The Governor from Koch Industries
Newsflash: There is no legitimate citizen movement in the United States dedicated to ending the rights of public employees to collectively bargain for the pay and benefits. According to Gallup, by almost two-to-one, 61% of Americans would oppose a law such as the one being pushed by Scott Walker in Wisconsin, compared to only 33% in favor. Democrats are obviously opposed-- 79 to 18%, but even self-described political independents are against bargaining restrictions at a stronger clip than the national average-- 62 to 31%.That isn't to say that there isn't a Corporate Republican movement to put an end to these hard-won human rights. Walker, "the Governor from Koch Industries", has the direct backing of the corporate paymasters who put him in office last year, and by extension, the publicity machine of corporate media and some useful idiots in the Tea Party. In Des Moines yesterday, union backers held a large rally in support of workers rights at the state capitol, but the "objective" reports a day later from the Gannett corporation had it that there were "twin tempests" at the statehouse-- one by the rallying workers and one by the Teabaggers. You have to dig into the story to find the facts that there were approximately 800 ralliers in the first group, compared with only about 120 in the counter-demonstration, the second group on hand to advocate for a race to the bottom economically between public and private-sector employees. Taken as just raw numbers, I'd like to point out that 120 is not a "twin" of 800, but such is the journalistic cult of the Tea Party.
Like the Tea Party itself, Scott Walker finds himself well-funded by corporate interests in the wake of the devastating Citizens United Supreme Court decision a year ago. Only a housing and real estate group in Wisconsin gave more directly to Walker's gubernatorial campaign last year than the Koch brothers' $40,000. Koch Industries is the second-largest privately-owned company in the U.S. The company's PAC also gave $1 million to the Republican Governors Association, which in turn funneled an additional $65,000 into Walker's campaign coffers. The Governors Association spent $3.4 million in television attack ads last fall on Walker's opponent. (This is Walker's so-called "grass roots" political support.) Koch Industries is a private energy conglomeration, based in Wichita, Kansas, run by a pair of robber baron brothers, and sons of a John Bircher who opposed the American Civil Rights movement. Charles and David Koch collect their billions in revenue from business ventures in oil, manufacturing, investments, and politicians.
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Scott Walker, Unleashed!: Wisconsin's governor tells the world that his attack on public workers is about the health of his state's budget, but in private, he tells David Koch the truth. This battle, for Walker, is really about pushing Ronald Reagan's political ideology of union-busting. How do we know this? Because he got crank-called by a journalist for an online magazine in New York who pretended to be Koch, the governor's billionaire sugar daddy. (Listen to the 20-minute interview here.) Nothing like a little dough to buy some political access whenever you need it, right? Classic. At the end of the call, Walker even says he'll take Koch up on the offer of a little bribe.
posted by CM @ 11:49 AM
2 Comments:
I don't understand your staunch support of all things union. They served their purpose 50+ years ago when worker safety and minimum wages weren't enforced. But with federal and state laws designed to protect worker rights, why do we need unions anymore? I can show you time and again how unions have stifled growth and innovation for entire industries for decades at a time. I have never been represented by a union and I earn a very good living and don't have to pay someone to represent me in negotiations for a 1.5% raise.
Come in early, work hard, follow corporate policies, contribute to the success of the firm and the rest will take care of itself.
You owe almost everything you have financially to unions. I'm glad you brought this up because this can be instructive of how we all benefit even when we don't carry a card.
From what I know of you as a pal: You don't work weekends. You're expected to work only 40 hours a week. In fact, it's been inconceivable since the time that you were born that you should be expected to work more than 40 hours a week as a standard. Union bargaining has raised the standard level of vacation and sick time available to all U.S. workers, which includes you. Though one may claim these are gains earned long ago, unions were major political players more recently in passing the Occupational Safety Health Act that helps keep you safe at work, as well as the Family Medical Leave Act, and these are benefits, again, that are enjoyed by even those not in unions. I doubt you're paid for overtime, but I'm sure many of your friends and family are. I'm actually quite sure of that.
If you were canned, your boss would have to compensate you-- and most importantly, he would have to can you for a justified reason.
Stock market investing, your trade, was for almost a century the virtually-monopolistic domain of Eastern financiers and blue bloods, but then labor unions created the American middle-class, and stock market investing became common in households across America and across nearly all income levels, raising the number of investment representatives to record heights. According to the Economic Policy Institute, the impact of unions on non-union wages is almost as large as the impact on union wages. Studies show that union workers have more money to invest, whether in employee retirement accounts or otherwise, than non-union workers in the same work.
Growing up in a single-parent household, the source of the parent's income, if I'm remembering the correct employer, was a unionized factory, and so either there was a union wage feeding young David's education, housing, clothing, and stomach, which is most likely, or at least, it was a non-union income from the same employer in which collective union bargaining raised the income ceiling for all employees.
Union wages help keep your home, family, belongings, and entire neighborhood safe from fire and intruders. Skilled union workers likely built your house and the family cars to levels of stringent safety. Union wages mean that competent and skilled nurses and hospital employees will be available when family members need care. In all of these industries, labor unions help protect us from "a race to the bottom," where we can least afford one.
Labor unions, as an institution, have been historic proponents of equality, a living wage, and for the protection of the health, safety, and compensation of the underclass, elements consistent with the core tenants of the Christian faith.
And union wages keep the players on your baseball team enriched and happy despite the team's century and more of losing.
Thank you, labor unions!
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