Video from ALEC’s Policy Summit Reveals the Anti-Union, Pro-Privatization Playbook

[Omaha Steve]

http://wepartypatriots.com/wp/2011/05/02/video-from-alecs-policy-summit-reveals-the-anti-union-pro-privatization-playbook/



Video of ALEC’s Budget Reform Workshop — “Creating True and Lasting Budget Reform in Your State” — has been online since a December policy summit held in Washington, D.C., but has attracted little attention. ALEC, the right-wing and anti-worker authors of “model legislation” that can be seen taking effect in states like Wisconsin, Ohio and Michigan, put together the workshop to show lawmakers “what you can do to balance those budgets without having to resort to tax increases.” The three major categories of alternatives, the workshop’s moderator suggests, are “budget process reform, transparency or privatization.” He then makes the claim that 80 percent of budget deficits are due to employee costs


The speakers talk about ALEC’s new “product” — a toolkit/brochure for ultra conservative budget reform — with smug excitement. Around the 30:00 mark, a gentleman who runs the privatization department at the Reason foundation and has been named to “privatization task forces” by Governors Christie (NJ), Brewer (AZ) and Jindal (LA), references a book the organization authored, Cutting Back City Hall, that “envisioned a privatized city.” He claims the book helped Margaret Thatcher make changes in the UK and celebrates the fact that there are cities in the U.S. “that closely resemble what we envisioned many decades ago where you have pretty much the private sector running almost entirely…everything in the city.”

Another featured speaker, Senator Dan Liljenquist of Utah, looks back at the implementation of the ALEC playbook in his state, comparing state employees to hazardous materials:

“When you look at reforming your pension systems, your biggest challenge is…is that these are contract rights in your states. As we looked at it we said, ‘this is like a chemical spill.’ The first thing you do is contain the spill, and then you work on cleaning it up.”

FULL story and video at link.

About the Author: E.M. Ployd
E.M. Ployd, The Ghost of Jobs Had Past, is the creator of the We Party and an unrelenting supporter of the Labor Movement. Ployd, now deceased, is rumored to have gone on an "eternal strike" in 2004. The Ployd void may never be filled.