Public workers are not the enemy

I am simultaneously proud and ashamed to be a Wisconsinite lately. The situation as I understand it is this, last November, riding a wave of anger, a bunch of new people were elected. A little over 1.2 million people, out of frustration, anger, malice, pure nihilism, or the sports team mentality "elected" a slack-jawed incompetent county executive named scott walker as governor. That represents about 25% of the population of this state, and his "victory" was by a 2% margin. But even winning by 1 vote is taken as a mandate for today's corporate masters. I may have some of the particulars wrong but walker immediately moved to cut taxes for the super rich and business, no suprize there, but then claimed it created a giant deficit which could only be repaired by crushing state worker unions. Their contracts are no longer worth the paper they were written on, except of course the firefighters and police who backed walker but they can't negotiate wages in this proposal. This is a quick poll on what Wisconsinites feel about this.

http://www.wispolitics.com/1006/BSW_POLL_PRESS_RELEASE_FEB_17___2011.pdf

This is why I am an historian and not a political pundit, I cannot suppress my contempt for walker and his ilk. This governor is a disgrace to the office, as are all the republican legislators who serve corporate power. It is impossible not to be disgusted at the character of this radical power grab by the extreme right and their paymasters, I cannot separate anger at these people from their policies as they are one and the same.

The whole affair reeks of partisanship and class warfare, reflecting a longstanding hatred of democracy and liberty. "Right to work" is how some genius first put the wedge of pitting workers against each other, this noxious phase first renders the employer neutral if not benevolent and the union as a barrier to individual liberty. Now this scheme is being adapted to destroy the public sector. Thomas Frank sketched out the strategy of "defunding the left," sabotaging good government and simultaneously putting it to work "fund, fund, funding the right" in The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Ruined Government, Enriched Themselves, and Beggared the Nation I could not put it any better, but the idea in short is a conscious effort to crush the spirit of the opposition and destroy liberalism as a viable option. It's working pretty well to the detriment of all of us non-millionaires.

This latest attempt to strip working people of rights that were hard won is especially obnoxious. Public workers like teachers especially are NOT in this field for the money but they have fought long and hard for recognition of their professionalism. Cynicism is not exactly a suprize in some teachers when the enemies of an enlightened and rational society (republicans) are constantly attacking that professionalism from all directions. Kids are programmed by TV not to value education, encouraged to be selfish brats, and view the authority of people trying to help them as suspect. Consequently, after years and years of commercialism young people have a subconscious imprint of selfish materialism that teachers try to counteract just as the teenage rebellion sets in. Making teachers' motivation suspect on the part of students and imparting the view that any public-piritedness must also be a con to take advantage of young minds. The right carefully cultivates this view as well, especially in college. You've heard it right? Liberal professors brainwash kids in the indoctrination centers called "higher education." From the other end, republicans in government constantly find or manufacture excuses to cut money for education.

Let's try a little thought experiment. Do you want the people entrusted to teach your children to be paid poorly? How about the people that fix roads and bridges? Or the police, firefighters, and corrections officers that we trust to keep us safe? If you buy the standard "conservative" line that money=effort, then somehow attacking public workers seems like a rather counterproductive road to a better society. Orrrr, you can recognize the malicious intent of walker and his gang of thieves in their attempt to divide and conquer the American people yet again.

My response to a good man.

"Bring back the Eisenhower and Rockefeller Republicans, and for that matter the Lincoln Republicans and LaFollette Republicans too! They could actually govern without demogaugery, and believed in democracy over oligarchy. Actual conservatives understood the need for preserving the good in society and for the whole society, not divide and conquer for the sake of special interests as these psuedo-cons believe. Right on man! You and other decent Republicans need to demand better from your party, as I need to demand better from mine as well."

blah

"The simplistic attitude of teabaggers seems to be that public services work like magic, and they can cut taxes, bash public workers and somehow schools, roads, etc. will continue to work. It shows that our schools need a lot more investment and teachers need a lot more support if the 1.2 million morons that elected walker is what comes out of them."

Guns cost more lives than they save - War Room - Salon.com

Guns cost more lives than they save - War Room - Salon.com: "It's worth emphasizing that the 11 victims were trained, experienced law enforcement officers. But their assailants, who'd found semi-automatic weapons easier to acquire than whiskey, gave them no chance.
Meanwhile, NRA fundamentalists pretend that America will be a freer, safer place if more poorly trained, inexperienced, unfit, would-be Bruce Willis heroes were waddling around shopping malls carrying pistols.
There's a word for people who cling to absurd beliefs against massive evidence. They're called cultists, and they're currently in charge."

