Free Republic

~~~~This is how they'll gut American democracy: Scott Walker and the Kochs want to [expletive] America as bad as they did Wisconsin~~~ The third week in December brought two startling stories highlighting the ongoing Dixiefication of the Midwest, a key ingredient in how the GOP, with its aging white male demographic base, is nonetheless strategically outmaneuvering the Democratic Party on multiple fronts. They are sharp reminders of how our politics are being reshaped in state legislatures and on the ground-and how inattentive to basics the Democrats have become since the demise of the 50-state strategy.The story from Wisconsin concerns the...

<p>The NFL used replacement players in the past because of labor strife.</p>

Republicans in the Wisconsin Senate voted Wednesday night to strip nearly all collective bargaining rights from public workers after discovering a way to bypass the chamber's missing Democrats. All 14 Senate Democrats fled to Illinois nearly three weeks ago, preventing the chamber from having enough members present to consider Gov. Scott Walker's so-called "budget repair bill" — a proposal introduced to plug a $137 million budget shortfall. The Senate requires a quorum to take up any measures that spend money. But Republicans on Wednesday split from the legislation the proposal to curtail union rights, which spends no money, and a...

Arianna Huffington scoffed at a group of unpaid Huffington Post contributors that announced on Wednesday they would stop contributing content to the site, weeks after its $315 million sale to AOL was announced. Huffington, speaking alongside AOL chief Tim Armstrong at PaidContent’s 2011 Conference in New York on Thursday, dismissed the notion that all bloggers should be paid, given the wide platform HuffPo gives them. She argued that blogging on the Huffington Post is equivalent to going on Rachel Maddow, Jon Stewart or the “Today” show to promote their ideas. And, she said, there are plenty of people willing to...

Today I had an absolutely BRILLIANT thought (if I must say so myself). Why not make it illegal to use state funds, computers, and personnel to collect union dues? I mean, why should the state have to spend taxpayer money to collect the union dues and distribute them to the unions? Make the individuals contribute the money themselves through an automatic band draft or write a check. The unions will have HELL trying to collect their dues!

The Communist Party USA is promoting widespread protests across the United States in support of leftist and labor protesters in Wisconsin. Reports Ohio Communist Party leader Rick Nagin reported from Columbus; Former Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland, the state AFL-CIO and its affiliates have called for a massive turnout for a rally Tuesday at the Statehouse in Columbus to protest a Republican bill to repeal collective bargaining for public employees. In robocalls and emails sent throughout the state, Strickland said "the fate of Ohio's middle class is on the line" and urged people "to join with the thousands who will gather...

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker says he has the votes to pass a bill removing collective bargaining rights for public employees. Walker says he is open to making changes to the measure, but that he will not "fundamentally undermine the principles" he is proposing. Senate Republicans met in secret earlier Wednesday in advance of a planned vote on the bill in the Legislature's budget committee. More than 13,000 protesters descended on the Capitol a day earlier to participate in a 17-hour public hearing. Thousands more came on Wednesday, with hundreds chanting outside his office door, "Recall Walker now!"

One of Barack Obama's staunchest supporters and prized campaigners and film biographers from the motion picture and television business has just been accused of union busting, according to a complaint filed Thursday with the National Labor Relations Board. Before the exposé, writer/actor/director/producer Tyler Perry invited the presidential candidate to the grand opening of his entertainment studio on the outskirts of Atlanta, Georgia, this coming Saturday night. But if Obama attends he will be met by picket lines thrown up by the Writers Guild of America with support from other unions including the Teamsters, even though the latter union has officially...

This week's back-to-school ads offer amazing bargains on lightweight backpacks and nifty school supplies. All those businesses scramble to offer us good stuff at low prices. It's amazing what competition does for consumers. The power to say no to one business and yes to another is awesome. Too bad we don't apply that idea to schools themselves. Education bureaucrats and teachers unions are against it. They insist they must dictate where kids go to school, what they study, and when. When I went on TV to say that it's a myth that a government monopoly can educate kids effectively, hundreds...

