For those who think Vermont Democrats are ignoring labor:
From VDP Chairwoman Judy Bevans:
As you have undoubtedly heard, workers in Wisconsin are under siege. Under the banner of addressing his state’s budget crisis, the Badger State’s tea party governor is pushing through one of the worst union-busting bills in modern history.
But Wisconsin’s workers aren’t alone!
All over this nation, teachers, fire fighters, cops, and other public employees are under the threat of having their voices silenced. Vermont might too have been one of these states, if it weren’t for the fact that we stood up against the Republican attack machine and elected a Democratic Governor and strong Democratic majorities in our State House and Senate who value our middle class.
To that end, we are asking our activists to stand together with Democrats in Wisconsin and fight for workers’ rights.
The Wisconsin Democratic Party is currently conducting virtual phone banks to let people know what’s happening in their state. If you’re interested and can help, please email saveourstate@wisdems.org for log-in information.
There’s more after the flip
VDP’s Labor message to Vermont Democrats, continued:
Republican Governor Scott Walker’s budget represents one of the boldest assaults on working families and the middle class in quite some time. And this from a state known for its progressive leaders from both sides of the aisle, like Republican Congressman “Fighting Bob” La Follette, Sr. and former Democratic Senator Russ Feingold, who has recently started his own PAC, Progressives United.
Right now, the bill is temporarily stalled in the Senate after 14 Democrats walked off the floor of that chamber in protest, denying Republicans the chance to pass this legislation. Those Democrats are currently in Illinois, working to get their message out about what this bill will mean to the working families they represent.
[Thursday], over 25,000 protesters stormed the statehouse in Madison in opposition to the bill, with many more expected to show today. But even this might not be enough to prevent Republicans from getting their way.
We need to stand shoulder to shoulder against these threats and show our solidarity with Wisconsin’s working families. Again, I’d like to ask you to consider taking an hour or two to make phone calls into Wisconsin to let people know what’s at stake. You can do your part by e-mailing the Wisconsin Democratic Party at saveourstate@wisdems.org.
I’m also calling on Vermont Democrats to make your voice heard next Tuesday, February 22nd as we stand with organized labor for a noontime rally at our own statehouse in support. Contact the Vermont AFL-CIO for more details at (802) 223-5229.
Thanks for your consideration of this urgent request.
~ Judy
Judy Bevans, Chairwoman, Vermont Democratic Party
[emphasis added]
Some notes from the scene:
According to someone I know who was at the Wisconsin Capitol Thursday, two Republicans have also absented themselves to prevent a quorum.
[UPDATE: The report of the two R’s walking is unconfirmed, although it was tallied that way on a whiteboard in the rotunda]
She also wrote that firemen from Janesville (home of Lands End catalog merchants) marched in solidarity, accompanied by three bagpipers, even though police and firefighters have been exempted from the depredations of this particular union-busting bill.
She saw:
People of every possible age and a wide demographic range. There were “Orthodox Christians For Unions”, and a guy at the top of State St calling for a General Strike.
And, btw, she says the unions are receiving statements of support from members of the Super Bowl-winning Green Bay Packers, the only publicly-owned football team in America.
Another person in a comment on this LiveJournal entry quoted “St. Molly of Austin: ‘have fun fightin’ for freedom!'”
Words to live by.
Also check out Steve Benen’s take:
[Republican Governor Scott] Walker inherited a pretty good fiscal situation from his Democratic predecessor — Wisconsin was on track to end the fiscal year with an extra $120 million in state coffers. […] a far-right governor inherited sound state finances, made them worse on purpose, and now demands public employees fix his problem. While he’s at it, Walker hopes to engage in superfluous union-busting, not to improve the budget, but just because he feels like it.
The “worse on purpose” came from a couple of big business tax breaks and a train wreck in health care policy.
Make some calls: you’ll be glad you did.
Thank you to the Vermont Democratic Party for your letter calling for support for the besieged Wisconsin public employees.
