Presidents’ Day Reads: Bargaining

Only about 5,000 showed up for the Tea Party counter protest.

That’s about 45,000 less than showed up on Saturday.

Gaddafi flees Tripoli
.
Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi is believed to have fled the capital Tripoli after anti-government demonstrators breached the state television building and set government property alight.
.
Protesters appear to have gained a foothold in Tripoli as banks and government buildings were looted while demonstrators have claimed they have taken control of the second city Benghazi.
.
It is thought up to 400 people may have died in the unrest with dozens more reported killed in Tripoli overnight as protests reached the capital for the first time and army units were said to have defected to the opposition.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1358972/Libya-protests-Gaddafi-flees-Tripoli-parliament-building-set-alight.html#ixzz1EbgG9pgD

And when Scott Walker says collective bargaining will remain fully intact…

In arguing the changes would be modest, Walker cited the civil service system and said “collective bargaining is fully in
tact.” However, Walker himself has outlined how his budget-repair bill would limit the collective bargaining rights of public employees.
.
Indeed, it’s that provision that provoked daily demonstrations at the state Capitol and national media attention. To now say now say collective bargaining would remain “fully intact” is not just false, it’s ridiculously false.
.
And that means it is Pants on Fire.

…he’s lying through his teeth.

Obama: Back Down To 44% Approval
.
Overall, 44% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of the president’s performance. Fifty-five percent (55%) disapprove.

We’re finally on our own | this summer I hear the drumming

Conservatives in the Ohio legislature cannot make a rational argument that connects their actions on collective bargaining to the budget. Ohio has a long history with collective bargaining, and the negotiation process works. They cannot explain why they refuse to sit down with workers, or why they seek to write the negotiation process out of law permanently and deny employees a seat at the table. Until they can do that, I have to assume they have some national political objective that is unrelated to the state budget. I wonder when they’ll get around to telling Ohio newspapers or their state constituents what that national objective might be?

Gold: $1400 / ounce
.
Government Shutdown? Very Possible
.
Coupled with all of the unrest both domestically and in the Middle East. Market worries are also very high.
.
What does Obama do? NOTHING!!

INTERNATIONAL ANARCHISTS, SOCIALISTS AND MARXIST, NOT AVERAGE UNION WORKERS, HAVE A SUBSTANCE FUELED RAVE WHILE TAKING OVER WISCONSIN STATE CAPITAL
.
Think it is just the “good-hearted” Teacher’s out protesting? Think again. See the video proof for yourself.

An interesting historical observation.

What thing becomes clear—as you consider the modern Republican Confederate Party’s effort to attack workers, Unions, the Middle Class and their rights—is that their focus is all about the theft of labor. Stealing the labor of folks is a sure fire way to get rich and it has been since, well, forever. Fighting efforts to protect people from the theft of their labor is what the modern so-called Conservative and/or Gliberterian movements are all about.

(with maps!)

Simple….

More Lies From Rachael Maddow – Madcow Woman LIES YET AGAIN
.
PolitiFact is crying foul over bold claims made about Wisconsin’s budget numbers, mainly that there is no budget deficit.
.
On Thursday, Maddow spent a chunk of her show advancing the popular, liberal rumor that Wisconsin is not facing a budget deficit this year, but rather a budget surplus. The governor’s recent emergency budget bill — which strips unions of much bargaining power — is then simply an “assault” on hard-working people. Maddow, and others, point to an independent report authored by Robert Lang and Wisconsin’s nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau:
.
According to the Wisconsin division of PolitiFact, Maddow didn’t read the fine print:

Yet another shocker: rustyblogwhore is trolling with another biased Rasmussen poll. It seems to be the only poll with a negative favorable/unfavorable spread. I’m shocked…….shocked that you would choose it. Try some reality here:
..
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/president_obama_job_approval-1044.html

And why is Scott Walker is lying through his teeth?

The best way to understand Walker’s proposal is as a multi-part attack on the state’s labor unions. In part one, their ability to bargain benefits for their members is reduced. In part two, their ability to collect dues, and thus spend money organizing members or lobbying the legislature, is undercut. And in part three, workers have to vote the union back into existence every single year. Put it all together and it looks like this: Wisconsin’s unions can’t deliver value to their members, they’re deprived of the resources to change the rules so they can start delivering value to their members again, and because of that, their members eventually give in to employer pressure and shut the union down in one of the annual certification elections.
.
You may think Walker’s proposal is a good idea or a bad idea. But that’s what it does. And it’s telling that he’s exempting the unions that supported him and is trying to obscure his plan’s specifics behind misleading language about what unions can still bargain for and misleading rhetoric about the state’s budget.

Gov Walker Explains in a Fox Exclusive Video Why Unions Are Not In Tax Payers Best Interests
.
Collective Bargaining = Collective Thugs Raping Tax Payers

Looking at a single poll is never a good idea, especially a single Rasmussen poll.

Pollster average: Favorable 51.6 Unfavorable 41.3

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/01/05/fav-obama_n_726774.html

And a more current poll average.

TPM poll average Favorable: 48.9 Unfavorable 46.0

And Obama is doing nothing? Based on what?That he hasn’t invaded a country in the middle east? Or sent troops to Wisconsin to break up the protests?

“Spooky Dude” To The Rescue!!! George Soros “The Tea Partiers Are Being Used”
.
No George, we are all fighting people like you. Get use to it buddy!! I have an idea, go back to whence you came!!

Maybe the Teabaggers can hire those unemployed pro-Mubarak thugs to start turning those protests violent.

Here is what I am doing in Sacramento, where they are holding a 5:30 PM event this coming Tuesday: (1) I signed up as an organizer (2) with any luck they will contact me and I will have an “in” (3) in or not I will be there and am asking as many other people as can get there to come with, all of us in SEIU shirts (those who don’t have them we can possibly buy some from vendors likely to be there) (4) we are going to target the many TV cameras and reporters looking for comments from the members there (5) we will approach the cameras to make good pictures… signs under our shirts that say things like “screw the taxpayer!” and “you OWE me!” to be pulled out for the camera (timing is important because the signs will be taken away from us) (6) we will echo those slogans in angry sounding tones to the cameras and the reporters. (7) if I do get the ‘in’ I am going to do my darnedest to get podium access and take the mic to do that rant from there…with any luck and if I can manage the moments to build up to it, I can probably get a cheer out of the crowd for something extreme.[...]
.
Our goal is to make the gathering look as greedy and goonish as we know that it is, ding their credibility with the media and exploit the lazy reporters who just want dramatic shots and outrageous quotes for headlines. Even if it becomes known that we are plants the quotes and pictures will linger as defacto truth.

Iran Warships: Set Sail Will Go Through Suez Canal On Tuesday
.
What has Obama done? NOTHING

Just look at what some simple common sense and mathematics can achieve!
Thanks Paul, enlightening!

Pro-tip: It’s always dangerous to attempt to dissect the enfeebled ramblings of a psychotic mind.

*sigh*

*heavy sigh*

Really makes my day when I know I am getting on your nerves, ladydiecash!!
.
Enjoy!!
.

Obviously we should sink them…………

*heavy heavy sigh*

*ignore*

And do tell what should he do? Blow it up? Close the canal?

It is a silly attention grabbing maneuver and you want to give it more attention.

Better luck next time troll. I just enjoy pointing out your dishonesty and unadulterated stupidity (to you, since the rest of the sane world can already see it).

Another Liberal Billionaire Distorting The Truth In Media – How Bill Gates Distorts Facts With $$ To Get Out The Liberal Lies
.
If anyone wants to know why Obama flew to San Francisco this past week. Read on….

More Gore Lies – Big Fat Al Goes To Aspen To Preach To The Choir
.
‘Self-inflicted wounds’
.
Their objective, he said, was to transform global warming into a theory rather than a fact. And so the opponents of the effort to recognize climate change embarked upon a “dedicated, cynical, lavishly funded strategy,” utilizing conservative talk radio, commentator Rush Limbaugh and his many imitators, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, Fox News and other right-wing outlets.
.
It didn’t help, Gore said, that the scientific community committed some “self-inflicted wounds.” That was a reference to mistakes and misstatements in an IPCC report four years ago that led to a large amount of political debate and media attention.

Oh, and there’s another thing about that Walker-sponsored Budget Repair Bill:

The fight in Wisconsin is over Governor Walker’s 144-page Budget Repair Bill. The parts everyone is focusing on have to do with the right to collectively bargain being stripped from public sector unions (except for the unions that supported Walker running for Governor). Focusing on this misses a large part of what the bill would do. Check out this language, from the same bill (my bold):

16.896 Sale or contractual operation of state−owned heating, cooling, and power plants. (1) Notwithstanding ss. 13.48 (14) (am) and 16.705 (1), the department may sell any state−owned heating, cooling, and power plant or may contract with a private entity for the operation of any such plant, with or without solicitation of bids, for any amount that the department determines to be in the best interest of the state. Notwithstanding ss. 196.49 and 196.80, no approval or certification of the public service commission is necessary for a public utility to purchase, or contract for the operation of, such a plant, and any such purchase is considered to be in the public interest and to comply with the criteria for certification of a project under s. 196.49 (3) (b).

The bill would allow for the selling of state-owned heating/cooling/power plants without bids and without concern for the legally-defined public interest.

I am not sure that I agree that dues should be witheld automatically. I believe that if you don’t want to belong to a union you should not have to pay. The union should be able to make a case where ppl see the positives of union membership. And those that become members should then pay their dues to cover the expenses. That said, collective bargaining is a core task of a union. Strip that away and you don’t have a union which is what this is all about, cooked up in the minds of the Koch Bros I think, who have Gov Walker in their pockets…. It is an assault on the nearly extinct middle class in this country and we shouldn’t stand for it.

President Christie?? Come On Chris Go For It
.
Palatucci, Christie’s former law partner, made the remarks even as he tried throwing cold water on the notion that the governor — who’s gotten acclaim from national Republicans — is taking steps designed toward a presidential run.

Nice map from TPM. Guess what the ACT/SAT rankings are for the five states that don’t allow public employees (including teachers, of course) to bargain collectively? –

South Carolina, 50th; North Carolina, 49th; Georgia, 48th; Texas, 47th; Virginia, 44th.

Oh, and Wisconsin? It’s ranked 2nd.

If you think that’s a coincidence, you should be fitted for a dunce cap.

The Constant Weader at http://www.RealityChex.com

Where Are The Democrat Illinois Senators? Go Do Your Job Boys and Girls
.
Voters around the State of Wisconsin are getting upset that the Democrat Senators will not go do their job.

SS will not split the left! It may define who in the Party is a Democrat, but split the left? Give it a rest.

Rise Up And Revolt!!! – Radical Michael Moore Calling For Youth To Revolt
.
Dedicating his website to help out any “revolt” or “revolution”, leftist talking head, Michael Moore calling for our youth to get violent.

The right-wing’s path to plutocracy.

These three aspects of the Republican strategy — a federal budget battle to shrink government, focused on programs the vast middle class depends on; state efforts to undermine public employees, whom the middle class depends on; and a Supreme Court dedicated to bending the Constitution to enlarge and entrench the political power of the wealthy — fit perfectly together.
.
They pit average working Americans against one another, distract attention from the almost unprecedented concentration of wealth and power at the top, and conceal Republican plans to further enlarge and entrench that wealth and power.

I believe that if you don’t want to belong to a union you should not have to pay.

What you’re describing is essentially the way things operate in a “right-to-work” state. The purpose of such law is to undermine unions. In states w/o “right-to-work” laws, they operate under “closed-shop” law which says that if the employees are unionized and you accept a job there, you must join the union. Your decision about the merits of the union takes place before you accept the job. If you don’t want to join because you fail to see the merit, you can decline the job. Being allowed to join a union while not paying your dues (as would occur under “right-to-work”) destroys unions because non-paying workers still receive the same benefits and the union must still represent those workers even though they don’t pay or support the union.

Where are the “rankings” for all of the States against OECD countries? Eh, constantwhinner?

