Democracy Is Nothing More Than Mob Rule

"Democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where 51% of the people may take away the rights of the other 49%." - Thomas Jefferson

A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship. - Justice Litle, Is America’s Economic Recovery on the Whole Based on a Rotten Sham?, Daily Markets, April 20, 2010

Split Over Union Law Reaches Wisconsin Court Race

April 6, 2011

AP – Wisconsin's fight over union rights came to a head at the polls as voters split almost evenly over whether to re-elect a conservative-leaning justice or give his little-known opponent his seat on the state Supreme Court.

The race between Justice David Prosser and challenger JoAnne Kloppenburg was too close to call early Wednesday morning. With 99 percent of precincts reporting, Prosser led Kloppenburg by fewer than 600 votes. Final, official results could vary and a recount appeared likely.

The race reflected the divide in the state over Republican Gov. Scott Walker's collective bargaining law, which would strip public workers of nearly all their union rights. The issue, which could ultimately be decided by the state Supreme Court, propelled the relatively unknown Kloppenburg into prominence and heightened voter interest in the election.

Kloppenburg, an assistant state attorney general, began her campaign with almost no name recognition and faced long odds against Prosser. The 12-year Supreme Court veteran emerged from a nonpartisan February primary with 55 percent of the vote, while Kloppenburg finished second out of four candidates with just 28 percent.

But opponents of the collective bargaining law redefined the Supreme Court race as a referendum on Walker and all Republicans, working to leverage the anger over the measure against Prosser, a former GOP legislator. They branded him a Walker clone and held Prosser up as the best hope for stopping the measure.

Prosser's campaign didn't immediately return a message early Wednesday. However, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported that he told supporters at his election-night party that there was "little doubt" there would be a recount.

Kloppenburg told supporters she hadn't given up.

"We're still hopeful," Kloppenburg said. "So thank you all and let's all get a good night's sleep and see what tomorrow brings."

Walker has insisted the new law is necessary to help balance the state's budget, but Democrats see it as a direct assault on unions, a key campaign supporter for the party.

Tens of thousands of people spent weeks protesting the measure at Wisconsin's Capitol and Democrats in the Senate even fled the state to try to block a vote in that chamber. Walker eventually signed the bill anyway, but the measure is on hold as legal challenges wend their way through the courts. Sixteen state senators — eight Republicans and eight Democrats — face recall efforts over the proposal.

The measure's opponents ultimately hope a Kloppenburg upset would tilt the Supreme Court's ideological balance to the left and set the stage for the court to strike the law down. A legal challenge already is before the court, although the justices have not decided whether to consider it. They also want to show the Republican senators facing recalls that they're next to go.

Prosser pushed back, disavowing his GOP connections. Prosser accused pro-labor groups of hijacking the race and argued Kloppenburg was so closely tied to them she couldn't ethically rule on the law.

Interest in what would have been an otherwise sleepy race skyrocketed.

According to the Brennan Center for Justice, a New York University program that tracks spending on judicial races, outside groups, including the Tea Party Express and national labor organizations, had poured a record $3.5 million into race through Monday.

Statewide voter turnout in Tuesday's election was 33 percent, shattering state election officials' pre-election predictions of 20 percent. April elections in past years have seen turnouts ranging from 18 percent to 21 percent.

Deborah MacFarland, 67, and her husband, Robert, 69, of Bayside, said the issue helped persuade them to vote for Kloppenburg.

"I can't stand Walker. I can't stand conservative Republicans. ... I have had enough of it," Deborah MacFarland said.

But Kelly Bodoh, 37, a self-described Libertarian from Sun Prairie, picked Prosser, saying she was upset that Democratic senators fled the state.

"The way the past couple of months have gone down in Madison made me very distrustful of that faction," she said. "Emotions and disrespect ruled the response to the ... bill."

Walker has said he wouldn't interpret the election results as either an endorsement or indictment of his policies.

Wisconsin law does not provide for automatic recounts. Instead, candidates have three days after official results are tallied to request one. They must provide a specific reason for such an effort to state election officials, such as a mistake in counting or some other irregularity.

Wisconsin: How Prosser Supporters May Have Stopped Statewide Fraud With the Brookfield Vote

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Editor's Note: According to a 2009 report from the Congressional Research Service, 24 states have laws giving all public-sector workers the right to bargain collectively; nine states either do not have such laws or have laws that expressly forbid contracts between a public employer and a labor union.

