Scott Walker, Union Buster

Started by Valerian, February 17, 2011, 09:31:43 AM

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Apple of Eris

Quote from: Valerian on March 14, 2011, 08:32:27 PM

Also, a neat video from the protests this weekend:

Wisconsin Protests:Tony Schultz, Speaks up for farmers, March 12, 2011

WOW! That guy was GOOD. I'm ready to start picketing right now. He should run for office, I bet he could fire up some voters.

Oh and I just saw this:
http://budget.wispolitics.com/2011/03/fitzgerald-dem-senators-wont-be-allowed.html

Apparently they're planning to continue to deny democatic senators a chance to vote. Despicable.
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Kuroneko

I get emails from the recall group after I signed the petition, and they sent an update sunday.  I'll see if I can find it.

I was under the impression we needed 500,000 signatures, but I've been on migraine meds all weekend, so I could be mistaken
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Kuroneko

#377
Ah, here's what they sent: 



This is also the total number of pledges listed on their webpage - http://www.unitedwisconsin.com/ . So, maybe the various groups circulating petitions are quoting the signatures they themselves have collected?
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Valerian

Aha.  540,000 and some is the number of signatures needed to recall Walker himself, not the GOP senators.  That's why it says pledges for recall -- no one can actually sign anything until next January as far as recalling him.

I don't know if that no voting thing is legal -- considering that all that was ever said about the missing senators being held in contempt was that they were compelled to return, I don't know where this business of ignoring the votes came from.
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Kuroneko

Ohhhh, I'm so sorry.  I thought we were talking about Walker and not the senators.  When I have a migraine it's really hard for me to read clearly, so that was my mistake.  Apologies again.  Meh.

Yes, no one can recall him until he's been in office for a year. 
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Oniya

Is okay - migraines are no fun at all.  Still, that's an impressive amount.  Somewhere in the 20% range of their goal without breaking out the calculator.
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Rhys

Quote from: Apple of Eris on March 14, 2011, 09:02:27 PM
WOW! That guy was GOOD. I'm ready to start picketing right now. He should run for office, I bet he could fire up some voters.

Oh and I just saw this:
http://budget.wispolitics.com/2011/03/fitzgerald-dem-senators-wont-be-allowed.html

Apparently they're planning to continue to deny democatic senators a chance to vote. Despicable.

Anyone know what they have to do to be considered NOT in contempt anymore? Or is this just an excuse to exclude them? Whatever the case, its like they've accepted that they'll be getting recalled and just want to throw their weight around as much as possible before they're gone.
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Valerian

Apparently, the contempt charges stick (according to Fitzgerald, who is managing to look more and more like a petulant child every time he opens his mouth) until the next session of the Senate officially opens on 5 April.  The issue is that several committees are meeting to conduct business before then, and the Democratic senators won't be allowed to vote as they normally would.

As far as I can tell, just the senators showing up for the session will lift the contempt charges, but in the absence of any specific promise to that effect in writing, I wouldn't be surprised if Walker, Fitzgerald, and Co. found a way to keep them in contempt beyond that point.

http://whbl.com/news/articles/2011/mar/15/runaway-senators-cant-vote-committee/
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Zakharra

 I'm a conservative (mostly) and I can say that if I lived in Wisconson, I'm sign the pledge just because of the gods awful and utterly bone headed things the governor and the Senators are doing. They are pretty much doing exactly what they screamed about Democrats doing.

I'm starting to think that some of these politicians just used the party platform to get elected and do not care a wit about the party they are supposedly in. They're just in it for themselves and their sponsors and screw the party.

Callie Del Noire

Quote from: Zakharra on March 15, 2011, 10:52:25 AM
I'm a conservative (mostly) and I can say that if I lived in Wisconson, I'm sign the pledge just because of the gods awful and utterly bone headed things the governor and the Senators are doing. They are pretty much doing exactly what they screamed about Democrats doing.

I'm starting to think that some of these politicians just used the party platform to get elected and do not care a wit about the party they are supposedly in. They're just in it for themselves and their sponsors and screw the party.

I'm surprised the party officals aren't doing more to stop this. The folks who AREN'T elected to office but work the party apparatus. This is the sort of thing the 'long view' guys have to watch out for. They are cutting off their nose to spite it. Short term gains in the senate. Awesome. Long term pay off? A TON of shit coming down the pipe under pressure. This is foolish, stupid and quite frankly... pretty petty.

You're doing EVERYTHING the republicans/tea party folks accused the Democrats of doing. Talk about two steps forward five backwards.


