election.

For the second, see my earlier reply. I'm not calling for the state to suppress anyone's right to speak or associate, I'm simply calling for them not to do business with a certain type of organization in their function as an employer. There are different rules applied to the state when it's in the role of shopkeeper, and freezing out the unions wouldn't run afoul of any of them, or my libertarian principles. Again, nice try with the false equivalencies.



I'm just going to comment on the above: To begin with, Marshall, your argument concerning freedom of association doesn't bear the test of the courts:

Quoting from an amicus brief filed in the Unions v. Walker Case, which was decided by an Obama appointee:

"Even if it is found that this court does have jurisdiction, by unionizing, government employees themselves are in violation of the Establishment and Guarantee Clauses as well as the Fourteenth Amendment. Unionization creates a clear constitutional impediment to the efficiency and neutrality of government due to the conflict of interests created by unionization.
All citizens are granted and guaranteed equal protection under the law per the Fourteenth Amendment. However, the protections of unionized federal employees impede said equal protection as it endangers and infringes on the non- government taxpayer’s rights. To begin with, we have the taxpayers’ rights of not being unduly burdened for unreasonable taxes mentioned supra. There is also a proven history of willful and intentional disobedience by unionized government employees during a given political crisis that have violated the rights of the taxpayers not only financially but constitutionally as well. Let us not forget the numerous “blue flu” episodes of the major metropolitan police departments in our past history, as well as the PATCO air traffic controller strike that took place during the early part of the Reagan Administration. Recent examples include the union encouraged teacher walkout during the recent protests around the state capitol building in Madison, Wisconsin, as well as alleged behavior exhibited by the Madison Police Department during a Tea Party Rally. As Wisconsin teachers called in “sick” during the recent protests, many actually visited their physicians and received falsified sick passes, thus forcing school many school districts to cancel classes for the day, placing many unnecessary financial and unconstitutional burdens upon the families and students themselves. The participating teachers – all union members - trampled upon and usurped the students’ right to a public education as well as cost their parents untold amounts of money as the parents in turn had to stay home from work and take care of their children. This information was broadcast on the airwaves by Ms. Vicki McKenna on WIBA 1310 AM Radio and Fox News. Also broadcast by the same Ms. McKenna were clear examples of the boisterous behavior of the protesters during a Tea Party Rally in which the unionized Madison Police Department allegedly refused to give the Tea Party Participants the same protections as the pro-union protesters. Thus, the taxpayers are indeed having their Fourteenth Amendment rights violated by the public employee unions. Needless to say, discipline was modestly light, if at all, against the unionized public employees who violated the taxpayers’ civil rights by their acts of commission and omission as well as violated the constitutionally mandated government obligation of neutrality. In fact, the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution makes clear that “Government may not demonstrate a preference for one particular sect or creed.”
The behavior of the union protesters also clearly violated both the federal and state constitutions by not allowing proper ingress and egress to those taxpayers having to do normal business there. The United States Supreme Court “upholds anti-picketing law which forbids any person or group of persons to picket or demonstrate in such a manner as to obstruct or unreasonably interfere with free ingress or egress to and from any public premises….” Cameron v Johnson, 390 U.S. 611, 88 S. Ct. 1335, 20 L. Ed. 2d 182, (1968), reh’g denied 391 U.S. 971, 88 S.Ct. 2029, 20 L. Ed. 2d 887 (1968).
Let us also examine an excerpt from that famous letter written in 1937 by Franklin Delano Roosevelt to the National Federation of Federal Employees. Roosevelt decried such behavior mentioned supra:
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."
By catering to their own interests instead of the public interest for which they serve, federal, state, and municipal employees themselves are in violation of the Establishment and Guarantee Clauses and the Fourteenth Amendment and because of this there is a conflict of interest. A conflict of interest is the choosing of one duty over another. In this case, it was the choosing of the duty to the unions over the duty to the taxpayers and thus the people.
The mere existence Public Employee Unions are in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. Equal Protection means Equal Protection. Citizens of the United States have constitutional rights to be protected from their government. Part of that protection has been struck down because unionized government employees are less accountable to the general public. In other words, taxpayers have no real protection from the unionized government employee. It is general common knowledge among the taxpayer public that it may take a legislative act to fire a unionized government employee. The author of this brief worked on, while self-employed as a tax professional, a tax litigation case that, upon information and belief, involved corrupt tax officials on both the federal and state levels. In the end, upon information and belief, the author presented evidence to The Inspector General for Tax Administration that forced the federal official to retire while the Doyle Administration of the State of Wisconsin, upon