New data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) show that a majority of American union members now work for the government. The pattern of unions adding members in government while losing members in the private sector accelerated during the recession. Representing government employees has changed the union movement's priorities: Unions now campaign for higher taxes on Americans to fund more government spending. Congress should resist government employee unions' self-interested calls to raise taxes on workers in the private sector.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, last year 36.2 percent of public-sector workers were union members, compared to 6.9 percent of private-sector workers. Union membership was highest among local government workers, at 42 percent, with 31 percent of state employees unionized, and 26.8 of federal workers. In 2010, median earnings of government workers who were union members were 25 percent higher than earnings of private workers.

One must try really hard to ignore the distinctions between public and private unions. It is those disparities that produce disproportionately rich salaries and benefits for public-sector employees and that burden state budgets. You would think that more politicians and pundits on the left, who have so many creative ideas for spending the taxpayers' money, would recognize that it's their agenda as well as the country's political health that is imperiled by the public employee union racket. - Jennifer Rubin , Public employee unions vs. the rest of us, Washington Post Voices, February 22, 2011

The collective bargaining laws have given enormous political power to the public sector unions. No matter what the real intent of these laws, by any objective standard they are not in the public interest. They represent an expression of the selfish self-interest of public sector union organizers and, indirectly, the interest of the politicians who enact them in order to curry favor with the union's political operatives. The existence of public sector collective bargaining makes public employees "super citizens" and relegates the rest of the public to second class status.

Public-sector unions have amassed great power to extract taxpayer dollars from politicians. Politicians reward government workers with our dollars, and they in turn are rewarded at election time by donations, free labor (phone banks, people who pass out flyers), and votes.

The public sector likes to point out that government workers have jobs that demand more education, which is not accounted for by raw averages. Public sector workers see themselves as superior to private sector workers and, therefore, deserving and entitled to compensation above that of the average taxpayer; they like to claim that state and local public sector workers are actually paid less than their private sector counterparts, once their qualifications are taken into account.

If you have ever worked for government, as I have, you would know that many positions do not require higher education. I suspect that job requirements may have been redefined in recent years to raise education levels since many more people, looking for the American dream, are competing for those lucrative public sector jobs, knowing that public sector employment is the last great source of middle class. I think it is shameful for the public sector to demand more and more from the taxpayers -- this sense of entitlement stems from their belief that they, being 'highly educated' and more skillful, are greater contributors to society than the average American and, therefore, are deserving of a standard of living greater than that of the 85% of Americans who work in the private sector [taking into account the government's hidden workforce, this number may be closer to 50-60%].

Public Sector Unions: Republicans Told You So

February 22, 2011

GoLocalProv - ...Currently posted on the left-wing blog RIFuture.org is a video that calls for people to attend a pro-labor rally today at the Statehouse in order “to support the fight against these anti-democratic, anti-worker attacks…We won’t allow the rich to wage class war against us.”

With millions of Americans consistently on the cusp of waking up to the horrors that public unions cause, Democrats have always had to retain their power not by legitimate debate, but rather by fueling class warfare and by posing as champions of the poor – and by hosting rallies that exhibit all of their phony outrage.

The Left’s strategy is wearing thin. Criticism of union politics is escalating, and a recent Clarus Group poll found that 64 percent of Americans now believe public sector workers should be denied the right to organize. Look for the Left’s desperate activism to reach extreme levels in the coming weeks...

Do Americans Back Employees in Public Sector Unions? It Depends on Who Is Conducting the Poll

March 1, 2011

Dregs of the Future - A majority of Americans say they oppose efforts to weaken the collective bargaining rights of public employee unions and are also against cutting the pay or benefits of public workers to reduce state budget deficits, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll [Editor's Note: Both owned and controlled by the financial oligarchs].

• Americans oppose weakening the bargaining rights of public employee unions by a margin of nearly two to one: 60 percent to 33 percent.
• Americans oppose, 56 percent to 37 percent, cutting the pay or benefits of public employees.
• Americans, 61 percent of those polled — including just over half of Republicans — say the salaries and benefits of most public employees were either “about right” or “too low” for the work they do.

The nationwide telephone poll was conducted Feb. 24-27, 2011, with 984 adults and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points for all adults. Of those surveyed, 20 percent said there was a union member in their household, and 25 percent said there was a public employee in their household. (Source)

Also this: 81% of Americans Support raising taxes on Millionaires to deal with the deficit. 68% support repealing the Bush Tax cuts. 74% support cutting Oil/Tax Breaks. AND 77% support public Union Bargaining…

Why Is the Public Suddenly Down on Unions?

The Bad Economy’s to Blame—Support Should Recover When the Economy Does

July 20, 2010

Center for American Progress Action Fund - Americans have expressed generally positive attitudes toward unions for as long as pollsters have been asking, and for decades public approval of labor unions has hovered around 60 percent. But starting in 2009 public opinion toward labor unions dropped precipitously. Why?

