toldailytopic: Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker: Hero or zero?

[bybee]

For you and the other right wing nutters praising Walker, here's some food for thought:

"These are the values inspiring those brave workers in Poland … They remind us that where free unions and collective bargaining are forbidden, freedom is lost."

The dirty lefty scumsucking commie who said it? Your boy Reagan, in pre-senile 1980. If your deific sockpuppet isn't authority enough, here's the father of the market, good old Adam Smith, who in prescient fashion lays forth the scenario we see playing out all over the country today:



In case that was too long for some of you, I'll summarize. Unions are a fundamental part of a market economy, a necessary counterbalance to industry for the price of labor to be efficient. Wealthy business will constantly vilify attempts of labor to organize in order to extract as much as they can from unions, breaking the labor market. It doesn't get much more anti-market (to say nothing of anti-democratic) than unionbusting, as any of you clowns would know if you actually had troubled yourself to learn any economics, instead of parroting right-wing talking heads.

In other words, the republican party has tilted so far crazy right that they make Reagan, who was nutty far right, look like a lefty pinko commie. In fact, they've gone so far right that they've wrapped the field and wound up on the extreme left, defying the economic system they claim to uphold. Walker, an elected official, is engaged in command-economy (read: communist) pricing, and is deliberately trying to break the Wisconsin labor market, and you 'pro-market' idiots are cheering him on like he's the second coming. Are there any right-wingers around these parts who got their political/economic 'education' somewhere other than Fox? Serious question.

I hope (and suspect) that you're going to get your behinds handed to you in 2012. Maybe then this tea party insanity will finally subside. Cutting spending in the worst recession since the Great Depression? Absofricklutely brilliant. But hey, if it helps get your party elected, who cares about the country? Really, though, suddenly pretending we care about fiscal responsibility just is not going to be enough to get us elected, after how bad we screwed up last time around. Let's make the deficits worse by cutting taxes, and give out billions of dollars to companies already making record profits, so they'll contribute to our campaign coffers! BOOYAH! :bang:

PL

My goodness where are your manners?
Is civil discourse beyond your capabilities?
Your abuse language will not win adherents to your viewpoint.
It does not follow that one holding viewpoints in opposition to one's own is the enemy. Rather, it behooves one to draw a bigger circle and at least, have a look at the data from all perspectives.
I don't trust people who spew invective.

 

[Frank Ernest]

Hero.

 

[chrysostom]

Time will tell if this guy is a hero or not. It is a step in the right direction. Public employee Unions are helping to suck this country dry.

I am not wholly opposed to Unions, but I am opposed to some of the tactics they use. The Public employee Union has spun out of control. Congressmen and Governors have been scooping way too much out of the public larder for far too long.

and
they support the democratic party
which
gives us liberal judges
who
kill babies

 

[tetelestai]

The dirty lefty scumsucking commie who said it? Your boy Reagan, in pre-senile 1980.

You don't appear to understand the topic of discussion in Wisconsin and here on this thread.

The issue is the PUBLIC serctor unions being allowed to have collective bargaining rights not PRIVATE sector unions.

Since you brought up Reagan, and quoted him out of context, here is what FDR the Democrat said:

"The process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service"

Here is what the first AFL-CIO president (George Meany) said:

"impossible to bargain collectively with the government.”


In 1943 the New York Supreme Court said:

"To tolerate or recognize any combination of civil service employees of the government as a labor organization or union is not only incompatible with the spirit of democracy, but inconsistent with every principle upon which our government is founded. Nothing is more dangerous to public welfare than to admit that hired servants of the State can dictate to the government the hours, the wages and conditions under which they will carry on essential services vital to the welfare, safety, and security of the citizen".

Do you understand the difference between PRIVATE and PUBLIC?

 

[tetelestai]

In other words, the republican party has tilted so far crazy right that they make Reagan, who was nutty far right, look like a lefty pinko commie.

And, you make yourself look stupid.

Reagan wasn't talking about Poland's PUBLIC sector employees in his statement; he was referring to the PRIVATE sector workers.

You won't find a Republican, Tea Partier, or any other conservative that cares whether a PRIVATE company unionizes.

What Gov. Walker and every other Republican is against is PUBLIC sector unions, because it is tax dollars from the people who pay these wages, not to mention the union dues going to the Democratic Party.

Why is this so hard for you to understand?

 

[Delmar]

You have to remember that Reagan was nothing like the frootloops carrying racist signs and spewing hatred at tea party rallies. Conservatism has been derailed in favor of whoever can hate the most.

