Gayle in MD
04-02-2011, 05:46 AM
01 April 2011 1:30 pm by Taylor Marsh
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Many cops and firefighters have thrown their allegiance to the GOP for years — union members who frequently stray from labor’s longtime support for Democrats. A host of new Republican governors is changing all that. [...] Chuck Canterbury, the national president of the Fraternal Order of Police, said his members are “shocked” by the turn of events. “Who are these evil teachers who teach your children, these evil policemen who protect them, these evil firemen who pull them from burning buildings? When did we all become evil?” said Canterbury, whose union endorsed Bush in 2000 and 2004 and John McCain in 2008. – Politico
The midterm elections were a rout. But voters weren’t giving a mandate to Republicans to come after collective bargaining rights or to weaken the unions that protect cops and firefighters. A massive overreach on their mandate is threatening Republicans for 2012 even more than their lousy presidential candidates.
Gallup also finds that people back unions over the marauding governors, 48% to 39%.
This is not rocket science. When you attack the main vein of how the middle class stays the middle class this was very predictable, especially when you have CEO pay exploding. From USA Today:
The heads of the nation’s top companies got the biggest raises in recent memory last year after taking a hiatus during the recession. At a time most employees can barely remember their last substantial raise, median CEO pay jumped 27% in 2010 as the executives’ compensation started working its way back to prerecession levels…
Add to this Donald Trump’s birther front man show and you’ve got a real circus on the Right.
</div></div>
http://www.taylormarsh.com/2011/04/01/union-busting-backfires-cops-firefighters-turning-on-gop/
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">UPDATE: LiberalJoe makes an excellent point in the comments that Politico forgot, which I hadn’t considered either:
Many Police officers/Law Enforcement, Firefighters/EMT’s, and building trades folks are married to, or have relatives who are, teachers, nurses, and other unions under attack by the GOP. The GOP in all their studidity, and desire to crush unions and the Dems forgot that simple truth. The GOP was attacking spouses, brothers /sisters. parents, relatives, and probably neighbors. When you start doing that to loved ones , family differences in political leanings are thrown out the window. You protect and fight for your own.
</div></div>
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">By ROBERT KUTTNER | 4/1/11 4:46 AM EDT
An unexpected effect of the war on unions by several Republican governors has been a sympathy backlash among voters.
By ratios of about two to one, respondents told pollsters that public-sector workers should not lose their rights to unionize. A slightly smaller majority didn’t want government employees to suffer cuts in wages or benefits, according to both Gallup/USA Today and New York Times/CBS polls.
Seldom heard words, such as “collective bargaining,” began showing up on network newscasts. People who hadn’t thought much about unions, or didn’t think about them at all, evidently liked what they heard.
All this reflects the emergence of a long-simmering issue: the anxiety of the middle class.
With neither party offering a believable story of what caused the economy to crash or a plan to rebuild the security of the middle class, the labor movement is one of the few sources of a coherent opposition story and compelling program of reinvestment and restored wages.
Meanwhile, in the Washington echo chamber, both Democrats and Republicans are behaving as though the biggest economic issue is the budget deficit. But out in America, people are more worried about losing their jobs. New York Times/CBS polls show that 43 percent of respondents put jobs as the top concern, compared with only 14 percent who cited deficits. Citizens know better than elites that austerity won’t bring recovery.
In Wisconsin, the GOP script called for regular people to be outraged that nurses, teachers, firefighters and cops still had decent pensions and jobs — when other citizens were losing theirs. But voters identified more with their neighbors who happened to work for the government than with the GOP governors. Indeed, Republican Govs. Scott Walker in Wisconsin, John Kasich in Ohio and Mitch Daniels in Indiana have all suffered in the polls.
Somehow, in the aftermath of an economic collapse created on Wall Street, it strained credulity to believe that the budget crises were mainly the fault of ordinary workers. People know that huge paydays have returned for investment bankers, while Main Street remains in the doldrums.
