Now Wisconsin

[Pyperkub]

Maybe I'm not familiar with how collective bargaining works in Wisconsin but why can't they tell the unions to fuck off if they ask for 20% raises and full pensions?

Because there's no money in it.

Unions give vast amounts in donations for -- and against -- candidates, all in service of "give us what we want."

By contrast, there's no constituency giving vast amount of money to candidates to be tough in bargaining against unions.

When GM and Ford bargain against auto workers, the countervailing financial interest is built-in: GM and Ford are playing with their own money.

Whereas the people in state capitols are playing with taxpayer money, and can always tax more, or run a higher deficit.

It's like P.J. O'Rourke's hierarchy of spending, which goes something like this: When we spend our own money on ourselves, we care about price and quality. This is how middle-aged men spend money on cars. When we spend other people's money on ourselves, we care about quality but not price. That's how the middle-aged men's trophy girlfriends spend their money. When we spend our money on others, we care about price but less about quality. That's how grandmothers buy us underwear for Christmas. And then there's spending other people's money on other people -- in which case who gives a shit?

If you didn't notice, Unions were outspent ~8-1 in Wisconsin. Fat lot of good those vast amounts of donations did. Some power.

So, let's see - the Chamber of Commerce tends to donate heavily to anti-union legislation and members, as well as every Grover Norquist-style Tax crusade. Arnold even championed a Wisconsin-style package of 'reforms' that were solely targeted at Unions - restricting Union political donations (but not Corporate, or Chamber of Commerce donations!), etc.



Additionally, as I said before, Unions are fighting health care cost increases as well as against furloughs and pay cuts. They aren't asking for 20% raises for the most part.

As to GM and Ford - what happened there is that the HEALTH CARE COSTS skyrocketed. It wasn't pensions, it was the associated HEALTH CARE. Arrgh. You keep skipping over this, when it has been a primary factor in just about every Union Negotiation over the past 15 years, public or private. Yes, pay is also included, but the real negotiations have been on Health Care costs, as every effort to push more onto the employees is effectively a pay cut, and one that will keep increasing.

[noxiousdog]

as every effort to push more onto the employees is effectively a pay cut, and one that will keep increasing.

No it's not. It's a failure of compensation to keep up with inflation.

[GreenGoo]

They can certainly waste more tax dollars in a legal squabble over whether their pension benefits can ever be reduced during their careers

After having read the article, it's not as simple or one sided as you make it sound, although it's not solely a manufactured crisis either.

If you want to keep bandying around public good like it somehow requires public servants to not exercise their rights as employees then you're barking up the wrong tree. The public is not being generous and donating money to these people, they are paying them a wage for performing a service/work. The employees are not the government, nor should they be considered the direct recipients of tax dollars. The government receives tax money directly. The government then contracts for employment and pays wages. Employees receiving wages should have every right to treat their employment with all the gusto, rage, loyalty, enthusiasm, apathy as any private employee, and of course receive the resulting aftermath of that behaviour.

There are some legit places to distinguish between public and private employees. Whether they should be allowed to "waste tax dollars" fighting for their rights is not one of them. You're basically suggesting that the government start pulling legitimate bargaining tools out from under them, and that they shouldn't take any recourse when it happens. You're crazy if you think you, your neighbour or any other human being is going to simply sit back and take it. Public good and nobility of service only goes so far. At the end of the day you're talking about peoples' livelihood, and telling them they're bad people for trying to protect it. You shouldn't be surprised if it gets nasty.

A more moderate course from the unions on pensions would help balance the budgets, preserve services, and perhaps even preserve much of the power of the unions

The article is written in the present. These things are going on now. A more moderate approach is still possible, from what I read in your article. The government certainly didn't take a moderate approach, by changing the law with regard to their contracts with employees. Honestly, changing the law in your favour is about as nuclear as you can go. Striking is peanuts when compared to making laws that make certain activities and agreements illegal or non-binding. How much more powerful can a negotiating tactic get? Particularly after the unions had already taken a TEN PERCENT cut in compensation the year before.

[GreenGoo]

If you didn't notice, Unions were outspent ~8-1 in Wisconsin. Fat lot of good those vast amounts of donations did. Some power.