“Andrew Rotherham has 10 good questions for just about everybody”
.
That is the trouble he says everything and nothing at the same time. Where is the critical thinking in this tripe? Good grief he comes out at the beginning and calls it like it is, then comes back and wonders why they protest.

@12: Why do you hate yourself?
.
Rhetorical question. No need to answer.

The same info is in a nice short video that PD posted @ 9.

ABC NEW’S KARL: OBAMA OFFERED ‘QUICKER’ ‘MORE FORCEFUL’ DENOUNCEMENT OF WI GOV. THAN OF MUBARAK
.
But that is the “Obama Way”, Karl. Vilify this country and it’s citizens. Vilify any political opponent to make them look like some rif-raft from the Southside of Chicago. It is the Chicago way man.
.
Community Organizing Tip #1 – Disparage your opponents, lie about them, and when that fails just call them a racist. Alinsky would be so proud of Obama.

link for the rankings..
.
http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/states/USCHARTsat.html

The Wisconsin mess is about the ruthless politics and radical ideology of the right, not about budget deficits or saving money by busting unions. The aggrieved state workers have offered compromises that have been gleefully rebuffed by Walker and the GOP. Republicans don’t want solutions, they want to kill the unions and kill public employees.
http://www.sunstateactivist.org

What Do People Eat In Vail Colorado When Skiing? Ask Michelle
.
God I love the Obamas. They are the Three Stooges minus one.

More Global Warming Woes: Is This One Of Al Gore’s Friends?
.
Washington, D.C., Feb. 18, 2011 — The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged a group of seven individuals who perpetrated a fraudulent pump-and-dump scheme in the stock of a sham company that purported to provide products and services to fight global warming.

In reference to the map of those states that allow collective bargaining, at Statemaster.com., they list the best educated states using data that is pulled from mostly elementary and middle school test scores. The top 20 states allow collective bargaining with the exception of Virginia at number 7. Wyoming is number 17 with “permissible” bargaining as per the map above.

If 538 doesn’t say it, it ain’t happening…

You should’ve seen George Soros with the light sticks. It was awesome!

Hey Guys anyone been noticing that when you ignore freeper up there he gets exasperated and irrelevant, lets stop engaging him in the future too, it is downright pleasant to see him unfed today.

Free and Rusty is the same person, when you ignore either one he responds to himself.

Our resident drunken lunatic reminds me of something that I noticed this weekend. Right-wingers love conflating unions with the Mafia. They use terms to describe the media that are most often associated with the mob. Terms like ‘thug’, ‘rape’ and ‘extortion’. They’ll say ‘organized labor’ instead of ‘union’, in an attempt to link it semantically with ‘organized crime’.
.
This is how they play their little games. They repackage health care reform into death panels. Union members are thugs and rapists. All state paid employees are slackers. We’ve even see NewLunaticBlog drop the phrase ‘welfare Blacks’ in an attempt to paint all black people as welfare recipients or all welfare recipients as black.
.
This is how right wingers use language. As a virus. To infect, rather than illuminate. And most of our media is either too stupid or too cowardly to refute them when they do it. Or at least, when the media are not themselves complicit in the effort.

Correction on the above:
.
They use terms to describe the unions that are most often associated with the mob.

OMG! GEORGE SOROS!
.
That is all.

Have you sold everything and invested in all in Goldline yet, nutcase?
.
Do you have you Non-hybrid Survival Seeds stockpiled?
.
Gen Glenn Beck will be verrrrry disappointed if you haven’t.

http://www.statemaster.com/graph/edu_bes_edu_ind-education-best-educated-index
.
Will the real results be published? State Ranking for Education.
.
Here is the truth on how well “Collective Bargaining” versus “Non-collective Bargaining” has on student outcomes.
.
Result, no real difference what-so-ever.

Maps that matter.
.
http://www.statemaster.com/red/graph/edu_bes_edu_ind-education-best-educated-index&b_map=1

They aren’t the same person. Again, you can tell because one understands HTML and the other doesn’t. They also have slightly different personalities. Though I could see why you’d be confused. They are both far right and nuts. A lot of what they are saying tends to run together. Its just that, newf tends to provide links to everything and freep just spouts his uninformed opinions and never backs it up with even a biased source.

When you know the source, in this case a far left extremist. Then you know the “facts” as they are spun.
.

“This piece originally appeared at Robert Reich’s blog.

Union Thugs beating up on a woman protesting at a Democrat arranged Townhall
.

More Union Thug Videos
.

Probably could not get fraudulent doctor notes to take the day off.

“he’s lying through his teeth”
.
As are the teachers who state they are doing this “for the children”

Professional Picketers!!
.

Obama doesn’t believe hos own website or as Joe Wilson said ‘Your lying”—again!!!

Over the weekend, the White House and Democratic Party officials pushed back against criticism from Republicans that Mr. Obama and his political network were meddling in the Wisconsin dispute.

Administration officials said Sunday that the White House had done nothing to encourage the demonstrations in Wisconsin — nor was it doing so in Ohio, Florida and other states where new Republican governors are trying to make deep cuts to balance their budgets…

…And, officials and union leaders said, reports of the involvement of the Democratic National Committee — specifically Organizing for America, the grass-roots network born of Mr. Obama’s 2008 campaign — were overblown to start with…

http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/statepage?state=WI#blogTop

Why, why, why all this? In a word, because that is what community organizers are supposed to do…..

Ramblerouse without solving any critical issue–That’s what hope and change brings us

Yet in the last twenty-four months, we have learned that the president will indeed declare that: the governor of Wisconsin is using his state budget disaster largely to punish public servants; the police in Cambridge, Massachusetts, act “stupidly” and racially stereotype minorities (“typically”) as do most police departments; the state of Arizona harasses Hispanic children when they go out to eat ice cream, and thus Mexico’s efforts to sue the state should be joined by the U.S. government; much of our ills are due to “fat cat” bankers who junket to Las Vegas and the Super Bowl and cannot seem to grasp that at some point they have made enough money; the pro-democracy protestors in the streets of Tehran are not to be encouraged by our “meddling” (because of our past sins of involvement in Iran), but their counterparts in Cairo are to be encouraged by our meddling (despite our past sins of involvement in Egypt).

In addition, why would the president call for “sacrifice” in lean times, advising Americans to cut out going to dinner and to “put off” a vacation — while favoring Martha’s Vineyard for vacation, as the first lady (of erstwhile “downright mean country” repute) seems especially fond of Vail ski escapes in winter and Costa del Sol Mediterranean jaunts in summer? Is not symbolism important in these hard times?

http://pajamasmedia.com/victordavishanson/but-thats-why-community-organizers-do/

More Do As I Say, Not As I Do (From Democrats)
.
A Broadview Heights woman is accusing state Rep. Robert F. Hagan of using a term that some believe has a racist connotation on a social networking site.
.
Hagan, D-60th, of Youngstown, used the term “buckwheat” in a Facebook posting Saturday.
.
He said the posting wasn’t racist, and the attack on him is the tea party’s attempt to make him look bad.

“What you’re describing is essentially the way things operate in a “right-to-work” state. The purpose of such law is to undermine unions.”
.
What happened to the big liberal concept of right to choose? Workers should have a right to choose if and how their money is spent. The only thing that right undermines is the ability of unions to extort money from unwilling workers.

Isn’t it amazing give? Two people with similar understanding of the liberal lies commenting on the same site?
.
Thanks gummy for taking up for me. LOL

Yes because the unions already have their own.

Spare us grape nuts the innocence of union organizers as a peaceful bunch looking out for mom and apple pie. You lying to yourself is far worse than any lie you accuse the Wisconsin governor of doing

Oh, that’s right, President’s Day. Rusty can hit the sauce early today

HaHa Robert Reich a far-left extremist…. you are funny! Mostly annoying but this one is funny.

You were saying Gum?

And of course we have the fine upstanding members of Team Donkey speaking fluently out of both side of tier mouth

If it’s so “reckless” to shutdown the government, why have Wisconsin legislators, the President and the DNC all supported the government shutdown in Wisconsin? Not only that, they have shutdown the government by fleeing the state and breaking the law, not to mention the illegal union strikes shutting down schools and national Democrats helping to organize the angry mob descending on Madison.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/after-wisconsin-how-will-democrats-argue-against-gop-government-shutdown_550497.html

“They pit average working Americans against one another, distract attention from the almost unprecedented concentration of wealth and power at the top”
.
While the innocent left practices class warfare against the productive members of society to re-distribute wealth regardless of the cost to the country. The problem is thee country barfs at the concept except for a small minded small minority of extremists

Buckwheat (Fagopyrum sagittatum Gilib) has been grown in America since colonial days, and the crop once was common on farms in the northeastern and northcentral United States. Production reached a peak in 1866 at which time the grain was a common livestock-feed and was in demand for making flour. By the mid 1960′s the acreage had declined to about 50,000 acres. The leading buckwheat states are New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and North Dakota. Canada has more buckwheat acreage than the United States.
.
Buckwheat enjoyed a resurgence of popularity in the mid 1970′s that was brought on by the demand for commercially prepared breakfast cereal and by exports to Japan for making buckwheat noodles. This boom was due to the nutritional excellence of buckwheat. USDA-ARS analyses indicate that the grain has an amino acid composition nutritionally superior to all cereals, including oats. Buckwheat protein is particularly rich (6%) in the limiting amino acid lysine (Table 1).

http://www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/afcm/buckwheat.html

Which conspiracy is this one, nutcase? I’m starting to lose track.
.
Is Bill Gates working with George Soros? Or is Gates working for the caliphate? Or is Bill Gates secretly a Kenyan Muslim Marxist working with Bill Ayers towards a New World Order? Is Windows 7 a liberal plot, a Marxist plot, or Muslim plot?
.
Educate us nutcase. Why should we quake in fear this time?

And it’s hard to tell which he understood less!

Candy’s Right, Obama Is Hated Everywhere
.
President Obama’s popularity around the world.

A must read for all the libtards who don’t believe in liberal bias.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/nb-staff/2011/02/21/bozell-tackles-media-bias-wis-protest-coverage-slams-media-ignoring-docs-h

Wrong again. The workers at a hypothetical company already decided to organize and form a union. Any prospective employee is free to not take the job as he or she would (or should) be well aware that he or she is seeking employment in a union shop. Any worker taking such a job while not wanting to join the union or pay dues is either a hypocrite, fool or both and is not entitled to the benefits the union has collectively bargained for.

Drunken Rusty, when you spend the whole morning copy and pasting links from Gen Glenn Beck’s The Blaze, you pretty much abdicate the right to complain about biased sourcing from others.
.
Back to the bottle, nutcase.

‘HaHa Robert Reich a far-left extremist…. you are funny! Mostly annoying but this one is funny.”
.
This is why the Tea Party has made great strides. The loon bat left thinks other loon bat leftists are “moderates” They are the only ones buying it. They just keep lying to themselves.

Columbia University Students Heckle and Call Wounded American War Veteran “Racist”. What’s Next? “Baby Killer”?
.
Several students laughed and jeered the Idaho native, a 10th Mountain Division infantryman who spent two years at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington recovering from grievous wounds.
.
Maschek, who is studying economics, miraculously survived the insurgent attack in Kirkuk. In the hail of gunfire, he broke both legs and suffered wounds to his abdomen, arm and chest.
.
He enrolled last August at the Ivy League school, where an increasingly ugly battle is unfolding over the 42-year military ban there.
.
More than half of the students who spoke at the meeting — the second of three hearings on the subject — expressed opposition to ROTC’s return. Many of the 200 students in the audience held anti-military placards with slogans such as, “1 in 3 female soldiers experiences sexual assault in the military.”
.
The university has created a task force polling 10,000 students on the issue, but would not release the vote tally of the 1,300 who have already responded.
.
Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/hero_unwelcome_Zi3u1fwtRpo87vXAiAQfSN#ixzz1EcKFcLKq
.
How about a “Task Force” to determine how many of these students are influenced by the radical left? The radical leftist Professors who are teaching our children?

“fraudulent doctors”. heh! I wonder where we can find any of those…?

