The middle class working stiff has had enough in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya and finally in the US. More than one hundred thousand are expected to swarm the capitol in Madison, Wisconsin today with thousands more holding protests at every state capitol in the country.
Labor groups also planned for large demonstrations in every state capital in the nation on Saturday to show solidarity with Wisconsin in fighting the proposal they see as trying to break the union movement.
Organizers and law enforcement were expecting another huge turnout in Madison, rivaling the estimated crowd of 50,000 last Saturday which was the largest protest since the demonstrations began.
But demonstrators will have to brave frigid temperatures in Madison, where the high is forecast to reach only 19 degrees Fahrenheit on Saturday.
So far cold temperatures have not deterred union members and their supporters, especially on the weekends. But this Saturday’s protests take place in a different context, after the controversial union proposal passed the state Assembly on Friday, testing the resolve of a movement that has so far been remarkably peaceful.
This video from Democracy Now gives some flavor of the city within the capitol in Madison that has formed to protest what is believed to be a right wing attempt to bust private and public sector unions.
Mark LeVine, a professor of history at UC Irvine, makes some comparisons between what is happening in the Middle East to rising unrest in the US.
…Even with the rise of a swaggeringly belligerent American foreign policy after September 11 on the one hand, and of China as a viable economic alternative to US global dominance on the other, the US’ melting pot democracy and seemingly endless potential for renewal and growth offered a model for the future.
Trading places
But something has changed. An epochal shift of historical momentum has occurred whose implications have yet to be imagined, never mind assessed. In the space of a month, the intellectual, political and ideological centre of gravity in the world has shifted from the far West (America) and far East (China, whose unchecked growth and continued political oppression are clearly not a model for the region) back to the Middle – to Egypt, the mother of all civilization, and other young societies across the Middle East and North Africa.
Standing amidst hundreds of thousands of Egyptians in Tahrir Square seizing control of their destiny it suddenly seemed that our own leaders have become, if not quite pharaohs, then mamluks, more concerned with satisfying their greed for wealth and power than with bringing their countries together to achieve a measure of progress and modernity in the new century….
…Egyptians, Tunisians and other peoples of the region fighting for revolutionary political and economic change have, without warning, leapfrogged over the US and China and grabbed history’s reins. Suddenly, it is the young activists of Tahrir who are the example for the world, while the great powers seem mired in old thinking and outdated systems. From the perspective of “independence” squares across the region, the US looks ideologically stagnant and even backwards, filled with irrational people and political and economic elites incapable of conceiving of changes that are so obvious to the rest of the world.
As an Egyptian labor activists sends a message of solidarity to Wisconsin teachers, sanitation workers, public health and road workers against the tyranny of a radical governor too many Americans, even those “those without healthcare, job security or pensions seem intent on dragging down the lucky few unionised workers who still have them rather than engage in the hard work of demanding the same rights for themselves.”
The top one per cent of Americans, who now earn more than the bottom 50 per cent of the country combined, could not have scripted it any better if they had tried. They have achieved a feat that Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, Hosni Mubarak and their fellow cleptocrats could only envy (the poorest 20 per cent of the population in Tunisia and Egypt actually earn a larger share of national income than does their counterpart in the US).
The situation is so desperate that a well known singer and activist contacted me in Cairo to ask organisers of Tahrir to send words of support for union workers in Wisconsin. Yet “Madison is the new Tahrir” remains a dream with little hope of becoming reality, even as Cairenes take time out from their own revolution proudly to order pizza for their fellow protesters in Wisconsin.
The power of youth and workers
In Egypt, workers continue to strike, risking the ire of the military junta that has yet to release political prisoners or get rid of the emergency law. It was their efforts, more than perhaps anyone else, that pushed the revolution over the top at the moment when people feared the Mubarak regime could ride out the protests. For their part, Americans have all but forgotten that the “golden years” of the 1950s and 1960s were only golden to so many people because unions were strong and ensured that the majority of the country’s wealth remained in the hands of the middle class or was spent on programmes to improve public infrastructure across the board.