College

"The idea of having large numbers of college students packing heat in their classrooms and at their parties and sporting events, or at the local pub or frat house or gymnasium, or wherever, is too stupid for words."

Bob Herbert
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/18/opinion/18herbert.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha212

History 1

I really vacillated on whether to post this story or not on facebook, just because the gun issue is such a loser on all counts. The author has good credentials as an American history professor who actually specializes on the history of guns, legal issues surrounding them, and the state of contemporary academic analysis on guns. However, this article jumps around too much to focus on any of these areas. The economic reframing he suggests would be attacked just as vociferously as the taxation of cigarettes, by many of the same people but with the huge dollars of the NRA behind it. However, it was interesting that after reading all the "spoons don't make you fat" statuses, that he brought up the sloganeering used by gun supporters. I guess "I don't want cuckoos to shoot me" doesn't make a very good bumper sticker.

http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/01/15/saul_cornell_guns/index.html

Bandwagon jumping wastes of space

I believe the phrase is "ROFL," that is what I felt last night when I saw on the nightly news that a bunch of our new conservative leaders were "threatened" in some way. Had to dig quite a bit on the Journal-Sentinel's website to find the story but here it is: http://www.jsonline.com/news/statepolitics/113398989.html

My first thought was "is karl rove behind this? or are they merely jumping on the palin 'i'm the victim' bandwagon to deflect criticism?" I actually doubt rove would be behind it, the jujitsu move of turning your (victim, enemy, opponent?)'s strength against them needs to be more subtle and better-timed. Wisconsin may be a provincial backwater, but the move works better and is harder to spot when undertaken by a third-party (swift boat dickheads) or the target themselves (bush's nasty girl records as presented by Ted Koppel or whoever in the mainstream media). So unless this was a trial balloon for the larger movements conservative, these threats were made by local type paranoid schizophrenics either inside or outside the government. I mean, the "good" people of this state did send/return a particularly obnoxious group of saboteurs to office in the recent election.

Could it be genuine? There have to be some people out there upset that walker has already killed thousands of jobs and it hasn't been a month yet. His cronies in the legislature are going balls deep to create, I don't know, feudalism in this state. With the ID law, yanking same day registration, yanking voting rights from felons while making all sorts of new felonies, and bringing back the "good 'ole days" of debtors' prisons. Wisconsin will resemble Mississippi more than Massachusetts pretty darn quick if these schemes go through. But I feel Wisconsinites could get rid of all of them and it wouldn't make a bit of difference. We've been heading that way for quite a while.

Wouldn't it be funny if they were referring to my previous post? My rambling, ultra-vague post about standing up to bullies? No, this is probably just tossing some grist to mark belling and charlie sykes and whoever that incredibly venomous woman is who's show is on right before slush dimbulb. Maybe it's just a way for walker, kleefisch, senselessbrenner, johnson, and my favorite bible-thumper jim liebham to render a few of their enemies to some deep, dark hole and jerk off to the torture vids. Nah, probably just a clumsy "the lady doth protest too much methinks" palinesque victim tirade. The "me-tooism" of it really stinks like yesterdays garbage though. If somebody does take a potshot at one of these idiot polititicans though, I'd be happy to eat my words and apologize. But then maybe, just maybe, the con artists that pollute the airwaves with Orwellian theories, like "Liberals are all effeminate pussies and crazed killers, at the same time" will have to pick one.

P.S. To all the paranoid meatheads out there that insisted I watch that pathetic "zeitgeist" movie, you're in good company http://www.salon.com/news/jared_loughner/index.html?story=/news/feature/2011/01/12/jared_laughner_compiled&source=newsletter&utm_source=contactology&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Salon_Daily%20Newsletter%20%28Not%20Premium%29_7_30_110 Seems this wackjob was obsessed with that film too. Though a few seconds of googling revealed an incredibly well-researched refutation of just about everything in the "money" part of the movie, I could care less about the rest of it. I suppose zeitgeist plays to the paranoid people who, while insisting all the problems of people around them are the result of personal irresponsibility, insist that there is a global conspiracy with absolute power and weird motives. The kind of thing religious people attribute to "God's plan" when bad things happen to good or not entirely bad people. This film is for the libertarian, secular males who know everything without ever going to college or even opening a serious book. It catches their attention by affirming all their "religion sucks" prejudices and then trots out the tried and true anti-semitic conspiracy theories complete with supposed quotations of the founding fathers. Basically, a great propaganda film for the unbalanced. Hits all the right buttons. Anyway, this violence thing is not my bag and I plan on moving far, far away as soon as I finish school. My wife is on board with my crazy idea to move to Austria, or at least Canada