Foghorn Leghorn Speaks On Matters in Wisconsin
Is it possible to channel a fictional character? Specifically, the Southern-gentrified blowhard from the Warner Bro.’s 1960’s “Foghorn Leghorn” franchise? Based upon experiments performed over the weekend, I can report a firm and conclusive “yes”. But the ritual requires copious volumes of an obscure Sri Lankan stout called “Lion“. And Mr. Legohorn seems to have quite a bit to say about Wisconsin people and places . . . .
“The behavior on display before us in this instance constitutes a perfect SCANDAL in the eyes of our sacred parliamentary traditions. This method of proceeding cannot call to mind words any loftier or more noble than “poltroon” and “knave”. I understand that the accepted standards of comportment may not be all they could in some of the darker corners of the great state of Wisconsin, but I see no reason to drag them into the sacred halls of our legislature.”
—Regarding the extraordinary violation of…
Through the Eye of a Needle …
Via Dystopia Diaries:
Some unexpected good news here: A Wisconsin judge has ruled that the passage of Governor Scott Walker’s aggressive union-busting bill’s, engineered late in the night without the statutorially required 24 hours notice or the quorum necessary for a budget bill, is a violation of the state’s open meetings law. An injunction is now in place to prevent the bill’s enforcement.
You may recall the raucuous buildup to the April 5th Wisconsin Supreme Court election which was widely seen as a referendum on that un-precedented (and now apparently un-lawful) powergrab, an Orwellian abuse of rhetoric and procedure whose only certain purpose was to destroy any group to politcally organize outside the orbit of his Koch brothers patrons. David Prosser, the Republican incumbent was and still is regarded as strongly in favour of Walker’s dubious scheme, whereas his opponent, Madison-based JoAnne Kloppenberg ran on the ticket of the Democratic party who not unnaturally opposed it.
But if the buildup was a barn-burner, the prolonged…
By The Top One Percent, For The Top One Percent
In a fantastic piece for Vanity Fair, acclaimed economist Joseph Stiglitz discusses what America’s vast income inequality means for our future — in short, how it will corrode and distort every aspect of society:
Some people look at income inequality and shrug their shoulders. So what if this person gains and that person loses? What matters, they argue, is not how the pie is divided but the size of the pie. That argument is fundamentally wrong. An economy in which most citizens are doing worse year after year—an economy like America’s—is not likely to do well over the long haul. There are several reasons for this.
First, growing inequality is the flip side of something else: shrinking opportunity. Whenever we diminish equality of opportunity, it means that we are not using some of our most valuable assets—our people—in the most productive way possible. Second, many of the distortions that lead to inequality—such…
“Herr Prösser?!!”: The Madison Uprising to Shift Gears on April 5th
The madness surrounding Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s efforts to destroy trade unionism continues apace, but outsiders are likely to be deceived into thinking momentum of the Madison Uprising has been dissipated from its previous well-defined orbit. They couldn’t be more wrong — and the turnout for Wisconsin’s April 5th supreme court contest between Prosser (R) and Kloppenburg (D) will prove that.
Current reports from Madison consistently describe a hard core of about one to two dozen protestors haunting the capitol building these days. Some Right Wing supporters of the union-busting tactics have publicly taken courage from this decrease since March 11th, when Walker signed the contententious bill. That, however, would be to focus on the hole, rather than the doughnut, so to speak.
While massive 100+ person rallies like those that continued for 3+ weeks in the capitol building are hugely important for gathering momentum and mobilizing latent energies, they really only represent the tip of an ungodly horror being whipped up for Walker and his supporters in…
Unpaid Huffington Post Writers May Strike Following $315 Million Sale To AOL
The progressive views of leading liberal website the Huffington Post apparently stop at the office door. When your company is worth $315 million, it’s hard to make excuses for not paying your writers, and so the Newspaper Guild is urging the site’s unpaid bloggers to strike, in a controversy that has gone oddly undermentioned in the left-wing blogosphere. The Wrap reports:
Arianna Huffington scoffed at a group of unpaid Huffington Post contributors that announced on Wednesday they would stop contributing content to the site, weeks after its $315 million sale to AOL was announced.
“The idea of going on strike when no one really notices,” Huffington said. “Go ahead, go on strike.”
