Some of the Wisconsin politicians who just voted to destroy worker's rights are headed to Washington, D.C., to be showered in money from lobbyists for some of the biggest national and international corporations and banks.
In an interview with the "Fox & Friends" morning show last Sunday, Wisconsin Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald arrogantly dismissed public support for the "Fab 14" Democratic Senators, recycling discredited talking points to deceive the public (and perhaps himself). Here is what Fitzgerald said and why it is wrong.
In 2010, the U.S. Census Bureau delivered the troubling but hardly shocking news that almost 51 million Americans -- nearly one out of every six of us -- had fallen into the ranks of the uninsured.
The MacIver Institute, also known as the John K. MacIver Institute for Public Policy, is a Wisconsin-based, free-market think tank formed in 2009 which also acts as a "news service," supplying videos and reports to media outlets, like newspapers and television broadcasters. But just who is the MacIver Institute?
SUNDAY, MARCH 20, 2011, NEWS ROUNDUP
Wisconsin State Journal: STUDY: BUDGET COULD HURT STATE'S ECONOMY
Gov. Scott Walker's plans to balance the state budget by cutting spending and public workers' take-home pay will slow the state's economic recovery, according to projections by a UW-Madison economist. An estimated 21,843 jobs will be lost over the next year or two as public agencies and workers are able to spend less in their communities, said Steven Deller, a professor of applied economics who studied the ripple effects of Walker's budget-repair bill and two-year budget proposal. "That's not just a bump in the road," Deller said. "That's a speed bump."
The divide-and-conquer attack on working people by Wisconsin Republicans continues. After pitting private sector workers versus public employees, Walker and the GOP are now targeting Wisconsin's quickly-growing Latino and immigrant communities.
The latest census numbers show that Wisconsin's Latino community has grown by 74 percent in recent years, and GOP lawmakers have responded aggressively to this shift in Wisconsin's ethnic composition. Walker's budget eliminates laws that had treated immigrants humanely, and a GOP bill circulating through the legislature seeks to impose a draconian racial profiling bill modeled after Arizona's SB1070. What's more, the anti-immigrant sentiment may be fueling the out-of-state effort to recall Wisconsin's Democratic Senators.
Sam Anderson, a retired Teamster who now runs a hobby farm in Marshall, thought Scott Walker needed to listen to the people. So did Elliot Zander, 15, who works on his family's organic vegetable and grain farm in Columbus, as well as Nick Huyvetter, a dairy farmer from Fairchild.
On the day that the bill passed the Wisconsin Assembly effectively ending 50 years of collective bargaining in Wisconsin and eviscerating the ability of public unions to raise money through dues, a new front opened in the battle for the future of Wisconsin families.
Bagpipes blaring, hundreds of firefighters walked across the street from the Wisconsin Capitol building, stood outside the Marshall and Ilsley Bank (M&I Bank) and played a few tunes -- loudly. Later, a group of firefighter and consumers stopped back in at the bank to make a few transactions. One by one they closed their accounts and withdrew their life savings, totaling approximately $190,000. See a video clip. After the last customer left, the bank quickly closed its doors, just in case the spontaneous "Move Your Money" moment caught fire.
The Wall Street Journal has pointed out what an expensive bureaucratic nightmare it will be for the twenty-person Wisconsin Employee Relations Committee to certify annual elections for the 2,000 unions representing Wisconsin's 200,000 state employees around the state.
In what many called possibly the largest labor demonstration in U.S. history, Wisconsin state legislators rallied a crowd Saturday afternoon that rivaled previous weekends' protests of Gov. Scott Walkers radical budget repair bill.
"Our fight to protect union rights has become a fight to protect all our rights -- a fight to protect democracy," said Minority Leader Sen. Mark Miller, D-Monona. "You have inspired the nation with your passionate and peaceful protests."
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