The “Civil” Liberals in this country are tweeting. I guess calling for the assassination of a Governor is acceptable in liberal tweetville.
.

.

Freeper’s posts are consistent and coherent. His tone and phraseology changes very little over the course of the day.
.
NewFreedomBlog/Rusty gets increasingly belligerent as the day wears on, especially after 5p or so EDT. He also starts dropping a handful of consistent ‘tells’ that indicate he’s likely a functioning alcoholic.
.
That’s the difference between the two. Freeper may be consistently wrong, but at least he’s sane and sober. Rusty’s a hot mess of delusional paranoia coupled with an ongoing substance abuse problem. Just look at any of his posts timestamped after 6p.

I wonder if mori-the-moron is tweeter? Or is he just a big TWIT?

Check any union rally

I fail to see how that’d prove anything. And my remarks weren’t made to compliment Freep or Newf. They are clearly two different people. I disagree with both of them on a clear majority of topics; but that doesn’t mean they are the same person.
·
I’ve met enough idiots in this world to believe that idiocy is not some unique quality that only the few and proud can possess.
·
I wasn’t talking up for Newf. He’s simply blind to what’s around him and always has been. But he’s moderately more intelligent than Freep. Which is like comparing fruit flies to house flies.

Gov McDonnell understands what is at stake. The clueless Obama doesn’t.
.

LOL, you wackjob libtards sure do crack me up. LOL!!

If folks want to form a union fine–form it. Extorting all to join is nothing but a money grab. Apparently the right to work doesn’t include the right to choose.

Just for my “friend” Mori
.

“Free and Rusty is the same person, when you ignore either one he responds to himself”
.
Wrong on this just like everything else.

“I’ve met enough idiots in this world to believe that idiocy is not some unique quality that only the few and proud can possess.”
.
Yes its called your circle of friends

omg newf, you are so idiotic in your complaints sometimes. Did you ever complain about the US association with Mubarak in the entire 30 years he was a US ally? Obama couldn’t come out against him right away because what if Mubarak had somehow stayed in power!!
.
WI is different. Obama is standing with the teachers and other public workers who will lose their union and collective bargaining rights if Walker has his way. I know you are against unions newf, but it is similar protests 100 years ago that gave us a 40 hr. work week, child labor laws, safe work environments, and even some of the massive bonuses on Wall Street.

“While the innocent left practices class warfare against the productive members of society to re-distribute wealth regardless of the cost to the country.“

Let’s start with Wells Fargo. After being bailed out with our money in 2008, their top five executives DOUBLED their compensation and each one of them made over $11 million in 2009. Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf made off with a cool $21.3 million last year.
.
And now comes news that Bank of America and Wells Fargo will pay zero, yes ZERO in federal taxes for 2009. Bank of America will net a $3.6 BILLION benefit from the federal government in 2009. Wells Fargo, after $8 BILLION in earnings for 2009, will net $4 BILLION from the federal government.
.
So you and I are working our asses off just to make ends meet, paying 30% of our limited income in taxes, and gizillionaire John Stumpf’s company is paying ZERO in taxes so that he can personally swipe another $21.3 million of tax payer funds.
.
Al Capone is a dime store thief compared to this guy!
.
Well, to be fair, Mr. Stumpf is just a small-timer himself in this all-time greatest heist.
.
JP Morgan Chase made $12 BILLION in profit in 2009, as a direct result of our tax money – yes, I need to keep repeating this fact. These are profits that would not exist if it weren’t for our tax dollars.
.
It’s also important to point out that this is just the level of theft that has already occurred. However, as I also can’t stress enough, the theft still continues without any let-up.
.
Now comes news that JP Morgan is on the verge of getting a $1.4 BILLION tax refund! Yes, you heard me right, a $1.4 BILLION TAX REFUND. But JP is not alone in this latest theft. In total, the financial terrorists are due to receive $33 BILLION IN TAX REFUNDS!
.
Do you comprehend how depraved it is to give these people another $33 billion in tax refunds? I assume that they’re thinking that after stealing $14 TRILLION, another $33 billion really isn’t all that much. After all, last year, Goldman Sachs, the most profitable firm Wall Street history, only paid 1% in taxes, so what’s another $33 billion kickback among friends?
.
–David DeGraw

Yes, quite “productive”.
.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25253.htm

If you think that’s a coincidence, you should be fitted for a dunce cap.”

Well adjust your dunce cap and take a stat course.

.
Of the top 6 worst high schools rank in the US Wi has 2 and IL has 2 – where is that collective bargaining advantage?

6 ROBESON HIGH SCHOOL Chicago, IL
5 YOUTHBUILD CHARLESTON CENTER North Charleston, SC
4 HR ACAD/GLOBAL AWARENESS HS Milwaukee, WI
3 SCHOOL OF HUMANITIES Milwaukee, WI
2 KENNEDY/LLOYD CHARTER SCHOOL Aiken, SC
1 TOMORROWS BUILDERS CHARTER SCHL East St. Louis, IL

“And now comes news that Bank of America and Wells Fargo will pay zero, yes ZERO in federal taxes for 2009. Bank of America will net a $3.6 BILLION benefit from the federal government in 2009. Wells Fargo, after $8 BILLION in earnings for 2009, will net $4 BILLION from the federal government.”
.
So your beef is with the tax code. And they didn’t do anything different than oh say GM who just paid millions out in bonuses. BTW, GM still owes the taxpayer money from TARP

“Obama couldn’t come out against him right away because what if Mubarak had somehow stayed in power!!”
.
He’s a dictator no he’s not–The Keystone Cops of US diplomacy

Gum I was referring to the HTML comment.

“So your beef is with the tax code.”
.
No, my beef is that they get to write the tax code through their paid corporatist “conservative” lackeys in the Congress and with brainwashed idiots who think they’re too “productive” to pay taxes.

“the theft still continues without any let-up.”
.
Theft? They are following the tax code. How many years over the past 50 years did the Democrats control Congress and have an opportunity to correct this inequity? Let’s also not forget that the regulations of those banks of having to mark-to-market loans forced the banks to recognize those losses.
.
So you want to blame the banks for following the laws while you excuse the lawlessness of the public unions. Amazing but not surprising.

What is it about free-market decision making that confuses you? A person may decide to take the union job or another job — that’s the beauty of the free market. A union cannot exist with a bunch of free-riders in its midst. It’s unfair to those that belong to the union and it undermines the system. It’s just not that complicated.

“So you want to blame the banks for following the laws…”
.
I’ll type this slowly for you: they…write…the…laws. That’s the f@cking problem. That’s why they can destroy the economy, get bailed out by the government (both Republican and Democratic) and then make themselves even richer than with working class taxpayer money. Moron.

The fiscal crisis in Wisconsin, as in other states, was largely caused by the increasing power of America’s oligarchy. After all, it was superwealthy players, not the general public, who pushed for financial deregulation and thereby set the stage for the economic crisis of 2008-9, a crisis whose aftermath is the main reason for the current budget crunch. And now the political right is trying to exploit that very crisis, using it to remove one of the few remaining checks on oligarchic influence.
.
– Paul Krugman

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/21/opinion/21krugman.html?_r=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

Over the past decade, Gates has devoted $1 billion to these programs, which now account for about a tenth of the giant philanthropy’s $3 billion-a-year spending. The Gates Foundation spends more on policy and advocacy than most big foundations… spend in total.
.
Much of the money goes to analyses of policy questions, such as the best way to finance vaccines for poor countries. But the “advocacy” side of the equation is essentially public relations: an attempt to influence decision-makers and sway public opinion. The ultimate goal is to boost funding and focus from governments, businesses and other foundations for the battle against disease and poverty — particularly now, as Congress considers deep cuts in foreign aid.
.
Fine to bring it up if you feel that this leads to biased reporting on those topics.
.
As such, you must be very upset about the Koch brothers’ advocacy and influence over the media and the Tea Party. When one of the richest oil barons in the country, with a horrible track record (“According to the EPA, Koch Industries is responsible for over 300 oil spills in the US and has leaked three million gallons of crude oil into fisheries and drinking waters. They were fined a record $35 million dollars and an additional $8 million in Minnesota for discharging into streams.” -link).. and that company’s website says it is “among Canada’s largest crude oil purchasers, shippers and exporters.” of carbon-heavy oil to the US– oil that would be effected by proposed cap-and-trade regs– you must be upset that they have founded the Cato Institute think-tank to develop anti-regulation themes and pressure politicians.
.
Moreover, this must really upset you:
.
The Koch brothers, after helping to create Cato and Mercatus, concluded that think tanks alone were not enough to effect change. They needed a mechanism to deliver those ideas to the street, and to attract the public’s support. In 1984, David Koch and Richard Fink created yet another organization, with (Matt) Kibbe (president of FreedomWorks Tea Party). The group, Citizens for a Sound Economy, seemed like a grassroots movement, but according to the Center for Public Integrity it was sponsored principally by the Kochs, who provided $7.9 million between 1986 and 1993. Its mission, Kibbe said, “was to take these heavy ideas and translate them for mass America… We read the same literature Obama did about nonviolent revolutions—Saul Alinsky, Gandhi, Martin Luther King. We studied the idea of the Boston Tea Party as an example of nonviolent social change. We learned we needed boots on the ground to sell ideas, not candidates.” Within a few years, the group had mobilized fifty paid field workers, in twenty-six states, to rally voters behind the Kochs’ agenda.
.
(also from the same article)
.
Public tax records show that between 1998 and 2008 the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation spent more than forty-eight million dollars. The Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation, which is controlled by Charles Koch and his wife, along with two company employees and an accountant, spent more than twenty-eight million. The David H. Koch Charitable Foundation spent more than a hundred and twenty million. Meanwhile, since 1998 Koch Industries has spent more than fifty million dollars on lobbying. Separately, the company’s political-action committee, KochPAC, has donated some eight million dollars to political campaigns, more than eighty per cent of it to Republicans. So far in 2010, Koch Industries leads all other energy companies in political contributions, as it has since 2006. In addition, during the past dozen years the Kochs and other family members have personally spent more than two million dollars on political contributions. In the second quarter of 2010, David Koch was the biggest individual contributor to the Republican Governors Association, with a million-dollar donation. Other gifts by the Kochs may be untraceable; federal tax law permits anonymous personal donations to politically active nonprofit groups. -link
.
The brothers have also started the American for Prosperity Tea Party group- one of the largest such groups in the country.

Criminy. The Drudge Report posted on Swampland. one. link. at. a. time….

Great read, thanks grape

“I’ll type this slowly for you: they…write…the…laws. That’s the f@cking problem”
.
So both parties allow companies (and unions, and other special interest groups) write laws. Isn’t that democracy, the government carrying out the will of the people. It may not be your will be of the majority. And when they don’t they get voted out (Repubs in 2008 and Demos in 2010).