September 8, 2006 To whom it may concern: It has come to my attention recently that the National Education Association may have breached their commitment to refrain from endorsing candidates in an election year. The IRS has the following to say about 501(c)(5) organizations: * The G.C.M. notes that the content of specific legislative proposals may be readily identified and related to the business or labor interests of the organizations. Therefore, business leagues and labor unions may engage in lobbying activities that are germane to their exempt purposes as their primary activity. * However, "support of a candidate for public...

A group of teachers receiving free legal aid from the National Right to Work Foundation today filed the opening brief in their U.S. Supreme Court appeal, which challenges a Washington State Supreme Court ruling giving union officials a constitutional “right” to use forced dues on political causes with which the teachers may disagree. In September, the nation’s highest court granted review of the ruling that had voided a campaign finance law intending to limit the misuse of mandatory union dues for certain political activities.

Here we go, folks. This is how to take some of the political power away from unions, a huge funder of the Dems. They use Republicans' money to fund the Dems. It must stop. The unions, particularly the teachers unions, will be Hillary's footsoldiers in 2008. You are going to love this. I am working with a teacher friend to have his money donated the the NRA Foundation. ================================================================= ================================================================= State workers can divert union dues to charity U.S., Ohio officials reach settlement in discrimination suit Saturday, September 02, 2006 Julie Carr Smyth ASSOCIATED PRESS State employees should be able...

THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE FReepers, I just had an enjoyable phone call with Glen Greenwood. He prevailed against the union thugs in Ohio after a 4-year battle. Glen works for the Ohio EPA and was forced to pay union dues that went for causes with which he did not believe. To take a "religious exemption" and give the money to charity instead of to the union generally required a person to belong to a recognized religious group such as the Quakers or Jehovah Witnesses. The union fought him with economic intimidation and even filed a counter claim against him. But...

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - The largest union at Philadelphia's two biggest daily newspapers is planning to launch an online newspaper to compete with the company Web site if workers go on strike after midnight on Thursday. Employees from The Philadelphia Inquirer and Philadelphia Daily News would contribute local content that will be edited and posted online, said Stu Bykofsky, a Daily News columnist and spokesman for their union, The Newspaper Guild of Greater Philadelphia. ``It's to provide news and information for the community so they won't be deprived,'' he said. In competing with Philly.com, the union's PhilaPapers.com would sell ads and...

A nasty fight between the news staff and the owner of a local paper here has created some new casualties: readers. Take, for example, Eric Zahm, a hairdresser who hung a sign in his window taking Wendy P. McCaw, owner and co-publisher of The Santa Barbara News-Press, to task for not recognizing a vote to unionize her news staff. Within days, Zahm received a letter from a lawyer for McCaw, warning him that the sign - which read, “McCaw Obey the Law” - could get him sued for defamation. After consulting a lawyer, Zahm took the bright orange sign down...

The chief executive of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. yesterday defended the retailer's decision to close a Canadian store after its employees voted to form a union, saying demands from negotiators would have forced an already unprofitable store to hire 30 more people and abide by inefficient work rules. "You can't take a store that is a struggling store anyway and add a bunch of people and a bunch of work rules that cause you to even be in worse shape," H. Lee Scott Jr. said. In his first interview since Wal-Mart announced it would close the store in Jonquiere, Quebec, Scott...

Officials at the New York based Union of Needletrades, Industrial, and Textile Employees Unite said they faced 'a vicious anti union campaign' last autumn' when they tried to unionize the Los Angeles plant of American Apparel, manufacturer of the Marc Jacobs/Hillary Clinton T-shirts.Unite spokesperson on Hillary Clinton, 'She should use a company that respects workers rights to organize.'They complained that American Apparel was 'dining out on a reputation for social conciousness that was ill deserved.'American Apparel had just settled a union busting complaint last week Unite has made to the National Labor Relations Board.American Apparel senior partner Dov Charney said...