12 Things You Need to Know About the Uprising in Wisconsin

reply to post by jimmyx
If you really believe that the evil cabal behind GATT and NAFTA bears the largest share of responsibility, then you need to redirect your volley of indignation:

really??? for detroit,. it had nothing to do with corporations moving their factories to mexico with GATT and NAFTA trade agreement help, written primarily by the BUSINESS ROUND TABLE (a small cauldron of business CEO's that meet with the president in washington)????

It was the Clinton Administration that successfully pushed through, and won endorsement from Democratic leaders in Congress for, both the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (1994) and the North America Free Trade Agreement (1994).

It was also during the Clinton administration and the enactment of the Telecommunications Act that the "tech bubble" generated unbelievable paper wealth for young, mostly Democrat entrepreneurs. This was the beginning of the really large shift of wealth from productive investment to the pockets of the techies. When the "bubble" burst (again, during the Clinton administration), it was the working people, with their money in 401ks and IRAs that saw their wealth and savings decimated.

Blame "conservatives" all you want, as most progressive lackeys do, regardless of facts.
The rest of us will stick with the truth and facts.

it's those evil democrats and liberals that picked up and moved the jobs away....

Although you were attempting sarcasm, you are correct!

simple question for you...who has benefited the most financially in america?
the executives and shareholders of corporations?...or the average wage earner?....

You mean like (Democrat/Progressive) Bill Gates? Or (Democrat supporting) Goldman Sachs? (where most of Obama's financial inner-circle came from)
Or the(staunchly pro-Obama, and pro democrat) Google Founders?
Or the recipients of HUGE government bailouts and million-dollar CEO bonuses like GE (Obama's chief financial advisor), Ford (CEO selected by Obama administration) or Chrysler (teachers, police and firefighters' union pension investments illegally wiped out during Obama-staged bankruptcy)?
Maybe you'd like to consider the affiliations of some of the highest-compensated CEOs and investors, like the Kerrys, the Rockefellers, George Soros --democrat/liberals all!

...they are simply unpatriotic and un-american, they want america to turn into another 3rd-world country, with a few rich at the top, with the rest of us just barely surviving.

If you mean the current administration, with their secretly-assessed carbon taxes, I guess you are right. Just look at what his "czars" want: socialism (Carol Browner), de-development and global re-distribution of wealth (John Holdren), or European-style energy prices (Henry Chu).

These are the same men and women who worked from 2009 to February 2010 to develop a "Social Cost of Carbon" to factor into current and future development and production (presently adding about $.20/gallon to fuel, at $21 to $43/ton of carbon)Obama's secret carbon tax

deny ignorance
jw

Pastor Niemoller quote was regarding the Nazis coming to power. But it was different when the "Communists"came to power in Russia, China and Cuba. They didn't come for the communists because they were the communists (and they use trade unions to organize the workers ["workers of the world unite!"]).

One (rhetorical) question I have is...IS THIS HOW THE STATE'S LOSE THEIR SOVEREIGNTY TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT (go bankrupt then get conditionally bailed out)??

Originally posted by ClintK
Folks, I've gotta go. Wifey wants me to run some errands with her. Sorry. I'll try to check in tomorrow. In the mean time, conservatives should feel free to label me, because they like that and somehow feel it has argumentative value. Label away!!

Yes, it's all about you, isn't it?

Don't get so full of yourself.

Typical union mentality.

If I wanted to turn the US into another China these are the steps I'd Take:
1.) Disband all public Unions...check
2.) Disband Private Unions... that's next
3.) Disband OSHA ....coming soon
4.) End the Labor Department... Working on that one too
and 5.) get rid of minimum wage...lots of support for that one
They are achieving their goals and all are singing their praises while taking it up the whazoo... hope you like working for a bowl of soup and a dirty bed in a dirt floored workhouse!!!! This is the future you stupid idiots are going to get and you deserve it.
Peace Out!

reply to post by jdub297


Where's the taxpayer return on investment for business tax breaks?

