LOGO: Truthdig: Drilling Beneath the Headlines. A Progressive Journal of News and Opinion. Editor, Robert Scheer. Publisher, Zuade Kaufman.
2010 Webby Award Winner for Best Political Blog
 
May 26, 2012
Log in / Register

 Choose a size
Text Size

Trending:     gay marriage     barack obama     ndaa     robert scheer     chris hedges
Most Read

TED: 'A Money-Soaked Orgy of Self-Congratulatory Futurism'

Truthdiggers of the Week: 400,000 Canadians Launching the ‘Maple Spring’

I Can't Hear Myself Think

Russia and Exxon Mobil Sign Arctic Oil Deal

A Rare Admission That Money Trumps Everything Else

Most Comments
Most Emailed

Reports
Why Bain Questions Matter
OSHA Struggles When Tower Climbers Die

Ear to the Ground

A/V Booth

Arts & Culture
Better Than We Found It
The Good-Natured Dictator

Digs
Financial Meltdown 101

Truthdig Bazaar
Cinema by the Bay

Cinema by the Bay

By Sheerly Avni
$26.37

While America Aged

While America Aged

By Roger Lowenstein
$17.13

more items

 
Ear to the Ground

Wisconsin’s Anti-Union Bill Stalled

Email this item Email    Print this item Print   

Posted on Feb 25, 2011
Flickr / miss jennifer jupiter

Protesters crowd the state Capitol in Madison, Wis., on Thursday.

The Wisconsin Assembly approved the infamous anti-union budget bill on Friday, but Republicans still lack a quorum to bring it to a vote in the state Senate.

Meantime, Madison’s police chief released a statement on Gov. Scott Walker’s claim that he considered planting rabble-rousers among the Capitol protesters.
The chief declared, “I find it very unsettling and troubling that anyone would consider creating safety risks for our citizens and law enforcement officers.”

For updates on the Wisconsin union struggle, check out Democracy Now’s coverage of the Madison protests.

New York Times:

The State Assembly approved a bill early Friday to limit the collective bargaining rights for most public workers, but the measure stalled because Senate Democrats remained out of the state as part of an effort to derail the legislation.

After the vote, Democratic Assembly members shouted at their Republican counterparts, who were escorted from the chamber by the police.

The State Senate cannot vote on the legislation without a quorum of 20 members. There are only 19 Republicans in the Senate, and their Democratic counterparts remained in Illinois to prevent a vote. Wisconsin troopers do not have jurisdiction to order them back home.

Before the vote, Senate Republicans once again issued a “call to the house,” sending out troopers in the hope of finding at least some of the Senate Democrats at home. They found none.

Read more

More Below the Ad

Advertisement


New and Improved Comments

We are launching a major overhaul of our comments section.

In addition to more robust spam filtering and moderation, new features include the ability to rate other comments, sort how they are displayed and respond directly via e-mail or in a thread.

Unfortunately, commenters will lose their existing Truthdig identities. It's a pain, we know, but on the plus side you will now be able to log in with a plethora of options, including Google, Twitter, Facebook and Disqus accounts.

Before launching this system we spent months in discussion with our top commenters. We listened to the feedback and we hope you like what we've come up with.

Please direct any problems or concerns to us via our contact page.

MarthaA's avatar

By MarthaA, February 26, 2011 at 3:46 pm Link to this comment

SEEK TRUTH, February 26 at 6:14 pm,

  Few get into either the
Corporate “New Money” or the Corporate “Old Money” aristocratic
kingdoms, and if they do, they have to give up totally any
representation of their own Common Population as a class and
culture.

The Corporate “New Money” Middle Class fiefdom is represented by the
conservatives/moderates of the DLC, the PPI, the 3rd Way, and
the New Democrats “New Class” that separated from the Common
Population in the 1980’s and formed their conservative/moderate
corporate “new money” aristocratic class and culture in cooperation with the
conservative corporate “old money” aristocratic elite class and
culture and each represent their own class and culture at the
expense of the 70% Majority Common Population as a class and
culture, the American Common Populace, the working class that
includes not just those who work, but the whole class and culture
as a class and culture of workers who are currently working if they
can find a job, the unemployed who would work if they could find a
job that would pay enough to get them back and forth to work,
for housing and utilities, the old, weak and crippled who have
worked or would work if they could, and the young who will work
in the future—this is a whole class and culture of the United
States Common Population that have no political representation
in the United States because of the NEW CLASS
that separated out of the Common Population to represent
themselves as a fiefdom ruling over the 70% Majority Common
Population class and culture, without any representation
whatsoever for the 70% Majority Common Population as a class
and culture, other than as individuals without class and culture.

