# Wisconsin GOP passes union-stripping bill **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 10, 2011, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111 "2011-03-10T00:56:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2011, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/261 "2011-03-10T23:23:03Z")
> [@furt](#): > > Far-off lands report seeing the goalposts wandering ever onward, heedless of what lay behind, brave travellers into the mist. So you got nothing? I didn’t expect you would. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2011, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/262 "2011-03-10T23:34:59Z")
> [@Duke](#): > > I don’t think someone who spends hours a day on a message board is doing a good job. Just me, though. And I think most employers would agree with me. You don’t work hard, you’re lucky to work in an office that looks the other way, frankly. Seeing the likes of you trumpet the values of “hard work” is base hypocrisy. Sorry, but you don’t strike me as someone I’d take business advice from. You’re an idiot. I work from 7 in the morning to 8:30 at night, usually. As a salaried employee, I earn no overtime. My employer gets more than eight hours per day from me, constantly. You know nothing and wouldn’t recognize hard work if it bit you. A useless and mediocre person, clamoring for the government to save you from your laziness and stupidity. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2011, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/263 "2011-03-10T23:41:57Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Of course, you are almost certainly a beneficiary of liberal gringo helping hands. If left to the likes of the Tea Party I am willing to bet your dad would have never made it to the US (at least not legally) and you would not have been allowed to attend schools and by extension a university to become a successful lawyer. > > You’d be lucky to be a migrant farm hand at this point. > > By supporting the right you are pulling the ladder up behind you. Future people will not have the chance to achieve what your dad and his family did because the republicans will prevent it if they can. Bullshit. Oh, yeah, the Tea Party is racist, huh? Funny, because I, with my background, have never felt any hint of that from any of the Tea Party folks I know. Why is that? They made a special exception for me, did they? On account of my winning smile? I absolutely deny and reject your claim. The Tea Party folks favor hard work and self-accountability. “Allowed to attend schools?” Don’t be a fool. There’s no Tea Party platform that would have changed any aspect of my attending schools. That’s utter bullshit from an utter bullshitter. ---
**Author:** ![Omegaman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/e480ec/32.png) [@Omegaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omegaman)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2011, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/264 "2011-03-10T23:45:49Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > While I’m mostly on your side in the ideological debate here, you should be informed that **Bricker** isn’t white. He’s Hispanic. Get the fuck outta here! You learn something new every day! Not that it makes any difference mind you. He’s all kinds of anal retentive for any race. Watching him debate is like watching a pot come to boil. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2011, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/265 "2011-03-10T23:49:38Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I absolutely deny and reject your claim. The Tea Party folks favor hard work and self-accountability. Nope, as their usual position on the causes of global warming does show. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2011, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/266 "2011-03-10T23:55:06Z")
> [@suranyi](#): > > But also, every time there has been a layoff I happened to be working on one of the few projects that were deemed “company critical” right at that moment, so my entire team would be spared, for the most part. Now that I do consider pure luck. Other people at the company that were just as smart and just as productive as me were let go because the whole project they were working on was cancelled. Yes, that’s luck. But suppose you had been laid off? Are you saying that no one outside your company knew of your value as a worker? You did nothing to toss out lifelines, network associates? That’s what I mean by making your own luck. Every year, give or take, I polish up my resume and start looking for work. I go on interviews until I get an offer. Maybe one day I’ll take that offer, but so far, my employer has always at least matched what I’ve been offered and I like it here, so I stay. But I know, to a reasonable certainty, how long it would take me to find new work if my job vanished. I keep up with colleagues that have moved on to other jobs, so that I have ready contacts if something happened. I have six months’ worth of salary in cash in savings so there’s no need to panic and take something out of desperation. See? That’s making my own luck. Sure, I could get laid off next month. And when I got a new job because I cultivated a contact, there are people who would shake their heads and marvel at how lucky I was, apparently never making the connection between preparation and the “luck” that follows it. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/267 "2011-03-11T00:00:34Z")
