Tag: wisconsin

#rsrh QotD, So THAT’s Why They Did It edition.

Clever: they’re limiting access to the Capitol on a strict one-comes-out, one-goes-in system, with police control of official visitors and strict visiting badge restrictions.  Fairly strict, but they’ve got a handy justification:

Officials say access to the Capitol was limited Monday after protesters failed to comply with police directives Sunday night after the building officially closed.

See, this is why we can’t have nice things.  It’s because of those reactionary union protesters – and, oh yes, are they ever reactionaries – spoiling it for regular, decent people who just want to visit the Capitol building.  Petulant crybabies, the lot of them.

#rsrh Man, those Wisconsin Assembly Dems were *ticked*.

I was watching this video for the paper- and water-throwing by a Wisconsin Democrat acting badly, but I got distracted by savoring the screams of impotent rage.  You’d think it would have gotten old after the fourth watching… but no.  No, it does not.

Via The Hispanic Conservative, via Instapundit – and mind the first link; it includes an example of what the Democratic base considered to be acceptable discourse towards Republican women during the 2008 election cycle.  If you’re wondering why the rhetoric from the Activist Left is so casually violent these days, it’s largely because they’ve been able to get away with it for the last decade or so.

Moe Lane

Wisconsin GOP Senate fights dirty.

Which they should.

They’ve taken over the approving of time sheets and photocopier requests for staffers of AWOL Wisconsin legislators.  The ballot can be found here; the photocopier restrictions are particularly rigorous, given that the staffers in question will have to go get permission every time they want to make a copy.  Speaking as somebody who has worked in an office that generated a lot of paperwork, that restriction is downright vicious.

But is it petty?  No.  Petty is Democratic state senators literally hiding from their job responsibilities – and risking the jobs of their constituents – because union bosses demand it of them*.  This is merely a sign that said Senators’ colleagues are getting tired of pretending that their hiding is acceptable behavior.  Or particularly mature.

Via @kevinbinversie.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

*In 2010, the currently-hiding Wisconsin state senators received roughly one-fifth of their total campaign contributions from union sources.  Explains a lot, doesn’t it?

Wisconsin Democrats now owe state $165,000,000.

The American Thinker points out that, thanks to the refusal of the Wisconsin Democratic party to admit that last November’s elections mattered, a deadline for reducing the debt servicing load of the state of Wisconsin by $165,000,000 expires today.  The money was to help pay a court case settlement involving a $200,000,000 raid on the Injured Patients and Families Compensation Fund in 2007 by the previous Doyle (D) administration; the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled that using the fund to balance the budget was unconstitutional, which means that the state has to pay it back. It also means that without this provision in place, the state is not going to have the opportunity to get even a little out from under its 43 billion dollar debt.

$165,000,000 divided 14 ways works out to just over $14.78 million per AWOL state Senator: personally, I say that they should have their paychecks garnished for it.  Forever.  And then send the remainder of the bill to the Wisconsin Democratic party, since they’re so happy to spend other people’s money on their own petulant political gestures…

Moe Lane (crosspost)

(Via Aaron Smith)

Escape to Rockford! Spend money there!

This is yet another reason why the United States of America is the greatest nation on the planet: our collective eye on the main chance.  Is there a group of Democratic state senators out there grimly determined to make themselves – and the Democratic party of Wisconsin – look like hilariously incompetent buffoons?  Well, one person’s idiocy is another person’s economic opportunity… and if you’re going to publicly run off to Rockford, Illinois to hide, then by GOD the city of Rockford, Illinois is going to try to make some money off of your idiocy.

For those without video access: the city of Rockford, Illinois was recently the first hiding place for Democratic Wisconsin state senators looking to avoid doing their jobs.  The city has turned this inane notion into a 2 1/2 minute video hawking the tourist attractions of Rockford.  How cool was it?  Put it this way:  they even got Cheap Trick.

Genius.

Via Sean Hackbarth.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

PS: Go back home, ye Democratic state Senators.  You have now officially lost the public narrative.

Gov. Kasich (R, OH) Chews iron, spits nails…

…on public sector unions.  Gov. Kasich is unamused at the notion that it’s somehow unacceptable to even note that public employees are getting great deals on healthcare at taxpayer expense – and by great deals I mean ‘Ohio public sector employees are paying between one half and three-quarters what Ohio private sector employees pay:’

The 9%/23% number there*, by the way, is one of the better ratios out there for private sector employees. And by ‘better’ I mean ‘better for the tax payers.’ To give an idea: one large part of the sturm und drang being witnessed in Wisconsin right now is over public sector employees having been told that they will be expected to double their contributions to their own health care plans from 6% to 12% – which is half the Ohio number (or, for that matter, the Wisconsin number of 20%-23%), and even worse when you look at national ones.  I understand that people are upset that their unsustainable sweetheart deals are about to go belly-up.  I do, truly.  But they are sweetheart deals, and they are unsustainable, and the country can no longer afford to ignore the fact that government employee unions have been raiding the public treasury in exchange for tawdry partisan  political patronage.  So as a practical matter the subject’s kind of closed. Continue reading Gov. Kasich (R, OH) Chews iron, spits nails…

#rsrh Yes, Megyn, Mike Langyel condones that.

But you knew that already.

Of course the president of the Milwaukee Wisconsin Teachers Union condones using fake doctors’ notes as coverage for an illegal strike. Otherwise, he’d have stopped the practice forthwith.

Moe Lane

PS: If you can read this, you probably shouldn’t thank a Wisconsin public school teacher.

PPS: Megyn Kelly is highly entertaining in this video.

NYT throws public sector unions under the bus.

It would seem that the New York Times has decided that this is indeed a time of shared sacrifice; and the New York Times has further decided to volunteer public sector union employees in Wisconsin to be the ones… ‘sharing.’  This article is fairly astounding: not because it is inaccurate in making a sharp distinction between public and private sector union employees, mostly to the former’s disadvantage.  And it’s not because the article makes it clear that suffering private sector union workers will not actually benefit from their public sector counterparts being able to keep their inflated privileges and perks.  Everybody sensible knew that already.

No, the article is astounding because it’s on today’s front page of the NYT, apparently.  This is pretty much an indication that public sector unions are now free to be thrown under the bus by the rest of the Democratic party. This is, of course, a regrettable necessity: but the needs of the larger party are at stake, and public sector unions are currently unpopular*.  In fact – and this is kind of shocking – public sector unions are even kind of unpopular among a certain type of liberal/progressive; the ones who actually takes all that nonsense about class warfare and struggle seriously.  Turns out some of those people were quietly unhappy that government employees got to get lumped in with real unions, and are now taking the time to actually articulate their objections on… on… on principle.

Who knew? Continue reading NYT throws public sector unions under the bus.

WI Senate to fast-track Voter ID bill?

Hey, maybe we’ve got this all wrong. Maybe all those Democratic state senators should stay in hiding for a couple of days longer; it’ll let the adults get some business done.

…Republicans plan to move ahead with regular Senate business. In addition to tomorrow’s calendar, that could mean public hearings on other legislation, and possibly a floor vote on a voter ID bill that Democrats don’t like.

Background on the Voter ID bill here: essentially, it’s the usual commonsense notion that people who vote should have to go through the same kind of hoops to establish identity that we expect from people who, say, buy beer. The Democrats hate the very idea, of course – it’s not that they personally indulge in election fraud, but it’s a weakness of some of their dearest companions – so they’ve been fighting it tooth and nail in Wisconsin for years. Continue reading WI Senate to fast-track Voter ID bill?