I've yet to see where a tax break for business resulted in higher overall tax revenues to pay for them.

Businesses that refuse to hire locally, that refuse to pay a living wage, and still pay executive bonusses are stealing from the public with every tax break their donations buy.

Originally posted by apacheman
reply to post by jdub297

 

Where's the taxpayer return on investment for business tax breaks?

I've yet to see where a tax break for business resulted in higher overall tax revenues to pay for them.

Businesses that refuse to hire locally, that refuse to pay a living wage, and still pay executive bonusses are stealing from the public with every tax break their donations buy.

I absolutely agree. Too big to fail was and still is a travesty. These companies should have went bankrupt. Tariffs need to be reinstated to compensate for the labor and legal inequities between nations. Unions need to be more reasonable and not try to get the sky and the moon. Most importantly, the federal government needs to get out of the damn way.

I had to laugh at the last photo...is this an example of a union teacher's spelling ability?

Originally posted by Alxandro
Here are a few more things you should know about the uprising.

Them teachers love to pollute.

...and they can't spell worth a crap.

I've read every single comment to this thread thus far. This has ignited a fantastic conversation with less vitriol than it perhaps could have ignited...

So let's start...
THANK YOU TO THOSE WHO HAVE DEFENDED THE RIGHTS OF THE WORKERS AND 'SLAVE'-CLASS WITH ME!

And (you'll probably be surprised to hear me say, but you shouldn't be) THANK YOU TO THOSE WHO PROVIDED CLARIFICATION OF THE FACTS ON THE DEFICIT/SURPLUS CONFUSION FOR WISCONSIN'S BUDGET! That should be what ANY ignorance-denying conversation is about- denying the falsehoods and supporting the facts.

With that said, I think the discrepancy between there being an inherited surplus or deficit is still not strong criticism against the union protests. As it has been demonstrated- only 6% of Wisconsin's state budget consists of state employee pensions. Also, Walker's tax cuts WILL EVENTUALLY create a higher deficit... so he's NOT off the hook for this.

For those who argue that union workers are being paid "too much" and that they need to "stop whining" because the rest of us (in the private sector) have it so bad... I must say that's EXACTLY WHAT I ADVISED NOT TO DO. When I said not to attack your fellow under-classman/woman, I meant in that very manner. The problem with the relativity game is that it is very similar to CHERRY-PICKING (and not picking the right battles); you always hear people say things like, "Well at least America isn't North Korea so therefore we are the best!!!" This is an example of FALSE/misguided logic. You cannot compare purgatory to hell and then call it Heaven. If we want to create the BEST SOCIETY we must compare ourselves to "HEAVEN", so to speak. In which case both America and EVEN UNION WAGES do not come close to par. So... the problem is not that union compensation (wages + benefits) is too high, the problem is that PRIVATE compensation does not match this! And that is why those of you who criticize union wages are being used by upper-class ideologies to attack your fellow modern slave because he has SLIGHTLY more than you. What we SHOULD be doing is fighting for our fellow slave brothers/sisters and DEMANDING MORE FOR OURSELVES! We need to demand MORE of our corrupt government and MORE of our corrupt markets/corporations. Keep in mind, there is a big difference between a very profitable/powerful big business and a barely-scraping-by small business... so an attack on big corporations is NOT an attack on small businesses (except when corporations seek to either legislate or propagandize small businesspeople into sharing the same losses when they either don't or didn't have to).