The funny is you complain about the government and you want them deeper in everyday life. That seems to a mental disorder bu then again that is the definition of liberalism

“A person may decide to take the union job or another job -”
.
It is not a union job. I don;t know a single company that was started by a union! And in true free markets- there is a right to work not a mandate to join a union

Happy President’s Day. God Bless George Washington.
.
Here’s a fine example of Union Boss behavior: act like a hog.
.
http://laborpains.org/2011/02/16/cops-called-in-to-quiet-rowdy-teachers-union-chief-trying-to-skip-out-on-his-restaurant-tab/
.
Cops called in to quiet rowdy teachers union chief trying to skip out on his restaurant tab
Cops booted an unruly group of city teachers union officials from a posh Albany eatery after they caused a ruckus over their dinner tab, the Daily News has learned.
Paul Egan, the union’s political and legislative director, set off the fracas – claiming the quail he was served, and finished, wasn’t large enough – sources said.
After being convinced by the fuzz to pay his tab, Egan then tried to figure out if he could stiff the working Joes who manned his party’s three tables:
Officers told Egan the dispute was a civil matter and ordered him to pay the bill – to which he followed up by asking if he was required to leave a tip, sources said.
Ah, union bosses. Friends of the working man! Perhaps the best part of this story is that Egan has actually done this before:
“He’s done this more than once, though he never got escorted out by the police before that I know of,” the source said.
The source recounted Egan loudly complaining during a Christmas-time lunch that he didn’t get enough meatloaf and mashed potatoes.

freep only knows how to start tags, not end them. I was the one who showed him how to use the tag some time ago, but he apparently never understood how to end a , and because of this he often rambles inside of the quote in response to what he was quoting. He rarely linked sources months ago when I first noticed him doing it. He may be doing it more now.
·
Newf prefers to link outside of the comment block either before it or afterwards, where he can get attention grabbing red text. Or where he can bold it.
·
I’m often lead to believe that Freep is an individual who has a set of ideas he actually consistently believes in. Newf’s posting style leads me to believe that he’ll do whatever he can to annoy people, take center stage, and push whatever talking points he can for his tea party point of view.
·
Essentially, Freep is an untrained commentor who’s not great at what he does and often leaves noticeable technical gaps, but probably actually believes everything he rights.
·
While Newf is a parrot with an understanding of web code & how to attract attention. If anyone is being paid to post on this site, it is likely him. And it would explain why he can be found contradicting himself three different ways in the same week by spouting all sorts of different talking points from the right.
·
Both are very far right. Both like to think they mock liberals well. And both absolutely believe they are doing the right thing or are on the right side of the line, to the point that anyone with a different view doesn’t have a clue what they are talking about. They also both like attention. But there’s a certain polish to Newf’s idiocy that doesn’t exist in freep’s.

Your opposition to unions blinds you to the facts. There is a right to free assembly and a right to organize. A company can fight it but once the employees have decided to unionize, they typically opt to negotiate through collective bargaining. There are other companies out there, competitors, where the employees may choose not to unionize and you’re free to get a job there. “Right-to-work” laws are nothing more than a transparent attempt to undermine unions by doing as you desire: Allowing employees to free-ride on the union members’ coattails while not supporting it or paying dues. The intention is to undermine and kill unionism in those states that allow it. In a truly free market, employees have the choice to organize or not organize, unlike in the “right-to-work” states.

Time’s code stripped out my [blockquote] tags… so that’s probably what was up above where it looks like something was missing.

Time’s code stripped out my [blockquote] tags… so that’s probably what was up above where it looks like something was missing.

~ mistakenly posted at 43

Notice how freepa seems to know all the secret stuff. Obviously, a closet unionist!

“So both parties allow companies (and unions, and other special interest groups) write laws. Isn’t that democracy, the government carrying out the will of the people.”
.
“Companies,” i.e., corporations, aren’t people they are financial entities. Their owners get to vote, just like everyone else (that’s how you establish the will “of the majority,” nitwit) and just like everyone else, they shouldn’t be allowed to bribe all of our representatives in government. But you’ve obviously replaced any understanding of our constitution and how democracy works with your sociopathic Randian dogma and that is the absolute definition of “conservatism”.

For the children..

The poor union folks work 10 months a year The average teachers salary is $48,743. The average for a Wisconsin worker is $37,398 for 12 months. On a annualized basis a teacher is paid is 58,491 or 56% higher than the average worker who BTW is footing that bill. Add in let’s say an average of benefit package of 30,000 or 36,000 annualized plus over 4 weeks paid vacation during the school year.

Oh yeah we are to believe this is about collective bargaining and for the children.

Jim Nelsen, a teacher at Hamilton High School in Milwaukee who attended the union protests in Madison, told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that he thought it was “time we had to move and we did.” He earns $62,877 in base salary with an additional $26,492 in benefits.

Julene Flanagan, a fourth-grade teacher at Story Elementary School in Milwaukee, said the reason she attended the protests in Madison was because she cares “about the children deeply” and about the “future of public education in Wisconsin.” Flanagan makes $48,406 in base salary and $37,600 in benefits.

Chris Fons, a social studies teacher at Milwaukee’s Riverside High School, said the union protests in Madison are a “bottom-up” movement, and that the “people have been acting and the leaders are following.” Fons earns $58,976 in annual salary with an additional $25,646 in benefits.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2011/02/21/wisconsins-teachers-make-a-little-more-money-than-theyre-letting-on/#ixzz1EcOnFls6

I really don’t understand why poor, lower middle class, middle class and even upper middle class vote GOP or support the TEA party. It is not in their best interest. It is debatable whether a vote for the Dems is all that much better. The middle class and with it the american dream has been systemetically dismantled ever since the Carter administration, by Dems as well as GOP. The real mental disorder is to support the TEA party when you are not part of the wealthy 5%. It simply is not in one’s own best interest.

Oil prices are going sky high. Sure glad that the great Obama shut down all those drilling rigs that have met safety standards.
.
Since higher oil prices act like a tax on our economy with billions of $ going overseas, we should cut back aid to oil producing countries, like Saudi Arabia.
.
And since economists agree that rising oil prices is bad for the economy, because it acts like a tax increase…that settles the discussion about raising taxes.
.
Now can our economic geniuses put two and two together and understand that sending billions, trillions? to China is draining money out of our system. Hence, any stimulus goes right out the window to China and the Middle East.

“”Companies,” i.e., corporations, aren’t people they are financial entitieies.”
.
And how long have inanimate objects been speaking to you. Not people. The CEO wife might be surprised he is not a person. But I noticed how you manged to ignore financial entities like unions or Planned Parenthood or Environmental groups. You hate for capitalism is quite apparent but your temper tantrums ignore the same issue with groups you agree. You you aren’t intellectually honest with yourself and prefer hatred and class envy
.
“has been systemetically dismantled ever since the Carter administration”
.
Yes the last time re-distribution policies were pitched (there is a clue there if you are paying attention). It is also the time that the steel workers union and airlines union were bankrupting 2 industries and the other auto an manufacturing unions were forcing companies to go offshore. What destroyed the middle class were teh polices you keep insisting help it. History tells a different story

Isn’t it great?!!!

Not a closet unionist. An EX-unionist.

“”Right-to-work” laws are nothing more than a transparent attempt to undermine unions by doing as you desire: Allowing employees to free-ride on the union members’ coattails”
.
Always the conspiracy theories. If unions are so wonderful why doesn’t every group of employees join one? Or right if you not an extreme leftist you are too stupid for your own good.
.
Free ride on the unions coattails? Flip side is compulsory dues regardless of how you feel about unions.

Worth repeating with slight adjustments.
.
As usual pintortwo attacks right wing or conservative billionaires, but can defend the outrageous abuse of the political system by liberal billionaires, so he will as I figured he would attack the Koch Brothers.
.
But, who is Jane Mayer. The purveyor of the so-called “facts” on the Koch Brothers?
.
You forgot to mention these facts from your source, pintortwo.
.
Fact #1 – Mayer is known for not only lying out right about facts but use terminology which sounds perverse, but in actuality is nothing more than mundane information.
.
Fact #2 – Mayer is also famous now after writing a scathing book about so called “covert operations” by the Bush Administration but has since been outed for her lies about the CIA since Obama had reams of secret CIA documents released. Most of what Mayer described as “covert” actions by the CIA didn’t turn out to be such.
.
Mayer exposed by Bush II Sr speech writer does bring out the facts. Marc Thiessen said the following about Mayer recently;
.
“But her work, Thiessen notes,
is largely dependent on sources who were opposed to the president’s policy or were on the periphery of the CIA interrogation program. By depending on such sources, she got this story wrong. And if her account of the writing of a presidential speech was so defective, how can we trust her accounts of what supposedly happened in CIA black sites thousands of miles away?
Indeed, this is the reason why Mayer and others on the left are attacking my book: I have brought facts to the table, information that undermines the torture narrative they have made careers of spinning. For years, critics like Mayer could level any unfounded accusation they wanted against the CIA, confident that those who could challenge them were powerless to respond — because the answers were classified. But then Barack Obama declassified reams of documents revealing the secrets of the CIA program. He did enormous damage to our national security, but he also liberated those of us familiar with the intelligence on CIA interrogations to speak out. As a result, Mayer is no longer free to make baseless accusations without challenge or consequence.
.
No wonder she’s upset.”
.
Read more: http://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/lachlan-markay/2010/04/14/marc-thiessen-exposes-new-yorker-reporter-jane-mayers-dishonesty-enh#ixzz1EY1ZbJRo
.
AEI had the following to report on Mayer;
.
“Mayer declares categorically that “the Bush administration’s interrogation policies . . . yielded no appreciable intelligence benefit.” Really? She must not have been listening when Barack Obama’s director of national intelligence, Admiral Dennis Blair, declared: “High value information came from [CIA] interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the al Qaeda organization that was attacking this country.”
.
She must have forgotten that when she herself interviewed Leon Panetta, Obama’s CIA director, he told her, “Important information was gathered from these detainees. [The CIA program] provided information that was acted upon.” And she must have forgotten her 2007 interview (also quoted in the Panetta article) with John Brennan (now Obama’s homeland-security advisor), in which she asked him if enhanced interrogation techniques “were necessary to keep America safe,” and he replied: “Would the U.S. be handicapped if the CIA was not, in fact, able to carry out these types of detention and debriefing activities? I would say yes.”
.
So what about the Koch Brothers? Yes they are Libertarians. But as Mayer writes, they are somehow closet anarchists who want to destroy this country. Far from it. They like so many others have seen how this country has been grown in size and scope far beyond the original intent.
.
The problem is liberals would love to be the only ones who have powerful lobbyists and deep money pockets in Washington. Fortunately, the Koch Brothers have equalized the scales. Do they contribute to the Cato Institute or the Heritage Foundation? I would bet my last dollar they do. But, what is the difference between what the Koch Brothers have done and what George Soros and his kind have done now for longer than anyone can remember? The only difference, the Koch’s support more libertarian / conservative organizations. Soros and his rabble rousing group of misfits, the liberal agenda and their now 100′s of organizations.
.
To date, liberal radical organizations with the Unions have outspent and out lobbied any other conservative organization 100 fold. These are the facts.
.
Soon to be released, “The Truth About The Koch Brothers”. I wonder how many facts by Mayer will be found to be nothing more than lies then?

“You hate for capitalism is quite apparent but your temper tantrums ignore the same issue with groups you agree.”
.
Sorry, that’s the “liberal,” in the fevered dreams of your hate-filled, indoctrinated, and now worthless mind. No group of any kind should be able to donate to political campaigns. None.
.
And I happen to like real market capitalism quite a bit, as a matter of fact. You just have no idea what that is.

“The CEO wife might be surprised he is not a person.”

I think she will be more surprised with the fact that she is married to a company.

A CEO is not a company!

Unions did not bankrupt industries. That is just utter nonsense nor did they force anybody to offshore. Giving tax breaks to companies in order to assist in offshoring is the real sweetener here.

Wages for the lower 95% have been stagnant for the last 30 years, in fact if you take inflation into account the paychecks have diminished where as the paychecks for the upper 5% has skyrocketed. At the same time due to cutbacks in especially education social mobility is non-existent (the american dream). The TP and GOP stand for social divide and I still don’t have a clue why middle class and the poor are voting against their own best interest.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41700027/ns/world_news-mideastn_africa/
.
Gaddafi headed for Venezuela. I wonder if Sean Penn and Danny Glover are there as the welcoming committee?
.
While he’s away, his Son is un-leashing the military and jets to kill off the protesters.

http://sas-origin.onstreammedia.com/origin/gallupinc/GallupSpaces/Production/Cms/POLL/m04wr4hhokmhs_fay9n1cq.gif
.
The declining Democrat Party

Latest word is that Gaddafi is headed for Venezuela. Obama’s are planning a welcoming party.
.
*Like a good neighbor (Socialist)………..Barack is there!!
.
*Hum it to the tune of State Farm Commercial

“I really don’t understand why poor, lower middle class, middle class and even upper middle class vote GOP or support the TEA party. It is not in their best interest.”
.
Mostly, there are two big reasons: one, a giant right-wing propaganda machine financed by billionaire sociopaths, manufacturing socially-divisive lies designed to appeal to high RWAs (right-wing authoritarian-followers). And two, thirty years of sustained antipathy toward liberals and a near complete embargo of liberal thought by the corporate media (mostly owned by billionaire sociopaths) and corrupted by he-said-she-said conventions designed to mask the ugly truths about corporatist “conservatism” and our greedy, sociopathic oligarchy.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/obama-defends-planned-parenthood-after-undercover-vids-manufactured/
.
Pushing Obama back to the left. President comes out and defends Planned Parenthood’s most recent “sting” where employees were caught on video advocating for the sexual abuse of young girls, not reporting a “Pimps” use of these girls for prostitution.
.
Good job President O

“No group of any kind should be able to donate to political campaigns. None.”
.
That is certainly your opinion and you are entitled to it. Just as I feel the government should not be able to confiscate anyone’s money to hand over to anyone else.

