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http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/03/09/wisconsin.budget/index.html?hpt=T1&iref=BN1

Power gaming ftw. Apparently the Dem's strategy failed.

To quote Matt Forbeck, "Nothing like passing bills within minutes, without any discussion, as a surprise, in the dark of night, to legitimize your politics."

Because Wisconsin (and the country at large) needs fewer, more poorly paid teachers.

The Democrats were hiding out of state to avoid voting on the bill? That doesn't sound very "by the books" either.

…and in the end, neither side comes out smelling anything remotely like daisies.

The best part of this is how much of the budget 'crisis' being used to justify this moronic gak is outright lies. Like the budget shortfall, which only reaches the size Walker's been bleating about by including every future spending initiative being passed. Or how all the benefits which Walker has been saying are being burdened onto the taxpayers are actually mostly paid for directly by the people using them.

RustyKnight wrote:The Democrats were hiding out of state to avoid voting on the bill? That doesn't sound very "by the books" either.

Staying away to avoid a quorum is an age old strategy going way back, especially when one side is being railroaded. Hell, this happened when the Constitution was being ratified. It is also happening in Indiana as well apparently.

It was actually passed legally you know, they took out certain elements of the bill to change the kind of bill it was. This change meant that they needed less senators to vote for it.

The people affected by the bill are teachers working for public schools.

Personally, I'm kind of glad that the bill got through. I really don't like unions because they allow some pretty bad employees to stay employed and prevent capitalistic competition from happening. We may even see an improvement in education as teachers compete with others to keep their jobs.

Of course we could also see teachers becoming a rare commodity as some may quit their jobs in protest. Or we could see teachers protesting which would harm the children the teachers are supposed to teach. I have fond memories of when a 5th grade teacher at my school offered extra credit to any kid who would make a picket sign and protest limiting the teacher's union, the same teacher also passed kids who were failing the class too so I can kind of see why.

We'll have to see what happens and hope for a positive outcome.

Nothing like treating teachers like crap to encourage the very best and brightest to become teachers...oh wait.

I just love that everyone complains about how bad teachers are but when they want to take money and benefits from them it's ok. You know our society is so messed up when we have to pay the banking CEO's their money because it was promised to them or it was in their contract but we can just screw teachers over regardless of previous agreements.

Not all teachers are bad of course, but there are some bad eggs just like anywhere else.

I complain about how bad teachers are and taking benefits them is okay. If I did that then its kind of logical you know? You know what, I do think we should take benefits from bad teachers.

As far as banking CEO's go we don't really have control over that, its the PRiVATE industry. Now I disagreed with bailing out the banks to begin with, but like I said they're not under government control in terms of pay.

Schools=public, CEO's=private so you can't really compare the two.

I'll make my point clear though, the bail out was bad so don't think I support CEO's being paid when they suck. I think that there could be some positives from this but we'll have to see who's going to do what in response.

halonachos wrote:It was actually passed legally you know, they took out certain elements of the bill to change the kind of bill it was. This change meant that they needed less senators to vote for it.

No, the illegality was that the general meeting on the bill wasn't given the 24 hours period of notice.

Personally, I'm kind of glad that the bill got through. I really don't like unions because they allow some pretty bad employees to stay employed and prevent capitalistic competition from happening. We may even see an improvement in education as teachers compete with others to keep their jobs.

Except that doesn't hold up with state by state comparisons of student performance. The states with restrictions on collective bargaining are all among the worst performing states in the union.

Now, I agree that sub-par teachers should be removed from the system. The practical way to resolve this is to negotiate with the unions, not ban collective bargaining.

keep this up and the salaries for teachers that japan, s.korea and china offer would start looking a lot more attractive to fresh grads

and in a few years youll end up importing teachers

Hah hah hathis is what happens when you abandon your posts Democrats.

In the words of the immortal bard: "HAH HAH!"




Automatically Appended Next Post:

sebster wrote:To quote Matt Forbeck, "Nothing like passing bills within minutes, without any discussion, as a surprise, in the dark of night, to legitimize your politics."

Thats what happens when you abandon your constituents and run across state lines.

Frazzled wrote:Hah hah hathis is what happens when you abandon your posts Democrats.

In the words of the immortal bard: "HAH HAH!"




Automatically Appended Next Post:

sebster wrote:To quote Matt Forbeck, "Nothing like passing bills within minutes, without any discussion, as a surprise, in the dark of night, to legitimize your politics."

Thats what happens when you abandon your constituents and run across state lines.

