Beginning of the Fascist Takeover

Late at night, before Independence Day weekend, the Republican-controlled Joint Finance Committee shoved various last-minute “Tea Party wish list” items into the state budget proposal with the passage of a 999 motion. The 999 motion includes undemocratic, unconstitutional policies that have got to receive public scrutiny, such as dramatically changing the powers and authority of the Milwaukee county board and county executive. The motion even repeals a 100-year-old law that states Wisconsin’s minimum wage must be a living wage.

With less than 24-hour notice, the public is again being shut out of their democracy. Republicans are trying desperately to outrun public scrutiny, having already been forced to retreat from their attempt to gut our open records laws. To escape additional public review, they have resorted to using extraordinary session rules that let them railroad the budget through the Senate. The public is catching on, so Republicans are desperate to get out of town with their grab bag of special interest goodies.

The damages done to Wisconsin’s reputation by this administration and Republican Legislature will take decades to recover from. Republicans already showed their lack of any long-term vision for Wisconsin by choosing to ignore Wisconsin’s middle class families and students in favor of special interest giveaways and unsustainable tax cuts for the wealthy. They prefer to once again divide our state into winners and losers by gutting $250 million from our UW System, while at the same time spending more on the scandal-plagued WEDC.

With the light of public scrutiny shining on them, GOP legislators are scrambling to grab what they can on their way out of Madison, it’s a wholesale dismantling of our democracy. Chris Larson       My hero……

Victory In Large Measure

Image by Sue Peacock via Flickr

 

Here we are after the great massive protests in Wisconsin.After massive recall elections costing many times normal ones in terms of money.  The State Senate is in large under control by people at odds with Scott Walker. Still is not time to rest on Laurels. This is a short list of the damage done to our Wisconsin Life. On Forward to November, let us recall Walker himself. People usually vote to balance the excesses in their government. I challenge you to make your government your personal responsiblity.

Senator Chris Larson, in his weekly newsletter, listed some of his greater concerns of the things Walker and the Republicans did in their disregard for bipartisanship:

• Cut $1.6 billion in funding for public education, while also cutting funds for higher education
• Eliminated accountability and consolidated power through administrative rules
• Spent $2.3 billion on special interests, corporate giveaways and loopholes while raising taxes and fees on working families and seniors
• Eliminated worker’s rights
• Reduced job retraining opportunities
• Added a waiting period for unemployment compensation on workers who just lost their job
• Killed wind energy jobs across the state
• Locked out the public from the Capitol
• Landed the state government in court over open meetings violations
• Undermined local control by passing extreme legislation related to wetlands, redistricting, highways and sick-leave
• Rejected federal grants to support transportation and health care that then went to other states
• Defunded women’s health care programs
• Removed consumer protection by changing our victim protection laws

Related articles

• Scott Walker Reacts To Wisconsin Recall Election Results (VIDEO) (huffingtonpost.com)
• The Progressive Magazine: Scott Walker, Fitzgerald, Take Us for Fools (kaystreet.wordpress.com)
• Jim Worth: A Grass Root’s Win in Wisconsin (huffingtonpost.com)
• Recalling Scott Walker (hotair.com)
• Scott Walker Concedes Mistakes, Defends Policies (huffingtonpost.com)

Letter From MoveOn

Image by BlueRobot via Flickr

The struggle in Wisconsin is still ongoing, but MoveOn members like you have already played a pivotal role in fighting back against Governor Scott Walker‘s radical attack on workers’ rights.

Walker expected his budget bill to sail through, but instead, it’s sparked a national backlash and energized millions of people. And that’s thanks, in part, to you.

Since the fight began:

• Thousands of Wisconsin MoveOn members attended the massive demonstrations in Madison, made calls to their state legislators, and sent almost 10,000 messages to Governor Walker, which protesters plastered all over the walls outside Walker’s office when he refused to accept them.
• MoveOn members contributed more than $100,000 to the Wisconsin 14, the brave Democratic state senators who left the state to prevent Republicans from jamming through Walker’s proposal—providing them a huge boost to fight back against Republican attacks.
• MoveOn members sent more than 260,000 statements of support to the Wisconsin 14. We delivered the statements—all 5,700 pages of them—to State Senator Chris Larson. He was thrilled to share them with his colleagues and posted on Facebook: “Thank you for standing with us! (And yes, people actually do get paper copies of those forms you fill out online. Thank you MoveOn.org).”
• MoveOn members nationwide contributed more than $445,000 to support the efforts to recall the Republican state senators who refuse to negotiate. The folks running the recall report they’re off to an amazing start, beating their signature goal in the first weekend by 35%, and they’re hugely grateful for the early fundraising.
• MoveOn members held solidarity rallies in every state capital—our biggest in years, and on just four days’ notice—to say that we are all Wisconsin and we won’t stand by while Republicans try to kill the American Dream.

It’s an amazing and inspiring list. And this fight is far from over. Even if Governor Walker manages to push through his disastrous proposal, the recall efforts targeting Republicans are already off to an amazing start and several of those who support Walker could be thrown out of office as soon as June.

With similar fights happening across the country and in Washington, we’ve got a long way to go before we put the American Dream back in reach for all Americans. But Wisconsin has sparked a national uprising and given us the strength to fight back.

For the moment though, we just wanted to take the time to say thanks, for all you do.

–Daniel, Joan, Kat, Lenore, and the rest of the team

P.S. With Republicans in Washington pushing devastating federal budget cuts—to education, student loans, NPR, environmental protection, family planning, health and nutrition programs for pregnant women and small children, and more—we’re looking to highlight the stories of those who’d be affected by the cuts. If any of the Republican budget cuts would affect you or your family, please click here to share your story:

http://pol.moveon.org/budgetcutstories/?id=26435-18839031-J4qMzmx&t=6

Related Articles

• Recall elections in Wisconsin … (ynative77.wordpress.com)
• Wisconsin public union fight brings threats of layoffs, recalls – Christian Science Monitor (news.google.com)
• Wisconsin Solidarity Rallies Today in All 50 States (news.change.org)
• MoveOn (maxredline.typepad.com)