Mostly from out of state.

[GreenGoo]

as every effort to push more onto the employees is effectively a pay cut, and one that will keep increasing.

No it's not. It's a failure of compensation to keep up with inflation.

If we ignore inflation and buying power remains identical, having additional costs pushed onto the employee could in fact result in reduced compensation, wouldn't you agree? It's not just about buying power in relation to inflation. It's buying power in relation to take home pay as measured separately from inflation, no?

I'm struggling to get my point clearer, but I hope you undstand it anyway, and can clarify if I missing something.

[geezer]

as every effort to push more onto the employees is effectively a pay cut, and one that will keep increasing.

No it's not. It's a failure of compensation to keep up with inflation.

Health care costs are increasing faster than inflation.

[geezer]

as every effort to push more onto the employees is effectively a pay cut, and one that will keep increasing.

No it's not. It's a failure of compensation to keep up with inflation.

If we ignore inflation and buying power remains identical, having additional costs pushed onto the employee could in fact result in reduced compensation, wouldn't you agree? It's not just about buying power in relation to inflation. It's buying power in relation to take home pay as measured separately from inflation, no?

As I said above, health care costs are rising faster than inflation, but the flip side of that is that the cost has to be paid somewhere. While it's not particularly "fair" to slide the whole of a annual premium increase onto the employee, neither is it equitable to expect that the company keep earning less while the employees compensation remains stable.

[Anonymous Bosch]

You shouldn't be surprised if it gets nasty.

I'm not; as I said, I suspect it's likely to get a whole lot nastier, especially if public employee unions prevail in court.

A more moderate course from the unions on pensions would help balance the budgets, preserve services, and perhaps even preserve much of the power of the unions

The article is written in the present. These things are going on now. A more moderate approach is still possible, from what I read in your article. The government certainly didn't take a moderate approach, by changing the law with regard to their contracts with employees. Honestly, changing the law in your favour is about as nuclear as you can go. Striking is peanuts when compared to making laws that make certain activities and agreements illegal or non-binding. How much more powerful can a negotiating tactic get? Particularly after the unions had already taken a TEN PERCENT cut in compensation the year before.

Alas, the "TEN PERCENT cut in compensation" is insufficient. As reported by the San Jose Mercury News:

Reed proposed Measure B a year ago after his efforts -- from championing new tax measures to imposing 10 percent pay cuts on city employees -- failed to erase budgetary red ink that has soaked the city ledger for a decade. Though the city projects a modest $9 million surplus in the upcoming budget, thanks largely to the pay cuts and hundreds of job cuts, a $22.5 million shortfall is expected the year after.

A key deficit driver has been the yearly pension bill that has more than tripled from $73 million to $245 million in a decade, far outpacing the 20 percent revenue growth and gobbling more than a fifth of the city's general fund. A city audit blamed the rise on a combination of benefit increases, flawed cost assumptions and investment losses.

City audits and news reports also assailed a system in which the city's police and firefighters take tax-free disability retirements at rates far exceeding those in other big cities.

You can't get blood from a stone; unsustainable is unsustainable. And the pension benefits that public employee unions continue to insist upon are just that. Your disagreement notwithstanding, I'd say public employee unions ignore the voters quoted in the same article at their own peril:

Voters like Howard Delano of Willow Glen were tired of watching their city shovel more and more tax money into government pensions far more generous than their own retirement.

"It's out of control," Delano, 60, said after dropping off his ballot. "Nobody gives me a pension."

[GreenGoo]

You can't get blood from a stone; unsustainable is unsustainable. And the pension benefits that public employee unions continue to insist upon are just that. Your disagreement notwithstanding, I'd say public employee unions ignore the voters quoted in the same article at their own peril:

Voters like Howard Delano of Willow Glen were tired of watching their city shovel more and more tax money into government pensions far more generous than their own retirement.

"It's out of control," Delano, 60, said after dropping off his ballot. "Nobody gives me a pension."

Lol, or what? They gonna take away their pensions? That's what they're doing. I'm sure they better tow the line or ELSE!

People are already fucking around with their compensation. They are already letting some of them go. What else do they have to threaten them with?

And Mr. Delano, on behalf of all the people working to provide you the services your government has decided you need, go fuck yourself.

