How the States Can Win Against Unions

When Scott Walker kicked off his campaign to reduce state government spending he made several mistakes. First, he didn’t anticipate the scope of the dispute, that in challenging teacher’s collective bargaining rights, he would attract the ire of every trade union in the country.

Secondly, he obviously didn’t anticipate that 14 of his state legislators would pack up and depart for the No-Tell Motels of Indiana. That action alone should have been the red flag. He was at war.

Finally, Walker didn’t realize the degree to which the unions had been preparing for his move on public employee’s bargaining rights. There was nothing spontaneous about the protests that followed the Governor’s attempt to bring common sense to state government spending.

For nine years I was an officer in one of the largest unions in the world, first as a shop steward and then in various higher district lodge offices. In 1978, I was a negotiator and strike organizer in a strike that eventually ended in the virtual demise of the commercial aerospace industry in the United States. It was not the desired or anticipated outcome but it certainly ended that way.

The first thing the company did when we went out on strike was to file a lawsuit against my fellow negotiators and me personally. I cannot describe the shock when I stepped out of my front door and found three reams of paper sitting on my welcome mat. The lawsuit named me and cited specific charges—all of them created from whole cloth—as to my “illegal actions” against the company. The suit was the first in a series of tactical moves by the company to throw the union off guard. Before the strike was over, the company had terminated some of my fellow workers, and lodged more complaints against us, both criminal and civil.

I should say here, that unions are full of thugs, but I was not one of them.

Of course, when the work stoppage ended, every one of us had our jobs and the suits and charges against us were dropped as part of the negotiated settlement. The company had used these methods for 40 years in every strike against them, but we still had to defend ourselves in the courts until the strike was resolved.

This is the strategy Walker should have employed against both his AWOL lawmakers and public servants who have hindered his ability to govern for more than three weeks. The Governor is now acting against his legislators, but he should have taken the offensive immediately.

Marxist protester in Madison (In Defense of Marxism website)

Walker should have immediately hit the missing senate members with fines, regulations anything at his disposal to disrupt their attempt to slowdown government. By not doing so he has given them a platform from which to wage a public relations campaign against him. The legislators are in violation of their oaths of office and there are legal remedies to deal with their actions, whether they have been used before or not.

Walker may win in Wisconsin; there is still reason for hope. But he has suffered a loss in the court of public opinion that he quite possibly could have avoided.

The public is overwhelmingly on the side of the American worker, but when the polls are conducted properly, showing the results of continued capitulation to extravagant labor demands, they will turn out on the side of their pocketbooks every time.

Granted, the courts in the long run may have thrown out many of Walker’s actions to bring the Democrats and labor to their knees, but tactically overloading the opposition is a tried and true method of winning in a labor dispute.

It will be interesting to see how other governors will act in coming days as the unions and Democrats widen their campaign to price state governments into bankruptcy. If John Kasich and Mitch Daniels maintain the offensive in their respective states, they are likely to accomplish more, faster, than Walker has in Wisconsin.

Huckabee Isn’t the Only One Who’d Like to Know

As soon as Mike Huckabee is finished wiping the egg off his face, maybe we can get down to the questions all Americans should be asking their presidents.

“Where do you come from?” “How did you do in school?” “Have you ever been addicted to drugs?”

Huckabee’s statement this week that Obama grew up in Kenya was a potentially disastrous political faux pas, but otherwise much of what he said was perfectly reasonable; he asked questions any American should ask of anyone who aspires to the U.S. presidency. Unfortunately no one in the media asked these questions before he was elected.

“I would love to know more,” Huckabee told radio host Steve Malzberg. “What I know is troubling enough.”

It is remarkable that Huckabee would allow himself to be drawn into such hazardous waters for a potential presidential contender, especially since the left-wing media brands anyone who dares question Obama’s past as a wacko, but the former governor did draw attention to the proverbial $64 question.

The number one googled question in respect to the 44th President of the United States is: “Was Barack Obama born in the United States?” Even many who believe that Obama is a natural-born US citizen wonder what is so mysterious in the President’s background that would cause him to spend millions keeping his birth, education and health records from the public.

Of course Hillary Clinton did the same, even before she ran for office. And George W. Bush had his secrets in 2000; even after the release of his DUI records some still believed he had a drug problem. Rumors abounded that Bill Clinton spent time in rehab when his half-brother Roger infamously claimed, “Bill has a nose like a Hoover.”

If any these public servants were to apply for a civil service or private sector job with a Fortune 400, they would be obligated to make these records available. No ifs ands or buts, they would not be employed without signing a form allowing their employer complete access to their birth, education and health records. The President of the United States has his finger on the “nuclear football” and the ability to literally destroy the world, yet anyone who has had a minor drug violation cannot own a firearm in most states. Does that make sense?

Huckabee was busily rounding the circuit yesterday doing damage control for his bizarre interview with Malzberg; the former governor has a warm, self-depreciating sense of humor and his explanation came off well.

But should that be the end of it?

Just why is it wrong for Americans to know about their presidents what the government would demand to know about them, were they to seek employment in the public sector? It is a question that should transcend any single presidency.

We ask this question of virtually everyone in whom we place any degree of trust.

Who are you?

Jackson Lee Staffer: ‘We Would Never Leave A Knife Around When The Congresswoman Was Here’

Jonathan Strong’s seven-page exposé of Sheila Jackson Lee’s fabled sadistic histrionics in today’s Daily Caller shouldn’t have come as a surprise. For those who don’t remember, Jackson Lee is the representative from Houston who stood casually chitchatting on her cell phone last summer, ignoring one of her constituent’s questions about the new health care bill, at a town hall meeting. She later repeated the insult on Fox News’ On the Record with Greta Van Susteren.

That arrogant behavior is tame in comparison to Strong’s research on the eight-term congresswoman’s record in office. But the journalist’s allegations that Jackson Lee sadistically browbeats her staffers, repeatedly calling them by abusive and crude term is disturbing on a whole new level.

Writes Strong:

The Houston Democrat addressed one of her employees as “you stupid motherfucker.” And not just once, but “constantly,” recalls the staffer, “like, all the time.” … For some, a job in Jackson Lee’s office proved not just emotionally but physically perilous. One staffer recalls a frank conversation with his doctor, who told him he needed to quit. “It’s your life or your job,” the doctor told him, warning that the stress and long hours were wreaking havoc on his body.

Sheila Jackson Lee’s history of incompetence in Congress is legendary. She is notoriously uninformed: In 1997, the then second-term representative from Houston asked a NASA scientist if the Mars Pathfinder had photographed the flag that Neil Armstrong had left behind. The flag was, of course, planted on the moon.

Last year the congresswoman hilariously insisted that, “Today, we have two Vietnams; side-by-side, North and South, exchanging and working. We may not agree with all that North Vietnam is doing, but they are living in peace … ”

Then when anyone deigns to point out her errors she accuses them of racism. In fact, Jackson Lee is a world-class race baiter, hurling accusations at every given opportunity.

Of course Jackson Lee wouldn’t be the first dummy to repeatedly win a seat in Congress or the Senate. Even the fact that she is a race-baiter isn’t shocking when one recalls the other members of Congress who have pulled the race card, even as recently as last summer.

Strong sums up his article:

Not surprisingly, Jackson Lee has one of the highest staff turnover rates in Washington. Over the last ten years, at least 39 staffers have left within one year. Over that time, Lee has employed at least nine chiefs of staff, eight legislative directors, and 18 schedulers or executive assistants, according to records of federal disclosure forms published by the website Legistorm. Nine staffers left within two months, 25 within 6 months.

Read this story, you will not believe your eyes.