So would you support the proposition that Barack Obama wasn’t actually worth supporting, but his fundraising and spending advantage over McCain just fooled people into voting for him?
A lot of studies have actually shown that political spending has extreme diminishing returns past a certain point, and the “money wins elections” argument is true on some levels but it’s not nearly that simple. (Obviously you can’t win with no money, but more money is no guarantee of victory.)
Seems to me you’re just unhappy that citizens of a State who had already legitimately elected this guy decided they believe in a four year term for Governor. You know some 9% of the people who voted today said they were opposed to recall elections as a concept, so that’s 9% of the voters who you can assume voted against the recall. That’s a pretty big ideological hurdle, on a “process issue” nonetheless, that Barrett had to overcome. I don’t really think that you’re making a very convincing argument that Walker hoodwinked Wisconsin by throwing a bunch of money at its people.
Obama making more by small donations is a good thing. I don’t think anyone begrudges donations by small donors.
However, a few billionaires can donate unlimited money now, canceling millions of smaller donors.
Remember, a large company doesn’t want laws that make your life better. They want laws that allow them to operate cheaply and without regulation. A corporation doesn’t care about your air quality. It cares how much it costs to scrub it clean. If large corporations have no regulations, you can set Lake Erie on fire.
As for the 9% who are against recalls in general, I have my doubts they’d say that if it were to recall a politico they liked.
I have no doubt there are diminishing returns. But it will sway some marginal elections. Which is why I’m against unlimited money.
This was the sort of strawman that dominated all this stuff when Walker first took the unions to task. Walker wasn’t going after unions representing employees of corporations. He instead was saying “we will not allow collective bargaining for these public sector unions.” Do you know what kind of fucking category that puts him in? The same category as Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jimmy Carter, and previous Presidents of the AFL-CIO–all have something in common: they didn’t think public sector employees should have the right to collective bargaining and striking.
When unions strike against companies they’re holding their employer “hostage” so to speak to try and get a better working condition or a better wage. When unions strike against the government, when the union represents public sector employees, they hold all of society hostage. People who need social services workers, kids who need teachers, people who need their tax refund checks cut and etc. These people took jobs in public service. They didn’t take a job working for a big corporation.
Public service isn’t the same as working for a corporation. For one, in virtually every State in which I’m personally aware (even ones like West Virginia for example, which has been like Wisconsin for years in which its public employee union had no collective bargaining or strike rights) these employees, after a probationary period, are protected by strict rules and regulations. If you want to fire these employees you have to go through serious hoops–this is even in states without public sector unions. That’s because we recognize in exchange for public service, we need to give them something to make up for the wage disparity with the private sector.
How many people in the private sector would like to not be “at will”? Because most public sector employees are not at will, and they can litigate based on civil service rules in their state. How many people in the private sector would like a guaranteed pension benefit? Often available at age 55 with 20 years of service? How many people in the private sector would like 18 sick days, 12-15 holidays, and 24 vacation days a year? How many people in the private sector would like their employer to continue to provide them healthcare from age 55-65, when they’ve taken early retirement but before they are eligible for Medicare? Public sector employees deserve some level of fair compensation, I’ll never deny that. But we do give them quite a lot because we recognize the sacrifices they’ve made as public servants. When you work at a Ford plant, if you want to strike more power to you. But when you work for the people as a whole, you should have no such right. Society cannot and should not ever be held hostage by a small group of special interests only concerned about their own benefit. The whole point of going into public service is to serve the public good.
In states that do not have “Right to Work,” laws, if you get a job in a unionized company with a union security agreement, your consent is not needed; your dues are legally automatically deducted from your paycheck. And while you can opt out of full dues, you cannot avoid paying the union basic representational fees.
And if you care about Lake Erie being flammable, you can vote for a candidate who will strengthen the EPA. The evil television ads are not going to float into the voting booth, grab your hand, and force it to pull the wrong lever.
As I said in the other thread on spending in GD, which you have not deigned to reply to, you are attempting to make the issue seem more threatening by arguing against this “corporations can buy themselves laws” boogeyman, which is simply unrelated to reality. Fundamentally, your real issue is “corporations can spend money to convince people of the validity of political positions I disagree with.”
Here’s another reprehensible bit about the public sector unions in Wisconsin. Before Walker, you had to give membership dues to the union, the dues were collected by the state and given to the union. In theory, the union was not supposed to use that money to participate in political campaigns–everyone knows that theory failed in practice.
So in essence, regardless of your political affiliation if you wanted to serve the people of Wisconsin you had no choice but to make a contribution to a political organization.
How many of you would be okay with employers forcing all their employees to make payroll contributions to the local Chamber of Commerce? Government work isn’t the same as other work. I’m opposed to “closed shops” in general, but if an employer and a union come to such an agreement more power to them. But such agreements must not be allowed in public service, because it is a disservice to the public. As citizens we want the fully body of the public to be interested and willing to take public service jobs, even the ones who might ideologically have problems with being forced to financially support a union.
Jokes aside, this is what the people of Wisconsin want. Should be interesting to see what we look like as a country w/ a Romney White house, where jobs are plentifull, unions are non-existent, wages are slightly better than dirt, and we’re at war with Iran. We can look back and say “THAT was the turning point!”
The Economist says you are wrong. I’ll try and find the citation. Sorry but Walker won because the voters agreed with him and his stance on the unions. Frankly it looks
Iike you are grasping at straws.