But…
I’m a Vermont state employee. In the past three years, we have seen our work force shrink by almost 10%. Many of us have seen our workloads increase dramatically, leading to diminished service to the people of Vermont. At the same time, we have received pay cuts and reductions in benefits. During the last round of contract negotiations, we were brow-beaten into accepting a concessionary contract. We were told that if we did not accept this concessionary contract and the final decision went to the legislature – the Democratic “super majority” legislature – we would be slammed even harder with drastic pay cuts and reductions in benefits.
And that’s not all. We are now being told that we must increase our share of contribution to the state employee’s retirement fund, to bail out the state, and, by extension, the thieves on Wall Street who caused the financial meltdown. Again we are being told that if we don’t agree to these concessions, the legislature – the Democratic “super majority” legislature – will extract even more drastic concessions from us.
The first thing our Democratic governor did after his inauguration was to announce a state hiring freeze, plans to shrink the work force even more through retirements, and plans to extract another $12 million in “savings” from state employees; then proudly announce this to the press, playing right into the currently popular “blame the overpaid, lazy public employees” stereotype. I worked for this governor’s campaign, phone banking, attending events, donating money. This is not the result I was expecting.
While it’s true that the state has a moderate budget deficit to deal with, our Democratic governor and Democratic legislative leaders refuse to even consider filling that hole by adequately taxing wealthy people who have benefitted magnificently from the theft on Wall Street and the outrageous federal tax cuts. These Democratic leaders would rather slash vital public services and extract more concessions from public employees than even consider making the wealthy in this state pay their fair share. So much for “shared sacrifice.” Seems like the people at the bottom are the ones doing all the “sharing”.
How dare the Vermont Democratic party suddenly jump on the bandwagon of supporting public employees and organized labor at the eleventh hour, when it seems politically popular in the wake of the Wisconsin protests. Where has the Party’s support for public employees been these last few years? With some important notable exceptions, it’s been lackluster at best.
Until the Vermont Democratic party leadership grows a spine and starts making the wealthy pay their fare share, and stops acquiescing to cuts in services and ever more concessions from state employees, I will remain thoroughly skeptical of their claims to “solidarity” with public employees in Vermont.
I watched Shumlin’s inaugural speech and it wasn’t bad til he got to the part about not touching taxes. I’m sick of these Democrats who serve Wall Street first and are willing to balance the budget by cutting social services and public workers while leaving the rich with their huge tax breaks. Taxes nationally are the lowest in 60 years. The rich get richer by the minute and the upper 1% have more than the lower half the country’s income combined. And this despite the fact that worker productivity continually rose during this time. We have no democracy only one big corporate party. Wisconsin I hope is the beginning of the people seeing through the absolute BS the media and all the conventional wisdom and politicians have been plying us with to distract us from the utter failure of capitalism. Capitalism is destroying the Earth and impoverishing the majority of people. Bash the Bankers! Tax the over coddled rich! On Wisconsin!
Yes, tax the obscenely wealthy! 40% minimum, 60% is better. 30% capital gains and 50% minimum ‘death’ tax.
Are the ruling factions are just self-destructively greedy or are they intentionally trying to ruin the global economy, turn America into a third-world police state, and end civilization?
I was watching an Apollo 11 show on History Channel. I thought, look what can be accomplished when the obscenely wealthy are paying their fair share of taxes!
When was America at it’s most powerful? When our highest tax bracket was taxed at 90%, 38% corporate and our union membership was at it’s highest. My uncle likes to say he’s an Eisenhower Republican, let’s set the tax rates to the same levels and increase our union’s numbers.
There is enough for everybody, but Fox News is preaching the All For One plan of greed. Class war has continued unabated since the Dems capitulated to the GOP in the Bush I years (1981 – 1992), and now they are ready for the final thrust – the final battle to kill off the middle class.
Until the workers turned out in WI, I wasn’t sure anyone was going to even try to stop the RepubliDems from killing the American Dream forever.