The quote makes me laugh. It's about as reasoned as a dog crap.

I will say this is the perfect time to go after unions though. When the economy is down, people definitely get bitter about stuff.

I'll bow out now since I was only trying to explain the opposite side of this, and don't really want to get into a me vs you nonsense, and frankly I don't really care that american governments are mismanaging their resources, both human and otherwise.

My pension will absolutely be reduced prior to my retiring. And I have plenty of hedge investments to compensate for that, so I don't have any plans to fight it. But my pension is not my fault, and the government's inability to meet its obligations is not my fault either.

Should be interesting to see the results in a few years. Not just in San Jose but across america. You're already suffering an infrastructure crisis. I don't see reducing cop and firefighter services helping that.

And for the record, cutting compensation by 10% in a single year and then asking for your employees to give up more the year after that is fucked up. Nobody rational would consider balking at more compensation cuts after 10% as unreasonable, no matter the state of their employer.

[Pyperkub]

You shouldn't be surprised if it gets nasty.

I'm not; as I said, I suspect it's likely to get a whole lot nastier, especially if public employee unions prevail in court.

A more moderate course from the unions on pensions would help balance the budgets, preserve services, and perhaps even preserve much of the power of the unions

The article is written in the present. These things are going on now. A more moderate approach is still possible, from what I read in your article. The government certainly didn't take a moderate approach, by changing the law with regard to their contracts with employees. Honestly, changing the law in your favour is about as nuclear as you can go. Striking is peanuts when compared to making laws that make certain activities and agreements illegal or non-binding. How much more powerful can a negotiating tactic get? Particularly after the unions had already taken a TEN PERCENT cut in compensation the year before.

Alas, the "TEN PERCENT cut in compensation" is insufficient. As reported by the San Jose Mercury News:

Reed proposed Measure B a year ago after his efforts -- from championing new tax measures to imposing 10 percent pay cuts on city employees -- failed to erase budgetary red ink that has soaked the city ledger for a decade. Though the city projects a modest $9 million surplus in the upcoming budget, thanks largely to the pay cuts and hundreds of job cuts, a $22.5 million shortfall is expected the year after.

A key deficit driver has been the yearly pension bill that has more than tripled from $73 million to $245 million in a decade, far outpacing the 20 percent revenue growth and gobbling more than a fifth of the city's general fund. A city audit blamed the rise on a combination of benefit increases, flawed cost assumptions and investment losses.

City audits and news reports also assailed a system in which the city's police and firefighters take tax-free disability retirements at rates far exceeding those in other big cities.

You can't get blood from a stone; unsustainable is unsustainable. And the pension benefits that public employee unions continue to insist upon are just that. Your disagreement notwithstanding, I'd say public employee unions ignore the voters quoted in the same article at their own peril:

Voters like Howard Delano of Willow Glen were tired of watching their city shovel more and more tax money into government pensions far more generous than their own retirement.

"It's out of control," Delano, 60, said after dropping off his ballot. "Nobody gives me a pension."

Well of course it will look unsustainable if you don't use real numbers:

The mayor also doesn’t know how Crosby came up with the projection, one that’s more than a quarter billion dollars higher than the city’s official projection.

"Do you think you should have sat down with him to find out where he was getting this number instead of just quoting him from a meeting?" we asked the Mayor.

“No,” Mayor Reed replied. “I understood it was a rough estimate off the top of his head,” he says.

That rough estimate was being questioned behind the scenes.

We obtained thousands of internal city emails. In one correspondence from Russell Crosby to the City of San Jose’s actuary, Crosby refers to comments made about “no back-up for 650” adding, “let’s do damage control.”

Crosby tells us he wrote that email because he believes 650 should never have been used in the first place.

“Is it wise to use the number 650 million dollars when you really don’t have any hard numbers to back that up?” we asked the Mayor....

...If you factor in pay-cuts and layoffs, it appears San Jose’s pension costs will reach about $300 million by 2015. That’s $350 million less than the figure the Mayor used to sell a fiscal disaster.

Additionally, if the money for the pensions was poorly invested, why is that the employees' fault? Also, if there is fraud on disability claims, address that, don't abrogate contracts with other employees.