[http://climatecrocks.com/2011/02/28/wisconsin-koch-brothers-power-plants-and-the-politics-of-climate-denial/](http://climatecrocks.com/2011/02/28/wisconsin-koch-brothers-power-plants-and-the-politics-of-climate-denial/) > [@](#): > > NBC Nightly news was one of many outlets that has picked up on a little noticed part of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s program, that might benefit the billionaire Koch brothers, key funders of the anti science movement. > > The Wisconsin State Journal explains: > > > [@](#): > > > > Assembly Democrats tried but failed Wednesday to prevent Gov. Scott Walker from selling state-owned power plants without bids amid growing concerns by Democrats that the owners of a multi-billion dollar oil-and-gas company are driving the governor’s legislative agenda. > > > > ``` > > That suspicion grew Wednesday after Walker was secretly recorded revealing his strategy for pushing through his anti-union budget repair bill during a 20-minute phone conversation with a blogger who purported to be David Koch, executive vice president of the Wichita, Kan.-based Koch Industries. > > > > The defeated amendment, which would have required that the sale be approved by the Public Service Commission, is among dozens likely to be shot down by the Assembly’s Republican majority. > > > > The $43 billion Koch Industries, which Koch owns with his brother, Charles, includes numerous energy-related enterprises, including a natural gas pipeline, refineries and a company that supplies coal to Wisconsin power plants. > > > > ``` Self-Accountability? Tea partiers laugh in the face of people like Bricker and they do not notice. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/268 "2011-03-11T00:03:31Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > …See? That’s making my own luck. Sure, I could get laid off next month. And when I got a new job because I cultivated a contact, there are people who would shake their heads and marvel at how lucky I was, apparently never making the connection between preparation and the “luck” that follows it. And I would be the first to sing your praises if the spot were not already taken. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/269 "2011-03-11T00:04:22Z")
> [@Omegaman](#): > > Get the fuck outta here! > > You learn something new every day! > > Not that it makes any difference mind you. He’s all kinds of anal retentive for any race. Watching him debate is like watching a pot come to boil. Huh, guys, a Hispanic \*\*could \*\*be a white person. ---
**Author:** ![Jenaroph](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e8c25b/32.png) [@Jenaroph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jenaroph)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/270 "2011-03-11T00:06:39Z")
> [@AlienVessels](#): > > Yes and you were lucky. There are a ton of people that worked just as hard as you that just managed to treat water. > > It’ the same old “I won because I kicked ass, they lost because they were lazy” argument. Because of course, if it weren’t that way and hard work didn’t guarantee your advancement… > [@Bricker](#): > > You know what that reminds me of? > > A had a friend in college who I helped move one day. As I was loading her trunk, I noticed her spare tire was flat. “Hey,” I said, “Did you know your spare tire is flat?” > > “Yeah, I know,” she said. “I’ll have to fix that one of these days.” > > A year later, she had a job interview for an on-campus position. I did too. There were filling three slots for a pretty menial job. I think there were about forty applicants. > > I got the job. She didn’t – in fact, she missed the interview. Why? She got a flat tire. Someone immediately stopped to help her (she was pretty cute, as it happens, and though I wasn’t there I suspect she had to wait about thirteen seconds for that assistance. He volunteered to change her tire, but… the spare was flat. > > “Man, I have the worst luck!” she told me. And if she had been rear-ended by a drunk on the way to the interview instead of getting a flat? (in other words, something entirely not her fault?) Well, you simply would have used something else as an example here, correct? It’s easy and not incorrect to lay blame when someone’s failure is clearly due to something they did. It’s less convenient when the cause is something outside their control. The second-guessing of their life choices and determining where they went wrong becomes a finer and finer art, to a point where in some cases you have to concede that they were left in a no-win situation. As the illustrious Captain Picard once said, “You can commit no mistake and still lose. That is not a weakness. That is life.” ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/271 "2011-03-11T00:23:44Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > See? That’s making my own luck. Sure, I could get laid off next month. And when I got a new job because I cultivated a contact, there are people who would shake their heads and marvel at how lucky I was, apparently never making the connection between preparation and the “luck” that follows it. I could say that I have managed to make progress also even in a retrograde place like Arizona, but recently the conservatively controlled department of education has come with new rules to target teachers that have an accent. It doesn’t matter how prepared I get or if 90 percent of students have no problems with my voice, it only takes one student with a beef against you to make a complaint. So, besides being reassigned back to IT duties I continue to increase my luck by learming more about internet programming and servers, connections will be there for me, but should I just let the local government keep on taking away what it could had been a big opportunity for me? Notice that I’m not waiting for a hand out, I’m only saying that it stretches my credulity that you can not see that others can be affected by rules that are coming from groups that you are supporting, they may not be racist, but they are ignorant in the long run. ---
**Author:** ![AlienVessels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ba8739/32.png) [@AlienVessels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlienVessels)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/272 "2011-03-11T00:35:00Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I have six months’ worth of salary in cash in savings so there’s no need to panic and take something out of desperation. > > See? That’s making my own luck. Sure, I could get laid off next month. And when I got a new job because I cultivated a contact, there are people who would shake their heads and marvel at how lucky I was, apparently never making the connection between preparation and the “luck” that follows it. A lot of people went through 6 months of cash savings and more trying to find new jobs during this recession. Most jobs are gotten through networking. Even us liberals know that. Stop knocking down straw men of your own making. If you don’t recognize “luck” as forces outside your control, we don’t even have common ground to communicate. You’ve been looking up so long you haven’t taken a look down to see what’s happening to those who don’t have your circumstances and point of vantage. ---
**Author:** ![superslug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e56c9b/32.png) [@superslug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/superslug)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/273 "2011-03-11T00:53:18Z")
> [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#): > > I’d love to find one. > > Can you suggest one that will not throw me out on my ear if I dare to suggest that perhaps Obama may not have been born in Kenya, or that it’s just possible that Palin’s musings on geopolitics may not be the smartest stuff, or if I allude to my opinion that publicly funded healthcare is not the same as communism? > > Most right leaning boards I have seen seem to take a pretty dim view of diverse opinions. You actually are treated rather well here. > **[Flamewarriors.net - unmoderated news, politics, and worthless bullshit](https://www.flamewarriors.net/forum/)** > > Conservative, climate- denying gun nuts square off against libtard, alarmist, broom-wielding pussies. Get your ass in here! ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/274 "2011-03-11T02:06:55Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > So you got nothing? > > I didn’t expect you would. I responded to a specific question on a specific point that another poster made. I’d be happy to defend that point, should you care to address it. I doubt you will, because you know full well that the point I was refuting was an absurd one. But rather than than concede the bleedingly obvious fact that, yes, employers often do grant benefits without any union being involved, you’re trying to engage me in some sort of rambling free-form discussion, within which you will no doubt continue to evade and obfuscate. Sorry, pass. Address my point or piss off. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/275 "2011-03-11T02:07:36Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > See? That’s making my own luck. Sure, I could get laid off next month. And when I got a new job because I cultivated a contact, there are people who would shake their heads and marvel at how lucky I was, apparently never making the connection between preparation and the “luck” that follows it. I grant you, good fortune favors the prepared man. But does misfortune avoid the **Bricker** household just because you are just so darned self reliant? How have you managed to control the universe to withhold incurable illness for so long, enabling you to work those long hours? I would really like to know the that secret of your success, because it has eluded my family. What personal deficiency have I failed to address? ---
**Author:** ![TravisFromOR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cc9497/32.png) [@TravisFromOR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TravisFromOR)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/276 "2011-03-11T02:10:39Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > I grant you, good fortune favors the prepared man. But does misfortune avoid the **Bricker** household just because you are just so darned self reliant? How have you managed to control the universe to withhold incurable illness for so long, enabling you to work those long hours? I would really like to know the that secret of your success, because it has eluded my family. What personal deficiency have I failed to address? Well, I guess, in my case, it’s may fault, since I chose to pair up with someone who has an illness, but yeah, I’m interested in this as well. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/277 "2011-03-11T02:10:42Z")
> [@margin](#): > > I certainly hope that’s what happens. > > Jeez, we’re coming up on the hundredth anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire. The Repubs want to send us back to those good old days. Only 12% of US workers belong to unions, so it looks like most of us are not being locked into buildings despite lacking a union to look out for us. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/278 "2011-03-11T02:25:57Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > I grant you, good fortune favors the prepared man. But does misfortune avoid the **Bricker** household just because you are just so darned self reliant? How have you managed to control the universe to withhold incurable illness for so long, enabling you to work those long hours? I would really like to know the that secret of your success, because it has eluded my family. What personal deficiency have I failed to address? He says his _father_ came here with nothing. It doesn’t tell me what bricker started with. I suspect his father did pretty well and provided well for him. Perhaps he actually was born on third base and thinks he hit a triple. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/279 "2011-03-11T02:32:16Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > And people fall for it every fucking time. Not [every](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Revolution) time. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111/280 "2011-03-11T02:41:23Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Sorry, but you don’t strike me as someone I’d take business advice from. You’re an idiot. > > I work from 7 in the morning to 8:30 at night, usually. As a salaried employee, I earn no overtime. My employer gets more than eight hours per day from me, constantly. You know nothing and wouldn’t recognize hard work if it bit you. A useless and mediocre person, clamoring for the government to save you from your laziness and stupidity. I’m going to bet you’ve never worked hard in your entire life. I’m going to further bet that your hands are soft and your back is weak. I’m not saying I’ve dug ditches either, but I’m not the arrogant jerkoff pretending I’m better than everyone else. You are lucky. Even if you have been smarter and worked harder than everyone around you, ask yourself, how much smarter are you than the average? Top four percent? Top three percent? Is it your opinion that the bottom 97% should have no possibility of a good life? Does everyone need to be as smart as you are to succeed? I bet your father has a strong work ethic. Did he teach that to you? Is it your opinion that people with fathers who aren’t as stellar should have no chance for a good life. Either way, you are where you are due to luck. That said, you certainly don’t come off as especially smart, but I’ll grant that the delusions you’re working under just make you seem like an idiot. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111.md?page=13) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wisconsin-gop-passes-union-stripping-bill/574111.md?page=15)