This assault on unions has tapped into the latent politics of class in America.
</div></div>
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">The secure middle class of the postwar era was built by activist government. It was government that sponsored social insurance, devised regulations to keep Wall Street from crashing the economy, provided educational opportunities to the nonrich and facilitated collective bargaining.
The labor movement was an anchor of this social compact. But as that model of broad prosperity came under assault, beginning in the 1970s, incomes at the top soared while those of the anxious middle class stagnated. It is hard to imagine restoring that prosperity without a stronger union movement.
Today, just 7 percent of private-sector workers belong to unions. But as the middle class becomes increasingly vulnerable, more Americans are remembering that unions “stick up for the little guy” — and gal.
Public workers are newly under attack. But there is fresh organizing among low-wage retail workers at places such as Wal-Mart and in occupations like janitor, hotel and restaurant worker and security guard, as well as middle-class occupations such as nursing.
The United Auto Workers, which was a genuine partner in the retooling of the U.S. auto industry, is launching a fresh campaign under its new president, Bob King, to organize foreign-owned U.S. auto plants. The United Steelworkers has helped domestic steel companies rebuild as a leaner and more competitive industry. The pending merger of AT&T and T-Mobile is likely to create a larger pool of unionized telephone workers. Unions have also been leaders of the effort to reregulate Wall Street.
Republicans may ultimately find that it was a strategic blunder to demonize unions. As more of the middle class feels the economic vulnerabilities of the working class, Americans are giving unions a second look.
Robert Kuttner is co-editor of The American Prospect.
</div></div>
Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0311/52323_Page2.html#ixzz1IMfLn9Gw
<span style="color: #990000"> <span style='font-size: 14pt'>While Republicans on the Hill, continue their attack, against Unions, IOW, against the suffering Middle Class, for the benefit of the wealthy, like always, and the Tea Party gets a RW Media label of a "Tea Party Rally" when only several dozen show up, LMAO!
This is going to be good! Fun to watch, and great for the country, and the Democratic Party.</span> </span>
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Many cops and firefighters have thrown their allegiance to the GOP for years — union members who frequently stray from labor’s longtime support for Democrats. A host of new Republican governors is changing all that. [...] Chuck Canterbury, the national president of the Fraternal Order of Police, said his members are “shocked” by the turn of events. “Who are these evil teachers who teach your children, these evil policemen who protect them, these evil firemen who pull them from burning buildings? When did we all become evil?” said Canterbury, whose union endorsed Bush in 2000 and 2004 and John McCain in 2008. – Politico
The midterm elections were a rout. But voters weren’t giving a mandate to Republicans to come after collective bargaining rights or to weaken the unions that protect cops and firefighters. A massive overreach on their mandate is threatening Republicans for 2012 even more than their lousy presidential candidates.
Gallup also finds that people back unions over the marauding governors, 48% to 39%.
This is not rocket science. When you attack the main vein of how the middle class stays the middle class this was very predictable, especially when you have CEO pay exploding. From USA Today:
The heads of the nation’s top companies got the biggest raises in recent memory last year after taking a hiatus during the recession. At a time most employees can barely remember their last substantial raise, median CEO pay jumped 27% in 2010 as the executives’ compensation started working its way back to prerecession levels…
Add to this Donald Trump’s birther front man show and you’ve got a real circus on the Right.
</div></div>
http://www.taylormarsh.com/2011/04/01/union-busting-backfires-cops-firefighters-turning-on-gop/
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">UPDATE: LiberalJoe makes an excellent point in the comments that Politico forgot, which I hadn’t considered either:
Many Police officers/Law Enforcement, Firefighters/EMT’s, and building trades folks are married to, or have relatives who are, teachers, nurses, and other unions under attack by the GOP. The GOP in all their studidity, and desire to crush unions and the Dems forgot that simple truth. The GOP was attacking spouses, brothers /sisters. parents, relatives, and probably neighbors. When you start doing that to loved ones , family differences in political leanings are thrown out the window. You protect and fight for your own.
