Posted on 02/23/2011 3:21:56 PM PST by Syncro
LOOK FOR THE UNION FABLE
February 23, 2011
The good news out of Wisconsin is that public school students' test scores skyrocketed last week, mystifying educators. The bad news is many student-teacher love affairs were hard-hit without access to janitors' closets and locker rooms.
Democrats are acting as if Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker's demand that public sector employees give up collective bargaining would have George Washington rolling in his grave (a clear violation of Gravediggers' Local 803 regulations concerning the rolling of the dead).
In fact, government employees should never, ever be allowed to organize.
The need for a union comes down to this question: Do you have a boss who wants you to work harder for less money? In the private sector, the answer is yes. In the public sector, the answer is a big, fat NO.
Government unions have nothing in common with private sector unions because they don't have hostile management on the other side of the bargaining table. To the contrary, the "bosses" of government employees are co-conspirators with them in bilking the taxpayers.
Far from being careful stewards of the taxpayers' money, politicians are on the same side of the bargaining table as government employees -- against the taxpayers, who aren't allowed to be part of the negotiation. This is why the head of New York's largest public union in the mid-'70s, Victor Gotbaum, gloated, "We have the ability to elect our own boss."
Democratic politicians don't think of themselves as "management." They don't respond to union demands for more money by saying, "Are you kidding me?" They say, "Great -- get me a raise too!"
Democrats buy the votes of government workers with generous pay packages and benefits -- paid for by someone else -- and then expect a kickback from the unions in the form of hefty campaign donations, rent-a-mobs and questionable union political activity when they run for re-election.
In 2006, 10,000 public employees staged a rally outside the New Jersey State House to protest the mere discussion of a cut to their gold-plated salaries and benefits. Then-Gov. Jon Corzine leapt onto the stage shouting: "We will fight for a fair contract!"
Only later, someone noticed: Wait -- isn't he management? (It takes a special kind of courage to promise 10,000 crazed union agitators that you'll fight to get them more money.)
Service Employees International Union officials openly threaten California legislators. At a 2009 legislative hearing, an SEIU member sneered into a microphone: "We helped to getchu into office, and we gotta good memory. Come November, if you don't back our program, we'll getchu out of office."
It used to be widely understood that collective bargaining has no place in government employment. In 1937, the American president beloved by liberals, FDR, warned that collective bargaining "cannot be transplanted into the public service." George Meany, head of the AFL-CIO for a quarter century, said unions were not appropriate for civil servants. As recently as 1978, the vast majority of states prohibited unionization of government employees.
Read more at AnnCoulter.Com
My husband was a 20+ year firefighter in one of the wealthiest counties in Florida. They, of course, had a firefighter’s union. But rather than use the dues (forced even in a so-called Right to Work state) to actually be there for the guys during contract hearings, this union did little more than what is “affectionately” called Collective Begging. They also were no help at the bargaining table because even if a new contract was agreed upon, they had what was “affectionately” called Non-Binding Arbitration. So in other words, the firefighter’s could never strike, they had no power to better work contracts and even when contracts were signed by the city, they could legally change their minds and the union could do nothing about it. Talk about a waste of money!
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How did this possibly happen where you have gov’t workers, working for us, become unionized?
If I’m a mail carrier, my allegiance is to my union, not my job. I pay union dues....that go to union boss who keep the gov’t from firing me.
We have the most lop sided country on earth.
I’m waiting for GM or Chrysler to go on strike, in essence union workers striking against themselves.
Outstanding photo. Well done.
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