WI democratic senators offer compromise to Walker

[Ellipsis]

Source: WAOW news line 9

Dear Governor Walker,

We've learned that earlier today public employees across the state made very clear their willingness to cooperatively accept additional pension and health insurance concessions in order to do their part to help Wisconsin close a 2011 budget gap, and to assist in reducing the state's deficit going forward.

This development confirms to us that the Capitol demonstrations all this week were not about an unwillingness to bargain pension or health insurance concessions, but rather about the devastating and unprecedented elimination of essential collective bargaining rights for public workers.

Consequently, we strongly and respectfully urge you to request that Senate and Assembly Republicans modify your budget repair legislation to remove all references to collective bargaining for all public employees.

We believe our request reflects a point of view shared by many all across the state, but perhaps most significantly by a variety of religious leaders who have expressed a sincere interest in bringing resolution to what has developed into a deeply divisive environment that threatens progress on so many other pressing state social and economic issues.



Read more: http://www.waow.com/Global/story.asp?S=14061343

[snappyturtle]

1. Yeah! They're putting the screws to Walker! Ball is in Walker's court...heehee! nt

[glinda]

2. Perhaps. I don't like that people give up something and then the wealthy get something.

[msongs]

3. not a compromise, a delaying action. in a compromise your are supposed to gain, not LOSE less nt

[onehandle]

4. Governor Mubarak needs to leave Cair... Madison, post haste.

I'll chip in for the helicopter.

[blackspade]

5. Are they kidding?

They should get something other than getting to keep their collective bargaining rights!
How about there be mandatory hearings and a comprehensive investigation by the state AG into how Wall Street raided the pension funds for their own profits causing this mess in the first place?
What is wrong with these guys????

[Pirate Smile]

6. They want to take away the argument Republicans are hiding behind - that this is a fight based on

public unions refusing to make financial concessions. The real fight is about collective bargaining. Republicans having been doing their best to hide that fact. The unions and Democratic officials want the fight to be on busting unions, not how much should be contributed to health care and pension costs.

They are taking away the actual "budget" issues so all that is left is the union busting.

It is very smart PR - and it may save them their right to collectively bargain. It looks like the pension and health-care contributions by union employees is a lost cause. They are trying to salvage what they can.

It's a smart move.

[blackspade]

8. I don't agree.

Pension and healthcare contributions by union employees are not a lost cause and are just as important to the everyday public worker.
What is the point of having collective bargaining if there is nothing to bargain for?

I understand your point from a tactical perspective, but removing the financial discussion from the process gives republicans a free pass on the actual causes of the whole mess.
The financial mis-management of the state pension funds by Wall Street and the poorly regulated health care industry makes the investigations thereof of paramount purpose if there is to be any righting of the capsizing boat that we all find ourselves.

[Shiver]

9. Actually, the cause of the whole mess

is that Walker passed $140,000,000 in tax cuts his first month in office, creating the deficit and requiring the need for 'budget repair'. Before he did that, Wisconsin was going to have a surplus for the fiscal year. He manufactured the deficit so he could introduce this bill and try to bust the unions.

[blackspade]

10. Thanks for the info.

I had linked it to the broader national problem of State budget shortfalls.

This is even worse.
By giving the republicans a pass on their created 'financial crisis' in the pension and healthcare systems, it redefines the narrative into an issue with collective bargaining.
Making these concessions cuts two legs off a three legged stool placing unions on the defensive.
Republicans are weak on the financial side of this argument.

[bonnieS]

16. I totally agree with you

if this is a made up crisis as they keep claiming, and tax breaks were just given to the rich, then giving up rights they have previously won through collective bargaining sends the wrong message and undercuts everything they have been saying. It also sets a lousy precedent.

[FBaggins]

15. I agreed with you the first time I read this last night... but now I'm not so sure.

It begins to look like fighting for the union (as an organization) while stabbing the union members in the back.

There are provisions in this bill that hurt teachers (for example) directly... and there are provisions that go after the strength of the teachers' union itself. The proposal can be read a couple different ways, but if this is really an offer to give up all of the budgetary/benefit demands in return for keeping the right to collective bargaining... then they're sacrificing all of the things that the union is supposed to protect, while protecting the union itself.

(And yes... I know that in some ways the union IS the membership.)

On a third reading, I'm not so sure that this is really what is being offered. I don't know that they're offering to give up all of the concessions that the governor is demanding. They may just be offering to negotiate it (giving up far less), but spinning it in how it's presented.

I need to find more details on this.

[Pirate Smile]

17. TPM has this up today: Focusing the Issue

Focusing the Issue

The latest out of Wisconsin is that the two big public employee unions say they're willing to accept the givebacks contained in Gov. Walker's budget. Apparently all of them. But they refuse to budge on their collective bargaining rights. They say this has been their position all along.

Since the changes to collective bargaining rights have no near term budget impact, it's been clear from the outset that Walker's aim in this whole effort is not budgetary but an effort to bust the public employees unions -- indeed, he's exempted the public employees unions, police and firefighters, that are more open to supporting Republicans. (Here's our report on Walker's late Friday press conference.) But this would seem to clarify any remaining question.

From talking to folks on the ground in the state and some very limited public opinion data (the situation in the country at large is less clear to me), my sense is that this is not wearing well for Walker.

In other news, state and national Tea Party groups are going to try to mobilize their own crowds today in Madison, with an assist from out of state folks like Breitbart, Missouri blogger Jim Hoft and VA based conservative operative training group American Majority.