</div></div>
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">By ROBERT KUTTNER | 4/1/11 4:46 AM EDT
An unexpected effect of the war on unions by several Republican governors has been a sympathy backlash among voters.
By ratios of about two to one, respondents told pollsters that public-sector workers should not lose their rights to unionize. A slightly smaller majority didn’t want government employees to suffer cuts in wages or benefits, according to both Gallup/USA Today and New York Times/CBS polls.
Seldom heard words, such as “collective bargaining,” began showing up on network newscasts. People who hadn’t thought much about unions, or didn’t think about them at all, evidently liked what they heard.
All this reflects the emergence of a long-simmering issue: the anxiety of the middle class.
With neither party offering a believable story of what caused the economy to crash or a plan to rebuild the security of the middle class, the labor movement is one of the few sources of a coherent opposition story and compelling program of reinvestment and restored wages.
Meanwhile, in the Washington echo chamber, both Democrats and Republicans are behaving as though the biggest economic issue is the budget deficit. But out in America, people are more worried about losing their jobs. New York Times/CBS polls show that 43 percent of respondents put jobs as the top concern, compared with only 14 percent who cited deficits. Citizens know better than elites that austerity won’t bring recovery.
In Wisconsin, the GOP script called for regular people to be outraged that nurses, teachers, firefighters and cops still had decent pensions and jobs — when other citizens were losing theirs. But voters identified more with their neighbors who happened to work for the government than with the GOP governors. Indeed, Republican Govs. Scott Walker in Wisconsin, John Kasich in Ohio and Mitch Daniels in Indiana have all suffered in the polls.
Somehow, in the aftermath of an economic collapse created on Wall Street, it strained credulity to believe that the budget crises were mainly the fault of ordinary workers. People know that huge paydays have returned for investment bankers, while Main Street remains in the doldrums.
This assault on unions has tapped into the latent politics of class in America.
</div></div>
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">The secure middle class of the postwar era was built by activist government. It was government that sponsored social insurance, devised regulations to keep Wall Street from crashing the economy, provided educational opportunities to the nonrich and facilitated collective bargaining.
The labor movement was an anchor of this social compact. But as that model of broad prosperity came under assault, beginning in the 1970s, incomes at the top soared while those of the anxious middle class stagnated. It is hard to imagine restoring that prosperity without a stronger union movement.
Today, just 7 percent of private-sector workers belong to unions. But as the middle class becomes increasingly vulnerable, more Americans are remembering that unions “stick up for the little guy” — and gal.
Public workers are newly under attack. But there is fresh organizing among low-wage retail workers at places such as Wal-Mart and in occupations like janitor, hotel and restaurant worker and security guard, as well as middle-class occupations such as nursing.
The United Auto Workers, which was a genuine partner in the retooling of the U.S. auto industry, is launching a fresh campaign under its new president, Bob King, to organize foreign-owned U.S. auto plants. The United Steelworkers has helped domestic steel companies rebuild as a leaner and more competitive industry. The pending merger of AT&T and T-Mobile is likely to create a larger pool of unionized telephone workers. Unions have also been leaders of the effort to reregulate Wall Street.
Republicans may ultimately find that it was a strategic blunder to demonize unions. As more of the middle class feels the economic vulnerabilities of the working class, Americans are giving unions a second look.
Robert Kuttner is co-editor of The American Prospect.
</div></div>
Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0311/52323_Page2.html#ixzz1IMfLn9Gw
<span style="color: #990000"> <span style='font-size: 14pt'>While Republicans on the Hill, continue their attack, against Unions, IOW, against the suffering Middle Class, for the benefit of the wealthy, like always, and the Tea Party gets a RW Media label of a "Tea Party Rally" when only several dozen show up, LMAO!
This is going to be good! Fun to watch, and great for the country, and the Democratic Party.</span> </span>