Valerian

The Democrats are no longer considered to be in contempt, and will be voting as usual.  Also, all fines have been lifted.  :)


http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/2011/03/protesters-stream-through-washington-to-protest-wisconsin-gop-fundraiser.html
Quote
Taking the fight from the statehouse in Madison to the nation’s capital, protesters shut down major streets in downtown Washington, D.C. this afternoon as they marched to the White House in protest against a fundraiser for Wisconsin GOP legislators.

Nearly 300 protesters, including Wisconsinites and union members from elsewhere, took to the streets in opposition to a fundraiser hosted by BGR Group, a Washington, D.C. lobbying firm founded by Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour.

Organized by the Wisconsin Republican Party, the $1,000-a-head fundraiser was expected to draw 60 to 70 people from Wisconsin, including Wisconsin Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald and Speaker Jeff Fitzgerald.

http://www.thenation.com/blog/159255/wisconsin-gop-senators-head-washington-collect-their-payoffs-er-campaign-contributions
Quote
Absent from the gathering will be the other sixteen Republican state senators, including Senate President Mike Ellis, who took the lead in forcing majority leader Fitzgerald to back off his attempt to deny Democratic senators voting. Capitol aides say that Ellis and a number of other senior senators have grown increasingly ill at ease with Fitzgerald’s erratic behavior and with his inability to recognize the damage that could be done to Republicans if they appear to be flying into Washington to pick up corporate money in return for passing Walker’s plan.

The fundraiser is a yearly one, but the timing is still very unfortunate.
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Callie Del Noire

OH yeah.. definitely a bad time to be getting contributions. That is all it is in this case. Plain stupid dumb timing.

Lyell

When you absolutely, positively have to kill it with fire...accept no substitutes.

itsbeenfun2000

everyone has recall petitions out the question is can they get the 25% needed to force a recall election. From what I have seen the efforts have been more widespread and better organized to go after the republicans.

Valerian

Papers have been filed against all senators who are eligible for recall, yes.  Efforts against the Democrats (mentioned somewhere up the thread) have been doubtful so far, though.

Quote
“It's clear that Democrats and liberal organizations are engaging in an attempt to make recall more than a mere hypothetical possibility for some Wisconsin Republicans,” said Liz Mair, Vice President of Hynes Communications and former RNC Online Communications Director, who has worked closely with officials on the ground in Wisconsin. “Even though Governor Walker acted to end the impasse, Republicans and conservatives should not be acting like this is done and dusted.”

A conservative activist working inside the state on recall efforts was even more explicitly distraught. The Wisconsin Republican Party, the operative said, was not lending resources to the recall campaign groups had launched against Democratic Senators, in turn causing those groups to narrow their target list down from eight lawmakers to just three.

...

The funding differences, it appears, are even more drastic than the organizational. While Mair pleaded for conservative groups to “raise and spend money in order ensure that those who pushed reform through aren't turfed out,” Democratic organizations claim to be swimming in a historic pool of funds.

Democracy for America, the group started by Howard Dean following his failed 2004 election, said it has raised nearly $800,000 to run ads and help with the recall campaign, which communications director Levana Layendecker described as “unprecedented for a non-election year issue.” In addition, 2,500 volunteers have signed up with DFA to help gather signatures. The group, with 25,000 members in Wisconsin alone, expects that number to only grow.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/16/conservatives-we-are-bein_n_836794.html

It seems to me that a lot of the complacency is probably due to Walker's overconfidence, and the Republican higher-ups taking him at his word that things are under control.
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HairyHeretic

Maybe now they'll start realising that the people weren't exactly in favour of his agenda after all.
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Valerian

You would think.  He's started making some public appearances now, but he doesn't seem to be realizing how outnumbered the supporters of his plan are.  He keeps saying first, that people will "get used to" the way things are now; and second, that most of the protesters are from out of state anyway, so they don't count.  As far as I can tell, he doesn't have any numbers to back that last claim up, either -- I haven't found any.  It's obviously a very unscientific survey, but my sister and a couple of my coworkers have been to the protests, and everyone they talked to was from Wisconsin.

Oh, but I did find another cool video, featuring time-lapse footage of the protests:

Tax the Rich: Madison Protest Time-lapse (Full Length)
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Callie Del Noire

Quote from: Valerian on March 17, 2011, 09:45:23 AM
You would think.  He's started making some public appearances now, but he doesn't seem to be realizing how outnumbered the supporters of his plan are.  He keeps saying first, that people will "get used to" the way things are now; and second, that most of the protesters are from out of state anyway, so they don't count.  As far as I can tell, he doesn't have any numbers to back that last claim up, either -- I haven't found any.  It's obviously a very unscientific survey, but my sister and a couple of my coworkers have been to the protests, and everyone they talked to was from Wisconsin.

