Check Out the Scumbag Dem's In WI

[d-ray657]

Originally Posted by piece-itpete

No, though it happened to the steelworkers.

Needs done like the UAW did, everyone hired after a certain date gets the new package. That way fairness is preserved.

Pete

Glad to see that you are being reasonable about the existing promises. I'm not sure all of the pols see it that way.

I understand your point with respect to the new hires, but I am not comfortable telling the working class that it's just time to get used to diminished expectations. I think the private sector employees need to organize to improve their standard of living rather than bitch about the government workers earning a decent living. Better wages for the middle class will increase tax revenues, because we all know that the rich know how to avoid paying taxes anyway. They might as well spread some of that tax-free money around to people who are willing to work for it and pay their fair share of taxes.

Regards,

D-Ray

[merrylander]

This deal for the new hires is a crock. UAW let GM hire newbies at half $14 instead of $28. Total difference in their newest small car cost $173.

What pisses me off is some asshole like Walker comes along and spreads around a layer of bullshit 3 feet thick and y'all believe him without questionning a damn thing. He would not recognize the truth if it bit him on the arse. But everyone so wants to believe government workers have it soft. If that is the case why don'y you apply for a job.

It is just so damn easy for someone sitting behind a desk to say, raise the retiremet age to 69 or 70. Not quite the same if you are down in an coal mine, or repairing water mains, or nursing where you need to get a bed pan under a 250 pound patient, or nailing shingles on a roof. We made a contract with the government, pay your FICA and we will give you something in your old age, providing you work for 40 months, otherwise tough shit. Funny how all the AGI and Goldman Sachs guys said "Well the bonuses are a contract, we can't go back on it". Different story when it is some middle class stiff. Yeah, well f**k you too!

[Charles]

Originally Posted by merrylander

This deal for the new hires is a crock. UAW let GM hire newbies at half $14 instead of $28. Total difference in their newest small car cost $173.

What pisses me off is some asshole like Walker comes along and spreads around a layer of bullshit 3 feet thick and y'all believe him without questionning a damn thing. He would not recognize the truth if it bit him on the arse. But everyone so wants to believe government workers have it soft. If that is the case why don'y you apply for a job.

It is just so damn easy for someone sitting behind a desk to say, raise the retiremet age to 69 or 70. Not quite the same if you are down in an coaal mine, or repairing water mains, or nursing where you need to get a bed pan under a 250 pound patient, or nailing shingles on a roof. We made a contract with the government, pay your FICA and we will give you something in your old age, providing you work for 40 months, otherwise tough shit. Funny how all the AGI and Goldman Sachs guys said "Well the bonuses are a contract, we can't go back on it". Different story when it is some middle class stiff. Yeah, well f**k you too!

I'm not too sure where the truth lies on this matter. I've read things to the effect that different public unions in Wisconsin operate under different charters?, and Wisconsin has a 3.5 billion deficit to start with. As far as the wisdom of offering the 123 million? tax incentives to businesses which relocate to Wisconsin and removing it from the public sectors benefits...well, the public sector doesn't create revenues, it expends them.

No doubt Walker is trying to pull the teeth from the teachers union, whether good, bad, or simply politics as usual. I'm more of a fan of the private sector unions.

Now I agree with you 100% on the bankers and Wall Street. I don't see them as private industry, I see them as parasites on private industry. Perhaps I'm being impatient, and once globalization has run it's course the tide will start to come back in, but I have serious doubts.

I know my dad, the good Teamster he was, wanted to take a tire iron to Bill Clinton's kneecaps whenever he was pushing to allow Mexican truckers on our roads.

He was under the impression that they had the government bought off!!!

Perhaps the reason the unions are declining is because they no longer represent the rank and file members. In the case of the Teamsters, I think the mob gave them a better deal than the politicians and their globalist masters.

The mob was happy with a few million bucks, and they knew better than to kill the goose that laid the golden egg.

Chas

[BlueStreak]

Originally Posted by piece-itpete

Once again - I'M not going to be able to retire at 65 - why should I pay someone else to be able to?
Pete

I don't give a damn if the part of the money I pay in taxes or for product prices goes to employee pensions. Private or Public. I'm glad to see someone has a pension and wish my fellow countrymen hadn't been talked into becoming such insufferable tightwads by Saint Ronnie and the Cheapservative Revolution. Then maybe more of us, maybe even you and I would have something/anything? (Well, I do I have a couple hundred grand in the 401ks----But that's a frigging house of sand built by pirates if there ever was one.)

"I don't have it, so why should anyone else?" That's what got us here.
Everyone wanting to share their misery. After a time, that's all any of us will have.