[noxiousdog]

as every effort to push more onto the employees is effectively a pay cut, and one that will keep increasing.

No it's not. It's a failure of compensation to keep up with inflation.

Health care costs are increasing faster than inflation.

Right. I was generalizing and it was the best word I could think of. But it certainly isn't a reduction in compensation (in the vast majority of cases.)

More specifically on topic, I think of it the same way I think of monopolies. Just as we don't allow industries to exert their monopoly power, we shouldn't allow unions to exert their monopoly power. So if the only labor pool for government services comes from a union, then it needs to be regulated in some form or fashion.

[GreenGoo]

More specifically on topic, I think of it the same way I think of monopolies. Just as we don't allow industries to exert their monopoly power, we shouldn't allow unions to exert their monopoly power. So if the only labor pool for government services comes from a union, then it needs to be regulated in some form or fashion.

I would certainly consider regulation.

[Smutly]

More specifically on topic, I think of it the same way I think of monopolies. Just as we don't allow industries to exert their monopoly power, we shouldn't allow unions to exert their monopoly power. So if the only labor pool for government services comes from a union, then it needs to be regulated in some form or fashion.

I would certainly consider regulation.

Awesome. More public service jobs.

[Anonymous Bosch]

You can't get blood from a stone; unsustainable is unsustainable. And the pension benefits that public employee unions continue to insist upon are just that. Your disagreement notwithstanding, I'd say public employee unions ignore the voters quoted in the same article at their own peril:

Voters like Howard Delano of Willow Glen were tired of watching their city shovel more and more tax money into government pensions far more generous than their own retirement.

"It's out of control," Delano, 60, said after dropping off his ballot. "Nobody gives me a pension."

Lol, or what? They gonna take away their pensions? That's what they're doing. I'm sure they better tow the line or ELSE!

See: the restrictions placed upon collective bargaining by public workers in Wisconsin, and subsequent dramatic decline in public employee union membership:

Public-employee unions in Wisconsin have experienced a dramatic drop in membership -- by more than half for the second-biggest union -- since a law championed by Republican Gov. Scott Walker sharply curtailed their ability to bargain over wages and working conditions.

[Exodor]

Public-employee unions in Wisconsin have experienced a dramatic drop in membership -- by more than half for the second-biggest union -- since a law championed by Republican Gov. Scott Walker sharply curtailed their ability to bargain over wages and working conditions.

Why would you pay to be a member of an orginaztion that can no longer collectively bargain for you?

Not sure what this shows other than Walker's efforts to destroy the unions is showing results.

It seems a bit strange to celebrate the erosion of rights but congrats, I guess?

[Kraken]

In the Two Birds with One Stone Dept: Has WI considered ending public employee pensions entirely and putting new hires in the Soc Sec system instead? SS could use a big infusion of new contributors and states/municipalities would love to shed the pension burden. It's one of those sensible ideas that never goes anywhere. Now that WI employees no longer have a say in matters, it could.

(Of course, if they're already in SS...never mind.)

[GreenGoo]

You can't get blood from a stone; unsustainable is unsustainable. And the pension benefits that public employee unions continue to insist upon are just that. Your disagreement notwithstanding, I'd say public employee unions ignore the voters quoted in the same article at their own peril:

Voters like Howard Delano of Willow Glen were tired of watching their city shovel more and more tax money into government pensions far more generous than their own retirement.

"It's out of control," Delano, 60, said after dropping off his ballot. "Nobody gives me a pension."

Lol, or what? They gonna take away their pensions? That's what they're doing. I'm sure they better tow the line or ELSE!

See: the restrictions placed upon collective bargaining by public workers in Wisconsin, and subsequent dramatic decline in public employee union membership:

Public-employee unions in Wisconsin have experienced a dramatic drop in membership -- by more than half for the second-biggest union -- since a law championed by Republican Gov. Scott Walker sharply curtailed their ability to bargain over wages and working conditions.

You really aren't listening to what I'm saying it seems. We're in a thread called Now Wisconsin btw.

Are you saying that losing the ability to collective bargain is worse than losing your pensions? Well, you might be right. But it's a close call, especially if the country/state/county/city just decides to change the laws so that what you gained via collective bargaining is no longer binding anyway.