I agree! And if they stayed they would have been railroaded into the same result. The bill would have been passed anyways. Isn't politics fun?


As for the unions, well I can say from observations in my school district, that they do keep horrible teachers employed. I would rather the job be about merit, but as it stands there is nothing I can do about it. Heck they have a school in New York that they put all the teachers in that they are trying to get rid of. The union is so strong there, that it can take a few years to actually fire the bad teachers. So in the mean time they go to work at a school with no students. They stay in their rooms and wait for judgement.

I really hate the whole situation. I would like to believe that I am a good teacher. I work with a special needs population that every other teacher is too afraid of to look at. I have been doing it for almost 10 years. Yet because of a bunch of bad apples I am looked at as if I was a glorified babysitter.

Ahtman wrote:

RustyKnight wrote:The Democrats were hiding out of state to avoid voting on the bill? That doesn't sound very "by the books" either.

Staying away to avoid a quorum is an age old strategy going way back, especially when one side is being railroaded. Hell, this happened when the Constitution was being ratified. It is also happening in Indiana as well apparently.

Railroading the opposite when you've got a majority is also an old strategy going way back, especially when one side isn't willing to seriously negotiate.

This happened as recently as last year.

Melissia wrote:Because Wisconsin (and the country at large) needs fewer, more poorly paid teachers.

Yep. My sons school just took a $400,000 cut in its funds, which I found odd, because about 2 months ago I read in the newspaper that our city had its budgets balanced and actually made money instead of loosing it. Its such a big cut for them, that they are now deciding on pay cuts and laying off teachers. I was a bit pissed off about it.

This thing in Wisconsin, I hope stays there. Im not a fan of unions as a whole, but doing what they did there, was a total FU to the people in that state

KingCracker wrote:

Melissia wrote:Because Wisconsin (and the country at large) needs fewer, more poorly paid teachers.

Yep. My sons school just took a $400,000 cut in its funds, which I found odd, because about 2 months ago I read in the newspaper that our city had its budgets balanced and actually made money instead of loosing it. Its such a big cut for them, that they are now deciding on pay cuts and laying off teachers. I was a bit pissed off about it.

This thing in Wisconsin, I hope stays there. Im not a fan of unions as a whole, but doing what they did there, was a total FU to the people in that state

The thing is, teachers are getting such a bad rap, that when it comes back around to election day, the majority will probably vote for those representatives again.

Lord Scythican wrote:

KingCracker wrote:

Melissia wrote:Because Wisconsin (and the country at large) needs fewer, more poorly paid teachers.

Yep. My sons school just took a $400,000 cut in its funds, which I found odd, because about 2 months ago I read in the newspaper that our city had its budgets balanced and actually made money instead of loosing it. Its such a big cut for them, that they are now deciding on pay cuts and laying off teachers. I was a bit pissed off about it.

This thing in Wisconsin, I hope stays there. Im not a fan of unions as a whole, but doing what they did there, was a total FU to the people in that state

The thing is, teachers are getting such a bad rap, that when it comes back around to election day, the majority will probably vote for those representatives again.

Those that don't learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.....

Hurray for voting trends! Id love to live in a time where people voted for reps that ACTUALLY will do things for them. Other then, I dont like Republicans so Im voting for that person. Regardless of who they are, and what they stand for, its that blue person, or that red fella.

KingCracker wrote:Hurray for voting trends! Id love to live in a time where people voted for reps that ACTUALLY will do things for them. Other then, I dont like Republicans so Im voting for that person. Regardless of who they are, and what they stand for, its that blue person, or that red fella.

Kind of makes the whole thing pointless doesn't it? We are sort of outnumbered by those kind of people.

Pointless maybe, but its still not a reason to stop voting. Its our right to, so you should just do it. Just dont ever be like the Libertarians. They tend to have more views I agree with, but my biggest problem with their party is thus

To them its not, wow, we only got 100k votes this last election? But the other guys had millions. Its HEY! Look we have 100K votes! YES! Thats awesome for us people, great job. This trend keeps up, we will have one of our own in the WhiteHouse in the year 5017! YEA!!!!!!

KingCracker wrote:Pointless maybe, but its still not a reason to stop voting. Its our right to, so you should just do it. Just dont ever be like the Libertarians. They tend to have more views I agree with, but my biggest problem with their party is thus

To them its not, wow, we only got 100k votes this last election? But the other guys had millions. Its HEY! Look we have 100K votes! YES! Thats awesome for us people, great job. This trend keeps up, we will have one of our own in the WhiteHouse in the year 5017! YEA!!!!!!

