Ohio, Wisconsin Shine Spotlight on New Union Battle: Government Workers vs. Taxpayers

By Peter Whoriskey and Amy Gardner
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, February 28, 2011; 12:10 AM

Wisconsin budget battle: Protesters rally against anti-union bill
Demonstrators at the Capitol building in Madison are protesting Republican Gov. Scott Walker's proposed legislation to cut public employees' benefits and eliminate most of their collective bargaining rights.




COLUMBUS, OHIO - Across Ohio last week, the legislative push to restrict the union rights of government workers was greeted again and again by noisy protests.

But in this state dotted with manufacturing plants and their locals, this may have been more striking: At least some elected officials normally sympathetic to industrial unions were questioning whether they should side with government workers.

"I believe in what unions do, but as an elected official I represent the taxpayers," said Jeff Berding, a registered Democrat on the Cincinnati City Council who ran as an independent after he opposed the party on a union issue. "I'm trying to get the best deal for them."

Chicago Solidarity Rally: Pro-Union Demonstrators Show Wisconsin Support (PHOTOS)

First Posted: 02-28-11 01:58 PM | Updated: 02-28-11 01:58 PM
All photos below by HuffPost reader Andy Lorenc.

On Saturday, Chicagoans joined the chorus of protesters across the country to support union members in Wisconsin and other states who are fighting to keep their bargaining rights.

More than 1,000 people reportedly turned out at the afternoon Thompson Center rally, chanting "Save the American Dream."

Demonstrators gathered elsewhere in Illinois as well. Hundreds of union supporters rallied in Springfield Saturday afternoon.

"If they bust the unions up (in Wisconsin), it's a matter of time before they bust the unions up here," laid-off Illinois electrician Rich Bonzani told the Chicago Tribune. "It's an assault on the middle class."

Scott Walker's Budget To Include Major Cuts To Schools, Local Governments

AP/The Huffington Post SCOTT BAUER First Posted: 02/28/11 06:02 PM Updated: 02/28/11 09:30 PM

MADISON, Wis. — Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker's explosive proposal to take nearly all collective bargaining rights away from most public workers represents just one piece of his vision for the state's future. Now he's ready to reveal the rest.

With the union rights proposal stuck in a legislative stalemate thanks to runaway Senate Democrats, Walker planned to forge ahead with the Tuesday release of his two-year spending plan that will include major cuts to schools and local governments to help close a projected $3.6 billion budget shortfall.

Tens of thousands of protesters have demonstrated for two weeks against Walker's collective bargaining proposal, which he calls necessary to free local governments from having to bargain with public employee unions as they deal with the cuts he'll outline Tuesday.

Union Solidarity at the Oscars

by James Parks, Feb 28, 2011

“The King’s Speech” may have ruled the Oscars last night, but union solidarity had a starring role in the remarks of several winners. According to the Associated Press, two awards recipients thanked their union crew — shots at Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who wants to take away public employees’ freedom to bargain.

Charles Ferguson, whose winning documentary “Inside Job” analyzed the causes of the global financial crisis of 2008, told the audience that those behind the crisis were criminals. “Not a single financial executive has gone to jail and that’s wrong,” he said to applause.

Here are some other Oscar quotes from the AP:

• “I think what’s going on in Wisconsin is kind of madness right now,”
said Wally Pfister, who won a cinematography Oscar for “Inception,”
during a press briefing backstage. Earlier, he thanked his “fantastic
union crew.”
• Gary Rizzo, who won for sound-mixing on “Inception,” thanked “all the
hard working boom operators and utility sound people that worked on the
production crew. Union, of course.”
• Another winner said that it was wrong that executives whose banks were
bailed out by the U.S. government had not gone to jail.

More Than 270 Lawmakers Oppose Taking Away Public Employee Bargaining Rights

Members of the Alliance for Retired Americans rallied this week in Nevada to support public employee bargaining rights.

by James Parks, Feb 28, 2011

UPDATE: As of this morning, 284 state lawmakers have signed on in support of Wisconsin Senators, according to Progressive States Network.

