or just another unpredictable spring day?
The Chicago Tribune reports that the Wisconsin Democrats did not get faked out in the first four election in Wisconsin. All six Democrats prevailed in primary races on Tuesday against candidates put on the ballot by the Republican Party. Those fake Democrats ran in order to delay the general election for the incumbents until Aug. 9. MORE
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This is a resounding win for the people, for the 80% majority, for those who earn less than $100,000 a year. It should be a loud and clear message to the leaders of the Democratic Party and the Obama/Clinton Administration. Although they are not likely to pay much attention to that message, that won’t stop them from piggy-backing on this victory as if they led the charge.
I hope that the progressive Democrats don’t lose sight of what happened in Wisconsin during the protests earlier this year. The protests against the Republican assault on the working people of Wisconsin got ZERO support from the White House and the leadership of the Democratic Party in the early stages of this citizen uprising.
I hope that the progressive Democrats remember that Barack Obama never even sent a representative to these protests. Instead, he stood back as he usually does like butter won’t melt in his mouth saying nothing to support the majority. Then near the end of it all when it was obvious that the people were going to win and would have their recall election, the White House sponsored an online conference with Biden and Hilda Solis, the Secretary labor. He also spoke in favor of workers at a February 28 bipartisan conference of Governors. [But let's remember that was February 28, the same day that 100,000 protesters against Scott Walker jammed the capitol of Wisconsin.]
Although the White House and the leadership of the Democratic Party will benefit from this win, we need to remember that they had NOTHING to do with it. It was the people and the Unions who forged this victory.
I read elsewhere that money is pouring into Wisconsin from the Unions and progressive organizations. For example, Democracy for America, a Vermont progressive organization, has announced that it will pour in an unprecedented $1.5 million into these recall races, which normally have cumulative budgets of a few hundred thousand. According to the MacIver Institute, the AFL-CIO has sent over $3.8 million to the “We Are Wisconsin” Super-Pac since May, including over $750,000 since the start of July. In the last two months, the public sector union collective AFSCME has sent over $1.8 million in the last two months, including $800,000 on July 7 alone.
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Remembering the history of President Obama’s support of workers correctly: Political expediency is not to be confused with standing up for the majority.
Back on February 18, four days into the demonstrations which had begun on February 14, Obama gave an interview to a Milwaukee television station. The first question was about his reaction to Walker’s actions in pushing through legislation to eliminate collective bargaining rights for most public employees.
“Everybody’s got to make some adjustments to new fiscal realities,” he began, endorsing the basic falsification employed by Democratic and Republican politicians alike to justify cuts in public employee wages and benefits.”
If this is “support” for workers, Obama needs to move over as he is standing in our light. The leadership of the Democratic Party and Obama did not get on the bandwagon of the recall efforts until it became apparent that the bus was leaving without them.
As the demonstrations progressed and it became more than apparent that the people of Wisconsin were mad as hell and were doing something about it, Obama’s remarks began to change in tone. For example, despite an order from Governor Scott Walker for protesters to leave the capital building no later than 4 p.m. on February 27, police refused to forcibly remove protesters and the demonstration entered its fifteenth day on the 28th of February. The size of the demonstration doubled within a week (From Feb 19 to Feb. 26) from 50,000 to 100,000. On Saturday, February 26th, over 100,000 protesters rallied against the bill in Madison, which was the largest state rally since the Vietnam War.
Two days after 100,000 people demonstrated, the Milwaukee Area Labor Council posted a blog titled: “Obama has hardly been silent about Wisconsin Protests”
The article says that it is false to say that Obama has been silent. However, according to my opinion, if you look at the timeline of Obama’s comments, you will see that they became strongly pro only after it became apparent that there was a huge and unexpected groundswell for the people. The article mentions as “proof” Obama’s comments at the bipartisan gathering of the nation’s governors in D.C. the last weekend in February which were pro-union. Well duh–he made those comments on the same day Feb 28 that 100,000 citizens were marching against the Governor of Wisconsin.
