The Corporate/Government Union

I live in a "right-to-work cheap" state.  But I can guarantee you that I would be working for a lot less than my $11.00 per hour if unions had not raised wages and improved benefits and working conditions up north where them damn Yankees live.


The non-union workers who are bitter about the good deal the government workers in Wisconsin are trying to preserve should know that as their union's power gets whittled away, our working conditions here in South Carolina will continue to worsen.


Be advised that all those governors who have begun to enact bills similar to that that is getting rammed down the democrats' throats in Wisconsin are working together.  Their goal is not balancing the budget -- Governor Walker put in some tax cuts for his business buddies just before he noted that, oops, now we got a budget that's not balanced.  The goal is a conservative movement goal, taking power out of the hands of the people so that management (including Walker) can make more out of less -- more profit out of lower wages.


The prank call that was ostensibly by David Koch should have us all incensed, not that Walker said anything surprising, but that he has that kind of relationship with one of the biggest corporate entities in the country.  In fact, even though Governor Walker is concerned about his state's deficit, he included in the deadly bill an item that allows for no-bid contracts.  You may recall Halliburton and no-bid contracts in Iraq.  That is where, instead of getting the best deal for the taxpayer, the corporate bedfellow is able to steal huge amounts from the government because there is no competition.


Of course, Walker has some sweet rationalizations for why no-bid contracts, uniformly seen as bad, undemocratic, dishonest, sneaky, and, well, bad, are actually going to help balance the budget.  So that a few years down the road, Koch has pocketed a small fortune from the state of Wisconsin, Walker has pocketed favors and maybe even a nice new non-government job, and the media is able to act incensed that this has happened.


Well, just so you know, it is happening now.  In a few years, Wisconsin's schools will be the worse for this Macchiavellian deal, the budget deficit will indeed be large, and Walker will continue to contend that he tried to straighten things out, but those darned unions wouldn't just go away and die quietly.


And there will be those voters that will say, yeah, you know, it's those unions.