Is your point that union breaking in Wisconsin is working? Yeah, we know. I guess you're suggesting that San Jose unions better watch out o laws will be passed that negatively impact their employment agreements and future ones too? It's too late for that. As was pointed out, what use is a union if you legally take away all the benefits a union provides?

This is just union breaking but instead of goons with baseball bats you've got legislators with pens. And the American people seem to be pretty happy about it.

As I've said multiple times, Wisconsin will be a very interesting place to watch for the next decade or so. We'll see. I can imagine them reaching an equilibrium and everything working out great. Unfortunately I don't believe it and anticipate the Wisconsin work force to become one of the worst treated work forces in the US. But it could work out. Maybe. I like to hope anyway.

[Anonymous Bosch]

You can't get blood from a stone; unsustainable is unsustainable. And the pension benefits that public employee unions continue to insist upon are just that. Your disagreement notwithstanding, I'd say public employee unions ignore the voters quoted in the same article at their own peril:

Voters like Howard Delano of Willow Glen were tired of watching their city shovel more and more tax money into government pensions far more generous than their own retirement.

"It's out of control," Delano, 60, said after dropping off his ballot. "Nobody gives me a pension."

Lol, or what? They gonna take away their pensions? That's what they're doing. I'm sure they better tow the line or ELSE!

See: the restrictions placed upon collective bargaining by public workers in Wisconsin, and subsequent dramatic decline in public employee union membership:

Public-employee unions in Wisconsin have experienced a dramatic drop in membership -- by more than half for the second-biggest union -- since a law championed by Republican Gov. Scott Walker sharply curtailed their ability to bargain over wages and working conditions.

You really aren't listening to what I'm saying it seems. We're in a thread called Now Wisconsin btw.

Perhaps we are talking past each other, as I also get the impression that you may have overlooked what I have already stated.

Are you saying that losing the ability to collective bargain is worse than losing your pensions? Well, you might be right. But it's a close call, especially if the country/state/county/city just decides to change the laws so that what you gained via collective bargaining is no longer binding anyway.

I'm saying that as painful as pension benefit reductions may be for public employee union members, further measures can be taken that could undo public employee unions in a much more fundamental way (in fact, that was pretty much exactly what I posted on page 10).

Is your point that union breaking in Wisconsin is working? Yeah, we know. I guess you're suggesting that San Jose unions better watch out o laws will be passed that negatively impact their employment agreements and future ones too? It's too late for that. As was pointed out, what use is a union if you legally take away all the benefits a union provides?

Measure B made the following changes:

• Current employees keep pension credits already earned but must pay up to 16 percent more of their salary to continue that benefit or choose a more modest and affordable plan for their remaining years on the job.
• Retirement benefits limited for future hires by requiring them to pay half the cost of a pension.
• Suspend current retirees' 3 percent yearly pension raises up to five years if the city declares a fiscal crisis.
• Discontinued "bonus" pension checks to retirees.
• Voter approval required for future pension increases.
• Changed disability retirement with the aim of limiting it to those whose injuries prevent them from working.

I very much doubt those are all the benefits the public employee unions provide (though I could be mistaken, so if you have evidence to the contrary, by all means share it).

This is just union breaking but instead of goons with baseball bats you've got legislators with pens. And the American people seem to be pretty happy about it.

As I've said multiple times, Wisconsin will be a very interesting place to watch for the next decade or so. We'll see. I can imagine them reaching an equilibrium and everything working out great. Unfortunately I don't believe it and anticipate the Wisconsin work force to become one of the worst treated work forces in the US. But it could work out. Maybe. I like to hope anyway.

Time will tell.

[Pyperkub]

In the Two Birds with One Stone Dept: Has WI considered ending public employee pensions entirely and putting new hires in the Soc Sec system instead? SS could use a big infusion of new contributors and states/municipalities would love to shed the pension burden. It's one of those sensible ideas that never goes anywhere. Now that WI employees no longer have a say in matters, it could.

(Of course, if they're already in SS...never mind.)

At least in CA, we pay into both - it's been awhile since the split of pension vs social security was eliminated here -decades I think, tho some were grandfathered.

