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Guest blogger JT puts the Wisconsin teachers in the Dunces chair...
I want to thank the Democrat National Committee, Organizing for America, unions in general, and public sector unions in particular for doing in one week what the conservative movement has been unable to do in five decades-show that liberalism is not so much looking out for the "little guy" as it is looking out for itself.
Last week, leftist power brokers and reportedly up to 70,000 useful idiots descended on Madison, WI and showed the nation what they are really about-their utter contempt for the taxpayer. They (not so peacefully) assembled to voice their opposition to-wait for it-the notion that government employees should contribute to their own generous benefits and pensions like the rest of the working people in this country.
Wisconsin state Democrats took a page out of the Texas Democrat playbook by taking their marbles and fleeing the state, effectively shutting down the state legislature by preventing a quorum required to do business. Not to be outdone, teachers lead by example by showing their students that if you don't get your way, don't waste your time working within the system, throw a tantrum and call in sick. Thankfully, the teachers were equally ineffective at teaching protesting as they are at teaching reading, writing, arithmetic, and history as most students had no idea what they were protesting.
Predictably, the democrat party stenographers at MSNBC, WAPO, NYTimes, etc. aren't reporting much on the counter protest the way they did during the Obamacare debate. Or that Wisconsin Gov. Walker campaigned on and was elected to address the state financial crisis and the problem of public sector collective bargaining along with a new Republican majority in the state legislature. In fact they are breathlessly supportive of government employees' right to "collectively bargain" and that is where the crux of this matter resides. It isn't collective bargaining when you bargain with other people's money.
If the employees of a company collectively bargain with the owner or executive management of the company for their pay and benefits, it involves the people (or agents thereof) with something at stake. Both the employees and the owner(s) of the company have something to win or lose at the negotiating table. The same cannot be said of public employees. When government employees go to the negotiating table, they are not dealing with the people paying the bill for their compensation-the taxpayer. They are dealing with a disinterested party (as far as keeping costs down) whose main interest is getting re-elected and often does so by handing out taxpayer dollars. This presents a clear conflict of interest. Both the politician and government employee union come to the negotiating table with nothing to lose. The politician gets votes without paying a cent, the union gets pay and benefits for its members that are completely out of line with the private sector, and the taxpayer gets the ever growing bill.
It's not just Wisconsin facing this unsustainable funding model. Other states are coming to the realization that public employee collective bargaining is contributing to their fiscal woes. Texas, New Jersey, California, Illinois, and Ohio are dealing with huge deficits and will have to make difficult decisions. And difficult decisions are what is needed to put us on a sound fiscal course as long as Washington, which can often be counted on to do precisely the wrong thing, minds its own business and refuses to bail out the states. Doing so will only prolong and exacerbate the problem. It's time to pay the piper.
Do not be mislead, the left is coming unhinged because they see their gravy train leaving the station without them and their power evaporate. The taxpayer, increasingly tapped out, is now wise to their game and has demanded a seat at the negotiating table. So keep on keeping on liberals, the moral bankruptcy of your position is on full display for the world to see.
by: Jon Thomas
February 22, 2011
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Collective bargaining for employees is an important right of the American citizen. The right to peaceably assemble to air grievance with an oppressive employer without fear of the government using force to disperse you should be respected. However, government employees should not have been allowed to unionize in the first place. It is clearly rife with corruption to have unions contributing to legislators who then approve union contracts; all paid for by the third party taxpayer who has no say.
ReplyDeleteIn reality, all unions should not be allowed to nationalize and create their own bureaucracy. They are in fact now corporations who lobby and pay off Congress, while their whole existence is involved with bleeding as much off of a company as possible. This is why so many states have adopted 'Right to Work' laws in the first place. Unions, as all leftist eventually do, have overreached and shot themselves in the foot. Good riddance.
Goood share
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