Governor Walker of Wisconsin was booed by patrons and asked to leave a local restaurant recently
Another hero is born:
Scott Walker Asked to Leave Local Restaurant
You know you’re not well liked when you are asked to leave a local tavern because people boo-ing at you causes an upset, but this is exactly what happened to Wisconsin State Governor Scott Walker on Friday the 18th of February.
The Merchant in Madison, WI confirms that on Friday night, Patrick Sweeney (one of the owners) politely asked Scott Walker to leave the establishment when other customers began boo-ing him. A bartender at The Merchant said that, “his presence was causing a disturbance to the other customers and management asked him to leave.”
Above is a hyperlink to the restaurant’s website. I spoke to a bartender there just before posting this article. If you’d like to give them a call to say thank you, I am sure they wouldn’t mind or give your patronage and thanks in person the next time you are in Madison.
Today we will see how much of the middle class is able and willing to endure the cold and stand united against the growing disparity between rich and poor.
UPDATE Reuters reports from Wisconsin as many as 100,000 peaceful protesters have demonstrated in frigid weather all day.
Jeff Skiles, US Airways co-pilot who helped safely ditch a packed passenger jet on the Hudson River in New York City in 2009: “On that day, there were many many heroes: pilots, flight attendants, traffic controllers, firemen, policemen, folks in the ferry boats, EMTs. We didn’t abandon those passengers to save themselves. We all worked together to save everybody. That’s a lesson that people in this capitol building need to learn … Every one of them was union.”
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[photo Reuters]
Most of this is old news but, at least, the NY Times has published it http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/02/business/02leonhardt.html?_r=1&smid=tw-nytimes&seid=auto
Also, read Olbermann’s take on Walker http://foknewschannel.com/scott-walker-that-man-is-an-idiot/
Thanks, Ron. It is unfortunate that so many try to paint public employees and unions as the villain when, in fact, they are the victim of Wall Street mismanagement of their pension funds and corporate welfare. Wisconsin has a governor who wants school teachers to pay for corporate tax breaks… evidently so our kids can grow up to be janitors for these corporations.
A lot is being made lately about how states should cut spending. Here in Oregon much of the talk centers on how state workers are getting too much and should have to start doing with less like the average citizen. I AM the average citizen. I also work for the State. Here’s how the economy has affected me so far. I’m currently on a wage freeze, the third in the last ten years. My retirement, PERS, is not doing as well as it once was, so I pay more of a share with every new contract. At the same time, retirement benefits are shrinking. I have had 14 furlough days(without pay) over the last two years. I donated 3 more in order to stave off the layoff of two co-workers. Cost of living raises are long gone. I’ve been in my current grade for 14 years. I have not yet reached the top of seven, annual, steps due to cost cutting. I pay a portion of my own health insurance, and contribute towards my wife’s coverage. Even after the premium is paid, there are still expenses. Insurance just doesn’t cover the whole cost. Finally, due to cost cutting and decreased staffing, I am doing more with less resources, facing an increasing popuIation, meaning, more customers with more problems. I shop local, I pay local property taxes, I pay the same high price for gasoline. As a native Oregonian, I contribute with my pay check for social services just like everyone else. So, please consider these things. I just happen to work for the State. But the state of the economy has the same affect on me as it does on everyone else.
no one is saying unions are perfect but they are the only thing at the moment that protects labor from the excesses of management. Check out this graph on income inequality – http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/02/income-inequality-in-america-chart-graph
Management needs labor and labor deserves to be paid
I can understand why your loyal readers are afraid to comment on this one. Some unions are great. Some are greedy and bloated. I was once a union member – by choice. My family are union members. There are many great young people with untapped potential who, to gain employment in their chosen field, are forced to belong to unions, forecd to pay exorbitant union dues, and who then find themselves first to be furloughed at tough times because some old friend of somebody stiff who died years ago has not yet dropped. They call it seniority. There is no reason why the best teacher in a school should be furloughed because some lazy ill prepared to teach stiffs have tenure. There is no reason why it takes four people to repair a local stop sign because of union dictated job descriptions. Perhaps it’s time for the bloated unions to change the way they do business and then they will have 100% support of the people. Perhaps it’s time for politicians in every state to stop hiding across state lines and elsewhere from controversial matters.