.
“And I happen to like real market capitalism quite a bit, as a matter of fact. You just have no idea what that is”
.
Oh and you do? As long as it re-distributes wealth according to your schedule or produce “fairness” by taxes or regulation. That’s the “free market” you love.
.
“Unions did not bankrupt industries.”
.
repeating it doens’t make it true. But here is the reality:
“A big reason is the cost of labor. As analyzed by Harbour-Felax, labor costs the Detroit Three substantially more per vehicle than it does the Japanese.

Health care is the biggest chunk. GM (Charts), for instance spends $1,635 per vehicle on health care for active and retired workers in the U.S. Toyota (Charts) pays nothing for retired workers – it has very few – and only $215 for active ones.

Other labor costs add to the bill. Contract issues like work rules, line relief and holiday pay amount to $630 per vehicle – costs that the Japanese don’t have. And paying UAW members for not working when plants are shut costs another $350 per vehicle.

Here’s one example of how knotty Detroit’s labor problem can be:

If an assembly plant with 3,000 workers has no dealer orders, it has two options. One is to close the plant for a week and not build any cars. Then the company still has to give the idled workers 95 percent of their take-home pay plus all benefits for not working. So a one-week shutdown costs $7.7 million or $1,545 for each vehicle it didn’t make.”
.
“At the same time due to cutbacks in especially education”
. Now we know for certain you are delusional or just idiotic. We spend more for education than nearly evry country but are results in math and science put us in the mid-20 rankings. Resukts of AP exams while spending exceeded 2 times inflation rate.
.
“An analysis finds that more than two in five students (41.5%) earned a failing score of 1 or 2, up from 36.5% in 1999. In the South, a Census-defined region that spans from Texas to Delaware, nearly half of all tests — 48.4% — earned a 1 or 2, a failure rate up 7 percentage points from a decade prior and a statistically significant difference from the rest of the country”
.
“there are two big reasons: one, a giant right-wing propaganda machine financed by billionaire sociopaths”.
.
Back to they are too stupid to know any better and aren’t as smart as we are; says the failures of the public education system.

You have a lot of difficulty with simple concepts, eh freeper? If you don’t like the union and the dues, don’t take the job. Seems like a simple concept even you could understand but perhaps I overestimate your capabilities.
..
Any company with a union workforce would not allow a prospective employee to take a unionized position without joining the union. Seems that they are in agreement with the union on that matter.
..
Nice attempt at deflection too. No one is suggesting that all workers and all industries must be unionized. The difference is that most of us believe in choice, something that falls on deaf ears in the “right-to-work” states.

“As long as it re-distributes wealth according to your schedule or produce “fairness” by taxes or regulation. That’s the “free market” you love.”
.
And, obviously, you love crony-capitalism which destroys competition, the economy and the American middle class. Labor is what actually produces things in this country, you dogma-spouting, brainwashed little jerk. Capital is money taken from the backs of working-class labor. Why don’t you pull your head out of the elephant’s @ss once and a while and take a look around. Or you can just keep letting it sh!t all over you.

Here:
.
“As long as it re-distributes wealth according to your schedule or produce “fairness” by taxes or regulation. That’s the “free market” you love.”
.
Obviously, you love crony-capitalism which destroys competition, the economy and the American middle class. Labor is what actually produces things in this country, you dogma-spouting, brainwashed little jerk. Capital is money taken from the backs of working-class labor. Why don’t you pull your head out of the elephant’s @ss once and a while and take a look around. Or you can just keep letting it sh!t all over you.

freeper @ 25.18:
..
That’s some pretty outdated “analysis” you’re quoting and it doesn’t reflect the current state of the UAW contracts with GM, Ford and Chrysler. Pasting outdated rhetoric from 3-4 years ago is not a prudent or honest way to make your argument.
..
As far as the unions killing the auto or steel companies: It’s just not borne out by the facts. High wages and associated benefits contributed to eroding margins but they did not bring about the demise of the companies. Poor management decisions, unrelenting (and in the case of steel) and unfair competition hastened the end of those companies. If you look around now, you can see that a new generation of steel-makers have popped up and they are profitable, modernized operations. After painful restructuring, Ford and GM are doing the same.

Nice try freep, but the real reason the american car industry fell over is because they were producing cars that nobody really wanted. The gas guzzlers being produces by Detroit were and are hopelessly outdated. The Japanese and european competitors simply made better cars. Labor costs had nothing to do with this. You can blame it all on the workers, they just want to make a buck so they can give their kids a better life. The defaltion of the paycheck over the last 30 years still holds true and is the main reason why middle class is evaporating in this country and with upward mobility non-existent so is the american dream. Talking about delusional, you should look in the mirror!

Headline: “Wongo-bongo Finally Goes Nuts At Time Swampland”.
.
LOL

“Labor is what actually produces things in this country, you dogma-spouting,”
.

So free markets are a punch line to you just like the constitution an patriotism.
.
“Capital is money taken from the backs of working-class labor.”
.
Spoken like a true communist! And its taxes that is taken from the producers and re-distributed according to some idiocy of “fairness and social justice”.

Yeah Rusty nothing sends leftists over the edge when they are called on their “we like free markets” as long as we can regulate, tax and re-distribute the crap out of it.

Where are all of our great American Liberals at to defend this War Hero? Hello? Anyone?

Racist ShepperdWong defends racist State Representative. Gee how nice.

<blockquote…..exception of Virginia at number 7
.
How many non-collectives versus collective again?
.
LOL, you people are totally amazing. Anything to spin and twist.

For the children..
.
Well, that is one way to describe The Daily Caller’s target audience. You’d have to be a child (at least mentally) to take those numbers at face value.
.
For starters, try controlling for age and experience, then add the time a teacher puts in doing their job outside of core school hours.
.
Then, add education. How much would someone with a Master’s in their field make in the private sector?
.
Then, ask yourself if teaching our children is the same as driving a truck or being a cashier at Wal-Mart. Should the pay be equivalent?
.
Now I don’t expect a serious answer from freewelcher – who does? – but context does make a difference here.

“Both are very far right. Both like to think they mock liberals well. And both absolutely believe they are doing the right thing or are on the right side of the line, to the point that anyone with a different view doesn’t have a clue what they are talking about.
.
Very far right from the view point of left extremists who believe they are moderate. And I love how you attribute views of folks on the right and yet you are blind to that fact you exhibit the same traits you seem to detest.

I am untrained commentator– absolutely and never claimed otherwise. I am a trained engineer and have over 2 decades experience in economics and investments. The left here for the most part may be “trained commentators” but have no experience in real business and their pont of view is not shaped by facts and reality but emotions then search for some semblance of “facts” to support mostly untenable positions.
.
“But there’s a certain polish to Newf’s idiocy that doesn’t exist in freep’s.”
.
Liberals style over substance which goes to the heart of the failings of liberalism. Attention? Hardly. 90% of the time the responses I get are from an unhinged left loon who immediately degrades in name calling and bile spewing.
.

“Nice try freep, but the real reason the american car industry fell over is because they were producing cars that nobody really wanted”
.
Every product moves at a price. The auto makers could not cut prices and make any profit because of the high sunk costs of labor which far exceeded other auto makers. Not to mention that the cars were poorly made.
.
“That’s some pretty outdated “analysis” you’re quoting and it doesn’t reflect the current state of the UAW contracts with GM, Ford and Chrysler. Pasting outdated rhetoric from 3-4 years ago is not a prudent or honest way to make your argument.
..
As far as the unions killing the auto or steel companies: It’s just not borne out by the facts. High wages and associated benefits contributed to eroding margins but they did not bring about the demise of the companies. Poor management decisions, unrelenting (and in the case of steel) and unfair competition hastened the end of those companies”
.
You mean the current state of contracts after they came out of bankruptcy where laid off workers were still being paid and collecting benefits? Markets change and competition comes in but you can NEVER blame labor for demanding more more more. Eroding margins? You mean those caused by lower prices and rising labor costs–those eroding margins? Of course its not the labor. If these other countries would just adopt the same stupidity we could all go bankrupt together.

robbert5, I sigh so often when the reactionaries comment here I actually hyperventilate. It is discouraging to read their same Glen Beck, Limbaugh rhetoric repeated ad nauseum.

but you can NEVER blame labor for demanding more more more

I realize that in your weak attempt to demonize labor, you can’t see the forest for the trees but there are two sides at that negotiation. The company runs the business and has all the numbers. If the demands are unreasonable, they can point that out with evidence and negotiate better terms.
..
You probably missed this but the cost of steel for an average car is greater than the cost of labor to build that car. Rising commodity prices are more likely to eat into margins than labor costs.

“Every product moves at a price”
..
Not if the cost of operation is too expensive. The american cars were not more or less expensive due to labor costs, they were indeed poorly made (something finally we agree on ) but also when the price of gasoline finally went up they became even less popular. If you want to take export and import of cars into account as well, American cars are and were unpopular abroad, in Europe as well as Asia because of the really high gas prices. The price of one gallon of unleaded is 2-3 times as high in Europe compared to the States which makes the American car compared to the European and Asian car way too expensive, not by price but just in operations i.e. driving.

Now having said that, fact is still that the middle class is squeezed at the expense of the upper class. The American dream is non-existent and that really needs to be repaired for America to preserve its superpower status. Dismantling unions and collective bargaining rights is exactly the wrong way to do it!

But the New York Times has a more subtle chart that tells the real story. Focusing only on Wisconsin, the Times chart shows that among workers without a bachelor’s degree, state workers are, indeed, better paid than private-sector workers – the figures are $37,000 annually for state workers, $33,250 for private-sector workers.
..
However, among workers with a bachelor’s degree, private-sector workers earn more than state workers — $57,113 for private-sector workers, $51,921 for public-sector workers.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/postpartisan/2011/02/wisconsin_dueling_statistics_a.html

grape_crush, thanks for sharing the map and article. There is a fascinating book I read recently called “The Warmth of Other Suns”. It records, through the stories of 3 people, the history of the Great Migration of black people to the north and far west. The movenment lasted from the early 1900s to the 1970s. They were fleeing Jim Crow laws and the “free labor” allowed by sharecropping. It notes how southern powers fought this flight.

Paul, that guy for President.
Now Newrusty, freeper, Dr. earljr, I challenge you to watch this video and point out the fallacies.

Ah..freepers usual “so’s your old man” response.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/29/politics/29column.html
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,145745,00.html
.
Third Journalist Was Paid to Promote Bush Policies
.
Those paid: Mike McManus, Maggie Gallagher. Armstrong Williams
.
This is my so’s your old man moment. Payola went on for years in the Bush administration. They were promoting their policies.
.
Gates is promoting world health and education initiatives through his foundation.

NewRusty: Mark Levin, I am sure one of your heroes, questioning Ann Coulter’s support. Her point is he could win. What about all those important reactionary tenets of faith?
.
http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2011/02/20/mark-levin-puzzled-by-ann-coulters-bizarre-endorsement-of-chris-christie-who-supports-gun-control-amnesty-obamacare-and-climate-legislation/
.