Not that there aren't still Reagan republicans around. But they are being quickly purged by the idiots running the party now.

So you are spreading the "tea party people are a bunch of racists" lie again! We have been through this before. You had nothing then and you have nothing now! If tea party events were really KKK friendly places you could find dozens of photos of racists posters on the internet, instead of the two you managed to find. The ones you did find were probably carried by liberals who got their buddies to flash a photo as soon as they held it up.

 

[Delmar]

Why is this so hard for you to understand?

because liberalism is a mental defect.

 

[The Barbarian]

So you are spreading the "tea party people are a bunch of racists" lie again!

If so, so is the republican party:

California GOP Chairman Ron Nehring has issued a verbal smack on the heads of those who used an anti-Semitic graphic to promote an anti-tax tea parties in San Mateo county.
http://www.ibabuzz.com/politics/2009/04/20/california-gop-slaps-san-mateo-tea-party-organizers/

It's enough of a problem that the very people who set up the campaign are now worried about it.

We have been through this before. You had nothing then and you have nothing now!

So the republicans are lying about it? To what end?

 

[tetelestai]

because liberalism is a mental defect.

:thumb:

Louis Farrakhan is in town here in Pittsburgh. He said the following yesterday:

"I Have Never Harmed One Jewish Person"

His quote reminds me of some other quotes from liberals:

“I Never Had Sexual Relations with That Woman” — Bill Clinton

“I don’t believe myself to be an addict"- Charlie Sheen

“Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this Presidency” — Barack OBama

You might be on to something Delmar.

 

[Krsto]

Public sector workers are the only ones who can lobby their state legislators for a pay raise - that's all they really need.

 

[chrysostom]

because liberalism is a mental defect.

you could say that they think with their hearts
but
it is still a mental problem

 

[Alate_One]

because liberalism is a mental defect.

If there's a mental defect involved it's probably the other way around. Education level tends to move people farther to the left. I'm sure you'll claim bias, but a good understanding of how the world works, as well as history tends to make Republican positions untenable.

For example, being anti-climate change, anti-government regulation, anti-evolution, anti-public education, anti-union, Trickle down economics etc. Anyone that actually knows and understands the sweep of history and science isn't going to hold the Republican position on these issues.

Yes, hard core Repubs hate private unions just as much as public ones. Why? because they eat into their corporate cronies' profits and make their lives difficult. "Right to work" legislation is ultimately anti-union.

Republicans play on the ignorance and worst of all the forgetfulness of the public. For as much as they may pretend they are for balanced budgets, no Republican since Reagan has ever balanced a budget.

They pretend they are for the middle class, while working to undermine them and upward mobility. In the past they were a better party and the better party in many cases, but since Reagan and onward they've only gotten worse. I've been wise to their games since Bush invaded Iraq. Until they regain sanity (which doesn't look like it will happen anytime soon) I have no interest in seeing any Republican in elected office. Although from what I heard of Mitch Danel's speech to CPAC, he's about as close to a rational Republican as exists today.

The more likely cause for all of this, is a general human tendency to entrench any position we hold and ignore all contradictory information. This is equally obvious on the extreme left. Unfortunately, Fox news tends to make it much easier for those on the Right.

 

[chrysostom]

but we understand how jobs are created
and
you don't

 

[Alate_One]

but we understand how jobs are created
and
you don't

No you don't. You think that public sector jobs are not "real jobs". So cutting spending doesn't actually cause unemployment! :dizzy:

You also think that giving rich people more money means they will create more jobs. The more we've done that the more they just . . .get richer. It doesn't actually trickle down, it stays at the top.

<--- Shown are the income GAINS (percent increases) by the top 1% and the four quintiles between 1979 and 2007 The era of trickledown.

And what do we see? The rich get insanely richer and the poor and middle class stay almost the same.

Anyone that knows the facts of economics knows the Repub model doesn't help the middle class.

 

[The Barbarian]

The problem is that huge imbalances in income are bad for business, particularly in the U.S., where consumer spending is such a large fraction of the GDP.

So it's not surprising that, as the inbalance grows, the economy runs into trouble.

On the other hand, people who own businesses would like to pay the people who produce things, as little as possible, since it means they get to keep more of the money from selling those things. Which is not unreasonable or surprising. The people who produce the things would like to get as much as they can for their work as they can, which is also not surprising or unreasonable.

The only time the system comes off the rails is when group or the other has the upper hand.

