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23 Feb 2011 10:42

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U.S.: Wisconsin Democrats drown anti-union bill in amendments

  • 200 number of amendments Democrats in the Wisconsin State Assembly plan to attach to that union-busting budget bill they’re fighting against
  • seven number of amendments they had dealt with by 5:30 a.m., after a brutal all-night session with many long, brutal debates source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

22 Feb 2011 13:26

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Politics: Ohio may be going the way of Wisconsin on deficit issues

  • State employees are not the cause of the economic problems we’re having, and for Senator Jones and other Republicans to point to them as the problem is absolutely unfair and untrue.
  • Ohio State Senator Joe Schiavoni • Speaking about the burgeoning labor face-off in Ohio. The Republican state legislature is considering a bill to tackle the state’s financial troubles, which presently amounts to an $8 billion deficit, that may sound rather familiar to those protesting in Wisconsin right now. Namely, it weakens or strips away long standing and hard fought collective bargaining rights for organized labor, a typically Democratic voting block. To be clear, fiscal responsibility does matter. But isn’t there a way to do this that’s all about being good with money, without the distracting attempt at anti-labor scapegoating that these bills reek of? source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

21 Feb 2011 10:43

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Politics: In partial defense of the Wisconsin State Journal’s bad photo editing

  • We’ve noticed a couple of our followers mentioning this pretty stellar Awl article about the situation in Wisconsin. This isn’t really about that, except indirectly. It mentioned this photo gallery using this phrase: “The Wisconsin State Journal, ran an entire photo journal titled ‘Saturday protests at the Capitol’—which contained photos only of the Walker supporters.” Now, we don’t like being critical of a publication we like (The Awl is cool), but this simply isn’t true. What we’re witnessing, conversely, is a bad case of photo editing which seems to emphasize the Tea Partiers above all else. There are a lot of photos of the Tea Party in this slideshow, either way, seemingly more than of the much larger crowd around them. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

21 Feb 2011 10:18

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Politics: Cuts like a knife: Scott Walker says Dems are on “vacation”

  • Instead of stimulating the hospitality sector of Illinois’ economy, Senate Democrats should come back to the Madison, debate the bill, cast their vote, and help get Wisconsin’s economy back on track.
  • A statement from Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker • Criticizing State Senators for taking a “vacation” instead of voting for the bill that would totally screw over their most important constituents. Walker is in no mood to compromise at the moment – even as unions have offered to take the cuts in efforts to retain their collective bargaining rights – which means that Democrats really have no incentive to return. Especially considering the continental breakfasts they’re probably eating right now! source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

21 Feb 2011 00:45

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U.S.: On the run: Wisconsin Dems still have time for continental breakfasts

Meet perhaps the most comfortable, relaxed fugitives the state of Wisconsin has ever seen. Never before have people on the run from the law looked so well-rested. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

19 Feb 2011 21:23

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U.S.: Are the Tea Partiers in Madison really that big a deal, anyway?

  • So how many Tea Partiers went to Madison today? While these crowds look reasonably large in size, they don’t appear to hold a candle to the 40,000+ union protesters going around Madison today. These arial shots seem to suggest much smaller crowds of Tea Partiers than pro-union folks. But guess which ones CNN decided to cover today? Take a guess. (photo from Americans for Prosperity’s Flickr stream) source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

19 Feb 2011 15:43

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Politics: Reader-submitted: One protester’s take on the Wisconsin issue

  • From someone who’s been there: Here’s a clip Tumblr user definitelynotcanon sent our way. Her friend Anna, who says in the clip that she’s never made a video blog, offers some perspective from the front lines of the protests in Madison, and wants to encourage better coverage of the entire issue. The important part is that the stripping of collective bargaining rights is the key issue here – not the current budget issue. We do have one point to make about all this: The part that she brings up about the special interest groups is actually inaccurate, as pointed out by Politifact. (It’s not spending on special interest groups, but tax breaks.) The heart of her argument still stands up, though. It’s OK though, because Ezra Klein has her back. After watching that, read this: source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

18 Feb 2011 02:03

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Politics: Fleeing Wisconsin Democrat posts amusing update on Facebook

Be right back!
You know how a bunch of Wisconsin Democrats just fled the state in order to thwart the Governor’s anti-union bill? Well, one of them just posted this on her Facebook. We like your style, Lena. source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink

17 Feb 2011 22:32

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Politics: Is Scott Walker’s budget crusade a MacGuffin to hurt unions?

  • Is this whole Wisconsin budget mess ginned-up? That’s one of the threads flowing around the left end of the media spectrum, which suggests that Wisconsin’s budgetary problems have nothing to do with unions – and everything to do with stuff Scott Walker pushed through. They’ve been pointing to this report from the state’s fiscal bureau with this particular sentence: “More than half of the lower estimate ($117.2 million) is due to the impact of Special Session Senate Bill 2 (health savings accounts), Assembly Bill 3 (tax deductions/credits for relocated businesses), and Assembly Bill 7 (tax exclusion for new employees).” To make it clear, these are all things that Walker pushed through. These have nothing to do with unions. They’re intended as stimulus through tax cuts and incentives, however, not special interest-focused spending as a few have suggested. The overall result still leads one to question Walker’s motives, however – because, based on this evidence, that the union collective bargaining cuts could be at the benefit of his own initiatives, not strictly “balancing the budget.” (thanks mgolladwine) source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

17 Feb 2011 19:55

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Politics: Wisconsin Dems: “We were left with no choice” but to leave state

  • We were left with no choice … The question is when are the Republicans going to sit down seriously with the other side on this issue and try to work something out.
  • Democrat Wisconsin state Sen. Jon Erpenbach • Explaining why he chose to leave the state, and what it will take to get him back. He and every other Democratic state senator in Wisconsin left in protest of a GOP-backed plan to limit public employees’ abilities to collectively bargain for better wages, in a push to stop a deficit crisis. As a result, the GOP doesn’t have quorum – because 20 state senators need to be there, and there are 19 Republicans. This is the first such incident were an entire party left a state to avoid a vote since Democratic members of the Texas state senate and state house left the state to avoid a vote on redistricting – the same vote, mind you, that led to Tom DeLay’s corruption conviction. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
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