If everyone thought like that, it would be closer to 2014. You are encouraging in your own little way, honestly.

That is me, the King of all Crackers my man. I like to encourage through jerky sarcasm. It works


But its true though. For me to think of the Libertarians as a potential player, they need to lay the pot pipes down, at least for a few minutes a day, and actually TRY to push their party. During the last election I watced on CNN hwo their party actually voted for their presidential hopeful. I was in awe at how they did it. There wasnt any insulting on other members, no dick swinging or anything. Infact they were all just sitting there, basically chatting and answering the questions given to them. And the weirdest part was, I saw many times one would say something like "Well see if you wanted this Id say go for my man so and so, and everyone would agree yea hes the perfect man in that regard.


Tell me if youve EVER seen that in a Republican/Democrat forum. gak its like a knife fight in the prison yard for those parties.

Ahtman wrote:

RustyKnight wrote:The Democrats were hiding out of state to avoid voting on the bill? That doesn't sound very "by the books" either.

Staying away to avoid a quorum is an age old strategy going way back, especially when one side is being railroaded. Hell, this happened when the Constitution was being ratified. It is also happening in Indiana as well apparently.

I can't remember, was it Lincoln that jumped out of a second story window at 3 in the morning to avoid a quorum?

Lord Scythican wrote:

As for the unions, well I can say from observations in my school district, that they do keep horrible teachers employed. I would rather the job be about merit, but as it stands there is nothing I can do about it. Heck they have a school in New York that they put all the teachers in that they are trying to get rid of. The union is so strong there, that it can take a few years to actually fire the bad teachers. So in the mean time they go to work at a school with no students. They stay in their rooms and wait for judgement.

I really hate the whole situation. I would like to believe that I am a good teacher. I work with a special needs population that every other teacher is too afraid of to look at. I have been doing it for almost 10 years. Yet because of a bunch of bad apples I am looked at as if I was a glorified babysitter.

Be careful about your terminology..."merit" is union code for "seniority." (The only reason I know this is because I have to deal with public service union reps on a daily basis.) Rather, use ability, drive, aptitude, etc.

With that said, what WI's governor has done is a load of bollocks. They stripped all public sector unions, which are typically Democrats, from being able to collectively bargain. However, they excluded firemen and police officers, who are typically Republicans, from having this right to collectively bargain stripped from them as well. This is more than just teachers, it is all public sector employees (except of course firemen and policemen). This could effect medical professionals in state run hospitals, state-run disability offices, etc.

And this was after the unions agreed to all of the financial concessions; the only thing they did not agree to was the stripping away of their right to collectively bargain.

Whether you agree with the decision and the ultimate outcome of it, it still stinks of raw partisan politics designed solely to hamstring the other parties base, while exempting specific groups that would have otherwise also been affected.

KingCracker wrote:Its HEY! Look we have 100K votes! YES! Thats awesome for us people, great job. This trend keeps up, we will have one of our own in the WhiteHouse in the year 5017! YEA!!!!!!

That's because the goal of libertarians currently is to work with the R-D monopolized system that prevents third parties from getting on the ballots, for fear that some people might vote for them. The goal is to get ~10% of voters to turn libertarian so that libertarian issues make it to the mainstream, causing the major parties to adopt those issues.

In my former state there was a libertarian running for governor. His political platform was: "We need 2%". Because that's what they needed to get 'major party status' and start serious campaigning on libertarian issues, rather than using their rather limited budget on gathering signatures so they can get on the ballot.

He only got 1.2% of the vote. Which was fortunately better than the anti-capitalist Socialist Worker party that campaigned on continuing the recession so the capitalist system could be brought down.

I get the idea they are going for, I really do. But you try this little experiment. Go and just ASK random people what/who the Libertarians are. You might be surprised if you get 5 out of 100 that know who they are, and Id bet 2 out of that 5 only heard of them. I still say, they need to push their party harder. Do what they are doing sure, but they still need to show some initiative and make their presence known to the American public. If more people knew about them, then they would realize, hey I dont have to choose between this jerk off and that jerk off, there is this OTHER option, and oddly enough, he makes sense to me.

Bakerofish wrote:and in a few years youll end up importing teachers

We already do. I've seen more than a few immigrants from African nations take up teaching positions in local public colleges.

Meh. At this point, along with all of the idiots I have to deal with on a day to day basis IRL, I'm rather convinced that republicans and tea party gits are fething donkey-caves who don't give a gak about the future of our country.