Progressive States Network today released a letter signed by a bipartisan group of more than 270 state legislators representing 44 states voicing their solidarity with the Wisconsin state senators who oppose an extreme measure to take away the right of public employees to bargain for good middle-class jobs.

The People Hold Their House

This is a cross-post from the Wisconsin State AFL-CIO.

In a huge victory for Wisconsinites, those fighting to save the middle class will remain inside the Capitol tonight. At 4 p.m. the governor and Republican senators wanted the building cleared of all citizens in order to resume normal operating hours.

The deadline came and went. It soon became clear that those fighting for rights would hold their Capitol for another sleep. Community members and working families are spending the night in what is becoming known as “The People’s Cathedral.” Many more will gather at 8 a.m. tomorrow as the fight continues.

In Wisconsin, a Repeat of Revolutionary War History?

Berry Craig is a professor of history at the West Kentucky Community and Technical College in Paducah, a member of AFT Local 6010 and the author of "True Tales of Old-Time Kentucky Politics: Bombast, Bourbon & Burgoo" and "Hidden History of Kentucky in the Civil War."


by Berry Craig, Feb 28, 2011

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker reminds me of old Lord North. OK, I’m a history teacher.

North was the Revolutionary War-era British prime minister who wanted to bust the American colonies. Walker is the Wisconsin governor who wants to bust public employee unions in the Dairy State.

•North was an uber-conservative. So is Walker.
•North’s strategy was divide and conquer. I suspect Walker’s is, too.
•It backfired on North. It may boomerang on Walker.

Anyway, after the famous Boston Tea Party of 1773, North got Parliament to crack down on Massachusetts in part by closing the port of Boston until the tea the local patriots dumped in the harbor was paid for.

North figured other colonies would let Massachusetts suffer alone. After all, he reasoned, they weren’t being punished.

But the other colonies rallied to beleaguered Massachusetts. We know the rest of the story.

Walker Orders Capitol Cleared

by Donna Jablonski, Feb 27, 2011

Continuing his unprecedented power grab, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker ordered the state capitol to be cleared at 4 p.m. local time Sunday, closing the building to Wisconsinites protesting his plan to gut the right to bargain for good jobs. Now he’s violating their freedom of assembly, too. Dozens of ministers, rabbis and priests joined workers and students from across the state, risking arrest to protest the closing of the capitol to the public.

Wisconsinites from all walks of life—nurses, firefighters, snowplow drivers, police officers, students, teachers, and others—have been in the capitol building peacefully for 14 days. During that time, they set up an elaborate community called “Capitol City” to keep the capitol building clean, protesters safe and fed and, most importantly, to keep up pressure on Walker to come to the table and open up a dialogue to get Wisconsin moving forward again.

Trumka: ‘This Is Not About a Budget Crisis’

by Donna Jablonski, Feb 27, 2011

“No person should have to face the loss of their rights or the loss of their jobs,” AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said today on NBC’s Meet the Press. His remarks came in response to Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s (R) threat to begin laying off public employees if he doesn’t get his way on a sham budget bill that would strip away collective bargaining rights.

Governors with state budget problems who sit down and bargain with public employees can solve problems, Trumka said, but Walker’s attack is not about budgets. Public workers have agreed to fiscal concessions Walker’s budget bill seeks, but in his drive to kill bargaining rights Walker has refused.

Assaults on Public Employees Deal a Sharp Blow to Blacks

Steven Pitts

by James Parks, Feb 27, 2011

Assaults on public employees’ right to bargain for a better life hurt all working people. But blacks are being hit especially hard. Black unemployment was 15.7 percent in January, compared with a national rate of 9 percent. Calls to slash the freedom of public employees could hit black job seekers especially hard because so many blacks are public employees.

In a Point of View column on the AFL-CIO website, Steven Pitts, a labor policy specialist at the Center for Labor Research and Education at the University of California, Berkeley, says these attacks are already dealing a sharp blow to the black middle class.