[GreenGoo]

I can't help but think that you've never participated in a union or paid attention if you did, since there really isn't much else to a union outside of compensation. There are other benefits, but they are small compared to collective bargaining. Mess with the compensation and the rest doesn't matter.

If an agreement can't be reached between the city and it's unions, and the city unilaterally lets themselves out of their contract, the union will have no teeth and therefore anything else you do to the union won't matter, including dissolving them.

You're basically suggesting that they better watch out of their union will have more teeth pulled. I'm saying that no one will care about if their compensation gets nuked. It's an empty, meaningless, laughable threat.

[Defiant]

Wisconsin Law Limiting Public Worker Unions Struck Down

[GreenGoo]

Wisconsin Law Limiting Public Worker Unions Struck Down

Just came here to post this.

Here's my link

WPost tells us what it means

[Defiant]

I figure I should put this in this thread.

Legislation that would allow emergency financial managers to throw out union contracts and overrule elected officials in financially distressed municipalities and school districts was approved Wednesday by the state Senate. Similar legislation passed in the House in February, and the two chambers are working on a final version to send to Gov. Rick Snyder. Snyder has called for more authority for emergency financial managers and is expected to sign the legislation into law.

Financial manager bill passes Michigan Senate

Michigan Proposal 1 Results: State Emergency Manager Law Fails

[LordMortis]

http://www.freep.com/article/20121209/O ... ays-voters" target="_blank

The freep finally turns on Snyder.

His insistence that the legislation was designed to promote the interests of unionized workers and "bring Michiganders together" was grotesquely disingenuous; even as he spoke, security personnel were locking down the capital in anticipation of protests by angry unionists.

Snyder's ostensible rationale for embracing right-to-work legislation -- it was, he insisted, a matter of preserving workers' freedom of association -- was equally dishonest.

The real motive of Michigan's right-to-work champions, as former GOP legislator Bill Ballenger ruefully observed, is "pure greed" -- the determination to emasculate, once and for all, the Democratic Party's most reliable source of financial and organizational support

I'm anti union but I think this will back fire on Snyder in this state. I think this will be the final issue that makes urban and suburban Michigan turn on the republican governor and the legislature that follows him and for better or worse we are going to move from Swing to squarely blue over this. Waiting until right after the election to introduce and ramrod this legislation while it concurrently becomes more and more transparent that the party in Michigan are becoming more dangerous and slimey snakes is going to spell the end for them in suburbia.

Michigan voters have never trusted business interests or organized labor to govern Michigan unilaterally, and they have been appropriately wary of schemes to secure a permanent advantage for either side. Thus the ignominious demise of Proposal 2, which a majority of voters correctly perceived as an attempt not just to tip the scales of labor negotiations in unions' favor, but to lock them there for decades to come.

That pretty much hit the nail on the head. The Republicans will be swept out of here over this like a bunch of domestic Gateway employees.

[Kraken]

the republican governor and the legislature that follows him

The reports I've read (as a distant observer) say that this right-to-work nonsense was not the governor's agenda, but rather the legislature's. He has agreed to sign it but didn't initiate it. Is that so?

[LordMortis]

The reports I've read (as a distant observer) say that this right-to-work nonsense was not the governor's agenda, but rather the legislature's. He has agreed to sign it but didn't initiate it. Is that so?

As far as I can tell that is so. It started in the legislature and is now put before Snyder. Publicly, it is the case at the very least.

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/20 ... ama-visit/" target="_blank

You have to love this, right after Prop 2 (anti union voting to hold extreme pro union politics was put to the people to vote) was defeated.

The right-to-work bill is structured so that it cannot be recalled by a statewide ballot initiative, so if it’s passed by the legislature and signed by the governor, voters will have no direct say in the matter.

I'm not pro-union (far from it) but I am more extremely anti slimey.

[Remus West]

Snyder announced at 11:30 am last Thursday that he would be willing to sign a RtW bill if it came across his desk. At the time there were no such bills actively being considered in either the senate or house. By 3:30 they were both in the process of passing RtW bills. If you think they did not already have them to hand with Snyder's knowledge and support behind the scene then you have much more faith in their honesty than any politician deserves. I promise you this was in the works as soon as the unions started pushing prop 2 (which was stupid and asinine on their part) if not before.