What is your great love of Chris Christie based on? The man supports gun control. The man appoints a radical Islamist to a judgeship. The man is for amnesty [for illegal aliens]. The man is, to some extent, part of the “green” movement. He campaigned for Michael Castle.
.
And it’s interesting. [Mitt] Romney is being attacked, correctly by the way, for RomneyCare. Yet here we have Obamacare, we have 28 states challenging it: 26 states in one suit; Virginia in another suit; Oklahoma in another suit — and New Jersey’s sitting on the sidelines.
.
But the idea that if we don’t back Christie, who’s already said he’s not qualified enough to be president, that Romney is the winner and that we were warned about McCain, is a little rewrite of history. Nobody was more against McCain than I. Then at the very end I said we had to vote for him to stop Obama. But I fought him every step of the way. Ask McCain’s people. They hate me. Feeling’s mutual!
.
And it’s not good enough to be good on one out of 20. So this [obsession with Christie] I don’t get.

NewRusty: If you think the map you posted proved your point, you need to go back to school, a unionized school.

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/02/anti-walker-protests-continue-outnumbering-pro-walker-showing.php?ref=fpb
.
“The pro-Walker Tea Party rally featured something of all-star cast: Andrew Breitbart, Joe “The Plumber” Wurzelbacher, Herman Cain and more. However, every estimate in the media has shown that the pro-Walker demonstration was outnumbered several times over by the pro-union demonstrators.”
.
They didn’t flock to see Breitbart, Joe “The Plumber” (my dad was a plumber, Joe is no plumber), and Cain. What’s wrong with Wisconsin. Maybe they are too educated.

“You mean the current state of contracts after they came out of bankruptcy where laid off workers were still being paid and collecting benefits? Markets change and competition comes in but you can NEVER blame labor for demanding more more more.“

The nation’s six largest banks—all committed to this balls-out, I drink your milkshake! strategy of flagrantly gorging themselves as America goes hungry—set aside a whopping $140 billion for executive compensation last year, a sum only slightly less than the $164 billion they paid themselves in the pre-crash year of 2007. In a gesture of self-sacrifice, Blankfein himself took a humiliatingly low bonus of $9 million, less than the 2009 pay of elephantine New York Knicks washout Eddy Curry. But in reality, not much had changed. “What is the state of our moral being when Lloyd Blankfein taking a $9 million bonus is viewed as this great act of contrition, when every penny of it was a direct transfer from the taxpayer?” asks Eliot Spitzer, who tried to hold Wall Street accountable during his own ill-fated stint as governor of New York.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/wall-streets-bailout-hustle-20100217

As usual pintortwo attacks right wing or conservative billionaires, but can defend the outrageous abuse of the political system by liberal billionaires
.
I haven’t defended anyone in this comment. I don’t believe that I ever defended any liberal’s abuse of the system. The first quote was from your link (perhaps you didn’t read it). In fact, I said your article was a “fine” topic of discussion.
.
I wanted to highlight your actions. You attack Gates’ motives as a distortion of fact and liberal lies but you don’t mention how. This is particularly craven as you have often denied the Kochs’ involvement in the TP movement and that it may represent a distortion of fact.
.
Personally, I don’t get worked up when a billionaire techie like Gates funds programs geared toward poverty and disease. Nor when Soros promotes ideas that would have him pay more taxes and not have a direct impact on his main business interests (although I think he has invested in alt-energy)– but feel free to debate this.
.
I do, however, get heated when billionaire oil tycoons fund think-tanks that create studies which directly benefit their core business– as the Kochs have done with Cato and Mercatus– and those “studies” are treated as non-biased by the media. I have a problem when billionaires start political movements and train operatives, then claim them to be populist and grass-roots– as the Kochs have done with AFP (and subsidiaries), Citizens for a Sound Economy and FreedomWorks.
.
I also think it is very hypocritical of you to lash-out so vehemently at liberal advocates while condoning conservative media advocacy. Be consistent.

http://www.americablog.com/2011/02/feds-dropping-case-against-countrywides.html
.
Feds dropping case against Countrywide’s Mozilo
.
http://www.americablog.com/2011/02/matt-taibbi-on-unjailables-of-wall.html
.

How can Wall Street destroy a global economy and walk away unscathed by it? Easy. The revolving door between government and Wall Street. There are plenty of high profile cases such as Orszag to Citi and William Daley from JP Morgan to the White House or even the more recent departure of a senior FDIC official to Goldman, but it happens throughout Washington in Congress as well as the agencies. It’s rotting the system to the core and nobody in Washington cares. There are future job prospects to consider after all. Country? How much can it pay compared to business?

The ever classy mysoginistic, bigotted Limbaugh perspective of Michelle Obama.

http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/201102210011
.

What is it – no, I’m trying to say that our First Lady does not project the image of women that you might see on the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue, or of a woman Alex Rodriguez might date every six months or what have you. I mean, women are under constant pressure to look lithe, and Michelle My Belle is out there saying if you eat the roots and tree bark and the berries and all this cardboard stuff you will live longer, be healthier and you won’t be obese. Okay, fine, show us.

“It’s rotting the system to the core and nobody in Washington cares.”
.
Yeah, we sort of covered that, 25.8-25.12. You never have to worry about running afoul of the rules if you get to write them in the first place. We do but they don’t.

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/01/29/2041020/hey-gov-dont-give-pill-mills-license.html#disqus_thread

Carl Hiason’s editorial in the Miami Herald on Rick Scott’s decision to kill efforts to end pill mills in Florida. This also allows Florida to be the source for opiates in other states. Scott thinks being involved in organized crime is a personal right that should not be infringed on

I wish there was a way to set up an exclusive thread for the reactionary right on this site so they could spend all their time propping each other up while not having to enlighten their minds with the facts presented by non-crazy commentators.

Really serious stuff.

http://english.aljazeera.net/watch_now/
.

.
Shot dead in Lybia

http://mediamatters.org/blog/201102210002
.
What Pundits Often Mean When They Refer To “People”
.

According to Gregory, not only did Christie’s speech earn “rave reviews” (from whom, we’re not told), but the governor’s rhetoric represents “the kind of plain talk that people are responding to.”

But are they “responding”? And who are these “people”? I’d suggest most of the “people” supposedly responding to Christie’s “plain talk” are other media players like Gregory who have been showering the first-term governor with often comically positive coverage for the last year. (i.e. OMG, he yells at voters on YouTube!)

.
Weiner Calls On Republicans to Defund Their Health Care Plans

There is april2563, go back to Daily Kos, Media Matters, TPM or one of the other multiple far left liberal websites you were at before you came here. I promise, I won’t go there.
.
LOL

You know they are all nuts over on Media Matters, don’t you april2563?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/uc/20110217/cm_uc_crjcox/op_4517025
.
Why Do They Hate Social Security?
.

Among the mysteries of modern politics in America is why so many of our leading pundits and politicians persistently seek to undermine Social Security,…
.
First, let’s remember that Social Security actually provides support at a very modest level. Last year, the average retirement benefit was $1,170 a month, or about $14,000 a year, with the average disabled worker or widow receiving slightly less.
.
Social Security is among the least generous retirement programs among all the developed nations. As a percentage of the average worker’s pre-retirement wages, the benefit has been declining for years and will continue to fall without any further cutbacks. The check that used to replace 39 percent of worklife income will replace only 31 percent by 2031. Compare that with the average wage replacement in the nations belonging to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) — which was roughly 61 percent last year.
.
More important than those comparative statistics is the fact that the great majority of Social Security beneficiaries have no other cushion for their retirement — not because they were lazy or improvident, but because their wages were simply too low to permit much savings, let alone investment.
.
Whenever someone starts to talk about “entitlements,” keep in mind that they are either trying to bamboozle or they’ve been bamboozled themselves. Under that category, most commentators mix up Medicaid and Medicare — two programs that are indeed endangered by rising health care costs — with Social Security, which will be solvent until at least 2037 and can easily be made solvent for decades to come with minor changes. This is a rhetorical deception perpetrated countless times every day in nearly every media outlet.
.
Well, there is a reason, but only if your real aim is to destroy the system and replace it with something less useful but more profitable.Wall Street and its servants on Capitol Hill have lusted after Social Security’s revenues for many years. And they regard the current uproar over the budget as a fresh opportunity to get their hands on a trillion-dollar bonanza. Given their record in recent years, it is all too easy to imagine how badly that would work out for everybody — except them, of course.

.

A video must-see for any SANE liberal.
.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/21/us-markets-oil-idUSTRE71192R20110221
.
Hold onto your wallets people. Energy costs will now “necessarily skyrocket”. Hey I didn’t say your “dear” Leader said it back a few years ago.

Who is in favor of sending in Hillary with combat boots and a couple machine guns?
.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110221/ap_on_re_us/us_us_libya
.
WASHINGTON – Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton condemned the violence against anti-government protesters in Libya on Monday and called on the government of Moammar Gadhafi to “stop this unacceptable bloodshed.”
.
Clinton said the world is watching event unfold in Libya “with alarm.” The strongly worded statement came amid signs that Gadhafi’s autocratic hold on the country was weakening. Still, reports from Tripoli depicted a chaotic scene of low-flying warplanes, snipers atop rooftops and armed men firing indiscriminately on protesters.

You and pattysartor must have taken HTML lessons together. You are both typing exactly the same now.

And this from a pot smoking old hippy who never progressed beyond the psychedelic sixties!
Your clouded mind is fed by the likes of Maxine Waters and you have the audacity to lecture conservatives who venture on to this liberal wasteland. I know, april, if it is not far enough left for you, then STFU….this is your meme and you remain faithful to the manifesto. (here is a small clue for you, worshiping Che Guevara is no longer hip)

pintortwo:
.
This is the part you left out, how come?
.

“Better-known for its battles against global disease, the giant philanthropy has also become a force in journalism.
.
The foundation’s grants to media organizations such as ABC and The Guardian, one of Britain’s leading newspapers, raise obvious conflict-of-interest questions: How can reporting be unbiased when a major player holds the purse strings?
.
But direct funding of media organizations is only one way the world’s most powerful foundation influences what the public reads, hears and watches.
.
To garner attention for the issues it cares about, the foundation has invested millions in training programs for journalists. It funds research on the most effective ways to craft media messages. Gates-backed think tanks turn out media fact sheets and newspaper opinion pieces. Magazines and scientific journals get Gates money to publish research and articles. Experts coached in Gates-funded programs write columns that appear in media outlets from The New York Times to The Huffington Post, while digital portals blur the line between journalism and spin.”

.
Now where do the Koch Brothers have influence on our journalists and news outlets again?
.
Do the Koch’s fund conservative causes? Absolutely. Do they go to the extent you find on the left with Gates, Soros and a whole host of other far left billionaires? He11 no.

What about all those important reactionary tenets of faith?

.
What about it? What does it have to do with fiscal responsibility, limited government and promotion of the free markets, april?
.
Maybe when you learn to ask a question which makes sense, I shall respond. Otherwise, nothing but far left reactionary responses to comments.

More “Weiner” facts.
.
http://www.weinerfacts.com/
.

For the daily crazy reactionary file:
.
http://whiskeyfire.typepad.com/whiskey_fire/
.
Sarah Palin and other right wingers trying to outthink Justin Bieber. They loose.

This could get ugly. Does Obambi have his finger on the button?
.
http://www.debka.com/article/20692/
.
God help us all if he does.

“So free markets are a punch line to you just like the constitution an patriotism.
.
“Free markets” can only exist if they are regulated by government. Now go outside quickly so the goop in your head you use for brains doesn’t splatter all over the clean carpet.

“–There is such a thing as the secular right.”

From the article:

“They are part of a small faction on the right: conservatives with no use for religion.”

Based on personal experience, I have doubts that it’s really small. I have far more conservative friends than I do liberal ones and yet a higher percentage of my conservative friends are atheists/agnostics. The conservative friends are just more likely to keep it under wraps because they don’t like being singled out. I don’t blame either group for not wanting to let their beliefs (or lack of) become public knowledge. Why take a chance on getting by-passed for a promotion or limiting business opportunities because you might alienate a beliver in a position to do you some good?