A 2nd aristocracy is not constitutional, but is what has happened
in the United States and therefore, the 70% Majority Common
Population in order to have political representation in the making
and enforcing of legislated law and order will have to rally and
demand political representation for their class and culture, as a
class and culture, because individual representation is impossible
against two classes and cultures, the American Corporate Elite
Capitalist Class and Culture that is 1/10th of the population and
the American Corporate Middle Class and Culture that is 1/5th or
2/10th of the population, while the American Common Populace as
a class and culture is being pushed around as individuals in
the United States when their class and culture is 7/10th of the
population in the United States and the Common Population must
demand their own representation as a class and culture in the
Congresses of the United States from their own political party
that is EQUAL in every way to the Democratic Party and the
Republican Party
, otherwise the American Common Populace
will continue without representation and be easily pushed around
as individuals divided into a nebulous middle class and a
supposed poor class.

The Middle Class stereotype had worked well for
many years for the aristocracy and may have
lasted forever if greed for power to be
aristocratic had not have overwhelmed the
Middle Class Clintonian’s into dividing out of the
common population, but they did, now the Middle
Class is no more for anyone other than the
20% Middle Class “New” aristocratic fiefdom. 
Now the 70% that was left of the Common
Population need to claim their own
representation of their class and culture, not as
children of the Middle Class but as grown ups
with an EQUAL seat at the table
for their own political representation of their 70%
Majority Common Population as a class and
culture in the Congresses
of the United States with a NEW Political Party of
their own that is legislated EQUAL in every way
with the Democratic Party and the Republican
Party, which, instead of deleting the unions, will
help the unions represent the working class of
the common population’s as a class and culture.

Report this

By samosamo, February 26, 2011 at 1:39 pm Link to this comment

****************


Wisconsin sure is a test case of what washington d.c. will end up
doing, not that w.d.c. isn’t already doing it. Next would be other
states weighing in with their version.

Report this

By SEEK TRUTH, February 26, 2011 at 12:14 pm Link to this comment

When will the average voter realize that they don’t belong in the same category as the rich? By rich I mean those people that own companies or enough stock to make a living without working. They are the people and corporations that will do anything to avoid paying taxes.

All the rest of us should be proud to be a taxpayer helping to provide a better world for our children, grand-children and great-grand-children.

If you follow the path of the rich, you will soon find out that the path becomes littered with the bodies of those less fortunate than you. Will you at least help to clear the path, or are you one of those who will just step over those left behind? If you are, I feel sorry for you as you will soon find other obstacles on the path that you can’t overcome. The Rich will never let you into their Kingdom.

Report this
MarthaA's avatar

By MarthaA, February 26, 2011 at 4:35 am Link to this comment

TDoff, February 25 at 9:38 pm,

Republicans count of the populace’s memory span
being so short that they will, like birth pains, just
forget all about Republican tyranny when the
Republicans blame it all on the Democrats, and
then, like clockwork, the public will overwhelmingly
reelect their sorry arses in 2012, just watch,
because if the public isn’t reelecting them, it is
fraud of the vote.  In OK I never run into anyone
who voted for the Republicans, but the Republicans
always get back into power or stay in power.

Report this

By Dravazed, February 25, 2011 at 8:22 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

The Dems are doing something right for a change.  I hope it becomes a trend.

Report this
prisnersdilema's avatar

By prisnersdilema, February 25, 2011 at 4:23 pm Link to this comment

Why wait until 2012. Walker should be impeached..

“I find it very unsettling and troubling that anyone would consider creating safety risks for our citizens and law enforcement officers.”

Conspiracy to incite a riot is a crime. Walker should be charged, along with every Rethuglican that had input on this.

Report this

By TDoff, February 25, 2011 at 3:38 pm Link to this comment

Gee, if the Egyptian or Libyan rebels would hurry up and form their new governments, the Wisconsin Democratic legislators would have a true democracy to which to defect and live for the next couple of years, until the Wisconsin GOPer dictatorship/cabal gets overthrown and tossed out on their a**es in 2012.

Report this
sallysense's avatar

By sallysense, February 25, 2011 at 3:24 pm Link to this comment

state government misbehavior borrowed heavily on credit…
for all kinds of things over the years there’s huge debts!...
do they admit the mistakes and learn how to behave?...
no! they create unfair laws now for all they can get!...

(there’s lotsa stuff to do to put the people in the driver’s seat and behind the wheel!... and it can be done!)...

(and also… http://citizenvoices.us )...

the best of wishes’n'ways’n'todays for the people and country!... smile

Report this

By ejreed, February 25, 2011 at 2:42 pm Link to this comment

An import from France which sounds as if it applies to recent developments in Wisconsin.
The French Phenomenon “Plan Social” 
A new card game has taken France by storm. It’s called “Plan Social” and the objective is to rid yourself of your employees as fast as possible, so you can relocate yourself to a totalitarian country with cheaper labor. http://www.newslook.com/videos/293390-the-french-phenomenon-plan-social?autoplay=true

Report this
Newsletter

Get Truthdig in your inbox


 
 
 
Join the Liberal Blog Advertising Network
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

A Progressive Journal of News and Opinion. Editor, Robert Scheer. Publisher, Zuade Kaufman.
Copyright © 2012 Truthdig, L.L.C. All rights reserved.