When people point out that unions make the market rigid and that they're to blame for all of our economic woes... it's sadly MISSING THE POINT. Businesses do not fail because of unions, sure the union wages don't help, BUT NEITHER DO NON-UNION WAGES. If big business could get whatever they wanted, they'd charge YOU to work for them! But... after a long and bloody history the world over and in the United States, workers FOUGHT hard, with their lives sometimes, for adequate pay, rights, and power. Once again... unions are NOT perfect. As JR Macbeth illustrated in one of his replies, it's a very GRAY AREA where unions are yet another power structure introduced into the system which is subject to its own corruptions. HOWEVER, so long as the system exists, unions are sort of a necessary evil so that AT LEAST the working class can have their own bully ready to fight the BIGGER bullies in government and business. Big business outsources BECAUSE other countries have TERRIBLE standards for workers, the environment, consumers, and so on. This is NOT a model to emulate!!! China is a TERRIBLE model for our country... it embodies the WORST of Communism combined with the WORST of Capitalism. THAT is hell, and no amount of GDP growth or employment is worth that kind of tyranny. If you think it is then you cannot consider yourself a free man/woman or an adherent to our constitution or free-thinking/non-coercive individualism OR collectivism.

If we want to compare ourselves to "heaven" we MUST compare ourselves to very economically competitive/stable countries with higher levels of freedom, health, equality, quality of life, happiness, environmental standards, workers rights, vacation time, access to health-care/higher-education, etc. than even we have in the United States. We MUST look towards countries like Germany, Canada, France, Norway, Sweden, Finland, etc. These are examples of SOCIAL DEMOCRACIES. They are essentially the MOST MATURE, intelligent, and beneficial governments on the planet thus far. Now don't get me wrong, I am an Anarchist! I ultimately want the dismantling of large-scale/centralized governments, monetary systems, markets, authority, and hierarchies. However, that will not happen in my lifetime so I DO have an opinion on what policies we enact WITHIN this system. And we really must look towards the most shining examples available. Countries like the Scandinavian countries have employed FANTASTIC levels of freedom/democracy with FANTASTIC workers rights/environmental laws, FANTASTIC economic stability and FANTASTIC benefits for its citizenry. Can this be applied and scaled up 100% to America? Of course not perfectly. HOWEVER, there are ABSOLUTELY improvements we can make while looking to these countries as a guide. We have NO excuses anymore... America is the only 1st world country without many of the humanitarian, economic, environmental, scientific, and socio-political advances of other 1st world countries. We are a strange mix of freedom/opportunity, the ILLUSION of freedom/opportunity, and extreme INVASIONS of freedom/opportunity. The future will change no matter what, it's our choice whether we foster/support/fight for REAL freedom/opportunity or let the illusions and fears combine into propaganda that ends up screwing over the slave class more than helping us.

Originally posted by jdub297
reply to post by jimmyx

 

If you really believe that the evil cabal behind GATT and NAFTA bears the largest share of responsibility, then you need to redirect your volley of indignation:

really??? for detroit,. it had nothing to do with corporations moving their factories to mexico with GATT and NAFTA trade agreement help, written primarily by the BUSINESS ROUND TABLE (a small cauldron of business CEO's that meet with the president in washington)????

It was the Clinton Administration that successfully pushed through, and won endorsement from Democratic leaders in Congress for, both the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (1994) and the North America Free Trade Agreement (1994).

It was also during the Clinton administration and the enactment of the Telecommunications Act that the "tech bubble" generated unbelievable paper wealth for young, mostly Democrat entrepreneurs. This was the beginning of the really large shift of wealth from productive investment to the pockets of the techies. When the "bubble" burst (again, during the Clinton administration), it was the working people, with their money in 401ks and IRAs that saw their wealth and savings decimated.

Blame "conservatives" all you want, as most progressive lackeys do, regardless of facts.
The rest of us will stick with the truth and facts.

it's those evil democrats and liberals that picked up and moved the jobs away....

Although you were attempting sarcasm, you are correct!

simple question for you...who has benefited the most financially in america?
the executives and shareholders of corporations?...or the average wage earner?....