Over a third of us where I work are atheists/agnostics but only 2 of us are open about it. It might even be over a third because a couple of the guys flat out refuse to even discuss religion (although both never attend church). Most of the churches in my area have been declining in attendence for years and their congregations are mostly elderly. The church next door has seen a drop of about half since I moved here 14 years ago. The older members die and no body replaces them. They even cancelled their annual Easter Egg hunts because there just weren’t enough young people to make it worth their while (I let them use my property because it’s all landscaped and had more hiding places).
.
The only thing I really have noticed is that the fewer their numbers become, the more “religious” they get. This may be one reason why they’re attracting fewer new members.

“You lying to yourself is far worse than any lie you accuse the Wisconsin governor of doing”
.
he’s not union busting? Why would anyone be so willing to ignore reality to make oneself look so foolish? is your tribe really that important that it triumphs reality?
.
He have the concessions but somehow he apparently don’t need to savings; what he really seems to want is the collective bargaining. Wierd, he need to save money but don’t want to take the deal. Wonder why?
.
Freeinpa, you’re a hoot. So willing to dupe yourself for everything that’s your tribe.

“The American dream is non-existent and that really needs to be repaired for America to preserve its superpower status. Dismantling unions and collective bargaining rights is exactly the wrong way to do it”
.
“Not if the cost of operation is too expensive. The american cars were not more or less expensive due to labor costs,”
.
So you agree that laboe costs were too high and the way too fix A,ericas superpower status i sto make our companies uncompetitive with high labor cost again! Brilliant!
.
“How can Wall Street destroy a global economy and walk away unscathed by it?”

.
.
First Countrywide is not a “Wall St” firm bu tto get your answer ask teh corrupt Democrats (Dodd Dorgan) who took favors (bribes) and Holder who won’t or can’t prosecute them.
.
“You never have to worry about running afoul of the rules if you get to write them in the first place”
.
That philosophy didn’t seem to work for Rangel who BTW is still in office collectign taxpayer money

Freeper, Newrusty, Dr.earljr:
.
Here’s is your opportunity to join the non-elite, non-Koch contributors and assist the Wisconsin Dems.

http://www.actblue.com/page/orangetoblue2012?refcode=2_21_WIDemsA

Here’s one thing that really bothers me. I’m an atheist. We’ve had an annual Christmas party at work for as long as I’ve been there (over 35 years). A co-worker was an elder in his church and decorated every year and organized the Christmas party. He retired 10 years ago and I took over. Another atheist helps me do all the work for the party. We couldn’t get any of the Christians to help us. When I retire he has said he won’t do it by himself. I hit retirement age last summer. I can go at any time.
.
I think it’s pretty f**king sad that a couple of atheists have to do all the work to celebrate a Christian holiday. Even the boss has said that when I go they probably won’t have the Christmas party anymore. I’ve had to really push it a couple of times to get everybody to show up. They’ve talked about cancelling it a few times but I’ve always raised hell until they gave in. We invite the retirees to come and talk about the old days. We always have a great time. I hate seeing a tradition end.

“Not if the cost of operation is too expensive. The american cars were not more or less expensive due to labor costs, they were indeed poorly made ”
.
and.
“The American dream is non-existent and that really needs to be repaired for America to preserve its superpower status. Dismantling unions and collective bargaining rights is exactly the wrong way to do it!”
.
So the autos lost billoions because of high labor costs and poorly made compliments th elabor unions and the way to preserve superpower status is to go back to failed policies that kill th eauto companies. Brilliant!.
.
“How can Wall Street destroy a global economy and walk away unscathed by it?”
.
First Countrywide is not a “Wall St” firm. Andd to find you r answer ask Dood or Dorgan who took favors (bribes) from Conutrywide or Holder who can’t or won’t prosecute them. He is probably too busy suuing AZ for doin ganother job he has failed to do.
.
“You never have to worry about running afoul of the rules if you get to write them in the first place. ”
.,
Didn’t seem to help Rangel who BTW is still collectin a taxpayer check in Congress.
.
More instance where governemtn failed and your answer is more government. Ah the intracies of the liberal mind.

.

Media Matters? And you have the nerve to complain about Breitbart?
.
Find any more phony denials about those Doctors writing fraudulent sick notes? Can’t wait.

“I wish there was a way to set up an exclusive thread for the reactionary right on this site so they could spend all their time propping each other up while not having to enlighten their minds with the facts presented by non-crazy commentators”
.
Now here is an arrogant over-esteemed opinion of the liberal posters on this site. Agaon what th eleft wants is a forum to smear and denigrate conservatives without any push back pointing out the lies and bankruptcy of their “facts”

Thanks, april, but I already contribute to our local humane society….I have no interest in breeding future democrats.
On the other hand, if it were a sterilization program, then I will access my checkbook with a happy heart.

earl — OT but didn’t you mention that you are a Miami (OH) University alum? What years were you there? I know a handful of Miami alums from the 90s.

Perhaps we should donate to planned parenthood.
.
You gonna donate to the Doctors defense fund in WI, April? They might need your help after all those fraudulent sick notes to Teachers getting paid for faking illness.

“Free markets” can only exist if they are regulated by government.”
.
That is a fallacy of the left. But what it does is provide a handy fall man when government fails in what the left insist they do– No matter how poorly they do it.

The left left whines that the finaical crisis was caused by banks, the most regulated industry on earth. There are at least 4 government agencies regualting them. When they fail at thier job they blame corrupt polticians. Ho wmany folks at the Fed, SEC, Comptroller of teh Currency or FDIC were fired. It probably hovers pretty close to zero. Politiicians since the beginning of time become corrupt with power and the ability to pass out favors in the form of tax payer money and yet you insist we need more. And you call teh Tea Party stupid

sacredh: Let O’Reilly and the rest of the Fox protectors of the faith know. They can add your “Christian” co-workers to their ever growing list of people who hate Christmas.

Who said this guy does not drink?

“Here’s is your opportunity to join the non-elite, non-Koch contributors and assist the Wisconsin Dems”
.
Why aren’t he sob stories about how the poor teachers are being crushed enough to bring in more extorted money from other unions. What I don’t understand if this isabout all the poor middle class where are the rest of the middle class in WI. It’s filled up with other overpaid underused union folks. Seems teh middle class knows pretty well what th eunions are about—themselves!
.
Now if you said for the children you would have had me.

“Social Security is among the least generous retirement programs among all the developed nations.”
.
Here we have another liberal lie. It was sold as a “safety net” it is not a retirement plan it was never funded as such and it is not run as one. It is nothing but a trsanfereence of wealth from one generation to another.
.
People collectin gnow will collect multiples of what they put in and the younger genration will collect nothing! The only thing they get is the bill

What did they loose, april?, the ability to spell a simple word like lose?
By the way, did you note that Justin equated abortion to “killing babies”. A pretty astute observation from one so young, wouldn’t you say.

Hasn’t anyone ever told you you shouldn’t drink and blog? It’s not a huge difference but it is noticeable.

Maybe they didn’t want to hear you say Merry F ing Christmas all night long. DUH

apr2563, I think what it comes down to is that they’ll pay lip service to their religion but when it comes down to doing anything they’re not interested. They put in their 45 minutes and then it’s lunch and a football game. I saw. I was seen. Now leave me alone. Not all Christians are like that by any stretch of the imagination but I know too many that are Christian in name only. CINOs. Let’s add that to our list of acronyms.

SInce you are now a expert in Christianity, how should a Christian act Sacred? Maybe you should set an example. LOL.

April,
.
I wouldn’t give you or any other crazy libtard the sweat off my bollocks if your mouth was parched. How’s that?

Been out of touch for a while. Have there been any sightings of the AWOL dem Senators lately? Has anyone checked the Bunny Ranch in Nevada?

How would the Wisconsin budget deficit be effected by firing unethical doctors and teachers and perhaps fining them?

They are blogging in the basement of Media Matters Headquarters…

This is the part you left out..
.
No it isn’t, I addressed it by quoting “the “advocacy” side of the equation is essentially public relations: an attempt to influence decision-makers and sway public opinion.” I gave my personal opinion with “I don’t get worked up when a billionaire techie like Gates funds programs geared toward poverty and disease.” And I said it’s a reasonable topic for discussion.
.
Bottom line, Gates has no skin in the game when he advocates for disease prevention and poverty issues (“the world’s most powerful foundation” which you quote and bold is a charitable foundation).
.
To the contrary, the Koch brothers do all the same things to advocate for issues that help them personally– will make them richer, pay less taxes, avoid restriction, drop unions, etc. That is unseemly to say the least.
.
Your quote highlights what I say about you (my changes in italics):
.
“To garner attention for the issues they care about, the Koch brothers have invested millions in training programs for journalists. It funds research on the most effective ways to craft media messages. Koch-backed (and founded) think tanks turn out media fact sheets and newspaper opinion pieces. Magazines and scientific journals get Koch money to publish research and articles. Experts coached in Koch-funded programs write columns that appear in media outlets from The New York Times to The Huffington Post, while digital portals blur the line between journalism and spin.” Plus the Koch brothers are the number one donator to political campaigns among all energy groups. They have also started and funded so-called grass-roots organizations and trained them in advocacy to fit their agenda.”
.
..and yet you are ok with that.

While the Middle East boils over and Wisconsin is experiencing the dying spasm of liberal profligacy, the People’s Republic of San Francisco is keeping it all in perspective. They expect to soon have a ban on circumcision on the ballot. Leave it to San Francisco to know what the right priorities are.

And the wheels continue to fall off the Liberal’s apple cart. Here we have the benefactor of Media Matters, the former Nazi and self hating Jew George Soros, showing how it’s done. Anybody that references Media Matters is as nuts as this guy.
.
http://weaselzippers.us/2011/02/21/jewish-nazi-collaborator-george-soros-says-fox-news-like-nazis-in-way-it-deceives-people/
.
Jewish-Nazi Collaborator George Soros Says Fox News Like Nazis in Way it Deceives People…
.

liberalmeltdown@63.1′
.
Who’s picking up the tab for this little jaunt? George Soros? The DNC?
.
I am actually beginning to grow fond of the idea of Dems skipping town. Suppose 14 Dem US Senators were to go on the lam. It would work wonders for the prospects of real progress on the deficit.
.
Perhaps they could all get a note from Dr Kevorkian excusing their absence.

“Maybe they didn’t want to hear you say Merry F ing Christmas all night long. DUH”
.
No one sings. It’s food and conversation. We invite the retirees because some of them live alone and it gives them a chance to talk with friends they haven’t seen since the previous year. We even invite @ssholes like you.
.
“SInce you are now a expert in Christianity, how should a Christian act Sacred? Maybe you should set an example. LOL.”
.
I never pesented myself as an expert. I made personal observations that I presented as such. Here’s how I think a Christian should act. They should act as if the Bible they claim to revere is something other than a political talking point that backs up their own agendas. They should quit cherry picking a sentence here or there and take the Bible as a whole. They should take it’s messages to heart instead taking quotes out of context as justification for discrimination. I don’t set myself up as an example for anyone else to follow. I’m as f**ked up as the next guy and don’t pretend that I’m a role model. One thing I don’t do is use the Bible to excuse my own failings and twist it’s meanings to serve as an excuse for my own behavior..

liberalmeltdown@66,

Who would know better than George Soros how the Nazi’s operated.

As they say: takes one to know one. He said the best time of his life was helping the Nazis round up fellow Jews and send them to the camps. This guy is unbelievable. Liberals should be so proud that there organizations are financed by this guy.

They should be fired.
.
How are Dems going to demonize a government shutdown? The 14 in WI are shutting down government.

48% of likely voters, nationally, support Gov Walker while just 38% are with the unions.
.
Rasmussen — February 21, 2011.

liberalmeltdown@66.2,
.
I would have to see documentation of that quote, meltdown. I don’t believe that even George Soros is stupid enough to utter an obscenity like that.