My favorite years ago was when a coworker told me;

"Why should I buy American? American workers are just greedy and lazy. F**k'em."

To which I replied, "What are YOU, genius?"

Dave

[bhunter]

Originally Posted by BlueStreak

"I don't have it, so why should anyone else?" That's what got us here.
Everyone wanting to share their misery. After a time, that's all any of us will have.

Dave

The problem with public unions is that they and politicians have similar interests in the expansion of their power. The politicians offer their pro-union positions in exchange for votes. There is no countervailing interest to halt the endless circle. Unlike private companies where you have opposing interests at the bargaining table, public unions lack this seminal part of just negotiations. The result is that those outside the union are forced to absorb the costs.

The extended problem is the growth and entrenchment of bureaucracies within the government and the attendant poor response that that entails to the interaction with the populace. Where government is involved we find inefficient delivery of products. Consider the the Post Office, DMVs, Fannie and Freddie as prime examples where the check of the marketplace fails to operate. I'll paraphrase Dwight D. Eisenhower: "we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the Government-Union complex."

[bhunter]

Originally Posted by piece-itpete

The Dems in Congress are much more wealthy than the GOP. They're just better at manipulating the poor.

Pete

Exactly, they are much better at manipulating the poor. Consider how the party of the KKK, the democratic party, convinced our black population that they are their friends. Moreover, the democrats are just as entangled, if not more so, with the wealthy. Just look at that idiot Al Gore, who had the same professor, Roger Revelle, that I had, raking in millions off his global warming hysteria. Roger Revelle was one of the first to notice the green house effect and CO2 in the late fifties. Those evil corporations are at least honest about their primary goal, maximize profit, whereas these democratic do-gooders have some ambiguous, unobtainable, feel good goal that changes with each and every exhaled word they utter. Hey, them and their ilk are like a religious cult complete with dogma and an all knowing leader that personifies the movement.

[d-ray657]

Originally Posted by bhunter

I'll paraphrase Dwight D. Eisenhower: "we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the Government-Union complex."

If you were paraphrasing President Eisenhower, you would be restating what he said in different words. The above quote is far from a paraphrase, because Eisenhower said no such thing. His original quote was, however, prophetic. We are willing to enrich defense contractors to the tune of billions and billions, but we worry about paying a decent salary and benefits to employees who serve the government in a peaceful capacity.

As far as the honesty of corporations, just look at all of the dishonesty they spent millions and millions to spew out in the last election. Their goal is to maximize profits, and they put that ahead of honesty, human rights, the environment, the communities in which they work, and for that matter the national interest.

Regards,

D-Ray

[noonereal]

Originally Posted by bhunter

Exactly, they are much better at manipulating the poor. Consider how the party of the KKK, the democratic party, convinced our black population that they are their friends. Moreover, the democrats are just as entangled, if not more so, with the wealthy. Just look at that idiot Al Gore, who had the same professor, Roger Revelle, that I had, raking in millions off his global warming hysteria. Roger Revelle was one of the first to notice the green house effect and CO2 in the late fifties. Those evil corporations are at least honest about their primary goal, maximize profit, whereas these democratic do-gooders have some ambiguous, unobtainable, feel good goal that changes with each and every exhaled word they utter. Hey, them and their ilk are like a religious cult complete with dogma and an all knowing leader that personifies the movement.

The dems policies are geared toward being socially responsible. The GOP supports unbridled greed.

[merrylander]

A little perspective on where the fault lies;

Over the years many people accepted lower paying state government jobs because of the promise of a pension. They might work some thirty years and get a pension of some $18,000 to $20,000 per year.

The state politicians thought this was great because they could brag about keeping down taxes, or they could blow those taxes on "bridges to nowhere" conveniently bearing their names.

What these politicians did not do was properly fund these pensions; they kicked that can down the road because they knew they would not be around when it hit the fan.

Well now it has hit the fan and so rather than accept the blame (and there is plenty to go around for both parties) they are attempting to point the finger at the state workers.

The media are not helping by the way they seem to suggest that all these pensions are out of line. Look at the pensions we taxpayers provide for most politicians. Take a good look at the healthcare we provide to politicians. Now there is something that is way out of line.

Sorry, but no matter how long Gov. Walker rants, and he got caught by a blogger who convinced him he was David Koch. The man is anti union, has been all his political life. Being pro or anti any group of people is not the proper function of a government official. Their duty is to all of the public regardless of their political leanings.

Quite frankly his behaviour verges on the impeachable.

[merrylander]

Originally Posted by bhunter

Hey, them and their ilk are like a religious cult complete with dogma and an all knowing leader that personifies the movement.

Pot, kettle, black.

"Them and their ilk"?