You mean like (Democrat/Progressive) Bill Gates? Or (Democrat supporting) Goldman Sachs? (where most of Obama's financial inner-circle came from)
Or the(staunchly pro-Obama, and pro democrat) Google Founders?
Or the recipients of HUGE government bailouts and million-dollar CEO bonuses like GE (Obama's chief financial advisor), Ford (CEO selected by Obama administration) or Chrysler (teachers, police and firefighters' union pension investments illegally wiped out during Obama-staged bankruptcy)?
Maybe you'd like to consider the affiliations of some of the highest-compensated CEOs and investors, like the Kerrys, the Rockefellers, George Soros --democrat/liberals all!

...they are simply unpatriotic and un-american, they want america to turn into another 3rd-world country, with a few rich at the top, with the rest of us just barely surviving.

If you mean the current administration, with their secretly-assessed carbon taxes, I guess you are right. Just look at what his "czars" want: socialism (Carol Browner), de-development and global re-distribution of wealth (John Holdren), or European-style energy prices (Henry Chu).

These are the same men and women who worked from 2009 to February 2010 to develop a "Social Cost of Carbon" to factor into current and future development and production (presently adding about $.20/gallon to fuel, at $21 to $43/ton of carbon)Obama's secret carbon tax

deny ignorance
jw

jdub,
Keep in mind... you can toss out a handful of very public examples of Democrat-supporting million/billionaires... but I could just as easily toss out the same number (if not more) of public Republican supporters. And as a general rule of political thumb- Republicans represent big business/banking FAR more than Democrats do... however Democrats are ONLY the lesser evil and are absolutely guilty of coddling the corporatist/plutocratic state of society.

Also... you've inserted paranoia about a carbon-tax. First of all, there is nothing to really fear in a carbon tax except higher prices. Other countries have implemented carbon taxes WITHOUT tyranny upon their citizenry. There isn't some worldwide conspiracy to tax the air we breathe... that's insane both to suggest and also insane to implement, it would never fly. Also, carbon taxes are actually EFFECTIVE but are NOT the answer to our AGW problems. We must also keep in mind that Americans pay PIDDLE for petrol compared to the rest of the world (except perhaps Iraqis or Saudis). The amount of money we pay also DOES NOT take into account the full costs of petroleum. We're actually bathed in fossil fuel luxury here and that has to end soon. The full costs of using fossil fuels includes environmental destruction (that we'll pay for one way or another), resource wars, the stiffing of local populations where we extract our fuel, the poisoning of other species, global warming (though you probably don't "believe" in that so let's not get into it... if you want to get into it then please see my other thread here: www.abovetopsecret.com... ) the list goes on...

The bottom line is- and I think we can all agree- that we must stop the rampant corporatism in our society and force the will of the people back into the vast majority of our government's agenda.

reply to post by NoHierarchy

HOWEVER, so long as the system exists, unions are sort of a necessary evil so that AT LEAST the working class can have their own bully ready to fight the BIGGER bullies in government and business.

Really? Then why do non-union shops do so well? Why aren't the more educated, intelligent members of our workforce unionized? Why do they summarily reject attempts to unionize their workplace?

Big business outsources BECAUSE other countries have TERRIBLE standards for workers, the environment, consumers, and so on.

What a load of Marxist bullcrap! Businesses outsource because of economics. If not, we'd be paying $200 for a simple pair of shoes because of union wages and benefits.

This is NOT a model to emulate!!! China is a TERRIBLE model for our country... it embodies the WORST of Communism combined with the WORST of Capitalism.

Uhhh...China emulates us, we don't emulate China.:shk:

Originally posted by CuriousObserver
Now correct me if I'm wrong, but don't workers give up part of their pay in hopes that the money will go to a retirement fund, isn't that money something that they already earned and saved?

You have that confused with a popular pyramid scheme. This particular scheme is known commonly as "Social Security" and let me tell you, it ends badly.

Originally posted by CosmicCitizen

One (rhetorical) question I have is...IS THIS HOW THE STATE'S LOSE THEIR SOVEREIGNTY TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT (go bankrupt then get conditionally bailed out)??