Paul, the unions in CA run the state, specifically the teacher’s union. But the liberal’s won’t see the light until the whole state is bankrupt. Their one idea is higher taxes. Every year CA is billions of dollars in debt, but there have been ZERO cuts to government workers. In fact, the state government has continued to grow. The state continues to hire, despite the fact that there is no money. That’s how messed up California is. Liberals have destroyed the once great state of California in less than 20 years.

Hey folks, there’s a fly in Democrat soup. Republican Senators in Wisconsin do not need them for other state business. The 20 member quorum is necessary only for fiscal and budgetary matters They can put off the budget vote and move on to other matters that also give Democrats agita.
.
More and more, it looks like the tactic of fleeing the state is really a can of worms for democrats.

“SInce you are now a expert in Christianity, how should a Christian act Sacred? Maybe you should set an example.”
.
Looks to me like he did just that, @sshole. Leave it to an atheist to think that Christ’s teachings and his example might matter to a self-proclaimed “Christian”. But I’m sure you’re a member in good standing of the wafer-a-week club and haven’t a clue what that example should look like.

liberalmeltdown@67.1,
.
California liberals deluded themselves into believing that when push came to shove, and the whole liberal house of cards was collapsing, that Barack Obama would come riding in on his three wheeler to bail them out.
.
That’s not gonna happen now. There is no chance that California will be bailed out by Washington. The people of California will have a high price to pay for their foolish political decisions.
.
It is high time that they learned that there really isn’t any such thing as a “free lunch.”

“Hasn’t anyone ever told you you shouldn’t drink and blog”
.
Well it does bring one closer to mimicking a mental disorder like liberalism. Closer but Jack Daniels doesn’t have enough alcohol to replicate that

And Jesus spoke unto them:
.
Get thee a creative accountant that will deny Caesar what is Caesar’s and deny the poor and needy food and medical care because they are the slackers. The meek shall inherit the earth but make sure that you leave it in such a state that when they inherit it, it shall be as worthless. Do unto others before they get a chance to do it unto you. Use my words however thee shall see fit. Let not what I say stand in the way of making a fast buck at the expense of others. Shaboom shaboom. I’m outta here.
.
Jesus didn’t really say that but we’re having a snowstorm and I have to leave for work so I improvised. Feel free to quote me. Nobody would ever know the difference.

It’s several statements from Soros. Sorry, I don’t have time to tie them all together on my Glen Beck blackboard…
.
But this is an amazing statement for someone that lived through the Holocaust.
.

It was a harrowing time, yet, in retrospect, a positive one for the young Soros. “Nineteen forty-four was the best year of my life,” he maintains. “I was 14 when the world intruded on my life. I was old enough to be aware of what was happening, and young enough to be excited by it.”

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,978621,00.html#ixzz1EeRZRdET

No, diecash, I did not attend this fine school. My undergraduate work was at Duke University.

“…deny the poor and needy food and medical care because they are the slackers.”
.
Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.

My goodness I made a typo! Sorry Dr.earljr. And yes, of course I read his objection to abortion and respect his opinion, as I am sure you do on the Canadian health care system.

paulejb: Try reading other’s comments. See comment 62. Rather than Koch power, it is called people power. Over $300,000 already raised. Feel free to contribute.

OK, so back to Soros. Here is a transcript from an 1998 interview where Soros admits to helping the Nazis. Now you put this together will his other statement that 1944 was the best year of his life…what was he doing? He was helping the Nazis. What were the Nazis doing? They were committing genocide. 44 years later Soros says that this was the best year of his life.
.

KROFT: (Voiceover) To understand the complexities and contradictions in his personality, you have to go back to the very beginning: to Budapest, where George Soros was born 68 years ago to parents who were wealthy, well-educated and Jewish.

When the Nazis occupied Budapest in 1944, George Soros’ father was a successful lawyer. He lived on an island in the Danube and liked to commute to work in a rowboat. But knowing there were problems ahead for the Jews, he decided to split his family up. He bought them forged papers and he bribed a government official to take 14-year-old George Soros in and swear that he was his Christian godson. But survival carried a heavy price tag. While hundreds of thousands of Hungarian Jews were being shipped off to the death camps, George Soros accompanied his phony godfather on his appointed rounds, confiscating property from the Jews.

(Vintage footage of Jews walking in line; man dragging little boy in line)

KROFT: (Voiceover) These are pictures from 1944 of what happened to George Soros’ friends and neighbors.

(Vintage footage of women and men with bags over their shoulders walking; crowd by a train)

KROFT: (Voiceover) You’re a Hungarian Jew…

Mr. SOROS: (Voiceover) Mm-hmm.

KROFT: (Voiceover) …who escaped the Holocaust…

(Vintage footage of women walking by train)

Mr. SOROS: (Voiceover) Mm-hmm.

(Vintage footage of people getting on train)

KROFT: (Voiceover) … by — by posing as a Christian.

Mr. SOROS: (Voiceover) Right.

(Vintage footage of women helping each other get on train; train door closing with people in boxcar)

KROFT: (Voiceover) And you watched lots of people get shipped off to the death camps.

Mr. SOROS: Right. I was 14 years old. And I would say that that’s when my character was made.

KROFT: In what way?

Mr. SOROS: That one should think ahead. One should understand and — and anticipate events and when — when one is threatened. It was a tremendous threat of evil. I mean, it was a — a very personal experience of evil.

KROFT: My understanding is that you went out with this protector of yours who swore that you were his adopted godson.

Mr. SOROS: Yes. Yes.

KROFT: Went out, in fact, and helped in the confiscation of property from the Jews.

Mr. SOROS: Yes. That’s right. Yes.

KROFT: I mean, that’s — that sounds like an experience that would send lots of people to the psychiatric couch for many, many years. Was it difficult?

Mr. SOROS: Not — not at all. Not at all. Maybe as a child you don’t — you don’t see the connection. But it was — it created no — no problem at all.

KROFT: No feeling of guilt?

Mr. SOROS: No.

KROFT: For example that, ‘I’m Jewish and here I am, watching these people go. I could just as easily be there. I should be there.’ None of that?

Mr. SOROS: Well, of course I c — I could be on the other side or I could be the one from whom the thing is being taken away. But there was no sense that I shouldn’t be there, because that was — well, actually, in a funny way, it’s just like in markets — that if I weren’t there — of course, I wasn’t doing it, but somebody else would — would — would be taking it away anyhow. And it was the — whether I was there or not, I was only a spectator, the property was being taken away. So the — I had no role in taking away that property. So I had no sense of guilt.

“I never pesented myself as an expert. I made personal observations that I presented as such. Here’s how I think a Christian should act. They should act as if the Bible they claim to revere is something other than a political talking point that backs up their own agendas. They should quit cherry picking a sentence here or there and take the Bible as a whole. They should take it’s messages to heart instead taking quotes out of context as justification for discrimination. I don’t set myself up as an example for anyone else to follow. I’m as f**ked up as the next guy and don’t pretend that I’m a role model. One thing I don’t do is use the Bible to excuse my own failings and twist it’s meanings to serve as an excuse for my own behavior”
.
I hear you. Well ‘said’.

No wonder our schools can’t keep good teachers and our students fail. Having lived abroad, I find Americans disrespect education and the results are predictable. The fuss about one teacher, Chris Fons, makes the point. His $58k and solid benefits are presented as a princely sum. I have met this guy and some of his students. He has two serious academic masters (one from a world-class institution) degrees (not some 1 year online degrees), and 10 years of education, in which he was not earning money. He has $50K in student debt. He lives in 2-bedroom duplex in the inner city. Yet, he is making a difference. He is in charge of this school’s history advanced placement (AP) program. His school graduates more AP students than any other in Wisconsin. His school has many troubled students with all the pathologies that our inner cities create. There is nothing average about this guy. He is a real talent. I would not last a week in that school, and neither would you. Our state is lucky to have him, and others like him. Most of us, myself included (I hold a PhD) could never successfully do his job, and again, neither could most of you. Yet, we complain when he gets $58K and benefits for this. Having spoke with many such teachers, I have learned they have had it and are about to quit. The best of them are grossly underpaid for what they do and are close to walking. They only keep at it because of the kids. America’s decline accelerates….

“Thanks, april, but I already contribute to our local humane society….I have no interest in breeding future democrats.
On the other hand, if it were a sterilization program, then I will access my checkbook with a happy heart.”
.
Humanity according to pretend doc earl.

New York, NY, November 11, 2010. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today criticized as “completely inappropriate and offensive” remarks by Glenn Beck on his radio and television programs, in which he inaccurately connected George Soros, who was then a young boy, to the actions of others in sending Jews to death camps during the Holocaust.
.
On his November 10 radio show, Beck described how Soros, who was born in Hungary to Orthodox Jewish parents, “used to go around with this anti-Semite and deliver papers to the Jews and confiscate their property and then ship them off. And George Soros was part of it. He would help confiscate the stuff. It was frightening. Here’s a Jewish boy helping send the Jews to the death camps.”
.
Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director and a Holocaust survivor, issued the following statement:
.
“Glenn Beck’s description of George Soros’ actions during the Holocaust is completely inappropriate, offensive and over the top. For a political commentator or entertainer to have the audacity to say – inaccurately – that there’s a Jewish boy sending Jews to death camps, as part of a broader assault on Mr. Soros, that’s horrific.
.
While I, too, may disagree with many of Soros’ views and analysis on the issues, to bring in this kind of innuendo about his past is unacceptable. To hold a young boy responsible for what was going on around him during the Holocaust as part of a larger effort to denigrate the man is repugnant.
.
The Holocaust was a horrific time, and many people had to make excruciating choices to ensure their survival. George Soros has been forthright about his childhood experiences and his family’s history, and there the matter should rest.”
.
-link

Here we have the benefactor of Media Matters, the former Nazi and self hating Jew George Soros
.
.
“Internet gossip Matt Drudge has claimed that Media Matters for America is a “Soros operation.”
.
In fact, Media Matters has never received funding from progressive philanthropist George Soros.”
.
- link
.
——————
.
You make a strong case to validate Soros’ claim that FOX (and others) engage in Orwellian newspeak and falsehoods– and that they can succeed in deceiving people, even in an open democracy.

Gee, hippo, this morning at seven, I replaced a mitral valve in a 50 yr old woman who had been experiencing severe angina. Without this replacement, her prognosis was extremely poor. With the replacement, she should be able to live out the rest of her years, angina free.
What have YOU done this morning, hippo?

Average Teacher salary for Madison Metropolitan School District

Avg Salary: $52,022
Average Fringe: $23,536

From Wisconsin Dept of Public Instruction
http://dpi.wi.gov/lbstat/newasr.html

For all other Private sector workers,
2009 Avg Salary : 38656.00
Source:http://worknet.wisconsin.gov/worknet/downloads.aspx?menuselection=da&pgm=QCEW

The numbers don’t lie.

Wow, there is more:

According to Wisconsin Govt Labor Dept statistics, here is the average salary for year 2009 by Ownership categories:

Federal Government: 55354
State Government: 51305
Local Government: 38121
Private: 38656
Aggregrate of all types: 39156
Aggregate of all Government: 42079

Source:
http://worknet.wisconsin.gov/worknet_info/downloads/QCEW/State_naics_T_2009.txt

“I’m as f**ked up as the next guy and don’t pretend that I’m a role model. One thing I don’t do is use the Bible to excuse my own failings and twist it’s meanings to serve as an excuse for my own behavior”

.
I’ll take you at your word. Then you don’t have any business telling others how to act, if you are “as f**ked up as the next guy,”
.
But you do judge based on what you think you know.
.
What gives you the right to judge, if you are no better. You’re standing on some pretty twisted moral low ground.
.
“…deny the poor and needy food and medical care because they are the slackers.”

.
I don’t think that government should be the distributor. Government is the most wasteful way to help the poor. In many, most third world countries like Haiti, donations never make it to the poor and needy BECAUSE of government.
.
Charity should belong to charities. You have much better results when a church, or other organization it right there on the ground helping people, instead of some government bureaucracy. Feeding the poor through government, feeds government first. You don’t see any welfare workers skipping a meal because they feel guilty about getting paid from money that could be feeding the poor. l