Most people intuitively get this, but the heads of big unions and the heads of big corporations (and apparently the politicians they buy) don't want to get it.

And there's the problem.

 

[chrysostom]

see

 

[Delmar]

If so, so is the republican party:

California GOP Chairman Ron Nehring has issued a verbal smack on the heads of those who used an anti-Semitic graphic to promote an anti-tax tea parties in San Mateo county.
http://www.ibabuzz.com/politics/2009/04/20/california-gop-slaps-san-mateo-tea-party-organizers/

It's enough of a problem that the very people who set up the campaign are now worried about it.



So the republicans are lying about it? To what end?

The old guard doesn't want to loose control of their party.

 

[Pragmatic_Liberal]

My goodness where are your manners?
Is civil discourse beyond your capabilities?
Your abuse language will not win adherents to your viewpoint.

You're upset because I used the word 'idiots'? I had some guy on here calling me a Nazi the other day because he thought I was flattering myself by calling my satire of his position 'humor'. Granted, that wouldn't excuse someone else's behavior (mine), but, given the exchanges I've seen on this forum, your critique rings pretty hollow. It seems like you're using that to avoid dealing with some of my points which you find uncomfortable to confront. I know they'd make me unconfortable, if I was accustomed to parroting pro-market talking points. They SHOULD make you uncomfortable, because they expose the gaping chasm between what republicans are saying and what they are actually doing.

In any event, while we're handing out free forensic advice, desperate resort to ad hominem attacks because you can't or don't want to respond substantively to my points won't win you any adherents, either. You want civil discourse, in an attempt to change minds? By all means, let's have it, starting with the points I made in my last post.

It does not follow that one holding viewpoints in opposition to one's own is the enemy. Rather, it behooves one to draw a bigger circle and at least,

Normally, I'd agree. Unfortunately, the republican party hasn't heeded your advice. They've turned the politics of this country into a zero-sum game. Instead of working for the betterment of all, nearly everything they do is aimed at getting them back into power. I dearly wish we had a credible alternative to the democratic party, but we don't. Today's democratic party, aside from being nearly as corrupted by special interests as republicans, is so conservative it's right of the republican party of just a few decades before (I have Nixon in particular in mind). But no. Instead, the alternative is a party dead-set on on sucking the middle-class dry, in an extremely short-sighted attempt to maximize their own slice of the economic pie. Why short-sighted? Because they wind up hurting themselves, by shrinking the pie.

have a look at the data from all perspectives.

I have to say, being accused of being 'small tent' and narrow-minded by a republican these days is quite amusing. Why is it you assume I haven't looked at the data from all perspectives, simply because I disagree? That seems awfully, well, narrow-minded. I HAVE looked at the data from all perspectives. The result is my present take on things, as expressed in my last post. In fact, I'm guessing I have a great deal more perspective than you, since, aside from actually having studied economics, political theory, and economics and law, I actually used to be a registered republican. That was doomed from the start, though, since my superpower is the ability to remember beyond the last election.

I don't trust people who spew invective.

No offense, but if that's the case, how are you still identifying yourself as on the right? Granted, the left has a number of chuckleheads, but no one does invective as well as the right. Rush, Beck, Malkin, Coulter, and O'Reilly all spring immediately to mind. Fox uses the word 'Nazi' like a teen uses the word 'like' (credit to Jon Stewart). The only guy on the other side who approaches any of them in this regard and is anywhere near as prominent in national politics is Michael Moore.

More seriously, why does it matter if you trust me? I've set out several appeals to authority other than my own, as well as offering an economic analysis of Walker's actions that's fairly easy to confirm. Do you rely solely on opinions of others to formulate your own, or are you able to look at the points I made and analyze them critically for yourself? Or, as your Great Leader put it, 'trust, but verify'.

C'mon, people, where are all the intellectual righties rushing to point out the error of my thinking? At bare minimum, one of you could toss the Laffer curve at me, just for kicks (not that it's relevant here, that'd be setting the bar pretty high). Any takers?

PL

 

[Alate_One]

Most people intuitively get this, but the heads of big unions and the heads of big corporations (and apparently the politicians they buy) don't want to get it.

The problem is that corporations have a lot more money overall than unions and they've started buying the Dems as well as the 'pubs. This puts the balance in the hands of the corporations, resulting in the graph I just posted.

 

[chrysostom]

The problem is that corporations have a lot more money overall than unions and they've started buying the Dems as well as the 'pubs. This puts the balance in the hands of the corporations, resulting in the graph I just posted.

the unions suck the life out of everything they touch