BTW, the capital was only reopened to the public via a court order declaring that it had been illegal for them to lock it down in the first place.

[LordMortis]

As I mentioned on facebook, I won't start a petition to recall Governor Snyder but if one shows in front of me, I'll sign it.

As much as Granholm sucked ass, I never thought she needed to be recalled.

And the horrible thing is, I'm anti union (in modern America) but, wow, have the republicans gone completely off the deep end with shady governance. My leaders. Theoretically, the more open less government is more leadership is scaring the shit out of me.

[Remus West]

As I mentioned on facebook, I won't start a petition to recall Governor Snyder but if one shows in front of me, I'll sign it.

As much as Granholm sucked ass, I never thought she needed to be recalled.

And the horrible thing is, I'm anti union (in modern America) but, wow, have the republicans gone completely off the deep end with shady governance. My leaders. Theoretically, the more open less government is more leadership is scaring the shit out of me.

We rarely see eye to eye on politcal things but this one we do.

[hitbyambulance]

this was super-shady business... i can't believe it.

[stessier]

The shadiest part was putting it all in the WI thread.

[LordMortis]

[El Guapo]

Apparently there are now two lawsuits seeking to void the law, arguing that the passage violated the state's Open Meetings law. It may also be possible to overturn the law via "voter initiated" referendum, which requires 258,000 signatures.

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/2012 ... CFRONTPAGE" target="_blank

[Remus West]

Apparently there are now two lawsuits seeking to void the law, arguing that the passage violated the state's Open Meetings law. It may also be possible to overturn the law via "voter initiated" referendum, which requires 258,000 signatures.

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/2012 ... CFRONTPAGE" target="_blank

My understanding is that by including the $1 million tag to them the voter referendum option was removed. I'd like to know how legal the law is that makes it illegal for the voters to nix anything though.

Democrats in both chambers were outraged a $1 million appropriation was attached to each of the bills to fund implementation. Opponents charged the appropriations were included to make the bills "referendum-proof," which Republicans deny.

Democrats questioned whether it would cost $1 million to implement the law, which GOP lawmakers didn't answer.

Whether or not they were attached for that purpose I want to know how any part of a law can make it unchallengable by the voters.

[El Guapo]

Apparently there is a difference between a "referendum" and a "voter initiated law":

Democratic Rep. Tim Greimel of Auburn Hills, the minority leader-elect of the House, said that citizens could still overturn the measure, not by referendum, but by passing a voter-initiated law, which would require collecting more than 258,000 valid signatures to get on the ballot.

From The Detroit News: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/2012 ... z2ErIM6hHn" target="_blank

Sounds like the legislature cannot put a repeal referendum on the ballot, but a voter process could put one on the ballot.

[Remus West]

Yeah, I need to look into and find out what the difference is. Seems like a law against the voters repealing a decision/bill would have to be unconstitutional but I admit to being ignorant where law is concerned. I simply think the voters should always hold the ultimate veto on any decision in a much more direct manner than who we put in office.

[PLW]

§ 9 Initiative and referendum; limitations; appropriations; petitions.
Sec. 9. The people reserve to themselves the power to propose laws and
to enact and reject laws, called the initiative, and the power to approve
or reject laws enacted by the legislature, called the referendum. The
power of initiative extends only to laws which the legislature may enact
under this constitution. The power of referendum does not extend to acts
making appropriations for state institutions or to meet deficiencies in state
funds and must be invoked in the manner prescribed by law within 90
days following the final adjournment of the legislative session at which the
law was enacted. To invoke the initiative or referendum, petitions signed
by a number of registered electors, not less than eight percent for initiative
and five percent for referendum of the total vote cast for all candidates
for governor at the last preceding general election at which a governor
was elected shall be required.

[Rip]

Unions are just organized leeches. I hope every state passes RTW laws.

[Jolor]

Hearing that this is now tied to Egypt's new constitution, Quebec's new language laws and Ontario's "Put the Children First" Bill.

Is it just me or is alienation of the voting populace an active strategy?

[Remus West]

Unions are just organized leeches. I hope every state passes RTW laws.

I hope that at some point you manage to educate yourself.