Posted on 02/19/2011 4:09:28 AM PST by kevkrom
The union-led school closures and demonstrations in Madison have left most ordinary Americans shaking their heads in disbelief. Months ago, I penned a message to my fellow union brothers and sisters when I found myself on the receiving end of union boss Richard Trumka’s wrath. Yesterday’s demonstrations reminded me of the full-page ads taken out against me when I put my foot down in dealing with union demands while I served as governor. My message then and now to good union brothers and sisters is that you have another option. You don’t have to kowtow to the union bosses who are not looking out for you, but instead are using you. You can join millions of other union members in a commonsense movement to help fight for the right causes in our great country – for budgets that share the burden in a truly fair way and for commonsense reforms that take power away from vested interests like union bosses and big business lobby groups, and put it back where it belongs – with “We the People.”
Here we are still struggling to get out of a deep recession and coping with high unemployment, record deficits, rapidly rising food prices, and a host of other economic problems; and Wisconsin union bosses want union members out in the streets demanding that taxpayers foot the bill for unsustainable benefits packages. I am a friend to hard working union members and to teachers. I come from a family of teachers; my grandparents, parents, brother, sister, aunt, and other relatives worked, or still work, in education. My own children attend public schools. I greatly admire good teachers and will always speak up in defense of the teaching profession. But Wisconsin teacher unions do themselves no favor by closing down classrooms and abandoning children’s needs in protest against the sort of belt-tightening that people everywhere are going through. Union brothers and sisters: this is the wrong fight at the wrong time. Solidarity doesn’t mean making Wisconsin taxpayers pay for benefits that are not sustainable and affordable at a time when many of these taxpayers struggle to hold on to their own jobs and homes. Real solidarity means everyone being willing to sacrifice and carry our share of the burden. It does no one any favors to dismiss the sacrifices others have already had to make—in wage cuts, unpaid vacations, and even job losses—to weather our economic storm.
Hard working, patriotic, and selfless union brothers and sisters: please don’t be taken in by the union bosses. At the end of day, they’re not fighting for your pension or health care plan or even for the sustainability of Wisconsin’s education budget. They’re fighting to protect their own powerful privileges and their own political clout. The agenda for too many union bosses is a big government agenda that only serves the union bosses themselves – not union members, not union families, and certainly not the larger community. Everybody else is just there to foot the bill; and if that bill eventually takes the form of thousands of teachers and other public sectors workers losing their jobs because the state of Wisconsin can no longer afford to keep them on the payroll, that’s a risk the union bosses are willing to take as long as their positions are secure. Union brothers and sisters: you are better than this and you deserve better. Don’t be led astray.
One final word of warning to my fellow Americans: back in 2009, I warned about what would happen if states accepted short-term unsustainable debt-ridden “Stimulus Package” funds. Accepting those funds allowed states to grow government, increase already unsustainable levels of spending, kick the can down the road on reforming entitlements, and create public expectations that they would continue financing these new mandates once the federal funds ran out. States were not in a position to grow government and take on new financial commitments then, and now the chickens have come home to roost. As goes Wisconsin today, so goes the country tomorrow.
- Sarah Palin
I apparently messed up the link... could you correct it please? (http://www.facebook.com/notes/sarah-palin/union-brothers-and-sisters-seize-opportunity-to-show-true-solidarity/10150093967618435)
The union moochers, encouraged by 0bama, will continue to make demands and attempt to intimidate; they’ll probably go for a crescendo at a Million Mooch March.
Their intimidation will go far and deep, everything from IRS audits to sudden foreclosures upon businesses and homes.
Or certain agencies will react from false information and next thing you know a SWAT team has just flashbombed your bedroom and Child Protection Services are taking the children away.
It’s PATCO time. If the parasites fail to show 2/21/11, fire them.
The last thing a union should be is a class war instrument. US unions are an anachronism dating back to Stalin, and most of their leaders need to go to jail.
What is Palin saying when she calls them union Brothers and Sisters? Is Palin a member SEIU or something?
"Hard working, patriot, and selfless union brothers and sisters: please don’t be taken in by the union bosses. At the end of day, they’re not fighting for your pension or health care plan or even for the sustainability of Wisconsin’s education budget. They’re fighting to protect their own powerful privileges and their own political clout."
I notice that the unionized teachers are wearing RED - the colors of communism.
The majority of the rank and file were out in full bloom in Wisconsin. Those selfish cretins and big mouthed communists are not my brothers and sisters.
They don’t give a fig about commonsense. If they did, they would have went to work.
nah Red=Republican Blue=Dems so they must be Republicans...not!
Palin has always talked about Todd being a union member.
OK...So Union Brothers and Sisters-in-law...;0)
And shame on the teacher (s) who didn’t teach you to say/write “would have gone” instead of “would have went”.
And then 0bie sends in the Guard to support the goons of the first wave.
You know that sooner or later, somewhere or other, 0bama’s going to overstep. This would be a very good opportunity. Lines clearly drawn, and he’s clearly on the left side.
LOL, I guess so. This was a well stated article. I am a teacher who opposes the union. I want real education reform. That means abolishing Dept. of education and getting rid of NCLB and RTTT.
In Alaska where good paying jobs are at a premium you almost have no choice but to be part of a union. I never had an opportunity to be employed at a job that was unionized, for what Id in Alaska I have no benefits, no insurance and I make one third less than a unionized concrete mixer driver, and I am also seasonally laid off.
In Alaska if you don’t join the Union you don’t get the thrills.
Sarah continues to make sense.
The governor of a sovereign state commands the National Guard of that state.
Odumbo would have to nationalize the NG first.
Note also the left-hand clenched fist at this site, employed as a map of Wisconsin.
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