Ding, ding, ding! We have a winner. This is of course the big push for dumping more borrowed money into the black hole of public education. Whatever it takes to milk the last wealth out of the working class. States owe the fed and in no time the fed owns the states. We will all soon be joyous union members. Welcome to the "North American Union" comrades.

Originally posted by apacheman
reply to post by jdub297

 

Where's the taxpayer return on investment for business tax breaks?

Which ones? Small farmers get business tax breaks in the form of subsidies to stay in business and produce locally. Means local distributors and grocers and restaurants pay less, hire more and stay afloat.

CDBG grants help underwrite neighborhood restoration and development -- even entire downtown business districts get Community Development Block Grants. Some businesses receive moratoriums on property or income taxes in exchange for promises to expand or hire new workers.

Seems to me that well-spent money through grants, abatements and other incentives can do well for everyone. Most are controlled through states but funded federally.

I've yet to see where a tax break for business resulted in higher overall tax revenues to pay for them.

So, when Toyota got a tax abatement to build a new plant on cheap, completely unused, wasted, undeveloped land in SW San Antonio, and hired 2,500 new workers right off the bat, there were no higher sales or income or other tax revenues? And, after the abatements expired, Toyota now sits on some of the most expensive land, instead of the poorest, almost worthless land it developed. Not to mention the new houses, restaurants, grocery stores, etc that have since sprung up around the plant.

That's the first one that comes to mind because my 20 acres about 5 miles away doubled in value and traffic since then.

I'll check around for other examples.

Don't get me wrong; I've seem some completely stupid deals done in the name of "new jobs," that never appear. Those are bad deals from the get-go and are usually the result of cronyism or trying to pick a favored industry (solar power) or company (GM) rather than a good or innovative concept. I have yet to see any value for the $687BILLION of tax dollars this administration gave away in the name of job creation or growth.

Businesses that refuse to hire locally, that refuse to pay a living wage, and still pay executive bonusses are stealing from the public with every tax break their donations buy.

I have to agree 100%, and you should include the UTA, SEICU, UAW, ATF and other union "businesses" among them. What have we received by GIVING Chrysler to the UAW and FIAT? Especially when you consider that the money that allowed the UAW to get their share was pension money invested by teachers, police and firefighters' unions that was wiped out by the staged Obama bankruptcy, contrary to the Constitution and federal law.

Now, if you want to think about drawing NEW business to Wisconsin, you might want to consider incentive that do what you want: require local hires, include high wage-earners, and have conservatively run executive departments.

In the 2011-2013 budget for example, Gov. Walker offers companies that relocate to Wisconsin a 2-year break from income taxes under a bill he signed signed into law earlier this year. But consider that for the first 2 years, start-up/relocated operations are likely to be income LOSERS, so no lost revenue in reality. Also consider that to reach his desk, Walker's bill was approved by a majority of the Democrats in the WI lege.

The measure joins three others Walker has signed in his first month in office that he said will send a message that Wisconsin is more business friendly. Again, with Democrat approval!

Even though the tax cut bill he signed Monday and other agenda have garnered bipartisan support, Democratic critics say much of what Walker is doing is more symbolic than substantive.
(That is, not really making much of an impact either way.)

For example, only $1 million in tax breaks is expected to be distributed to qualifying businesses that relocate to Wisconsin under the bill Walker signed. Another tax cut Walker is backing that's tied to every new job created would come with a tax benefit of only between $90 and $315 per job.

Sometimes, just appearing to be "business friendly" can make the determination about where a business relocates or expands. Walker argues the changes will improve the state's business climate.

The $1 million tax cut bill he signed Monday takes effect this tax year and affects taxes due in 2012. Companies that have not operated in the state for two years could essentially get their corporate and personal income tax obligation in Wisconsin erased for a two-year period. At least 51 percent of the workforce's payroll, or at least $200,000 in wages, must be paid to the workers in Wisconsin to qualify.

www.postcrescent.com... xzz1EYphl2vX

What else?

jw