Last summer less than half of Americans said they approved of labor unions. This is the first time this happened in the over 70 years the Gallup survey research group has asked. Just one year earlier nearly 60 percent of respondents approved of labor unions. Similarly, a 2010 Pew Center for the People and the Press survey found union favorability was at just 41 percent, while in 2007—the last time they asked the question—favorability was 58 percent. The Pew survey also found that the decline in support was widespread, falling for virtually every demographic and political group.

What happened? And what does this mean for the U.S. labor movement’s future given that membership is already at 30-year lows?

The answer is largely that the public is angry about the weak economy and is blaming major economic institutions such as business, government, and organized labor. As a result, support for unions should improve when the economy gets back on track. Moreover, despite the drop in overall approval the public continues to value many of the functions unions perform—such as helping workers.

Still, labor unions may have suffered a more lasting blow. It’s hard to know the longer-term effect of the government’s bailout of GM and Chrysler, but the bailout was deeply unpopular and may have sullied unions’ reputations. Likewise, the conservative campaign to criticize unionized public sector workers’ compensation and work ethic—although very unlikely a major source of the decline—may have some effect on the public’s opinion of unions in the future, though data limitations make it hard to know this for certain.

In short, public support for labor unions should recover when the economy improves. But unions may need to take some different actions and work on their public image to bring their approval ratings back up to pre-recession levels.

This brief will examine these issues in more detail by surveying opinion polls on unions taken over the last several decades...

Only 7% Think Government Employees Work Harder Than Those in Private Sector

According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis for 2008 (an organization within the Department of Commerce), the average federal employee made $79,197, excluding benefits; when benefits were added in, the average federal employee's total compensation was $119,982. The average private sector employee made $49,935; when benefits were added in, the average private employee's total compensation was $59,909. Stated differently, the benefit cost for the average federal employee back in 2008 was $40,785; the average benefit cost for private sector employees for the same year was $9,974. [Ralph Smith, Federal Pay Gap With Private Sector Growing, FedSmith, August 25, 2009]

March 31, 2011

Rasmussen Reports - Adults nationwide continue to believe government workers have it easier than those in the private sector.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of American Adults shows that 70% believe workers in the private sector work harder than government workers. Just seven percent (7%) believe government employees work harder, but 23% more are undecided. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

Those numbers have changed little in surveys dating back to December 2009.

Even 44% of government workers say private sector employees work harder than they do, and another 39% are not sure. Most employees of private companies (80%) say those in the private sector work harder.

Fifty-six percent (56%) of all Americans believe the average government worker earns more annually than the average private sector worker. That’s down slightly from past surveys: 61% felt that way a year ago. Twenty-two percent (22%) now disagree with this assessment, while the same number (22%) are undecided.

Two-thirds (66%) of those who work for private companies think government workers on average make more than they do. Thirty-three percent (33%) of government employees agree.

The survey of 1,000 Adults was conducted on March 25-26, 2011 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

The federal government in fiscal year 2009 had 4.43 million employees, including nearly 1.6 million men and women in the armed services. USA Today reports that the average federal worker’s pay and benefits totalled $123,049 in 2009, not including military personnel, while on average private workers made $61,051 in total compensation.

Despite high-profile budget-cutting moves in several states that involve government employees, most Americans (67%) still think those who work for the government have more job security than those in the private sector. Only nine percent (9%) say government workers have less job security. Eighteen percent (18%) say workers in both sectors have about the same level of job security.

Those findings have changed little in recent months, but the number who thinks government workers have more job security is down from 77% in April 2010.

Fifty-eight percent (58%) of government workers say they have more job security than private sector workers, a view shared by 72% of those who work for private companies.

Investors are more likely than non-investors to believe government workers have more job security. More investors also think private sector employees work harder.

Seventy-one percent (71%) of Likely U.S. Voters believe those who work for the government get better retirement benefits than those who work for private companies. Most voters also think it’s unlikely their state can afford the benefits given to state workers.

Thirty-six percent (36%) of voters nationwide think that the average public employee in their state earns more than the average private sector worker. Twenty-one percent (21%) say the government employee earns less, while 20% think their pay is about the same. Twenty-three percent (23%) are not sure.

Roughly one-in-four Americans now think the government should assume responsibility for those who have been unemployed for an extended period of time.

The Rasmussen Employment Index, which measures workers’ perceptions of the labor market each month, plummeted nine points in March to its lowest level since last August.

Despite concern about the federal budget deficit, just 26% of American Adults think it would be good for the economy if the federal government laid off 100,000 workers. Forty-nine percent (49%) say a layoff like that would be bad for the economy.