information and belief, refused to discipline the very state official who catalyzed the scandal in the first place. As a result, upon information and belief, the state employee in question is still free to terrorize other law-abiding taxpayers. Upon information and belief, both of the said officials were union members. My client had no option to recover the damages caused by the above officials and had not the same level of protection under the law that the union employees did. Yet, upon information and belief, taxpayers are preyed upon by union-protected charlatans on a regular basis. These infringements of taxpayer rights are the very thing the Constitution was designed to protect taxpayers against. To rid ourselves of these infringements, we must rid ourselves of the public sector unions first. Public employee unions affect the public interest, and it is in the public interest to rid society of the public employee unions or turn them over to non-member public control. The meaning of “affected with a public interest” means that which is clothed with a public interest when used in such a manner to make it of public consequence and affects the community at large or is subject to control for the public good.” Munn v State of Illinois, 94 U.S. 113, 24 L. Ed. 77 (1876). Also see Wolff Packing Co. v Court of Industrial Relations of State of Kansas, 262 U.S. 522, 43 S. Ct. 630, 67 L. Ed. 1103 (1923). Public employee unions have a direct impact upon taxation of the general public because the wages and benefits that public employee unions negotiate for their members are paid for by the taxpaying general public. Furthermore, as these public employee unions make large and noteworthy campaign contributions to various public officials, including but not limited to legislators, they compromise said legislators by creating conflicts of interests with said legislators who then must vote on the union contracts between the public employee unions and the taxpayers whose interests these conflicted legislators represent. The public employee unions may argue that they themselves are taxpayers. That may be. But, they are not the majority of the taxpayers and it is with that very majority that the legislative recipients of public employee union money conflict themselves. This is why the public employee unions are of public interest – their actions have consequences to the general public.
Furthermore, this issue of accountability has, as cited supra, become severely abridged because of public employee unions and their power. This lack of accountability severely abridges our republican form of government. The United States Supreme Court ruled in the case of Minor v. Happerett, 88 U.S. 162, 22 L. Ed. 627 (1874) that the Guarantee Clause is a restraint upon the political institutions and processes of the states implying a duty upon the states themselves to provide a republican form of government.
To quote James Madison, an author of the Constitution, “Although the Guarantee Clause was not inserted in Article 1, Section 10, containing the principle limitations upon the states, it was from the very beginning accepted the clause would limit the states. At the constitutional convention, and in the ratifying conventions, it was generally acknowledged that the clause would forbid the states to have an “unrepublican” government such as a despotism, a monarchy, or an aristocracy.” James Madison, in the Federalist Papers, wrote that “the restraint upon the states is, that they shall not exchange a republican government for an anti-republican constitutions: a restriction which, it is presumed will hardly be considered a grievance.” The Federalist #43 (James Madison). With unaccountable and over-powerful union employees and their union bosses administering the government and affecting people’s fates merely because of political or religious persuasion, how does this not interfere with our republican form of government? How is this not despotism or a de facto dictatorial oligarchy?
To quote 16b Am Jur 2d 636, “In a republic, the tenure of office may be for a short or a long period, or even for life; yet those who are at all times answerable directly, or indirectly to the people and the power to enact laws and control public servants lies within the great body of the people.” With unions protecting and controlling the public servants, the chain is broken and we have no republic. Thus, it is also true, in the author’s view, any law allowing any such public employee union and/or public employees to unionize is in and of itself also unconstitutional.
Please examine at the financial backing the unions are giving the recall elections. “No government is republican in form which fails to secure the purity of elections and the majority rule is at foundation of republican systems of government.” See Thomas v Reid 142 Okla. 38 285 P. 92 (1930).
Thus, by catering to their own interests instead of the public interest, public employee unions are not only in a massive conflict of interest, but are in clear and unequivocal violation of the Fourteenth Amendment, Establishment Clause, and Guarantee Clause.
Thus, to quote the Declaration of Independence: “to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”
In quoting the above quotation, I am not, for the record, advocating that we abolish our government. Rather, I am indicating that we alter it by excluding the public employee unions and any elected officials who are recipients of public employee union money from it.

I would think long and hard before responding to that, Marshall.

Marshall, if you're so hell-bent for leather about rich-guys supporting politicians, than why don't you put your perverbial money where your mouth is and condemn guys like Bill Gates and George Soros and the liberal politicians who eagerly accept their cash - Obama, Biden, Pelosi, Reid, Schumer, and others. I don't see any condemnation of that - but, that's right. Liberals selective condemn, don't they?

Longshanks