How to Fight Back against Public Unions: A Primer

[Rheo]

American Thinker:

We have reached a potential turning point in the relationship of public employee unions and the electorate they ostensibly serve. Over the past year, there has been a steady drumbeat of criticism focused on public unions and the havoc they have wrought on our public finances. Governments -- city, country, state, and federal -- are drowning in red ink Our taxes are flowing to ever-voracious government workers (whose own ranks are growing steadily while the private payrolls shrink); they are better compensated than private workers in comparable positions.

What is to be done?

We -- taxpayers, tea partiers and sympathizers, independents, Republicans, and Democrats -- need to come together and forge a blueprint to take back our nation. The inclusion of Democrats was deliberate, despite the fact that many Democrat politicians are in the pockets of public unions. AFSCME, the government employee union, has a political action committee that is the second-largest in the nation, and virtually all of its donations are to Democrats; ditto the teachers' unions, or as they like to call themselves, "federations" and "associations" -- teachers know how to use thesauruses for political purposes. But when liberal newspapers such as the New York Times now report on subway conductors earning hundreds of thousands of dollars a year and the Boston Globe takes editorial swipes at public employee unions and their greedy and self-centered leadership, the timing may be ripe for Democrats to come out of the closet and transform themselves from donkeys into fiscal hawks (see Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's efforts in Los Angeles).

When that arbiter of popular culture "Saturday Night Live" makes fun of surly government workers, we may have reached a turning point. Hope springs eternal on the political front, but what can people power do to weaken the grip of public employee unions and restore fiscal sanity to our governments' budgets?

We are in a communications war where we have a voice.

Public employee unions will spend millions to try to defeat measures to rein in their bloated salaries and pension benefits. They threaten even longer lines at government offices (and fewer of them), shorter hours at libraries, park districts cutting programs, and fewer policeman and firefighters. The list goes on and on of the plagues that will hit us if we dare take on public unions.

They never address high salaries, excessive days off, sick days being used because government employees are sick of work, or pensions being used to buy piña coladas in Pensacola.

Government unions spend vast sums on this propaganda (and on lobbyists and political campaigns to elect politicians to put in their pockets), and the exact amount is now almost unknowable. Barack Obama, in the first few days of his presidency, issued an executive order shielding unions from disclosure rules requiring them to report how they spend union dues.

But facts can be marshaled that put the blame where it belongs. Public-sector unions and state debt go hand in hand; states with the highest per capita debt have the strongest public-sector unions, who have cut sweetheart deals with politicians. We should highlight how these unions have diminished our futures.

[Valin]

Rheo

 

 

 

 

 

My Favorite

 

 

 

I love this guy. He comes across as A GUY....and that's a good thing, no make that a very good thing

[Casino67]

Governor Christie is on Twitter as @GovChristie. Posting a lot of his vids of speeches.

 

http://twitter.com/GovChristie

[Valin]

Governor Christie is on Twitter as @GovChristie. Posting a lot of his vids of speeches.

 

http://twitter.com/GovChristie

 

 

Just one of the new (evil) Republican Rock Stars.

 

"Have a seat, This won't take long"

Chris Christie to NJ Senate Leader before vetoing a tax increase budget bill

 

Ya gotta love that.

[Sanguine]

I like that he's rotund. Very politically incorrect.

[pinz]

Maybe he's just a big guy because he's got a lot of guts! I hope he's the first of many gutsy Republicans who come along to sort out this mess and get our country back on the path of prosperity and liberty!

 

I'd love to see union members be ashamed to acknowledge their affiliation to institutions like SEIU within a few years. 2012 would work nicely.