The controversy arose after writers for the websites ArtScene and Visual Art Source , which had been contributing content to the Huffington Post for free since 2010, refuse to contribute additional material to the site unless they got paid. They are asking…
Ralph Nader Discusses How The Labor Movement May Start A Revolt
On the Middle East news network Al Jazeera, Ralph Nader suggests that President Obama is not supporting the labor movement and if such ‘games’ continue it may lead to a ‘popular revolt’ in the United States.
DNC RIP: 1848 – February 16, 2011
“There was madness in any direction, at any hour. You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning.” — Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
Trumka and McEntee
Well, almost . . . I’m not too confident about defeating Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s junta in the near term. In fact I’m detecting a growing rumble that suggests the earth is about to crack open within the next week and swallow the Madison Uprising whole. However, two other points seem equally clear to me:
1.) If it does, it will likely drag the DNC to Hell along with it
2.) The DNC’s demise may not be all that great a loss for Richard Trumka and Jerry McEntee — or the American people.
Madness
I’m only one lone blogger, an overfed garden gnome with a bad haircut. I can’t possibly hope to convey to those outside of Wisconsin the…
Radical Union Advocate (In)action (Video)
Check out this “radical union” advocate….
More commentary at Dystopia Diaries.
Caller Posing As Major GOP Contributor Dupes Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker
Well, we knew Wisconsin governor Scott Walker was morally and intellectually challenged, but a recent phonecall, as discussed in this expose in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel provides some dramatic new details …
Madison — Gov. Scott Walker, believing he was talking to prominent financial backer David Koch, revealed to a Buffalo, N.Y., blogger Tuesday his strategies to deal with public-sector unions and to lure Democrats boycotting the Senate back to Wisconsin.
In the 20-minute talk, he also likened his tough stance to take away most bargaining rights from public workers to former President Ronald Reagan successfully combating the air-traffic controllers union three decades ago.
“That was the first crack in the Berlin Wall in the fall of Communism because from that point forward the Soviets and the Communists knew that Ronald Reagan wasn’t a pushover,” according to the recording.
He said he told his cabinet, “This is our moment. This is our time to change the course of…
Madison, Wis. – The Cairo of the United States?
Disinfo reader Jacob H wrote to us about the Wisconsin labor union protests, saying “I wonder if the government is letting the media tell the nation how big this really is. Just the other day, there were over 30,000 people. Today maybe more. Here’s an edited video capturing the last three days”:
Rachel Maddow Reveals the Hidden Truth Behind the Wisconsin Protests (Video)
Says Rachel Maddow:
Wisconsin is on track to have a budget surplus this year. I am not kidding. I’m quoting their own version of the congressional budget office, the state’s own nonpartisan assess the state’s finances agency. That agency said the month that the new Republican governor of Wisconsin was sworn in, last month, that the state was on track to have a $120 million budget surplus this year. So then why exactly does Wisconsin look like this right now? Why is there a revolt in the American Midwest tonight?
The main headline that you are seeing right now about this remarkable thing — look at these images — this remarkable thing that’s going on in the American Midwest, the headlines you are seeing about this are mostly wrong, because what’s going on right now in the American Midwest is about Republicans versus Democrats. It is about politics. It is about who wins the next election and the elections after that. That’s what’s going on right now in Wisconsin. This is about the survival of the Democratic Party. There are parts of the story that actually don’t make any sense unless you understand that.
What’s happening in Wisconsin right now is not about a budget. This is about elections. This is about the Republican Party going after the institutions that make it possible for Democrats to win elections in America.
Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker Readies National Guard Against Unions
Scott Walker. Photo: WisPolitics.com (CC)
Bah! Who needs democratic rights like freedom of association or collective bargaining? Americans weren’t really usin’ ‘em anyways. From the Huffington Post:
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) said Friday that he was willing to mobilize the state’s National Guard force in order to address the potential repercussions of his stated proposal to eliminate collective bargaining rights for state employees.
The Associated Press reports:
Gov. Scott Walker says the Wisconsin National Guard is prepared to respond wherever is necessary in the wake of his announcement that he wants to take away nearly all collective bargaining rights from state employees.Walker said Friday that he hasn’t called the Guard into action, but he has briefed them and other state agencies in preparation of any problems that could result in a disruption of state services, like staffing at prisons.
On Thursday, Walker told the Associated Press that he will propose removing nearly all public…