Oh, but I did find another cool video, featuring time-lapse footage of the protests:

What puzzles me is that the folks with the Party (republican) haven't done a better job of damage control. Surely they would have sent someone in to explain to Walker that he's screwing things up for everyone? I mean he (Walker) isn't top dog on the Republican Party set up is he? I would think this amount of off year attention would DEFINITELY translate into trouble next year. This entire LACK of debate and willingness to discuss things isnt' as bad as his public refusal to do so, it WILL come back to haunt those who support him in the state house. The margin is theirs, for now, but really TIGHT. This continued stubbornness and occasional public lying will do a LOT of damage.

Rhys

I think the reason the Republicans haven't done so is they've painted themselves into a corner by embracing the extreme views of the Tea Party concerning what type of people should be in power. Now they're realizing their mistake but there's nothing they can do about it.

Things are transparent enough these days and this new batch of Republicans is foolish enough that if the Republicans sent someone to tell him to knock it off, word of the matter would spread. Look at the Republicans, who supposedly hate career politicians these days, sending their career politicians to meddle in state affairs while they've been publicly advocating greater state power/minimal federal involvement. The Tea Party, for all their flaws, is more than willing to call the Republicans out and that sort of hypocrisy and at this point, that'll only cause them more issues.

Has Walker damaged things? No question about it. He set out to bust unions and Republicans talked about how this could've caused an end to 'corrupt unions' all over the country. Instead pro-union sentiment is as high as its been in years, anti-union legislation across the nation has had to be scaled back and more and more people are starting to see the current Republican Party as being too synonymous with far right, lunatic fringe types only interested in pushing an outdated political, ideological agenda that doesn't fix the country's problems.

But the damage has been done. Now they're better off either doing damage control from the outside or working to distance themselves from Walker type Republicans as they get closer to the 2012 elections.
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Belle33

I've arrived late to this discussion, but I was so pleased to find this thread that I couldn't help but add my two cents.  I live in Florida and don't belong to a union, but I know so many wonderful people who do -  teachers, police officers, firemen, and other public employees.  I can tell you that we are all watching what is happening in Wisconsin with a very closely.  I so hope they are able to recall the necessary Senators (Democrats need a net gain of three, correct?) to restore collective bargaining rights. 

Did Walker and recently elected state Senators campaign on the promise of breaking unions?  This all seemed to have come out of nowhere.  Were the people of Wisconsin taken by surprise with this guy?  It's as though someone has slipped something terrible into the koolaid and the Republicans are drinking it.  They seem so eager to break the backs of the middle class, and so determined to protect the wealth of the wealthiest, that a class war seems to be inevitable.  One good thing to come out of this is that I feel sure more voters will take a much closer look at candidates than they used to during future election cycles. 

The crisis in Japan absolutely deserves our attention, but I hope that the good people of Wisconsin continue to be vigilant as their struggle takes a necessary backseat for a while.   


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Callie Del Noire

You know.. looking back at the biggest snafu of the Republican party.. it seems they like to sit up and beg like a trained dog for any significantly loud group that shows up. Regardless of what the rest of the party might think. They kowtowed to the fundementalist faction on and off for YEARS and now they are do the 'sit up and beg' routine to the tea party types.

itsbeenfun2000

Quote from: Callie Del Noire on March 17, 2011, 08:29:54 PM
You know.. looking back at the biggest snafu of the Republican party.. it seems they like to sit up and beg like a trained dog for any significantly loud group that shows up. Regardless of what the rest of the party might think. They kowtowed to the fundementalist faction on and off for YEARS and now they are do the 'sit up and beg' routine to the tea party types.

That is so true. When I first started teaching 3 decades ago most teachers were Republicans. Voted for Reagan, Bush Sr. even though the National Association endorsed their opponents. In Illinois we have a Republican Governor, Jim Thompson that had our backing and endorsement from the state association and was pro education. Look how much they have driven away the educators in the last decade.

Callie Del Noire

Quote from: itsbeenfun2000 on March 17, 2011, 08:47:29 PM
That is so true. When I first started teaching 3 decades ago most teachers were Republicans. Voted for Reagan, Bush Sr. even though the National Association endorsed their opponents. In Illinois we have a Republican Governor, Jim Thompson that had our backing and endorsement from the state association and was pro education. Look how much they have driven away the educators in the last decade.