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2011/02/focusing_the_issue.php#more?ref=fpblg

[FBaggins]

18. Thanks. If true, then I don't think that I like the offer.

For a moment, don't think of "the union" as "all of us standing together". I'm not saying it isn't that, but I need to set that part aside for a moment.

The union is also an organization with it's own needs (independent of the members). Like a company, there are people who get paid to do this job and people at the top who wield (and often enjoy) power and control. There are great benefits to them personally when the "company" succeeds. Now, most of the time, "success" for this "company" means success for the members individually, but they still aren't the same thing (which is why I want to set that aside for a moment).

Now... take the legislation and break it into the things that hurt the individual members and the things that hurt the organization/union itself. Teachers would be hurt individually by less attractive pensions and more expensive health insurance benefits, as well as smaller raises capped to a measure of inflation (guranteeing that their purchasing power will never go up). The union itself would be hurt by making union membership and dues entirely optional, and by forcing the union to hold an annual (secret) vote each year just to remain in existence.

What we have here sure looks like stabbing the individual union members in the back in order to protect the union leadership. They give up everything they were counting on the union to protect in exchange for the union leadership maintaining it's influence. Frankly, I don't think I like the idea. Particularly since I haven't read thing one about such a vote being placed before the membership. It's being offered (surprise) by the people who end up not making the direct sacrifice.


Ok. Back to what really can't be set aside. Breaking the union WOULD eventually lead to more sacrifice on the parts of individuals. "The union" isn't just the people at the top.

But after they give all of this up, there isn't anything that the individuals benefit from the union (from a contract/compensation collective-bargaining standpoint) over the next two years. So winning the next election could get all of those collective bargaining rights back (AND it would give us a heck of an issue to run on).


Pardon my rambling. I'm still trying to get a grasp on this offer.

[Nikia]

19. I agree with you

We have to be realistic about this. Any way anyone tries to spin it, this compromise makes the Republicans the "bad guys" if they don't accept it. Even if Walker is firm, the compromise is likely to bring some Repubiclan legislators over. Whatever happens, Walker will look bad.

[Doctor_J]

23. I'm with you. Sounds like Obama's advising them

No reason for them to give anything to this psychopath.

[CLANG]

7. Dear Governor (cough, wheeze, barf) Walker.

You will save some face by meeting our demands. But 11 months from now we will have 1 million signatures to recall your ass back to the 8th grade where you belong.

Dumb ass!

[alp227]

11. If Obama compromises with House Republicans a lot, why not Walker? n/t

[Ellipsis]

12. Statement from Senator Hanson In Response to workers concessions

"Today teachers, nurses, child care workers, prison guards and other public employees agreed to pay a greater share of their pension and health insurance to help resolve the state's budget issues. As we have said throughout this week, the issue is not a financial one, but a matter of principle: that is to protect the rights of Wisconsin workers.

Governor Walker and legislative Republicans have sought to pass an unprecedented assault on 50 years of collective bargaining rights for Wisconsin workers in less than five days. Deciding to declare the polka the state dance received more legislative consideration than this 144 page bill that would turn back the clock on decades of hard fought protections for Wisconsin families.

It is time for Governor Walker and legislative Republicans to remove all language related to collective bargaining from this bill and return the bill's focus to their stated concern for the state's finances."

http://www.wbay.com/Global/story.asp?S=14061732

[du_da]

13. On one hand

I agree that this takes the wind out of the Republican argument and it is an acknowledgment of reality that without accepting the need to contribute directly to their retirement funds the unions are going to lose the battle in the court of public opinion.

On the other hand, the logical response to focusing the discussion purely on collective bargaining will be that leaving the ability to collectively bargain for work place rules in place is simply setting the state to be "held hostage" to the unions in the next negotiation. That is exactly how they will word it because that is image they are trying to establish in the minds of voters of what it is like to deal with a union. Making matters worse, someone on the Republican side actually had a rare glimmer of clarity and left salaries out of the equation thus allowing them to make the argument, on a purely intellectually honest grounds, that collective bargaining would still exist although we all know that is a facade at best since you have to have it all on the table for collective bargaining to be meaningful. What we know isn't what matters how they frame this to the public matters.

So I am not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. I think it might be the only play though, but I am not so sure we should be rallying around it quite yet. This will be more like sending in the play from the sidelines then holding your breath to see how it turns out.

[No Elephants]

14. +1

[quakerboy]

20. Hmm.

thus dies the American revolution? Will they all play nice and hope the people are just satisfied enough to go home today?

[Ellipsis]

21. Miller waiting for guv to 'come to his senses'

Senate Minority Leader Mark Miller said today the momentum is on the side of public workers and Dems are waiting for the guv “to come to his senses.”

“He’s the one who created this crisis. He’s the one who can end it,” Miller said in an interview with WisPolitics.

Miller, D-Monona, said Senate Dems were together today at an undisclosed location. Asked how long they planned to stay away, he demurred.

Miller said now that union leaders have said they would accept the higher pension and health care payments in return for keeping their collective bargaining rights, the guv has what he needs to help close the state’s budget gap and can drop his other demands.

<snip>

“If he doesn’t accept this, it’s clear what he’s trying to do is eliminate collective bargaining for workers and he’s just using the budget repair as a pretext,” Miller said.


http://budget.wispolitics.com/2011/02/miller-waiting-for-guv-to-come-to-his.html

[Doctor_J]

22. I hope it's not an Obama-level compromise

But since the slimy piece of shit deliberately broke the state's finances, they shouldn't be offering anything.