What I find (darkly) amusing is how BOTH sides solution to the loss of jobs is 're-education' and higher post-high school training. They all talk about how now that the 'cheap paying' blue collar jobs are gone that the people who lost them need to 'move up' to white collar jobs, YET every time something comes up short on the budget education gets dicked. With 20 grit.

We're sabotaging ourselves badly with this 'anyone can be a teacher' outlook. I have had to do some MINOR instruction as a petty officer in the Navy, and teaching is HARD. Especially when the training I got to do my job was phased out as 'un-needed'. Going back to basic electrical theory and how logic gates work so my workers know how to trouble shoot a system is a LOT of work. I can't imagine doing that over 9 months or more a year.


Oniya

Quote from: Callie Del Noire on March 17, 2011, 09:08:41 PM
We're sabotaging ourselves badly with this 'anyone can be a teacher' outlook. I have had to do some MINOR instruction as a petty officer in the Navy, and teaching is HARD. Especially when the training I got to do my job was phased out as 'un-needed'. Going back to basic electrical theory and how logic gates work so my workers know how to trouble shoot a system is a LOT of work. I can't imagine doing that over 9 months or more a year.

Not to mention the fact that methods of teaching have changed so much over the years.  I majored in math.  I can do power rule in my head.  I use linear regression to predict when I'm going to finish my cross-stitch projects.  Tonight, the little Oni came to me with a math problem:  Estimate the answer of 296/5 using compatible numbers.  It took me a minute to figure out what the teacher meant - and then the answers were given in 'multiple guess' format, so that the first 'compatible number' we used (295) didn't give an available answer. 

I'm waiting for them to ask her to do the problem in base 8.
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Valerian

It just doesn't end...

http://www.jsonline.com/news/statepolitics/118217614.html

Quote
Gov. Scott Walker will be able to name political appointees to fill three dozen civil-service jobs that handle open records requests from the public under the budget-repair law he signed last week.

The changes affecting 15 state agencies and offices are among the provisions of the law that drew less attention over the past month because of the epic fight over its provisions stripping public employee unions of most of their bargaining power.

Walker's separate 2011-'13 budget proposal would also make a political appointment out of another key civil service job - the top lawyer spot at the agency overseeing state labor law.

...

[Bob] Jambois [soon-to-retire general counsel of the Wisconsin Dept. of Transportation] said he did see one state agency where the general counsel should be insulated from politics - the top legal job at the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission. That agency, headed up by three commissioners appointed by the governor to staggered six-year terms, handles union bargaining disputes and oversees state labor laws - the focus of most of the controversy over Walker's recently passed legislation.

Walker's 2011-'13 budget bill would also make the agency's general counsel, now a civil-service position, into a political appointment.

"That is one that absolutely should be a civil-service position," Jambois said. "The WERC has to stand up to the governor on occasion, and the general counsel has had to stand up to the commission on occasion."
Emphasis mine.  Walker has already come under fire for refusing to release emails and other documents that should come under the open records policy.  The administration was taken to court earlier this month by the Madison paper, the Isthmus, and the Associated Press over Walker's refusal to release the "flood" of supportive emails he claimed to have received over the budget bill.  They've agreed to pay a fine and release the emails by next Tuesday, though they have admitted no wrongdoing.

http://www.isthmus.com/daily/article.php?article=32765

Quote
Isthmus and the AP both made requests, under the state's Open Records Law, on Feb. 18, seeking emails that had been received by the governor's office in response to his "budget repair bill." Gov. Walker stated at his press conference on Feb. 17 that his office has gotten "over 8,000 emails" over the last few days and "the majority are telling us to stay firm, stay strong, to stand with the taxpayers."

The next day, Feb. 18, the governor said his office had now gotten 19,000 emails from state residents, with the "majority in favor" of his plan.

Both Isthmus and the AP sent follow-up emails seeking information as to the status of their requests, which drew no replies. The AP updated its request on Feb. 25 to include emails received as of that date.

Walker's office sent responses to both Isthmus and the AP shortly after 5 pm on Friday, March 4, about two hours after the lawsuit was filed. The office said the responses were written earlier but not sent due to a "clerical oversight."

At a March 8 hearing on the lawsuit, Dane County Judge Patrick Fiedler said he believed the lawsuit was the "trigger" that prompted the office's responses, and rejected arguments that the filing of the suit was premature.
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